the windows and looked down into the street. There was a sort of
complacent calm in the manner in which she viewed the girls' hats and
dresses. Many of them were really pretty, she told herself, but for the
most part they were not better than what she had had down home. There
was a sound quality in the girl's make-up that helped her to see through
the glamour of mere place and recognise worth for itself. Or it may have
been the critical faculty, which is prominent in most women, that kept
her from thinking a five-cent cheese-cloth any better in New York than
it was at home. She had a certain self-respect which made her value
herself and her own traditions higher than her brother did his.
When later in the evening the porter who had been kind to them came in
and was introduced as Mr. William Thomas, young as she was, she took his
open admiration for her with more coolness than Joe exhibited when
Thomas offered to show him something of the town some day or night.
Mr. Thomas was a loquacious little man with a confident air born of an
intense admiration of himself. He was the idol of a number of
servant-girls' hearts, and altogether a decidedly dashing back-area-way
Don Juan.
"I tell you, Miss Kitty," he burst forth, a few minutes after being
introduced, "they ain't no use talkin', N' Yawk 'll give you a shakin'
up 'at you won't soon forget. It 's the only town on the face of the
earth. You kin bet your life they ain't no flies on N' Yawk. We git the
best shows here, we git the best concerts--say, now, what 's the use o'
my callin' it all out?--we simply git the best of everything."
"Great place," said Joe wisely, in what he thought was going to be quite
a man-of-the-world manner. But he burned with shame the next minute
because his voice sounded so weak and youthful. Then too the oracle only
said "Yes" to him, and went on expatiating to Kitty on the glories of
the metropolis.
"D'jever see the statue o' Liberty? Great thing, the statue o' Liberty.
I 'll take you 'round some day. An' Cooney Island--oh, my, now that 's
the place; and talk about fun! That 's the place for me."
"La, Thomas," Mrs. Jones put in, "how you do run on! Why, the strangers
'll think they 'll be talked to death before they have time to breathe."
"Oh, I guess the folks understan' me. I 'm one o' them kin' o' men 'at
believe in whooping things up right from the beginning. I 'm never
strange with anybody. I 'm a N' Yawker, I tell you, from the word go. I
say, Mis' Jones, let 's have some beer, an' we 'll have some music purty
soon. There 's a fellah in the house 'at plays 'Rag-time' out o' sight."
Mr. Thomas took the pail and went to the corner. As he left the room,
Mrs. Jones slapped her knee and laughed until her bust shook like jelly.
"Mr. Thomas is a case, sho'," she said; "but he likes you all, an' I 'm
mighty glad of it, fu' he 's mighty curious about the house when he
don't like the roomers."
Joe felt distinctly flattered, for he found their new acquaintance
charming. His mother was still a little doubtful, and Kitty was sure she
found the young man "fresh."
He came in pretty soon with his beer, and a half-dozen crabs in a bag.
"Thought I 'd bring home something to chew. I always like to eat
something with my beer."
Mrs. Jones brought in the glasses, and the young man filled one and
turned to Kitty.
"No, thanks," she said with a surprised look.
"What, don't you drink beer? Oh, come now, you 'll get out o' that."
"Kitty don't drink no beer," broke in her mother with mild resentment.
"I drinks it sometimes, but she don't. I reckon maybe de chillen better
go to bed."
Joe felt as if the "chillen" had ruined all his hopes, but Kitty rose.
The ingratiating "N' Yawker" was aghast.
"Oh, let 'em stay," said Mrs. Jones heartily; "a little beer ain't goin'
to hurt 'em. Why, sakes, I know my father gave me beer from the time I
could drink it, and I knows I ain't none the worse fu' it."
"They 'll git out o' that, all right, if they live in N' Yawk," said Mr.
Thomas, as he poured out a glass and handed it to Joe. "You neither?"
"Oh, I drink it," said the boy with an air, but not looking at his
mother.
"Joe," she cried to him, "you must ricollect you ain't at home. What 'ud
yo' pa think?" Then she stopped suddenly, and Joe gulped his beer and
Kitty went to the piano to relieve her embarrassment.
"Yes, that 's it, Miss Kitty, sing us something," said the irrepressible
Thomas, "an' after while we 'll have that fellah down that plays
'Rag-time.' He 's out o' sight, I tell you."
With the pretty shyness of girlhood, Kitty sang one or two little songs
in the simple manner she knew. Her voice was full and rich. It delighted
Mr. Thomas.
