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She had forgotten, in considering
and explaining the result of her day, that Drouet might come.
Now, when she saw how unreceptive these two people were, she hoped he
would not. She did not know
exactly what she would do or how she would explain to Drouet, if he came.
After supper she changed her clothes. When she was trimly dressed she was
rather a sweet little being, with large eyes and a sad mouth. Her face
expressed the mingled expectancy, dissatisfaction, and depression she felt.
She wandered about after the dishes were put away, talked a little
with Minnie, and then decided to go down and stand in the door at the foot
of the stairs. If Drouet came, she could meet him there. Her face took on
the semblance of a look of happiness as she put on her hat to go below.
"Carrie doesn't seem to like
her place very well," said Minnie to her husband when the latter came
out, paper in hand, to sit in the dining-room a few minutes.
"She ought to keep it for a
time, anyhow," said Hanson. "Has she gone downstairs?"
"Yes," said Minnie.
"I'd tell her to keep it if
I were you. She might be here
weeks without getting another one."
Minnie said she would, and Hanson
read his paper.
"If I were you," he
said a little later, "I wouldn't let her stand in the door down there.
It don't look good."
"I'll tell her," said
Minnie.
The life of the streets continued
for a long time to interest Carrie. She
never wearied of wondering where the people in the cars were going or what
their enjoyments were. Her
imagination trod a very narrow round, always winding up at points which
concerned money, looks, clothes, or enjoyment.
She would have a far-off thought of Columbia City now and then, or an
irritating rush of feeling concerning her experiences of the present day,
but, on the whole, the little world about her enlisted her whole attention.
The first floor of the building,
of which Hanson's flat was the third, was occupied by a bakery, and to this,
while she was standing there, Hanson came down to buy a loaf of bread.
She was not aware of his presence until he was quite near her.
"I'm after bread," was
all he said as he passed.
The contagion of thought here
demonstrated itself. While Hanson really came for bread, the thought dwelt
with him that now he would see what Carrie was doing. No sooner did he draw
near her with that in mind than she felt it.
Of course, she had no understanding of what put it into her head,
but, nevertheless, it aroused in her the first shade of real antipathy to
him. She knew now that she did
not like him. He was
suspicious.
A thought will colour a world for
us. The flow of Carrie's
meditations had been disturbed, and Hanson had not long gone upstairs before
she followed. She had realised
with the lapse of the quarter hours that Drouet was not coming, and somehow
she felt a little resentful, a little as if she had been forsaken-- was not
good enough. She went upstairs,
where everything was silent. Minnie
was sewing by a lamp at the table. Hanson had already turned in for the
night. In her weariness and
disappointment Carrie did no more than announce that she was going to bed.
"Yes, you'd better,"
returned Minnie. "You've
got to get up early, you know."
The morning was no better.
Hanson was just going out the door as Carrie came from her room.
Minnie tried to talk with her during breakfast, but there was not
much of interest which they could mutually discuss.
As on the previous morning, Carrie walked down town, for she began to
realise now that her four-fifty would not even allow her car fare after she
paid her board. This seemed a
miserable arrangement. But the
morning light swept away the first misgivings of the day, as morning light
is ever wont to do.
At the shoe factory she put in a
long day, scarcely so wearisome as the preceding, but considerably less
novel. The head foreman, on his
round, stopped by her machine.
"Where did you come
from?" he inquired.
"Mr. Brown hired me,"
she replied.
"Oh, he did, eh!" and
then, "See that you keep things going."
The machine girls impressed her
even less favourably. They seemed satisfied with their lot, and were in a
sense "common." Carrie had more imagination than they. She was not
used to slang. Her instinct in
the matter of dress was naturally better.
She disliked to listen to the girl next to her, who was rather
hardened by experience.
"I'm going to quit
this," she heard her remark to her neighbour. "What with the
stipend and being up late, it's too much for me health."
They were free with the fellows,
young and old, about the place, and exchanged banter in rude phrases, which
at first shocked her. She saw that she was taken to be of the same sort and
addressed accordingly.
"Hello," remarked one
of the stout-wristed sole-workers to her at noon.
"You're a daisy." He really expected to hear the common
"Aw! go chase yourself!" in return, and was sufficiently abashed,
by Carrie's silently moving away, to retreat, awkwardly grinning.
That night at the flat she was
even more lonely--the dull situation was becoming harder to endure.
She could see that the Hansons seldom or never had any company.
Standing at the street door looking out, she ventured to walk out a
little way. Her easy gait and
idle manner attracted attention of an offensive but common sort.
