My Notorious Life Read Online Free

wait here while I take your mother to see the doctor, said Our Protector.
    —We’ll come along, I cried. —Won’t we? Mam!
    —You must go with Mr. Brace, said Mam, in pain and surrender—and if he’s good as his word I’ll meet you again soon on Cherry Street when I’m improved.
    —I’m good as my word, madam, you can trust it, says he.
    —And Axie, listen, Mam said. —For the love of God promise you’ll take care of our Joseph and our Dutchess. Keep them with you d’ya hear me?
    —Yes I promise Mam, I says, fainthearted.
    Mr. Brace helped her down, and she leaned on him into the gray building. We kept our six eyes on her to the last. It was not a ceremonious nor hysterical farewell. We did not cry nor cling to her but bit down on our fears and obeyed as she had taught us. We waited in the carriage with a warm robe over our legs, and after a time we fell asleep.
    We was awoken by the noise of wheels on cobbles, and seen the carriage was off again, but our Mam was not with us. —Where is she? I accused Mr. Brace.
    —The doctor must see to her injury. We’re off to find you some dinner and a bed.
    Dutchie clutched at me while Joe whimpered on my lap.
    —Suffer the little children, said Mr. Brace, with a tender look.
    —We are suffering, sure, I said. —You took our mother, you don’t need to tell us.
    —‘Suffer the little children to come unto me,’ said the Lord Jesus Christ.
    —It was you that said it, I told him.
    —My only motive in life is to do good for the unfortunate, dear child.
    Brace was the pooka, I thought, come to haul us off to the hills, turn us to cabbages, cook us and eat us. The unfamiliar streets passed till at last we arrived very nervous at a house with a grand porch and fluted columns, its tower topped with a golden weather vane in the shape of a rooster. The snow lay around it pure and cold as froth on a draft of beer.
    —What is this place? Dutch asked the Gentleman. —Is this where you live?
    —This, young lady, is the Little Roses Orphan Asylum.
    —We are not no orphans, I said hotly.
    —Of course not, my spirited girl! His voice was honey in his throat. —You may stay here until such time as your mother is able to take care of you.
    We were taken inside, limp with traveling, and Brace introduced us to a Lady, Mrs. Reardon. The look of her was starched, her apron white and stiff, her hair pulled back severely on her small head. Plus we never seen such a rump on a human. It was its own continent, but we did not stare now, as we were stupefied to distraction by the sight of the sweeping staircase and the high ceilings, the statue of a stone child holding one stone rose there in the vestibule of the Asylum.
    —These merry rascals are the Muldoon children, the Gentleman told her. —I found them half-frozen on Catherine Street.
    —Poor lambs.
    —The home is patently unfit, he whispered low to her. —Terrible vice and degradation. I left the Mother at Bellevue. Her prognosis is dire.
    Dire he said. The word stang me with fear, but before I could ask its meaning here was Mr. Brace bidding us farewell with a wave of his leather glove hand, leaving us to the Asylum, where it was common knowledge among the children of Cherry Street that the matrons kidnapped Catholic kids to sell them into slavery.
    Mrs. R. led us to a large dining room, a lordly place full of tables, every one of them with uniformed children sitting, banging their forks in a racket till somebody rang a bell and the room went quiet. All those scrubbed orphan eyes turned our way, and I seen us now as they must, unwashed and reeking of misery. We had to sit right down amongst them. —Let us give thanks, said Mrs. R.
    Like one marvelous machine, the orphans folded their hands and bowed their heads. We did likewise and mumbled along with the blessing.
    —Amen, said all the kids. The word was deafening.
    —Where yiz come from? said one girl. She was the size of a man, nearly, with red pimples on her long