"Come on; let's get out of this dump. Say, it's a swell night for a funeral."
She grasped at his coat sleeve, pinching the flesh with it, and he drew away half angrily.
"Come on, I said."
"All right!"
A thin line filed past them, grim-faced, silent. At the far end of the room, statistics in red inch-high type ran columnwise down the wall's length. She read, with a gasp in her throat:
1. Ten thousand people died from tuberculosis in the city of NewYork last year.
2. Two hundred thousand people died from tuberculosis in the UnitedStates last year.
3. Records of the Health Department show 31,631 living cases oftuberculosis in the city of New York.
4. Every three minutes some one in the United States dies fromconsumption.
"Oh, Charley, ain't it awful!"
At a desk a young man, with skin as pink as though a strong wind had whipped it into color, distributed pamphlets to the outgoing visitors—a thin streamlet of them; some cautious, some curious, some afraid.
"Come on; let's hurry out of here, Sweetness. My lung's hurting this minute."
They hurried past the desk; but the young man with the clear, pink skin reached over the heads of an intervening group, waving a long printed booklet toward the pair.
"Circular, missy?"
Sara Juke straightened, with every nerve in her body twanging like a plucked violin-string, and her eyes met the clear eyes of the young clerk.
Like a doll automaton she accepted the booklet from him; like a doll automaton she followed Charley Chubb out into the street, and her limbs were trembling so she could scarcely stand.
"Gotta hand it to you, Sweetness. Even made a hit on the fellow in the lung-shop! He didn't hand me out no literachure. Some little hit!"
"I gotta go home now, Charley."
"It's only ten."
"I better go, Charley. It ain't Saturday night."
At the stoop of her rooming-house they lingered. A honey-colored moon hung like a lantern over the block-long row of shabby-fronted houses. On her steps and to her fermenting fancy the shadow of an ash-can sprawled like a prostrate human being.
"Charley!" She clutched his arm.
"Whatcha scared about, Sweetness?"
"Oh, Charley, I—I feel creepy to-night."
"That visit to the morgue was enough to give anybody the blind staggers."
Her pamphlet was tight in her hand. "You ain't mad at me, Charley?"
He stroked her arm, and the taste of tears found its way to her mouth.
"I'm feeling so silly-like to-night, Charley."
"You're all in, kiddo." In the shadow he kissed her.
"Charley, you—you mustn't, unless we're—engaged." But she could not find the strength to unfold herself from his arms. "You mustn't, Charley!"
"Great little girl you are, Sweetness—one great little girl!"
"Aw, Charley!"
"And, to show you that I like you, I'm going to make up for this to-morrow night. A real little Saturday-night blow! And don't forget Sunday afternoon—two o'clock for us, down at Crissey's Hall. Two o'clock."
"Two o'clock."
"Good!"
"Oh, Charley, I—"
"What, Sweetness?"
"Oh, nothing; I—I'm just silly to-night."
Her hand lay on his arm, white in the moonlight and light as a leaf; and he kissed her again, scorching her lips.
"Good night, Sweetness."
"Good night, Charley."
Then up three flights of stairs, through musty halls and past closed doors, their white china knobs showing through the darkness, and up to the fourth-floor rear, and then on tiptoe into a long, narrow room, with the moonlight flowing in.
Clothing lay about in grotesque heaps—a woman's blouse was flung across the back of a chair and hung limply; a pair of shoes stood beside the bed in the attitude of walking—tired-looking shoes, run down at the heels and skinned at the toes. And on the far side of the three-quarter bed the hump of an outstretched figure, face turned from the light, with sparse gray-and-black hair flowing over the pillow.
Carefully, to save the slightest squeak, Sara Juke undressed, folded her little mound of clothing across the room's second chair, groping carefully by the stream of moonlight. Severe as a sibyl in her straight-falling nightdress, her hair spreading over her shoulders, her bare feet pattered on the cool matting. Then she slid into bed lightly, scarcely raising the covers. From the mantelpiece the alarm-clock ticked with emphasis.
An hour she lay there. Once she coughed, and smothered it in her pillow. Two hours. She slipped from under the covers and over to the littered dresser. The pamphlet lay on top of her gloves; she carried it to the window and, with her limbs trembling and sending ripples down her nightrobe, read it. Then again, standing there by the window in the moonlight, she quivered so that her knees bent under her.
After a while she raised the window slowly and without a creak, and a current of cool air rushed in and over her before she could reach the bedside.
On her pillow Hattie Krakow stirred reluctantly, her weary senses battling with the pleasant lethargy of sleep; but a sudden nip in the air stung her nose and found out the warm crevices of the bed. She stirred and half opened her eyes.
"For Gawd's sake, Sara, are you crazy? Put that window down! Tryin' to freeze us out? Opening a window with her cough and all! Put it down! Put—it—down!"
Sara Juke rose and slammed it shut, slipping back into the cold bed with teeth that clicked. After a while she slept; but lightly, with her mouth open and her face upturned. And after a while she woke to full consciousness all at once, and with a cough on her lips. Her gown at the yoke was wet; and her neck, where she felt it, was damp with cold perspiration.
"Oh—oh—Hattie! Oh—oh!"
She burrowed under her pillow to ease the trembling that seized her. The moon had passed on, and darkness, which is allied to fear, closed her in—the fear of unthinking youth who knows not that the grave is full of peace; the fear of abundant life for senile death; the cold agony that comes in the night-watches, when the business of the day is but a dream and Reality visits the couch.
Deeper burrowed Sara Juke, trembling with chill and night-sweat.
Drowsily Hattie Krakow turned on her pillow, but her senses were too weary to follow her mind's dictate.
"Sara! 'Smatter, Sara? 'Smat-ter?" Hattie's tired hand crept toward her friend; but her volition would not carry it across and it fell inert across the coverlet. "'Smatter, dearie?"
"N-nothing."
"'Smat-ter, dear-ie?"
"N-nothing."
* * * * *
In the watches of the night a towel flung across the bedpost becomes a gorilla crouching to spring; a tree-branch tapping at the window an armless hand, beckoning. In the watches of the night fear is a panther across the chest, sucking the breath; but his eyes cannot bear the light of day, and by dawn he has shrunk to cat size. The ghastly dreams of Orestes perished with the light; phosphorus is yellowish and waxlike by day.
