Mary Rose of Mifflin | Page 4

work if she can get a permit, so we've got the law on
our side. You see how easy it is, Larry?" She beamed with pride at the
solution she had found for the problem that had tormented her ever
since the letter had come from Mifflin.
"Do you mean you're goin' to tell lies about your own niece?"
demanded Larry incredulously.
Mrs. Donovan looked at him sadly. "Why should I tell lies?" she asked
sweetly. "Sure, it's no lie to say Mary Rose is goin' on fourteen. I ain't
denyin' it'll be some time before she gets to fourteen but she's goin' on
fourteen more'n she is on ten. If the tenants take a wrong meaning from

my words is it my fault? No, Larry," firmly. "I wouldn't tell lies for
nobody an' I wouldn't let Mary Rose tell lies. We al'ys had our mouths
well scoured out with soft soap when we didn't tell the truth. But it ain't
no lie to say a child's goin' on fourteen when she is."
CHAPTER II
A taxicab stopped before the Washington Apartment House and a slim
boyish little figure hopped out and stared up at the roof of the long red
brick building that towered so far above.
"It's an e-normous house, isn't it!" she said in surprise.
"Here, Mary Rose." A hand reached out a basket and then a birdcage.
"I'll go in with you."
"You're awfully good, Mrs. Black." Mary Rose looked at her with
loving admiration. "Of course, I'd have come here all right by myself
for daddy always said there was a special Providence to look after
children and fools and that was why we were so well taken care of, but
it certainly did make it pleasant for me to have you come all the way."
"It certainly made it pleasant for me," Mrs. Black said, and it had. Mary
Rose was so enthusiastic on this, her first trip away from Mifflin, that
she had amused Mrs. Black, who had made the journey to Waloo so
many times that it had become nothing but a necessary bore. She was
sorry that they had arrived at Mary Rose's destination. "Now, where do
we find your aunt?" She, too, looked up at the red brick building that
faced them so proudly.
"My Uncle Larry's the janitor of this splendid mansion!" Mary Rose
told her joyously, although there was a trace of awe in her birdlike
voice. The mansion seemed so very, very large to her. "Is janitor the
same as owner, Mrs. Black? It's--it's----" she drew a deep breath as if
she found it difficult to say what it was. "It's wonderful! There isn't one
house in all Mifflin so big and grand, is there? It looks more," she
cocked her head on one side, "like the new Masonic Temple on Main
Street than anybody's home."

"So it does," agreed Mrs. Black, leading the way into the vestibule,
where she found a bell labeled "Janitor."
When Kate Donovan answered it she saw a pleasant-faced, smartly clad
woman with a child in a neat, if shabby, boy's suit of blue serge, belted
blouse over shrunken knickerbockers. She knew at once that they had
come to look at the vacant apartment on the second floor.
"An I'll have to tell her we don't have no childern here," she said to
herself, and she sighed. "I wish Larry had a place in a house that was
overrun with childern. Seems if I hate to tell her how it is."
But the pleasant-faced smartly clad woman smiled at her as no
prospective tenant had ever smiled and asked sweetly: "Is this Mrs.
Donovan?"
Before Kate Donovan could admit it the boyish little figure ran to her.
"My Aunt Kate! I know it is. It's my Aunt Kate!"
"My soul an' body!" murmured the startled Mrs. Donovan, staring
stupidly at the child embracing her knees.
"I brought your little niece," began Mrs. Black.
"Niece!" gasped Mrs. Donovan in astonishment, for the figure at her
knees did not look like any niece she had ever seen. "Sure, it's a boy!"
The little face upturned to her broke into a radiant smile. "That's what
everyone says. But I'm not a boy, I'm not! Am I, Mrs. Black? I'm a girl
and my name's Mary Rose and I'm almost eleven----"
"H-sh, h-sh, dearie!" Mrs. Donovan's hand slipped over the red lips and
she sent a quick glance over her shoulder. Bewildered and surprised as
she was she realized that her niece's age was not to be shouted out in
the vestibule of the Washington in any such joyous fashion. "My soul
an' body," she murmured again as she looked at the sturdy little figure
in knickerbockers. "You're Mary Rose Crocker?" she asked doubtfully.

She almost hoped she wasn't.