Morris Goldberg, by this time, was ready to wait upon Muriel, who
seemed to be slowly overcoming the effects of the drink she had taken.
And, in a few moments, the shoemaker had fixed the price at twenty
cents for the work he was to do.
Morris took the dainty shoe and went to work at it, blind to the
blandishments that come so natural to a woman of her class--so natural
that they are tried upon every man whosoever he may be.
Dora took Loney upstairs, to give him something to eat, and
incidentally to add a few touches to her toilet, for was not Bennie
coming? Bennie, whom Dora loved next to her father, and somewhat more
than Loney; Bennie, the bright, clever and industrious young man whose
heart was fixed upon the pretty Dora.
Muriel suddenly turned in her chair so as to face the shoemaker, who
was busily at work, and said, in a strident voice:
“Say, do you know, I like you?”
The man before her was so surprised by this remark that he let his work
fall and looked at her, but she had turned her head, and asked:
“Say, do you know why I like you?”
The man hastily reflected that it could not be for his money, and a dim
idea dawned upon him that he must be a rather nice-looking man, and--he
simpered a little as he sheepishly replied:
“Sure, I know. I am not so bad-looking yet.”
“No, not that; but it is because you are living here in this
God-forsaken cellar that isn’t fit for rats, living from hand to mouth,
and yet you take in and feed that half-witted boy that you told your
daughter to give some gonsalabus, whatever that is. It must be good,
though, for I saw the little chap’s look of pleasure. That’s why.”
“Vot de poy get? Yust a place to sleep, someding to eat unt run
errants. He don’t cost much, led him stay. I am from a family who will
always help dose who neet it. Our mutter raised us dat vay.”
Muriel looked at the shoemaker with sincere and open admiration while
she said:
“I guess it’s you all right. Those things must be in the heart, or they
wouldn’t come out.”
The shoemaker, with a smothered sigh, picked up the dainty shoe and
started again to fit the high heel into its place, when he thought of a
brilliant remark; and he made it:
“Yes, lady; der same as der measles.”
“I guess that’s right,” replied Muriel.
“Dot is only right dot we shall help oder peoples vot is worser off dan
ve are. Der same Gott is ofer us all, and I can nefer forget dot I haf
ein daughter of mine, und dot if anyt’ing effer happen to her I shall
vant somepody’s fader to do py mein child as I do py deirs. Here is
your shoe, lady; it is fixet.”
“Put it on, please,” said Muriel, holding out her shapely foot.
The shoemaker drew back. He had fitted on many a shoe for the dwellers
of that neighborhood, and it never occurred to him to be afraid nor
ashamed, but this was different. He put powder in the shoe, and all
over the extended foot in his confusion, but at last the shoe was on.
Muriel stamped the foot a couple of times and asked how much it was.
The man stammered:
“Nodings, nodings. I put it down to profit und loss.”
“But I insist. You cannot make a living that way.” And she, quietly
and unobserved, laid some money on the bench as she started toward
the cellar-steps, her head almost clear. But before she could reach
the steps Helen Pierson came to the cellar-door, and as she started
down the first step she staggered and stumbled down the rest, reaching
the room almost falling. At the same moment Loney came in from the
door leading to the upper room. Muriel started as she saw the wretched
creature whose fair heritage of womanhood was thus wrecked and besodden
in gin, and drew aside, turning her back so that the unfortunate
creature could not recognize her. For it was Helen Pierson, John
Pierson’s abandoned and forsaken wife, who stood there staggering and
reeling. The sordid and soiled rags that covered her so scantily told
plainly to what a depth the poor creature, once so neat, had descended.
No wonder Muriel, who had been the cause of this downfall, hurried to
the darkest corner, shuddering and muttering:
“It is she! My God! It is she!”
As Helen tottered forward, almost falling, Loney caught her and helped
her to sit on the bench, aided by Morris.
Then Muriel, seizing the chance while all three were by the bench,
hurriedly stepped to the door and up the steps, muttering:
“Mother and child together, and neither one knows it. This is my work,
mine, mine! And then he wonders that I drink to drown it out.”
“Holt her up, Loney,” said Morris. “I will delephone Dora to pring a
trink of vater. Der poor voman is sick.”
With a childlike innocence Morris picked up a tin-box with a string
attached to it, and by dint of shouting very loudly his request to Dora
to bring a glass of water, he made himself heard and she came with it,
while the father was anxiously muttering:
“Mine Loney, dot voman is in a bad fix. She cannot speak nor see
anydings, not now, but if she goes on like dis she will see more dings
in a minute dan effer she see in her life pefore.”
Dora brought the water, and the dazed creature drank it as Morris held
it to her lips without knowing what it was. The shoemaker had been
half-afraid to give it, for fear of some convulsion, but as Helen drank
it she revived somewhat and looked at Morris, then at Loney. She stared
at the child with an intensity that surprised Dora and Morris, while
she asked Loney, in a husky whisper:
“Who are you?”
“I am Loney.”
“Loney! And where’s your father and mother?”
“Dead, I guess. I can just remember them, and that’s all,” said the
child.
“I had a child once, a boy--he is dead, I guess, and I can just
remember him. A little boy who loved me. A baby whom I had taught to
pray--but now he is gone with all the rest.”