So Sara Juke found new courage with the day, and in the subbasement of the Titanic Store, the morning following, her laughter was ready enough. But when the midday hour arrived she slipped into her jacket, past the importunities of Hattie Krakow, and out into the sun-lashed noonday swarm of Sixth Avenue.
Down one block—two, three; then a sudden pause before a narrow store-front liberally placarded with invitatory signs to the public, and with a red cross blazoning above the doorway. And Sara Juke, whose heart was full of fear, faltered, entered.
The same thin file passed round the room, halting, sauntering, like grim visitors in a grim gallery. At a front desk a sleek young interne, tiptilted in a swivel chair, read a pink sheet through horn-rimmed glasses.
Toward the rear the young man whose skin was the wind-lashed pink sorted pamphlets and circulars in tall, even piles on his desk.
Round and round the gallery walked Sara Juke; twice she read over the list of symptoms printed in inch-high type; her heart lay within her as though icy dead, and her eyes would blur over with tears. Once, when she passed the rear desk, the young man paused in his stacking and regarded her with a warming glance of recognition.
"Hello!" he said. "You back?"
"Yes." Her voice was the thin cry of quail.
"You must like our little picture-gallery, eh?"
"Oh! Oh!" She caught at the edge of his desk, and tears lay heavy in her eyes.
"Eh?"
"Yes; I—I like it. I wanna buy it for my yacht." Her ghastly simulacrum of a jest died in her throat; and he said, quickly, a big blush suffusing his face:
"I was only fooling, missy. You 'ain't got the scare, have you?"
"The scare?"
"Yes; the bug? You ain't afraid you've ate the germ, are you?"
"I—I dun'no'."
"Pshaw! There's a lot of 'em comes in here more scared than hurt, missy. Never throw a scare till you've had a examination. For all you know, you got hay fever, eh! Hay fever!" And he laughed as though to salve his words.
"I—I got all them things on the red-printed list, I tell you. I—I got 'em all, night-sweats and all. I—I got 'em."
"Sure you got 'em, missy; but that don't need to mean nothing much."
"I got 'em, I tell you."
"Losing weight?"
"Feel."
He inserted two fingers in her waistband. "Huh!"
"You a doctor?"
He performed a great flourish. "I ain't in the profesh, missy. I'm only chief clerk and bottle-washer round here; but—"
"Where is the doctor? That him reading down there? Can I ask him? I—Oh!Ain't I scared!"
He placed his big, cool hand over her wrist and his face had none of its smile. "I know you are, little missy. I seen it in you last night when you and—and—"
"My—my friend."
"—your friend was in here. There's thousands come in here with the scare on, and most of 'em with a reason; but I picked you out last night from the gang. Funny thing, but right away I picked you. 'A pretty little thing like her'—if you'll excuse me for saying it—'a pretty little thing like her,' I says to myself. 'And I bet she 'ain't got nobody to steer her!'"
"Honest, did you?"
"Gee! it ain't none of my put-in; but when I seen you last night—funny thing—but when I seen you, why, you just kinda hit me in the eye; and, with all that gang round me, I says to myself: 'Gee! a pretty little thing like her, scared as a gazelle, and so pretty and all; and no one to give her the right steer!'"
"Aw, you seen me?"
"Sure! Wasn't it me reached out the pamphlet to you? You had on that there same cutey little hat and jacket and all."
"Does it cost anything to talk to the doctor down there?"
"Forget it! Go right down and he'll give you a card to the Victoria Clinic. I know them all over there and they'll look you over right, little missy, and steer you. Aw, don't be scared; there ain't nothing much wrong with you—maybe a sore spot, that's all. That cough ain't a double-lunger. You run over to the clinic."
"I gotta go back to the store now."
"After store, then?"
"Free?"
"Sure! Old Doc Strauss is on after five, too. If I ain't too nervy I'm off after six myself. I could meet you after and we could talk over what he tells you—if I ain't too nervy?"
"Blaney's my name—Eddie Blaney. Ask anybody round here about me. I—I could meet you, little missy, and—"
"I can't to-night, Mr. Blaney. I gotta go somewheres."
"Aw!"
"I gotta."
"To-morrow? To-morrow's Sunday, little missy. There's a swell lot of country I bet you 'ain't never seen, and Old Doc Strauss is going to tell you to get acquainted with it pretty soon."
"Country?"
"Yes. That's what you need—outdoors; that's what you need. You got a color like all indoors—pretty, but putty."
"You—you don't think there's nothing much the matter with me, do you,Mr. Blaney?"
"Sure I don't. Why, I got a bunch of Don'ts for you up my sleeve that'll color you up like drug-store daub."
Tears and laughter trembled in her voice. "You mean that the outdoor stuff will do it, Mr. Blaney?"
"That's the talk!"
"But you—you ain't the doctor."
"I ain't, but I 'ain't been deaf and dumb and blind round here for three years. I can pick 'em every time. You're taking your stitch in time. You 'ain't even got a wheeze in you. Why, I bet you 'ain't never seen red!"
"No!" she cried, with quick comprehension.
"Sure you 'ain't!"
More tears and laughter in her voice. "I'm going to-night, then—at six,Mr. Blaney."
"Good! And to-morrow? There's a lot of swell country and breathing-space round here I'd like to introduce you to. I bet you don't know whether Ingleside Woods is kindling or a breakfast food. Now do you?"
"No."
"Ever had a chigger on you?"
"Huh?"
"Ever sleep outdoors in a bag?"
"Say, whatta you think I am?"
"Ever seen the sun rise, or took the time to look up and see several dozen or a couple of thousand or so stars glittering all at once?"
"Aw, come off! We ain't doing team-work in vaudeville."
"Gee! wouldn't I like to take you out and be the first one to make you acquainted with a few of the things that are happening beyond Sixth Avenue—if I ain't too nervy, little missy?"
"I gotta go somewhere at two o'clock to-morrow afternoon, Mr.—Mr. Blaney; but I can go in the morning—if it ain't going to look like I'm a freshie."
"In the morning! Swell! But where—who—" She scribbled on a slip of paper and fluttered it into his hand. "Sara Juke! Some little name. Gee! I know right where you live. I know a lot of cases that come from round there. I used to live near there myself, round on Third Avenue. I'll call round at nine, little missy. I'm going to introduce you to the country, eh?"
"They won't hurt at the clinic, will they, Mr. Blaney? I'm losing my nerve again."
