“There is a sick woman being brought in,” said the porteress. “She was taken sick on the train. Would you mind getting up and letting them put her here? She is having a heart attack!”
Margaret arose quickly and found the early dawn was stealing in at the windows. The woman was brought in looking ghastly in the mingled light of night and morning. Margaret hurried into the washroom and dashed cold water in her face. She felt sick and sore from head to foot. Every muscle and nerve was crying out for rest and relief, but she remembered her job and took heart of hope.
She went out again and sat in one of the rocking chairs with her eyes closed till morning was fully come and it was time to go and hunt a cheap little excuse for a breakfast.
For three days and nights, Margaret went on in this way, with only broken scraps of sleep here and there in some public place, working with superhuman energy in the daytime, driving herself in spite of weakness and pain and faintness, eating the least that any human being could get along with and live and work. And at the end of the third day, she finished the last envelope, stamped the last stack of circulars, and looked up to see her employer standing before her with a few grimy bills in his hand.
“You done good!” he said. “Here’s the rest of your money—what you ain’t had—and your bonus. We got no more use for you just now. Anytime you come ‘round and see that card in the winder, you come in. You’re sure of a job. But we ain’t got no more use fer no helper till after the orders come in. Maybe we need some help then. You stick around oncet in a while. See?”
Margaret saw, and her heart sank. She had begun to hope that this was permanent at least until she could find something better. Still, she was glad to get a little money, and there was always Hope stalking ahead of the way.
Wearily she put on her hat and went out. It had turned cold, and she shivered in her little fall jacket that matched her suit. She turned the scanty collar up around her neck and bent her head to the sharp wind, which went through her like a knife. It was almost dark, and she felt as if she just must have a real bed tonight. She must go somewhere and think it out. Perhaps that Traveler’s Aid woman she had read about in the framed certificate on the wall of the station could help her to find a cheap, respectable bed. She would try her. They had lodging houses for men where you could get a bed and coffee for a quarter. She had read about them. Did they have places for destitute women also? It seemed terrible for a daughter of a fine old New England family to have come to a place of need like this, but she could. There was no telling how long it would take to locate another job. But first she must go to the post office. There would surely be a letter from home. There hadn’t been time to go, and she had been too tired to make the extra effort since she came out of the hospital.
So Margaret went to the post office and found a letter from home. She cried all the way back to the station in the darkness of the street over the joy of just holding the envelope that she knew the precious old hand of her grandmother had touched.
She sat down in a rocking chair in the ladies’ waiting room and read her letter before she even stopped to get the food that she needed so much.
My precious girl:
We are in great distress because we have not heard from you in five whole days. At least I am in distress. Your grandfather says he is not worried. He thinks you are very busy. He says we must trust you with God, and I do, only somehow I am so hungry for word from you. We do hope you are not sick or anything. And it is rather hard not knowing just where you are located. When you wrote and said you were thinking of moving to another boarding place and told us to send your letters to the General Delivery, I thought right away, what if you should get sick, and we wouldn’t know where to come to you. But of course you will let us know soon. I am just writing this to tell you how much we want to hear from you. So if you have written on your regular day and something happened that it went astray, please write another line right off to let us know you are all right, and where you are staying, because it is dreadful to me not knowing your right address. Perhaps you better telegraph it, only that would cost so much more. No, if you are all right, just write a postal card. I’ll wait. I know I’m a silly old fool worrying about you when we have such a wonderful God. But you’re the only child we have left, you know
And now to tell you some bad news. I didn’t want to tell you, but your grandfather said you would be hurt if we didn’t, and he says it’s all right, anyway, that God knows what He is doing, and it will be all for the best
You see, Elias Horner came in the other evening and told us he had to have his money. Not just the interest, but the whole mortgage money that we borrowed a few years ago. It comes due just after Thanksgiving, and I guess there isn’t any way out of it. Of course your grandfather has written to an old friend who used to know a lot about mortgages to find out if there is any way we could get a new mortgage with someone else. But he isn’t counting on it much. He’s been going ahead planning just as if we’d lost the farm
We had figured that we could sell the furniture—you know a lot of it is real old and is said to be worth a good deal of money. And the farm implements ought to bring something. And then there is Sukey. Of course your grandfather really isn’t strong enough to milk her himself anymore, and he won’t let me try. A man has offered thirty dollars for her. It doesn’t seem much, but every little counts
We thought if we could get together a thousand dollars, perhaps Elias Horner would accept that now and let the mortgage run another year or two.
But if he won’t, and if we lose it, why we thought perhaps we would just go down the mountain and find some place where they would board us for what we could do this winter. I’m still able to cook, and your grandfather can do clerical work. He writes a beautiful hand, and even if we weren’t able to sell our things for much, we’d get along. So you’re not to worry. He thinks his friend Elihu Martin will let him keep books in his hardware store. Of course he couldn’t pay much because he hasn’t much business in the winter. But they might let us have a room in return for what he could do, and then I could bake bread and cake and things and make out to get the little we need to eat
So we are quite cheerful about it now. And I’m just writing to suggest that perhaps if you would speak to some of the rich ladies that come into your office sometimes, perhaps you could get them interested in buying some of the old furniture. You know that old walnut chest is over two hundred years old and really ought to be worth something
Margaret suddenly stopped reading, put her head down, and sobbed softly into her two hands, thankful that there was so much noise in the station that no one could hear her.
