CHAPTER V_Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise

AT the corner of Twenty-sixth Street a man put himself squarely

across her path. She was attracted by the twinkle in his

good-natured eyes. He was a youngish man, had the stoutness of

indulgence in a fondness for eating and drinking--but the

stoutness was still well within the bounds of decency. His

clothing bore out the suggestion of his self-assured way of

stopping her--the suggestion of a confidence-giving prosperity.

"You look as if you needed a drink, too," said he. "How about

it, lady with the lovely feet?"

For the first time in her life she was feeling on an equality

with man. She gave him the same candidly measuring glance that

man gives man. She saw good-nature, audacity without

impudence--at least not the common sort of impudence. She

smiled merrily, glad of the chance to show her delight that she

was once more back in civilization after the long sojourn in

the prison workshops where it is manufactured. She said:

"A drink? Thank you--yes."

"That's a superior quality of smile you've got there," said he.

"That, and those nice slim feet of yours ought to win for you

anywhere. Let's go to the Martin."

"Down University Place?"

The stout young man pointed his slender cane across the street.

"You must have been away."

"Yes," said the girl. "I've been--dead."

"I'd like to try that myself--if I could be sure of coming to

life in little old New York." And he looked round with

laughing eyes as if the lights, the crowds, the champagne-like

air intoxicated him.

At the first break in the thunderous torrent of traffic they

crossed Broadway and went in at the Twenty-sixth Street

entrance. The restaurant, to the left, was empty. Its little

tables were ready, however, for the throng of diners soon to

come. Susan had difficulty in restraining herself. She was

almost delirious with delight. She was agitated almost to

tears by the freshness, the sparkle in the glow of the

red-shaded candles, in the colors and odors of the flowers

decorating every table. While she had been down there all this

had been up here--waiting for her! Why had she stayed down

there? But then, why had she gone? What folly, what madness!

To suffer such horrors for no reason--beyond some vague,

clinging remnant of a superstition--or had it been just plain

insanity? "Yes, I've been crazy--out of my head. The break

with--Rod--upset my mind."

Her companion took her into the café to the right. He seated

her on one of the leather benches not far from the door, seated

himself in a chair opposite; there was a narrow marble-topped

table between them. On Susan's right sat a too conspicuously

dressed but somehow important looking actress; on her left, a

shopkeeper's fat wife. Opposite each woman sat the sort of man

one would expect to find with her. The face of the actress's

man interested her. It was a long pale face, the mouth weary,

in the eyes a strange hot fire of intense enthusiasm. He was

young--and old--and neither. Evidently he had lived every

minute of every year of his perhaps forty years. He was

wearing a quiet suit of blue and his necktie was of a darker

shade of the same color. His clothes were draped upon his good

figure with a certain fascinating distinction. He was smoking

an unusually long and thick cigarette. The slender strong

white hand he raised and lowered was the hand of an artist. He

might be a bad man, a very bad man--his face had an expression

of freedom, of experience, that made such an idea as

conventionality in connection with him ridiculous. But however

bad he might be, Susan felt sure it would be an artistic kind

of badness, without vulgarity. He might have reached the stage

at which morality ceases to be a conviction, a matter of

conscience, and becomes a matter of preference, of tastes--and

he surely had good taste in conduct no less than in dress and

manner. The woman with him evidently wished to convince him

that she loved him, to convince those about her that they were

lovers; the man evidently knew exactly what she had in

mind--for he was polite, attentive, indifferent, and--Susan

suspected--secretly amused.

Susan's escort leaned toward her and said in a low tone, "The

two at the next table--the woman's Mary Rigsdall, the actress,

and the man's Brent, the fellow who writes plays." Then in a

less cautious tone, "What are you drinking?"

"What are _you_ drinking?" asked Susan, still covertly watching Brent.

"You are going to dine with me?"

"I've no engagement."

"Then let's have Martinis--and I'll go get a table and order

dinner while the waiter's bringing them."

When Susan was alone, she gazed round the crowded café, at the

scores of interesting faces--thrillingly interesting to her

after her long sojourn among countenances merely expressing

crude elemental appetites if anything at all beyond toil,

anxiety, privation, and bad health. These were the faces of

the triumphant class--of those who had wealth or were getting

it, fame or were striving for it, of those born to or acquiring

position of some sort among the few thousands who lord it over

the millions. These were the people among whom she belonged.

Why was she having such a savage struggle to attain it? Then,

all in an instant the truth she had been so long groping for in

vain flung itself at her. None of these women, none of the

women of the prosperous classes would be there but for the

assistance and protection of the men. She marveled at her

stupidity in not having seen the obvious thing clearly long

ago. The successful women won their success by disposing of

their persons to advantage--by getting the favor of some man of

ability. Therefore, she, a woman, must adopt that same policy

if she was to have a chance at the things worth while in life.

She must make the best bargain--or series of bargains--she

could. And as her necessities were pressing she must lose no

time. She understood now the instinct that had forced her to

fly from South Fifth Avenue, that had overruled her hesitation

and had compelled her to accept the good-natured, prosperous

man's invitation. . . . There was no other way open to her.

