Poor and Proud or the Fortunes of Katy Redburn Part 1

Poor and Proud.

by Oliver Optic.

PREFACE.

Bobby Bright and Harry West, whose histories were contained in the last two volumes of the "Library for Young Folks," were both smart boys. The author, very grateful for the genial welcome extended to these young gentlemen, begs leave to introduce to his juvenile friends a smart girl,--Miss Katy Redburn,--whose fortunes, he hopes, will prove sufficiently interesting to secure their attention.

If any of my adult readers are disposed to accuse me of being a little extravagant, I fear I shall have to let the case go by default; but I shall plead, in extenuation, that I have tried to be reasonable, even where a few grains of the romantic element were introduced; for Baron Munchausen and Sindbad the Sailor were standard works on my shelf in boyhood, and I may possibly have imbibed some of their peculiar spirit.

But I feel a lively satisfaction in the reflection that, whatever exaggerations the critic may decide I have perpetrated in this volume, I have made the success of Katy Redburn depend upon her good principles, her politeness, her determined perseverance, and her overcoming that foolish pride which is a snare to the feet. In these respects she is a worthy exemplar for the young.

Pride and poverty do not seem to agree with each other; but there is a pride which is not irreconcilable with the humblest station. This pride of character finds an ill.u.s.tration in the life of my heroine.

Thanking my young friends again for the pleasant reception given to my former books I submit this volume in the hope that Katy Redburn will prove to be a worthy and agreeable companion for their leisure hours.

WILLIAM T. ADAMS.

DORCHESTER, Sept. 29, 1858.

CHAPTER I.

KATY REDBURN AND OTHERS ARE INTRODUCED.

"Give me a flounder, Johnny?" said a little girl of eleven, dressed in coa.r.s.e and ragged garments, as she stooped down and looked into the basket of the dirty young fisherman, who sat with his legs hanging over the edge of the pier.

"I'll bet I won't," replied Johnny, gruffly, as he drew the basket out of the reach of the supplicant. "You needn't come round here tryin' to hook my fish."

"You hooked 'em," said another juvenile angler who sat on the capsill of the pier by Johnny's side.

"Who says I hooked 'em?" bl.u.s.tered Johnny, whose little dirty paws involuntarily a.s.sumed the form of a pair of fists, scientifically disposed and ready to be the instruments of the owner's vengeance upon the traducer of his character.

"I say so," added Tommy Howard, who did not seem to be at all alarmed at the warlike att.i.tude of his fellow-angler.

"Say it again, and I'll smash your head," continued Johnny, jumping up from his seat.

"Didn't you hear me? Once is enough."

Tommy coolly hauled up a large flounder at that moment, and threw the fish into his basket. It was rather refres.h.i.+ng to see how regardless he was of that pair of menacing fists.

"Jest you say that once more, and see what I'll do," persisted Johnny.

"I won't do it."

"You dasn't say it again."

"Perhaps I dasn't; at any rate, I shan't."

"Do you mean to say I hooked them fish?" exclaimed Johnny, desperately, for it seemed as though he must do something to vindicate his injured honor.

"That's just what I did say."

But Tommy was so confoundedly cool that his fellow-angler had some doubts about the expediency of "pitching into him." Probably a vision of defeat flashed through his excited brain and discretion seemed the better part of valor. Yet he was not disposed to abandon his position, and advanced a pace or two toward his provoking companion; a movement which, to an unpracticed eye, would indicate a purpose to do something.

"Don't fight, Tommy," said the little ragged girl.

"I don't mean to fight, Katy,"--Johnny, at these words, a.s.sumed an artistic att.i.tude, ready to strike the first blow,--"only if Johnny hits me, I shall knock him into the middle of next week."

Johnny did not strike. He was a prudent young man.

"Don't fight, Johnny," repeated the girl, turning to the excited aspirant for the honors of the ring.

"Do you suppose I'll let him tell me I hooked them fish?" bl.u.s.tered Johnny.

"He didn't mean anything."

"Yes, I did," interposed Tommy. "He caught 'em on a hook; so of course he hooked em. I hooked mine too."

"Is that what you meant?" asked Johnny, a broad grin overspreading his dirty face, and his fists suddenly expanding into dirty paws again.

"That's just what I meant; and your skull is as thick as a two-inch plank, or you would have seen what I meant."

"I see now."

Johnny was not disposed to resent this last insinuation about the solidity of his cranium. He was evidently too glad to get out of the sc.r.a.pe without a broken head or a b.l.o.o.d.y nose. Johnny was a bully, and he had a bully's reputation to maintain; but he never fought when the odds were against him; and he had a congressman's skill in backing out before the water got too hot. On the whole, he rather enjoyed the pun; and he had the condescension to laugh heartily, though somewhat unnaturally, at the jest.

"Will you give me a flounder, Tommy?" said the little ragged girl, as she glanced into his well-filled basket.

"What do you want of him, Katy?" asked Tommy turning round and gazing up into her sad, pale face.

Katy hesitated; her bosom heaved, and her lips compressed, as though she feared to answer the question.

"To eat," she replied, at last, in a husky tone.

"What's the matter, Katy?"

The face of the child seemed to wear a load of care and anxiety, and as the young fisherman gazed a tear started from her eye, and slid down her cheek. Tommy's heart melted as he saw this exhibition of sorrow. He wondered what could ail her.

"My mother is sick," replied Katy, das.h.i.+ng away the tell-tale tear.

"I know that; but what do you want of flounders?"

"We have nothing to eat now," said Katy, bursting into tears. "Mother has not been able to do any work for more than three months: and we haven't got any money now. It's all gone. I haven't had any breakfast to-day."

"Take 'em all, Katy!" exclaimed Tommy, jumping up from his seat on the capsill of the pier. "How will you carry them? Here, I will string 'em for you."

Tommy was all energy now, and thrust his hands down into the depths of his pockets in search of a piece of twine. Those repositories of small stores did not contain a string, however; but mixed up with a piece of cord, a slate pencil, an iron hinge, two marbles, a bra.s.s ring, and six inches of stovepipe chain, were two cents, which the owner thereof carefully picked out of the heap of miscellaneous articles and thrust them into the hand of Katy.

"Here, take them; and as you go by the grocery at the corner of the court, buy a two-cent roll," whispered he. "Got a bit o' string, Johnny?" he added aloud, as Katy began to protest against taking the money.