If Phillida could have known the thoughts that occupied the mind of
Millard on Sunday afternoon, two or three weeks later, as he started for
his monthly visit in Avenue C, she would not have judged his purposes in
life severely. His walk lay through a cross-street which steadily
deteriorated as he journeyed eastward, condescendingly assimilating
itself to the character of each avenue in turn. Beer saloons, cheap
grocery stores, carts against the curbstones with their shafts pointing
skyward, and troops of children on the sidewalk, marked the increasing
poverty and density of the population. Millard wondered at the display
of trinkets and confectionery in the shop-windows, not knowing that
those whose backs are cheaply clad crave ornaments, and those whose
bellies lack bread are ravenous for luxuries.
Being a fastidious man and for years accustomed to the refinements of
life, he exaggerated the discomforts of tenement-house living. How
people endured such misery and yet seemed so cheerful he could not
imagine. And though he did not feel that diffusive benevolence which
prompted Phillida to try to ameliorate the moral condition of such of
this mass as she could reach, he had a strong desire to lift his aunt
and her children to a little higher plane. To this, hitherto, he had
found an obstacle in the pride of her husband. Henry Martin was a
tinsmith who had come to the city to work in a great factory for a
little higher wages than he could get as a journeyman tinker in a
country town. He did not refuse to let the children accept presents from
"Cousin Charley," but he was not willing "to be beholden to any of his
wife's folks," as he expressed it. He resented the fact that even in
Cappadocia he had been somewhat outstripped by his brother-in-law,
Charles Millard's father, and when the "Millard boys" had inherited
money from their father's brother, and Martin saw their mother, his
wife's sister, living in a style to which he could never hope to lift
his own family, it weighed on his mind, and this offense to his pride
had helped to fix his resolution in favor of a removal to New York.
During the walk eastward Millard was debating what might be done for the
promising eldest girl in his aunt's family and for the two boys. Once,
it is true, the throng of children that obstructed his path, as they
chased one another round and round in a maze, did suggest to him that
from Miss Callender's standpoint he ought to do something "for those
less fortunate than himself" even beyond the circle of relationship. But
what could he do? He felt that by his very nature he was disqualified
for contact and personal sympathy with humanity rough-hewn. And as he
crossed Avenue A, and paused to look up and down it, he saw such
inexhaustible swarms of people that what one man could do for them
seemed of no avail. He might give something to some mission or other
agency, and thus get the disagreeables of benevolence done, as he got
his boots blacked, by paying for it. Then he wondered what Miss
Callender would think of such a device, and whether in the luminous
moral atmosphere which enveloped her it would seem mean to substitute a
money service for a personal one--to employ a substitute when you have
no stomach for the war yourself.
He climbed the flights of dark stairs to his aunt's dwelling, which
occupied half of the next to the top floor of a four-story building; the
flat above being the dwelling and working-place of a slop-shop tailor.
He was welcomed with sincere affection by Aunt Hannah Martin, and with
shouts of delight by the two smaller children--the two older ones had
not yet come back from Sunday-school. Mr. Martin, a tallish and rather
broad-shouldered man, with a face whose habitual seriousness was
deepened into a tombstone solemnity by its breadth and flatness in the
region of the cheek-bones, shook hands cordially, but with a touch of
reserve in favor of his own dignity, saying, "How are you, Charley?
How's things with you?" He was proud enough of his connection with a
prosperous man like Millard, and among his comrades in the shop he often
affected to settle points in dispute regarding finance or the ways of
people in high life by gravely reminding the others that he had superior
opportunities for knowing, since his nephew was a banker and "knew all
the rich men in Wall street." But face to face with Charley Millard his
pride was rendered uneasy, and he generally managed to have some
pressing occasion for absenting himself on the afternoons of Millard's
visits.
Millard's attentions were soon engrossed by the little boy Tommy, who of
all the children was his favorite. Tommy climbed on his knees and rifled
his pockets, certain of finding something hidden there for himself.
