FullReads

“But, Jane,” she said finally, “the dogs go out walking—and—and nobody steals the dogs.”

“Hear the silly child!” cried Jane. “Nobody steals the dogs! Why, if anybody was to steal the dogs what good would it do ’em? They’re only Pomeranians anyhow, and Madam could go straight out and buy more. Besides, like as not Pomeranians won’t be stylish next year, and so Madam wouldn’t care two snaps. She’d go buy the latest thing in poodles, or else a fine collie, or a spaniel or a Spitz.”

“But other little girls walk all the time,” insisted Gwendolyn, “and nobody steals them.”

Jane crossed her knees, pursed her mouth and folded her arms. “Well, Thomas,” she said, shaking her head, “I guess after all that I’ll have to tell her.”

“Ah, yes, I suppose so,” agreed Thomas. His tone was funereal.

Gwendolyn looked from one to the other.

“I haven’t wanted to,” continued Jane, dolefully. “You know that. But now she forces me to do it. Though I’m as sorry as sorry can be.”

Thomas had just taken his portion of cake in one great mouthful. “Fo’m my,” he chimed in.

Gwendolyn looked concerned. “But I’m seven,” she reiterated.

“Seven?” said Jane. “What has that got to do with it? Age don’t matter.”

Gwendolyn did not flinch.

“You said nobody steals other little girls,” went on Jane. “It ain’t true. Poor little girls and boys, nobody steals. You can see ’em runnin’ around loose everywheres. But it’s different when a little girl’s papa is made of money.”

“So much money,” added Thomas, “that it fairly makes me palm itch.” Whereat he fell to rubbing one open hand against a corner of the piano.

Gwendolyn reflected a moment. Then, “But my fath-er isn’t made of money,”—she lingered a little, tenderly, over the word father, pronouncing it as if it were two words. “I know he isn’t. When I was at Johnnie Blake’s cottage, we went fishing, and fath-er rolled up his sleeves. And his arms were strong; and red, like Jane’s.”

Thomas sniggered.

But Jane gestured impatiently. Then, making scared eyes, “What has that got to do,” she demanded, “with the wicked men that keep watch of this house?“

Gwendolyn swallowed. “What wicked men?” she questioned apprehensively.

“Ah-ha!” triumphed Jane. “I thought that’d catch you! Now just let me ask you another question: Why are there bars on the basement windows?“

Gwendolyn’s lips parted to reply. But no words came.

“You don’t know,” said Jane. “But I’ll tell you something: There ain’t no bars on the windows where poor little girls live. For the simple reason that nobody wants to steal them.”

Gwendolyn considered the statement, her fingers still busy knotting and unknotting.

“I tell you,” Jane launched forth again, “that if you run about on the street, like poor children do, you’ll be grabbed up by a band of kidnapers.”

“Are—are kidnapers worse than doctors?” asked Gwendolyn.

“Worse than doctors!” scoffed Thomas, “Heaps worse.”

“Worse than—than bears?” (The last trace of that rebellious red was gone.)

Up and down went Jane’s head solemnly. “Kidnapers carry knives—big curved knives.”

Now Gwendolyn recalled a certain terror-inspiring man with a long belted coat and a cap with a shiny visor. It was not his height that made her fear him, for her father was fully as tall; and it was not his brass-buttoned coat, or the dark, piercing eyes under the visor. She feared him because Jane had often threatened her with his coming; and, secondly, because he wore, hanging from his belt, a cudgel—long and heavy and thick. How that cudgel glistened in the sunlight as it swung to and fro by a thong!

“Worse than a—a p’liceman?” she faltered.

“Policeman? Yes!“

“Than the p’liceman that’s—that’s always hanging around here?”

Now Jane giggled, and blushed as red as her hair. “Hush!” she chided.

Thomas poked a teasing finger at her. “Haw! Haw!” he laughed. “There’s other people that’s noticed a policeman hangin’ round. He’s a dandy, he is!—not. He let that old hand organ man give him a black eye.”

“Pooh!” retorted Jane. “You know how much I care about that policeman! It’s only that I like to have him handy for just such times as this.”

But Gwendolyn was dwelling on the newly discovered scourge of moneyed children. “What would the kidnapers do?” she inquired.

“The kidnapers,” promptly answered Jane, “would take you and shut you up in a nasty cellar, where there was rats and mice and things and—”