CHAPTER III
THE PAPER-GIRL

On Saturday night as soon as supper was cleared away, Terence was accustomed to make out his weekly accounts. He had a small account-book with crisscross rulings and two fascinating little canvas money-bags, one for coppers, the other for nickels and silver. After his book accounts were finished, he would gravely open his money-bags and, with banker-like precision, pile up together coins of the same denomination – pennies by themselves, nickels by themselves, dimes, and so on.

Though oft repeated, it was an impressive performance and one that Rosie and little Jack surveyed with untiring gravity and respect. With a frown between his eyes and his lips working silently, Terence would estimate the totals of the various piles, then the sum total. He would very deliberately compare this with the amount his book showed and then – it always happened just this way – with a sigh of relief, he would murmur to himself: "All right this time!"

On this particular night, instead of sweeping the money piles back into their little bags at once, Terence paused and looked at Rosie with a questioning: "Well?"

"Well." Rosie used the same word with a different intonation.

"I suppose I owe you twenty cents."

"Yes, Terry, you do."

"Are you having any trouble?"

With a truthfulness that made her own heart glow with happiness, Rosie was able to answer: "No, I'm not having a bit of trouble, honest I'm not. You're going to let me have it now regular, aren't you?"

Before Terence could answer, Ellen O'Brien, who was seated on the far side of the table, presumably studying the pothooks of stenography, called out suddenly: "Ma! Ma! Come here! Quick!"

Mrs. O'Brien appeared at once. She was still nursing the baby to sleep, but no matter. Whenever her oldest child called, Mrs. O'Brien came.

"Say, Ma, I think it's disgraceful the way Terry's letting Rosie sell papers. If I was you I just wouldn't allow it! It's awful for a girl to sell papers!"

Rosie's heart sank. Was this comfortable income of twenty cents a week now, at the last moment, to be snatched from her?

"Aw now, Mama," she began; "it's only right around here where every one knows me, honest it is! This is the end of Terry's route and he gets here so late that if I don't help him he'll lose his customers, won't you, Terry?"

Rosie appealed to Terence, but Terence was busy scowling at his older sister. "Say, Ellen O'Brien, what do you think you are? You mind your own business or I'll give that pompadour of yours a frizzle!"

Ellen concentrated on her mother: "I don't care, Ma! You just mustn't let her! How do you think I'd feel going into a swell office some day, hunting a job, and have the man say, no, he didn't want any common newsgirls around!"

For a moment every one was silent, overcome by the splendour of that imagined office. Then Terence broke into a jeer:

"Aw, forget it! If Rosie was to make her living selling papers, who'd know about it downtown? And if some one from downtown did see her, how would they know she was your sister? Say, Sis, it's time for you to go shine your nails!"

"Now, Ma, just listen to that! I wish you'd make Terry stop always making fun of me! Haven't I got to keep my hands nice if ever I'm going to be a stenog?"

Mrs. O'Brien tried hard to restore a general peace: "Terry lad, you mustn't be talkin' that way to your sister. P'rhaps what Ellen says is right. I dunno. We'll see what himself says when he comes in."

The young O'Briens were used to having their mother refer to their father as one to decide all sorts of vexed questions. When he was out of the house he seemed the person to appeal to. When, however, Jamie O'Brien was at home, no one ever heeded him in the least. He would come in tired and silent from his run and, after sitting about in shirtsleeves and socks long enough to smoke a pipe, would slip quietly off to bed. So no one was deceived by Mrs. O'Brien's manœuver of begging them to await their father's judgment in the matter. Rosie and Terence would have been willing to let it mark the close of the discussion, but not Ellen.

"I tell you, Ma," she insisted, "it's a perfect disgrace if you don't stop it right now!"

Terry regarded his sister grimly. "Listen here, Ellen O'Brien, I've got something to say to you: Who's been paying your carfare and your lunch money, too, ever since you been going to this fool business college?"

Mrs. O'Brien feebly interposed: "Ah now, Terry lad, Ellen's just borrowin' the money from you. She'll pay you back as soon as she gets a job, won't you, Ellen dear?"

