Part 24 (1/2)

”That's what she always said,” exclaimed Grandma Johnson; ”that the pleasant things come to the people who are looking for pleasant things but, land! see what's happened to her and if anyone ever looked for pleasantness it was Mary Rose. Why she even looked for it in us!” And she laughed harshly.

”And she found it, too,” Mrs. Schuneman declared quickly. ”Yes, she did. She looked deep enough to find the pleasantness we didn't know was there because we'd covered it up with so much disagreeableness.

I'm not ashamed to admit that she made me see that so long as you live in a world with other people you owe some obligation to be agreeable to them. If each of us did our share, as Mary Rose was always asking us to do, we'd find this world a friendlier place than it is.”

”She must have said that to me a hundred times,” sniffled Miss Adams.

”I knew she was right all the time but I wouldn't say so.”

”It's easy to get out of the habit of being friendly in the city,”

murmured Mrs. Matchan. ”It's different in the country.”

”I guess it's much the same, city or country. If she hadn't found Germania for me I'd have been in an asylum by now,” a.s.serted Mrs.

Schuneman. ”There I was all by myself and while a bird isn't a human being, it's a lot of company. And it's through Germania and Mary Rose that I've got acquainted with all of you.”

”If it hadn't been for Mary Rose I doubt if Mr. Bracken would have asked me to go for Harriet,” Mrs. Bracken said in a low voice.

It seemed as if each of them had something to say of what Mary Rose had done for her. Mary Rose's friendly nature, her undaunted belief in the friendliness of people and of the world in which she lived had made those whose lives she had touched develop friendliness also. The dozen people gathered in the Donovan living-room said so, quite frankly.

Suddenly the clock struck eleven times. Mrs. Donovan burst into a perfect storm of tears. ”She should have been in her bed hours ago!”

she sobbed. ”An' where is she? Where's Mary Rose?”

”Sh--s.h.!.+” There was a step on the stairs. It seemed as if everyone stopped breathing to listen.

CHAPTER XXIII

Larry Donovan jumped to the door.

But it was Mr. Wells' grim face that appeared in the circle of light and his grimmer voice that asked harshly:

”What's the matter? What's all this disturbance through the building, Donovan? Every door is open and there's a general turmoil.”

They faced him indignantly, fellow tenants and janitor. Each had had some experience with him that had been more unpleasant than pleasant.

All of them knew that he disliked Mary Rose, that he had complained to the agents because she lived in the bas.e.m.e.nt with the Donovans. Each of them resented the selfishness that had brought him down to make another complaint when all of them were so worried and anxious. It was Bob Strahan who put some of this feeling into words.

”No doubt you'll be glad to hear that Mary Rose, the little girl who has been such a nuisance to you, has disappeared?” he said sarcastically.

Mr. Wells looked at him from under his s.h.a.ggy eyebrows. ”What do you mean?” he snapped. ”What do you mean?”

Everyone tried to tell him at once but Mrs. Donovan who was sobbing in her ap.r.o.n and could not speak. Mr. Wells looked at her oddly.

”Nonsense!” he said when the story was clear to him. ”She's locked herself in somewhere as she did once before.” He had heard of the time the wind had slammed Mrs. Bracken's door and shut Mary Rose inside.

”She's fallen asleep.”

”We've been in every flat but yours,” Larry Donovan told him dully.

”Everyone but mine?” repeated Mr. Wells. ”Well, she wouldn't go there.” Then he remembered that Mary Rose had been there in a neighborly desire to be kind to him when he was ill, in a friendly wish to tell him of her belief in him when he was under suspicion, and he colored painfully. For all he knew she might be there now. She had a habit of going when and where she pleased. That was what made her such a nuisance in his eyes. ”You can come and see for yourself,” he said sharply. ”So far as I know there's no one there. Sako is out and I've just come in.”