CHAPTER III
THE SUPREME CALL
That was the last letter which Phil received from Mary for many weeks,although he wrote regularly to the address she gave of theboarding-house on the sycamore-shaded street. Several times she sent apostal with a scribbled line of acknowledgment, but the days were toofull for personal affairs, and at night she was too tired to attend toher own correspondence, after pounding on the typewriter so many hours.
She had attacked her new duties with all the zeal and force that hadcharacterized her "snake-killings" on the desert. Habit alone made herdo that, and pride added another motive. She was determined to justifyMadam Chartley's opinion of her. Not being able to write shorthand sheworked overtime to gain extra speed on the typewriter, so that she mighttake dictation directly on the machine. Now, all the neatness and systemwhich had made her housekeeping so perfect in its way, made her apainstaking and methodical little business woman. Her neatly typed pageswere a joy to Mrs. Blythe. Her system of filing and indexing broughtorder out of confusion in the topsy-turvy desk, and she soon had thevarious reports which they referred to daily, labelled and arranged inthe different pigeon-holes as conveniently as the spice boxes and cerealjars had been in the kitchen cabinet at home.
It was not long before Mrs. Blythe began handing letters over to her asJack had done, saying briefly, tell them this or thus, and leaving herto frame the answer in the best style she could. This spurred her on tostill greater effort, and she made up her mind to become so familiarwith every branch of the subject that she could give an intelligentanswer to any question that might be asked. Once she wrote home to Jack:
"I am beginning to see now some of the things that my Desert of Waitingin Lone-Rock taught me. I couldn't fill this position half sosatisfactorily if I hadn't had the training that you gave me in youroffice in all sorts of business forms and details. I am especiallythankful for the letters you made me answer in my own words. Mrs. Blytheturns over two-thirds of her mail to me now to be answered in that way.She has had many invitations lately from clubs in neighboring towns,asking her to go and explain what it is she wants them to do, and shefeels that she can't afford to miss a single opportunity of the kind.Every time she gives a talk she gets more people interested in thecause, and they in turn interest other people, and that sends the ballrolling still farther. Really, it is getting to be as exciting as a gameof 'Prisoners' Base,' seeing how many we can get on 'our side,' and whenshe is out of town and I am left to 'guard base,' I surely feel as if Iam 'It,' and had the whole responsibility on my shoulders."
It must be confessed that it was Mary's pride in doing her work wellwhich made her a competent helper, more than any personal interest whichshe took in Mrs. Blythe's plans. After the first round of visits to thetenements she kept away from them as much as possible. The first month'ssalary was accorded a silent jubilee in her room. Most of it had to gofor board and some few things she needed, but she started a savingsaccount and locked away her bank-book with the feeling that she waslaying the corner-stone of her home in the Happy Valley. True, therewasn't the same joy in planning for it that there had been when shelooked forward to her mother sharing it with her, but it was with asense of deep satisfaction that she opened her account and carried homethe little book with its first entry.
On one of the occasions when Mrs. Blythe was away from home for severaldays, an indignant letter came from some one in a town where she hadspoken the previous week, demanding to know why she was making such afight to have a law passed which would work hardship to worthy landlordswho were good citizens and prominent in all public charities. It named aman in Riverville as a sample of the kind of citizen she was trying toinjure, and demanded so threateningly her reasons for doing so, thatMary was troubled by its covert threats. Mrs. Blythe would not be backtill the end of the week, Mr. Blythe was in New York, and there was noone in Riverville whom she knew well enough to discuss the situationwith. After worrying over it all one day and night, quite unexpectedlyshe found out what she wanted to know from Sandford Berry.
He came out on the side porch where she was sitting after an earlylunch, and paused to light a cigar. Something prompted her to refercasually to the man who had been spoken of in the letter as a modelcitizen, and to ask if the reporter knew him.
"Oh, yes, he's a charitable old cuss," was Mr. Berry's elegant answer."His name leads all the subscription lists a-going; but I'll give you atip on the side, if you're after him to get a bit of local color for anyof your documents. Just make some excuse to visit some lodging houses heowns on the corner of Myrtle and Tenth Streets. Diamond Row they callit, because they say he gets the worth of his wife's gorgeous diamondsout of it in rents every year, and she has the most notable ones intown. It's the worst ever! I don't think Mrs. Blythe has discovered ityet. I didn't get into it myself until the other day, when I had to goto report an accident, but we newspaper men unearth all the sights thatare to be seen, eventually."