"I say, that 's singin' now, I tell you," he cried. "You ought to have
some o' the new songs. D' jever hear 'Baby, you got to leave'? I tell
you, that 's a hot one. I 'll bring you some of 'em. Why, you could git
a job on the stage easy with that voice o' yourn. I got a frien' in one
o' the comp'nies an' I 'll speak to him about you."
"You ought to git Mr. Thomas to take you to the th'atre some night. He
goes lots."
"Why, yes, what 's the matter with to-morrer night? There 's a good coon
show in town. Out o' sight. Let 's all go."
"I ain't nevah been to nothin' lak dat, an' I don't know," said Mrs.
Hamilton.
"Aw, come, I 'll git the tickets an' we 'll all go. Great singin', you
know. What d' you say?"
The mother hesitated, and Joe filled the breach.
"We 'd all like to go," he said. "Ma, we' ll go if you ain't too tired."
"Tired? Pshaw, you 'll furgit all about your tiredness when Smithkins
gits on the stage. Y' ought to hear him sing, 'I bin huntin' fu' wo'k'!
You 'd die laughing."
Mrs. Hamilton made no further demur, and the matter was closed.
Awhile later the "Rag-time" man came down and gave them a sample of what
they were to hear the next night. Mr. Thomas and Mrs. Jones two-stepped,
and they sent a boy after some more beer. Joe found it a very jolly
evening, but Kit's and the mother's hearts were heavy as they went up to
bed.
"Say," said Mr. Thomas when they had gone, "that little girl 's a peach,
you bet; a little green, I guess, but she 'll ripen in the sun."
VIII
AN EVENING OUT
Fannie Hamilton, tired as she was, sat long into the night with her
little family discussing New York,--its advantages and disadvantages,
its beauty and its ugliness, its morality and immorality. She had
somewhat receded from her first position, that it was better being here
in the great strange city than being at home where the very streets
shamed them. She had not liked the way that their fellow lodger looked
at Kitty. It was bold, to say the least. She was not pleased, either,
with their new acquaintance's familiarity. And yet, he had said no more
than some stranger, if there could be such a stranger, would have said
down home. There was a difference, however, which she recognised. Thomas
was not the provincial who puts every one on a par with himself, nor was
he the metropolitan who complacently patronises the whole world. He was
trained out of the one and not up to the other. The intermediate only
succeeded in being offensive. Mrs. Jones' assurance as to her guest's
fine qualities did not do all that might have been expected to reassure
Mrs. Hamilton in the face of the difficulties of the gentleman's manner.
She could not, however, lay her finger on any particular point that
would give her the reason for rejecting his friendly advances. She got
ready the next evening to go to the theatre with the rest. Mr. Thomas at
once possessed himself of Kitty and walked on ahead, leaving Joe to
accompany his mother and Mrs. Jones,--an arrangement, by the way, not
altogether to that young gentleman's taste. A good many men bowed to
Thomas in the street, and they turned to look enviously after him. At
the door of the theatre they had to run the gantlet of a dozen pairs of
eyes. Here, too, the party's guide seemed to be well known, for some one
said, before they passed out of hearing, "I wonder who that little light
girl is that Thomas is with to-night? He 's a hot one for you."
Mrs. Hamilton had been in a theatre but once before in her life, and Joe
and Kit but a few times oftener. On those occasions they had sat far up
in the peanut gallery in the place reserved for people of colour. This
was not a pleasant, cleanly, nor beautiful locality, and by contrast
with it, even the garishness of the cheap New York theatre seemed fine
and glorious.
They had good seats in the first balcony, and here their guide had shown
his managerial ability again, for he had found it impossible, or said
so, to get all the seats together, so that he and the girl were in the
row in front and to one side of where the rest sat. Kitty did not like
the arrangement, and innocently suggested that her brother take her seat
while she went back to her mother. But her escort overruled her
objections easily, and laughed at her so frankly that from very shame
she could not urge them again, and they were soon forgotten in her
wonder at the mystery and glamour that envelops the home of the drama.
There was something weird to her in the alternate spaces of light and
shade. Without any feeling of its ugliness, she looked at the curtain as
at a door that should presently open between her and a house of wonders.
She looked at it with the fascination that one always experiences for
what either brings near or withholds the unknown.
As for Joe, he was not bothered by the mystery or the glamour of things.
