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Race Brokers
 Race Brokers
Housing Markets and Segregation in
21st-​Century Urban America

E L I Z A B E T H KO RV E R-​G L E N N

1
 3
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DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190063863.001.0001

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For Randall, Jude, and Emma
With deepest love
For Rice Sociology

With deepest gratitude

 Contents

Acknowledgments  ix

Introduction  1
1. H-​Town  21
2. Building Homes  40
3. Brokering Sales  62
4. Lending Capital  91
5. Appraising Value  116
6. Fair Housing  143
Conclusion  162

Methodological Appendix  175

Notes  183
References  201
Index  215
 Acknowledgments

One of the deep joys of pursuing an academic career has been sharing life
and research with a supportive, generous, critical, and brilliant community
made up of academic colleagues, acquaintances, friends, and family. While
any errors in this work are my responsibility alone, Race Brokers would not
exist without the web of intellectual, emotional, and practical supports my
community has provided along the way.
Rice University’s Sociology Department started a new PhD program, and
as part of their initial graduate student recruiting, the faculty took a chance
(from my perspective) and accepted me into the program. Because I had no
research background, they basically had to start from scratch when I matric-
ulated. They expended countless hours advising and training me as well
as equipping me with practical resources to progress through and excel in
graduate school. Jim Elliott: Thank you. I will never forget your eagerness to
join me in a day of fieldwork as I drove you around Houston and explained
what I was doing. Your keen questions and insight, constructive criticism
and encouragement, and general good humor motivated me and made me a
stronger and better person and scholar. You made all the difference. Michael
Emerson: Thank you. You believed in this project from the beginning and
have cheered me on ever since. I hope you know that you and your work
have long been one of my main sources of inspiration. Thank you also for
providing feedback and encouragement on this book at various stages. You
helped me cross the finish line. Jenifer Bratter, Sergio Chávez, Elaine Howard
Ecklund, and Ruth López Turley: Thank you. You all trained and mentored
me through multiple important milestones and served key roles as members
of my master’s thesis, comprehensive exam, and/​or doctoral dissertation
committees. You also helped immensely with my professionalization into ac-
ademia; I learned and continue to learn so much from each of you from afar.
Other Rice Sociology faculty provided many other kinds of valuable support,
including Rachel Kimbro, who helped me transition to the world of being
both a graduate student and a mother.
Being a member of the Rice Sociology community also meant joining an
incredible group of graduate students and post-​docs, many of whom remain
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x Acknowledgments

close colleagues and friends. Junia Howell: I cannot believe the good fortune
I have had to know, work with, and love you. Thank you for your honesty,
encouragement, and support. From helping me understand contemporary
theory during the first semester of graduate school to caring for my chil-
dren, picking me up from airports, cooking for me, co-​authoring with me,
and reading and providing critical feedback on multiple iterations of this
book—​thank you. Sandra Alvear, Kevin Smiley, and Ellen Whitehead: I’m so
grateful to each of you for the constructive and generous ways you live and
work. Each of you has shaped me in profound ways. Thanks, friends.
While at Rice, I also had the amazing privilege of learning with and from
brilliant and generous faculty, staff, and students in other departments. In
the history department, Alex Byrd and David Ponton III deeply influenced
this particular project as well as my long-​ term research trajectory.
Dr. Byrd: Thank you for supporting this project and pushing me to read and
think critically about race, racism, and cities. Your comments during my dis-
sertation defense remain with me to this day. David: Thank you. I continue
to learn from your brilliance and thank my lucky stars that you and I were
in that same graduate seminar that first semester. I cherish our friendship.
Thanks also for reading and providing helpful feedback on various book
chapter iterations. Other faculty and staff at Rice, including Jean Aroom at
the GIS/​Data Center and Libby Vann and Alan Steinberg at the Center for
Civic Leadership, shaped not only this project but also who I am as an aca-
demic and how I approach my work. And, undergraduate students at Rice
breathed life into my tired bones. Working with you all in teaching and re-
search roles and advising you in community-​based participatory research
confirmed that I did really want to pursue this academic life. I also thank the
Social Sciences Research Institute at Rice, which provided grant support for
professional transcription of the in-​depth interviews I conducted. Speaking
of in-​depth interviews, I am grateful for the many dozens of people who par-
ticipated in this study as interviewees and informants—​I learned much be-
cause you generously shared your time and professional expertise.
I am also deeply grateful for the many scholars I now have the pleasure
of knowing as departmental and professional colleagues and friends. Many
colleagues at or previously at the University of New Mexico (UNM) have
helped me with the book-​writing process. Sharon Erickson Nepstad and
Owen Whooley both provided valuable feedback on my book prospectus
and advised me through the book contract process. Lisa Broidy, Felipe
Gonzales, Sofia Locklear, Nancy López, Wayne Santoro, María Vélez, Owen
 Acknowledgments xi

Whooley, Jon Williams, and Eli Wilson all provided valuable feedback on
previous iterations of book chapters. To my students at UNM: thank you
for your sharp questions and critical insights. You inspire me every day.
In fact, I had you in mind as I wrote each chapter of this book. Outside of
UNM, Clayton Childress, Nicole Gonzalez Van Cleve, Neda Maghbouleh,
Amaka Okechukwu, Ranita Ray, and Chris Smith all helped me through the
book prospectus writing, feedback-​getting, and submission process in var-
ious ways. Thank you all. Thanks also to Dan Hirschman, Whitney Pirtle,
Victor Ray, Jake Rugh, Louise Seamster, and Haj Yazdiha, all of whom read
portions of this book in its previous iterations and provided incisive, encour-
aging feedback. Special thanks to Haj, who has been an extraordinary book
buddy, friend, and fellow academic mama. Thanks also to Max Besbris, who
provided critical, generative comments on my writing and helpful advice on
the book publishing process. I also thank Cristina Mora, Mary Pattillo, and
Robert Vargas, each of whom asked important questions and gave valuable
comments at various stages of the analysis process. Thanks to Jeff Guhin and
Tony Lin, who co-​hosted an early morning Zoom writing group during the
COVID-​19 crisis that gave me the structure I needed to complete final book
revisions. I also thank Michael Allen, Diane Houk, and Morgan Williams,
all of whom generously shared their fair housing legal expertise with me.
Prentiss Dantzler read through and provided detailed, extremely helpful
feedback on the penultimate draft of this book—​thank you, dear friend.
I’m so grateful to share the journey with you! Audra Wolfe (The Outside
Reader): Thank you for helping me strengthen this manuscript through crit-
ical, constructive editorial assistance. Thank you to James Cook and Emily
Mackenzie at Oxford University Press and to the reviewers who helped make
this book stronger. Each of you has shaped my thinking and writing in pro-
found ways. Thank you all.
Other key organizations and people made this work possible by providing
fellowship and childcare support. The Institute for Analytic Sociology at
Linköping University in Sweden awarded me a Robert K. Merton Visiting
Research Fellowship, which supported me as I made book revisions. Thanks
especially to Peter Hedström, Karl Wennberg, Sarah Valdez, Ben Jarvis, Åsa
Arnoldson, and Madelene Töpfer, who all welcomed me and facilitated a
productive stay at the Institute. While in Sweden, my dear friends Alex and
Nate Messarra, sister Allegra, mom Marcia, and dad Bill provided childcare,
and Alex also provided feedback on book chapters. Thank you to you all. My
deepest thanks also to St. Matthew’s, especially Lisa, who cared for Jude and
xii Acknowledgments

