THE POLICEMAN.
I heard a little boy say, the other day, “When I grow up, I mean to be a policeman!” He liked the bright star on the policeman’s breast, and the big club in his hand. He thought it would be “fun” to sound his whistle, when he spied a fellow getting a ride for nothing on the steps of an omnibus, and to see him running off as fast as he could, for fear of a crack from the driver’s long whip. He thought it would be nice to walk up and down, and scare the little beggar girls, who were teasing for “one penny, please,” from the ladies on the sunshiny side of the street, as they came out of the shops. But hedidn’tthink, how many policemen have kissed their little boys and girls, when they left at night, and been killed before these little ones woke in the morning, by some robber, or murderer,whom they had to catch in the night. He didn’t think how many wretched, drunken men and women they have to drag through the streets, to the station houses, every day, and how many shocking fights they have to see and take part in. He didn’t think how forlorn it must be to pace up and down of a cold, dismal night, that other people might lie snug and safe in their warm beds, till morning. He didn’t think how sick a policeman might get of misery, and poverty, and wretchedness, and how glad he was sometimes to walk into a nice, clean neighborhood, where people had enough to eat, and drink, and wear, and live clean and comfortable. You see, Johnny was only nine years old, and didn’t know about all these things. It was his birthday, that very day that he said, “I want to be a policeman,” and he had beautiful presents, and a little sugared plumcake, made on purpose for him by his grandmother; and he was to have a little party in the evening, and ice cream and cake to eat; and they were to play blind man’s buff, and all go to the circus in the evening, to see the horses, who flew round so fast that you could hardly tell what color they were. Well, that very day the policeman he was lookingat, and envying, had seen a dreadful sight. As he was going round on his “beat,” through one of the narrow streets in New York, he heard a little girl, who was just nine years old that very day like Johnny, crying piteously. He went into the room where the noise came from, and saw, not a birthday party, of warmly-dressed little children, and a bright fire, and pretty pictures on the walls, and such beautiful roses on the pretty carpet, that one almost hated to step on them. No, indeed! The floor was bare, and so were the walls; there was no bed in the room, no chairs, no tables; but on the floor lay a dead woman, and over her stood her own little girl, named Katy, only nine years old that very day, crying, as I told you, as if her little heart would break. In her hand was a basket of cold victuals, that her mother had sent her out alone to beg; and there lay her mother,dead!and now little Katy was all alone in the great city, with no friend to whom she could tell her troubles, and no money even to buy a coffin for her dead mother. No wonder she cried. The policeman asked the little girl how long her mother had been dead; and when she could stop sobbing, she told him, that her mothertold Katy, in the morning, to go beg some food, and that she had to be gone a long while, before she could get any; and when she came back, she found her mother lying so still on the floor; and that she called “Mother!” and she didn’t speak; and that, when she touched her, she was so cold, she knew she must be dead; and then poor little Katy trembled, because she didn’t know what was to become of her, or whether the policeman would take her away from her mother; for, while her body lay there on the floor with her, the poor little girl felt as though her mother was still with her. But the policeman didn’t speak, for he was looking round the room, and presently he found a bottle; there was nothing in itnow, but therehadbeen some rum in it; and now you know why it was the room had no fire and no furniture, and how a mother could stay at home, and send her poor little girl out alone in a great city to beg. Katy didn’t say a word. I suppose she, too, knew that her mother used to get drunk; but she didn’t want to talk about it. She only knew that her mother was all the friend she had, bad or good, and that she lay theredead, and would never say “Katy” any more; and so she began to cryagain, as if her heart would break. Well, the policeman had a little girl of his own, and he felt very sorry for her; so he didn’t take her to the “station house,” where all sorts of drunken people are carried, but he took her to his own home, and asked his kind-hearted wife, to whom he told Katy’s story, to give her some warm breakfast, and keep her till he came back again. At first Katy didn’t want to stay there, warm and pleasant as it was. She would rather have sat on the bare floor, beside her dead mother; but the sorrows of most little children are soon forgotten by them; and when little Katy looked round again at the clean, bright, warm room, and had eaten a nice little bit of beefsteak, and some bread, and drank a cup of warm milk, she began to feel a great deal better. Nanny, the policeman’s little girl, had a beautiful doll, which she let Katy hold in her own hands. This pleased Katy very much; she had often seen dolls in the shop windows, but she never thought to have one in her own hand all her life. Well, little Nanny gave her leave to take off the dolly’s dress, and put it to bed; and Katy was so bright and happy, when the policeman came back, that hehardly knew she was the same little Katy; but at the sight of him, tears came into her eyes, she gave the dolly back to Nanny, and sobbed out, “I want to see my mother.”
Then the policeman’s wife wiped her eyes with the corner of her apron, and turned away to the window; for she thought, Oh, how dreadful it would be, ifmylittle, curly-headed Nanny were as friendless as this poor little girl. And then she and the policeman whispered together at the window a long while, and Katy heard the policeman say, “But it will be so much trouble for you, Mary, and, you know, I can hardly earn enough now to eat and to wear for you and me and Nanny!” but his wife only cried the more, and said, “Poor little thing! suppose it were our own little Nanny, John!” and then they whispered together again; and then the policeman patted his wife on the shoulder, and took up his hat and his big club, and went out; and then his wife got some warm water, and some soap, and washed Katy’s face, and hands, and neck, and combed her bright, brown hair smooth and nice, and put on one of Nanny’s little dresses, and told her, while she was doing it, that she was going to be Nanny’s littlesister now, and always live there with them, and have plenty to eat, and never go shivering out in the streets, to beg cold victuals any more; but still little Katy sobbed out, every now and then, “I want to see my mother.” Poor little girl! she forgot that her mother was very unkind to her sometimes; that she used to drink rum, and beat her when she came home, if she did not beg cold victuals enough, or bring some pennies; she forgot all this; and every time she thought of her, it was only as lying on the floor, cold anddead; and the great big lump came up again in her throat, and she wanted to go back to the old, dreadful room, and look at her dear, dead mother once more. But Katy’s mother was not there, though she did not know it; they had carried her away and buried her out of sight; but they didn’t tell Katy that, till she became used to living with them, for fear it would make her little heart ache so bad; but by and by, when her little thin cheeks had grown round and rosy, like Nanny’s, and when she began to run about the house and play “Puss in the Corner” with Nanny, then they told her. And, do you know, after a while, it seemed to little Katy that she hadalwayslived with thegood policeman and his wife, and that the dreadful, desolate room, and the cold victuals, and the ragged clothes, were only a bad dream, and not real at all. It just seemed to her as though Nanny werereallyher littleownsister, when they slept in the same bed at night, and laid their rosy cheeks on the same pillow. By and by the policeman’s wife was taken very sick, and then she found out what a good heart the little beggar girl had; for Katy ran up stairs and down for her, and gave her the doctor’s medicine; and sat by her bed, and bathed her hot forehead, and repaid her for all her care; and, after many years, when the policeman’s wife died, and Katy was married, and had a home of her own, she took poor, motherless Nanny there, and gave her a nice little room all by herself, and a table to put her dear mother’s workbox on, and very pretty pictures on the wall; and when Nanny said, with wet eyes, “How good you are to me, Katy!” she said, “Ah! I haven’t forgotten who took me in whenIhad no mother, and fed and clothed me!”