"Shame on a pretty little thing like you losing her nerve! Gee! I've seen 'em come in here all pale round the gills and with nothing but the whooping-cough. There was a little girl in here last week who thought she was ready for Arizona on a canvas bed; and it wasn't nothing but her rubber skirtband had stretched. Shame on you, little missy! Don't you get scared! Wait till you see what I'm going to show you out in the country to-morrow—leaves turning red and all. We're going to have a heart-to-heart talk out there—eh? A regular lung-to-lung talk!"
"Aw, Mr. Blaney! Ain't you killing!" She hurried down the room, laughing.
* * * * *
At Sharkey's on Saturday night the entire basement cafe and dance-hall assumed a hebdomadal air of expectancy; extra marble-topped tables were crowded about the polished square of dancing-space; the odor of hops and sawdust and cookery hung in visible mists over the bar.
Girls, with white faces and red lips and bare throats, sat alone at tables or tête-à-tête with men too old or too young, and ate; but drank with keener appetite.
A self-playing piano performed beneath a large painting of an undraped Psyche; a youth with yellow fingers sang of Love. A woman whose shame was gone acquired a sudden hysteria at her lone table over her milky-green drink, and a waiter hustled her out none too gently.
In the foyer at seven o'clock Sara Juke met Charley Chubb, and he slid up quite frankly behind her and kissed her on the lips. At Sharkey's a miss is as good as her kiss!
"You—you quit! You mustn't!"
She sprang back, quivering, her face cold-looking and blue; and he regarded her with his mouth quirking.
"Huh! Hoity-toity, ain't you? Hoity-toity and white-faced and late, all at once, ain't you? Say, them airs don't get across with me. Come on! I'm hungry."
"I didn't mean to yell, Charley—only you scared me. I thought maybe it was one of them fresh guys that hang round here; all of 'em look so dopey and all. I—You know I never was strong for this place, Charley."
"Beginning to nag, are you?"
"No, no, Charley. No, no!"
They drew up at a small table.
"No fancy keeling act to-night, kiddo. I ain't taking out a hospital ward, you know. Gad! I like you, though, when you're white-looking like this! Why'd you dodge me at noon to-day and to-night after closing? New guy? I won't stand for it, you know, you little white-faced Sweetness, you!"
"I hadda go somewheres, Charley. I came near not coming to-night, neither, Charley."
"What'll you eat?"
"I ain't hungry."
"Thirsty, eh?"
"No."
He regarded her over the rim of the smirchy bill of fare. "What are you, then, you little white-faced, big-eyed devil?"
"Charley, I—I got something to—to tell you. I—"
"Bring me a lamb stew and a beer, light. What'll you have, little white-face?"
"Some milk and—"
"She means with suds on, waiter."
"No—no; milk, I said—milk over toast. Milk toast—I gotta eat it. Why don't you lemme talk, Charley? I gotta tell you."
He was suddenly sober. "What's hurting you? One milk toast, waiter. Tell them in the kitchen the lady's teeth hurt her. What's up, Sweetness?" And he leaned across the table to imprint a fresh kiss on her lips.
"Don't—don't—don't! For Gawd's sake, don't!"
She covered her face with her hands; and such a trembling seized her that they fell pitifully away again and showed her features, each distorted. "You mustn't, Charley! Mustn't do that again, not—not for three months—you—you mustn't."
He leaned across the table; his voice was like sleet—cold, thin, cutting: "What's the matter—going to quit?"
"No—no—no!"
"Got another guy you like better?"
"Oh! Oh!"
"A queenie can't quit me first and get away with it, kiddo. I may be a soft-fingered sort of fellow, but a queenie can't quit me first and get away with it. Ask 'em about me round here; they know me. If anybody in this little duet is going to do the quitting act first it ain't going to be you. What's the matter? Out with it!"
"Charley, it ain't that—I swear it ain't that!"
"What's hurting you, then?"
"I gotta tell you. We gotta go easy for a little while. We gotta quit doing the rounds for a while till—only for a little while. Three months he said would fix me. A grand old doc he was!
"I been to the clinic, Charley. I hadda go. The cough—the cough was cutting me in two. It ain't like me to go keeling like I did. I never said much about it; but, nights and all, the sweats and the cough and the shooting pains was cutting me in two. We gotta go easy for a while, Charley; just—"
"You sick, Sara?" His fatty-white face lost a shade of its animation."Sick?"
"But it ain't, Charley. On his word he promised it ain't! A grand old doc, with whiskers—he promised me that. I—I am just beginning; but the stitch was in time. It ain't a real case yet, Charley. I swear on my mother's curl of hair it ain't."
"Ain't what? Ain't what?"
"It ain't! Air, he said, right living—early hours and all. I gotta get out of the basement. He'll get me a job. A grand old man! Windows open; right living. No—no dancing and all, for a while, Charley. Three months only, Charley; and then—"
"What, I say—"
"It ain't, Charley! I swear it ain't. Just one—the left one—a little sore down at the base—the bottom. Charley, quit looking at me like that! It ain't a real case—it ain't; it ain't!"
"It ain't what?"
"The—the T.B. Just the left one; down at—"
"You—you—" An oath as hot as a live coal dropped from his lips, and he drew back, strangling. "You—you got it, and you're letting me down easy. You got it, and it's catching as hell! You got it, you white devil, and—and you're trying to lie out of it—you—you—"
"Charley! Charley!"
"You got it, and you been letting me eat it off your lips! You devil, you! You devil, you! You devil, you!"
"Charley, I—"
"I could kill you! Lemme wash my mouth! You got it; and if you got it I got it! I got it! I got it! I—I—"
He rushed from the table, strangling, stuttering, staggering; and his face was twisted with fear.
For an hour she sat there, waiting, her hands folded in her lap and her eyes growing larger in her face. The dish of stew took on a thin coating of grease and the beer died in the glass. The waiter snickered. After a while she paid for the meal out of her newly opened wage-envelope and walked out into the air.
Once on the street, she moaned audibly into her handkerchief. There is relief in articulation. Her way lay through dark streets where figures love to slink in the shadows. One threw a taunt at her and she ran. At the stoop of her rooming-house she faltered, half fainting and breathing deep from exhaustion, her head thrown back and her eyes gazing upward.
Over the narrow street stars glittered, dozens and myriads of them.
