JUST IN TIME.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VIII, Issue 36, 5 September 1891, Page 351

JUST IN TIME.

A photographer was sitting in his reception room one dull day in midwinter, when a tired-looking, hollow-eyed woman slowly and timidly entered, with the air of one unaccustomed to anything but the hardships of life. Her clothing was thin and old, and she held close to her breast a baby wrapped in a shawl. • 1 come to see if—if—’ she stopped, with one hand still on the knob of the door, and her eyes downcast. • To see if ichat ?’ asked the artist. ‘To see if you’d take my baby’s photograft. I ain’t got any money to pay for it, but I thought maybe you’d let me scrub and clean up your room, and pay for it in that way. I’d be so glad if you would.’ The baby set up a feeble cry at that moment, and after his mother had quieted him she said : • Yon see he don’t cry like a well baby ; he ain’t never been strong ; none of my babies are. I’ve buried four, and I ain’t got no picture of any of ’em. It would be a real comfort to me if I had. And I thought I’d try to git a photograft of this one in case anything should happen. I’d do any amount of scrubbin’ you’d say was right.’ Unaccustomed as she was to kindness, the artist could hardly make her understand that he would take her baby’s picture for nothing, and she left the room with tears in her eyes. When she returned for the completed photograph, two weeks later, she came alone. A strip of dingy crape dangled from her old black bonnet. What her mother's heart had feared, had come to pass—the baby had gone the way of the other four.