The Story of Patsy | Page 9

belonged to the Salvation Army, and the most striking articles of his attire, when sweeping, were a flame-colored flannel shirt and a shiny black hat with "Prepare to Meet Thy God" on the front in large silver letters. The combination of color was indescribably pictorial, and as lurid and suggestive as an old-fashioned Orthodox sermon.
As I went through the lower hall, I found Mr. Bowker assisting Helen to search the coal-bin. "Don't smile," she cried. "Punch says, 'Sometimes the least likeliest place is more likelier than the most likeliest,'--and sure enough, here is the hat! I should have been named Deborah or Miriam,--not Helen!" and she hurried to dry the tears of the weeping Jacob.
[Illustration: "HERE IS THE HAT!"]
CHAPTER V.
I SEEK PATSY, AND MEET THE DUCHESS OF ANNA STREET.
"'Tis pride, rank pride and haughtiness of soul."
I make my way through the streets, drinking in the glorious air, breathing the perfume of the countless fruit stands and the fragrances that floated out from the open doors of the little flower stores in every block, till I left all that was pleasant behind me and turned into Anna Street.
I soon found Number 32, a dirty, tumble-down, one-story hovel, the blinds tied together with selvedges of red flannel, and a rickety bell that gave a certain style to the door, though it had long ceased to ring.
A knock brought a black-haired, beetle-browed person to the window.
"Does Mrs. Kennett live here?"
"No, she don't. I live here."
"Oh! then you are not Mrs. Kennett?"
"Wall, I ruther guess not!" This in a tone of such royal superiority and disdain that I saw in an instant I had mistaken blue blood for red.
"I must have been misinformed, then. This is Number 32?"
"Can't yer see it on the door?"
"Yes," meekly. "I thought perhaps Anna Street had been numbered over."
"What made yer think Mis' Kennett lived here?"
"A little girl brought me her name written on a card,--Mrs. Kennett, 32 Anna Street."
"There!" triumphantly, "I might 'a knowed that woman 'd play some common trick like that! Now do you want ter know where Mis' Kennett re'ly doos live? Wall, she lives in the rear! Her number's 32-1/2, 'n I vow she gits more credit o' livin' in the front house 'n I do, 'n I pay four dollars more rent! Ever see her? I thought not! I guess 'f you hed you wouldn't think of her livin' in a house like this!"
"Excuse me. I didn't expect to make any trouble"--
"Oh, I've nothin' agin you, but just let me ketch her puttin' on airs 'n pertendin' to live like her betters, that's all! She's done it before, but I couldn't never ketch her at it. The idee of her keepin' up a house like this!" and with a superb sniff like that of a battle-horse, she disappeared from the front window of her ancestral mansion and sought one at the back which might command a view of my meeting with her rival.
I slid meekly through a side gate, every picket of which was decorated with a small child, stumbled up a dark narrow passage, and found myself in a square sort of court out of which rose the rear houses so objectionable to my Duchess in the front row.
It was not plain sailing, by any means, owing to the collection of tin cans and bottles through which I had to pick my way, but I climbed some frail wooden steps, and stood at length on the landing of Number 32-1/2.
The door was open, and there sat Patsy, "minding" the Kennett baby, a dull little lump of humanity, whose brain registered impressions so slowly that it would play all day long with an old shoe without exhausting its possibilities.
Patsy himself was dirtier than ever, and much more sullen and gloomy. The traces of tears on his cheeks made my heart leap into my throat. "Oh, Patsy," I exclaimed, "I am so glad to find you! We expected you all day, and were afraid you weren't well."
Not a word of response.
"We have a chair all ready for you; it is standing right under one of the plant-shelves, and there are three roses in bloom to-day!"
Still not a word.
"And I had to tell the dog story without you!"
The effect of this simple statement was very different from what I had anticipated. I thought I knew what a child was likely to do under every conceivable set of circumstances, but Patsy was destined to be more than once a revelation to me.
He dashed a book of colored advertisements that he held into the farthest corner of the room, threw himself on the floor at full length and beat it with his hands, while he burst into a passion of tears. "There! there!" he cried between his sobs, "I told 'em you'd tell it! I told 'em