made me think that everything would be okay during the data collection for
this project. Thanks also to Wesley Kids, especially Alex, Angelica, Christina,
Lori, Jackie, Roberta, Terri, and Vanessa who cared for Jude and Emma while
I completed this book. All of you have loved my children so well—​thank you
from the bottom of my heart.
Others have provided the intellectual, emotional, and motivational sup-
port to bring this project to fruition. Gloria Kenyon, Lenora McNamara,
Cynthia Muccio, and Lesley Vanaman: We must be the only “us” in the world,
right? Grateful for 20+ years with you all; thankful, too, for the general and
specific comments and questions you offered about this project that helped
strengthen it. Lynne Graham: You taught me how to read and write and,
when I was around you, never once did I feel weird or uncool (as I did most
of the time in high school). Thank you. Jennifer Aycock: Miracles happen
when kindred spirits come together. Running the race with you is my soul’s
deep delight. Je t’aime. Emily Zimbrick-​Rogers: you have inspired me for ten
years! I can’t wait until we actually meet in person one day. Karla and Rob
Woodruff: Your friendship has saved me over the past few years. Thank you
for sharing your lives and joy.
Finally, my family. Mom and dad, thank you for loving me uncondition-
ally, for teaching me grace, and for cultivating a thirst for knowledge and jus-
tice. I love you. Jared and Allegra: You have shown me, in word and deed,
how to be whole and at peace. I wouldn’t trade growing up and old with you
for the world. Each of you write in ways that motivate me to keep growing
past the limitations of my own writing: Thank you. Amy: What a joy it has
been to share life with you over the past decade. Your strength, courage, and
independence inspire me daily. Resa and Dell: Thank you for welcoming me
as your own and always finding ways to encourage me. Jude: I was terrified
of you at first, mainly because I had no idea what I was doing. But you, my
firstborn, are a force of nature. You single-​handedly transformed my fear into
purpose and you are the joy of my life. Emma: My firecracker, my comedi-
enne, my independent, fierce second-​born. You make me a stronger woman
every day; you are the light of my life. Randall: You have supported me in
every possible way; with you, I flourish. Thank you for journeying with me
through it all with humor, patience, hope, and steadfast love.
 Introduction

Racial segregation is so prevalent in American cities that it can seem normal,

even natural. Many Americans, including government officials and eve-
ryday housing consumers, view segregation in this way.1 Housing market
professionals, or those who professionally assist consumers with home
buying or selling, are no exception. For example, in April 2015, Jay, a White
middle-​aged real estate agent, invited me to his real estate brokerage in
Houston’s Montrose neighborhood. He wanted to show me a contract he
had drawn up for a house he had listed for sale in Near Northside, a Latinx2
neighborhood just north of downtown. After inviting me into the conference
room near the front of the brokerage office space, Jay explained the terms of
the contract. As he did so, he described who the buyers and sellers were and
also provided running commentary on Near Northside and its surrounding
areas, including several White neighborhoods west of Near Northside. “In
the last six months,” he said, “I’ve had lots of young hipsters calling. People
are being pushed out of the Heights, Norhill, and Brooke Smith. That’s
the natural progression, to come to Near Northside. The tide of hipsters is
coming.” Jay did not think that Near Northside would stay a Latinx neighbor-
hood for long.
Two months after I observed Jay at his brokerage, I met and interviewed
Diego, a Mexican American appraiser, at a diner in southeast Houston. Diego
explained that he tries not to allow “ethnicity” to come into his appraising.
But he went on to say that he thinks racial segregation exists because Black,
Latinx, and White individuals want to live near “someone who is your equal.”
For this reason, he explained, Black individuals wanted to live in the Black
Third Ward neighborhood “amongst their peers—​not my natural peers—​but
young Black urban professionals that are buying in that area.” From Diego’s
perspective, it seemed “natural” that Black professionals wanted to live near
Black peers and that he and other Latinx individuals—​such as his sister,
who had purchased a home in a Latinx neighborhood—​wanted to live near
Latinx peers.

Race Brokers. Elizabeth Korver-​Glenn, Oxford University Press (2021). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190063863.003.0001
2 Race Brokers

Then, in July 2015—​a month after I interviewed Diego—​I met Lauren, a

White real estate agent, at her brokerage on the west side of Houston. She led
me into a large multipurpose room that had several long tables and dozens of
chairs set up in anticipation of a continuing education class. We sat together
at one of these tables for our interview. Lauren told me that her White clients
make housing decisions based on neighborhood racial composition:

But, you know, I definitely see in clients when I’m showing them proper-
ties in some areas that they think, “Oh, you know, we love the look of this
neighborhood, we love the location. You know we love the price.” And I’ll
go and show them and they’ll make comments like, “Nobody here looks
like me.” And, you know, I think that’s natural. I don’t think that’s neces-
sarily a racist thing.

Less than a month after I interviewed Lauren, I interviewed Howie, a

White mortgage banker. Like Jay, Howie referred to the Heights and Brooke
Smith neighborhoods when he discussed differences in home values across
neighborhoods. Inhabited by White residents as the neighborhoods were de-
veloped from the late nineteenth through the mid-​twentieth centuries, these
areas became predominantly Latinx after several decades of White flight that
began in the 1960s. More recently, White residents have returned to these
areas. By the time I conducted my research, these areas were once again pre-
dominantly White, and property values were higher than before. Echoing
Jay’s comments, Howie explained that he thought these changes in both
neighborhood race and home values were a “natural progression.”
These housing market professionals recognized that Houston and other
American cities are racially segregated. In fact, Jay, Diego, Lauren, Howie,
and many other housing market professionals I studied viewed racial seg-
regation as so ever-​present as to seem “natural.” These professionals were
correct in their assessment that racial segregation is the way things are in
the United States. Most White Americans live in White neighborhoods and
most Asian, Black, and Latinx Americans live in neighborhoods of color.
In fact, although segregation appears to be slowly fading in some cities, it is
remaining stagnant or intensifying in other cities. This is especially true in
cities with large populations of residents of color, such as Atlanta, Houston,
and Miami (Frey 2010a, 2010b; Krysan and Crowder 2017).
Even as real estate professionals describe this situation as “natural,” it is
anything but, particularly given recent legal and social trends. Beginning in
 Introduction 3