"Would it be all right for me to go--I mean safe?" asked Maryhesitatingly.
"Sure!" was the cheerful answer. "It's safe as far as the people you'llmeet are concerned. I can't say as much for the germs."
"But I haven't a shadow of excuse for going," faltered Mary. "I couldn'twalk into a hovel out of sheer curiosity without some reason forintruding, any more than I could into a rich person's home. I haven'tany more right to do the one than the other."
"That's what they all say," answered Sandford Berry. "But there is adifference. You'll find that those tenants are glad of a chance to telltheir troubles to some one. Oh, of course, they'd spot you if you wentpoking in for no reason _but_ curiosity, but anybody with tact and adesire to get at the real inwardness of things for the purpose ofbettering them would find a welcome. _Those_ people know thedifference."
He puffed away in silence a moment, considering a way to help her as hehad often helped Mrs. Blythe, and taking it for granted that Mary wasjust as eager for his suggestions as the other one had been.
"You might tell them you are looking for an old woman from the countrywho knits some sort of lace for sale. There used to be one there. Atleast, I've seen an old woman who used to be always knitting, sitting ata corner window. I don't know whether she sold it or not, or whether shewas from the country. But it will do for an opening wedge, and with herto start on you can easily get into conversation with any of them."Then, as Mary still hesitated, he added, "If you really want toinvestigate and feel anyways backward about it, I'll walk down that farwith you and show you where it is. It happens to be on my beat."
Mary really had no wish to go. She shrank from contact with somethingwhich the experienced Mr. Berry pronounced "the worst ever." But he waswaiting so confidently for her to put on her hat and accompany him, thatthere seemed nothing else for her to do.
"Get an eye on those basement rooms," he advised her as he left her atthe corner of Myrtle and Tenth Streets, and pointed out the stepsleading to the underground rooms in Diamond Row. With the helplessfeeling of one who cannot swim, yet is left to plunge alone into icywater, Mary stood at the top of the steps until she was afraid herhesitation would attract attention. Then plucking up her courage, sheforced herself to walk down and knock at the open door.
What she saw in her first quick glance was a girl no older than herself,lying on a dirty bare mattress, a woman bending over a wash-tub, and ababy crawling around the floor. What she saw in her second horrifiedglance was that a green mould stood out on the walls, that both plasterand lath were broken away in places, so that one could peer throughinto an adjoining cellar. Evidently the cellar had water standing in it,from the foul, dank odor which came in through the holes. And the watermust have seeped through into this room at times, for some of the planksin the floor nearest the wall were rotting.
The woman looked up listlessly without taking her arms from the tub, asMary made her faltering inquiry for the old lady who made lace, andanswered in some foreign tongue. Then she bent again to her rubbing, instolid indifference to the strang
er who had made a sudden descent on herhome. Mary was too inexperienced to know that one cause of herindifference was that she was too underfed and overworked and mentallystunted by her hideous surroundings to care who came and went aroundher.
Mary turned to the girl on the musty mattress. It wasn't actualstarvation which drew the skin so tightly over her cheek-bones and gavethe pinched look to her face, for there was food still left on thecluttered table, where flies buzzed over the unwashed dishes insickening swarms. It was the disease which had claimed a victim,sometimes several, from every family in turn who occupied the room,because it had never been properly disinfected. Not even the sunlightcould get in to do its share towards making it fit for a human dwelling,for the only windows of this half-underground room were narrow transomsnear the ceiling, and the only air reached it through the door at thebottom of the steps.
The girl was evidently asleep, and, after one more glance, Mary turnedwith a shudder and hurried back up the steps. She hesitated to make asecond attempt but nerved herself to it by the thought of the questionsSandford Berry was sure to ask of her. On the first floor she knocked atseveral doors, and although she found no clue to the old lace knitter,she soon found a welcome from a voluble old Irish woman, who hospitablyinvited her in. Her eyes were that bad, she explained, that she couldn'tsee to do much. Her family worked in the factory all day, and she wasglad of some one to talk to.
The door into the hall stood open, and presently another woman strayedin, scenting entertainment of some kind, and then a much younger womanfollowed, a slatternly creature with a sickly looking baby in her arms.Old Mrs. Donegan talked freely of her neighbors after Mary had tactfullywon her confidence. She told her that most of them worked in thefactory. The Polish woman in the basement washed for some of the factoryhands, and although she worked all day and often far into the night, ittook nearly all she could make to pay the rent. There wasn't enough tobuy medicine for the girl, who was dying of consumption.