She was slightly taken back at the overtures of a well-dressed man of
thirty, who in passing looked at her, reduced his pace, turned back, and
said:
"Out for a little stroll,
are you, this evening?"
Carrie looked at him in
amazement, and then summoned sufficient thought to reply: "Why, I don't
know you," backing away as she did so.
"Oh, that don't
matter," said the other affably.
She bandied no more words with
him, but hurried away, reaching her own door quite out of breath.
There was something in the man's look which frightened her.
During the remainder of the week
it was very much the same. One
or two nights she found herself too tired to walk home, and expended car
fare. She was not very strong,
and sitting all day affected her back.
She went to bed one night before Hanson.
Transplantation is not always
successful in the matter of flowers or maidens.
It requires sometimes a richer soil, a better atmosphere to continue
even a natural growth. It would
have been better if her acclimatization had been more gradual--less rigid.
She would have done better if she had not secured a position so quickly, and
had seen more of the city which she constantly troubled to know about.
On the first morning it rained
she found that she had no umbrella. Minnie
loaned her one of hers, which was worn and faded.
There was the kind of vanity in Carrie that troubled at this.
She went to one of the great department stores and bought herself
one, using a dollar and a quarter of her small store to pay for it.
"What did you do that for,
Carrie?" asked Minnie when she saw it.
"Oh, I need one," said
Carrie.
"You foolish girl."
Carrie resented this, though she
did not reply. She was not
going to be a common shop-girl, she thought; they need not think it, either.
On the first Saturday night
Carrie paid her board, four dollars. Minnie had a quaver of conscience as
she took it, but did not know how to explain to Hanson if she took less. That worthy gave up just four dollars less toward the
household expenses with a smile of satisfaction.
He contemplated increasing his Building and Loan payments.
As for Carrie, she studied over the problem of finding clothes and
amusement on fifty cents a week. She
brooded over this until she was in a state of mental rebellion.
"I'm going up the street for
a walk," she said after supper.
"Not alone, are you?"
asked Hanson.
"Yes," returned Carrie.
"I wouldn't," said
Minnie.
"I want to see
SOMETHING," said Carrie, and by the tone she put into the last word
they realised for the first time she was not pleased with them.
"What's the matter with
her?" asked Hanson, when she went into the front room to get her hat.
"I don't know," said
Minnie.
"Well, she ought to know
better than to want to go out alone."
Carrie did not go very far, after
all. She returned and stood in
the door. The next day they
went out to Garfield Park, but it did not please her.
She did not look well enough. In
the shop next day she heard the highly coloured reports which girls give of
their trivial amusements. They
had been happy. On several days
it rained and she used up car fare. One
night she got thoroughly soaked, going to catch the car at Van Buren Street.
All that evening she sat alone in the front room looking out upon the
street, where the lights were reflected on the wet pavements, thinking. She
had imagination enough to be moody.
On Saturday she paid another four
dollars and pocketed her fifty cents in despair.
The speaking acquaintanceship which she formed with some of the girls
at the shop discovered to her the fact that they had more of their earnings
to use for themselves than she did. They
had young men of the kind whom she, since her experience with Drouet, felt
above, who took them about. She
came to thoroughly dislike the light-headed young fellows of the shop.
Not one of them had a show of refinement.
She saw only their workday side.
There came a day when the first
premonitory blast of winter swept over the city. It scudded the fleecy clouds in the heavens, trailed long,
thin streamers of smoke from the tall stacks, and raced about the streets
and corners in sharp and sudden puffs. Carrie now felt the problem of winter
clothes. What was she to do?
She had no winter jacket, no hat, no shoes.
It was difficult to speak to Minnie about this, but at last she
summoned the courage.
"I don't know what I'm going
to do about clothes," she said one evening when they were together.
"I need a hat."
Minnie looked serious.
"Why don't you keep part of
your money and buy yourself one?" she suggested, worried over the
situation which the withholding of Carrie's money would create.
"I'd like to for a week or
so, if you don't mind," ventured Carrie.
"Could you pay two dollars?" asked Minnie.
Carrie readily acquiesced, glad
to escape the trying situation, and liberal now that she saw a way out.
She was elated and began figuring at once.
She needed a hat first of all. How
Minnie explained to Hanson she never knew.
He said nothing at all, but there were thoughts in the air which left
disagreeable impressions.
The new arrangement might have
worked if sickness had not intervened.
It blew up cold after a rain one afternoon when Carrie was still
without a jacket. She came out
of the warm shop at six and shivered as the wind struck her.
In the morning she was sneezing, and going down town made it worse.
