He had a box of matches under his arm, of which very few seemed to have been sold. He had a weary, spiritless air, and walked as if quite tired. He had been on his feet all day, and was faint with hunger, having eaten nothing but an apple to sustain his strength. The thought that he was near his journey's end did not seem to cheer him much. Why this should be so will speedily appear.

He crossed William Street, passed Gold Street, and turned down Vandewater Street, leading out of Frankfort's Street on the left. It is in the form of a short curve, connecting with that most crooked² of all New York avenues, Pearl Street. He paused in front of a shabby house, and went upstairs. The door of a room on the third floor was standing³ ajar. He pushed it open, and entered, not without a kind of shrinking.

A coarse-looking woman was seated before a scanty⁴ fire. She had just thrust a bottle into her pocket after taking a copious⁵ draught⁶ therefrom, and her flushed face showed that this had long been a habit with her.

"Well, Mark, what luck to-night?" she said, in a husky voice.

"I didn't sell much," said the boy.

"Didn't sell much? Come here," said the woman, sharply.

Mark came up to her side, and she snatched the box from him, angrily.

"Only three boxes gone?" she repeated. "What have you been doing all day?"

She added to the question a coarse epithet⁷ which I shall not repeat.

"I tried to sell them, indeed I did, Mother Watson, indeed I did," said the boy, earnestly, "but everybody had bought them already."

分享到：