1968, the U.S. Congress began to pass a series of laws that prohibited explicit
racial discrimination in the sale or rental of a home. Defendants of color won
numerous lawsuits against real estate agents, mortgage lenders, appraisers,
and other housing market professionals who had discriminated against them.
At approximately the same time these legal changes occurred, America’s so-
cial landscape began to shift dramatically. The proportion of Americans who
identified as White declined as White families began to have fewer children.
During the same period, millions of African, Asian, and Latin American
individuals—​most of whom moved directly to American cities rather than
rural areas—​immigrated to the United States, dramatically increasing urban
ethnoracial diversity. White Americans began to report more favorable and
less explicitly racist attitudes toward groups of color on surveys. Individuals
of color were increasingly able to purchase homes, and they more frequently
expressed a desire to live in racially diverse neighborhoods than their White
counterparts.
In other words, multiple conditions that could have contributed to more
rapid or steep declines in racial segregation did not do so and at times ac-
tually coincided with increases in racial segregation. This is because these
social and legal changes occurred even as racism, or the ideas and practices
that justify and maintain racial inequality and White dominance (Bonilla-​
Silva 2006; Fields and Fields 2014; Lewis and Diamond 2015), has persisted
in every major sphere of contemporary American life (Seamster and Ray
2018), including the housing market (Howell and Korver-​Glenn 2018;
Korver-​Glenn 2018a, 2018b).3 Indeed, racism, like racial segregation, has
become naturalized—​so pervasive that it seems natural (Jung 2015). Thus,
when considering the housing market and the role real estate professionals
play in shaping housing opportunities and urban residential landscapes, the
key question is not whether racial segregation is an inevitable, or natural, out-
come of market exchanges or whether racism contributes to racial segrega-
tion (see also Taylor 2019). Rather, it is how racism in real estate contributes
to racial segregation in twenty-​first-​century urban America.
The question is pressing. Racial segregation poses serious problems for
American society more broadly. Among many other problems, it is tied to
ongoing wealth, educational, and health inequalities; intensified and more
violent policing of Black and Latinx people; social isolation and lack of inter-
racial contact; and sociopolitical conflict. In other words, racial segregation
is one of the key mechanisms at the core of systemic American racial ine-
quality (Reskin 2012).
4 Race Brokers

This book examines how racism enables racial segregation to persist in

order to denaturalize and chip away at this inequality. To do so, it examines
real estate professionals, a group of individuals at the heart of the housing
market. Many of these professionals, including housing developers, real
estate agents, mortgage bankers, and appraisers, often portray their work
and its relationship to racial segregation as a passive—​and not necessarily
color-​blind—​response to market dynamics or the purportedly “natural” way
people prefer to live. But as I studied these individuals and learned about
their work from their perspectives, I came to the opposite conclusion. Racial
segregation is not a natural feature of the American urban landscape, a sur-
face contour that market professionals trace as they find it. Instead, housing
market professionals—​especially those who are White—​actively create ra-
cially unequal housing markets and urban landscapes. They do so by using
racist ideas to inform how they implement professional norms and pol-
icies and how they distribute their professional resources, including au-
thority, knowledge, and capital. These housing market professionals are race
and racism brokers: They make a hierarchy of racial categories socially and
materially real by ensuring that people who fall into what they perceive as
different categories receive unequal housing opportunities. Despite their in-
sistence otherwise, housing market professionals are the visible hands of the
housing market, and they often use racism to re-​create and exacerbate racial
segregation in their everyday work.
Among the housing market professionals I studied, one small group—​
almost all individuals of color—​were a sharp foil for how their White
counterparts and, at times, counterparts of color actively contribute to the
process of segregation. They drew on equitable, people-​affirming ideas4 that
emphasized the worth and deservingness of people of color and used their
experiences and observations of racial discrimination to generate alternate
professional strategies that better served communities of color. Importantly,
at the same time they subverted real estate business as usual, these
professionals built economically profitable businesses. These professionals
also brokered race. But they did so through reference to racial equity, thus
undermining racism and mitigating, rather than exacerbating, racial ine-
quality in the housing exchange process.
Real estate professionals are the gatekeepers of the housing market. As
such, the choices they make influence who has access to homes, under what
conditions that access is granted, and where such access is granted. In the next
section, I discuss the relationship between housing market professionals,
 Introduction 5

racism, and racial segregation by drawing attention to their interactions

with housing consumers and other professionals as well as their professional
and organizational routines. Housing market professionals interpret their
interactions and routines through the lens of racist or equitable, people-​
affirming ideas and make decisions about allocating housing resources based
on their interpretations. In doing so, these race brokers recycle or challenge
housing market racism.

Racism, Racial Segregation, and Housing

Market Professionals

Through the early and mid-​twentieth century, the U.S. federal government,
state and municipal governments, professional real estate organizations,
and individual White real estate professionals actively implemented policies
and practices that explicitly aimed to segregate American neighborhoods
(Connolly 2014; Gotham 2014; Jackson 1985; Rothstein 2017). Such practices
included cities’ use of racial zoning ordinances, which forbade Americans
of color—​especially Black Americans—​from purchasing homes in White
neighborhoods and vice versa (Rothstein 2017);5 the National Association
of Real Estate Boards’ harsh penalization of real estate agents who violated its
explicit goal of maintaining racial segregation (Taylor 2019); and White real
estate agents’ refusal to show or sell homes in White neighborhoods to Asian,
Black, Indigenous, or Latinx home buyers (e.g., Helper 1969). These practices
effectively cemented racially segregated urban landscapes. By the 1960s,
many American cities were extremely segregated by race and class (Massey
and Denton 1993). Since then, in terms of overall national patterns, segrega-
tion between Black and White Americans has declined slightly, slowly, and
unevenly. Segregation between Asian and White Americans and Latinx and
White Americans has remained virtually unchanged. But, in many urban
areas with large or growing populations of residents of color, racial segrega-
tion between White residents and residents of color appears to be on the rise
(Frey 2010a, 2010b; Krysan and Crowder 2017).
The system of racial segregation continues to influence how everyday
Americans experience their lives, with dire consequences for communities
of color. Alongside other forms of inequality, racial segregation is at the heart
of unequal educational opportunities, wealth accumulation, and criminal
justice system encounters. For example, relative to their peers in otherwise
6 Race Brokers