She must not evade that fact; she must accept it. Other ways

there might be--for other women. But not for her, the outcast

without friends or family, the woman alone, with no one to lean

upon or to give her anything except in exchange for what she

had to offer that was marketable. She must make the bargain

she could, not waste time in the folly of awaiting a bargain to

her liking. Since she was living in the world and wished to

continue to live there, she must accept the world's terms. To

be sad or angry either one because the world did not offer her

as attractive terms as it apparently offered many other

women--the happy and respected wives and mothers of the

prosperous classes, for instance--to rail against that was

silly and stupid, was unworthy of her intelligence. She would

do as best she could, and move along, keeping her eyes open;

and perhaps some day a chance for much better terms might

offer--for the best--for such terms as that famous actress

there had got. She looked at Mary Rigsdall. An expression in

her interesting face--the latent rather than the surface

expression--set Susan to wondering whether, if she knew

Rigsdall's _whole_ story--or any woman's whole story--she might

not see that the world was not bargaining so hardly with her,

after all. Or any man's whole story. There her eyes shifted

to Rigsdall's companion, the famous playwright of whom she had

so often heard Rod and his friends talk.

She was startled to find that his gaze was upon her--an

all-seeing look that penetrated to the very core of her being.

He either did not note or cared nothing about her color of

embarrassment. He regarded her steadily until, so she felt, he

had seen precisely what she was, had become intimately

acquainted with her. Then he looked away. It chagrined her

that his eyes did not again turn in her direction; she felt

that he had catalogued her as not worth while. She listened to

the conversation of the two. The woman did the talking, and

her subject was herself--her ability as an actress, her

conception of some part she either was about to play or was

hoping to play. Susan, too young to have acquired more than

the rudiments of the difficult art of character study, even had

she had especial talent for it--which she had not--Susan

decided that the famous Rigsdall was as shallow and vain as Rod

had said all stage people were.

The waiter brought the cocktails and her stout young companion

came back, beaming at the thought of the dinner he had

painstakingly ordered. As he reached the table he jerked his

head in self-approval. "It'll be a good one," said he.

"Saturday night dinner--and after--means a lot to me. I work

hard all week. Saturday nights I cut loose. Sundays I sleep

and get ready to scramble again on Monday for the dollars." He

seated himself, leaned toward her with elevated glass. "What

name?" inquired he.

"Susan."

"That's a good old-fashioned name. Makes me see the

hollyhocks, and the hens scratching for worms. Mine's Howland.

Billy Howland. I came from Maryland . . . and I'm mighty

glad I did. I wouldn't be from anywhere else for worlds, and

I wouldn't be there for worlds. Where do you hail from?"

"The West," said Susan.

"Well, the men in your particular corner out yonder must be a

pretty poor lot to have let you leave. I spotted you for mine

the minute I saw you--Susan. I hope you're not as quiet as

your name. Another cocktail?"

"Thanks."

"Like to drink?"

"I'm going to do more of it hereafter."

"Been laying low for a while--eh?"

"Very low," said Susan. Her eyes were sparkling now; the

cocktail had begun to stir her long languid blood.

"Live with your family?"

"I haven't any. I'm free."

"On the stage?"

"I'm thinking of going on."

"And meanwhile?"

"Meanwhile--whatever comes."

Billy Howland's face was radiant. "I had a date tonight and

the lady threw me down. One of those drummer's wives that take

in washing to add to the family income while hubby's flirting

round the country. This hubby came home unexpectedly. I'm

glad he did."

He beamed with such whole-souled good-nature that Susan

laughed. "Thanks. Same to you," said she.

"Hope you're going to do a lot of that laughing," said he.

"It's the best I've heard--such a quiet, gay sound. I sure do

have the best luck. Until five years ago there was nothing

doing for Billy--hall bedroom--Wheeling stogies--one shirt and

two pairs of cuffs a week--not enough to buy a lady an

ice-cream soda. All at once--bang! The hoodoo busted, and

everything that arrived was for William C. Howland. Better

get aboard."

"Here I am."

"Hold on tight. I pay no attention to the speed laws, and

round the corners on two wheels. Do you like good things to eat?"

"I haven't eaten for six months."

"You must have been out home. Ah!--There's the man to tell us

dinner's ready."

They finished the second cocktail. Susan was pleased to note

that Brent was again looking at her; and she thought--though

she suspected it might be the cocktail--that there was a

question in his look--a question about her which he had been

unable to answer to his satisfaction. When she and Howland

were at one of the small tables against the wall in the

restaurant, she said to him:

"You know Mr. Brent?"

"The play man? Lord, no. I'm a plain business dub. He

wouldn't bother with me. You like that sort of man?"

"I want to get on the stage, if I can," was Susan's diplomatic reply.

"Well--let's have dinner first. I've ordered champagne, but if

you prefer something else----"

"Champagne is what I want. I hope it's very dry."

Howland's eyes gazed tenderly at her. "I do like a woman who

knows the difference between champagne and carbonated sirup.

I think you and I've got a lot of tastes in common. I like

eating--so do you. I like drinking--so do you. I like a good

time--so do you. You're a little bit thin for my taste, but

you'll fatten up. I wonder what makes your lips so pale."

"I'd hate to remind myself by telling you," said Susan.

