Part 6

Some very odd things happen in this world sometimes. It certainly was an odd thing which happened to Sara. She had to cross the street just as she was saying this to herself--the mud was dreadful--she almost had to wade. She picked her way as carefully as she could, but she could not save herself much, only, in picking her way she had to look down at her feet and the mud, and in looking down--just as she reached the pavement--she saw something shining in the gutter. A piece of silver--a tiny piece trodden upon by many feet, but still with spirit enough to shine a little. Not quite a sixpence, but the next thing to it--a four-penny piece! In one second it was in her cold, little red and blue hand. “Oh!” she gasped. “It is true!”

And then, if you will believe me, she looked straight before her at the shop directly facing her. And it was a baker's, and a cheerful, stout, motherly woman, with rosy cheeks, was just putting into the window a tray of delicious hot buns,--large, plump, shiny buns, with currants in them.

It almost made Sara feel faint for a few seconds--the shock and the sight of the buns and the delightful odors of warm bread floating up through the baker's cellar-window.

She knew that she need not hesitate to use the little piece of money. It had evidently been lying in the mud for some time, and its owner was completely lost in the streams of passing people who crowded and jostled each other all through the day.

“But I'll go and ask the baker's woman if she has lost a piece of money,” she said to herself, rather faintly.

So she crossed the pavement and put her wet foot on the step of the shop; and as she did so she saw something which made her stop.

It was a little figure more forlorn than her own--a little figure which was not much more than a bundle of rags, from which small, bare, red and muddy feet peeped out--only because the rags with which the wearer was trying to cover them were not long enough. Above the rags appeared a shock head of tangled hair and a dirty face, with big, hollow, hungry eyes.

Sara knew they were hungry eyes the moment she saw them, and she felt a sudden sympathy.

“This,” she said to herself, with a little sigh, “is one of the Populace--and she is hungrier than I am.”

The child--this “one of the Populace”--stared up at Sara, and shuffled herself aside a little, so as to give her more room. She was used to being made to give room to everybody. She knew that if a policeman chanced to see her, he would tell her to “move on.”

Sara clutched her little four-penny piece, and hesitated a few seconds. Then she spoke to her.

“Are you hungry?” she asked.

The child shuffled herself and her rags a little more.

“Ain't I jist!” she said, in a hoarse voice. “Jist ain't I!”

“Haven't you had any dinner?” said Sara.

“No dinner,” more hoarsely still and with more shuffling, “nor yet no bre'fast--nor yet no supper--nor nothin'.”

“Since when?” asked Sara.

“Dun'no. Never got nothin' to-day--nowhere. I've axed and axed.”

Just to look at her made Sara more hungry and faint. But those queer little thoughts were at work in her brain, and she was talking to herself though she was sick at heart.

“If I'm a princess,” she was saying--“if I'm a princess--! When they were poor and driven from their thrones--they always shared--with the Populace--if they met one poorer and hungrier. They always shared. Buns are a penny each. If it had been sixpence! I could have eaten six. It won't be enough for either of us--but it will be better than nothing.”

“Wait a minute,” she said to the beggar-child. She went into the shop. It was warm and smelled delightfully. The woman was just going to put more hot buns in the window.

“If you please,” said Sara, “have you lost fourpence--a silver fourpence?” And she held the forlorn little piece of money out to her.

The woman looked at it and at her--at her intense little face and draggled, once-fine clothes.

“Bless us--no,” she answered. “Did you find it?”

“In the gutter,” said Sara.

“Keep it, then,” said the woman. “It may have been there a week, and goodness knows who lost it. You could never find out.”

“I know that,” said Sara, “but I thought I'd ask you.”

“Not many would,” said the woman, looking puzzled and interested and good-natured all at once. “Do you want to buy something?” she added, as she saw Sara glance toward the buns.