equal Black and Latinx neighborhoods, children in White neighborhoods

are disproportionately likely to access higher quality educational opportuni-
ties and achieve higher educational attainment. This is in part because local
public schools are funded by property taxes based on local home values, and
home values are systematically higher in White neighborhoods net of home
and other neighborhood characteristics (Howell and Korver-​Glenn 2018;
Lareau and Goyette 2014). These differences in home values across White
neighborhoods and neighborhoods of color also mean that homeowners
in White neighborhoods are disproportionately likely to gain more wealth
from the sale of their homes than their counterparts in neighborhoods of
color (Flippen 2004; Howell and Korver-​Glenn 2018, forthcoming; Thomas
et al. 2018). Moreover, residents in neighborhoods of color are far more
likely to encounter police and experience violence at the hands of police
than residents in White neighborhoods (Bell 2020a; Terrill and Reisig 2003).
Policing in neighborhoods of color, especially poor neighborhoods of color,
“exacerbates disadvantage by cycling people through unending rounds of ar-
rest, misdemeanor prosecution, and various modalities of supervision” (Bell
2020a:690). And, when people of color enter or exist in White areas, they are
likely to “seem particularly out of place, and thus police are more likely to in-
tervene” (Bell 2020a:697; see also Anderson 2015).
However, racial segregation in and of itself does not cause these and other
inequalities. Rather, people, including politicians, educators, police officers,
residential appraisers, business owners, health care providers, and many
others, use racial segregation as a tool for making decisions about where
and how to allocate resources. As sociologist and legal scholar Monica
Bell (2020a) argues, segregation first means separation and confinement,
or cutting off people and those who represent them from each other. In a
system of segregation, White people are rarely exposed to individuals or
neighborhoods of color and individuals of color, regardless of their class
status, are less likely to be exposed to White neighborhoods than poor White
individuals (Wang et al. 2018). Segregation then becomes a means for White
people—​who control a disproportionate share of American resources—​to
subordinate and dominate communities of color (Bell 2020a). They do so
by keeping their resources in White areas and excluding individuals of color
from entering these neighborhoods or policing them if they do.
Likewise, it is people who maintain contemporary racial segregation at
above-​expected levels given decades of legal and social transformation.
American housing consumers and housing market professionals play key
 Introduction 7

roles in these processes. American home buyers, for example, purchase

millions of homes each year. These home buyers frequently have existing
knowledge about local communities and preferences about where to live.
Moreover, White home buyers and home buyers of color have very dif-
ferent knowledge and preferences. Home buyers of color tend to know more
about neighborhoods of color and prefer to live in more racially diverse
areas (Howell and Emerson 2018; Krysan and Crowder 2017). By contrast,
White home buyers know the most about White communities and have the
strongest preferences to live near other White neighbors and avoid neighbors
of color. To the extent that they act on their community knowledge and res-
idential preferences, White home buyers help sustain racially segregated
neighborhoods.
Housing market professionals also shape the process of racial segre-
gation by influencing home buyers’ and sellers’ knowledge, preferences,
prejudices, and opportunities. Especially when purchasing or selling a home,
housing consumers rely extensively on housing market professionals to fa-
cilitate the process by providing access to information, social connections,
and other resources (Besbris 2016, 2020; Shi and Tapia 2016). Although
professionals’ behaviors appear to be less racially discriminatory now than
they were fifty years ago (Turner et al. 2013), real estate agents and mort-
gage lenders (among others) still treat buyers and sellers of different races
in systematically different ways. For example, a 2012 national audit study of
real estate agents revealed that agents told prospective White home buyers
about 17 percent more homes and showed them 17.7 percent more homes
than equally qualified prospective Black home buyers. Similarly, agents told
prospective White home buyers about 15.5 percent more homes and showed
them 18.8 percent more homes than equally qualified prospective Asian
buyers (Turner et al. 2013). Moreover, mortgage lenders targeted Black and
Latinx mortgage borrowers with predatory lending schemes in the lead-​up
to the housing crash. Such predatory lending meant that Black and Latinx
mortgage borrowers were disproportionately likely to experience foreclosure
and wealth loss during and after the housing crash (Rugh et al. 2015).
Because housing market professionals often interact with each other and
make decisions in background, or behind-​the-​scenes, settings, home buyers
and sellers may not be aware that professionals are treating them differently
or that they have different housing opportunities than their counterparts.
Among other professionals, real estate agents often interact with one an-
other when home buyers and sellers are not present. Such contact takes
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 “I’ve been asking my sister to let you stay here with her. Would
you like that?”
Tom regarded Mrs. Merton attentively. The face was careworn, but
very different from granny’s. On the whole, it inspired her with some
degree of confidence.
“If she wouldn’t lick me very often,” she said.
“How about that, Martha?” he asked.
“I think I can promise that,” said Mrs. Merton, amused in spite of
herself.
“Of course you will have to work. My sister will find something for
you to do.”
“I aint afraid of work,” said Tom, “if I only get enough to eat, and
aint licked.”
“You see, Tom, I feel an interest in you.”
“You’re a brick!” said Tom, gratefully.
“Little girl,” said Mrs. Merton, shocked, “you mustn’t use such
language in addressing my brother.”
“Never mind, Martha; she means it as a compliment.”
“A compliment to call you a brick!”
“Certainly. But now about clothes. Can’t you rig her out with
something that will make her presentable?”
“She needs a good washing first,” said Mrs. Merton, surveying
Tom’s dirty face and hands with disfavor.
“A very good suggestion. You won’t mind being washed, I
suppose, Tom?”
“I’d just as lives,” said Tom.
In fact she was quite indifferent on the subject. She was used to
being dirty, but if she could oblige her new protector by washing,
she was quite willing.
“I’ve got to go out for an hour or two,” said Captain Barnes, “but I
will leave my carpet-bag here, and come back to lunch.”
“Of course, Albert. When do you sail?”
“In three days at farthest.”
“Of course you will remain here up to the day of sailing.”
“Yes, if you can find a spare corner to stow me in.”
“It would be odd if I couldn’t find room for my only brother.”
 “So be it, then. You may expect me.”
He rose and taking his hat left the house. Tom and Mrs. Merton
were now alone.
 CHAPTER X.
TOM DROPS HER TATTERS.

