Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1894-02-16
JEANIB'S LOVE LETTERS.

Jeanne Campbell came back from the
tailor's shop where she worked, and found
company of boys and girls congregatet
round the doorstep of the tall tenement
house in which she rented one small. back
room. They were hooting and ieering al
man seated in his shirt sleeves on the
doorstep placidly smoking huge German
porcelain pipe. The man did not seem in
the least disturbed at their ieers and
shrieks, but smoked on with his ewes fixed
upon one strip of sunset sky visible above
the grimy roofs.
Jeanie pushed her way in.
whats the matter?'
"Yah-Dutchy! INT e blooming soft
Give boy shilling to 90 and fetch IN
something to eat and is witing ere for
m. INT e style! Wonder 'ow long
he'll wite?"
"Who is hep"
"a blooming Dutchy learnt speak no
English, e carnt-'as to make signs-and
nobody ere carnt speak nothing else. INT
e a softy!'
The girl paused and looked at the man ::
there was something in his patient atti-
tude that aroused her pity. Some softer
remembrance of the days when she came
to this great, wicked London came over
ana
bright, and the healthy tinge of his whole
some face, smote upon her with pang of
recollection of the honest Scottish faces
she had left with contempt for their con-
tent, when she had started forth to see life
in London.
She went up to the man and signed to
him to follow her indoors. She tried to
make him understand that he had been
robbed. The soft, gentle tones that an
swered her were quite unintelligible: he
smiled, shrugged his shoulders, spread his
hands, and looked at her with that calm
trustfulness one sees in dogs and children.
She smiled, nodded, pointed up the
stairs, and then ran out of the house.
She returned with a loaf of bread and a
halt pound of sausages for him, and roll
Tor herself; she would make that do: he
was stranger, alone and friendless.
She put the things in his hand, pointing
down the street as if to indicate that She
had brought the things from the boy. He
seemed to understand, took her hand. and
raised it to his lips; the action was so
simple, so grateful, that she felt ashamed.
and ran up stairs to her own room.
Her comfortless breakfast of a dry roll
the next morning made her little regret
iul OF her charity the night before. He
must shift for himself as ! have had to
do, she thought, and she went out to her
days work
When she returned in the evening she
found him standing outside his door He
bowed and smiled, opened his door, and
showed his various purchases on his table.
He had evidently found his way round to
shops.
She went up the stairs, feeling the least
little bit disarr tied that he did not re-
y cure hec more. He seemed diff
60 cpo- men and women she
cam, .--.. ..st'WI,h in her city life. The
air of the fields seemed to cling to him
still. She thought as she toiled up the
weary stairs how sweet the country must
be looking now. Was the sun shining on
the hills a. home and making the waters of
the loch sparkle-the bonnie hills that she
would never see again? Friends were
dead, and to tailoress at twelve shillings
a week ii was indeed far cry TO Loeb
Awe
Something was on her table. little
sketch of a sweep of wide hills, with fir
forests clinging to their sides, a little clus-
ter of houses with wide overhanging roofs
and shutters to the windows. A figure
was standing in the. doorway of one of the
houses.
That is his house." said Jeanie to her
self What funny thing to do, to give
me picture of it / wish l could send
him back one of Loeb Awe, and our house
mp on the braes."