The corner groceries of the poor are also their meat markets, bakeries, and dairies, and there was so much in the crowded little shop that was alluring that the child forced herself to look diligently out of the door into the alley lest she should be untrue to her training. In a brief time the shopman called, “All ready, Take-a-Stitch! Here’s your parcel.”
Glory faced about and gasped. That was such a very big parcel toward which he pointed that she felt he had made a mistake and so reminded him, “Guess that ain’t mine, that ain’t. One chop an’ a small roll ’twas. That must be Mis’ Dodd’s, ’cause she’s got nine mouths to feed, savin’ Nick’s ’at he feeds himself.”
“Not so, neighbor. It’s yourn. The hull o’ it. They’s only a loaf, a trifle stale–one them three-centers, kind of mouldy on the corners where’t can be cut off–an’ two the finest chops you ever set your little white teeth into. They’re all yourn.”
The grocer enjoyed doing this kindness as heartily as she enjoyed receiving it, although he was so thrifty that he made his own meal from equally stale bread and some unsalable dried fish. But, after a momentary rapture at the prospect of such delicious food, Glory’s too active conscience interfered, making her say, with a regret almost beyond expression, “I mustn’t, I mustn’t. Grandpa wouldn’t like it, ’cause he says ‘always pay’s you go or else don’t go,’ an’ that nickel’s all I’ve got.”
“No, ’tisn’t. Not by a reckonin’. You’ve got the nimblest pair o’ hands I know an’ I’ve got the shabbiest coat. I’m fair ashamed to wear it to market, yet I ain’t a man ’shamed of trifles. If you’ll put them hands of yourn and that coat o’ mine together, I’d be like to credit you a quarter, an’ you find the patches.”
“A quarter! A hull, endurin’ quarter of a dollar! You darlin’ old grocer-man. ’Course I will, only I–I’m nigh out o’ thread, but I’ve got a power o’ patches. I’ve picked ’em out the ash-boxes an’ washed ’em beautiful. An’ they’re hung right on our own ceiling in the cutest little bundle ever was–an’–I love you, I love you; Give me the coat, quick, right now, so’s I can run an’ patch it, an’ you see if I don’t do the best job ever!”
“Out of thread, be you? Well, here, take this fine spool o’ black linen an’ a needle to fit. A workman has to have his tools, don’t he? I couldn’t keep store if I didn’t have things to sell, could I? Now, be off with you, an’ my good word to the cap’n.”
There wasn’t a happier child in all the great city than little Take-a-Stitch as she fairly flew homeward to prepare the most delicious supper there had been in the littlest house for many a day. Down came the tiny gas stove from its shelf, out popped a small frying pan from some hidden cubby and into it went a dash of salt and the two big chops. Oh, how delightful was their odor, and how Glory’s mouth did water at thought of tasting! But that was not to be till grandpa came. She hoped that would be at once, before they cooled; for the burning of gas, their only fuel, was managed with strictest economy. It would seem a wasteful sin to light the stove again to reheat the chops, as she would have to do if the captain was not on hand soon.
Alas! they were cooked to the utmost limit of that brown crispness which the seaman liked, and poor Glory had turned faint at the delayed enjoyment of her own supper, when she felt she must turn out the blaze or ruin all. Covering the pan to keep its contents hot as long as might be, she sat down on the threshold to wait; and, presently, was asleep.
It had grown quite dark before the touch of a cold wet nose upon the palm of her hand aroused her, and there was Bo’sn, rubbing his side against her knee and uttering a dismal sort of sound that was neither bark nor howl, but a cross between both and full of painful meaning.