Presently Millard drew Uncle Martin into talk. With his chair tilted
back and his broad hands locked together on his lap, Uncle Martin gave
Charley an oracular account of all the mistakes which his employers had
recently made in the conduct of their business. From his standpoint the
affairs of the company were usually on the high road to bankruptcy, and
all because of certain failures of judgment which Uncle Martin could
have pointed out in a moment had they taken the trouble to consult a man
of his experience. When Charley suggested that the company had paid an
eight per cent. dividend during the past year Uncle Martin put on a look
of contempt, and shook his head.
"Dividing their capital in order to keep up the price of stock," he said
sagely. Then he proceeded to show that if they would only do this and
not do the other they might easily crowd their rivals to the wall. He
knew three months before it took place that tin would fall in price. But
the company laid in a big stock just in time to get caught.
Having done the polite by Uncle Martin, Millard turned to Aunt Hannah.
Uncle Martin proceeded, therefore, to fill up the stove; which done, he
said:
"Well, Charley, I am going to see one of the men in our shop that got
his foot hurt a week ago Friday. I'll see you at supper; you'll take tea
with us."
"Thank you, Uncle Martin, but this time I can't stay so long. I've
promised to take dinner with some friends."
He held out his hand, and Uncle Martin said good-by, and good luck to
you, and come again, and always glad to see you, Charley, and then made
his exit, stooping a little as he went out through the low door, leaving
Charley what he wanted most, a chance to talk with his aunt about the
progress her children were making in their studies, and to find out what
he could do to help them. The mother told him that besides their school
they were reading some books brought to them by Dick's Sunday-school
teacher, who took a great interest in all the children. Millard always
expected to hear the praises of this Sunday-school teacher when he came
to see his aunt. Once on this theme good Aunt Hannah could not easily
stop.
"She doesn't put on the fine lady or talk to me as though I was somebody
different because I am a workingman's wife. I haven't many friends; the
people down here are so different from the people up in the country. But
I think she is the best friend I ever had. There, she's coming up now,"
she said, hearing the clatter of feet and voices ascending the stairway.
Millard was a little curious to see the teacher of whom he had heard so
much. He figured to himself some one only a little above his aunt in
station, and so the more ready to form an intimacy with humble people.
When Mary and Dick threw open the hall door of the apartment, so as to
make the interior visible from the obscurity of the stair-landing,
Millard, who was sitting with his back to the door, holding Tommy on his
lap, heard the voice of Phillida Callender say:
"I'll not go in this time; you have company."
"Do come in; it's only our Cousin Charley," pleaded Mary Martin, a girl
of fourteen.
Millard felt himself caught, and he would have liked to sit there and
let Miss Callender go down the stairs without recognizing him. But he
felt that he must be polite to her above all things, and his
relationship to the Martins was not a thing to be ashamed of, and must
besides soon be known to Phillida. So he rose with quick decision and
said as he walked towards the door:
"Don't let my presence keep you from coming in, Miss Callender; I am on
the point of leaving."
"You, Mr. Millard!" Phillida came forward, coloring a little, while Aunt
Hannah and the children stood and looked on in amazement. "Who would
have believed it! You are the cousin--the Cousin Charley of whom the
children here speak as though he were a good fairy. They pronounce the
name _Mill_erd, you know, and I didn't suspect _you_."
"But fancy _my_ surprise!" said Millard. "I ought to have guessed that
such a famous Sunday-school teacher could not be anybody but Miss
Callender. But I didn't even think to ask the name. So you are the
person of whose praises I am so jealous when I come here."
"Don't you think we're lucky to have such a cousin?" said Dick Martin,
the second child and the eldest boy, looking up at Miss Callender.
"Ah! now, Dick, you can't trap me into praising Mr. Millard to his
face," said Miss Callender. "Maybe I'll tell you some time when he isn't
here what I think of him." She was patting Dick on the shoulder. "But I
don't mind telling Mr. Millard right here and now that he is a very
lucky man to have such an aunt as your mother."
"Well said and true," answered Millard. "I like that better than
anything Miss Callender could say about me, Dick, even if what she
should say were to be all good; and that it wouldn't be, for she speaks
the truth, and I'll tell you for a secret that she doesn't quite approve
of a man that wastes his leisure time as I do. She'd like me better if I
were to come down to the mission every Sunday."
"Well, there ain't anybody at the mission as good as you, except Miss
Callender," objected Dick.
