Witch Winnie Part 17

"This is a picture of the _Princess Charlotte_," handing Emma Jane his drawing.

"It is night, and the captain is pacing the lonely deck; he has set his lantern on a small stand, and has put his hands in his pockets to keep them warm. The second verse goes this way:

'Up aloft! up aloft!' our gallant captain cried; Blow high, blow low, so sailed we.

'Look ahead, look astern, look aweather, look alee,'

Cruising down on the coast of Barbaree.

'Oh, I've seen on ahead, and I've seen on astern,'

Blow high, blow low, so sailed we; 'And I see a ragged wind and a lofty ship at sea,'

Cruising down on the coast of Barbaree.

'Ahoy! ship ahoy!' our gallant captain cried, Blow high, blow low, so sailed we; 'Are you a man-of-war, or a privateer?' says he; Cruising down on the coast of Barbaree.

'Oh! I am no man-of-war or privateer,' says he, Blow high, blow low, so sailed we; 'But I am a jolly pirate seeking for my fee,'

Cruising down on the coast of Barbaree.

"This is the picture of the pirate ship and the fight. Captain Kidd has cut off the head of one of the men who boarded his ship. One of his men is firing a cannon, the rest of his crew may be seen between-decks.

'Twas broadside to broadside, so quickly then came we; Blow high, blow low, so sailed we; Until the _Princess Charlotte_ shot her masts into the sea, Cruising down on the coast of Barbaree.

Then 'Quarter! oh, quarter!' the pirate captain cried; Blow high, blow low, so sailed we; But the quarters that we gave them were down beneath the sea, Cruising down on the coast of Barbaree.

"Grandfather called it the story of Captain Kidd, because he thought he must have been the pirate whose ship the _Princess Charlotte_ sunk.

Captain Kidd was taken to London and hanged in chains, and I've made a picture of that too."

Emma Jane hardly approved of the sanguinary spirit displayed by these drawings, but she could not expect that the boy's antecedents and surroundings would produce an angel. She endeavored to draw his attention to gentler subjects for his pencil, recited tender and loving ballads, and changed the current of the boy's thought and aspiration, realizing that here was material which, in the fostering atmosphere of Rickett's Court, might easily develop into an anarchist--a menace to the state.

The Sandy girls were the last to be received from the court. The father had been a truckman, but a heavy box had fallen upon him, and he had lived in pain and misery for a year and had then died. Mrs. Sandy, by making men's clothing, managed to keep the wolf from the door--no, only snarling _at_ the door with fierce, hungry eyes. All of her six children helped her. The oldest girl did the ironing and finishing; the next child, a boy, carried the great bundles back and forth in the intervals of his profession as a bootblack; the second girl did all of their poor housework; the twins sewed on b.u.t.tons and pulled out basting threads, and the youngest boy sold newspapers, while Mrs. Sandy herself ran the sewing-machine ten or twelve hours in the day.

When Mrs. Hetterman asked her why she did not give up this desperate battle with the point of the needle, and leave her vile surroundings to take service in some good family, she replied that she had often thought of this, but she must keep a home, however poor, for the children. "The two boys could live at the Newsboys' Lodging-House, for they earn enough to support themselves, but what would I do with my four girls?"

When Mrs. Hetterman a.s.sured her that there was a Home where they could all be cared for in cleanliness, health, and comfort, and have time for study and schooling and industrial education, which would fit them to earn their own living in future, and all for a sum quite within the means of any domestic, she brought her cramped hand down with a heavy blow upon the sewing-machine.

"I don't mind if I break every bone in yer body, ye Satan's grindstone!"

she said to the machine; "it's the last time that Mary Sandy'll grind soul and body thin at ye, praise be to a delivering Providence!"

Mrs. Hastings, one of the managers of the Home, had had great trouble with incompetent and ungrateful servants, and she gladly took the faithful Scotch woman into her family.

These, then, were the guests of the Elder Brother, for that first summer, from Rickett's Court:

1 Jim Halsey, American.

3 Hettermans, English.

3 Amatis, Italian.

4 Babies from Mrs. Grogan's, Irish.

2 Carl and Gracie Rumple, German.

1 Lovey Dimple, American.

1 Merry Twinkle, American.

4 Sandy Girls, Scotch.

In all, nineteen children transplanted from the filth and vice, hunger and ignorance, of the court, and six more from other localities as bad, to sweet, wholesome surroundings. It was thought best that those children of school age should attend a public school to avoid "inst.i.tutionizing" them; and for this end they wore no uniform, and mingled freely with other well-behaved children in the park under Mrs.

