“Don’t go away,” said she, as the cars stopped for me and my party to get out.
“Rock-a-baby—by-baby,” sang the happy little sister, still twisting the flowers.
I kissed them both. I looked into their father’s face, as I passed him on the platform. I read nothing there that made my heart happier when I thought of his little girls; but I looked up in the bright blue sky, and I read there that “not a sparrow falls to the ground without God’s knowledge,” and I knew that He who cares for the sparrows, would surely care for the motherless little sisters.
BED-TIME.
“Just half an hour; only just half an hour more, mother.”
“Not one minute, Tommy—you have been saying ‘just half an hour more,’ these two hours; I think you would keep on saying so till daybreak, if I would let you set up all night; little boys should go to bed early, that they may get up early.”
“I wish there was no such thing as bed,” muttered Tommy, as he picked up his playthings, and followed his mother up-stairs.
“I am sorry to hear you say that, my boy; bring me your night-gown, and while I am undressing you, I will tell you a little story.
“The other night I was lying in my bed awake; it was between eleven and twelve o’clock; it was a damp, chilly night, but there are always plenty of people about the New York streets, long after twelve o’clock. I lay there listening to a hand-organ beneath my window; I don’t like hand-organs much, but this was a very good one, and the tunes were sweet, mournful tunes, such as I like best to listen to. The organist played as long as he could get any pennies, and then strapping his organ across his back trudged off. Lulled by the sweet music, I was just falling asleep, when I heard a child’s scream beneath the window—then another—then another; then the words ‘Oh—don’t! oh—don’t! let me go—oh, dear—oh, dear!’ What could a little child be doing out in the street at that time of night? and who could be hurting it? I flew to the window and opened it. There was a great crowd beneath the window, for the little girl had screamed so loud that every body had run, as I did, to know what was the matter. At first I could not make out what it all meant; it seemed so strange that not one of all those people who were looking on, should take the little girl away from that great tall man, who was holding her so tight, while she still kept on screaming, ‘Oh, don’t! oh, let me go!’
“Not only did they not take hold of him, but they moved on one side to let him go off with the little girl, who was throwing herself about in his arms, as if she were wild with fear. Presently the man who had the child, passed under a bright gas-light, and as he did so I saw a star glitter upon his broad breast. A policeman! that was why nobody meddled with him then; but what naughty thing could a little girl like that have done, that she must be carried off by a policeman at twelve o’clock at night? Surely—surely—so young a child as that could not have done any thing so very bad.