"STARVE THEN!"
Dennis now followed the natural impulse to go to some distant part of
the city, entirely away from the region that had become so hateful to
him.
Putting the trunk on the front of a street-car, he rode on till he was
in the heart of the south-side district, the great business centre.
He took his trunk into a roomy hardware store, and asked if he might
leave it there a while. Receiving a good-natured permission, he next
started off in search of a quiet, cheap boarding-place. His heart was
heavy, and yet he felt thankful to have escaped as he had, for the
thought of what might have been his experience if Barney had tried to
fulfil his threat sickened him. The rough was as strong as he, and
scenes of violence were his delight and daily experience. He rather
gloried in a black eye, for he always gave two in exchange, and his
own bruised, swollen member paved the way gracefully for the telling
of his exploits, as it awakened inquiry from the lesser lights among
whom he shone. But what would Dennis have done among the merchants
with "a head on him," as the barkeeper understood the phrase? He would
have had to return home, and that he felt would be worse than death.
In fact, he had come nearer to a desperate struggle than he knew, for
Barney rarely resisted so inviting an opportunity to indulge his
pugilistic turn, and had he not seen the policeman going by just at
that time, there would have been no idle threats in the case.
Dennis set his teeth with dogged resolution, determined if necessary,
to persevere in his search till he dropped in the street. But as he
remembered that he had less than five dollars left, and no prospect
of earning another, his heart grew like lead.
He spent several weary hours in the vain search for a boarding-house.
He had little to guide him save short answers from policemen. The
places were either too expensive, or so coarse and low that he could
not bring himself to endure them. In some cases he detected that they
were accompanied by worse evils than gambling. Almost in despair,
tired, and very hungry (for severe indeed must be the troubles that
will affect the appetite of healthful youth on a cold winter day), he
stopped at a small German restaurant and hotel. A round-faced, jolly
Teuton served him with a large plate of cheap viands, which he devoured
so quickly that the man, when asked for more, stared at him for a
moment, and then stolidly obeyed.
"What do you ask for a small room and bed for a night?" said Dennis.
"Zwei shillen," said the waiter, with a grin; "dot ish, if you don't
vant as pig ped as dinner. Ve haf zwei shillen for bed, and zwei shillen
for efery meal--von dollar a day--sheap!"
The place was comparatively clean. A geranium or two bloomed in the
window, and lager instead of fiery whiskey seemed the principal beverage
vended. Dennis went out and made inquiries, and every one in the
neighborhood spoke of it as a quiet, respectable place, though
frequented only by laboring people. "That is nothing against it,"
thought Dennis. "I will venture to stay there for a night or two, for
I must lose no more time in looking for a situation."
He took his trunk there, and then spent the rest of the day in
unavailing search. He found nothing that gave any promise at all. In
the evening he went to a large hotel and looked over the files of
papers. He found a few advertisements for clerks and experts of various
kinds, but more from those seeking places. But he noted down everything
hopeful, and resolved that he would examine the morning papers by
daylight for anything new in that line, and be the first on hand. His
new quarters, though plain and meagre, were at least clean. Too weary
to think or even to feel more than a dull ache in his heart, he slept
heavily till the dawn of the following day. Poor fellow! it seemed to
him that he had lived years in those two days.
He was up by daylight, and found a few more advertisements that looked
as if they might lead to something. As early as it was possible to see
the parties, he was on the ground, but others were there as soon as
himself. They had the advantage of some knowledge and experience in
the duties required, and this decided the question. Some spoke kindly,
and suggested that he was better fitted for teaching than for business.
"But where am I to find a position at this season of the year, when
every place is filled?" asked Dennis. "It might be weeks before I could
get anything to do, and I must have employment at once."
They were sorry, hoped he would do well, turned away, and went on doing
well for themselves; but the majority merely satisfied themselves that
he would not answer their purpose, and bade him a brief, business-like
good-morning. And yet the fine young face, so troubled and anxious,
haunted a good many of those who summarily dismissed him. But "business
is business."
The day passed in fruitless inquiry. Now and then he seemed on the
point of succeeding, but only disappointment resulted. There were at
that season of the year few situations offering where a salary
sufficient for maintenance was paid, and for these skilled laborers
were required. Dennis possessed no training for any one calling save
perhaps that of teacher. He had merely the fragment of a good general
education, tending toward one of the learned professions. He had fine
abilities, and undoubtedly would in time have stood high as a lawyer.
But now that he was suddenly called upon to provide bread for himself
and those he loved, there was not a single thing of which he could
say, "I understand this, sir, and can give you satisfaction."
