Flower Read Free Page B

me a bunch of violets from a flower-seller. First time anyone bought me flowers. I felt like a real lady. This one’s for you. I pressed one of the violets under the washstand.”
    “Oh, Mother … I mean Helen, thank you.”
    “We share, don’t we? You’re my little girl. I’ll take care of you, don’t you worry.”
    “Where are we going now, Helen?” I said.
    “I’m going to show you a place, and I want you to remember the way, so you can find it by yourself if ever you need to. Stepney Causeway, it’s called.” She made me say it out loud three times, so I wouldn’t forget. We sang it to the tune of “Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay.” Then we stopped in front of this big gray building.
    “Looks dark, Helen. I don’t like it. It makes my stomach feel funny.”
    All her good mood gone, she said sharply, “You stop that kind of talk, Lillie. It’s a big place, that’s all. As big as Buckingham Palace, where the king and queen live. It’s a fine place. There are some words written over the door. I’ll read them to you, and don’t you forget what they say: NO DESTITUTE CHILD EVER REFUSED ADMISSION. That means, it’s for boys and girls who have no place else to go. You can knock at the door, and they’ll take you in and feed you and look after you.” Then she grabbed my hand and we turned around to go back to Mrs. Riley’s.
    “Cheer up, my little Lil,” Helen said, and started to sing again. I joined in. A window opened above us and a man threw us a penny. We laughed so hard Helen began to cough, and then couldn’t stop. She put her handkerchief to her mouth and, when she took it away, I saw a drop of blood.
    When we got back to Mrs. Riley’s, she patted my cheek and said, “Be a good girl.” Then she walked off into the rain and I could hear her coughing all the way down the alley.
    I wait and wait for her for three Sundays and a Wednesday. I lose count how many weeks she doesn’t come. Mrs. Riley gets crosser and crosser, and slaps me more often. Some days I go without supper.
    One morning she tells Bert to get his jacket. “We’regoing uptown to see what’s what. Lillie, finish them pile of hankies, if you know what’s good for you.”
    They are gone a long time. None of us has anything to eat at midday. I am hemming the last of the hankies when they come back. Mrs. Riley sends the others upstairs.
    “I got something to tell you, Lil. It’s bad news. Helen’s gone. Died and gone to Heaven. The cough killed her. Tuberculosis, her friend Gertie said. Them people she works for paid for the funeral.”
    I look down at a drop of blood that has fallen on the hanky. I must’ve stuck the needle in the tip of my finger. I never felt it. I don’t cry–even when Mrs. Riley cuffs me for spoiling the work.
    “Go and wash out the stain,” she says, “and fetch me your boots, the ones you hide under your bed. I can sell them and they’ll pay for your keep a bit longer. You heard me, girl. I want them now.”
    Next day she takes in a baby for me to mind, a thin little yellow-faced girl who screams all day. She sleeps in my old place in the bed, and I sleep wrapped in my shawl on the floor in the corner. I get up and rock the baby in the night when she wails. “Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay,” I sing to her, and think of Helen–how we laughed that time, and the blood on her handkerchief. I wish I still had my boots.
    One night, when Mrs. Riley has gone to bed, I put my shawl over my head, tuck my Lillie Langtry picture–the flower glued to the back of it–inside my dress, and run off.
    Helen said to go to the big gray house, and I remember the way. I hurry down the alley, past the King’s Head pub glowing warm and bright in the dark. The door is open and I see the sawdust on the floor, hear the piano playing, smell the beer. As I run by, a man stumbles out and pushes against me. I fall down. A Gypsy woman selling trinkets from her wooden tray puts her hand out to help me. The children waiting for their parents