Janet was ready with a good suggestion. "Why don't you save it and buy roller skates, Rosie? I don't mean old common sixty-cent ones, but a fine expensive pair with good ball-bearings. Then you could skate on Boulevard Place. Why, Rosie, is there anything in the world you'd rather do than go up to Boulevard Place with a pair of fine skates? And listen here, Rosie: if you lend them to me in the afternoon while you're on your paper route, I'll take good care of them, honest I will."
H'm, roller skates. The longer Rosie thought about the idea, the better she liked it. She decided to talk it over with Danny Agin on Monday afternoon when she left him his paper.
Danny met her with a sly grin. "Have you been chin-chopperin' some more of them, Rosie?"
Rosie looked at her old friend reprovingly. "Aw now, Danny, why do you always talk about that? I don't like to fight boys, you know I don't. It was Otto Schnitzer's own fault. But, Danny, listen here: Bet you can't guess what I'm saving for."
Danny couldn't, so Rosie explained. Then she continued:
"You see it's this way, Danny: those old cheap skates are no good anyhow. They're always breaking. I'd give anything for a good pair and so would Janet. We just love to skate on Boulevard Place—the cement's so smooth and it's so shady and pretty. But do you know, Danny, last summer when we used to go up there on one old broken skate they called us 'muckers.' We're not muckers just because we're poor, are we, Danny?"
Danny Agin snorted with indignation. "As long as ye mind yir manners, ye're not to be called muckers! You don't fight 'em, Rosie, and call 'em names, do you?"
"No, Danny, I don't, honest I don't, but sometimes Janet does. She gets awful mad if any one calls her 'Cross-back!' You see, Danny, they're all Protestants and Jews on Boulevard Place."
"From their manners, Rosie, I'd know that!"
"But it seems to me, Danny, if we had a pair of ball-bearing skates we'd be just as good as they are."