Terence grunted impatiently. "Aw, don't go talkin' to me about borrowin'! I guess I know what borrowin' means in this house! But I tell you one thing, Ellen O'Brien: if you don't stop your jawin' about Rosie, it'll be the last cent of carfare and lunch money you ever get out o' me!"

More than two-thirds of Terence's weekly earnings went into the family coffers, so what he said carried weight. Ellen tossed her head but was careful not to speak.

Terence rumbled on disjointedly: "Business college! Business nuthin'! I bet all you do down there is look at yourself in a glass and fix your hair and shine your nails. Huh!"

Ellen shrugged her handsome shoulders and, tilting a scornful nose, returned to her pothooks.

Rosie was jubilant. She was sure Terry had intended letting her keep on, but Ellen's opposition had clinched the matter firmly.

"So it's all settled," she told her friend, Janet McFadden, the next day. "Just think of it, Janet – twenty cents a week!"

Janet sighed. "My, Rosie! What are you going to do with it all?"

Rosie hadn't quite decided.

Janet was ready with a good suggestion. "Why don't you save it and buy roller skates, Rosie? I don't mean old common sixty-cent ones, but a fine expensive pair with good ball-bearings. Then you could skate on Boulevard Place. Why, Rosie, is there anything in the world you'd rather do than go up to Boulevard Place with a pair of fine skates? And listen here, Rosie: if you lend them to me in the afternoon while you're on your paper route, I'll take good care of them, honest I will."

H'm, roller skates. The longer Rosie thought about the idea, the better she liked it. She decided to talk it over with Danny Agin on Monday afternoon when she left him his paper.

Danny met her with a sly grin. "Have you been chin-chopperin' some more of them, Rosie?"

Rosie looked at her old friend reprovingly. "Aw now, Danny, why do you always talk about that? I don't like to fight boys, you know I don't. It was Otto Schnitzer's own fault. But, Danny, listen here: Bet you can't guess what I'm saving for."

Danny couldn't, so Rosie explained. Then she continued:

"You see it's this way, Danny: those old cheap skates are no good anyhow. They're always breaking. I'd give anything for a good pair and so would Janet. We just love to skate on Boulevard Place – the cement's so smooth and it's so shady and pretty. But do you know, Danny, last summer when we used to go up there on one old broken skate they called us 'muckers.' We're not muckers just because we're poor, are we, Danny?"

Danny Agin snorted with indignation. "As long as ye mind yir manners, ye're not to be called muckers! You don't fight 'em, Rosie, and call 'em names, do you?"

"No, Danny, I don't, honest I don't, but sometimes Janet does. She gets awful mad if any one calls her 'Cross-back!' You see, Danny, they're all Protestants and Jews on Boulevard Place."

"From their manners, Rosie, I'd know that!"

"But it seems to me, Danny, if we had a pair of ball-bearing skates we'd be just as good as they are."

"Betther!" said Danny.

"So you think I'm right to save for skates, do you, Danny?"

"Do I think so? I do. Why, Rosie dear, as soon as people find out that ye're savin' in earnest, they'll be givin' ye many an odd penny here and there. Let me see now… Go to the panthry, Rosie, and on the third shelf from the top ye'll see a cup turned upside down, and under the cup – well, I dunno what's under the cup."

Rosie went to the pantry and under the cup found two nice brown pennies. "Thanks, Danny. But do you think Mis' Agin would want me to take them?"

"Mary? Why, Mary'd be givin' ye a nickel – she's that proud of you for chin-chopperin' the young Schnitzer. He stones her cat, but if he does it again she'll be warnin' him that you'll take after him. Ha, ha, that'll stop him if anything will!"

CHAPTER IV
A LITTLE SAVINGS ACCOUNT

What Danny said proved right. As soon as Rosie's immediate family and friends heard of the project, they gave her every encouragement. Little Jack lent her his last Christmas money-box – one of those tin banks whose opening is supposed to be burglarproof against the seducing attractions of all hatpins and buttonhooks except those employed by its rightful owner – and Mrs. O'Brien suggested at once that the old wardrobe upstairs would be the place of greatest safety for the bank.