The restaurant was filling. Most of the men and women were in

evening dress. Each arriving woman brought with her a new

exhibition of extravagance in costume, diffused a new variety

of powerful perfume. The orchestra in the balcony was playing

waltzes and the liveliest Hungarian music and the most sensuous

strains from Italy and France and Spain. And before her was

food!--food again!--not horrible stuff unfit for beasts, worse

than was fed to beasts, but human food--good things, well

cooked and well served. To have seen her, to have seen the

expression of her eyes, without knowing her history and without

having lived as she had lived, would have been to think her a

glutton. Her spirits giddied toward the ecstatic. She began

to talk--commenting on the people about her--the one subject she

could venture with her companion. As she talked and drank, he

ate and drank, stuffing and gorging himself, but with a

frankness of gluttony that delighted her. She found she could

not eat much, but she liked to see eating; she who had so long

been seeing only poverty, bolting wretched food and drinking

the vilest kinds of whiskey and beer, of alleged coffee and

tea--she reveled in Howland's exhibition. She must learn to

live altogether in her senses, never to think except about an

appetite. Where could she find a better teacher? . . .

They drank two quarts of champagne, and with the coffee she

took _crême de menthe_ and he brandy. And as the sensuous

temperament that springs from intense vitality reasserted

itself, the opportunity before her lost all its repellent

features, became the bright, vivid countenance of lusty youth,

irradiating the joy of living.

"I hear there's a lively ball up at Terrace Garden," said he.

"Want to go?"

"That'll be fine!" cried she.

She saw it would have taken nearly all the money she possessed

to have paid that bill. About four weeks' wages for one

dinner! Thousands of families living for two weeks on what she

and he had consumed in two hours! She reached for her half

empty champagne glass, emptied it. She must forget all those

things! "I've played the fool once. I've learned my lesson.

Surely I'll never do it again." As she drank, her eyes chanced

upon the clock. Half-past ten. Mrs. Tucker had probably just

fallen asleep. And Mrs. Reardon was going out to scrub--going

out limping and groaning with rheumatism. No, Mrs. Reardon was

lying up at the morgue dead, her one chance to live lost

forever. Dead! Yet better off than Mrs. Tucker lying alive.

Susan could see her--the seamed and broken and dirty old

remnant of a face--could see the vermin--and the mice could

hear the snoring--the angry grunt and turning over as the

insects----

"I want another drink--right away," she cried.

"Sure!" said Howland. "I need one more, too."

They drove in a taxi to Terrace Garden, he holding her in his

arms and kissing her with an intoxicated man's enthusiasm.

"You certainly are sweet," said he. "The wine on your breath

is like flowers. Gosh, but I'm glad that husband came home!

Like me a little?"

"I'm so happy, I feel like standing up and screaming," declared she.

"Good idea," cried he. Whereupon he released a war whoop and

they both went off into a fit of hysterical laughter. When it

subsided he said, "I sized you up as a live wire the minute I

saw you. But you're even better than I thought. What are you

in such a good humor about?"

"You couldn't understand if I told you," replied she. "You'd

have to go and live where I've been living--live there as long

as I have."

"Convent?"

"Worse. Worse than a jail."

The ball proved as lively as they hoped. A select company from

the Tenderloin was attending, and the regulars were all of the

gayest crowd among the sons and daughters of artisans and small

merchants up and down the East Side. Not a few of the women

were extremely pretty. All, or almost all, were young, and

those who on inspection proved to be older than eighteen or

twenty were acting younger than the youngest. Everyone had

been drinking freely, and continued to drink. The orchestra

played continuously. The air was giddy with laughter and song.

Couples hugged and kissed in corners, and finally openly on the

dancing floor. For a while Susan and Howland danced together.

But soon they made friends with the crowd and danced with

whoever was nearest. Toward three in the morning it flashed

upon her that she had not even seen him for many a dance. She

looked round--searched for him--got a blond-bearded man in

evening dress to assist her.

"The last seen of your stout friend," this man finally

reported, "he was driving away in a cab with a large lady from

Broadway. He was asleep, but I guess she wasn't."

A sober thought winked into her whirling brain--he had warned

her to hold on tight, and she had lost her head--and her

opportunity. A bad start--a foolishly bad start. But out

winked the glimpse of sobriety and Susan laughed. "That's the

last I'll ever see of _him_," said she.

This seemed to give Blond-Beard no regrets. Said he: "Let's

you and I have a little supper. I'd call it breakfast, only

then we couldn't have champagne."

And they had supper--six at the table, all uproarious, Susan

with difficulty restrained from a skirt dance on the table up

and down among the dishes and bottles. It was nearly five

o'clock when she and Blond-Beard helped each other toward a cab.

"What's your address?" said he.

"The same as yours," replied she drowsily.

Late that afternoon she established herself in a room with a

bath in West Twenty-ninth Street not far from Broadway. The

exterior of the house was dingy and down-at-the-heel. But the

interior was new and scrupulously clean. Several other young

women lived there alone also, none quite so well installed as

Susan, who had the only private bath and was paying twelve

dollars a week. The landlady, frizzled and peroxide,

explained--without adding anything to what she already

knew--that she could have "privileges," but cautioned her

against noise. "I can't stand for it," said she. "First

offense--out you go. This house is for ladies, and only

gentlemen that know how to conduct themselves as a gentleman

should with a lady are allowed to come here."

