he little girl looked to be eight or nine years old, although she told Hero she would be twelve the week before Christmas. Hero was beginning to realize that she was hopeless when it came to estimating children’s ages.
A plain child named Elsie, she had small, unremarkable features and a habit of frowning thoughtfully before she answered each of Hero’s questions. Her nondescript hair was braided inexpertly into two plats that stuck out at odd angles from her head, while her faded navy frock was hopelessly tattered, with large, triangular rents that someone had tried to repair with big, crooked stitches. But her face was surprisingly clean, and she wore a cotton bonnet tied around her neck with ribbons. She’d pushed the bonnet off her head, so that it bounced about her shoulders every time she dropped a curtsy—which was often.
“I been sweepin’ nine months now, m’lady,” she told Hero with one of her bobbing curtsies. “Me mother died last year, you see. She used to bring in money making lace, and now she’s gone, me da can’t make enough to keep us.” She nodded to the two small children, a boy of about three and a girl of perhaps five, who sat on the steps behind her playing with a pile of oyster shells. “I gots t’ bring the little ones with me when I sweeps, which scares me, ’cause I’m always afraid they’re gonna run out in front of a carriage when me back is turned.”
Hero watched a stylish barouche drawn by a team of high-stepping bays dash up the street and knew an echo of the little girl’s fear. Children were always being run over and killed in the streets of London. She cleared her throat. “What does your father do?”
Elsie dropped another of her little curtsies. “He’s a cutler, m’lady. But the work’s been slow lately. Real slow.”
“And was it his idea that you take up sweeping?”
“Oh, no, m’lady. I got the idea all by meself. At first I tried singing songs. I could get four or five pence a day for singing—even more on Saturday nights at the market.”
“So why did you give that up?”
“I only knows a few songs, and I guess people got tired of hearing ’em, because after a while, I wasn’t makin’ much at all. If I could read, I could buy some new ballads and sing ’em, but I ain’t never been able t’ go t’ school on account of having to watch the children.”
“Would you like to go to school?”
A wistful look came over the child’s small, plain features. “Oh, yes, m’lady. Ever so much.”
Hero blinked and looked down at her notebook. “And how much do you make sweeping at your crossing?”
“Usually I takes in between six and eight pence. But I can’t come in really wet weather, on account o’ the little ones.” Another carriage was rumbling down the street toward them, and Elsie cast a quick, anxious glance at her siblings.
“How long do you find your broom lasts?”
“A week, usually. I don’t sweep in dry weather. The take is always bad on those days, you know. So when it’s dry, I go back to singing.”
“That’s very clever of you,” said Hero, impressed. All the boys to whom she’d spoken had also complained about the poor “take” in dry weather. But Elsie was the first crossing sweep she’d found who thought to do something else on those days. “What time do you usually come to work?”
“Well, I try to get here before eight in the morning, so’s I can sweep the crossing before the carriages and carts get thick. They scares me. I always try to stand back when I see one coming.”
“And how late do you stay?”
Elsie frowned thoughtfully. “This time o’ year, usually till four or five. Me da wants me home before it starts gettin’ real dark. So I can’t stay out late like the boys.”
“Who gives you more money? The ladies or the gentlemen?”
“Oh, the gentlemen almost always gives me more than the ladies. But there’s an old woman what keeps a beer shop, just over there.” She nodded across the narrow street. “She gives me a hunk o’ bread and cheese every day for tea, and I shares it with the children.”
Hero checked her list of possible questions. “What do you see yourself doing in ten years’ time? Do you think you’ll always be a crossing sweeper?”
“I hope not.” Elsie glanced back at the two children now following the progress of a bug along the steps. “Once Mick and Jessup gets big enough to look after themselves, maybe I could get a situation as a servant in a house. I’d work hard—truly, I would. Only, you can’t get a situation without proper clothes, so I don’t know how that’ll ever come to pass.” She smoothed one anxious hand down over her tattered skirt.
Hero smiled. “Did you mend your dress yourself?”
“No, m’lady. Me da did that. He braids me hair every morning too, b’fore he goes out lookin’ for work.”