He knew that if he could get a chance at almost anything, he could
soon learn enough to make himself more useful than the majority
employed, for few had his will and motive to work. But the point was
to find some one who would pay sufficient for his own and his mother's
support while he learned.
It is under just such circumstances that so many men, and especially
women, make shipwreck. Thrown suddenly upon their own resources, they
bring to the great labor-market of the world general intelligence, and
also general ignorance. With a smattering of almost everything, they
do not know practically how to do _one thing well_. Skilled hands,
though backed by neither heart nor brains, push them aside. Take the
young men or the young women of any well-to-do town or village, and
make them suddenly dependent upon their own efforts, and how many could
compete in any one thing with those already engaged in supplying the
market? And yet just such helpless young creatures are every day
compelled to shift for themselves. If to these unfortunates the paths
of honest industry seem hedged and thorny, not so those of sin. They
are easy enough at first, if any little difficulty with conscience can
be overcome; and the devil, and fallen humanity doing his work, stand
ready to push the wavering into them.
At the close of the next day, spent in weary search, Dennis met a
temptation to which many would have yielded. As a last resort he had
been going around among the hotels, willing to take even the situation
of porter, if nothing better offered. The day was fast closing, when,
worn out and dejected, he entered a first-class house, and made his
usual inquiry. The proprietor looked at him for a moment, slapped him
on the back, and said: "Yes, you are the man I want, I reckon. Do you
drink? No! might have known that from your face. Don't want a man that
drinks for this place. Come along with me, then. Will give you two and
a half a day if you suit, and pay you every night. I pay my help
promptly; they ain't near so apt to steal from you then."
And the man hurried away, followed by Dennis with beating heart and
flushed, wondering face. Descending a flight of stairs, they entered
a brilliantly lighted basement, which was nothing less than a large,
elegantly arranged bar-*room, with card and lunch-tables, and
easy-chairs for the guests to smoke and tipple in at their leisure.
All along one side of this room, resplendent with cut glass and polished
silver, ran the bar. The light fell warm and mellow on the various
kinds of liquor, that were so arranged as to be most tempting to the
thirsty souls frequenting the place.
Stepping up to the bulky man behind the bar the landlord said: "There,
Mr. Swig, is a young man who will fill capitally the place of the chap
we dismissed to-day for getting tight. You may bet your life from his
face that he don't drink. You can break him in in a few days, and you
won't want a better assistant."
For a moment a desperate wish passed through Dennis's mind, "Oh, that
wrong were right!" Then, indignant with himself, he spoke up, firmly--"I
think I have a word to say in this matter."
"Well, say on, then; what's the trouble?"
"I cannot do this kind of work."
"You will find plenty harder."
"None harder for one believing as I do. I will starve before I will
do this work."
The man stared at him for a moment, and then coolly replied, "Starve
then!" and turned on his heel and walked away.
Dennis also rushed from the place, followed by the coarse, jeering
laugh of those who witnessed the scene. In his morbid, suffering state
their voices seemed those of mocking demons.
The night had now fallen. He was too tired and discouraged to look any
further. Wearily he plodded up the street, facing the bitter blast
filled with snow that had begun to fall.
This then was the verdict of the world--"Starve!" This was the only
prospect it offered--that same brave world which had so smilingly
beckoned him on to great achievements and unbounded success but a few
days since--"Starve!" Every blast that swept around the corners howled
in his ears, "Starve!" Every warmly clad person hurrying unheedingly
by seemed to say by his indifference, "Starve! who cares? there is no
place for you, nothing for you to do."
The hard, stern resolution of the past few days, not to yield an inch,
to persist in hewing his way through every difficulty, began to flag.
His very soul seemed crushed within him. Even upon the threshold of
his life, in his strong, joyous youth, the world had become to him
what it literally was that night, a cold, wintry, stormy place, with
a black, lowering sky and hard, frozen earth.
His father's old temptation recurred to him with sudden and great
power. "Perhaps father was right," he mused. "God was against him, and
is also against me, his son. Does He not visit the iniquity of the
fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation? Not
but that He will save us at last, if we ask Him, but there seems some
great wrong that must be severely punished here. Or else if God does
not care much about our present life, thinking only of the hereafter,
there must be some blind fate or luck that crushes some and lifts up
others."
Thus Dennis, too sad and morbid to take a just view of anything, plodded
on till he reached his boarding-place, and stealing in as if he had
no business to be there, or anywhere else, sat down in a dusky corner
behind the stove, and was soon lost to surrounding life in his own
miserable thoughts.