and the winter's ice, just chopped up by the
street cleaners, lay muddy and ragged and high in the streets from
curb to curb. So it must lie till there was time to cart it to the
Dvina, which had all it could do at this season to carry tons, and
heavy tons, of ice and snow and every sort of city rubbish,
accumulated during the long closed months. Polotzk had no underground
communication with the sea, save such as water naturally makes for
itself. The poor old Dvina was hard-worked, serving both as
drinking-fountain and sewer, as a bridge in winter, a highway in
summer, and a playground at all times. So it served us right if we had
to wait weeks and weeks in thawing time for our streets to be cleared;
and we deserved all the sprains and bruises we suffered from
clambering over the broken ice in the streets while going about our
business.

Leah the Short, little and straight and neat, with a basket on one arm
and a bundle under the other, stood hesitating on the edge of the curb
opposite my window. Her poor old face, framed in its calico kerchief,
had a wrinkle of anxiety in it. The tumbled ice heap in the street
looked to her like an impassable barrier. Tiny as she was, and loaded,
she had reason to hesitate. Perhaps she had eggs in her basket,--I
thought of that as I looked at her across the street; and I thought of
my old ambition to measure myself, shoulder to shoulder, with Leah,
reputedly short. I was small myself, and was constantly reminded of it
by a variety of nicknames, lovingly or vengefully invented by my
friends and enemies. I was called Mouse and Crumb and Poppy Seed.
Should I live to be called, in my old age, Mashke the Short? I longed
to measure my stature by Leah's, and here was my chance.

I ran out into the street, my grandmother scolding me for going
without a shawl, and I calling back to her to be sure and watch me. I
skipped over the ice blocks like a goat, and offered my assistance to
Leah the Short. With admirable skill and solicitude I guided her timid
steps across the street, at the same time winking to my grandmother at
the window, and pointing to my shoulder close to Leah's. Once on the
safe sidewalk, the tiny woman thanked me and blessed me and praised me
for a thoughtful child; and I watched her toddle away without the
least stir of shame at my hypocrisy. She had convinced me that I was a
good little girl, and I had convinced myself that I was not so very
short. My chin was almost on a le