Halsey's motherly supervision. Their birthdays were celebrated with a little party, with cake and candles, and everything was done to cultivate a home-like feeling. They drew their books like other children from the children's new free circulating library, and were taught to guard them carefully. They had a sewing society--in reality a sewing-cla.s.s--where boys and girls were alike taught to mend and darn, to sew on b.u.t.tons, and to make b.u.t.ton-holes--all but the Sandy children, who, it was judged, had served a long enough apprenticeship in this department, and were sent to Mrs. Hetterman to learn how to cook.

Miss Prillwitz was anxious that the boys should have industrial training, and brought the matter before the board of managers, who entirely agreed with her, and voted that a subscription sent them by Mr.

Armstrong be used to secure a suitable teacher.

It was just at this time that a letter was received from Adelaide announcing that she had fitted up the cottage which her father had placed at her disposal, and would like to have Mrs. Halsey occupy it with the youngest children for the heated term. Miss Prillwitz was delighted. Jim was already at the Pier with the Roseveldts, and it would be pleasant for his mother to be near him, and a fine thing for the little girls and the babies. This would leave the nursery vacant, and it could be fitted up as a workshop for the boys. She had a chat with Mrs.

Halsey the day before she left, and asked her if she knew of anyone who could teach the boys carpentry.

"Mr. Trimble, Lovey's father, is a perfect jack-of-all-trades," replied Mrs. Halsey.

Miss Prillwitz was doubtful. "Mr. Trimble is a drunkard," she said.

"Not irreclaimable, I am sure," said Mrs. Halsey. "He was a sober man when I knew him. Despair alone could have driven him to drink. I wish you would send and ask him to call and see you."

So a letter was sent, and none too soon, for affairs were now at their worst with Stephen Trimble.

CHAPTER XII.

WITH THE DYNAMITERS.

"While we range with Science, glorying in the time, City children soak and blacken soul and sense in city slime; Where among the glooming alleys Progress halts on palsied feet, Crime and hunger cast out maidens by the thousand on the street; Where the master scrimps his haggard seamstress of her daily bread, And a single sordid attic holds the living and the dead."

--_Anon._

[Ill.u.s.tration: {Drawing of the anarchist of Rickett's Court.}]

The anarchist of Rickett's Court, under whose influence the inventor had fallen, was a thoroughly bad man, and the writer has no sympathy to waste upon him or his methods, but with his deluded and desperate victim we should all sympathize.

Stephen Trimble had brooded over his troubles and wrongs until he was half crazed, and the men for whom he worked added fuel to the flame.

"Why should you be so precious careful of the rich?" his employer said.

"What have the rich ever done for you? They've murdered your wife, as I make out, insisting on her standing all day long, when she was not able to do so, and might have done her work just as well sitting. They've sent your innocent little boy to jail along with common pickpockets.

They've robbed you of your money--"

"Stop!" cried Stephen Trimble; "you've said that over and over, until I believe it, though I don't know why I should take your word any quicker than that of anyone else. You've made much of your kindness in telling me, though I don't see what good it does me, unless you are willing to go into court and testify for me as to what you've seen."

The men shook their heads. "No going into court for us! We want to keep as far away from the law as possible."

"Then I don't see but you are as much against me as the rest. I've worked with you long enough to know what your aims are; your machine is now in working order, ready to blow up the finest house, the largest audience, in New York, church or armory, bank-vault or prison; and if all you say is true, you may blow away, for all I care, and blow yourselves up with the rest, and me too. If the world is the Sodom and Gomorrah it seems to me, we have Bible warrant for its destruction. My work for you is done; give me my money, and we are through with each other."

"See here, Trimble," said the anarchist, "we have already paid you fifteen dollars, and you ought not to be too close with us."

"You promised me a hundred; do you mean to say--"

"Don't be so touchy; what I mean to say is this: We cannot help you by testifying in court, as you suggested; it wouldn't do you any good if we did; but find out the man who has wronged you, and we will help you to your revenge. In a few days our society will begin its operations. We are out of funds now, but there will be a new deal soon. We begin with the banking-house of Roseveldt, Gold & Co., and as soon as the fireworks are over we will be rich enough, and you shall have a fair share."