“Now, what is your name, little girl?” asked Mrs. Merton, surveying
Tom doubtfully, half sorry that she had undertaken the care of her.
“Tom.”
“That’s a boy’s name.”
“Everybody calls me Tom,—sometimes Tattered Tom.”
“There’s some reason about the first name,” thought Mrs. Merton,
as her glance rested on the ragged skirt and well-ventilated jacket of
her brother’s protegée.
“As you are a girl, it is not proper that you should have a boy’s
name. What is your real name?”
“I think it’s Jenny. Granny used to call me so long ago, but I like
Tom best.”
“Then I shall call you Jenny. Now, Jenny, the first thing to do, is to
wash yourself clean. Follow me.”
Mrs. Merton went up the front stairs, and Tom followed, using her
eyes to good advantage as she advanced.
The landlady led the way into a bath-room. She set the water to
running, and bade Tom undress.
“Am I to get into the tub?” asked Tom.
“Yes, certainly. While you are undressing, I will try and find some
clothes that will fit you.”
Though she did not at first fancy the idea of bathing, Tom grew to
like it, and submitted with a good grace. Mrs. Merton took care that
it should be thorough. After it, she dressed Tom in some clothes, still
very good, which had been laid aside by her daughter Mary. Then
she combed Tom’s tangled locks, and was astonished by the
improvement it made in the appearance of the little waif.
I have already said that Tom had elements of beauty, but it took
sharp eyes to detect them under the rags and dirt which had so
effectually disguised her. She had very brilliant dark eyes, and a
clear olive complexion, with cheeks that had a tinge of red instead of
the pallor usually to be found in those children who have the
misfortune to be reared in a tenement house. In her new clothes she
looked positively handsome, as Mrs. Merton thought, though she did
not see fit to say so to Tom herself.
When her toilet was concluded she turned Tom to the glass, and
said, “There, Jenny, do you know who that is?”
Tom stared in open-eyed wonder at the image which she saw. She
could hardly believe the testimony of her eyes.
“Is that me?” she asked.
“I believe so,” said Mrs. Merton, smiling.
“It don’t look like me a bit,” continued Tom.
“It doesn’t look like ‘Tattered Tom,’ certainly. Don’t you like it
better?”
“I dunno,” said Tom, doubtfully. “It looks too much like a girl.”
“But you are a girl, you know.”
“I wish I wasn’t.”
“Why?”
“Boys have more fun; besides, they are stronger, and can fight
better.”
“But you don’t want to fight?” said Mrs. Merton, scandalized.
“I licked a boy yesterday,” said Tom, proudly.
“Why did you do that?”
“He sassed me, and I licked him. He was bigger’n I was, too!”
“I can’t allow you to fight in future, Jenny,” said Mrs. Merton. “It
isn’t at all proper for girls, or indeed for boys, to fight; but it is worse
for girls.”
“Why is it?” asked Tom.
“Because girls should be gentle and lady-like.”
“If you was a girl, and a boy should slap you in the face, what
would you do?” asked Tom, fixing her bright eyes upon her mentor.
 “I should forgive him, and hope he would become a better boy.”
“I wouldn’t,” said Tom. “I’d give him Hail Columby.”
“You’ve got some very wrong ideas, Jenny,” said Mrs. Merton. “I
fear that your grandmother has not brought you up properly.”
“She did not bring me up at all. I brought myself up. As for
granny, she didn’t care as long as I brought her money to buy
whiskey.”
Mrs. Merton shook her head. It was very evident to her that Tom
had been under very bad influences.
“I hope you will see the error of your ways after a while, Jenny.
My brother takes an interest in you, and for his sake I hope you will
try to improve.”
“If he wants me to, I will,” said Tom, decidedly.
Arab as she was, she had been impressed by the kindness of
Captain Barnes, and felt that she should like to please him. Still,
there was a fascination in the wild independence of her street life
which was likely for some time to interfere with her enjoyment of
the usages of a more civilized state. There was little prospect of her
taming down into an average girl all at once. The change must come
slowly.
“My brother will be very much pleased if he finds that you have
improved when he returns from his voyage.”
“When is he goin’ to sea?”
“In two or three days.”
“I asked him to take me with him,” said Tom; “but he wouldn’t.”
“You would only be in the way on a ship, Jenny.”
“No, I shouldn’t. I could be a cabin-boy.”
“But you are not a boy.”
“I could climb the masts as well as a boy. If there was only a pole
here, I’d show you.”
“What a child you are!”
“Did you ever read about the female pirate captain?” asked Tom.
“No.”
“Jim Morgan told me all about it. He’d read it in some book. It was
a bully story.”
“Such stories are not fit to read.”
 “I’d like to be a pirate captain,” said Tom, thoughtfully.
“You mustn’t talk so, Jenny,” said Mrs. Merton, shocked.
“But I would, though, and carry two pistols and a dagger in my
belt, and then if anybody sassed me I’d give ’em all they wanted.”
“My brother wouldn’t like to hear you talk so, Jenny. I’m sure I
don’t know what has got into you to say such dreadful things.”
“Then I won’t,” said Tom. “I wonder what granny would say if she
saw me in these fixin’s. She wouldn’t know me.”
“When my brother comes, you shall go down and open the door
for him, and see if he knows you.”
“That will be bully.”
“Now I must be thinking what I can find for you to do. You will be
willing to help me?”
“Yes,” said Tom, promptly.
“Do you know how to make beds?”
“I can learn,” said Tom.
“Didn’t your grandmother ever teach you?” asked Mrs. Merton,
who, though for a long time a resident of New York, had a very
imperfect knowledge of how the poorest classes lived.
“Granny never made her bed,” said Tom. “She just gave it a shake,
and tumbled into it.”
“Bless me, how shiftless she must be!” ejaculated Mrs. Merton, in
surprise.
“Oh, granny don’t mind!” said Tom, carelessly.
“Did you ever sweep?”
“Lots of times. That’s the way I got money to carry to granny.”
“Were you paid for sweeping, then?” asked Mrs. Merton.
“Yes, people that came along would give me money. If they
wouldn’t I’d muddy their boots.”
“What do you mean, child? Where did you sweep?”
“Corner of Broadway and Chambers’ Streets.”
“Oh, you swept the crossing, then.”
“In course I did. If you’ll give me a broom, I’ll go out and sweep
front of your house; but I guess there aint so many people come
along here as in Broadway.”
 “I don’t want you to do that,” said Mrs. Merton, hastily. “I want
you to sweep the rooms in the house. Sarah, the chambermaid, will
show you how, and also teach you to make beds.”
“All right,” said Tom. “Bring her on, and I’ll help her.”
“We will defer that till to-morrow. Now you may come down to the
kitchen with me, and I’ll see if I can find anything for you to do
there.”
Tom felt ready for any enterprise, and started to follow Mrs.
Merton downstairs, but rather startled the good lady by making a
rapid descent astride the banisters.
“Don’t you do that again, Jenny,” she said reprovingly.
“Why not?” asked Tom. “It’s jolly fun.”
 CHAPTER XI
THE MISTAKES OF A MORNING.