That day her bones ached and she felt light-headed.
Towards evening she felt very ill, and when she reached home was not
hungry. Minnie noticed her drooping actions and asked her about
herself.
"I don't know," said
Carrie. "I feel real
bad."
She hung about the stove,
suffered a chattering chill, and went to bed sick.
The next morning she was thoroughly feverish.
Minnie was truly distressed at
this, but maintained a kindly demeanour.
Hanson said perhaps she had better go back home for a while. When she got up after three days, it was taken for granted
that her position was lost. The
winter was near at hand, she had no clothes, and now she was out of work.
"I don't know," said
Carrie; "I'll go down Monday and see if I can't get something."
If anything, her efforts were
more poorly rewarded on this trial than the last.
Her clothes were nothing suitable for fall wearing.
Her last money she had spent for a hat.
For three days she wandered about, utterly dispirited.
The attitude of the flat was fast becoming unbearable.
She hated to think of going back there each evening.
Hanson was so cold. She
knew it could not last much longer. Shortly
she would have to give up and go home.
On the fourth day she was down
town all day, having borrowed ten cents for lunch from Minnie. She had applied in the cheapest kind of places without
success. She even answered for a waitress in a small restaurant where she
saw a card in the window, but they wanted an experienced girl. She moved through the thick throng of strangers, utterly
subdued in spirit. Suddenly a
hand pulled her arm and turned her about.
"Well, well!" said a
voice. In the first glance she
beheld Drouet. He was not only
rosy-cheeked, but radiant. He
was the essence of sunshine and good-humour.
"Why, how are you, Carrie?" he said.
"You're a daisy. Where
have you been?"
Carrie smiled under his
irresistible flood of geniality.
"I've been out home,"
she said.
"Well," he said,
"I saw you across the street there. I thought it was you.
I was just coming out to your place.
How are you, anyhow?"
"I'm all right," said
Carrie, smiling.
Drouet looked her over and saw
something different.
"Well," he said,
"I want to talk to you. You're
not going anywhere in particular, are you?"
"Not just now," said
Carrie.
"Let's go up here and have
something to eat. George! but
I'm glad to see you again."
She felt so relieved in his
radiant presence, so much looked after and cared for, that she assented
gladly, though with the slightest air of holding back.
"Well," he said, as he
took her arm--and there was an exuberance of good-fellowship in the word
which fairly warmed the cockles of her heart.
They went through Monroe Street
to the old Windsor dining-room, which was then a large, comfortable place,
with an excellent cuisine and substantial service. Drouet selected a table
close by the window, where the busy rout of the street could be seen.
He loved the changing panorama of the street--to see and be seen as
he dined.
"Now," he said, getting
Carrie and himself comfortably settled, "what will you have?"
Carrie looked over the large bill
of fare which the waiter handed her without really considering it.
She was very hungry, and the things she saw there awakened her
desires, but the high prices held her attention. "Half broiled spring
chicken--seventy-five. Sirloin steak with mushrooms--one twenty-five."
She had dimly heard of these things, but it seemed strange to be called to
order from the list.
"I'll fix this,"
exclaimed Drouet. "Sst!
waiter."
That officer of the board, a
full-chested, round-faced negro, approached, and inclined his ear.
"Sirloin with
mushrooms," said Drouet. "Stuffed
tomatoes."
"Yassah," assented the
negro, nodding his head.
"Hashed brown
potatoes."
"Yassah."
"Asparagus."
"Yassah."
"And a pot of coffee."
Drouet turned to Carrie.
"I haven't had a thing since breakfast. Just got in from Rock
Island. I was going off to dine
when I saw you."
Carrie smiled and smiled.
"What have you been
doing?" he went on. "Tell
me all about yourself. How is
your sister?"
"She's well," returned
Carrie, answering the last query.
He looked at her hard.
"Say," he said,
"you haven't been sick, have you?"
Carrie nodded.
"Well, now, that's a
blooming shame, isn't it? You
don't look very well. I thought
you looked a little pale. What
have you been doing?"
"Working," said Carrie.
"You don't say so!
At what?"
She told him.
"Rhodes, Morgenthau and
Scott--why, I know that house. over here on Fifth Avenue, isn't it? They're a close-fisted concern.
What made you go there?"
"I couldn't get anything
else," said Carrie frankly.
"Well, that's an
outrage," said Drouet. "You
oughtn't to be working for those people.
Have the factory right back of the store, don't they?"
"Yes," said Carrie.
"That isn't a good
house," said Drouet. "You
don't want to work at anything like that, anyhow."
