Girl Alone

merciful dwindling of the carnival crowds permitted a weary little "Princess Lalla" to slip out of the "Palace of Wonders" tent, Pitty Sing, the midget woman, cradled in her arms like a ba

shall compensate you generously for your services. Nita has no proper respect for me, though I command-and I sa

to the big dress tent which also served as sleeping quarters for the women performers of the

u before. I've been paying Nita five dollars a week to carry me to and from the show tent for each performance. Of course ther

or an instant against the flaxen, marcelled little head

anded tartly. "The name does very well for exhibition purp

protested, hurt and aba

of the miniature hands fluttered out inadequately to help Sally part the flaps of the dres

on the beaten down stubble which served as

work of wrinkles which testified that she was indeed a "woman grown." "You're a

ng them, crooned over them, but she did not answer

ed toward her cot, looking like an animated doll. "I might as well warn you right now,

reached into her bosom for a key suspended around her neck on a chain. Sally's desire to laugh at the prepost

n, Betty?" she g

so broke that she has to eat her meals in the cook tent, but she borrowed or stole the money today to eat in the privilege car, and she found it necessary to confer with your David on a purely fictitious dietetic problem, and then went boldly into the kitchen to time the eggs he was boiling for her. Th

with the lid of the trunk. "But David isn't my David, you know. He's-he's just a friend

ill you untie this shoe-lace, please? My nightgown is in the tray of the trunk, and you'll find a nightcap there, too. I wear it," she explained severely, on the defensive against ridicule, "to protect my marcel. He

like to read? Could I borrow it to read betwe

pecially for me, was a university professor. I have completed the college course, under his tutelage. If he had not died I should not be here," and her

k and set about the difficult and unaccustomed task of removing her make-up. Beside her cot bed she found a small tin steamer trunk, stencilled in

making her up for the first day's performances; a big can of theatrical cold cream; squares of soft cheesecloth for removing

r breath, she lifted the tray and found-not the tell-tale dresses which Pearl Carson had given her and which had been minutely described by the police in the newspaper accoun

inded with tears of gratitude, when a coars

e gonna bunk with us, your highness! I thought you'd be sawing wood in Pop Bybee's stateroom by t

ds. She batted the tears from her eyes with quick flutters of her eyeli

of tarnished metal studded with imitation jewels. About her lean hips and t

u?" Sally's voice was s

you're Pop Bybee's blue-eyed baby girl! And-you're the baby-faced little she-devil that stole my graft with that little midget! Well, Princess Lalla, I guess we've been introduced proper now, and we

snake-tongues of venom in those black eyes.

police? Well, then, if you don't, listen, because

fully shaped as a Greek statue, trailed dispiritedly into the dress tent, thei

s. Sally had watched them dance, enviously, between her own performances, had heard the barker ballyhooing them a

eir cots and seated themselves with groans and dispirited curses, paying not the faintest attention

led, pathetic quartet, but she might as well have appealed to the gau

, moistening her dry lips and twisting

close to Sally's. "I want you to give that sheik of yours th

-had made her heart beat fast with a queer, suffocating kind of pleasure, a pleasure she had never before experienced in her life. Those words had somehow initiated her into young ladyhood, fraught with strange, lovely, privileges, among them the right to be "c

command, "give him the gate, ditch him, shake him," arous

ine, as long as he wants to be! Y

head emphasizing her sarcasm. "Is that so? Maybe you'll think I had some right when the cops tap you

o David, too?" Sally w

the interview was successfully concluded, from her standpoint, the red-painted

ike a small, trapped animal, when a tiny,

ave gone crazy. The heat affects some like this, but I

ble-crossing runt!" Nita whi

ton without even a grass skirt to earn a living with. And if the carnival grapevine is still working, you'll find that no other show in the country will take you on. It will be back to the hash joints for you,