"Why don't they leave here and go out to the country?" asked Mary."People out there need help, and they could at least have clean water,and clean grass to lie on. They'd be better off out under the trees thanin that basement."
Mrs. Donegan's dim eyes narrowed shrewdly. "Did you ever see a ratcaught in a trap?" she asked. "_It_ can't help itself. _It_ can't getout. No more can they. They can't even speak English."
"Don't you go to telling the landlord we complained," whined the womanwith the baby. "He'd turn us out. Rents are so high everywhere that Itramped for days to find this place. The others was worse than this."
Mary's evident friendliness and warmly expressed interest soon startedall three of the women to telling tales of Diamond Row. Mrs. Donegan'swere the worst, as she claimed the distinction of being the oldestinhabitant. The one that aroused Mary's greatest indignation was of achild which had been drowned in the cellar ten years ago. The insidestaircase going to the basement ran down over the cellar in some way,and it was so rotten in parts that it gave way one day and he fellthrough. It was in the spring, when the river was so high that thecellar was half full of backwater, and the child drowned before theycould get him out.
Mrs. Donegan gave a dramatic account of it, omitting none of thegruesome details, for she had been fond of the pretty golden-haired boyof three, and sympathized with all the ardor of her warm Irish heartwith the old grandmother, who was one of her best friends.
"That's sorrow for you," she exclaimed, shaking her head dismally. "Ifyou could only see the poor old creature now, so crippled up with themisery in her bones that she can't leave her chair, and nothing for herto do all day but sit and eat her heart out with longing for littleTerence. Ah, he was the fine lad, always hanging on his granny's chairand putting his little curly head on her shoulder to be petted. Shekeeps one of those curls always by her in a little box on the table, andlike the sunshine it is. Come in and see it now. Do," she urgedhospitably. "It's always glad she is to talk about him and cry over thesad end he come to."
Mary drew back, protesting that she couldn't bear to. It was all sohorrible. "What did they do about it afterwards?" she asked.
"Nothing," was the answer. "The lad's father, Tim Reilly, was too poorto bring suit, and it cost something to move, and they couldn't getanything better for the same price. So they just stayed on, although hiswife and the poor old granny almost wept their eyes out at the sight ofthat staircase for many a month. It was all written up in the papers,with pictures of Terence and the cellar. Lots of people came to look atthe house, and there was a piece in the paper saying that the stairwaywas a death-trap, and that the owner ought to have the charge of murderlaid at his door, and that an indignant public demanded that he put in anew one. Mrs. Reilly keeps one of these same papers by her to this day.She keeps it for the picture of Terence that's in it."
"How long was it before he put in the new stairway?" asked Mary, seeingthat some response was expected of her.
The old woman leaned over and shook her finger impressively. "It's thegospel truth I'm telling you, never a one has been put in to this day.They just patched up the old one with a few new planks, and all rottenit is and tearing loose again, as you may see for yourself if you'llfollow me."
But Mary refused this invitation also, and a little later took herleave, unutterably depressed by all that she had seen and heard. Mrs.Donegan, with the other women to refresh her memory, had counted upforty funerals which had taken place in Diamond Row in the eleven yearsthat she had lived under its leaky roof.
Mary was through supper that night when Sandford Berry strolled in."Well," he said, pausing to put his head in at the parlor door, whereshe sat glancing over the evening paper. "What luck?"
"Oh, it was perfectly hideous!" she exclaimed, and proceeded to pour outthe story of her visit so indignantly that he nodded his approval.
"I see that you got your local color all right. It's fairly lurid."
"And I did something else," confessed Mary. "I tried to find the ownerof the place, Mr. Stoner, and paint the picture for him. But he was inEurope. So was his wife. And then I found out who his agent was, and Iwent to him and asked him why he didn't fix the place up. He was ascoolly polite as an iceberg, but he told me in so many words that itwas none of my business. That it was his business to look after theinterests of his employer and collect the rents, and not to humor thewhims of a few fussy women who had more sentiment than sense."
"Then what did _you_ say?" laughed Sandford.
Mary's eyes flashed angrily, and her cheeks grew redder and redder asshe talked.
