"No, but it's cracking." Jack's tone was hopeful.
Rosie moved uneasily. "Terence O'Brien, I just wish you'd look out what you're saying, and you too, Ellen! It's dangerous to go in swimming, and Jackie's never going again, are you, Jackie?"
Jack hesitated a moment, then murmured a weak little "No."
Mrs. O'Brien nodded approvingly. "Ah, now, ain't Jack the good b'y to promise sister Rosie never to go in swimmin' again!"
Ellen chuckled. "At least until his back's well!"
Rosie flew at her sister like an angry little clucking hen. "Ellen O'Brien, you just mind your own business! Come on, Jackie, we're through. We're going out in front by ourselves, aren't we?"
Jack, apparently, wanted to remain where he was; but when Rosie whispered, "And I've got another penny for you," he slipped quietly down from his chair.
When you know that this was Jack's fifth penny for that day, you have some idea of what the struggle was costing Rosie. A week's wages seemed in a fair way of being eaten up in a few days. It was a fearful drain on her resources, but anything, Rosie told herself, to keep him out of the clutches of the Slattery gang!
By the third day his back was dry and peeling. After dinner, as Rosie was coming home from the grocery, she found him at the front gate boasting about it to Joe Slattery.
Rosie interrupted politely: "Jackie, will you come into the house a minute? I got something to ask you."