Susan paid a week in advance, reducing to thirty-one dollars

her capital which Blond-Beard had increased to forty-three.

The young lady who lived at the other end of the hall smiled at

her, when both happened to glance from their open doors at the

same time. Susan invited her to call and she immediately

advanced along the hall in the blue silk kimono she was wearing

over her nightgown.

"My name's Ida Driscoll," said she, showing a double row of

charming white teeth--her chief positive claim to beauty.

She was short, was plump about the shoulders but slender in the

hips. Her reddish brown hair was neatly done over a big rat,

and was so spread that its thinness was hidden well enough to

deceive masculine eyes. Nor would a man have observed that one

of her white round shoulders was full two inches higher than

the other. Her skin was good, her features small and

irregular, her eyes shrewd but kindly.

"My name's"--Susan hesitated--"Lorna Sackville."

"I guess Lorna and Ida'll be enough for us to bother to

remember," laughed Miss Driscoll. "The rest's liable to

change. You've just come, haven't you?"

"About an hour ago. I've got only a toothbrush, a comb, a

washrag and a cake of soap. I bought them on my way here."

"Baggage lost--eh?" said Ida, amused.

"No," admitted Susan. "I'm beginning an entire new deal."

"I'll lend you a nightgown. I'm too short for my other things

to fit you."

"Oh, I can get along. What's good for a headache? I'm nearly

crazy with it."

"Wine?"

"Yes."

"Wait a minute." Ida, with bedroom slippers clattering,

hurried back to her room, returned with a bottle of bromo

seltzer and in the bathroom fixed Susan a dose. "You'll feel

all right in half an hour or so. Gee, but you're swell--with

your own bathroom."

Susan shrugged her shoulders and laughed.

Ida shook her head gravely. "You ought to save your money. I do."

"Later--perhaps. Just now--I _must_ have a fling."

Ida seemed to understand. She went on to say: "I was in

millinery. But in this town there's nothing in anything unless

you have capital or a backer. I got tired of working for five

per, with ten or fifteen as the top notch. So I quit, kissed

my folks up in Harlem good-by and came down to look about. As

soon as I've saved enough I'm going to start a business. That'll

be about a couple of years--maybe sooner, if I find an angel."

"I'm thinking of the stage."

"Cut it out!" cried Ida. "It's on the bum. There's more money

and less worry in straight sporting--if you keep respectable.

Of course, there's nothing in out and out sporting."

"Oh, I haven't decided on anything. My head is better."

"Sure! If the dose I gave you don't knock it you can get one

at the drug store two blocks up Sixth Avenue that'll do the

trick. Got a dinner date?"

"No. I haven't anything on hand."

"I think you and I might work together," said Ida. "You're

thin and tallish. I'm short and fattish. We'd catch 'em

coming and going."

"That sounds good," said Susan.

"You're new to--to the business?"

"In a way--yes."

"I thought so. We all soon get a kind of a professional look.

You haven't got it. Still, so many dead respectable women

imitate nowadays, and paint and use loud perfumes, that

sporting women aren't nearly so noticeable. Seems to me the

men's tastes even for what they want at home are getting louder

and louder all the time. They hate anything that looks slow.

And in our business it's harder and harder to please them--except

the yaps from the little towns and the college boys. A woman

has to be up to snuff if she gets on. If she looks what she

is, men won't have her--nor if she is what she looks."

Susan had not lived where every form of viciousness is openly

discussed and practiced, without having learned the things

necessary to a full understanding of Ida's technical phrases

and references. The liveliness that had come with the

departure of the headache vanished. To change the subject she

invited Ida to dine with her.

"What's the use of your spending money in a restaurant?"

objected Ida. "You eat with me in my room. I always cook

myself something when I ain't asked out by some one of my

gentleman friends. I can cook you a chop and warm up a can of

French peas and some dandy tea biscuits I bought yesterday."

Susan accepted the invitation, promising that when she was

established she would reciprocate. As it was about six, they

arranged to have the dinner at seven, Susan to dress in the

meantime. The headache had now gone, even to that last

heaviness which seems to be an ominous threat of a return.

When she was alone, she threw off her clothes, filled the big

bathtub with water as hot as she could stand it. Into this she

gently lowered herself until she was able to relax and recline

without discomfort. Then she stood up and with the soap and

washrag gave herself the most thorough scrubbing of her life.

Time after time she soaped and rubbed and scrubbed, and dipped

herself in the hot water. When she felt that she had restored

her body to some where near her ideal of cleanness, she let the

water run out and refilled the tub with even hotter water. In

this she lay luxuriously, reveling in the magnificent

sensations of warmth and utter cleanliness. Her eyes closed;

a delicious languor stole over her and through her, soothing

every nerve. She slept.

She was awakened by Ida, who had entered after knocking and

calling at the outer door in vain. Susan slowly opened her

eyes, gazed at Ida with a soft dreamy smile. "You don't know

what this means. It seems to me I was never quite so

comfortable or so happy in my life."

"It's a shame to disturb you," said Ida. "But dinner's ready.

Don't stop to dress first. I'll bring you a kimono."