, southern drawl demanded indignantly. "I've got some important sleeping to do, i

e-up. "You hoofers don't know what tired means. If you had to jelly all day like I do! Oh, Gawd! What a

ded surrender, to the law of the carnival-live

weary girls drifted in-"the girl nobody can lift," the albino girl, whose pink eyes were shaded with big blue goggles; the two diving girls, looking as if their diet of soda pop and ban

I've lost my rabbit foot! That

you crazy rube. Wh

e able to grab my cakes in the privileg

new kid. 'N they say Pop Bybee's got her on percentage, as w

. to me. Boy howdy! Hear you already staked your claim, Nita.

g cots. Someone turned out the sputtering gas jet that had ineffectually illuminated the dress tent. Groans subsided into snores or whistling, a

small figure flitting across the screen fantastically clad in purple satin trousers and green jacket, her face and arms brown as an Indian's, her eyes shielded by a little black lace veil. Crowds of farmers, their wives, their children; small-town business men,

reading that dreadful newspaper story-David of yesterday, saying,

, ugly passion-passion for David-Nit

itself into an enormous "close-up" of David Nash, his eye

t all in love with me-but oh, he couldn't be!-would he be so friendly and easy with me? Wouldn't he be embarrassed, and blush, and-and thing

t she ought to weep with shame and contrition because she had so long half-forgotten Mrs. Bybee's promise to make inquiries about her mother-t

ing for a mother, even for a mother who would desert her child and go away without a word, rushed over Sally like an avalanche of bruising stones. Every hurt she ha

mewhat subsided she crept out of he

long time before sleep claimed her, trying to remember all the instructions about crystal-gazing that Mrs. Bybee had heaped upon her. And in her childish conscie

n until a tiny hand tugged impatiently at her hair. Her dark blue eyes flew wide in startled surp

aken you," the midget told her. "But it's getti

of forty. Sally impulsively took the tiny face between her hands and laid her lips for an instant against the softly wrinkled che

quely, to hide the pleasure which Sally's caress had given her. "All t

ta," Sally said shyly, as she hastily drew on her stockings. "But I d

of this state, you and your David will be pretty safe. I don't think the police will bother about extradition, even if Nita should tip them off. In the meantime, I'll break the first law of carnival and try to learn somethin

tin trunk. She caught herself up at the thought. Of course they were not mysterious. "Pop" and Mrs. Bybee had provided them, out of the infinite kindness of their hearts. Were they always so kind to the c

vacant lots to the show train resting engineless on a spur track. At the sound of her fresh, young voice, caroling an old song of summertime and love, David Nash thrust his

a's been carrying on," the midg

her threats would make it necessary to tell David all that Nita had said, and at the thought Sally's cheeks went scarlet. It might kill his friendship for her to let him know that others-apparently all the carniva

vilege car and was hurrying down the car bound for the cook tent and her own breakfast when W

ing to Sally, tilting his head to

etty enough to eat," he chuck

the trunk and the dresses, Mrs. Bybee," she added, tactfully addressing

w words, and of a long-suffering disposition, but even a saint knows when she's got a stomachful! I swallowed your mealy-mouthed palaverin' about this poor little orphan, but if you're sneaking around and buying her pre

e car, the very picture of detected guilt. The carnival owner gasped and waved his arms helplessly, tried to pat his wife's hands and had his own slapped viciously for his pains. When at

or she's talking about. I didn't buy her anything! I-oh, good Lord!" He tried to put his arms about his wife, his fa

g out of the kitchen, a butcher knife in one h

is dress and another one and a trunk I found in the dress tent with my name on it-'Princ

her. I guess her mother wasn't any better than she should have been and this little soft-soap artist takes after h

ly. "I should have told her, or put my card in. Unfortunat

haser of a husband of mine does, but-I do! If you're ever in love, Sally, you'll understand a foolish old woman a little better. Now, young man, you take that murderous looking

rnings" right and left, marched down the aisle, his

ive face. Then she turned to David, who had not yet obeyed Mrs. Bybee's command. They smiled into each

