Chapter XVI

The first thing that happened to little Golden Glenalvan after she arrived in the city of New York, was something that not infrequently happens to simple and inexperienced travelers.

She had her pocket picked of her purse by some expert thief. Such things have often happened in the annals of New York crime, and will again, but it is probable that no one's life was ever so much affected by such a loss as was the unfortunate little Golden's.

She found herself by this totally unlooked-for catastrophe thrown into the streets of the great, wicked city penniless, friendless, and utterly forsaken. Every cent she possessed in the world had been in the little purse, together with the card that bore her father's name. The latter was not so great a loss to her. The name of the man who had wronged her mother was engraven on her mind in characters that were never to be destroyed.

Her little plans for the discovery of her mother, laid with such girlish art, were all turned away by this accident. She had meant to take cheap lodgings somewhere, and prosecute her search, but now she knew not what to do, nor where to turn.

The great, busy city, with its strange faces and hurry and bustle frightened her, even though she dreamed not in her girlish innocence of its festering sin and underlying wickedness.

Sinking down on a secluded seat in Central Park where she had been walking when she first discovered her loss, she sobbed bitterly in her grief and distress--so bitterly that a well-dressed, benevolent-looking lady who was walking along a path with a pretty poodle frisking before her, went up to her with kind abruptness.

"My dear little girl," she said, laying her hand gently on the showering, golden wealth of hair that escaped from Golden's little sailor hat, "what is the matter? Can I help you?"

Golden lifted her head and the lady who had a kind, middle-aged face, decidedly aristocratic, started and uttered a cry of surprise at the beautiful, girlish face with its tearful eyes like purple-blue pansies drowned in dew.

In a moment the lady's quick eyes had seen from the cut and fashion of Golden's simple garments that she was a stranger in New York. She repeated kindly:

"What ails you, my child? Have you become separated from your friends?"

"No, for I have not a friend in this whole, great city. But I have lost my purse," answered Golden, with childish directness.

The lady sat down beside her and regarded her a moment in thoughtful silence. She saw nothing but the most infantile sweetness, purity and truth in the lovely, troubled young face. She was touched and interested.

"So you have lost your purse?" she said. "Have you had your pocket picked?"

"I do not know," answered Golden, forlornly. "I carried it in my jacket pocket, and awhile ago, when I felt for it I discovered that it was gone."

"Now, I am quite sure you are a stranger in New York," said the lady. "If you belonged in the city you would know better than to carry your purse carelessly in the pocket of your walking jacket. New York is full of sneak thieves who are on the watch for the unwary. You say you have not a friend in the city. Where are you from, my child?"

"From the south," replied Golden.

"Did you come to New York alone?"

"Yes madam. I am an orphan," replied the girl, not wishing to disclose her history to her interrogator.

"What do you wish for in this great city?" asked the lady.

"I want to find some employment at present. Can you help me?" asked Golden, timidly and beseechingly lifting her large blue eyes to the interested face of the lady.

"Perhaps I can," said the lady, smiling gently. "What kind of employment do you wish? What kind of work can you do?"

The beautiful, girlish face grew a little blank. She remembered her careless, idle life at Glenalvan Hall, where no one ever taught her anything but her grandfather and old Dinah. She was compelled to confess despondently that she did not know how to do anything.

The lady who was a really good woman with a decidedly benevolent turn, studied the drooping face attentively. She saw that there was some mystery about the girl, but the lovely young face was so guileless and winning that she could see no evil in it. She asked her, rather abruptly, what her name was.

"Golden Glenalvan," answered the girl, and the lady frowned slightly, and said it was too fanciful and pretty.

"If you are going to work for your living, I would advise you to call yourself by some plain and common name, such as Jones or Brown or Smith."

"Then I will call myself Mary Smith," replied Golden, resignedly.

"That will do very well. Now, my child, do you think you would like to undertake chambermaid's work?"