Susan turned on the cold water, and the bath rapidly changed

from warm to icy. When she had indulged in the sense of cold

as delightful in its way as the sense of warmth, she rubbed her

glowing skin with a rough towel until she was rose-red from

head to foot. Then she put on stockings, shoes and the pink

kimono Ida had brought, and ran along the hall to dinner. As

she entered Ida's room, Ida exclaimed, "How sweet and pretty

you do look! You sure ought to make a hit!"

"I feel like a human being for the first time in--it seems

years--ages--to me."

"You've got a swell color--except your lips. Have they always

been pale like that?"

"No."

"I thought not. It don't seem to fit in with your style. You

ought to touch 'em up. You look too serious and innocent,

anyhow. They make a rouge now that'll stick through

everything--eating, drinking--anything."

Susan regarded herself critically in the glass. "I'll see,"

she said.

The odor of the cooking chops thrilled Susan like music. She

drew a chair up to the table, sat in happy-go-lucky fashion,

and attacked the chop, the hot biscuit, and the peas, with an

enthusiasm that inspired Ida to imitation. "You know how to

cook a chop," she said to Ida. "And anybody who can cook a

chop right can cook. Cooking's like playing the piano. If you

can do the simple things perfectly, you're ready to do anything."

"Wait till I have a flat of my own," said Ida. "I'll show you

what eating means. And I'll have it, too, before very long.

Maybe we'll live together. I was to a fortune teller's

yesterday. That's the only way I waste money. I go to fortune

tellers nearly every day. But then all the girls do. You get

your money's worth in excitement and hope, whether there's

anything in it or not. Well, the fortune teller she said I was

to meet a dark, slender person who was to change the whole

course of my life--that all my troubles would roll away--and

that if any more came, they'd roll away, too. My, but she did

give me a swell fortune, and only fifty cents! I'll take you

to her."

Ida made black coffee and the two girls, profoundly contented,

drank it and talked with that buoyant cheerfulness which

bubbles up in youth on the slightest pretext. In this case the

pretext was anything but slight, for both girls had health as

well as youth, had that freedom from harassing responsibility

which is the chief charm of every form of unconventional life.

And Susan was still in the first flush of the joy of escape

from the noisome prison whose poisons had been corroding her,

soul and body. No, poison is not a just comparison; what

poison in civilization parallels, or even approaches, in

squalor, in vileness of food and air, in wretchedness of

shelter and clothing, the tenement life that is really the

typical life of the city? From time to time Susan, suffused

with the happiness that is too deep for laughter, too deep for

tears even, gazed round like a dreamer at those cheerful

comfortable surroundings and drew a long breath--stealthily, as

if she feared she would awaken and be again in South Fifth

Avenue, of rags and filth, of hideous toil without hope.

"You'd better save your money to put in the millinery business

with me," Ida advised. "I can show you how to make a lot.

Sometimes I clear as high as a hundred a week, and I don't

often fall below seventy-five. So many girls go about this

business in a no account way, instead of being regular and

business-like."

Susan strove to hide the feelings aroused by this practical

statement of what lay before her. Those feelings filled her

with misgiving. Was the lesson still unlearned? Obviously Ida

was right; there must be plan, calculation, a definite line

laid out and held to, or there could not but be failure and

disaster. And yet--Susan's flesh quivered and shrank away.

She struggled against it, but she could not conquer it.

Experience had apparently been in vain; her character had

remained unchanged. . . . She must compel herself. She

must do what she had to do; she must not ruin everything by

imitating the people of the tenements with their fatal habit of

living from day to day only, and taking no thought for the

morrow except fatuously to hope and dream that all would be well.

While she was fighting with herself, Ida had been talking

on--the same subject. When Susan heard again, Ida was saying:

"Now, take me, for instance. I don't smoke or drink. There's

nothing in either one--especially drink. Of course sometimes

a girl's got to drink. A man watches her too close for her to

dodge out. But usually you can make him think you're as full

as he is, when you really are cold sober."

"Do the men always drink when they--come with--with--us?" asked Susan.

"Most always. They come because they want to turn themselves

loose. That's why a girl's got to be careful not to make a man

feel nervous or shy. A respectable woman's game is to be

modest and innocent. With us, the opposite. They're both

games; one's just as good as the other."

"I don't think I could get along at all--at this," confessed

Susan with an effort, "unless I drank too much--so that I was

reckless and didn't care what happened."

Ida looked directly into her eyes; Susan's glance fell and a

flush mounted. After a pause Ida went on:

"A girl does feel that way at first. A girl that marries as

most of them do--because the old ones are pushing her out of

the nest and she's got no place else to go--she feels the same

way till she hardens to it. Of course, you've got to get broke

into any business."

"Go on," said Susan eagerly. "You are so sensible. You must

teach me."

"Common sense is a thing you don't often hear--especially about

getting on in the world. But, as I was saying--one of my

gentlemen friends is a lawyer--such a nice fellow--so liberal.

Gives me a present of twenty or twenty-five extra, you

understand--every time he makes a killing downtown. He asked

me once how I felt when I started in; and when I told him, he

said, 'That's exactly the way I felt the first time I won a

case for a client I knew was a dirty rascal and in the wrong.

But now--I take that sort of thing as easy as you do.' He says

the thing is to get on, no matter how, and that one way's as

good as another. And he's mighty right. You soon learn that

in little old New York, where you've got to have the money or

you get the laugh and the foot--the swift, hard kick. Clean up

after you've arrived, he says--and don't try to keep clean

while you're working--and don't stop for baths and things while

you're at the job."