* * * * *
Literature has little enough to say of the heartaches and the heartburns of the Sara Jukes and the Hattie Krakows and the Eddie Blaneys. Medical science concedes them a hollow organ for keeping up the circulation. Yet Mrs. Van Ness's heartbreak over the death of her Chinese terrier, Wang, claims a first-page column in the morning edition; her heartburn—a complication of midnight terrapin and the strain of her most recent rôle of corespondent—obtains her asuite de luxein a private sanitarium.
Vivisectionists believe the dog is less sensitive to pain than man; so the social vivisectionists, in problem plays and best sellers, are more concerned with the heartaches and heartburns of the classes. But analysis would show that the sediment of salt in Sara Juke's and Mrs. Van Ness's tears is equal.
Indeed, when Sara Juke stepped out of the streetcar on a golden Sunday morning in October, her heart beat higher and more full of emotion than Mrs. Van Ness could find at that breakfast hour, reclining on her fine linen pillows, an electric massage and a four-dollars-an-hour masseuse forcing her sluggish blood to flow.
Eddie Blaney gently helped Sara to alight, cupping the point of her elbow in his hand; and they stood huddled for a moment by the roadway while the car whizzed past, leaving them in the yellow and ocher, saffron and crimson, countryside.
"Gee! Gee whiz!"
"See! I told you. And you not wanting to come when I called for you this morning—you trying to dodge me and the swellest Indian-summer Sunday on the calendar!"
"Looka!"
"Wait! We 'ain't started yet, if you think this is swell."
"Oh! Let's go over in them woods. Let's." Her lips were apart and pink crept into her cheeks, effacing the dark rims of pain beneath her eyes.
"Let's hurry."
"Sure; that's where we're going—right over in there, where the woods look like they're on fire; but, gee! this ain't nothing to the country places I know round here. This ain't nothing. Wait!"
The ardor of the inspired guide was his, and with each exclamation from her the joy of his task doubled itself.
"If you think this is great, wait—just you wait. Gee! if you like this, what would you have said to the farm? Wait till we get to the top of the hill."
Fallen leaves, crisp as paper, crackled pleasantly under their feet; and through the haze that is October's veil glowed a reddish sun, vague as an opal. A footpath crawled like a serpent through the woods and they followed it, kicking up the leaves before them, pausing, darting, exclaiming.
"I—Honest, Mr. Blaney, I—"
"Eddie!"
"Eddie, I—I never did feel so—I never was so—so—Aw, I can't say it."Tears sprang to her eyes.
"Sure you never was. I never was, neither, before—before—"
"Before what?"
"Before I had to."
"Had to?"
"Yeh; both of them. Bleeding all the time. Didn't see nothing but red for 'leven months."
"You!"
"Yeh; three years ago. Looked like Arizona on a stretcher for me."
"You—so big and strong and all!"
He smiled at her and his teeth flashed. "Gad! little girl, if you got a right to be scared, whatta you think I had? I seen your card over at the clinic last night, and you 'ain't got no right to have that down-and-out look on you had this morning. If you think you got something to be scared at you looka my old card at the clinic some day; they keep it for show. You oughtta seen me the day I quit the shipping-room, right over at the Titanic, too, and then see whether you got something to be scared at."
"You—you used to work there?"
"Six years."
"I—I ain't scared no more, Eddie; honest, I ain't!"
"Gee! I should say not! They ain't even sending you up to the farm."
"No, no! They're going to get me a job. A regular outdoor, on-the-level kind of a job. A grand old doc, with whiskers! I ain't a regular one, Eddie; just the bottom of one lung don't make a regular one."
"Well, I guess not, poor little missy. Well, I guess not."
"Three months, he said, Eddie. Three months of right living like this, and air and all, and I'll be as round as a peach, he said. Said it hisself, without me asking—that's how scared I was. Round as a peach!"
"You can't beat that gang over there at the clinic, little missy. They took me out of the department when all the spring-water I knew about ran out of a keg. Even when they got me out on the farm—a grown-up guy like me—for a week I thought the crow in the rooster was a sidewalk faker. You can't beat that, little missy."
"He's a grand old man, with whiskers, that's going to get me the job.Then in three months I—"
"Three months nothing! That gang won't let you slip back after the three months. They took a extra shine to me because I did the prize-pupil stunt; but they won't let anybody slip back if they give 'em half a chance. When they got me sound again, did they ship me back to the shipping department in the subbasement? Not muchy! Looka me now, little missy! Clerk in their biggest display; in three months a raise to ninety dollars. Can you beat it? Ninety dollars would send all the shipping-clerks of the world off in a faint."
"Gee! it—it's swell!"
"And—"
"Look! Look!"
"Persimmons!" A golden mound of them lay at the base of a tree, piled up against the hole, bursting, brown. "Persimmons! Here; taste one. They're fine."
"Eat 'em?"
"Sure!"
She bit into one gently; then with appetite. "M-m-m! Good!"
"Want another?"
"M-m-m—my mouth! Ouch! My m-mouth!"
"Gee! you cute little thing, you! See, my mouth's the same way, too. Feels like a knot. Gee! you cute little thing, you—all puckered up and all."
And linking her arm in his they crunch-crunched over the brittle leaves and up a hillside to a plateau of rock overlooking the flaming country; and from the valley below smoke from burning mounds of leaves wound in spirals, its pungency drifting to them.
"See that tree there? It's a oak. Look; from a little acorn like this it grew. See, this is a acorn, and in the start that tree wasn't no bigger than this little thing."
"Quit your kidding!" But she smiled and her lips were parted sweetly; and always unformed tears would gloze her eyes.
"Here, sit here, little lady. Wait till I spread this newspaper out. Gee! Don't I wish you didn't have to go back to the city by two o'clock, little lady! We could make a great day of it here, out in the country; lunch at a farm and see the sun set and all. Some day of it we could make if—"
"I—I don't have to go back, Eddie."
His face expanded into his widest smile. "Gee! that's great! That's just great!"
Silence.
"What you thinking of, little lady, sitting there so pretty and all?"
"N-nothing."
"Nothing? Aw, surely something!"
A tear formed and zigzagged down her cheek. "Nothing, honest; only I—I feel right happy."
"That's just how you oughtta feel, little lady."
"In three months, if—Aw, ain't I the nut?"
