Maggie: A Girl of the Streets

humping of feet in unseen corridors and rooms, mingled with the sound of varied hoarse shoutings in the street and the rattling of wheels

n of "God bless yehs" pitched in assorted keys of fervency. Each day she took a position upon the stones of Fifth Avenue, where she crooked her legs under her and crouched im

her cloak. When she was arrested she had cursed the lady into a partial swoon, and with her aged limbs, twisted from rheumatism, had al

now, like a dear an' buy me a can, an' if yer mu

d went to the bar. Straining up on his toes he raised the pail and pennies as high as his arms would let hi

met a lurching figure. It was his fa

See?" said the m

dat ol' woman an' it 'ud be dirt

mouth. He glued his lips to the under edge and tilted his head. His hairy throat swelled until

d with the empty pail. As it rolled clanging into the street, Ji

one me," he yelled. "Deh ol'

street, but the man did not purs

when I ketch yeh," he s

to all comers, confidentially: "My home reg'lar livin' hell! Damndes' place! Reg'lar

through the building. He passed with great caution the door of th

e was chanting in a mournful voice, occasionally interjecting bursts of volcanic

keep Jim from fightin'? I'll brea

ndifference. "Ah, wha' deh hel

hes, yeh damn fool," cried

ments. Jimmie partially suppressed a howl and darted down the stairway. Below he paused and listened. He heard howls and curses, groans and shrieks, confusingly

nd whispered comments passed to and f

ut their doors. Then he crawled upstairs with the caution of an invader of a panther den. Sounds of

bare floor, the cracked and soiled plasteri

sleep. In one corner of the room his father

amed and swollen from drinking. Her yellow brows shaded eyelids that had brown blue. Her tangled hair tossed in waves over her forehead. Her mouth was set in the same lines of vindict

her eyes, and the dread within him was so strong, that he could not f

ght into that expression, which, it would seem, had the power to

ossed her arms about her head as if

ollowed his cry at the discovery that his mother was awake. He grovelled in t

Are yehs dere?" it whispered. The urchin started. The thin, white face of his sister

ber, her chest wheezing as if she were in the agonies of strangulation. Out at the window a flori

. She grasped the urchin's arm in her little trembling hands and they huddled in a corner. The eyes of both were drawn,

at the window, drawing close to the panes, and look