Susan was listening with every faculty she possessed.

"He says he talks the other sort of thing--the dope--the fake

stuff--just as the rest of the hustlers do. He says it's

necessary in order to keep the people fooled--that if they got

wise to the real way to succeed, then there'd be nobody to rob

and get rich off of. Oh, he's got it right. He's a smart one."

The sad, bitter expression was strong in Susan's face.

After a pause, Ida went on: "If a girl's an ignorant fool or

squeamish, she don't get up in this business any more than in

any other. But if she keeps a cool head, and don't take lovers

unless they pay their way, and don't drink, why she can keep

her self-respect and not have to take to the streets."

Susan lifted her head eagerly. "Don't have to take to the

streets?" she echoed.

"Certainly not," declared Ida. "I very seldom let a man pick

me up after dark--unless he looks mighty good. I go out in the

daytime. I pretend I'm an actress out of a job for the time

being, or a forelady in a big shop who's taking a day or so

off, or a respectable girl living with her parents. I put a

lot of money into clothes--quiet, ladylike clothes. Mighty

good investment. If you ain't got clothes in New York you

can't do any kind of business. I go where a nice class of men

hangs out, and I never act bold, but just flirt timidly, as so

many respectable girls or semi-respectables do. But when a

girl plays that game, she has to be careful not to make a man

think he ain't expected to pay. The town's choked full of men

on the lookout for what they call love--which means, for

something cheap or, better still, free. Men are just crazy

about themselves. Nothing easier than to fool 'em--and

nothing's harder than to make 'em think you ain't stuck on 'em.

I tell you, a girl in our life has a chance to learn men. They

turn themselves inside out to us."

Susan, silent, her thoughts flowing like a mill race, helped

Ida with the dishes. Then they dressed and went together for

a walk. It being Sunday evening, the streets were quiet. They

sauntered up Fifth Avenue as far as Fifty-ninth Street and

back. Ida's calm and sensible demeanor gave Susan much needed

courage every time a man spoke to them. None of these men

happened to be up to Ida's standard, which was high.

"No use wasting time on snide people," explained she. "We

don't want drinks and a gush of loose talk, and I saw at a

glance that was all those chappies were good for."

They returned home at half-past nine without adventure. Toward

midnight one of Ida's regulars called and Susan was free to go

to bed. She slept hardly at all. Ever before her mind hovered

a nameless, shapeless horror. And when she slept she dreamed

of her wedding night, woke herself screaming, "Please, Mr.

Ferguson--please!"

Ida had three chief sources of revenue.

The best was five men--her "regular gentleman friends"--who

called by appointment from time to time. These paid her ten

dollars apiece, and occasionally gave her presents of money or

jewelry--nothing that amounted to much. From them she averaged

about thirty-five dollars a week. Her second source was a Mrs.

Thurston who kept in West Fifty-sixth Street near Ninth Avenue

a furnished-room house of the sort that is on the official--and

also the "revenue"--lists of the police and the anti-vice

societies. This lady had a list of girls and married women

upon whom she could call. Gentlemen using her house for

rendezvous were sometimes disappointed by the ladies with whom

they were intriguing. Again a gentleman grew a little weary of

his perhaps too respectable or too sincerely loving ladylove

and appealed to Mrs. Thurston. She kept her list of availables

most select and passed them off as women of good position

willing to supplement a small income, or to punish stingy

husbands or fathers and at the same time get the money they

needed for dress and bridge, for matinées and lunches. Mrs.

Thurston insisted--and Ida was inclined to believe--that there

were genuine cases of this kind on the list.

"It's mighty hard for women with expensive tastes and small

means to keep straight in New York," said she to Susan. "It

costs so much to live, and there are so many ways to spend

money. And they always have rich lady friends who set an

extravagant pace. They've got to dress--and to kind of keep up

their end. So--" Ida laughed, went on: "Besides the city

women are getting so they like a little sporty novelty as much

as their brothers and husbands and fathers do. Oh, I'm not

ashamed of my business any more. We're as good as the others,

and we're not hypocrites. As my lawyer friend says,

everybody's got to make a _good_ living, and good livings can't

be made on the ways that used to be called on the

level--they're called damfool ways now."

Ida's third source of income was to her the most attractive

because it had such a large gambling element in it. This was

her flirtations as a respectable woman in search of lively

amusement and having to take care not to be caught. There are

women of all kinds who delight in deceiving men because it

gives them a sweet stealthy sense of superiority to the

condescending sex. In women of the Ida class this pleasure

becomes as much a passion as it is in the respectable woman

whom her husband tries to enslave. With Susan, another woman

and one in need of education, Ida was simple and scrupulously

truthful. But it would have been impossible for a man to get

truth as to anything from her. She amused herself inventing

plausible romantic stories about herself that she might enjoy

the gullibility of the boastfully superior and patronizing

male. She was devoid of sentiment, even of passion. Yet at

times she affected both in the most extreme fashion. And

afterward, with peals of laughter, she would describe to Susan

how the man had acted, what an ass she had made of him.

"Men despise us," she said. "But it's nothing to the way I

despise them. The best of them are rotten beasts when they

show themselves as they are. And they haven't any mercy on us.

