1.

Elsie lay lazily upon the bank of the stream. She had just given up her attempt to search the rose bushes and trees for any more of the beautiful silver white roses, that usually lit her garden with a eerie, luminous glow.

“Oh, Cheshery, how very dull,” she snatched upon her cat from the grass, where she still sat guarding a mouse hole, in which he must have seen a mouse or shrew. She buried her dirty face with the thick black- maybe even purplish- fur, of the feline.

Together, they watched as newly fallen leaves danced upon the water’s surface before her; winter had to be nearing. Another frizzing, bitter struggle just for Elsie to stay warm, throughout the season. It would be as have been as easy as cuddling up to roaring, crackling fire under five or six blankets. Yet, Elsie didn’t have those luxury of blankets to warm under, or fire wood to spawn a flame, or even a fireplace to cradle that fire. Elsie didn’t have anything. Poor. Homeless. Ever since childhood.

Although Elsie might have been poverty-stricken, she remained ever so stunning of her good looks. Hidden beneath the filth of the lower class, under the ripped and tattered rags she wore, Elsie Hart was a very beautiful young lady of early twenties. Why, she was this beautiful? She had often make believed at a young age her father was a charming prince, and her mother a fair maiden. That was most defiantly and obviously a fairytale. Her father and mother were normal people, normal broke adults.

Elsie sat up, lifted her boot from her foul smelling foot, dumping the contents into the soft dewy grass. A thinning pack of ordinary playing cards, a ancient charcoal sketch of a pretty woman, hopefully her mother she thought, and the miserable, measly pittance of currency she did own; three shillings.

Cheshery weaved with her arms and legs, purring the whole while.

A bell tower chimed in a cathedral the distant town square, signaling the beginning of another day. People would be making their way through the town, going about their business. This was about the time Elsie swept through the streets offering those townspeople her roses. Elsie collected her possessions, fit her boot back upon her foot, and gather together her basket of the white flowers, that she did happened to find among the bushes. She headed into town to start her work.

It was the year of 1862, a young English woman, ran through Edinburgh waving roses in people’s faces, crying out for anyone to purchase at least one.

“Oh, there’s that wretched girl,” cackled a vile woman from behind a shop window. A Mrs. Cecelia Liddell, roughly older than Elsie, but that was where their similarities split. Cecelia was a rich, rude, nasty young lady, who never refrained herself from taunting the unfortunate. Basically, everything that Elsie was not. She was extraordinarily beautiful, with pale skin, chocolate brown eyes, and a slim waist (with the slight help of the rib removal operation, of course). “Elsie Hart. Selling those roses again.” She gave a short unladylike cackle, but quickly fixed herself as not to appear unladylike in front of her daughter.

“But that cat, mother,” exclaimed the little girl, no more than five. “It’s adorable. May we get one?”

“Of course not,” said Cecelia directing her daughter away from the window. “Beatrice, don’t you agree, darling? Cats are despicable.”

“Well, I do not know about that,” Beatrice a friend of Cecelia’s also browsing among the hats. “My aunt, had this cat when I was young, oh she was the greatest-”

Beatrice was silenced by the look she had given her.

“I mean, yes quite drool and insufferable.”

“Yes,

“If you are going to spend your wasted days insulting the less fortunate, squander it away, just do it anywhere that’s not my shop, otherwise buy something,” Mr. Madrone, the shop owner chimed in. “Who may not realize it, but I’m trying to run a business here. And please abstain from insulting that poor Miss Hart, ladies.”

“Oh, Mr. Madrone, you only spoil the fun.”

“Yes, it’s just the homeless.”

“Just the homeless,” Mr. Madrone asked slightly taken aback. “That’s the sort of intolerance that this city is reeking of. You should not persecute the poor, but assist and help them. Coexist.”

“Yes, thank you, Mr. Madrone,” Cecelia interjected, cutting Mr. Madrone in mid sentence. “But, We’ve already had my moral lesson this morning.”

The girls spread back out through the shop carefully rustling through the many colorful hats, trying on some of the most hideous of the selection. Beatrice accompanied herself under a hat, yet Cecelia had not stirred. She had appeared to be distracted by something else. She had not left the window side, still staring at Elsie. There was a small secret kept deep within Cecelia, that she was certain must never be revealed. She held a slight jealously for the poverty-stricken girl, not for her class of course, but for her beauty. Beneath the layer of filth, that comes with living on the streets, Elsie Hart was far more attractive than Cecelia was.

