Author:  Clara Augusta Jones Trask

Release Date:  June 4, 2005 [eBook #15989]

Language:  English

Character set encoding:  ISO-646-us (us-ASCII)

***Start of the project gutenberg EBOOK the fatal glove***

E-text prepared by Bill Tozier, Barbara Tozier, Mary Meehan, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)

Transcriber’s note:  After “The Fatal Glove” is a short story titled
                     “Constitutionally Bashful.”  The author was not
                     identified.

THE FATAL GLOVE

by

CLARA AUGUSTA

Author of “The Rugg Documents,” “Patience Pettigrew’s Perplexities,” etc.

1892

PART I.

Arch Trevlyn had had a good day.  Business had been brisk.  The rain had fallen steadily since daybreak, and the street-crossings in New York were ankle deep in mud.  The little street-sweeper’s arms ached fearfully, but his pocket was full of pennies, interspersed with an occasional half-dime.

The clouds were breaking in the west, and a gleam of sunshine gilded the tall tower of St. John’s.  Arch shouldered his broom, and whistled a merry tune as he took his way homeward.  His bright dark eyes sparkled as he thought how the sight of his earnings would cheer his feeble mother.  She could have tea now, with real milk and some sugar in it, and an orange, too.  Only yesterday she was wishing she had an orange.

Arch’s way led past a horticultural store, and his eye wandered longingly over the display of flowers in the window.  He must have just one wee white rose, because, only the Sabbath before, while he sat at his mother’s feet, she had wept in telling him about the sweet roses that used to grow under the window of the little country cottage where her happy youth had been spent.

The white rose would be like bringing back to her ever so little a bit of the happy past.  It could not cost much, and Arch felt wealthy as a prince.  He stepped into the store and asked the price of a white rose.  The clerk answered him roughly: 

“Get out of the store, you young rascal!  You want to steal something!”

“I am not a thief, sir,” said the boy, proudly, his sallow cheeks crimsoning hotly.  “I want a rose for my mother.  I guess I can pay for it!”

“It’s half a dollar, if you want it,” said the man, sneeringly.  “Show your money, or take yourself off this minute!”

Archie’s countenance fell.  He had not half a dollar in all.  He turned sadly away, his head drooping, his lip quivering.  Oh, how very hard it was to be poor, he thought, looking enviously at the costly carriage, with a pair of splendid grays, standing before the door.