It's too ridiculous. Men despise a man who is virtuous and a

woman who isn't. What rot!"

She deceived the "regulars" without taking the trouble to

remember her deceptions. They caught her lying so often that

she knew they thought her untruthful through and through. But

this only gave her an opportunity for additional pleasure--the

pleasure of inventing lies that they would believe in spite of

their distrust of her. "Anyhow," said she, "haven't you

noticed the liars everybody's on to are always believed and

truthful people are doubted?"

Upon the men with whom she flirted, she practiced the highly

colored romances it would have been useless to try upon the

regulars. Her greatest triumph at this game was a hard luck

story she had told so effectively that the man had given her

two hundred dollars. Most of her romances turned about her own

ruin. As a matter of fact, she had told Susan the exact truth

when she said she had taken up her mode of life deliberately;

she had grown weary and impatient of the increasing

poverty of a family which, like so many of the artisan and

small merchant and professional classes in this day of

concentrating wealth and spreading tastes for comfort and

luxury, was on its way down from comfort toward or through the

tenements. She was a type of the recruits that are swelling

the prostitute class in ever larger numbers and are driving the

prostitutes of the tenement class toward starvation--where they

once dominated the profession even to its highest ranks, even

to the fashionable _cocotes_ who prey upon the second generation

of the rich. But Ida never told her lovers her plain and

commonplace tale of yielding to the irresistible pressure of

economic forces. She had made men weep at her recital of her

wrongs. It had even brought her offers of marriage--none,

however, worth accepting.

"I'd be a boob to marry a man with less than fifteen or twenty

thousand a year, wouldn't I?" said she. "Why, two of the

married men who come to see me regularly give me more than they

give their wives for pin money. And in a few years I'll be

having my own respectable business, with ten thousand

income--maybe more--and as well thought of as the next woman."

Ida's dream was a house in the country, a fine flat in town, a

husband in some "refined" profession and children at high-class

schools. "And I'll get there, don't you doubt it!" exclaimed

she. "Others have--of course, you don't know about

them--they've looked out for that. Yes, lots of others

have--but--well, just you watch your sister Ida."

And Susan felt that she would indeed arrive. Already she had

seen that there was no difficulty such as she had once imagined

about recrossing the line to respectability. The only real

problem in that matter was how to get together enough to make

the crossing worth while--for what was there in respectability

without money, in a day when respectability had ceased to mean

anything but money?

Ida wished to take her to Mrs. Thurston and get her a favored

place on the list. Susan thanked her, but said, "Not yet--not

quite yet." Ida suggested that they go out together as two

young married women whose husbands had gone on the road. Susan

put her off from day to day. Ida finally offered to introduce

her to one of the regulars: "He's a nice fellow--knows how to

treat a lady in a gentlemanly way. Not a bit coarse or

familiar." Susan would not permit this generosity. And all

this time her funds were sinking. She had paid a second week's

rent, had bought cooking apparatus, some food supplies, some

necessary clothing. She was down to a five-dollar bill and a

little change.

"Look here, Lorna," said Ida, between remonstrance and

exasperation, "when _are_ you going to start in?"

Susan looked fixedly at her, said with a slow smile, "When I

can't hold out another minute."

Ida tossed her head angrily. "You've got brains--more than I

have," she cried. "You've got every advantage for catching

rich men--even a rich husband. You're educated. You speak and

act and look refined. Why you could pretend to be a howling

fashionable swell. You've got all the points. But what have

you got 'em for? Not to use that's certain."

"You can't be as disgusted with me as I am."

"If you're going to do a thing, why, _do_ it!"

"That's what I tell myself. But--I can't make a move."

Ida gave a gesture of despair. "I don't see what's to become

of you. And you could do _so_ well! . . . Let me phone Mr.

Sterling. I told him about you. He's anxious to meet you.

He's fond of books--like you. You'd like him. He'd give up a

lot to you, because you're classier than I am."

Susan threw her arms round Ida and kissed her. "Don't bother

about me," she said. "I've got to act in my own foolish,

stupid way. I'm like a child going to school. I've got to

learn a certain amount before I'm ready to do whatever it is

I'm going to do. And until I learn it, I can't do much of

anything. I thought I had learned in the last few months. I

see I haven't."

"Do listen to sense, Lorna," pleaded Ida. "If you wait till

the last minute, you'll get left. The time to get the money's

when you have money. And I've a feeling that you're not

particularly flush."

"I'll do the best I can. And I can't move till I'm ready."

Meanwhile she continued to search for work--work that would

enable her to live _decently_, wages less degrading than the

wages of shame. In a newspaper she read an advertisement of a

theatrical agency. Advertisements of all kinds read well;

those of theatrical agencies read--like the fairy tales that

they were. However, she found in this particular offering of

dazzling careers and salaries a peculiar phrasing that decided

her to break the rule she had made after having investigated

scores of this sort of offers.

