"STRAIGHT AWAY THE BIRD FLEW" See p. 63
Two Prisoners
By Thomas Nelson Page
Illustrated in Color
by
Virginia Keep
New York
R. H. Russell
MCMIII
Copyright, 1898
By ROBERT HOWARD RUSSELL
Copyright, 1903
By HARPER & BROTHERS
To the memory of
ALFRED B. STAREY
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
are made to Messrs. Harper & Brothers, in whose magazine, Harper'sYoung People, when under the management of the late Alfred B. Starey,some years ago, this story in a condensed form first appeared. Thestory has been rewritten and amplified.—T.N.P.
Illustrations
"Straight Away the Bird Flew" . . . . . . . . . Frontispiece
"Could See a Little Girl Walking About with her Nurse"
"Mildred Played Out-of-Doors all Day Long"
"'Are You a Princess?' Asked Molly"
"'Mother,' She Whispered"
Two Prisoners
Squeezed in between other old dingy houses down a dirty, narrow streetpaved with cobble-stones, and having, in place of sidewalks, guttersfilled with gray slop-water, stood a house, older and dingier than therest. It had a battered and knock-kneed look, and it leant on thehouses on either side of it, as if it were unable to stand up alone.The door was just on a level with the street, and in rainy weather thewater poured in and ran through the narrow little passage leaving asilt of mud in which the children played and made tracks. The windowswere broken in many places, and were stuffed with old rags, or in someplaces had bits of oilcloth nailed over the holes. It looked black anddisreputable even in that miserable quarter, and it was. Only thepoorest and the most unfortunate would stay in such a rookery. Itseemed to be in charge of or, at least, ruled over by a woman namedMrs. O'Meath, a short, red faced creature, who said she had once been"a wash lady," but who had long given up a profession which requiredsuch constant use of water, and who now, so far as could be seen, usedno liquid in any way except whiskey or beer.
The dingiest room in this house was, perhaps, the little hall-cupboardat the head of the secon