That young lady only laughed and put her arms about Tommy, who had
deserted Millard and was now climbing on her lap.
This encounter advanced Millard's acquaintance with Phillida more than a
dozen calls or conversations in formal society. Phillida was pleased to
find that Millard was not merely a male butterfly, and he in turn felt
strangely drawn to this young woman who had discovered the royal
excellence of Aunt Hannah Martin amid the rubbish of Avenue C. Millard,
who was "just going" when Phillida came in, sat out the half-hour that
she staid, and when she rose to go he asked her if he might have the
pleasure of walking with her as far as Second Avenue. It seemed to him,
though he did not say so, that a young lady needed an escort in that
part of the town; but Phillida, who knew the people better, had no such
thought.
"Thank you, Mr. Millard," she said; "I should be glad of your company.
But I am not going home; I am going to Washington Square: I promised my
aunt that I would go directly there from Sunday-school, and now I've
staid here longer than I intended, and I shall be late."
"Why, I'm expected there too. If you don't object we'll go together."
The two said good-by all around and descended the stairs, holding on to
the narrow steps with their heels, as it were. When they came into the
light, and breathed the cool salt air blowing into the avenue from the
neighboring East River, Phillida, who had something on her mind, said
rather awkwardly:
"I did not know that you were expected at Aunt Harriet's this evening."
The speech was one of maidenly modesty; if Aunt Gouverneur had planned
to bring the two people together at her table, Phillida wished it known
that she was not a party to the plot. But Millard laughed and said:
"If you had known, I am to understand that you would have declined to
go."
"I did not say that I should be sorry to have you there," she answered,
with the hesitancy of one stepping among pitfalls.
"Shall we take the Tenth street car?" asked Millard. "It runs through
Eighth street on the west side."
"As you please. I should have walked if alone," said Phillida.
"And I would much rather walk with good company than ride. So we will
walk."
It took them full three-quarters of an hour to reach Washington Square,
though either would have done it alone in a quarter less, for walking is
a kind of work that is not shortened when shared with a friend.
Millard purposely drew Miss Callender into talk about the work of the
mission, and he was soon rewarded by seeing her break through her
habitual restraint and reveal the enthusiastic self within. She told him
of the reading-room at the mission, and of the coffee-room where rolls
and hot coffee were served to men every day in the week, so as to keep
them from the saloons. Her face was aglow with interest as she talked,
but Millard would rather have drawn her to speak of her own relation to
the work. This she avoided, beyond confessing that she took her turn
with the other ladies in superintending the coffee-room. At length,
however, as they passed one of those open stairways that lead to
thronged tenements above,--like the entrance to a many-chambered
ant-hill, save that this mounts and that descends,--she spoke to a lad
on the sidewalk, telling him to give her love to his sister and say that
she was coming in to see her the next day. To Millard she explained
that the boy's sister was an invalid young woman on one of the upper
floors, bed-ridden for many years.
"And you visit her?" asked Millard, with a hardly concealed repulsion at
the notion of Phillida climbing these populous stairs and threading the
dingy and malodorous hallways above.
"Yes; she thinks so much of seeing me--because I am well, I suppose. She
says it makes her stronger just to look at me. And if I can take her a
flower, or some little bit of outdoors, it is more in her life than a
trip to the country would be in mine. Poor Wilhelmina Schulenberg has
not been down the stairs for five years. We talk of trying to get an
invalid's chair for her when the warm weather comes, so that her brother
can wheel her in the Square."
Millard turned and looked again at the stairway as though noticing all
the particulars of its environment. It was a balmy day in the last of
February, and they were soon crossing Tompkins Square diagonally towards
Eighth street. He had caught the infection of Phillida's exaltation;
instead of feeling repulsion at sight of the swarming children in cheap
and often shabby clothes, racing madly up and down the broad asphalted
walks, instead of turning in aversion from the commonplace people
sitting talking, staring, smoking, sleeping, flirting, or courting on
the benches, he was able to take Miss Callender's view of the matter and
to feel gratified that the poor, and especially the little folk so long
winter-cribbed in narrow tenements, were now able to get so much
happiness in the open ground.