Rough and Ready

"You work too hard."

"I have to work hard," she replied, smiling faintly. "Sewing is not very well paid, and it costs a great deal to live. Where are you living now?"

"We are not living anywhere," said Rose.

"We are living on Broadway just at present," said Rough and Ready.

The seamstress looked from one to the other in surprise, not understanding what they meant.

"Where is your father now?" she asked.

"I have no father," said the newsboy.

"Is Mr. Martin dead, then?"

"No, he's alive, but he isn't my father, and I won't own him as such. If you want to know where he is, I will tell you. He is lying drunk on the floor of a room on Leonard Street, or at least he was half an hour ago."

The newsboy spoke with some bitterness, for he never could think with any patience of the man who had embittered the last years of his mother's life, and had that very morning nearly deprived his little sister of the clothing which he had purchased for her.

"Have you left him, then?" asked the seamstress.

"Yes, we have left him, and we do not mean to go near him again."

"Then you mean to take the whole care of your little sister, Rufus?"

"Yes."

"It is a great responsibility for a boy like you."

"It is what I have been doing all along. Mr. Martin hasn't earned his share of the expenses. I've had to take care of us both, and him too, and then he didn't treat us decently. I'll tell you what he did this morning."

Here he told the story of the manner in which his little sister had been robbed of her dress.

"You don't think I'd stand that, Miss Manning, do you?" he said, lifting his eyes to hers.

"No, Rufus; it seemed hard treatment. So you're going to find a home somewhere else?"

"Yes."

"Where do you expect to go?"

"Well, that is what puzzles me," said the newsboy. "I want some place in the west part of the city, so as to be out of Martin's way. Where do you live?"

"In Franklin Street, not far from the river."

"Is it a good place?"

"As good as I can expect. You know that I am poor as well as you."

"Is there any chance for us in the house?" asked Rufus, with a sudden idea touching the solution of the problem that had troubled him.

"No, there is no room vacant, I believe," said the seamstress, thoughtfully. "If there were only Rose, now," she added, "I could take her into the room with me."

"That's just the thing," said Rufus, joyfully. "Rose, wouldn't you like to be with Miss Manning? Then you would have company every day."

"Yes," said Rose, "I should like it ever so much; but where would you be?" she asked, doubtfully.

"I'll go to the Newsboys' Lodging House to sleep, but I'll come every afternoon and evening to see you. I'll give Miss Manning so much a week for your share of the expenses, and then I'll feel easy about you. But wouldn't she be a trouble to you, Miss Manning?"

"A trouble," repeated the seamstress. "You don't know how much I shall enjoy her company. I get so lonely sometimes. If you'll come with me now, I'll show you my room, and Rose shall find a home at once."

Much relieved in mind, Rough and Ready, with his sister still clinging to his arm, followed the seamstress down Franklin Street towards her home near the river.

CHAPTER V.

A NEW HOME

Miss Manning paused before a house, not indeed very stylish, but considerably more attractive than the tenement house in Leonard Street.

"This is where I live," she said.

"Is it a tenement house?" asked the newsboy.

"No, there's a woman keeps it,—a Mrs. Nelson. Some of the rooms are occupied by boarders, but others only by lodgers. I can't afford to pay the board she asks; so I only hire a room, and board my self."

While she was speaking, the two children were following her upstairs.

The entries were dark, and the stairs uncarpeted, but neither Rough and Ready nor his sister had been used to anything better, and were far from criticising what might have been disagreeable to those more fastidious.

Miss Manning kept on till she reached the fourth story. Here she paused before a door, and, taking a key from her pocket, opened it.

"This is where I live," she said. "Come in, both of you."

The room occupied by the seamstress was about twelve feet square. Though humble enough in its appearance, it was exquisitely neat. In the centre of the floor was a strip of carpeting about eight feet square, leaving, of course, a margin of bare floor on all sides.

"Why, you've got a carpet, Miss Manning!" said Rose, with pleasure.

"Yes," said the seamstress, complacently; "I bought it at an auction store one day, for only a dollar and a half. I couldn't well spare the money; but it seemed so nice to have a carpet, that I yielded to the temptation, and bought it."

"It seems more respectable to have a carpet," said the newsboy.

"It's more comfortable," said Miss Manning, "and it seems as if the room was warmer, although it doesn't cover the whole floor."

"What a nice little stove!" said Rose, admiringly, "Can you cook by it?"

She pointed to a small square stove, at one end of the apartment.

"Oh, yes, I can boil eggs, and do almost anything. I bought it at a junk-shop for only two dollars. I don't have a fire all the time, because I can't afford it. But it is pleasant, even when I am feeling cold, to think that I can have a fire when I want to."