Betty's Happy Year

“What is it nice you wants fer to give me?”

The child did not look receptively inclined, but Betty held out the big box toward her and said:

“It’s this box of lovely luncheon, fried chicken and little pies! Take it home to your mama.”

The girl turned on Betty like a little fury. Her black eyes snapped, and her whole little body shook with indignation as she cried:

“Think shame how you says! My mama wouldn’t let me to take whole bunches of lunch from a lady! It ain’t for ladies to give lunches off on the street!” With a flirt of her shabby little skirts, the child turned her back on Betty and walked haughtily away.

It was Betty’s first experience with that peculiar type of dignity and self-respect, and she was bewildered at the sudden fury of the indignant child.

But the box was still to be disposed of, and Betty looked around for another opportunity. She was tempted to throw it away, but the thought of Ellen’s dainty morsels being wasted was so disappointing that she resolved to try once more anyhow.

“I didn’t think it was so hard to give food away in town,” she reflected, smiling grimly at her predicament. “Oh, I do believe it’s going to rain!”

The sky had suddenly clouded over, and there were portents of a coming shower. Betty looked at the clouds, and resolved to make one more attempt to bestow her charity, and if that failed she concluded she must throw away the box. As Dorothy had said, she couldn’t very well walk into a large hotel carrying a box of luncheon. It would look ridiculous. And even if she did have to throw it away, she had the satisfaction of knowing she had tried to utilize it. The drops began to fall, but they were large and scattered, so Betty thought she had time for one more attempt at her good work before she ran for shelter.

A poor-looking man came toward her, and Betty stopped him. She had become timid about the box by this time, so, unconsciously, she spoke as if asking a favor.

“Wouldn’t you like a box of nice food to take home?” she said, as she hesitatingly held the box out to him.

“Do you mean to give it to me?” he asked, in such a threatening tone that Betty recoiled a little. She thought quickly. Here was another who would take offense at being looked upon as an object of charity. It flashed through her mind that if she asked him to pay a small price he would keep his self-respect and get far more than the value of his money.

“No,” she stammered; “I mean to sell it to you – for ten cents.”

It seemed awful to ask money for it, but surely he could pay that much, and Betty felt instinctively that he would refuse it as a gift.

The man looked at her with a strange glance.

“Have you got a license to sell things in the street?” he asked.

“N-no!” gasped Betty, frightened now by his intent gaze at her.

“Well, you quit your foolishness, lady. You move on, you and your precious bundle, or I’ll call a policeman and have you arrested!”

She almost ran back to the ferry-house, concluding, as she went, to throw away the luncheon and take a cab up to Dorothy’s as quickly as she could.

Where to throw it away was the next question. Betty looked in vain for a refuse receptacle or ash-can. She knew it was not allowed to throw things in the street, and the cleanly swept pavement near the ferries showed no resting-place for the objectionable-box.

There were poor-looking people about, but Betty did not care to risk another impertinent refusal. Just as she was about to turn into the little office to engage a taxicab, she had a brilliant idea.

“I’ll go back on the ferry-boat,” she thought; “I’ll get a ferry ticket and go through the slip and on to the boat. Then I can throw the old box into the water, and come off the boat again before it starts.”

This seemed a really good plan, and with rising spirit Betty paid her pennies and went on the boat. She had ample time, as the boat had just arrived and would not go out again for several minutes. On the upper deck Betty walked to the extreme end, and stood looking over into the water. It seemed an awful pity to waste that lovely luncheon, but it was getting late, and it was raining quite steadily, so there was really nothing else to do.

“Good-by, then, pretty little tarts and jolly good chicken!” said Betty, and she pushed the box over the rail.

Then she hurried back, and started again for the cab-stand.

“Yes, a taxicab, please,” said Betty to the kind-faced official in charge, and then, “To the Waldorf,” she said, as she got into the vehicle. She felt very capable and grown-up, as she settled herself in the broad seat, and noticed with satisfaction that the shower was almost over.

But, just as the driver was about to start, a voice called, “Hi! hold on there!” and running toward the cab came a deck-hand from the ferry-boat, carrying that box!

