The Law-Breakers and Other Stories | Page 3

once in a
while it would occur to her that it would be very pleasant if he should
drop in for a cup of tea, and she would wonder what he was doing. Did
she, perchance, at the same time exert herself with an ardor born of an
acknowledged inkling that these might be the last months of her service?
However that may have been, she certainly was very busy, and
responded eagerly to every call upon her sympathy.
Among the cases of distress brought to her attention which interested
her most was that of two children whose mother had just died. Their
father was a drinking man--a reeling sot who had neglected his family
for years. His wife, proud in her destitution, had worked her fingers to
the bone to maintain a tenement-roof over the heads of their two little
boys and to send them neat and properly nourished to school. This
labor of love had been too much for her strength, and finally she had
fallen a victim to consumption. This was shortly after her necessities
had become known to the Settlement to which Mary Wellington
belonged. The dying mother besought her visitor to keep watch over
her boys, which Mary promised faithfully to do.
The waifs, Joe and Frank, were two bright-eyed youngsters of eleven
and nine. They stood so well in their classes at school that Mary
resolved that their attendance should not be interrupted during the
interval while a new home was being found for them. She accompanied
them to the school-house, on the morning after the funeral, in order to
explain the situation to their teacher and evince her personal interest.
Miss Burke was a pretty girl two or three years younger than herself.
She looked capable and attractive; a little coquettish, too, for her smile

was arch, and her pompadour had that fluffy fulness which girls who
like to be admired nowadays are too apt to affect. She was just the sort
of girl whom a man might fall desperately in love with, and it occurred
to Mary, as they conversed, that it was not likely she would remain a
public-school teacher long.
Miss Burke evidently knew the art of ingratiating herself with her
pupils. Joe and Frank smiled bashfully, but contentedly, under her
sympathetic, sunny welcome. The two young women exchanged a few
words, the sequel of which was that Mary Wellington accepted the
invitation to remain and observe how the youthful mind was inoculated
with the rudiments of knowledge by the honeyed processes of the
modern school system. While the teacher stepped to the blackboard to
write some examples before the bell should ring, Joe, the elder of the
two orphans, utilized the occasion to remark in a low voice intended for
Mary's ear:
"She's Jim Daly's mash."
Mary, who failed on the instant to grasp the meaning of this piece of
eloquent information, invited the urchin to repeat it, which he did with
the sly unction of one proud of his secret. Mary laughed to herself.
Some girls would have repressed the youthful gossip, but she was
human. Somehow, too, the name sounded familiar.
"Who's Jim Daly, Joe?"
"He's the boss of the Ninth Ward."
"The Daly who has just been elected alderman?"
"Yes, ma'am."
Then Mary understood. "Really, Joe!" she said in the stage whisper
necessary to the situation.
"Maybe she's going to be married after Easter," the guileless prattler
continued, to make his confidence complete.

"Then you and Frank would lose her." This was the answer which rose
to Mary's lips, partly prompted, doubtless, by her own instinctive
aversion to the match.
The suggestion of another loss worked upon Joe's susceptible feelings.
Evidently he had not taken this side of the matter into consideration,
and he put up one of his hands to his eyes. Fortunately the bell for the
opening of the session broke in upon the conversation, and not only
diverted him, but relegated the whole subject to the background for the
time being. Nevertheless, the thought of it continued in Mary's mind as
she sat listening to the exercises. How could an attractive girl like this
take a fancy to such a trickster? It seemed totally incompatible with the
teacher's other qualities, for in her attitude toward her pupils she
appeared discerning and conscientious.
When the time came to go, Mary referred to her connection with the
Settlement work in the course of the few minutes' further conversation
which they had together. Miss Burke expressed so lively an interest in
this that it was agreed before they parted that the schoolmistress should
pay Mary a visit some day later in the week, with the twofold object of
taking tea with the two orphans and of being shown the workings of the
establishment.
At this subsequent interview, the