I, also, had to make these journeys to the nearest saloon, and, also, did not mind it for the above mentioned reason. Sometimes, after returning from my trip, a man would ask me to sing him one of the popular songs of the day, but I would refuse with the diffidence of a boy. My father never missed these opportunities to inform his friends that "that brat ain't good for nothing. Don't bother with him."
I began to dislike my foster father, rather than hate him. More than once I met his casual glance with a bitter scowl.
A PAIR OF SHOES.
CHAPTER II.
A PAIR OF SHOES.
It was winter, still. I was running about bare-footed. This was preferred by me to having my feet shod with the old shoes of my mother. She had a small foot, yet her old shoes were miles too large for me, and furthermore, always made me the butt of the jeers and jibes of my playmates in the street. Therefore, I never wore the cast-off shoes unless snow or ice was on the ground.
But whether bare-footed or slouching along in my unwieldy cast-offs, the comments became so personal that I resolved to ask my father for a pair of real, new shoes.
The moment for presenting my petition anent the new shoes was ill chosen.
My father was experiencing a period of idleness, and had reached that intense state of feeling which prompted him to declare with much banging on the table that "there wasn't an honest day's work to be got no more, at all, by an honest, decent, laboring man." At the moment my mother was deeply engaged in the task of mollifying her husband's irascibility by preparing some marvelous feat of cooking, and was not at liberty to give me her most essential moral support.
My request was received in silence. It was an ominous silence, but I did not realize it.