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Rose Clark
Rose Clark
CHAPTER I
"Here is number fifty-four, Timmins," said the matron of a charity-school to her factotum, as she led in a little girl about six years of age; "number fifty-four; you must put another cot in the long hall, and another plate in the eating-room. What is your name, child?"
"Rose," replied the little one, vailing her soft, dark eyes under their curtaining lashes, and twisting the corner of a cotton shawl.
"Rose!" repeated the matron, in a contemptuous aside, to Timmins; "I knew it would be sure to be something fanciful; beggars always go on stilts."
"I am not a beggar," said the child, "I am mother's little Rose."
"Mother's little Rose?" repeated the matron, again, in the same sneering tone; "well – who was mother?"
"Mother is dead," said the child, with a quivering lip.
"No loss, either," said Mrs. Markham to Timmins, "since she did not know better than to let the child run in the streets."
"Mother was sick, and I had to go of errands," said the child, defensively.
"Ah, yes – always an excuse; but do you know that I am the matron of this establishment? and that you must never answer me back, in that way? Do you know that you must do exactly as I and the committee say? Timmins, bring me the scissors and let us lop off this mop of a wig," and she lifted up the clustering curls, behind which Rose seemed trying to hide.
"There – now you look proper and more befitting your condition," said Mrs. Markham, as the sheared lamb rose from its kneeling posture and stood before her. "Timmins, Timmins!" Mrs. Markham whispered, "don't throw away those curls; the hairdresser always allows me something handsome for them. It is curious what thick hair beggar children always have."