om "The Opposite House," published by T.
Woolmer, 2 Castle Street, E.C.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER II.

ITS RESULTS.

"WHERE'S mother, Mrs. Warren?" inquired a girl of about seven or eight
years of age, with pallid face, and dress hanging in tatters about her
bare feet, as she slowly dragged up the broken stairs to the one room
where her father and mother, herself, and four younger children lived
and slept.

"You needn't ask me, child. She's locked her door, and the little uns
are inside; and here's the key. I 'spect she's off on a spree." The
child took the key, and sighing heavily, proceeded on her way. Two of
the children were screaming loudly, but ceased their cries as she
entered the room, and began, one to crawl, and the other to toddle,
towards the only being in their little world who never struck or kicked
them, but tended them with the love and gentleness which, but for her,
they would never have known.

"Mammie's left us all alone, Mattie; and Fan and baby has been crying
all the morning, and Bob and me's been doing all we can, and they won't
do nothing but scream," exclaimed the eldest of the four children in
wearied tones.

"That's right, Melie; you're good children; but I've come home, and 'll
look after the lot of you. What's for dinner? Did mammie say?"

"There's some crusts left up on the mantel," answered Melie.

"Bob, you just climb up and fetch 'em down, and I'll nurse the baby,
and, Fan, you come right away and sit by me." Mattie picked up the
dirty, tear-stained baby, and seated herself on the only chair in the
room. She had been to school all the morning, and, while ostensibly
puzzling her little brain with the mysteries of "the three R's," her
heart had been full of fear for those little ones in the house. What if
her mother should leave them with the door unlocked, and Fan and baby
should find their way headlong down those dark, steep stairs? Or,
suppose the window in their room should by any means become unfastened,
and one of them should fall to the pavement beneath; for Mattie
remembered that, only the week before, a drunken mother had let her baby
drop from her arms out of the window at the top of the house into the
court below, from whence it had been picked up a shapeless, bleeding
mass. So she was greatly relieved that everything had gone well in her
absence. As for Fan's and baby's crying, that was to be expected while
she was away.

"I shan't go to school this a