Calvary Alley

汊Calvary Alley [with accents]

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Calvary Alley, by Alice Hegan Rice Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook.
This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the header without written permission.
Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is important information about your specific rights and restrictions in how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved.
**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!*****
Title: Calvary Alley
Author: Alice Hegan Rice
Release Date: January, 2006 [EBook #9794] [Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on October 17, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CALVARY ALLEY ***

Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Mary Meehan and PG Distributed Proofreaders

CALVARY ALLEY
BY ALICE HEGAN RICE
1917
Author of "MRS. WIGGS OF THE CABBAGE PATCH," "LOVEY MARY," "SANDY," ETC.
ILLUSTRATED BY WALTER BIGGS
THIS STORY IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED TO THE SMALL BAND OF KENTUCKY WRITERS WITH WHOM IT HAS BEEN MY HAPPY FORTUNE TO MAKE THE LITERARY PILGRIMAGE

CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I THE FIGHT II THE SNAWDORS AT HOME III THE CLARKES AT HOME IV JUVENILE COURT V ON PROBATION VI BUTTERNUT LANE VII AN EVICTION VIII AMBITION STIRS IX BUTTONS X THE PRINCESS COMES TO GRIEF XI THE STATE TAKES A HAND XII CLARKE'S XIII EIGHT TO SIX XIV IDLENESS XV MARKING TIME XVI MISS BOBINET'S XVII BEHIND THE TWINKLING LIGHTS XVIII THE FIRST NIGHT XIX PREPARATIONS FOR FLIGHT XX WILD OATS XXI DAN XXII IN THE SIGNAL TOWER XXIII CALVARY CATHEDRAL XXIV BACK AT CLARKE'S XXV MAC XXVI BETWEEN TWO FIRES XXVII FATE TAKES A HAND XXVIII THE PRICE OF ENLIGHTENMENT XXIX IN TRAINING XXX HER FIRST CASE XXXI MR. DEMRY XXXII THE NEW FOREMAN XXXIII NANCE COMES INTO HER OWN

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
"The boy is infatuated with that girl"
"Her tense muscles relaxed; she forgot to cry"
"Don't call a policeman!" she implored wildly

CALVARY ALLEY

CHAPTER I
THE FIGHT
You never would guess in visiting Cathedral Court, with its people's hall and its public baths, its clean, paved street and general air of smug propriety, that it harbors a notorious past. But those who knew it by its maiden name, before it was married to respectability, recall Calvary Alley as a region of swarming tenements, stale beer dives, and frequent police raids. The sole remaining trace of those unregenerate days is the print of a child's foot in the concrete walk just where it leaves the court and turns into the cathedral yard.
All the tired feet that once plodded home from factory and foundry, all the unsteady feet that staggered in from saloon and dance-hall, all the fleeing feet that sought a hiding place, have long since passed away and left no record of their passing. Only that one small footprint, with its perfect outline, still pauses on its way out of the alley into the great world beyond.
At the time Nance Molloy stepped into that soft concrete and thus set in motion the series of events that was to influence her future career, she had never been told that her inalienable rights were life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Nevertheless she had claimed them intuitively. When at the age of one she had crawled out of the soap-box that served as a cradle, and had eaten half a box of stove polish, she was acting in strict accord with the Constitution.
By the time she reached the sophisticated age of eleven her ideals had changed, but her principles remained firm. She did not stoop to beg for her rights, but struck out for them boldly with her small bare fists. She was a glorious survival of that primitive Kentucky type that stood side by side with man in the early battles and fought valiantly for herself.
On the hot August day upon which she began to make history, she stood in the gutter amid a crowd of yelling boys, her feet far apart, her hands full of mud, waiting tensely to chastise the next sleek head that dared show itself above the cathedral fence. She wore a boy's shirt and a ragged brown skirt that flapped about her sturdy bare legs. Her matted hair was bound in two disheveled braids around her head and secured with a piece of shoe-string. Her dirty round face was lighted up by a pair of dancing blue eyes, in which just now blazed