"Oh, son, how careless!" Martha was just exclaiming when a call in
Jacob's sharp voice interrupted her.
"Martha, grocery!" it commanded her and I was not sure whether he was
ignorant of the fact that I was still her caller or was interrupting her
on purpose. I think Martha shared the same uncertainty; she blushed and
looked both ashamed and frightened.
"I'll go now, Martha, out this door that leads onto the street," I
hastened to say to relieve her of the dilemma. "But I'm coming back to
you," I added with determination, as I made ready to slip out the side
door of the Last Chance in regular underworld style.
"Please don't, Miss Charlotte," she called, as she was passing through
the other door into the world from which I was escaping. The sad
significance of our two exits struck me so forcibly that I was two
blocks away before I really became conscious of things around me, and
then I was brought back to the squalid street of the Settlement and its
surroundings by feeling a damp little hand slipped into mine as I strode
along.
"Please take me with you, Miss Lady," the Stray pleaded, as he ran along
beside me, trying to keep up with my long steps. "I've got me a dog now
to keep off turkles from me and you." And the slinking brindle bunch of
ears and tail and very little else, at our heels, regarded me with the
same brave entreaty. He and the Stray, indeed, presented a picture of
chivalrous attention as they stood regarding me.
"But what will your mother say?" I asked of my small human attendant
with conscientious contention against my desire to take them both with
me on out of the dirt and heat and flies and other swarming young humans
up into the coolness and shade and--loneliness--of my own life.
"She groceries all day and has to forget me," he answered calmly. "You
can bring me back to bed when she is through." And to this plea was
added a pathetic wag of the brindle tail.
"Well, I'll take you up as far as Mother Spurlock's and give you both a
tea cake," I capitulated as I started again up the street of the
Settlement towards the haven of the Town.
And as my escort and I progressed through the Settlement I could see the
most violent signs of interest being manifested in all of us. Dirty,
sweaty women, with their sleeves rolled up, came to the doors to look at
us, and as I greeted them one and all with a nod they smiled back with
pleased astonishment. I had never been down in the Settlement before,
but most of them spoke to me by name and one toothless old woman hastily
broke off a bloom from a struggling geranium, came to her rickety gate
and offered it to me with an admiring smile.