The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1883-10-17

Nor we 'lS in dreams for some sweet thing
long tl"l.
It's cold and lonely now set wide the door
Good-morrow, heart. and rest thee evermore.
-IhHip H"r,h" .Hr,Sion. IN Hn'pcr.
TIE BABl'S MISSION
The Mulantys commenced with a
battered-up old grandfather who pos
sesSed a disastrous ia ent for getting
into trouble and staying there, and
ended in a crumb OF Il baby, whose
name had been twisted by some inron-
ceivable process from John Patrick
Michael into Tim. lie vas such Il
skinny baby that nature must have
patched him up out Of the cuttings and
scrapings of luckier patterns, and, fall
ing short # sight, hal made it up to
him in gloriouSly big slate-gray eyes
that "opened wide but could not see
There was a widow and some odds
and ends of children wcGged in be-
tween the two, and all lived together
in a Stutlv little house that was aS like
as peas to the mob Of other stutf,v
houses that disgrared both side>o Of the
street-only it wasn't a street, after
all, but an alley, choked up with want
and ilavore with babies: with Il red
lamp swung out at II corner where
the beer-Shop stood, and a dismal little
Indian upholding with its one foot
(the other might have been in its
grave for all Stun Alley knew or 10th
cred the cigar-Storc interests at the
other.
Grandfather Mulanev ownel a COW
that came as near his ideal us any COW
could that gave milk instead Of whisky,
and he divided his tine impartially
between it and those patriotic meet
ings the Al!eyites devoted to poor Ire
land and worse poteen. Then there
was a riG-two ~pigS-tucked und"r
the woodshcd, that sIuealed and scuf
fled and grunted, and astraddling r o s
ter that cackleI, regardless Of sex, and
a cat that mewcd, and a dog that
whined-and then, by way of rivalry,
the odds and ends of MulanevS, who
squealed and shuttle and cackled and
whined worse than them all put TO-
gether.
Mother Mulaney was n Of those
misery-ridden widows the world knows
by healt-a woman who laundried her
life away with all the odds and ends
Juggling at her gatherS-all save Kitty,
who even resented the figurative apron
strings now that she had asserted her
superiority to them by standing in a
store uptown.
Pretty Kitty, Her eyes were Irish
blue. her hair was Irish black, her
heart-but all Stun NJ ey stoutiy de-
MED that Kitty Mulaney had one. She
was tall and straight as a poplar sap
ling, was Kitty, and she had a trick Of
lifting 1ler eyebrows at her neighbors,
which was rather superb, but pretty
conclusive evidence that the diagnosis
of Stun Alley was correct.
How she lad managed to grow up
under such cramped circumstances, or
how the beauty her mother had left
behind her in the peat boys OF Ireland
along with her youth had found such
a glorious resurrection in her fac,
never puzzled the brain of Mis-, Kitty
Mulaney-she was tall, and there were
the Irish eyes and the clouds of black
hair tantalizing her from the cracked
bit of mirror cay after day, till her
vanity hlcd at the idea of wasting so
much sweetness on two old people anil
a gang of noisy cubS-for there vas
enough OF Grandfather Mulaney's
blood rioting through her veins to
warrant that young person in calling
a spade a spade.
It was no crime, surely, to rebel
against the fate that had cast her
. among them like a jewel in Il dust
heap, but if it had heen rankest trea-
son Miss Mulancy would have gone on
rebelIing all the same. Stun Alley
was good enough, perhaps, for her
moldy Old grandfather and those
knuckle-bones of children, but fate
should have remembered that she was
Kitty Mulanev, and cut her cloth ac-
cordinSly. She loved her mother, of
course, but deep down in her heart
(for she really had one, though it WAS
so cramped and stitied under its heaps
of vanity and ruinous pride that Stun
Alley might well beforgiven %itsdoubts)
she knew she was ashamed Of the toll
stained face and naked brogue, and
she never meant to forgive her father
for dying as poor a. he did.
Those other girls at the shop could
have theiI evenings to themselves,
with a trip now and then to the thea
ire, and friends they were not ashamed
to own, while she-she-must trudge
home to bare floors and sud, stained
walls, 10 coarse fare heaped on cloudy
dishe:, with the Odds and ends squeal.
ing and scu.i!ing about her while she
ate it, and Baby Tim actually sIuirm-
ing up in her lap from under the tail"
to coil his wien little arms around her
dainty waist.
She was tired, of course, and there
was little exhilaration in kissing. a
scrap of a face that was black with
dirt and generally blue with bruises
so Miss Mulaney never did it and the
chill, whose love for his eldest sister,
like the brilliant red flower of the cac-
tus, was the one passion Of his thorny
little life, would accept his defeat with
something shining in his sightlesS eyes
that ought to have brought tears to
her own, and go scuttling about the
floor squealing worse than ever. 1t
counted for little that the sud-stains
meant 50 mu h of her mo'her's
strength: she only knew that she was
spending her youth with neither pleas
ure nor profit, that Tins Grafton
was the torment Of her life, and that
Grandfather Mu!apey's. playing fast
and loose with the proprietor Of the
red lamp at IL corner of the alley and
Che sa"age at the other, getting his
drinks and smoke free and welcome in
change for the hopes. so lavislly given
in pay, was nearly driving her frantic,
as if she would ever, ever
cav coorse not, jewel" chuckled
the d~issipatcd old villain; "sure, it's
cho0sin' twixt the byes would Spite me
game intoirely."
That ended everything. For year
she had been plotting and planning to
get rid of it all, the poverty and dirt
and disgrace of Stun Alley, and now