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Wanted–A Real Mother
by
“Seventeen years ago there came to a town in the eastern part of Pennsylvania a young man and his bride. Just a slip of a girl she was, but her face was full of sunshine and every one soon loved her. She had beautiful wavy hair and bright, blue eyes and a cheery smile. After they had been there for a while, their story came to be known, for his father was the great mill owner in a near-by town. When the young man had married the High School girl instead of the wealthy one whom the father had chosen for him, there had been a lot of trouble and the young man had been told to leave home with his bride and expect no more help from the father.
“Now the young man had never worked, so it was very hard for him, but she also worked and, little by little, they bought the things needed in the tiny home on the hill, and they were very happy. Then, one day, a scaffold fell and they brought the young husband to the little wife all bruised and bleeding, and that very night a tiny girl came to the home to live. The neighbors helped all they could, but in a few days the father of the baby was gone, and the little girl-wife was left alone to care for the baby.
“When the mill owner heard of the death of the son and the birth of the little girl, he sent to the mother and said: ‘We will take the little girl and bring it up as our own if you will give it to us and have no more to do with it.’ But the brave little woman sent back answer, ‘As long as I have a mind with which to think and two hands with which to work, I can and will support my little girl. I thank you for your offer, but I love my baby too much to accept it.’
“But it was a hard pull. She worked in an office; she worked on a farm. Then a position was offered her as a teacher in a Home for Little Children. Here she could have her own room and keep the baby with her when she was not teaching. And while she was teaching, it would be cared for with the rest. Gladly the mother took the position and for more than a year she was very, very happy.
“One night when the baby was nearly three years old, she sat reading in the parlor of the home when some one called, ‘Fire! Fire! Fire in the left wing!’ Oh! that was where her baby was, on the very top floor. Like a bird she flew across the hall where the smoke already was pouring out. Up the first flight, choking, she went. Up the second. Then she had to fall to the floor to creep along. She could see the fire. It was on the fourth floor where her Mary was. Could she ever reach it? Would the fire block her way?
“Ten minutes after the call of fire had been given, the workers saw some one staggering through the lower hall. In her arms she carried a bundle wrapped tightly in a bed-quilt. And dangling from her hands was a long string of beads. Her face was burned. There was no hair on her head. She was writhing in agony, but she reached the door, handed the burden to a worker, saying quietly, ‘I am badly burned, but I have saved my two treasures. Keep them safely for me.’ Then she fell in a heap on the floor.
“For months and months and months she tossed on a bed of pain. No one thought she could possibly live. But she did, for she was living for her baby. When at last she came from the hospital, her beautiful face was scarred and red; only in spots had the hair grown; her hands were stiff and painful, and one leg dragged as she walked. But she was alive, and that was all she asked.