Rod was abroad; anyhow, enough time had elapsed. One of the

most impressive features of the effect of New York--meaning by

"New York" only that small but significant portion of the four

millions that thinks--at least, after a fashion, and acts,

instead of being mere passive tools of whatever happens to turn

up--the most familiar notable effect of this New York is the

speedy distinction in the newcomer of those illusions and

delusions about life and about human nature, about good and

evil, that are for so many people the most precious and the

only endurable and beautiful thing in the world. New York,

destroyer of delusions and cherished hypocrisies and pretenses,

therefore makes the broadly intelligent of its citizens hardy,

makes the others hard--and between the hardy and hard, between

sense and cynicism, yawns a gulf like that between Absalom and

Dives. Susan, a New Yorker now, had got the habit--in thought,

at least--of seeing things with somewhat less distortion from

the actual. She no longer exaggerated the importance of the

Rod-Susan episode. She saw that in New York, where life is

crowded with events, everything in one's life, except death,

becomes incident, becomes episode, where in regions offering

less to think about each rare happening took on an aspect of

vast importance. The Rod-Susan love adventure, she now saw,

was not what it would have seemed--therefore, would have

been--in Sutherland, but was mere episode of a New York life,

giving its light and shade to a certain small part of the long,

variedly patterned fabric of her life, and of his, not

determining the whole. She saw that it was simply like a bend

in the river, giving a new turn to current and course but not

changing the river itself, and soon left far behind and

succeeded by other bends giving each its equal or greater turn

to the stream.

Rod had passed from her life, and she from his life. Thus she

was free to begin her real career--the stage--if she could. She

went to the suite of offices tenanted by Mr. Josiah Ransome.

She was ushered in to Ransome himself, instead of halting with

underlings. She owed this favor to advantages which her lack

of vanity and of self-consciousness prevented her from

surmising. Ransome--smooth, curly, comfortable

looking--received her with a delicate blending of the paternal

and the gallant. After he had inspected her exterior with

flattering attentiveness and had investigated her

qualifications with a thoroughness that was convincing of

sincerity he said:

"Most satisfactory! I can make you an exceptional assurance.

If you register with me, I can guarantee you not less than

twenty-five a week."

Susan hesitated long and asked many questions before she

finally--with reluctance paid the five dollars. She felt

ashamed of her distrust, but might perhaps have persisted in it

had not Mr. Ransome said:

"I don't blame you for hesitating, my dear young lady. And if

I could I'd put you on my list without payment. But you can

see how unbusiness-like that would be. I am a substantial,

old-established concern. You--no doubt you are perfectly

reliable. But I have been fooled so many times. I must not

let myself forget that after all I know nothing about you."

As soon as Susan had paid he gave her a list of vaudeville and

musical comedy houses where girls were wanted. "You can't fail

to suit one of them," said he. "If not, come back here and get

your money."

After two weary days of canvassing she went back to Ransome.

He was just leaving. But he smiled genially, opened his desk

and seated himself. "At your service," said he. "What luck?"

"None," replied Susan. "I couldn't live on the wages they

offered at the musical comedy places, even if I could get placed."

"And the vaudeville people?"

"When I said I could only sing and not dance, they looked

discouraged. When I said I had no costumes they turned me down."

"Excellent!" cried Ransome. "You mustn't be so easily beaten.

You must take dancing lessons--perhaps a few singing lessons,

too. And you must get some costumes."

"But that means several hundred dollars."

"Three or four hundred," said Ransome airily. "A matter of a

few weeks."

"But I haven't anything like that," said Susan. "I haven't so

much as----"

"I comprehend perfectly," interrupted Ransome. She interested

him, this unusual looking girl, with her attractive mingling of

youth and experience. Her charm that tempted people to give

her at once the frankest confidences, moved him to go out of

his way to help her. "You haven't the money," he went on.

"You must have it. So--I promised to place you, and I will.

I don't usually go so far in assisting my clients. It's not

often necessary--and where it's necessary it's usually

imprudent. However--I'll give you the address of a flat where

there is a lady--a trustworthy, square sort, despite her--her

profession. She will put you in the way of getting on a sound

financial basis."

Ransome spoke in a matter-of-fact tone, like a man stating a

simple business proposition. Susan understood. She rose. Her

expression was neither shock nor indignation; but it was none

the less a negative.

"It's the regular thing, my dear," urged Ransome. "To make a

start, to get in right, you can't afford to be squeamish. The

way I suggest is the simplest and most direct of several that

all involve the same thing. And the surest. You look

steady-headed--self-reliant. You look sensible----"

Susan smiled rather forlornly. "But I'm not," said she. "Not yet."

Ransome regarded her with a sympathy which she felt was

genuine. "I'm sorry, my dear. I've done the best I can for

you. You may think it a very poor best--and it is. But"--he

shrugged his shoulders--"I didn't make this world and its

conditions for living. I may say also that I'm not the

responsible party--the party in charge. However----"

To her amazement he held out a five-dollar bill. "Here's your

fee back." He laughed at her expression. "Oh, I'm not a

robber," said he. "I only wish I could serve you. I didn't

think you were so--" his eyes twinkled--"so unreasonable, let

us say. Among those who don't know anything about life there's

an impression that my sort of people are in the business of

dragging women down. Perhaps one of us occasionally does as

bad--about a millionth part as bad--as the average employer of

labor who skims his profits from the lifeblood of his

employees. But as a rule we folks merely take those that are

falling and help them to light easy--or even to get up again."

Susan felt ashamed to take her money. But he pressed it on

her. "You'll need it," said he. "I know how it is with a girl

alone and trying to get a start. Perhaps later on you'll be