HUNTING FOR A FURNISHED ROOM.
As I said before, when I landed in Glasgow I had only a few dollars in
my possession, therefore I deemed it wise to make them go as far as
possible, for I didn't know what I was up against or how I would get
along. The country was strange and new to me, I didn't know a soul this
side the water, I knew nothing of the ways of the country or the people,
and hadn't the faintest idea as yet how I was going to get through the
country. That I could not beat my way I had already learned, and as I am
not very partial to hiking it over long distances, I cogitated. But what
was the use of thinking or worrying? Didn't I have some money in my
inside pocket? Of course I had, and it was time enough to worry when I
was broke. "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof," has always
been my motto, and I had been on the turf long enough to know that there
is always some way out of a scrape when one gets into it.
What was the next event on the program? I had dined and seen
considerable of the city and it was "more better" that I go and look up
a furnished room. I had to have some place to sleep and the cheapest and
most comfortable way, I thought, was to rent a room in a private family.
I have slept in lodging houses time without number but they are too
public and sometimes too noisy. For a good, honest sleep give me a
private dwelling. I knew that I was looking shabby but good clean money
looks good to a whole lot of people.
I wandered through Buchanan and Argyle Streets, the Trongate and
Gallowgate Street, but couldn't find a "To Let" sign anywhere. This kind
of stumped me. I asked some one if there were no furnished rooms to let
in Glasgow and he informed me that there were lots of them but that I
would have to look in the upper stories of the houses for the signs. I
did so but saw very few of them. I tackled the first place where I saw
one. It was in a three-story building along the Trongate and the
structure didn't look good to me. There was a narrow, stone-paved
hallway leading through the building and at the rear of it was a
cork-screw-like stairway that wound upward. The hallway was as dim and
dark as a dungeon and made me feel funny. But I was there for a purpose
so there was no use getting scared of bugaboos. Up the stairway I went,
slowly and cautiously, keeping my eyes peeled for obstructions. I came
to the first landing, where there was a single strongly made wooden
door. I saw a knocker on the door and rapped at it rather faintly for
admittance. An elderly woman came to the door and demanded to know what
I wanted. I told her I was looking for a furnished room. From my accent
she gathered that I was a foreigner for she asked at once:
"Yer a furriner, ain't ye?"
I can't describe the Scotch accent just right for it ain't my language,
but I will try to set down what the lady said to me as well as I can.
"Yes, ma'am," said I; "I arrived from New York today."
"Yer a Yankee, I believe."
"No, ma'am," responded I, "I'm a Westerner."
This evidently puzzled the lady for she murmured "Ooh eye! ooh eye!" in
the same tone somewhat as the boozy lassie at the Workingman's
Restaurant had done.
"What will ye be doin' in Glasgie?" asked the lady.
I was stumped for a moment. I assured her I was going to look for a
job.
"What's yer trade?"
"Oh, I work at anything," I answered.
"Ah, then yer jack of all trades and maister of none."
I assured the lady that was about the size of it and she then asked me
how much I wanted to pay for a room. I told her about a dollar a week.
As things were cheaper on this side of the water than on the other side,
I figured it out that I ought to get things at about half price.
Evidently the lady didn't think so, for she scanned me scornfully and
wanted to know if I took her place for a tramp's lodging house. That was
putting it rather plain which caused me to kind of wilt. I assured the
landlady I had no such idea. I asked her what she charged for a room and
she said two dollars and a half per week. Too much for yours truly, I
thought, and told her so. We couldn't make a deal so I groped my way
down stairs and tried my luck elsewhere. Rents probably were high in
that part of the city so I crossed the Clyde and wandered into the
Gorbals district. This is a section of the city inhabited by the poorer
classes of working people and I had my eye on it while wandering along
the Broomielaw. I saw warehouses along the waterfront over there and
stone-paved streets full of houses. The houses were ancient-looking and
grimy but I would probably find what I sought there.
The first house I entered in that district had the same kind of a
hallway with a spiral stairway at the end of it as the house I had been
in on the other side of the river, and when I rapped at the door on the
first floor a lady answered the summons. When I told her that I wanted a
furnished room she wanted to know how much I was willing to pay. She did
not tell me her price but wanted to size up my pile. Her little racket
wouldn't work. I told her that if she had a room that suited me and if
the price was right we could make a deal, otherwise not. Whereupon she
opened her hall door, let me in and led me to a fair-sized room and
asked me how I liked it. It contained a table, sofa and two chairs, but
nothing else. I told her I wanted a bed-room, not a sitting-room.
"This is a bed-room," said she, opening a closet in the room in which
was a bunk.
Holy Jerusalem! What did the lady take me for; a Chinaman, to put me in
a china closet? Nay, nay, Pauline! I'm no Chinaman. Here was another
case where the deal fell through. I like plenty of fresh air and light
where I sleep when I can get it, and enough room to kick in. Here there
was none of these things.
I kept a-moving. I came to a house opposite a theater where I met two
young ladies who occupied a flat and had a spare room. I believe they
were actresses. They told me that their vacant room was rented by an
actor who was now making a tour of the cities and that they didn't know
just when he would be home. In the meanwhile I could occupy his room if
I wished and when the actor returned I could share the room with him. I
did not feel as if I would like to sleep with an actor, for he might
have been a snorer or a high kicker, and I didn't know when he would be
back anyway. That sort of an arrangement did not suit me. No deal was
made here, either.
The next place I went to and where I finally located, was a flat
occupied by an old man and his daughter. The father was over seventy
years of age and the daughter about thirty. They rented me a neat room
for one dollar a week which contained an ample bed, chairs, rocker, a
wash-stand, soap, towel, a window, lace curtains and a shade. My
patience and perseverance had been rewarded at last. As soon as my
landlady left me I stripped and took a wash from head to foot, the first
good clean-up I had since I left New York. It was great. I rented the
room for a week and concluded to hike out of town when the week was up.
During the week that I remained in this house I became quite well
acquainted with the old man and his daughter and learned that he was
from the north of Ireland and that his wife who was dead had been
Scotch. The daughter, therefore, was half-and-half. She was an amiable,
good-tempered young woman, though far from pretty, and the devotion she
showed to her father astonished me. He wasn't in the best of health and
often was crabbed and cross, but no matter how crusty he was the
daughter petted and humored him, and crowed and goo-ed and gaa-ed to him
and never got out of patience. She treated him as a mother does her
child and never wearied of soothing him. The old man didn't seem to
appreciate these attentions for his daughter got no thanks from him and
not even a kind word. One day when the daughter had gone out on an
errand the father suspected that she was in my room, so he rushed into
my room, looked under the bed and into the corners to see if she were
there. The old man had not the slightest reason or cause to suspect his
daughter and I watched his maneuvers with anger but said nothing. He
deserved a good tongue-lashing and I felt like giving it to him but his
great age held me back. Had he been a younger man I would have told him
what I thought of him in short order.