Daisy had not been at work in the restaurant many weeks before the
proprietor perceived that business was increasing. The four tables to
which Daisy attended were nearly always full, and the other waitresses
were beginning to show symptoms of jealousy and nerves. More dishes were
smashed; more orders went wrong; and Daisy, a smooth, quick, eager
worker, was frequently delayed and thrown out of her stride, so to
speak, by malicious stratagems and tricks. But Linnevitch, the
proprietor, had a clear mind and an excellent knowledge of human nature.
He got rid of his cash-girl, and put Daisy in her place; and this in
face of the fact that Daisy had had the scantiest practice with figures
and was at first dismally slow in the making of change. But Linnevitch
bore with her, and encouraged her. If now and then she made too much
change, he forgave her. He had only to look at the full tables to
forget. For every nickel that she lost for him, she brought a new
customer. And soon, too, she became at ease with money, and sure of her
subtraction. Linnevitch advanced her sufficient funds to buy a neat
black dress; he insisted that she wear a white turnover collar and white
cuffs. The plain severity of this costume set off the bright coloring
of her face and hair to wonderful advantage. In the dingy, ill-lighted
restaurant she was like that serene, golden, glowing light that
Rembrandt alone has known how to place among shadows. And her temper was
so sweet, and her disposition so childlike and gentle, that one by one
the waitresses who hated her for her popularity and her quick success
forgave her and began to like her. They discussed her a great deal among
themselves, and wondered what would become of her. Something good, they
prophesied; for under all the guilelessness and simplicity she was able.
And you had to look but once into those eyes to know that she was
string-straight. Among the waitresses was no very potent or instructed
imagination. They could not formulate the steps upon which Daisy should
rise, nor name the happy height to which she should ascend. They knew
that she was exceptional; no common pottery like themselves, but of that
fine clay of which even porcelain is made. It was common talk among them
that Linnevitch was in love with her; and, recalling what had been the
event in the case of the Barnhelm girl, and of Lotta Gorski, they knew
that Linnevitch sometimes put pleasure ahead of business. Yet it was
their common belief that the more he pined after Daisy the less she had
to fear from him.
A new look had come into the man's protruding eyes. Either prosperity or
Daisy, or both, had changed him for the better. The place no longer
echoed with thunderous assaults upon slight faults. The words, "If you
will, please, Helena"; "Well, well, pick it up," fell now from his lips,
or the even more reassuring and courteous, "Never mind; I say, never
mind."
Meanwhile, if her position and work in the restaurant were pleasant
enough, Daisy's evenings and nights at home were hard to bear. Her
mother, sick, bitter, and made to work against her will, had no tolerant
words for her. Grandfather Pinnievitch, deprived of even pipe tobacco by
his bibulous son-in-law, whined and complained by the hour. Old Mrs.
Brenda declared that she was being starved to death, and she reviled
whomever came near her. The oldest boy had left school in disgrace,
together with a classmate of the opposite sex, whom he abandoned shortly
at a profit. The family had turned him off at first; had then seen that
he had in spite of this an air of prosperity; invited him to live at
home once more, and were told that he was done with them. His first
venture in the business of pandering had been a success; a company,
always on the lookout for bright young men, offered him good pay, work
intricate but interesting, and that protection without which crime would
not be profitable.
Yes, in the secure shadow of The Organization's secret dark wings, there
was room even for this obscure young Pole, fatherless, now, and
motherless. For The Organization stands at the gates of the young
Republic to welcome in the unfortunate of all nations, to find work for
them, and security. Let your bent be what it will, if only you will
serve the master, young immigrant, you may safely follow that bent to
the uttermost dregs in which it ends. Whatever you wish to be, that you
may become, provided only that your ambition is sordid, criminal, and
unchaste.
Mr. Obloski was now an incorrigible drunkard. He could no longer be
relied on to cast even his own vote once, should the occasion for voting
arise. So The Great Organization spat Obloski aside. He threatened
certain reprisals and tale-bearings. He was promptly arrested for a
theft which not only he had not committed, but which had never been
committed at all. The Organization spared itself the expense of actually
putting him in jail; but he had felt the power of the claws. He would
threaten no more.
To support the family on Daisy's earnings and the younger boys'
newspaper sellings, and at the same time to keep drunk from morning to
night, taxed his talents to the utmost. There were times when he had to
give blows instead of bread. But he did his best, and was as patient and
long-suffering as possible with those who sapped his income and kept him
down.
One night, in a peculiarly speculative mood, he addressed his business
instincts to Daisy. "Fourteen dollars a month!" he said. "And there are
girls without half your looks--right here in this city--that earn as
much in a night. What good are you?"
I cannot say that Daisy was so innocent as not to gather his meaning.
She sat and looked at him, a terrible pathos in her great eyes, and said
nothing.
"Well," said her father, "what good are you?"
"No good," said Daisy gently.
That night she hugged her old doll to her breast and wept bitterly, but
very quietly, so as not to waken her brothers. The next morning, very
early, she made a parcel of her belongings, and carried it with her to
the restaurant. The glass door with its dingy gilt lettering was being
unlocked for the day by Mr. Linnevitch. He was surprised to see her a
full half-hour before opening time.
"Mr. Linnevitch," said Daisy, "things are so that I can't stay at home
any more. I will send them the money, but I have to find another place
to live."
"We got a little room," he said; "you can have if Mrs. Linnevitch says
so. I was going to give you more pay. We give you that room
instead--eh?"
Mrs. Linnevitch gave her consent. She was a dreary, weary woman of
American birth. When she was alone with her husband she never upbraided
him for his infidelities, or referred to them. But later, on this
particular day, having a chance to speak, she said:
"I hope you ain't going to bother this one, Linne?"
He patted his wife's bony back and shook his head. "The better as I know
that girl, Minnie," he said, "the sorrier I am for what I used to be
doing sometimes. You and her is going to have a square deal."
"I bin up to put her room straight," said Mrs. Linnevitch. "She's got a
doll."
She delivered this for what it was worth, in an uninterested,
emotionless voice.
"I tell you what she ought to have got," said her husband. "She ought to
have got now a good husband, and some live dolls--eh?"