“I seen you!” he cried to Betty, in jubilant tones; “I seen you get on the boat, and then I seen you drop this box. I wuz on the lower deck, an’ I jest caught it! It dropped out of my hand, and the corners is smashed some, but I saved it from goin’ in the water, all the same! Here it is, ma’am!”

He looked so delighted at his feat that Betty couldn’t help smiling back at him, though deeply exasperated to have the box on her hands again.

The young fellow clearly thought he had done Betty a great favor in restoring her property, and he stood smiling, and shifting from one foot to another, while the cab driver obligingly waited.

“Oh,” thought Betty, “he expects a reward! Imagine paying a reward for getting that box back!”

But she realized that the deck-hand thought it was valuable property he had restored, so she took out her purse and gave him a coin that sent him away grinning with pleasure.

Then the cab started, and Betty sat looking at the horrid box which had grown such a burden to her. It was beginning to look disreputable, too. The paper was soiled and torn, for the rain-drops had wet it, and the jar as the box fell on the ferry-boat deck had broken the pasteboard. Also, to Betty’s horror, she could see tiny drops of jelly and something yellow oozing out at the edges. The stuffed eggs must be upset, and the warm weather had softened the jelly tarts! It was simply impossible to carry the box into the hotel, and it would be also impossible to leave it in the cab.

Betty was at her wits’ end, and the street corners were flying by with annoying rapidity. Soon she would be at the Waldorf, and she must dispose of that box first.

Fortunately no drop from its edges had soiled her pretty dress, and if she could only rid of it, she could enter the hotel in serene forgetfulness of all her trouble. She was tempted simply to pitch it out of the window, but if she did, it would break apart and scatter its contents all over the street, and – she might be arrested.

Betty didn’t know much about the law, but she was almost certain it was against it, to scatter stuffed eggs and fruit tarts along the middle of Fifth Avenue! And yet something must be done!

She made a desperate resolve.

“Stop at a news-stand, please,” she called to the driver. The man did so, and Betty bought four newspapers. “Go on slowly,” she said; and the driver obeyed. Then Betty untied the string from the damaged box, wrapped it all in many thicknesses of newspaper, and tied it with the string, making a secure if very cumbersome bundle. Surveying it with satisfaction, she called to the driver, “Go as fast as you can!” and as he accelerated his speed, she pitched the bundle out of the window. Too frightened to look back, she huddled in a corner of the cab, scarcely daring to think she was free at last from that hated presence.

“It won’t spill in the street,” she thought, “unless something runs over it, and if it does, my! how the eggs will spatter!”

It all appealed to Betty’s sense of humor, and, though she was still a little scared, she couldn’t help laughing at her ridiculous experiences of the morning.

She sat up very straight, and when the cab stopped at the hotel, she gravely alighted, paid the driver, and marched with a dignified air up the steps and in at the door.

Once inside, the first face she saw was Dorothy’s.

“Where have you been?” she cried. “We’ve waited and waited! I couldn’t telephone, ’cause I didn’t know where to find you. Aunt Evelyn is so anxious about you. Oh, let me present my cousins, Tom and Fred Bates.”

Two good-looking, merry-faced young men looked admiringly at pretty Betty and made polite bows. Still full of merriment at the remembrance of her funny morning, Betty’s bright eyes were twinkling, and her cheeks rosy beneath her flower-trimmed hat.

“How do you do?” she said, smiling prettily at the boys, then turning to Dorothy, she said: “Yes, I was detained a little; I’ll tell you about it some other time. But I came just now, from the ferry, in a taxicab.”

“Yes, I saw you drive up,” said Dorothy; “I was looking out of the window. But I’ve been there flattening my nose against the pane for half an hour. Where were you, Betty?”

“Seeking my fortune,” said Betty, teasingly; “or, rather, seeking to bestow fortune.”

But her speech was not heard, because of a commotion behind her.

“That’s the one!” said a childish voice, and, to Betty’s horror, an employee of the hotel ushered a ragged small boy straight toward her. The boy held in his arms a large muddy, newspaper-covered bundle!

“I seen you drop it out o’ yer cab, ma’am, an’ I brung it to yer!”