She glanced, as she spoke, at the girl's ungloved hands, and saw that they were delicately white and aristocratic, so she answered the question negatively to herself before Golden answered, shrinkingly and timidly:

"I do not believe I would like it, madam, but I am willing to try. I must do something to support myself, and I have no choice left me since I do not know how to do anything."

The lady looked at her a little wonderingly.

"My child, if you would tell me something about yourself I might know better how to help you," she said. "It is quite evident that you have met with reverses. You are unaccustomed to labor, and you look like a born lady."

Golden was silent, and a deep blush colored her face. Not for worlds would she have told her sad story to this gentle woman.

She fancied that the sweet pity beaming from her gray eyes now would change to scorn and contempt, if she could know that she was a nameless child seeking a lost and guilty mother.

"Perhaps you have imprudently run away from your friends," she said, questioningly, and striking so near the truth that Golden burst into tears again, and would have left her but that she detained her by a firm yet gentle pressure of the hand.

"Do not go," she said. "I want to help you if I can. Perhaps I could tell you something you are far too young and innocent to know."

"What is that, ma'am?" asked Golden, looking at her questioningly.

"This, my child--that one so pretty and simple as you are should not be alone and friendless in this great city. You are in the greatest danger. Beauty is only a curse to a poor girl who has to earn her own living."

"Yes, madam," Golden answered, with perfect meekness, though she crimsoned painfully.

"So I think," continued her kind friend, "that a home and shelter in even the humblest capacity is better for you than to be wandering alone in the streets homeless and penniless."

"I know that," said Golden, "but I have nowhere to go," and the pathos of the tearful tone touched the kind lady's heart.

"My child, I have been thinking about that," she said. "I have a friend who needs a nurse for her little invalid girl. Should you like to try for the situation?"

"Oh, yes," Golden answered, gratefully.

"The little girl is the petted and only daughter of wealthy people," continued the kind lady. "She is delicate, and has been humored and spoiled injudiciously all her life, until she is, at times, quite overbearing and disagreeable, so much so indeed that her mother can scarcely keep a nurse for her more than a week or two at a time. Are you frightened at my description? Have you a good store of patience?"

"I have been impatient and self-willed all my life," confessed Golden, frankly.

"Yet you have a sweet-tempered face, if there is any truth in physiognomy," said her new friend. "It seems to me that you could not grow impatient ministering to the needs of that poor, little invalid child. Think how much happiness you could give the poor, ailing little soul if you tried. And when you are as old as I am," she added, with a faint sigh, "you will understand that the greatest pleasure in life is in giving happiness to others."

"I will try to be patient and kind to the child, if you will be so kind as to get the place for me," said little Golden, trembling with eagerness.

"Very well, my dear; I will myself accompany you to my friend's house and speak a kind word in your favor. It is rather a risk to run, this introducing and vouching for a total stranger, but I believe that your gentle, honest face will be a passport to Mrs. Desmond's favor, just as it has been to mine. You will follow me, now, my child."

Golden walked on with the warm-hearted woman some distance through the beautiful green park, when, to her surprise, her benefactress stopped before an elegant, liveried carriage, with quite an imposing-looking driver in a white hat and gloves.

"Drive to Mrs. Desmond's, John," she said, as the footman handed her and her timid _protege_ into the carriage.

Little Golden felt like one in a bewildering dream as she lay back among the luxurious satin cushions and was whirled through the stately streets, past the beautiful buildings and brown-stone palaces until they stopped at last before one more splendid than all the rest, and she found herself gliding up the marble steps, her young heart throbbing fast at the novelty and strangeness of her position.

She was going to be a servant in this splendid house! She, one of the Glenalvans of Glenalvan Hall, a name that had been proud and honored in the past until her girlish mother had stained its haughty prestige with shame.

Her heart beat heavily and slow. The thought came to her mind that these proud and wealthy people would not even permit her to be a servant to their daughter if they knew that she was a nameless child.