On the way to the kitchen they met Sarah, the chambermaid,

going upstairs to make the beds.
“Sarah,” said Mrs. Merton, “here is a little girl who is going to stay
with me, and help about the house. You may take her upstairs, and
show her how to help you make the beds.”
If Tom had been in her street costume, Sarah would have
preferred to dispense with her assistance, but she looked quite
civilized and respectable now, and she accepted the offer. Tom
accompanied her upstairs to the second floor. The first chamber was
that of Mr. Craven,—a gentleman in business down town. It was of
course vacant, therefore.
Tom looked about her curiously.
“Now,” said Sarah, “do you know anything about making beds?”
“No,” said Tom.
“Then stand on one side, and I will tell you what to do.”
Tom followed directions pretty well, but, as the task was about
finished, an impish freak seized her, and she caught the pillow and
threw it at Sarah’s head, disarranging that young lady’s hair, and
knocking out a comb.
“What’s that for?” demanded Sarah, angrily.
Tom sat down and laughed boisterously.
“It’s bully fun!” she said. “Throw it at me.”
“I’ll give you a shaking, you young imp,” said Sarah. “You’ve broke
my comb.”
She picked up the comb, and dashed round the bed after Tom,
who, seeing no other way for escape, sprang upon the bed, where
she remained standing.
“Come down from there,” demanded Sarah.
“Let me alone, then!”
“I’ll tell the missis, just as sure as you live!”
“What’ll she do? Will she lick me?”
“You’ll see.”
This would not have checked Tom, but it occurred to her, all at
once, that her freak would be reported to the captain, and might
displease him.
“I’ll stop,” said she. “I was only in fun.”
By this time, Sarah had ascertained that the comb was not
broken, after all, and this made her more inclined to overlook Tom’s
offence.
“Now behave decent!” she said.
She gave Tom further directions about the proper way of doing
chamber-work, which Tom followed quite closely, being resolved
apparently to turn over a new leaf. But her reformation was not
thorough. She caught sight of Mr. Craven’s shaving materials, which
he had carelessly left on the bureau, and before Sarah anticipated
her intention, she had seized the brush and spread the lather over
her cheeks.
“What are you doing, you little torment?” asked Sarah.
“I’m goin’ to shave,” said Tom. “It must feel funny.”
“Put that razor down!” said Sarah, approaching.
Tom brandished the razor playfully, in a manner that considerably
startled the chamber-maid, who stopped short in alarm:—
“I’ll go and tell the missis how you cut up,” said she, going to the
door.
This was unnecessary, however, for at this moment Mrs. Merton,
desirous of learning how Tom was getting along, opened the door.
She started back in dismay at the spectacle which greeted her view,
and, in a tone unusually decided for so mild a woman, said, “Jenny,
put down that razor instantly, and wipe the soap from your cheeks.
Not so,” she added hastily, seeing that Tom was about to wipe it off
upon her skirt. “Here, take the towel. Now, what do you mean by
such conduct?”
 “Wouldn’t he like it?” asked Tom, somewhat abashed.
“Do you mean my brother?”
“Yes, the sailor man.”
“No, he would be very angry.”
“Then I won’t do so again;” and Tom seemed quite decided in her
repentance.
“What possessed you to touch those things, Jenny?”
“That isn’t all she did, mum,” said Sarah. “She threw the pillow at
me, and almost druv the comb into my head. She’s the craziest
creetur’ I ever sot eyes on.”
“Did you do that?” asked Mrs. Merton.
“Yes,” said Tom. “I told her she might pitch it at me. It’s bully fun.”
“I can’t allow such goings-on,” said Mrs. Merton. “If you do so
again, I must send you back to your grandmother.”
“You don’t know where she lives,” said Tom.
“At any rate I won’t keep you here.”
Tom thought of the three square meals which she would receive
daily, and decided to remain. She continued quiet, therefore, and
really helped Sarah in the remaining rooms. When this task was
completed she went downstairs. At this moment a ring was heard at
the door-bell. Thinking that it might be the captain, Tom answered
the summons herself. She opened the door suddenly, but found
herself mistaken.
A young gentleman was the visitor.
“Can I see Mrs. Merton?” he inquired.
“Yes,” said Tom; “come in.”
He stepped into the hall.
“Come right along. I’ll show you where she is.”
She knew that the landlady was in the kitchen, and supposed that
this was the proper place to lead the visitor.
The latter followed Tom as far as the head of the stairs, and then
paused.
“Where are you leading me?” he asked.
“She’s down in the kitchen. Come right along.”
“No, I will stay here. You may tell her there is a gentleman wishes
to see her.”
 Tom went down, and found the landlady.
“There’s a feller upstairs wants to see you,” she said. “He wouldn’t
come down here. I asked him.”
“Good gracious! You didn’t invite him down into the kitchen?”
“Why not?” said Tom.
“You should have carried him into the parlor.”
“All right!” said Tom. “I’ll know better next time.”
Mrs. Merton smoothed her hair, and went upstairs to greet her
visitor, who proved to be an applicant for board.
Only fifteen minutes later Tom had a chance to improve on her
first mistake. Again the door-bell rang, and again Tom opened the
door. A wrinkled old woman, with a large basket, stood before her.
“I’m a poor widder,” she whined, “with four childer that have
nothing to ate. Can’t you give me a few pennies, and may the
blessings of Heaven rest upon you!”
“Come in,” said Tom.
The old woman stepped into the hall.
“Come right in here,” said Tom, opening the door of the parlor.
The old beggar, not accustomed to being received with so much
attention, paused doubtfully.
“Come in, if you’re comin’,” said Tom, impatiently. “The lady told
me to put everybody in here.”
The old woman followed, and took a seat on the edge of a sofa,
placing her basket on the carpet. Before Tom had a chance to
acquaint her mistress with the fact that a visitor awaited her, the bell
rang again. This time Tom found herself confronted by a fashionably
dressed and imposing-looking lady.
“I wish to see Mrs. Merton,” she said.
“All right!” said Tom. “Just you come in, and I’ll call her.”
The visitor entered, and was ushered also into the parlor. Leaving
her to find a seat for herself, Tom disappeared in pursuit of the
landlady.
Mrs. Courtenay did not at first observe the other occupant of the
room. When her eyes rested on the old crone sitting on the sofa,
with her basket, which was partly stored with cold victuals, resting
on the carpet, she started in mingled astonishment and disgust. Her
aristocratic nostrils curved, and, taking a delicate handkerchief, she
tried to shut out the unsavory presence. The old woman saw the
action, and fidgeted nervously, feeling that she ought not to be
there. While the two guests were in this uncomfortable state of
feeling, Mrs. Merton, quite unsuspicious of anything wrong, opened
the door.
“Is this Mrs. Merton?” asked Mrs. Courtenay.
“Yes, madam.”
“I called to inquire about a servant who referred me to you,”
continued Mrs. Courtenay, haughtily; “but I didn’t anticipate the
company I should find myself in.”
Following her glance, Mrs. Merton was struck with dismay, as she
saw the second visitor.
“How came you here?” she demanded hastily.
“The little gal brought me. It wasn’t my fault indeed, mum,”
whined the old woman.
“What do you want?”
“I’m a poor widder, mum. If you could be so kind as to give me a
few pennies.”
“I have nothing for you to-day. You can go,” said Mrs. Merton, who
was too provoked to be charitable, as otherwise she might have
been. She pointed to the door, and the applicant for charity hobbled
out hastily, feeling that she was not likely to obtain anything under
present circumstances.
“I must beg your pardon,” said Mrs. Merton, “for the mistake of an
inexperienced child, who has never before waited upon the door;
though, how she could have made such an absurd blunder, I cannot
tell.”
Mrs. Courtenay deigned to be appeased, and opened her
business. When she had left the house, Mrs. Merton called Tom.
“Jenny,” she said, “how came you to show that beggar into the
parlor?”
“She asked for you,” said Tom, “and you told me to take
everybody that asked for you into the parlor.”
“Never take such a woman as that in.”
“All right!” said Tom.
 “That comes of taking a girl in from the street,” thought Mrs.
Merton. “I wish I hadn’t agreed to take her.”
 CHAPTER XII
THE VANQUISHED BULLY.