Presently she summoned strength to brush away the tears and read the rest of the letter.
There was a paragraph of loving trust and resignation, and then down at the bottom in fine hasty writing a postscript:
Your Grandfather just said that he feels there might be just a possibility that Elias might weaken and let us have a little longer time on paying the mortgage if we could be sure of having the whole of the interest in hand the day it is due. He thinks he can get together enough, all but twenty-five dollars, and he is wondering if you would have any way of getting that other twenty-five by Thanksgiving. Perhaps your office will let you have a little in advance just for once. Let us know what you think
Your loving grandmother,
Rebecca Lorimer
Eventually Margaret got control of herself, but not until she had decided to spend some of her precious money to send a telegram. She ought to have written before. It was dreadful to let them wait so long and be anxious, but she had been in such a frenzy to get those awful envelopes finished that she hadn’t had time. Besides, there hadn’t been any paper or envelope or stamp or pen or anything. Well, there wasn’t now either, and if she bought all those necessities to a letter, it would cost almost as much as a telegram, and then wouldn’t reach home for two days, because one always had to allow for someone to go down the mountain to the villa
ge to bring up the mail.
So she walked steadily to the telegraph desk and wrote out her telegram. It had to be abrupt, but they would understand.
New job. Awfully busy. Depend on me money
Thanksgiving. Lovingly. Margaret.
She paid for the message and turned away somewhat relieved in mind. They would get it sometime tomorrow, and it would set their fears at rest. But where was she to get the twenty-five dollars?
She counted over in her mind the few dollars she had just been paid, well knowing the least amount she could live on, remembering that the sixty cents she had just paid for that telegram would have kept her almost two days, living as she had been doing, yet was glad she had sent it. But now she must get a real job somehow. And to that end she must have at least one good night’s rest. So she went to the Traveler’s Aid and asked questions, discovering a place where she could get a clean bed for thirty-five cents.
She stopped at a drugstore on the way and got a cup of hot soup and a sandwich, realizing that when she had paid for her bed, nearly two of her precious hard-earned dollars would be gone.
Her heart sank as she hurried down the street toward the sleeping quarters. She had relieved the minds of her dear family for the moment and had fed and housed herself for the night, but she was in a desperate situation. Great walls seemed to be rising on every side around her and closing in to crush her to death. What was she to do? Twenty-five dollars! Twenty-five dollars! Where could she get it? She had had the boldness to promise to send it in time, and how was she to get it? She counted the days to Thanksgiving. There would be no way to get it but to ask her Grandfather’s God! And how could God give it to her? There seemed no human means. Did God ever really nowadays use any other? There were no miracles now as in the Bible times. One had to depend on human means. How silly she had been to think that handsome young Sterling had been God’s miracle to care for her and lead her to a job!
She sighed deeply as she entered the clean, bare precincts of the charity dormitories. Twenty-five dollars! Twenty-five dollars!
She paused inside the warm entrance hall to slip her grandmother’s letter into the little compartment with the other letter she knew was there, patted it tenderly, choked back a sob, strapped it in with the other, and went in to the desk to apply for a bed.
Chapter 11
Gregory Sterling looked down upon that little jeweled hand on his arm, and something protective flared in his heart. He looked up at the flabby Mortie triumphantly. He was needed here to shelter Alice from these half-drunken people. Poor little Alice! She had never been half taught. He would get her away from them presently and bring her home and try to dissuade her from this sort of thing. He remembered their beautiful, intimate dinner and looked down at her again, her face turned in profile there against his shoulder. What did that remind him of?
There had been another face quite recently, turned thus against his shoulder, closer than this, white and sweet and fragile in its beauty. Margaret! Involuntarily, he drew back just a fraction and looked at this beautiful painted face. Somehow it did not belong there. Somehow it gave him a start. What was it like? Those red lips, glaringly red under the bright light of the vestibule chandelier?
Ah! Those girls on the train. Those girls who had advised him to go and get his hair cut! Those fresh, uncouth girls! How he disliked their memory. They had dogged his steps on the train, come through and tried to find him more than once.
The day he had his hair cut by the barber on the train they had spied him again. He had forgotten all about them and taken a walk to the front end of the train. He had seen them too late to turn back. They were sprawled over their seats in various stages of afternoon naps, their kinked hair in disorder, their bright dresses creased and soiled with travel, their painted faces smeary, one red mouth wide open. He walked by them in disgust. When he returned from the front of the train, they were just coming awake and recognized him. The one in red called out chummily to him as he went by, “Good old boy! Got ‘em cut after all, didn’t ya?” And the one in blue had added in a high falsetto, “It looks just darling, buddie!” He remembered that now and recalled how Alice had called him darling! Then it was a kind of nomenclature of the present day, a thing they had in common, Alice and these girls of the lower class.