“Mein poor vomans. Vot has brought you to dis?”
“Gin, or the want of it. Send the children away, and I will tell you.”
“Dot’s a good girl, Dora; take de Loney und go py der oder room, der
laty vants to make a secrets.”
“Yes, papa,” said Dora, looking sympathetically at the unfortunate
woman, “call me if you want me.”
The shoemaker looked at Dora, then in her girlish grace and purity, and
then at the poor creature on the bench, and held out his arm to Dora.
“Come here, mein child. Kiss de fader. If anyt’ing shall efer happen to
you, mein daughter--dot vould kill your fader!”
“But nothing--like this--will ever happen to me, father,” said Dora,
kissing him fondly and smiling at him bravely.
“Dot’s de mudder’s eyes looking at me, Dora--de eyes of your mudder,
vot is now dead--there,” he added, with a sob, “run along mit Loney
and play pinochle.”
Dora and Loney ran out of the shop, smiling back at the shoemaker, who
turned to the now weeping woman, saying:
“They have gone now.”
“What I have to say will not take long. I was a wife--an honest wife.
My husband deserted me for another woman, robbed me of my child and
left me to die alone. He had taught me to take an occasional drink,
saying that my health required it. In my trouble I turned to it, and
before I realized it--well--it has brought me to this.”
“Vell, don’t you t’ink it has brought you far enough? If you go much
farder you vill fall ofer. Vy don’t you quit?”
“Look at me,” said Helen, showing her shaking hand. “See my hand
shaking like an aspen. I am all but dead, and the craving for that
awful stuff is eating out my vitals. Quit! Quit! Don’t you see it is
too late, too late!”
“Vy are you talking--it is only half-past eight. Look, mein poor
vomans. Read you dot sign of mein.”
Saying these last words, the poor shoemaker pointed to an illuminated
card hung against the wall, and Helen slowly rose and looked at it,
reading aloud:
“It is never too late to mend.”
“Dot’s right. It is nefer too late to mend an olt shoe, nor der human
heart--neider von.”
[Illustration: “IT’S NEVER TOO LATE TO MEND”]
“Do you think that is true, Mister? Is there any hope for a battered
wreck like me?”
“As true dot ve stant here lifing, dere is always hope, always. Dit not
Gott pring vater for Israel from der dry rock of Horeb? Dit Gott not
sent quail in der vilderness? Is Gott’s great arm come veak? No, it is
yust so strong as effer it vos. Vot you vant is to go far from here
and pegin all ofer again vere no one knows you. Here is death, dere is
safeness, hope, a new life--a petter von.”
“How am I to get there? All I have are these few rags, this shattered
body, and the fragments of a woman’s broken heart.”
As the poor creature sobbed out these words, Loney came quietly into
the room, and as he heard them the child knelt silently behind the
bench and folded his thin hands in prayer unobserved.
Morris stood a moment silent, and then he said, solemnly:
“In the name of my dead vife, and of mein lifing child, I vill help you
to go, if you vill promise me dot you will nefer drink again.”
Helen turned and fixed her humid eyes upon the sign, and again read
aloud, “It is never too late to mend.” Then her eyes fell on the
kneeling child, and she crossed to the side where he was, and, placing
her trembling hand on his head, asked tremulously:
“What are you doing, my boy?”
“I don’t know why, but I am praying for you.”
“And Almighty God has heard you, for I shall never want to drink
again,” said Helen, with a strange sense of freedom from the enslaving
habit, while the child said simply that he knew it would be so.
Helen then turned to the shoemaker, with a new light in her eyes,
saying:
“I am going to the dispensary for something for my nerves, and I will
come back and accept your help. And you, little boy--I know I am
low-down--but--and so unworthy--but will you let me kiss you for the
prayer you said?”
For answer, the child lifted his face to hers and kissed her, all the
while seeming to be trying to see something through a maze.
A great sob tore the bosom beneath the sordid rags, as the sweet
breath of the little boy swept over her face, and Helen sobbed:
“That’s the first pure thing that has touched my lips for so long that
I can’t remember. And I’m going to try to take it with me to the throne
of God. May He bless and protect you, whosesoever child you are, in the
name of a broken-hearted mother who has lost her own little boy.”
The shoemaker dug his big fists into his eyes, muttering something
about the wax getting into his eyes, so that he could not see just
then, while Helen, straighter now, and with a new purpose showing
through her sodden features and ennobling them to womanhood again, said:
“Good-bye, for a while, Mr.--Mr.----”
“Goldberg--Morris Goldberg, madam. I’ll pe reaty for you to-morrow ven
you come. And don’t forget de number, nor dot”--pointing to the card.
“The God of us all will bless you for this day’s work. Good-bye. It is
never too late to mend. Thank God! it is never too late to mend!”
Helen, pale, but now strong in her new resolution and hope, left the
humble shop and went out into the street, while the shoemaker went to
a niche in a corner, and drew aside a curtain which had covered the
sacred Shema, muttering, as he did so:
“Hear ye, O Israel. There is but one God”--and ending with a fervent
prayer for the saving of the soul in peril who had just left there. And
he wist not that his face shone.