"It'll be a big Christmas, won't it, little missy, for both of us? A big Christmas for both of us; you as sound and round as a peach again, and me shooting up like a skyrocket on the pay-roll."
A laugh bubbled to her lips before the tear was dry. "In three months I won't be a T.B., not even a little bit."
"'Sh-h-h! On the farm we wasn't allowed to say even that. We wasn't supposed to even know what them letters mean."
"Don't you know what they mean, Eddie?"
"Sure I do!" He leaned toward her and placed his hand lightly over hers."T.B.—True Blue—that's what they mean, little lady."
She could feel the veins in his palm throbbing.
At seven o'clock the Seaside Hotel struggled into full dress—ladies emerged from siestas and curlpapers, dowagers wormed into straight fronts and spread the spousal vestments of boiled shirt, U-shaped waistcoatet al. across the bed. Slim young men in the swelter of their inside two-fifty-a-day rooms carefully extracted their braided-at-the-seams trousers from beneath the mattresses and removed trees from patent-leather pumps.
At seven-thirty young girls fluttered in and out from the dining-room like brilliant night moths, the straight-front dowagers, U-vested spouses, and slim young men in braided trousers seams crowded about the desk for the influx of mail, and read their tailor and modiste duns with the rapt and misleading expression that suggested a love rune rather than a "Please remit." Interested mothers elbowed for the most desirable veranda rockers; the blather of voices, the emph-umph-umph of the three-nights-a-week orchestra and the remote pound of the ocean joined in united effort.
At eight o'clock Miss Myra Sternberger yawned in her wicker rocker and raised two round and bare-to-the-elbow arms high above her head.
"Gee!" she said. "This place is so slow it gets on my nerves—it does!"
Mrs. Blondheim, who carried toast away from the breakfast-table concealed beneath a napkin for her daughter who remained abed until noon, paused in her Irish crochet, spread a lace wheel upon her ample knee, and regarded it approvingly.
"What you got to kick about, Miss Sternberger? Didn't I see you in the surf this morning with that shirtwaist drummer from Cincinnati?"
"Mr. Eckstein—oh, I been meetin' him down here in July for two years.He's a nice fellow an' makes a good livin'—but he ain't my style."
"Girls are too particular nowadays. Take my Bella—why, that girl's had chances you wouldn't believe! But she always says to me, she says, 'Mamma, I ain't goin' to marry till Mr. Right comes along.'"
"That's just the same way with me."
"My Bella's had chances—not one, but six. You can ask anybody who knows us in New York the chances that goil has had."
"I ain't in a hurry to take the first man that asks me, neither."
Mrs. Blondheim wrapped the forefinger of her left hand with mercerized cotton thread, and her needle flashed deftly.
"What about the little Baltimore fellow that went away yesterday? I seen he was keepin' you pretty busy."
"Aw, Mrs. Blondheim, can't a girl have a good time with a fellow without gettin' serious?"
But she giggled in pleased self-consciousness and pushed her combs into place—Miss Sternberger wore her hair oval about her face like Mona Lisa; her cheeks were pink-tinted, like the lining of a conch-shell.
"My Bella always says a goil can't be too careful at these here summer resorts—that's why she ain't out every night like some of these goils. She won't go out with a young man till she knows he comes from nice people."
Miss Sternberger patted the back of her hand against her mouth and stifled a yawn.
"One thing I must say for my Bella—no matter where I take that goil, everybody says what a nice, retirin' goil she is!"
"Bella does retire rather early," agreed Miss Sternberger in tones drippingly sweet.
"I try to make her rest up in summer," pursued Mrs. Blondheim, unpunctured. "You goils wear yourselves out—nothin' but beaus, beaus all the time. There ain't a night in New York that my Bella ain't out with some young man. I always say to her, 'Bella, the theayters ought to give you a commission.'"
Miss Sternberger rocked.
"Where did you say you live in New York, Miss Sternberger?"
"West One Hundred and Eleventh Street."
"Oh yes—are you related to the Morris Sternbergers in the boys'-pants business?"
"I think—on my father's side."
"Honest, now! Carrie Sternberger married my brother-in-law; and they're doin' grand, too! He's built up a fine business there. Ain't this a small woild after all!"
"It is that," agreed Miss Sternberger. "Why, last summer I was eatin' three meals a day next to my first cousin and didn't know it."
"Look!" said Mrs. Blondheim. "There's those made-up Rosenstein goilscomin' out of the dinin'-room. Look at the agony they put on, would you!I knew 'em when they were livin' over their hair-store on Twenty-thoidStreet. I wonder where my Bella is!"
"That's a stylish messaline the second one's got on, all right. I think them beaded tunics are swell."
"If it hadn't been for the false-hair craze old man Rosenstein wouldn't—"
Mrs. Blondheim leaned forward in her chair; her little flowered-silk work-bag dropped to the floor. "There's Bella now! Honest, that Mr. Arnheim 'ain't left her once to-day, and he only got here this morning, too! Such a fine young man, the clerk says; he's been abroad six months and just landed yesterday—and been with her all day. When I think of the chances that goil had. Why, Marcus Finberg, who was down here last week, was crazy about her!"
"Did you say that fellow's name was Arnheim?"
"Yes. 'Ain't you heard of the Arnheim models? He's a grand boy, the clerk says, and the swellest importer of ladies' wear in New York."
Miss Sternberger leaned forward in her chair. "Is that Simon Arnheim?"
"Sure. He's the one that introduced the hobble skoit. My Bella was one of the foist to wear one. There ain't a fad that he don't go over to Europe and get. He made a fortune off the hobble skoit alone."
"Is that so?"
"Believe me, if he wasn't all right my Bella wouldn't let him hang on that way."
"I've heard of him."
"I wish you could see that Babette Dreyfous eying my Bella! She's just green because Bella's got him."
"Do you use the double stitch in your crochet, Mrs. Blondheim? That's a pretty pattern you're workin' on."
"Yes. I've just finished a set of doilies you'd pay twenty-five dollars for anywhere."
Miss Sternberger rose languidly to her feet. "Well," she said, "I guessI'll take a stroll and go up to bed."
"Don't be so fidgety, Miss Sternberger; sit down by me and talk."
Miss Sternberger smiled. "I'll see you later, Mrs. Blondheim; and don't forget that preparation I was tellin' you about—Sloand's Mosquito Skit. Just rub the bottle stopper over your pillow and see if it don't work."