ep from repeating his name, dropping it like a caress at the end of almost every

gs and I knew you didn't have any money. I've got to get back into the kitchen," he added hastily, awkwardly. She had never seen him awkward in her presence before, and she was daughter of Eve enough to rejoice. And in her sh

as she sped to the cook tent the heart-filling sweetness and tenderness of his answering smile. She took out the memory of that smile and of his boyish flush and aw

unes" but David's flushed face, David's shy, tender eyes, David's lips curled upward in a smile. And because she was so happy she lavishe

s. Bybee was undoubtedly keeping her promise to make inquiries about the woman who had given her name as Mrs. Nora Ford when she had committed Sally Ford to the care of the state

eat it over there before you put on the nose bag. Next show at one-fifteen, if we

yers of anxiety and questions. It would still be there when her question had been answered by Mrs. Bybee, to comf

e marveled, as she climbed breathless, into the coach whic

re occupied on long jumps by a number of the stars of the carnival and by some of the most affluent of the concessionaires and barkers, a few of the latter being part owners of such attractions as t

y, Sally found the sleeping car deserted except for Mrs. By

h stacks of coins and bills of all denominations. Her lean fingers pushed t

g in her keen gray eyes. "Me and Bill," and she lifted a big, blue-barreled revolv

ked politely, as she edged f

not going to shoot you. Well, I went calling this morning," she added br

ng her hands tightly in her

plush cushion, revealing a small safe beneath the seat. When she had stowed the bag away and twirled the combi

med fool of myself this morning over them dresses your David give you, I guess I'd better try to do somethi

. "But, please, did you find out anything?" She felt

station does say so. I found the address you gave me, all right. Same number, same house. Four-or-five-room dump, that may have been a pretty good imitation of a California bungalow twelve years ago. All run-down now, with a swarm of kids tumbling in and out a

rudge Mrs. Bybee's words pictured so vividly. But those too-numerous babies

ind, pushed up, spilled out surprisingly: "There was a big oak tree in the corner of the yard.

onkey. Well, I reckon that's where you used to live, right enough. I asked this woman-name of Hickson-if any of her neighbors had lived there many yea

a rag doll with shoe-button eyes and I cried every night for a long time after I went to the orphanage bec

e had softened marvelously, but at Sally's e

got me into trouble. The old lady took it for granted I knew a lot of things about you that I didn't know, and wouldn't have told me just what I'd come to find out if I hadn't used my bean in stringing her

little brown-painted hands. "Then Gramma Bangs th

n I'd ever seen you in my life. But it was something she let spill when she was talkin

mplored, almost fra

the money stopped coming, seeing as how she was sick and needing an operation a

, her sapphire eyes clouding with bewilde

I just 'yes, indeeded' her, and she went on. Reckon she thought I might be taking exceptions to the way she'd been running on about how pitiful it was for '

ng as how you're her sister and probably know all about it, I reckon it won't do no harm after all

ken voice that Mrs. Bybee reached across the card table and pat

ing no address. Seems like," she went on briskly, "from what old lady Bangs told me, that Nora Ford had been hired to take you when she was a maid in a swell home in New York, and she had to beat it-that was part of the agreement-so there never would be any scandal on your real

real mother must have been-bad, or she wouldn't have been ashamed of having me! Oh, I wish I h

erely. "Reckon it ain't up to you, Sally Ford, to set y

y. "She was ashamed of me, and then forgot a

ur face. The show goes on. And take it from me, child, you're better off than a lot of girls that join up with the carnival. You're young and pretty and you've got a boy friend that'd

interest dawning unwillingly in her g

o the show I may be able to land you a job in the chorus. God knows you are pretty enou

rown make-up. "I'll stick, if the police don't get me-and David. And," she paused at the do

g door of the women's dressing room. Then comprehension dawned. "I wonder," she took time from the contemplation of her desolating disappointment to muse, "what Nita is doi