"Number, please?" She is anonymous, that inquirer. But behind her
anonymity there is humanity. Fifth Avenue and Forty-second Street caught
a glimpse of her at six forty-five A. M.
She was up at five in the morning. She had a pang as she put on her
check suit, slightly darker than her check coat lined with pink. Her
little hat, however, was smart and new. Her mother cooked breakfast
while she set the table. Then she walked to the Third Avenue "L" with
her friend. They got off the express at Forty-second Street, rode to
Fourth Avenue on the short spur line, and walked along Forty-second
Street in time for them to do a brief window-shopping as they passed the
shirtwaists at Forsythe's. Her friend's bronze shoes she envied as they
crossed the little park back of the Library. On Sixth Avenue they
inspected the window at Bernstein's. A slight argument engrossed them.
They hovered over the window, chirping not unlike the sparrows in Bryant
Park. Then, in a flurry of punctuality, they raced for the telephone
company to begin their "Number, please."
An hour earlier laborers with dinner-pails had crossed Fifth Avenue, and
hatless Polish girls on their way to scrub. By seven o'clock the negro
porters and laborers were giving way to white-collar strap-hangers on
the elevateds and in the subway. It was getting to be the hour of
salesmen and salesgirls and office-boys and shop-subordinates and
clerks. The girls back of the scenes at the milliner's, they go up Fifth
Avenue at seven, to take one side-street or another. The girl who sells
you a toothbrush in the drug-store hurries by the shop windows, herself
as neat as a model. Is it early? Myriads of men are pouring down
already. Besides, "'S use of kickin'? If you don't like it, you can walk
out!"
The night-watchman is going home, and an old attendant from the Grand
Central. "Tired, Pop?" "Yeh, p'tty tired." "What right've you to git
tired workin' for a big corporation?" The oppressed wage-slave bellows,
"Ha, ha."