Notwithstanding Tom’s mistake, she was still intrusted with the

duty of answering the bell. At length, to her satisfaction, she opened
the door to her friend of the morning.
He looked at her in surprise.
“What, is this Tom?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, enjoying his surprise. “Didn’t you know me?”
“Hardly. Why, you look like a young lady!”
“Do I?” said Tom, hardly knowing whether or not to feel pleased
at the compliment, for she fancied she should prefer to be a boy.
“Yes, you are much improved. And how have you been getting on
this morning?”
“I’ve been cutting up,” said Tom, shaking her head.
“Not badly, I hope.”
“I’ll tell you what I did;” and Tom in her own way gave an account
of the events related in the previous chapter.
The captain laughed heartily.
“You aint mad?” questioned Tom.
“Did you think I would be?”
“She said so,” said Tom.
“Who is she?”
“Your sister.”
The captain recovered his gravity. He saw that his merriment
might encourage Tom in her pranks, and so increase the difficulties
his sister was likely to find with her.
“No, I am not angry,” he said, “but I want you very much to
improve. You will have a good home here, and I want you to do as
well as you can, so that when I get home from my voyage I may
find you very much improved. Do you think I shall?”
Tom listened attentively.
“What do you want me to do?” she asked.
“To learn, as fast as you can, both about work and study. I shall
leave directions to have you sent to school. Will you like that?”
“I don’t know,” said Tom. “I’m afraid I’ll be bad, and get licked.”
“Then try not to be bad. But you want to know something when
you grow up,—don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then you will have to go to school and study. Can you read?”
“Not enough to hurt me,” said Tom.
“Then, if you find yourself behind the rest, you must work all the
harder. Will you promise me to do it?”
Tom nodded.
“And will you try to behave well?”
“Yes,” said Tom. “I’ll do it for you. I wouldn’t do it for granny.”
“Then do it for me.”
Here Mrs. Merton appeared on the scene, and Tom was directed
to go downstairs to assist the cook.
“Well, what do you think of her, Martha?”
“She’s a regular trial. I’ll tell you what she did this morning.”
“I know all.”
“Did she tell you?” asked his sister, in surprise.
“Yes, she voluntarily told me that she had been ‘cutting up;’ and,
on my questioning her, confessed how. However, it was partly the
result of ignorance.”
“I wish I hadn’t undertaken the charge of her.”
“Don’t be discouraged, Martha. There’s some good in her, and
she’s as smart as a steel trap. She’s promised me to turn over a new
leaf, and do as well as she can.”
“Do you rely upon that?”
“I do. She’s got will and resolution, and I believe she means what
she says.”
“I hope it’ll prove so,” said Mrs. Merton, doubtfully.
 “I find she knows very little. I should like to have her sent to
school as soon as possible. She can assist you when at home, and I
will take care that you lose nothing by it.”
To this Mrs. Merton was brought to agree, but could not help
expressing her surprise at the interest which her brother took in that
child. She was a good woman, but it was not strange if the thought
should come to her that she had two daughters of her own, having a
better claim upon their uncle’s money than this wild girl whom he
had picked up in the streets. But Captain Barnes showed that he had
not forgotten his nieces, as two handsome dress-patterns, sent in
from Stewart’s during the afternoon, sufficiently evinced.
Tom had not yet met Mrs. Merton’s daughters, both being absent
at school. They returned home about three o’clock. Mary, a girl of
about Tom’s age, had rather pretty, but insipid, features, and was
vain of what she regarded as her beauty. Fanny, who was eight, was
more attractive.
“Children, can’t you speak to your uncle?” said Mrs. Merton; for
the captain declared himself tired, and did not go out after lunch.
“How do you do, uncle?” said Mary, advancing and offering her
hand.
“Why, Mary, you have become quite a young lady,” said her uncle.
Mary simpered and looked pleased.
“And Fanny too. Martha, where is that doll I brought for her?”
The doll was handed to the delighted child.
“I suppose you are too old for dolls, Mary,” said the captain to his
eldest niece.
“I should think so, Uncle Albert,” answered Mary, bridling.
“Then it’s lucky I didn’t bring you one. But I’ve brought you a
playmate.”
Mary looked surprised.
Tom was passing through the hall at the moment, and her
guardian called her.
“Come in, Tom.”
Mary Merton stared at the new-comer, and her quick eyes
detected that the dress in which she appeared was one of her own.
“Why, she’s got on my dress,” she said.
 “She is about your size, Mary, so I gave her your dress.”
“Didn’t she have any clothes of her own?”
“Were you unwilling to let her have that dress?” asked her uncle.
Mary pouted, and Captain Barnes said, “Martha, I will put money
in your hands to supply Jenny with a suitable wardrobe. I had
intended to give Mary new articles for all which been appropriated to
Tom’s use; but I have changed my mind.”
“She can have them,” said Mary, regretting her selfishness, from
an equally selfish motive.
“I won’t trouble you,” said her uncle, rather coldly.
Tom had listened attentively to this conversation, turning her
bright eyes from one to the other.
“Come here, Tom, and shake hands with these two little girls.”
“I’ll shake hands with her,” said Tom, indicating Fanny.
“And won’t you shake hands with Mary?”
“I don’t want to.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t like her.”
“Shake hands with her, for my sake.”
Tom instantly extended her hand, but now it was Mary who held
back. Her mother would have forced her to give her hand, but
Captain Barnes said, “It don’t matter. Leave them to become friends
in their own time.”
Two days afterwards the captain sailed. Tom renewed her promise
to be a good girl, and he went away hopeful that she would keep it.
“I shall have somebody to come home to, Jenny,” he said. “Will
you be glad to see me back?”
“Yes, I will,” she said; and there was a heartiness in her tone
which showed that she meant what she said.
The next day Tom went to school. She was provided with two or
three books such as she would need, and accompanied Fanny; for,
though several years older, she was not as proficient as the latter.
In the next street there was a boy, whose pleasure it was to bully
children smaller than himself. He had more than once annoyed
Fanny, and when the latter saw him a little in advance, she said,
nervously, “Let us cross the street, Jenny.”
 “Why?” asked Tom.
“There’s George Griffiths just ahead.”
“What if he is?”
“He’s an awful bad boy. Sometimes he pulls away my books, and
runs away with them. He likes to plague us.”
“He’d better not try it,” said Tom.
“What would you do?” asked Fanny, in surprise.
“You’ll see. I won’t cross the street. I’m goin’ right ahead.”
Fanny caught her companion’s arm, and advanced, trembling,
hoping that George Griffiths might not see them. But he had already
espied them, and, feeling in a bullying mood, winked to a companion
and said, “You’ll see how I’ll frighten these girls.”
He advanced to meet them, and took off his hat with mock
politeness.
“How do you do this morning, young ladies?” he said.
“Go away, you bad boy!” said little Fanny, in a flutter.
“I’ll pay you for that,” he said, and tried to snatch one of her
books, but was considerably startled at receiving a blow on the side
of the head from her companion.
“Just let her alone,” said Tom.
“What have you got to say about it?” he demanded insolently.
“You’ll see.”
Hereupon he turned his attention to Tom, and tried to snatch her
books, but was rather astounded when his intended victim struck
him a sounding blow in the face with her fist.
“Take my books, Fanny,” she said, and, dropping them on the
sidewalk, squared off scientifically.
“Come on, if you want to!” said Tom, her eyes sparkling with
excitement at the prospect of a fight.
“I don’t want to fight with a girl,” he said, considerably astonished
at vigorous resistance where he had expected timid submission.
“You’re afraid!” said Tom, triumphantly.
“No, I’m not,” said George, backing out all the while; “I don’t want
to hurt you.”
“You can’t do it,” said Tom; “I can lick you any day.”
 “How could you do it?” asked Fanny, as the dreaded bully slunk
away. “How brave you are, Jenny! I’m awful afraid of him.”
“You needn’t be,” said Tom, taking her books. “I’ve licked boys
bigger’n him. I can lick him, and he knows it.”
She was right. The story got about, and George Griffiths was so
laughed at, for being vanquished by a girl, that he was very careful
in future whom he attempted to bully.
 CHAPTER XIII
GRANNY IS COMPELLED TO EARN HER OWN LIVING.