"You can get into it whenever you like, Rosie dear, for you know yourself where the key's to be found."

It might be argued that every one else in the family knew where the key was to be found, for it was an open secret that its hiding-place was under the foot of the washstand. Nevertheless, it was an accepted tradition that anything in the wardrobe was under lock and key and therefore safe. So, with unbounded confidence, Rosie slipped her first week's wages into Jack's money-box and carefully locked the old wardrobe.

George Riley, the boarder, was the first to make a handsome contribution.

"Do you know, Rosie," he said, "here you are carrying my supper up to the cars every night and I've never said anything more than 'Thank you.' I just tell you I'm ashamed of myself! After this I'm going to pay you a nickel a week regular."

"Aw now, Jarge, you won't do any such thing!" Rosie shook her head vigorously. "You can't afford it! And besides, Jarge, I just love to carry your supper up to the cars, honest I do!"

"Of course you do! And why? 'Cause you're my girl!" George turned Rosie's face up and gave her a hearty kiss. "Now you'll be making twenty-five cents a week regular. Here's a nickel for last week."

Twenty-five cents a week and two good sure jobs to one who, but a few days before, was nothing but a penniless creature dependent on any chance windfall! Rosie hugged herself in delighted amazement. She even bragged a little to her friend Janet McFadden.

"Why, Janet, once you know how to do it, making money's just as easy as falling off a log! Look at me: My papers don't take me more'n half an hour in the afternoon and carrying Jarge's supper-pail up to the cars is just fun. And every Saturday night twenty-five cents, if you please!"

Janet said "Oh!" with a rising inflection and "Oh!" with a falling inflection: "Oh! Oh!"

"And besides that, if I hadn't my paper route I'd have to take care of Geraldine all afternoon. Don't you see?"

"You would indeed, Rosie, I know you would."

Rosie looked at her friend thoughtfully. "Say, Janet, why don't you get a job? Of course, I'll lend you my skates, but if we both had a pair we could go to Boulevard Place together. Wouldn't that be fun?"

Janet cleared her throat apologetically. "Do you think Terry would give me a job, Rosie?"

Hardly. Though he did employ Rosie, Terence was scarcely in position to employ every needy female that might apply to him. Rosie spoke kindly but firmly:

"No, Janet, I don't believe Terry can take on any more girls. When I get my skates, though, I tell you what I'll do: I'll let you 'sub' for me sometimes. Yes. On the afternoons I go to skate on Boulevard Place, I'll let you deliver my papers. I'll pay you three cents a day. Three cents ain't much but, if you save 'em real hard, they count up – really they do. If you 'sub' for me eight different times then you'll have twenty-four cents. I told you, didn't I, that twenty-five cents is what's coming in to me now every week regular?"

Yes, Rosie had already specified the amount many times but Janet, being a devoted friend, exclaimed with unabated enthusiasm: "You don't say so, Rosie! Well, I think that's just grand!"

Janet was right. It is fine to have an income that permits one to enjoy the good things of life. Without a touch of envy Rosie could now view the rich Jews and Protestants as they skimmed the smooth surface of Boulevard Place. She, too, would soon be rolling along as well skated as the best of them. The time was not far distant when, hearing the soft whirr of the ball-bearings, they would look at her with a new respect and no longer call out "Mucker!" the moment her back was turned.

This was the happy side of saving. There was, however, another side, and to ignore it would be to ignore the effect upon character which any effort as conscious as saving must produce. In simple innocence Rosie had started out supposing that all that was necessary toward saving was to have something savable. She soon discovered her mistake. The prime essential in saving was not, after all, the possession of a tidy little sum coming in at regular intervals, so much as the ability to keep that sum intact. That is to say, for the sake of this one Big Thing, that looms up faint but powerfully attractive on the distant horizon, you must do without all the Little Things that make daily life so pleasant.