“Mother, what ever is the matter,” the young Liddell asked.

“I was… just thinking of Elsie’s roses,” Cecelia partially lied. “I mean, it’s been a while since I’ve ever seen such white a rose, besides those that Elsie hoards.”

A outbreak of girlish laughter rang through the shop. Cecelia laughed at herself, as if she was joining in with Beatrice’s hurtful manner. If she had known the truth, she herself would be ruined. Her position as a well sociable woman would be risked, if not annihilated all together, if a soul found out that a woman of Mrs. Liddell’s standing was in an envious state of this homeless person.

“Well, now that you mention it,” said Beatrice, taking a break from her cackling shriek. “I actually don’t remember seeing any rose like that, either. All the white roses I have ever seen have only came from Elsie.’

They both took a moment, and one by one, the girls either nodded or replied, in agreement.

It might have only been act of distraction, but Cecelia thought this idea and decided that she herself felt the same. Where had Elsie gotten white roses, when no one else had the same luck in discovering a bushel of them.

“Yes,” Cecelia said still transfixed, looking menacing at the young flower girl. “Beatrice, what do say about paying a visit with our close friend, the pretty little rose barer? Tootles, Madrone.”

“Goodbye, Ladies,” Mr. Madrone ushered them out through the door, quickly locking the door after them.

“Why, Mr. Turner. Is it not Mrs. Turner’s birthday this Thursday. I am guessing she would just adore something quite…romantic, I am sure,” Elsie commented casually, to a wealthy banker, among the crowd of civilians. “And I might have just by chance, overheard her hint of desiring a lovely bouquet of silver white roses.”

Elsie often worked her sly way of a getting a customer.

“How much, Miss Hart,” Mr. Turner asked reluctantly.

“Just two sixpence today, in benefits of your wife,” Elsie smiled as she counted out the roses while single handedly stringing them together. “Pleasure, doing business with you, Mr. Turner. See you tomorrow.”

“Yes it‘s something, Miss Hart,” Turner collected his flowers after forfeiting two sixpences. “But it may not a be a pleasure.” He began to walk away from the flower, but was stopped by her voice.

“Oh, and there was one other thing Anna mentioned also. Now, what was it?” Elsie paused placing her forefinger to her temple, as if she was actually trying to think over what she had said. “Oh yes, she had said never mind about the roses, she would much desire some pearls instead. Adieu, Mr. Tuner. I hope to see you again.”

“Goodbye, Elsie,” Mr. Turner grumbled his response, upset by her trickery again.

Elsie chuckled to herself at her conniving ruse and returned to walking through the streets offering the many citizens roses as they came and left, going about their business. Two dreadful ladies exited Mr. Madrone’s hat shop up the street towards her right. Leading the party, as always, was truly the most vile and cold woman imaginable.

Elsie quickly changed her course of path, steering herself off towards the left, and down another street.

“Come on Cheshery,” urging her feline down the lane.

And of course, as if by magic, the small knot of bickering women, caught up with the poor flower girl. The girls’ head forced Elsie around to face them.

“Mrs. Cecelia Liddell, what a pleasure,” Elsie sighed, peering at the dried mud under Cecelia’s feet, never into her eyes. She held her last single rose up towards her as an offering. “Rose, Ma‘am?” As much as she hated this woman, she couldn’t bring herself to confront her. Never was a poor homeless citizen aloud to harass one of such high society, no matter how great they do to them.

“Hello, kitty. What is your name?”

Cecelia’s daughter crouched down in attempt to coax the cat out from behind Elsie’s legs.

“Darling don’t touch that thing,” Cecelia snatched her child from view of the cat. She aimed a swift kick towards the feline, but Elsie managed to retrieve him in time. “It’s foul with disease, no doubt.”

Cecelia caught the rose Elsie had dropped within her palm.

A beat, a moment of silence and gratification.

