Motion Picture Story Magazine (Feb-Jul 1912)

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102 TEE MOTION PICTURE STORY MAGAZINE vanities of life to its duties, seemingly too late. For thru the midnight stillness droned the dismal clangor of several fire apparatus, wearily making their way homeward, and in the eastern sky was the faint glow of a dying conflagration. All that was left of the Norton cottage was a tottering chimney, four broken foundation walls and an ugly mass of smoking ruins ! The desultory group of spectators who remained were watching, with morbid curiosity, several firemen, who still poked about among the ruins in an evidently hopeless search for what the fire should have left of a tragedy. The crowd was startled by a bloodfreezing cry that at first seemed to rise from the midst of the steam and smoke. It was some time before they discerned a wild female figure, clothed in spattered and bedraggled silk, hugging a half-charred object close to her half*bared breast with one hand, while the other was extended before her, the fingers crooked stiffly in appeal. Several men rushed to her side and charitably threw a warm blanket over her icy shoulders. All the while she laughed mirthlessly, while great, meaningless tears flowed down her cheeks. Then they looked into her eyes and saw that the light of reason had departed from them ! And all the way to the hospital she continued to laugh and point to the charred rag doll, a smudge against her fair white breast, murmuring in a harsh voice, ' ' See ! I found her — my Toddles ! Never shall she leave mother's breast again — my baby!" ' And some men wept that night to whom tears had for years been strangers. It must have been fully two hours before this when Dr. Norton had finished the first tedious stage of skingrafting in the case of a wan little child. His assistant beckoned him aside. "You're wanted.' ' ' ' I cant come, ' ' was his reply. "There's been a fire." ' ' My God ! any more of this V He pointed to the prostrate figure. "They're calling for you again, out there in the receiving ward. ' ' Dr. Norton, still in his ghostly operating garb, flitted sinisterly toward a cot on which lay a little creature, sobbing as if her heart would break. The man gave a sharp cry and ripped the coverlet from the bed, disclosing a nightgown with a few holes burned in it. ' ' Toddles ! My little Toddles ! " he moaned, scanning every inch of the white flesh. "But, daddy, I lost dolly — wanta go home ! ' * the child sobbed. He folded her in his arms, and then turned on a fireman, demanding, ''And Mrs. Norton — tell me — oh, my God, you must have sa\cd her! I tell you, you must have ! ' ' "They're lookin' — now. But I'm afraid " The man stopped. ' ' Here, orderly ! My coat and hat — and our ambulance ! Oh, Katherine, Katherine ! to think that I spoke one cross word ! That I suspected you of What does the child say ? ' ' "I tay," repeated Toddles, laboredly, "I tole my Nannah she tood doe — an' I 'tay home wid dolly. I want dolly!" "The soulless wretch!" muttered the doctor, half reeling under this new intelligence. Then he turned fiercely on the assembled group. "Go! Leave me with my child! I want to be alone — oh, I want to be alone!" And they left him, a crumpled heap, dry sobs shaking his broad shoulders, the curly head of his sleepy child nestled close to his face. "Will Nannah tome toon?" she was saying, drowsily. When they brought "Nannah" in, what seemed years later to all concerned, and gently laid her on a warm, white sheet, she was calmer and laughing softly now. Some one whispered in his ear, "Come," and he followed mechanically. His pain-wearied eyes saw