She moved away with the dignity of an emperor moth, slim and supple-hipped in a tight-wrapped gown.
The Seaside Hotel lobby leaned forward in its chairs; young men moved their feet from the veranda rail and gazed after her; pleasantries fell in her pathway as roses before a queen.
A splay-mouthed youth, his face and neck sunburnt to a beefy red, tugged at her gold-colored scarf as she passed.
"Oh, you Myra!" he sang.
"Quit your kiddin', Izzy!" she parried back. "Who was that blonde I seen you with down at the beach this mornin'?"
A voluptuous brunette in a rose-pink dress and diamonds dragged her down to the arm of her rocker.
"I got a trade-last for you, Myra."
"For me?"
"Yes."
"Give it to me, Clara."
"No, I said a trade—and a dandy, too!"
"Who from—man?"
"Yes."
"Well, I got one for you, too—Leon Eckstein says he thinks you're an awfully sweet girl and will make some man a grand wife."
Clara giggled and fingered the gold-fringe edging of Miss Sternberger's sleeve. She spoke slowly and stressed each word alike.
"Well, there's a fellow just got here from Paris yesterday—says you sure know how to dress and that you got a swell figure."
"Who said it?"
"Guess."
"I should know!"
"That fellow over there with Bella Blondheim—the one with the smooth face and grayish hair. I hear he's a swell New York fellow in the importin' business."
"How'd Bella grab him?"
"She's been holdin' on to him like a crawfish all day. She won't let anybody get near him—neither will her mother."
"Here comes Izzy over here after me! If there's one fellow I can't stand it's him."
Miss Sternberger moved away with her chin tilted at a sharp angle. At a turn in the veranda she came suddenly upon Miss Bella Blondheim and a sleek, well-dressed young man with grayish hair. Miss Blondheim's hand was hooked with a deadlock clutch to the arm of her companion.
Miss Sternberger threw herself before them like a melodrama queen flagging a train. "Hello, Bella!" she said in a voice as low as a 'cello.
Miss Blondheim, who had once sold the greatest number of aprons at a charity bazar, turned cold eyes upon the intruder.
"Hello, Myra!" she said in cool tones of dismissal.
There was a pause; the color swept up and surged over Miss Blondheim's face.
"Are you finished withLove in a Cottage, Bella? I promised it to Mrs.Weiss when you're finished with it."
"Yes," said Bella. "I'll bring it down to-night."
There was another pause; the young man with the grayish hair coughed.
"Mr. Arnheim, let me introduce you to my friend, Miss Sternberger."
Miss Sternberger extended a highly groomed hand. "Pleased to meet you," she said.
"Howdy-do, Miss Sternberger?" His arm squirmed free from the deadlock clutch. "Won't you join us?"
"Thanks," said Myra, smiling until an amazing quantity of small white teeth showed; "but I just stopped by to tell Bella that Mrs. Blondheim was askin' for her."
There was a third pause.
"Won't you come along, Mr. Arnheim? Mamma's always so worried about me; and I'd like for you to meet mamma," said Bella, anxiously.
With a heroic jerk Mr. Arnheim managed to free himself entirely."Thanks," he said; "but I think I'll stay out and have a smoke."
Miss Blondheim's lips drooped at the corners. She entered the bright, gabbling lobby, threading her way to her mother's stronghold. The maternal glance that greeted her was cold and withering.
"I knew if I couldn't hold her she'd get him away. That's why I didn't go and play lotto with the ladies."
"Well, I couldn't help it, could I? You're always nosin' after me so—anybody could say you want me and not be lyin'."
"That's the thanks I get for tryin' to do the right thing by my children. When I was your age I had more gumption in my little finger than you got in your whole hand! I'd like to see a little piece like her get ahead of me. No wonder you ain't got no luck!"
Miss Blondheim sat down wearily beside her mother. "I wish I knew how she does it."
"Nerve! That's how. 'Ain't I been preachin' nerve to you since you could talk? You'd be married to Marcus Finberg now if you'd 'a' worked it right and listened to your mother."
"Aw, maw, lemme alone. I couldn't make him pop, could I? I don't see other girls' mothers always buttin' in."
Out in the cool of the veranda Miss Sternberger strolled over to the railing and leaned her back against a white wooden column. Her eyes, upslanting and full of languor, looked out over the toiling, moiling ocean. She was outlined as gently as a Rembrandt.
"A penny for your thoughts, Miss Sternberger."
Mr. Arnheim, the glowing end of a newly lighted cigar in one corner of his mouth, peered his head over her shoulder.
"Oh, Mr. Arnheim, how you scared me!" Miss Sternberger placed the well-groomed left hand, with a seal ring on the third finger, upon the thread-lace bosom of her gown. "How you frightened me!"
"It's a nice night, Miss Sternberger. Want to walk on the beach?"
"Don't mind if I do," she said.
They strolled the length of the veranda, down the steps to the boardwalk and the beach beyond.
Mrs. Blondheim rolled her crochet into a tight ball and stuck her needle upright. "Come on, Bella; let's go to bed."
They trailed past the desk like birds with damp feathers.
"Send up some ice-water to three-hundred-and-eighteen," said Miss Bella over the counter, her eyes straining meanwhile past the veranda to the beach below.
Without, a moon low and heavy and red came out from the horizon; it cast a copper-gold band across the water.
"Let's go down to the edge, kiddo."
Mr. Arnheim helped Miss Sternberger plow daintily through the sand.
"If I get sand in my shoes I'll blame you, Mr. Arnheim."
"Little slippers like yours can't hold much."
She giggled.
They seated themselves like small dunes on the white expanse of beach; he drew his knees up under his chin and nursed them.
In the eery light they might have been a fay and a faun in evening dress.
"Well," said Mr. Arnheim, exhaling loudly, "this is something like it."
"Ain't that a grand moon, though, Mr. Arnheim?"
"The moon 'ain't got a show when you're round, little one."
"I'll bet you say that to every girl you meet."
"Nix I do; but I know when a girl looks good to me."
"I wish I knew if you was jollyin' me or not."
He tossed his cigar into the surf that curled at their very feet, leaving a rim of foam and scum. The red end died with a fizz. Then he turned his dark eyes full upon her with a steady focus.
"If you knew me better you'd know that I ain't that sort of a fellow.When I say a thing I mean it."