Her gaze rested on the rose’s petals. A twinkle crossed through her eyes, but then-

She shook her face as is decided against something, then took the rose in both hands and proceeding, snapped the stem in half. She threw it to the ground within the mud, along with an amount of spit towards her feet.

Elsie made an effort to turn and leave, but found to her dismay Cecelia’s legs entwined with her ankles. The next moment Elsie lay face down in the dry mud.

A roar of laughter erupted in the street at that moment above Elsie. The street and its passersby were alive with jubilation at the expense of Elsie. She lifted herself off the ground, just tears began to run. Though they went undetected under the layer of caked on dust and grime. Elsie became aware of herself kneeling in the center of the bustling road cover in dirt and cries. What they must have thought of her, yet it must have been just the same a few minutes prior.

The ladies quickly straightened themselves as to appear proper after their childish torment.

“Good afternoon, Elsie,” Cecelia squealed to her, the she turned along with her daughter and friend and departed down the street. A slight haze lay in the air a few minutes after she had left as if her entity shortly followed.

Elsie was left kneeling in the center of the street, mud and dirt clinging to every inch of her and her dress. Cheshery went about his business, doing his best to clean his friend. They managed to swab off most of it from her face. The majority of the passersby just stared, some even giggled and snickered behind many gloves and fans.

“How do you gawk at me, the victim, and let the marauder leave without a glance,” said Elsie, well rather what she would have wanted to say, if her cowardice had not have gotten within the way.

“Oh, you poor dear,” came a voice from behind.

Sympathy?

She turned and looked up to see Mr. Madrone, the hat shop’s owner, offering his hands for her aid. She climbed to her feet, brushing herself off.

“Thank you, Mr. Madrone, sir,” said Elsie, gathering her basket from the ground and the remains of her last rose. She directly avoided his eyes. She never wanted a man to see the tears in her eyes. But, he did happen to; he offered his hacker chief. She declined.

“You’re a right gentleman, Mr. Madrone, you know that. The rest are dogs,” she said, a little higher in pitch than intended. “But, not you, sir.”

“A man without manners is hardly an honorable man at all,” Mr. Madrone recommended. “But yes, I agree. No person should ever be treated like that. You should not let people like Liddell walk all over you.”

“Let her,” Elsie gasped. “How was I an any way begging her to humiliate me?”

“Elsie, you’re shouting, come sit,” Mr. Madrone took Elsie by the elbow and led her to a bench. She wrenched herself free from him, but sat nevertheless. They sat looking at each other. “Elsie, you know what you have to do.” They was a bat of silence, Elsie gave no answer. “Stand up for yourself.”

“Excuse me,” Elsie’s voice had once again risen. She dapped her face with his handkerchief. Though she couldn’t help it. “No, I never- I can’t do that. She’s wealthy, and- and high class, and I’m… well look at me, Mr. Madrone. I’m mud!”

“No, Elsie,” Mr. Madrone had attempted to console her. “No, you are not.”

“No, I am. Mud. You are what other people look upon you as. Cecelia sees me as dirt- less than dirt.”

There was a short, uncomfortable pause, equipped with silent sobs and short shallow breathes.

“That’s wrong,” Mr. Madrone finally said after minutes. “If it were true, I’d be a old, pompous, and senile man, and you’d be a bitter, sour prat… you’re not, nor will ever be.”

“Mr. Madrone,” Elsie exclaimed at the old man, sitting across from her. She looked up the street in the direction the Liddell’s had just ventured up. “Okay, maybe I’m not as bitter as those old birds-”

“- that’s for sure.”

“But, I’m…a loser,’ Elsie sighed, looking down into her lap, she twisted the handkerchief. “Why am I a accompanist of the street, while things like Mrs. Liddell are lounging about in the lap of luxury.”

“Well, I’m not in charge of arranging the finances of the world’s denizens,” Mr. Madrone chuckled to himself, without Elsie’s contributing. “But, if it’s any concern of mine, but I’ve always said “You might be the richest man as the face of the earth, but at the end of the day can money or power really bring you love or friendship?”

“I understand, yet I still would like a fresh start,” Elsie cut in. “Be a different person, than the one I am. Go to a different, a new society. A more justice one. But, I guess we all dream, and some of us don’t have are dreams answered.”

Mr. Madrone listened to this,a s a grin cracked across his face.