She didn't need a second invitation, but swallowed the food as if she were famished. She put on the shoes and stockings I gave her, and then she told me that her father was killed on the railroad; that her mother had four little children beside herself; that they lived in a cellar in —— street, where the water often came in and covered the floor; that her mother had a dreadful bad cough; that her baby brother was very sick, and that they had nothing to eat except what they got begging.
"Why did you hunt in that old barrel?" said I.
"To find bits of coal, to burn. Sometimes the servants in the big houses don't sift it, and then we find a great many pieces to carry home and burn. Oh dear! that was such a nice barrel, that the women beat me for coming to!"
"Never mind the barrel," said I; "do you want this? and this? and this? and this?"—giving her some old dresses, "and this loaf of bread, and this bit of money for your mother?"
"Oh yes—yes. She will be so glad!" And off she skipped, down street, drawing her ragged shawl over her head.
Directly after, thinking of an errand I wished to do, I put on my bonnet and walked out.
I had passed several blocks, when I came to an alley where I heard voices. The speakers had their backs turned to me, but I could see them. It was the child who had just left me, and the woman who had beat her for meddling with the barrel of cinders.
"You did it well," said the woman. "I couldn't have made believe cry better myself. I knew she'd call you in. Did she give you all these? and these? and these?" (holding up the dresses.) "That's good. I can sell them to the second-hand clothes shop there, for money;—you may have that bit of money she gave you, to buy yourself a string of beads, because you cried so well. Which story did you tell her, hey?"
"The one you told me this morning"—said the child; "all about the cellar, and the water in it, and how father was killed on the railroad track. Didn't she give me a good breakfast, though?" And the child stretched up her arms and yawned.