"I told him it was not rents alone he was collecting, but blood-money,and that the owner of that tenement was as responsible for the fortydeaths inside its walls as if he'd deliberately poisoned them. And Itold him I'd _make_ it my business from now on to see that the peopleknew the truth about him. And then I got so mad that I knew I'd burstout crying if I stayed another minute, so I flounced out and left himstaring after me open-mouthed, as if I'd flown at him and pecked him."
The reporter laughed again and started on towards the dining-room, butpaused to look back with a wise nod of the head, which aggravated Maryquite as much as the knowing tone with which he exclaimed, "I told youso! I told you that when the torch once set you to blazing you'd be thebiggest beacon fire in the bunch!"
That night Mary dreamed of that basement room with the mould on thewalls and the water seeping in from the adjoining cellar, and of thegirl dying of consumption on the musty mattress. And all the fortysufferers who had sickened and died from the unsanitary conditions ofthe tenement trooped through her dream, and held out their feverish thinhands to her, imploring her to help. And she answered them as she hadanswered the agent, "I'll _make_ it my business. I'll tell your storyall over the state and all over the land until the people demand a lawto save you."
It was a hot July night, and Mary, waking in her big many-windowed room,sat up almost gasping. She wondered what the heat must be like in thosetenement rooms without any windows, with half a dozen or m
ore peoplecrowded into each one. Slipping out of bed she drew a low rocker to thewindow overlooking the river, and with her arms crossed on the sill,looked out into the darkness. There was only the starlight to-night, andthe colored lights of the wharf boats along the bank. She could not seethe dim outline of the Kentucky shore, but it was a comfort to know thatit was there.
Presently she lifted her head and looked up, her lips parted and a halffrightened throbbing in her ears. It had come over her with an almostoverpowering realization that those voices she was hearing were likethose which Joan of Arc heard. It was the King's Call summoning heragain as it had summoned her at Warwick Hall. Then it was all vague andshadowy, the thing she was to do. Now she knew with what great task shewas to keep tryst. She was to help in this struggle to free these poorpeople from the conditions which bound them. She was to help them reachout for their birthright, which was nothing more than a fair chance tohelp themselves.
Gazing up at the stars, a great wonder swept over her, that she, littleMary Ware, had been called to a destiny even greater than that of theMaid of Orleans. For was it not greater to enlist a nation in suchwarfare than to ride at the head of an army and spur men on tobloodshed? This battle, once won, would give not only this generation ofhelpless poor their chance for health and decent homes, but would liftthe handicap from their children and all their children's children whomight come after them.
Once, as she sat there, the thought came to her that if she devotedherself to this cause she might be an old woman before it wasaccomplished, and that she would have to give up all hope of the homeshe had long planned to have eventually in the Happy Valley. Even in herexalted mood it seemed a great sacrifice to make, and a long time shesat there, counting the cost.
"To live in scorn of miserable aims that end in self--" She started asif a real voice had spoken in her ear. "That is what mamma used to sayso often," she thought. "That is the way _she_ lived. But can I keep itup for a whole lifetime, clear to the end?"
It was the years that lay behind her which helped her to an answer. Theyears, which, could they have been marked like Edryn's would have beenbejewelled with the tokens of little duties faithfully performed. Nopearls showed white like his to mark them, no diamond gleamed whereSorrow's tear had fallen, no amethyst glowed in purple splendor to markher patient meeting with Defeat, yet she had earned them as truly as he,and in the earning had fitted herself for this fuller fealty.
The sky had lightened until the far shore of the river was dimly visiblewhen she stood up and held out her hands towards it in a mute gesture ofsurrender. Like Edryn she had heard the supreme call, and like him sheanswered it:
"Oh, heart, and hand of mine, keep tryst! Keep tryst or die!"
She was still in the same exalted mood when she sat down next day toanswer the angry letter which had started her on her search after "localcolor." All her indignation of the previous day came back, and shepictured the foul conditions of the basement room as realistically as aphotographer could have done, ending with the underscored statement:
"The man you are defending is living luxuriously on the rents hecollects from this death-trap and others like it, and yet refusesthrough his agent to drive one nail in it to make it more fit to livein. A man who gives out as alms, with one hand, what he wrings with theother as blood-money from the victims of his miserly greed, deserves tohave a trumpet sounded before him as the hypocrites do, and we shallcontinue to sound it until public sentiment compels him to be as humaneas his pretensions."