He had been angry with himself for having put himself in their way again and strode on back to his place without a glance in reply. An hour later when the train stopped to change engines and make some slight repair, most of the passengers alighted to stretch tired limbs, walking up and down the platform, or to partake of the refreshments offered at the little wayside booth. He had gone out to walk with the rest and had suddenly found himself surrounded by these girls all clamoring at once.
“Be a good sport and take us to a soda over there at the counter! We’re parching for a drink!” shouted the red one.
“I want ginger ale!” cried the blue one.
“I’m simply dying for chocolate ice-cream soda,” said the third.
Greg had surveyed their eagerness with disgust. Then moved by a kind of pitying contempt, he marched over to the counter and tossed a bill to one of the busy waiters behind the counter, saying, “There, Buddie, give these girls what they want and keep the change!” and then turning, strode away, back to the train.
The three had looked after him disappointed, a blankness coming over their eagerness. “Gosh! Can you beat it?” he heard the red one call in dismay. “I can’t get his number, can you?”
A half hour later when he was sitting quietly reading the paper he had purchased at the newsstand, he heard a bubble of laughter in chorus emerge from the front end of his car and, stealing a quick glance over his paper, he caught a glimmer of red and blue and green. Although he was a young man acquainted with emergencies, used to stalking wild animals, never swerving in critical times, he crouched low behind his paper as a screen and vanished from his seat to the washroom before they had even discovered his identity. They had been all too evidently hunting for him, to thank him perhaps, or compel further intimacy. He had heard them later bubbling noisily by, calling out fresh remarks to the passengers, making their conversation most public. He could hear fragments of their talk outside the heavy green curtains of the men’s compartment.
“He mebbe got off at the station. He mebbe waited for another train.”
“Aw, guess again. He’s on board all rightie. He’s jus’ tryin’ to give us the slip.”
And then nothing daunted, they had had the audacity to stop the conductor who happened to be passing and question him. They stopped just outside the men’s compartment to do it.
“Say, we’re lookin’ for a young fella in khaki, looks like a cowboy. We wanta thank him for something he did fer us. He didn’t get off at that last station did he?”
The conductor looked at them amusedly, a mask upon his face.
“I really couldn’t say,” he answered noncommittally.
“Aw, think a minute. You know who we mean,” said the one in red—Greg knew her voice by this time. “Looks like a regular guy. Got a cartridge belt on, and boots. You’ve noticed him—you know you have. You couldn’t help it. He looks diffrunt.”
“I may have noticed him,” said the conductor in a disinterested tone, “but I can’t say what’s become of him. I can’t keep track of every passenger.”
“Aw shucks!” said the girl in blue as they reluctantly gave up the search and drifted back to their own car.
A moment later, the conductor parted the green curtains and stood in the doorway, sending a swift glance around the little room and letting his eyes rest upon Sterling for one quizzical instant. But Greg did not lift his eyes from his paper nor relax the studied frown on his face, and with a quickly suppressed smile, the conductor passed on his way again.
Greg stayed in the men’s compartment until time to retire and went to sleep at last behind his own curtains, glad that they were due to arrive in Chicago the next morning.
So now as he s
tood there with Alice’s jeweled hand upon his arm, he remembered it, and a sudden likeness in her face to those girls flashed upon him.
Of course it was ridiculous. Those had been cheap, common girls without refinement, tawdrily dressed, crudely painted; and Alice was exquisite in every detail, the makeup so perfectly applied, and yet she reminded him of them, and a certain shock came to him with the recognition. Refined, educated, exquisitely garbed as Alice was, she yet resembled somehow those girls, those dreadful girls! Or was she refined? He didn’t know. He honestly didn’t. His mother didn’t use to think she was refined as a girl, but he had thought her wrong. If he had asked himself that question at the dinner table, he would have unhesitatingly said she was, but since her friends had come into the picture, there had been something about her that grated upon his finer senses, and now as he looked down at those red, red lips, that confident alluring face so near his shoulder, she looked like those other girls! So utterly unlike the girl he had taken to the hospital! The girl who had run away from him because a nurse had insinuated that he was not respectable. The girl who even now might be in some kind of peril and he not there to help!
Suddenly he felt as he had felt when those girls had asked him to treat them. Then, as suddenly, with all the ease and nonchalance with which he had flung that bill to the soda clerk and told him to treat them and keep the change, he lifted the lady’s hand from his arm and held it out to Mortie.
“With all appreciation of the honor you would put upon me,” he said to Alice, “I must forgo the pleasure. This gentleman, I believe, has prior claim, and I have a duty in another direction. I will bid you good evening—Alice!”
Then, with a slight inclination of his head toward the others of the party who had not noticed him until now, he went out the door and left them.