But he had suddenly raised himself in his own estimation. He had gazed
steadily at a girl across the aisle until she had smiled in response. Of
course, he went hot and cold by turns, and the sweat broke out on his
brow, but instantly he began to swell. He had made a decided advance in
knowledge, and he swelled with the consciousness that already he was
coming to be a man of the world. He looked with a new feeling at the
swaggering, sporty young negroes. His attitude towards them was not one
of humble self-depreciation any more. Since last night he had grown,
and felt that he might, that he would, be like them, and it put a sort
of chuckling glee into his heart.
One might find it in him to feel sorry for this small-souled, warped
being, for he was so evidently the jest of Fate, if it were not that he
was so blissfully, so conceitedly, unconscious of his own nastiness.
Down home he had shaved the wild young bucks of the town, and while
doing it drunk in eagerly their unguarded narrations of their gay
exploits. So he had started out with false ideals as to what was fine
and manly. He was afflicted by a sort of moral and mental astigmatism
that made him see everything wrong. As he sat there to-night, he gave to
all he saw a wrong value and upon it based his ignorant desires.
When the men of the orchestra filed in and began tuning their
instruments, it was the signal for an influx of loiterers from the door.
There were a large number of coloured people in the audience, and
because members of their own race were giving the performance, they
seemed to take a proprietary interest in it all. They discussed its
merits and demerits as they walked down the aisle in much the same tone
that the owners would have used had they been wondering whether the
entertainment was going to please the people or not.
Finally the music struck up one of the numerous negro marches. It was
accompanied by the rhythmic patting of feet from all parts of the house.
Then the curtain went up on a scene of beauty. It purported to be a
grove to which a party of picnickers, the ladies and gentlemen of the
chorus, had come for a holiday, and they were telling the audience all
about it in crescendos. With the exception of one, who looked like a
faded kid glove, the men discarded the grease paint, but the women under
their make-ups ranged from pure white, pale yellow, and sickly greens to
brick reds and slate grays. They were dressed in costumes that were not
primarily intended for picnic going. But they could sing, and they did
sing, with their voices, their bodies, their souls. They threw
themselves into it because they enjoyed and felt what they were doing,
and they gave almost a semblance of dignity to the tawdry music and
inane words.
Kitty was enchanted. The airily dressed women seemed to her like
creatures from fairy-land. It is strange how the glare of the footlights
succeeds in deceiving so many people who are able to see through other
delusions. The cheap dresses on the street had not fooled Kitty for an
instant, but take the same cheese-cloth, put a little water starch into
it, and put it on the stage, and she could see only chiffon.
She turned around and nodded delightedly at her brother, but he did not
see her. He was lost, transfixed. His soul was floating on a sea of
sense. He had eyes and ears and thoughts only for the stage. His nerves
tingled and his hands twitched. Only to know one of those radiant
creatures, to have her speak to him, smile at him! If ever a man was
intoxicated, Joe was. Mrs. Hamilton was divided between shame at the
clothes of some of the women and delight with the music. Her companion
was busy pointing out who this and that actress was, and giving
jelly-like appreciation to the doings on the stage.
Mr. Thomas was the only cool one in the party. He was quietly taking
stock of his young companion,--of her innocence and charm. She was a
pretty girl, little and dainty, but well developed for her age. Her hair
was very black and wavy, and some strain of the South's chivalric blood,
which is so curiously mingled with the African in the veins of most
coloured people, had tinged her skin to an olive hue.
"Are you enjoying yourself?" he leaned over and whispered to her. His
voice was very confidential and his lips near her ear, but she did not
notice.
"Oh, yes," she answered, "this is grand. How I 'd like to be an actress
and be up there!"
"Maybe you will some day."
"Oh, no, I 'm not smart enough."
"We 'll see," he said wisely; "I know a thing or two."
Between the first and second acts a number of Thomas's friends strolled
up to where he sat and began talking, and again Kitty's embarrassment
took possession of her as they were introduced one by one. They treated
her with a half-courteous familiarity that made her blush. Her mother
was not pleased with the many acquaintances that her daughter was
making, and would have interfered had not Mrs. Jones assured her that
the men clustered about their host's seat were some of the "best people
in town." Joe looked at them hungrily, but the man in front with his
sister did not think it necessary to include the brother or the rest of
the party in his miscellaneous introductions.
One brief bit of conversation which the mother overheard especially
troubled her.
"Not going out for a minute or two?" asked one of the men, as he was
turning away from Thomas.
"No, I don't think I 'll go out to-night. You can have my share."
