Katie Robertson

by Margaret E. Winslow

"For the matter of that," said Mr. Sanderson, "I shall be glad to have my Bertie take the place if you don't want it for Katie. I have a large family to bring up, and I want my girls and boys both to be independent. I hadn't thought of it for Bertie quite yet, but your Katie reminded me last night of how old she is; and I see she is none too young to begin."

This put a little different face on the matter, for Mrs. Sanderson and Mrs. Robertson had been intimate friends when girls, in precisely the same rank in life, although one had married a doctor and the other the overseer of the bookbindery. Moreover, Mr. Sanderson was known to be very well off and quite able—had he judged it best—to bring up his girls in idleness, as useless fine ladies. Perhaps it would not be such a disgrace, after all, and they did sorely need the money. Katie was not dressed as her father's child should be, and toil as she might, even with the boys' wages the widow could not make more than sufficed to keep up the little home. Then, too, her child would have to do something for herself when she grew up; she would have no one to look to but herself, and though teaching would be perhaps a more genteel way of support, it was a very laborious one, and would make it necessary to go away from home, as the Lloyd girls were going to do, and to remain away for several years, first at some higher institution of learning and then at the Normal School, and where would the money come from to pay the tuition fees, traveling expenses, and board bills?

All this passed through Mrs. Robertson's mind as Mr. Sanderson reasoned with her and showed her the foolishness of her objections, and finally the impatient Katie was called in, and informed that she might "try it for a while"; and then the visitor was thanked for his trouble, and took his leave.

This all happened a week ago. The intervening time had been spent in putting Katie's simple wardrobe in order and in making home arrangements by which Mrs. Robertson would not miss her daughter more than she could help, in those various little services which she had been wont to render. The last day had now come; to-morrow the new life was to begin, and Katie was clearing up the breakfast things for the last time when the conversation with which our story commences took place.

"I wish it was not in the rag-room," said Mrs. Robertson, by-and-by, when Katie, having finished her dishes and swept up the room, drew her seat to her mother's side and took up her work—the ruffle of the last of the six mob-caps she was to wear at her work.

"Why?" said her daughter, to whom the factory was just now a sort of enchanted palace, any one of whose rooms was delightful to contemplate.

"It's such a low, dirty place, I'm told, and there's so many common women and girls there."

"Well, I needn't talk to them, I suppose. I needn't be common, at any rate, and I can't get dirty in those great long-sleeved aprons and these nice little caps. You don't know how smart I'm going to be, and won't you be proud of your big girl when she brings home her first three-dollar bill, all earned in one week? Eric will see that a girl's worth something, after all, and Alfred sha'n't make fun of me any more."

Mrs. Robertson did not say anything else just now; she did not like to be always checking the exuberance of her child's spirits with the dull forebodings of her own, but she could not see the paper-mill through the same halo that invested it in Katie's eyes. She knew there were snares and temptations, besides disagreeable and hard work to be met and encountered there, and she feared that the child's future disappointment would be proportioned to the brightness of her present hopes. Still, as the matter was determined upon, she knew it was right to make the best of it, and she tried to talk pleasantly and at least seem to sympathize with her daughter's enthusiasm.

So passed the day, and at night when the boys came home they were called upon to listen for the hundredth time to all the rose-colored plans, and were pressed to declare that there could be nothing in the world more delightful than working in a factory.