His hand lay outstretched; she poured rivulets of white sand between the fingers. They watched the little mounds of sand which she patted into shape.
"I'll bet you're a New York girl."
"Why?"
"I can tell them every time—style and all."
"I'll bet you're a New York fellow, too."
"Little New York is good enough for me. I've been over in Paris four months, now, and, believe me, it looked good yesterday to see the old girlie holdin' her lamp over the harbor."
Miss Sternberger ran her hand over the smooth sheen of her dress; her gown was chaste, even stern, in its simplicity—the expensive simplicity that is artful rather than artless.
"That's a neat little model you're wearin'."
"Aw, Mr. Arnheim, what do you know about clothes?"
Mr. Arnheim threw back his head and laughed long and loud. "What do I know about clothes? I only been in the biz for eight years. What I don't know about ladies' wear ain't in the dictionary."
"Well," said Miss Sternberger, "that's so; I did hear you was in the business."
"I'm in the importin' line, I am. Why, girl, I've put through every fad that's taken hold in the last five years—brought them over myself, too, I've dressed Broadway and Fifth Avenue in everything from rainy-day to harem skirts."
"Honest?"
"Sure! I've imported more good sellers than any dealer in New York. I got a new model now passin' customs that's to be a bigger hit than the sheath was. Say, when I brought over the hobble every house on the Avenue laughed in my face; and when I finally dumped a consignment on to one of them, the firm was scared stiff and wanted to countermand; but I had 'em and they couldn't jump me."
"Just think!"
"By Jove! it wasn't two weeks before that very model was the talk of New York and Lillian Russell was wearin' one in the second act of her show; and when she wears a model it's as good as made."
"Gee!" she said. "I could just sit and listen to you talk and talk."
He hunched close. "I sold the first dozen pannier dresses for a sum that would give you the blind staggers. I was just as scared as she was, too, but all you got to do with women is to get a few good-lookin' bell-sheep to lead and the others will follow fast."
She regarded him in the wan moonlight. "If there's anything I admire," she said, "it's a smart man."
"Oh, I don't know," he said. "I've just got a little better judgment than the next fellow. Those things come natural, that's all. In my line a fellow's got to know human nature. If I'd sprung the hobble on the Avenue five years ago I'd gone broke on the gamble; but I sprung the idea on 'em at just the right time."
Her hand, long and slim, lay like a bit of carved ivory on the sand; he leaned forward and covered it with his.
"I want to see a great deal of you while I'm down here."
She did not reply, but drew her hand away with a shy diffidence.
"I'll bet I could show you some things that would warm you up all right. I'm goin' into New York with the swellest bunch of French novelties you ever seen. I've got a peach-colored Piquette model I've brought over that's goin' to be the talk of the town."
"A Piquette?"
He laughed delightedly. "Sure! You never heard of the firm? Wait till you see 'em on show at the openin'. It's got the new butterfly back; and, believe me, it wasn't no cinch to grab that pattern, neither. I laid low in Paris two months before I even got a smell at it."
"You talk just like a story-book," she said.
He stretched himself full length on the sand and looked up into her face. "I'll show you a thing or two when we get back to New York, little one."
"You ain't like most of the boys I know, Mr. Arnheim. You got something different about you."
"And you got a face like the kind you see painted on fans—on the order of a Japanese dame. I got some swell Japanese imports, too."
"Everybody says that about me. I take after paw."
"Say, little one, I want your telephone number when I get back to NewYork."
"I'll be pleased to have you call me up, Mr. Arnheim."
"Will I call you up? Well, rather!"
"I know some nice girls I'll introduce you to."
He looked at her insinuatingly. "I know one nice girl, and that's enough," he said.
"Aw, Mr. Arnheim, of all the jolliers I ever knew you got 'em beat." She rose to her feet like a gold-colored phoenix from a mound of white sand. "When I meet a fellow I like I don't want him to tell me nothin' but the truth."
"That's just the way with me—when I meet a girl that looks good I want to treat her white, and I want her to do the same by me."
They strolled along the edge of the beach. Once the foaming surf threatened to lap over her slippers; he caught her deftly and raised her high above the swirl.
"Oh," she cried, a little breathlessly, "ain't you strong!" Then she laughed in a high-pitched voice.
They dallied until the moon hardened from a soft, low ball to a high, yellow disk and the night damp seeped into their clothes. Miss Sternberger's yellow scarf lay like a limp rag on her shoulders.
"You're a perfect thirty-six, ain't you, little one?"
"That's what they say when I try on ready-mades," she replied, with sweet reticence.
"Gee!" he said. "Wouldn't I like you in some of my models! Maybe if you ain't no snitch I'll show you the colored plates some day."
"I ain't no snitch," she said. Her voice was like a far-away echo.
They climbed the wooden steps to their hotel like glorified children who had been caught in a silver weft of enchantment.
The lobby was semi-dark; they asked for their keys in whispers and exchanged good-nights in long-drawn undertones.
"Until to-morrow, little one."
"Until to-morrow."
She entered the elevator with a smile on her lips and in her eyes. They regarded each other through the iron framework until she shot from sight.
* * * *
At breakfast next morning Mrs. Blondheim drew up before her "small steak, French-fried potatoes, jelly omelet, buttered toast, buckwheat cakes, and coffee."
"Well, of all the nerve!" she exclaimed to her vis-à-vis, Mrs. Epstein."If there ain't Myra Sternberger eatin' breakfast with that Mr.Arnheim!"
Mrs. Epstein opened a steaming muffin, inserted a lump of butter, and pressed the halves together. "I said to my husband last night," she remarked, 'I'm glad we 'ain't got no daughters'; till they're married off and all, it ain't no fun. With my Louie, now, it's different. When he came out of the business school my husband put him in business, and now I 'ain't got no worry."
"My Bella 'ain't never given me a day's worry, neither. I ain't in no hurry to marry her off. She always says to me, 'Mamma,' she says, 'I ain't in no hurry to marry till Mr. Right comes along.'"
"My Louie is comin' down to-day or to-morrow on his vacation if he can get away from business. Louie's a good boy—if I do say so myself."
"I don't want to talk—but I often say what my Bella gets when she marries is enough to give any young man a fine start in a good business."
"I must have my Louie meet Miss Bella. The notes and letters Louie gets from girls you wouldn't believe; he don't pay no attention to 'em. He's an awful mamma-boy, Mrs. Blondheim."