Leaving Tom in her new home, we return to Mrs. Walsh, which

was the proper designation of the old woman whom she called
granny. Though Tom had escaped from her clutches, granny had no
idea that she intended to stay away permanently. She did not
consider that all the advantages of the connection between them
had been on her side, and that Tom had only had the privilege of
supporting them both. If she had not carried matters so far our
heroine would have been satisfied to remain; but now she had fairly
broken away, and would never come back unless brought by force.
When six o’clock came granny began to wonder why Tom did not
come back. She usually returned earlier, with whatever money she
had managed to obtain.
“She’s afraid of a lickin’,” thought granny. “She’ll get a wuss one if
she stays away.”
An hour passed, and granny became hungry; but unfortunately
she was penniless, and had nothing in the room except a crust of
hard bread which she intended for Tom’s supper. Hunger compelled
her to eat this herself, though it was not much to her taste. Every
moment’s additional delay irritated her the more with the rebellious
Tom.
“I wish I had her here,” soliloquized granny, spitefully.
When it was half-past seven granny resolved to go out and hunt
her up. She might be on the sidewalk outside playing. Perhaps—but
this was too daring for belief—she might be spending her afternoon’s
earnings on another square meal.
 Granny went downstairs, and through the archway into the street.
There were plenty of children, living in neighboring tenement
houses, gathered in groups or playing about, but no Tom was visible.
“Have you seen anything of my gal, Micky Murphy?” asked granny
of a boy whom she had often seen with Tom.
“No,” said Micky. “I haven’t seen her.”
“Haven’t any of you seen her?” demanded Mrs. Walsh, making the
question a general one.
“I seen her sellin’ papers,” said one boy.
“When was that?” asked granny, eagerly.
“’Bout four o’clock.”
“Where was she?”
“Greenwich Street.”
This was a clue at least, but a faint one. Tom had been seen at
four o’clock, and now it was nearly eight. Long before this she must
have sold her papers, and the unpleasant conviction dawned upon
granny that she must have spent her earnings upon herself.
“If I could only get hold of her!” muttered granny, vengefully.
She went as far as the City Hall, and followed along down by the
Park fence, looking about her in all directions, in the hope that she
might espy Tom. But the latter was at this time engaging lodgings
for the night, as we know, and in no danger of being caught.
Unwilling to give up the pursuit, Mrs. Walsh wandered about for
an hour or more, occasionally resting on one of the seats in the City
Hall Park, till the unwonted exertion began to weary her, and she
realized that she was not likely to encounter Tom.
There was one chance left. Tom might have got home while she
had been in search of her. Spurred by this hope, Mrs. Walsh hurried
home, and mounted to her lofty room. But it was as desolate as
when she left it. It was quite clear that Tom did not mean to come
back that night. This was provoking; but granny still was confident
that she would return in the course of the next day. So she threw
herself on the bed,—not without some silent imprecations upon her
rebellious charge,—and slept till morning.
Morning brought her a new realization of her loss. She found her
situation by no means an agreeable one. Her appetite was excellent,
but she was without food or money to buy a supply. It was certainly
provoking to think that she must look out for herself. However,
granny was equal to the occasion. She did not propose to work for a
living, but decided that she would throw herself upon charity. To
begin with, she obtained some breakfast of a poor but charitable
neighbor, and then started on a walk up town. It was not till she got
as far as Fourteenth Street that she commenced her round of visits.
The first house at which she stopped was an English basement
house. Granny rang the basement bell.
“Is your mistress at home?” she asked.
“Yes; what’s wanted?”
“I’m a poor widder,” whined granny, in a lugubrious voice, “with
five small children. We haven’t got a bit of food in the house. Can’t
you give me a few pennies?”
“I’ll speak to the missis, but I don’t think she’ll give any money.”
She went upstairs, and soon returned.
“She won’t give you any money, but here’s a loaf of bread.”
Mrs. Walsh would much have preferred a small sum of money, but
muttered her thanks, and dropped the loaf into a bag she had
brought with her.
She went on to the next block, and intercepted a gentleman just
starting down town to his business.
“I’m a poor widder,” she said, repeating her whine; “will you give
me a few pennies? and may the Lord bless you!”
“Why don’t you work?” asked the gentleman, brusquely.
“I’m too old and feeble,” she answered, bending over to assume
the appearance of infirmity. This did not escape the attention of the
gentleman, who answered unceremoniously, “You’re a humbug! You
won’t get anything from me! If I had my way, I’d have you arrested
and locked up.”
Granny trembled with passion, but did not think it politic to give
vent to her fury.
Her next application was more successful, twenty-five cents being
sent to the door by a compassionate lady, who never doubted the
story of the five little children suffering at home for want of food.
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