The fellow gave a horse laugh and replied, "Well, you 're doing a great
piece of work, Miss Hamilton, whenever you can keep old Bill from goin'
out an' lushin' between acts. Say, you got a good thing; push it along."
The girl's mother half rose, but she resumed her seat, for the man was
going away. Her mind was not quiet again, however, until the people were
all in their seats and the curtain had gone up on the second act. At
first she was surprised at the enthusiasm over just such dancing as she
could see any day from the loafers on the street corners down home, and
then, like a good, sensible, humble woman, she came around to the idea
that it was she who had always been wrong in putting too low a value on
really worthy things. So she laughed and applauded with the rest, all
the while trying to quiet something that was tugging at her away down in
her heart.
When the performance was over she forced her way to Kitty's side, where
she remained in spite of all Thomas's palpable efforts to get her away.
Finally he proposed that they all go to supper at one of the coloured
cafes.
"You 'll see a lot o' the show people," he said.
"No, I reckon we 'd bettah go home," said Mrs. Hamilton decidedly. "De
chillen ain't ust to stayin' up all hours o' nights, an' I ain't anxious
fu' 'em to git ust to it."
She was conscious of a growing dislike for this man who treated her
daughter with such a proprietary air. Joe winced again at "de chillen."
Thomas bit his lip, and mentally said things that are unfit for
publication. Aloud he said, "Mebbe Miss Kitty 'ud like to go an' have a
little lunch."
"Oh, no, thank you," said the girl; "I 've had a nice time and I don't
care for a thing to eat."
Joe told himself that Kitty was the biggest fool that it had ever been
his lot to meet, and the disappointed suitor satisfied himself with the
reflection that the girl was green yet, but would get bravely over that.
He attempted to hold her hand as they parted at the parlour door, but
she drew her fingers out of his clasp and said, "Good-night; thank you,"
as if he had been one of her mother's old friends.
Joe lingered a little longer.
"Say, that was out o' sight," he said.
"Think so?" asked the other carelessly.
"I 'd like to get out with you some time to see the town," the boy went
on eagerly.
"All right, we 'll go some time. So long."
"So long."
Some time. Was it true? Would he really take him out and let him meet
stage people? Joe went to bed with his head in a whirl. He slept little
that night for thinking of his heart's desire.
IX
HIS HEART'S DESIRE
Whatever else his visit to the theatre may have done for Joe, it
inspired him with a desire to go to work and earn money of his own, to
be independent both of parental help and control, and so be able to
spend as he pleased. With this end in view he set out to hunt for work.
It was a pleasant contrast to his last similar quest, and he felt it
with joy. He was treated everywhere he went with courtesy, even when no
situation was forthcoming. Finally he came upon a man who was willing to
try him for an afternoon. From the moment the boy rightly considered
himself engaged, for he was master of his trade. He began his work with
heart elate. Now he had within his grasp the possibility of being all
that he wanted to be. Now Thomas might take him out at any time and not
be ashamed of him.
With Thomas, the fact that Joe was working put the boy in an entirely
new light. He decided that now he might be worth cultivating. For a week
or two he had ignored him, and, proceeding upon the principle that if
you give corn to the old hen she will cluck to her chicks, had treated
Mrs. Hamilton with marked deference and kindness. This had been without
success, as both the girl and her mother held themselves politely aloof
from him. He began to see that his hope of winning Kitty's affections
lay, not in courting the older woman but in making a friend of the boy.
So on a certain Saturday night when the Banner Club was to give one of
its smokers, he asked Joe to go with him. Joe was glad to, and they set
out together. Arrived, Thomas left his companion for a few moments while
he attended, as he said, to a little business. What he really did was to
seek out the proprietor of the club and some of its hangers on.
"I say," he said, "I 've got a friend with me to-night. He 's got some
dough on him. He 's fresh and young and easy."
"Whew!" exclaimed the proprietor.
"Yes, he 's a good thing, but push it along kin' o' light at first; he
might get skittish."
"Thomas, let me fall on your bosom and weep," said a young man who, on
account of his usual expression of innocent gloom, was called Sadness.
"This is what I 've been looking for for a month. My hat was getting
decidedly shabby. Do you think he would stand for a touch on the first
night of our acquaintance?"
"Don't you dare? Do you want to frighten him off? Make him believe that
you 've got coin to burn and that it 's an honour to be with you."
"But, you know, he may expect a glimpse of the gold."