"It will be grand for them to meet," said Mrs. Blondheim. "If I do say it, my Bella's had proposals you wouldn't believe! Look at Simon Arnheim over there—he only met her yesterday, and do you think he would leave her side all day? No, siree. Honest, it makes me mad sometimes. A grand young man comes along and Bella introduces him to every one, but she won't have nothin' to do with him."
"Try some of this liver and onions, Mrs. Blondheim; it's delicious."
Mrs. Blondheim partook and nibbled between her front teeth. "I got a grand recipe for suss und sauer liver. When we're at home my Bella always says, 'Mamma, let's have some liver andgedämftes fleischfor lunch.'"
"Do you soak your liver first?" inquired Mrs. Epstein. "My Louie won't eat nothin' suss und sauer. It makes me so mad. I got to cook different for every one in my family. Louie won't eat this and his father won't eat that!"
"I'll give you the recipe when I give you the one for the noodles. Bella says it's the best she ever ate. My husband gets so mad when I go down in the kitchen—me with two grand girls and washerwoman two days a week! But the girls can't cook to suit me."
"Excuse me, too, from American cookin'."
Mrs. Blondheim's interest and gaze wandered down the dining-hall. "I wish you'd look at that Sternberger girl actin' up! Ain't it disgusting?"
"Please pass the salt, Mrs. Blondheim. That's the trouble with hotel cooking—they don't season. At home we like plenty of it, too. I season and season, and then at the table my husband has to have more."
"She wouldn't have met him at all if it hadn't been for Bella," pursuedMrs. Blondheim.
The object of Mrs. Blondheim's solicitude, fresh as spring in crisp white linen, turned her long eyes upon Mr. Arnheim.
"You ought to feel flattered, Mr. Arnheim, that I let you come over to my table."
Mr. Arnheim regarded her through a mist of fragrant coffee steam. "You betcher life I feel flattered. I'd get up earlier than this to have breakfast with a little queen."
"Ain't you ever goin' to quit jollyin'?"
He leaned across the table. "That ain't a bad linen model you're wearin'—it's domestic goods, too. Where'd you get it?"
"At Lipman's."
"I sold them a consignment last year; but, say, if you want to see real classy white goods you ought to see some ratine cutaways I'm bringing over. I've brought a model I'm goin' to call the Phoebe Snow. It's the niftiest thing for early fall you ever saw."
"Ratine?"
"You never heard of it? That's where I get my work in—it's the new lines, the novelty stuff, that gets the money."
"Are you goin' in the surf this morning, Mr. Arnheim?"
"I'm goin' where you go, little one." He dropped two lumps of sugar into her coffee-cup. "Sweets to the sweet," he said.
"Silly!" But she giggled under her breath.
They pushed back their chairs and strolled down the aisle between the tables. She smiled brightly to her right and left.
"Good morning, Mrs. Blondheim. Is it warm enough for you?"
"Good morning," replied Mrs. Blondheim, stabbing a bit of omelet with vindictive fork.
Mrs. Epstein looked after the pair with warming eyes. "She is a stylish dresser, ain't she?"
"I wish you'd see the white linen my Bella's got. It's got sixteen yards of Cluny lace in the waist alone—and such Cluny, too! I paid a dollar and a half a yard wholesale."
"Just look at this waist I'm wearin', Mrs. Blondheim. You wouldn't thinkI paid three and a half for the lace, would you?"
"Oh yes; I can always tell good stuff when I see it, and I always say it pays best in the end," said Mrs. Blondheim, feeling the heavy lace edge of Mrs. Epstein's sleeve between discriminating thumb and forefinger.
Suddenly Mrs. Epstein's eyes widened; she rose to her feet, drawing a corner of the table-cloth awry. "If it ain't my Louie!"
Mr. Louis Epstein, a faithful replica of his mother, with close black hair that curled on his head like the nap of a Persian lamb, imprinted a large, moist kiss upon the maternal lips.
"Hello, maw! Didn't you expect me?"
"Not till the ten-o'clock train, Louie. How's papa?"
"He'th fine. I left him billing thom goods to Thpokane."
"How's business, Louie?"
"Not tho bad, but pa can't get away yet for a week. The fall goods ain't all out yet."
"Ain't it awful, the way that man is all for business, Mrs. Blondheim?This is my son Louie."
"Well, well, Mr. Epstein. I've heard a lot about you. I want you to meet my daughter Bella. You ought to make friends."
"Yeth'm," said Mr. Epstein.
* * * * *
Out on the clean-washed beach the sun glinted on the water and sent points of light dancing on the wavelets like bits of glass. Children in blue rompers burrowed and jangled their painted spades and pails; nursemaids planted umbrellas in the sand and watched their charges romp; parasols flashed past like gay-colored meteors.
In the white-capped surf bathers bobbed and shouted, and all along the shore-line the tide ran gently up the beach and down again, leaving a smooth, damp stretch of sand which soughed and sucked beneath the steps of the bathers.
Far out, where the waters were highest and the whitecaps maddest, Mr. Arnheim held Miss Sternberger about her slim waist and raised her high over each rushing breaker. They caught the swells and lay back against the heavy tow, letting the wavelets lap up to their chins.
Mr. Arnheim, with little rivulets running down his cheeks, shook the water out of his grayish hair and looked at her with salt-bitten, red-rimmed eyes.
"Gee!" he wheezed. "You're a spunky little devil! Excuse me from the beach-walkers; I like 'em when they're game like you."
She danced about like an Amphitrite. "Who would be afraid of the water with a dandy swimmer like you?"
"This ain't nothin'," said Mr. Arnheim. "You ought to see me in still water. At Arverne last summer I was the talk of the place."
They emerged from the water, dripping and heavy-footed. She wrung out her brief little skirts and stamped her feet on the sand. Mr. Arnheim hopped on one foot and then on the other, holding his head aslant. Then they stretched out on the white, sunbaked beach. Miss Sternberger loosened her hair and it showered about her.
"Gee! 'Ain't you got a swell bunch of hair!"
She shook and fluffed it. "You ought to seen it before I had typhoid. I could sit on it then."
"That Phoebe Snow model that I got in mind for Lillian Russell would make you look like a queen, with that hair of yourn!"
She buried his arm in the sand and patted the mound. "Now," she said, "I got you, and you can't do anything without askin' me."