The Penalty by Gouverneur Morris
page 55 of 331 (16%)
page 55 of 331 (16%)
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gutter in which he had reached to his present stunted stature, a child
half gone in pneumonia, he had told her that his name, his whole name, was "Bubbles" and nothing but "Bubbles." "Good morning, Miss Barbara," he said; "the plumber's bin and gone, and the feller from the hardware store has swore hell be around before noon to fix the new knobs in the doors." "Good!" said Barbara. "Well done, Bubbles." And she passed into the studio, wondering why a little face all knotting with smiles, affection, and the pleasure of commands lovingly received and well obeyed, should remind her of that other face, massive, sardonic, lost, satanic, which had looked up into hers across the battered tin cup on the top of a battered street-organ. She turned to a little clay head that she had made recently and for which Bubbles had sat; touched it here and there, stepped back from it, turned her own head to the left, to the right, and even, such was the concentration of her mood, showed between her red lips the tip of a still redder tongue. But no matter what she did to test and undo her first impression there persisted between the two faces a certain likeness, though in just what this resemblance consisted she was unable to say. "Bubbles," she said, "you were telling me about beggars the other day and how much they make, and how rich some of them are. Did you ever run across one that sells shoe-laces, plays a hand-organ, and hasn't got any legs?" "Sure," said he; "there's half a dozen in the city." And he named them. "Burbage: he's the real thing, got his legs took off by a cannon-ball in |
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