When Mrs. Blythe came back and found this fiery response on her deskawaiting her signature, she smiled at first, then recognized gratefullythat this burst of indignation meant that a new ally had been born tothe cause. But she had to explain tactfully to Mary that while heranswer was a just one, it was not wise to anger the man still farther bysending it.
"I shall have to ask you to rewrite that last page," she saidregretfully. "Send your description of Diamond Row, just as it is, andthe agent's refusal to do anything to better it, but leave out thepersonal tirade that follows. It may relieve your feelings but it willdo the cause harm by arousing an opposition which means the loss of manyvotes when the question comes up before the Legislature next winter.
"But I'll tell you what I'd like," she added, seeing the shade ofdisappointment that clouded Mary's face for a second. "I'd like to havethat description published in _The Survey_, and I'd like to take youwith me this afternoon to the meeting of a committee of the CommercialClub, and have you tell them about this visit, just as you have told itin this letter. It's one of the most realistic things I ever read. Itfairly makes my flesh creep in places."
Mary gave a gasp of astonishment, unable to believe at first that Mrs.Blythe was serious. To be pushed forward as a magazine writer and apublic speaker, both in one day, was too much for her comprehension.
"Oh, Mrs. Blythe! I couldn't make a speech in public!" protested Mary,half frightened at the mere thought.
"I don't want you to," was the placid answer. "I merely want you to comewith me and sit at a big table with a dozen or more people around it,and answer the questions that we put to you about what you've seen.You're not afraid to do that, are you?"
"No, if that's all," admitted Mary hesitatingly. "It's never been anytrouble for me to do just plain talking. It used to be that mydifficulty was I never knew when to quit."
"I'll attend to that part of it," laughed Mrs. Blythe.
So it came about that afternoon that Mary sat at the big directors'table in an upper room of the Commercial Club building, and told oncemore the story of her visit to the tenement on Myrtle and Tenth Streets.She began it a little hesitatingly, with a quicker beating of pulses anda deepening of color, but gradually she lost her self-consciousness. Theinspiration of many interested listeners gave her a sense of power. Shewas conscious of the breathless silence in which her story held them.She felt rather than saw that no one stirred, and that they were allmoved by the story of the old blind grandmother, grieving over thegolden curl that was all that was left to her of the child who was hersunshine. When she mimicked the agent's voice and manner, the ripple ofappreciation which passed around the table gratified her more than theapplause which followed. It showed that she had made what Sandford Berrywould have called "a decided hit."
"You will do it again," Mrs. Blythe said when the meeting was over andthey were on their way home, and Mary nodded assent. She didn't mind anyamount of "just plain talking," especially when it succeeded in arousingsuch interest as this first effort had done. She told the same storyseveral times that week in Riverville to small audiences, and then againin Maysport, in a room so large that she had to stand in order to makeherself heard. But even then she was not embarrassed, for Mrs. Blythewas standing too. She had turned in the midst of her own talk to sayquite naturally, "You tell them about that part of it, Miss Ware. Youcan make them see it more plainly than I."
Again Mary, in the midst of profound silence, saw eyes grow misty withsympathy and saw faces light up with indignation at her recital. Itnever occurred to her to write home that she had spoken in public. Shedidn't really count it as such, for, as she told Sandford Berry, itwasn't a real speech. It was just as if she had seen a case that neededthe attention of a Humane officer, and had stopped in off the street toreport it. It was Mrs. Blythe who made the real speeches, who put theirduty so clearly before the people of Riverville that before August wasover a Better Homes society had been organized, and a score of membersenrolled as active workers.
When Mary had time to stop and think, she realized that she was truly inthe thick of things at last, for the more she tried to interest peoplethe more necessary she found it to go often to the tenements for freshpictures of their need. And sometimes a day that began by sending her toa needy family on Myrtle Street, ended by taking her to a musicale or alawn fete in one of the most beautiful homes of the city. Mrs. Blythe'sintroduction of her everywhere as her friend, rather than her secretary,would have opened Riverville doors
to her of its own self, but, asidefrom that, Mary won an entrance to many a friendship on her own account.She was so sincerely interested in everything and everybody, so glad tomake friends, so fresh in her enthusiasm, and so attractive in all thehealthy vigor of heart and body which a sturdy outdoor life had givenher.