So Janet was settled for the night. It is true she had to sleep on the floor and put up with some scraps to eat. But things go by comparison in this world, and to poor, cold, starving Janet it seemed like living in a palace. Tired and worn out, she slept soundly, forgetting all her sorrows.
At last the sun rose in the glory of a new day, making the icicles sparkle in its light, and decking vines, bushes, and trees with a covering of diamonds. Dame Nature in all her glory of sparkling jewels smiled at the ladies of the world, wearing their paltry gems, as they drove to the slums to leave some little dolls, and wooden horses, and tin watches that wouldn’t go, for starving, ragged, weary children. Dame Nature longed to teach them if they would learn of her; for, besides her beauty, she was very wise in all things. But they thought they knew, and turned a deaf ear to all her teachings.
II
WHEN Janet opened her eyes, she rubbed them hard to collect her scattered senses. After a few minutes everything came back to her, and with a heart full of sorrow she realized her desolation. Mother, brothers, sisters, all she loved—gone! Even the drunken father did not seem so bad, now she had no one to love her. Yes, there was Roy! And then her heart seemed filled to overflowing with love and gratitude to him.
She got up and asked the apple-woman if she had any chores for her to do. The old woman gave her some apples to shine and pile, with the red side up, to tempt the customers as they passed by. After this was done, she gave her one of them, and a piece of bread.
About noon Roy came along, with three cents and a paper. Then Janet remembered the thirty cents she had been paid for her mother’s sewing; she had been too full of other things to think of it before. Roy invested them in matches and pins, and started her out to sell them on the street. He thought they would be doing well if, between them, they could make enough to keep body and soul together and find some shelter at night.
Janet could make no plans. She only knew enough to do as Roy told her. A child of the slums, she had never been inside of any house but the most wretched tenement. She was ignorant of the names and use of the simplest things; so it was impossible to find a place of service for her. All she had ever seen were the windows of forlorn second-hand clothing stores, pawnshops, saloons, and factories. Roy’s sale of papers took him into a wider field, so that he knew a little more about civilized life.
The old apple-woman had a mongrel dog that she had raised. He helped to guard her stand, and was a very sagacious animal. Janet and the dog became fast friends, and he would leave the stand and follow her on her rounds. This did not please old Aunt Betsy, so she tied him to the stand. Janet and the dog, however, still continued the best of friends.
The morning that Janet had gone with her mother’s work, she had dressed herself in a short skirt of her mother’s and an old straw hat with a bit of black ribbon round the crown, while over her shoulders was a coarse woollen shawl. These garments were patched and mended, but they were better than the rags the poor child wore when we first saw her, dancing on the pavement.
The winter passed away, and the blessed summer, which is so much easier for the poor, came in its turn. Then Janet could sleep out-of-doors under some shed.