"A smart man don't need to show nothin'. All he 's got to do is to act."
"Oh, I 'll act; we 'll all act."
"Be slow to take a drink from him."
"Thomas, my boy, you 're an angel. I recognise that more and more every
day, but bid me do anything else but that. That I refuse: it 's against
nature;" and Sadness looked more mournful than ever.
"Trust old Sadness to do his part," said the portly proprietor; and
Thomas went back to the lamb.
"Nothin' doin' so early," he said; "let 's go an' have a drink."
They went, and Thomas ordered.
"No, no, this is on me," cried Joe, trembling with joy.
"Pshaw, your money 's counterfeit," said his companion with fine
generosity. "This is on me, I say. Jack, what 'll you have yourself?"
As they stood at the bar, the men began strolling up one by one. Each in
his turn was introduced to Joe. They were very polite. They treated him
with a pale, dignified, high-minded respect that menaced his pocket-book
and possessions. The proprietor, Mr. Turner, asked him why he had never
been in before. He really seemed much hurt about it, and on being told
that Joe had only been in the city for a couple of weeks expressed
emphatic surprise, even disbelief, and assured the rest that any one
would have taken Mr. Hamilton for an old New Yorker.
Sadness was introduced last. He bowed to Joe's "Happy to know you, Mr.
Williams."
"Better known as Sadness," he said, with an expression of deep gloom. "A
distant relative of mine once had a great grief. I have never recovered
from it."
Joe was not quite sure how to take this; but the others laughed and he
joined them, and then, to cover his own embarrassment, he did what he
thought the only correct and manly thing to do,--he ordered a drink.
"I don't know as I ought to," said Sadness.
"Oh, come on," his companions called out, "don't be stiff with a
stranger. Make him feel at home."
"Mr. Hamilton will believe me when I say that I have no intention of
being stiff, but duty is duty. I 've got to go down town to pay a bill,
and if I get too much aboard, it would n't be safe walking around with
money on me."
"Aw, shut up, Sadness," said Thomas. "My friend Mr. Hamilton 'll feel
hurt if you don't drink with him."
"I cert'n'y will," was Joe's opportune remark, and he was pleased to see
that it caused the reluctant one to yield.
They took a drink. There was quite a line of them. Joe asked the
bartender what he would have. The men warmed towards him. They took
several more drinks with him and he was happy. Sadness put his arm about
his shoulder and told him, with tears in his eyes, that he looked like a
cousin of his that had died.
"Aw, shut up, Sadness!" said some one else. "Be respectable."
Sadness turned his mournful eyes upon the speaker. "I won't," he
replied. "Being respectable is very nice as a diversion, but it 's
tedious if done steadily." Joe did not quite take this, so he ordered
another drink.
A group of young fellows came in and passed up the stairs. "Shearing
another lamb?" said one of them significantly.
"Well, with that gang it will be well done."
Thomas and Joe left the crowd after a while, and went to the upper
floor, where, in a long, brilliantly lighted room, tables were set out
for drinking-parties. At one end of the room was a piano, and a man sat
at it listlessly strumming some popular air. The proprietor joined them
pretty soon, and steered them to a table opposite the door.
"Just sit down here, Mr. Hamilton," he said, "and you can see everybody
that comes in. We have lots of nice people here on smoker nights,
especially after the shows are out and the girls come in."
Joe's heart gave a great leap, and then settled as cold as lead. Of
course, those girls would n't speak to him. But his hopes rose as the
proprietor went on talking to him and to no one else. Mr. Turner always
made a man feel as if he were of some consequence in the world, and men
a good deal older than Joe had been fooled by his manner. He talked to
one in a soft, ingratiating way, giving his whole attention apparently.
He tapped one confidentially on the shoulder, as who should say, "My
dear boy, I have but two friends in the world, and you are both of
them."
Joe, charmed and pleased, kept his head well. There is a great deal in
heredity, and his father had not been Maurice Oakley's butler for so
many years for nothing.
The Banner Club was an institution for the lower education of negro
youth. It drew its pupils from every class of people and from every part
of the country. It was composed of all sorts and conditions of men,
educated and uneducated, dishonest and less so, of the good, the bad,
and the--unexposed. Parasites came there to find victims, politicians
for votes, reporters for news, and artists of all kinds for colour and
inspiration. It was the place of assembly for a number of really bright
men, who after days of hard and often unrewarded work came there and
drunk themselves drunk in each other's company, and when they were drunk
talked of the eternal verities.