He chatted on at a great rate,
asking questions, explaining things about himself, telling her what a good
restaurant it was, until the waiter returned with an immense tray, bearing
the hot savoury dishes which had been ordered.
Drouet fairly shone in the matter of serving.
He appeared to great advantage behind the white napery and silver
platters of the table and displaying his arms with a knife and fork.
As he cut the meat his rings almost spoke.
His new suit creaked as he stretched to reach the plates, break the
bread, and pour the coffee. He
helped Carrie to a rousing plateful and contributed the warmth of his spirit
to her body until she was a new girl. He
was a splendid fellow in the true popular understanding of the term, and
captivated Carrie completely.
That little soldier of fortune
took her good turn in an easy way. She felt a little out of place, but the
great room soothed her and the view of the well-dressed throng outside
seemed a splendid thing. Ah,
what was it not to have money! What
a thing it was to be able to come in here and dine!
Drouet must be fortunate. He rode on trains, dressed in such nice
clothes, was so strong, and ate in these fine places.
He seemed quite a figure of a man, and she wondered at his friendship
and regard for her.
"So you lost your place
because you got sick, eh?" he said. "What are you going to do
now?"
"Look around," she
said, a thought of the need that hung outside this fine restaurant like a
hungry dog at her heels passing into her eyes.
"Oh, no," said Drouet,
"that won't do. How long
have you been looking?"
"Four days," she
answered.
"Think of that!" he
said, addressing some problematical individual.
"You oughtn't to be doing anything like that.
These girls," and he waved an inclusion of all shop and factory
girls, "don't get anything. Why,
you can't live on it, can you?"
He was a brotherly sort of
creature in his demeanour. When he had scouted the idea of that kind of
toil, he took another tack. Carrie was really very pretty. Even then, in her
commonplace garb, her figure was evidently not bad, and her eyes were large
and gentle. Drouet looked at her and his thoughts reached home. She felt his
admiration. It was powerfully
backed by his liberality and good-humour.
She felt that she liked him--that she could continue to like him ever
so much. There was something
even richer than that, running as a hidden strain, in her mind. Every little
while her eyes would meet his, and by that means the interchanging current
of feeling would be fully connected.
"Why don't you stay down
town and go to the theatre with me?" he said, hitching his chair
closer. The table was not very
wide.
"Oh, I can't," she
said.
"What are you going to do
to-night?"
"Nothing," she
answered, a little drearily.
"You don't like out there
where you are, do you?"
"Oh, I don't know."
"What are you going to do if
you don't get work?"
"Go back home, I
guess."
There was the least quaver in her
voice as she said this. Somehow, the influence he was exerting was powerful.
They came to an understanding of each other without words--he of her
situation, she of the fact that he realised it. "No," he said,
"you can't make it!" genuine sympathy filling his mind for the
time. "Let me help you.
You take some of my money."
"Oh, no!" she said,
leaning back.
"What are you going to
do?" he said.
She sat meditating, merely
shaking her head.
He looked at her quite tenderly
for his kind. There were some
loose bills in his vest pocket--greenbacks. They were soft and noiseless,
and he got his fingers about them and crumpled them up in his hand.
"Come on," he said,
"I'll see you through all right. Get yourself some clothes."
It was the first reference he had
made to that subject, and now she realised how bad off she was.
In his crude way he had struck the key-note.
Her lips trembled a little.
She had her hand out on the table
before her. They were quite
alone in their corner, and he put his larger, warmer hand over it.
"Aw, come, Carrie," he
said, "what can you do alone? Let me help you."
He pressed her hand gently and
she tried to withdraw it. At
this he held it fast, and she no longer protested.
Then he slipped the greenbacks he had into her palm, and when she
began to protest, he whispered:
"I'll loan it to you--that's
all right. I'll loan it to
you."
He made her take it.
She felt bound to him by a strange tie of affection now.
They went out, and he walked with her far out south toward Polk
Street, talking.
"You don't want to live with
those people?" he said in one place, abstractedly. Carrie heard it, but it made only a slight impression.
"Come down and meet me to
morrow," he said, "and we'll go to the matinee.
Will you?"
Carrie protested a while, but
acquiesced.
"You're not doing anything.
Get yourself a nice pair of shoes and a jacket."
She scarcely gave a thought to
the complication which would trouble her when he was gone.
In his presence, she was of his own hopeful, easy-way-out mood.
"Don't you bother about
those people out there," he said at parting.
"I'll help you."
Carrie left him, feeling as
though a great arm had slipped out before her to draw off trouble. The money she had accepted was two soft, green, handsome
ten-dollar bills.
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