“It wasn’t bad; but my goodness! maybe it isn’t hard to keep straight. If I hadn’t had sneakers on, and if it hadn’t been for the cracks between the boards, I shouldn’t wonder if I’d been at the foundry now or even out to Tamarack Hill.”
George Pogany stared at the girl. He felt weak and shaken.
“Sit down, Rosy—I’ll fetch you a chair,” he said, sighing deeply. And he glanced anxiously out into the back shop wondering if he could venture to leave her alone while he fetched it. But Rose was her quick-witted self. She felt for the glass showcase, moved the length of it until she reached the end, put her hand upon the flat counter, and giving a little spring perched thereon, facing him jauntily.
“Now we must talk business quick, Mr. Pogany, before mama gets her jam cooked and in the jars and begins looking around for me. But first I don’t want you to think that I came at this time because of the streets being empty. I came now because it was the first chance I had to slip away. I felt a little bit queer—the least little mite afraid. But I love to walk when Betty’s with me.”
“Betty would ’a come with you in a jiffy, if she’d ’a known.” Pogany said reproachfully, “or I could have stopped at the house if you wanted to see me. It ain’t safe, you know, at all, your coming off so.”
“But it was a secret and I had to see you alone,” she insisted prettily. “Now listen. You know how I am going over to the high school and be just like the others in my class except I can’t take algebra, and I am simply wild to go? But I’ll tell you what I don’t like. I hate like everything to go on the train every day. Mama will worry all the time for fear I’ll be coming home at night with both legs chopped off, and—well, you know I am sort of reckless and ’twould be just like me to be jumping off before the train stopped.”
“Rosy Harrow!” he cried in utter dismay.
“It’s true, but listen. I got papa off by himself last night and asked him why I couldn’t walk over to Paulding and back just like he and Aunt Maude used to do—Aunt Maude went to Mr. Appleton, too, the same teacher we’re going to have. And papa said, yes, I could, if Betty could go with me. And I hugged him and said he’d save the car-fare, which is ninety cents, and he said I could have it just the same. And so I never said a word to Betty but came right down here to tell you. O, Mr. Pogany, can Betty walk with me?”
“Why, of course, Rosy, if you set such store by it, Betty can go with you,” he assured her heartily, thrilled by the delight of doing something for one so afflicted, and the daughter of his lifelong friend.
“You are sure it won’t be too much for you, Rosy?” he asked anxiously.