Chapter II: Part ONE: I (2)

East Broadway was the Fifth Avenue of the East Side. A wide street lined, not with tall tenements like the other streets, but with moderate sized brick houses with steep roofs and big chimneys. Nothing grand about them, but solid looking. One family to a house. In these houses lived the smart guys who lived directly off the poor boobs of the East Side: that is to say: doctors, lawyers, politicians, rabbis and prosperous storekeepers. Many of these guys were able to buy up the up-town blokes several times over, it was said, but they made out they lived simple and bragged about being East-Siders; it was good for business. They were smart guys all right, but Joe had no intention of stopping at East Broadway.

He was on his way to report to a lawyer who had hired him to secure evidence against a man, whose wife wanted to get a divorce. Having extended the scope of his operations, Joe had been able to procure himself a whole suit with long pants; also new shoes and a cap. He wore a white celluloid collar which he cleaned with a rag every morning. But he was already dissatisfied with the effect; his suit was beginning to look crummy, because he had no way of getting it cleaned and pressed. He wanted two suits.

The nights were cold now, and the people had retired indoors. While he was still some way off, therefore, Joe’s attention was attracted by a little group gathered below one of the old-fashioned stoops. From the way the people on the sidewalk were bending over, he perceived that something was the matter; and hastened forward. Sitting on the bottom step he beheld a funny-looking little woman, her knees as high as her chest, her skirts drawn up high enough to reveal a pair of new button shoes of soft leather, which toed in like a little girl’s. She was tenderly feeling of her ankle. Not at all a grand person, yet Joe instantly perceived she was of the up-town world. What a chance! he thought, energetically shouldering aside the women of the neighborhood who were bending over her. They fell back muttering: “Fresh!”

“Are yez hurted, lady?” Joe enquired, making his voice purr.

She lifted a pair of big, foggy grey eyes. “My ankle,” she murmured, “I put my foot in a crack, and twisted it badly. . . . I don’t know. . . . I’m afraid it’s sprained!”

“Send for the ambylance,” said a voice.

“Oh, no! no!” said the little woman like a scared child. “I want to go home!”

“Sure!” said Joe. “What you want is a cab.”

“Oh, yes!” she said. “Can one get a cab in this neighborhood?”

“I can git you one,” said Joe. “Fella I know. Just around the corner. You wait here.”

He ran around to McArdel’s livery stable in Division street, and gave the order. In three minutes he was back again. The crowd had increased in numbers; he bored his way through it as a matter of right. “S’all right, ma’am. Cab ’ll be here d’rectly.”

She looked up at him half grateful, half afraid of the bold-faced boy.

Joe faced the crowd truculently, his eyes darting from face to face to discover if anybody was inclined to dispute his claim to the woman. Just let them try it, that was all! “Get back, can’t yeh!” he cried roughly. “Can’t yeh give the lady air?”

Out of the corners of his eyes he sized her up. He was excited. What a chance! What a chance! He put aside his errand to the lawyer. He felt a burning desire to learn her, to master the secret of her nature, to envelope her, to turn her to his own uses. She looked easy, with that foggy glance and the childlike droop to the corners of her mouth; but she was of a world that was strange to him; he must make no mistakes. He had not missed the fact that she was half afraid of him; and he set himself to subdue his masterful air before her, and to butter his grating voice.

“Yer all right, Lady. I’ll see yeh troo!”

He cuffed aside the small boys, who came pushing between the legs of the adults to have a look.

Meanwhile he registered every detail of her appearance. She was about fifty years old, but her face was very little wrinkled, and her color was fresh. She looked as if she had been preserved under a thin film of paraffine; even her eyes. There was a strained look in her eyes. She’s scared now; you can’t get her right, thought Joe. Obviously an old maid; likes the soapy stuff, he thought. She wore a long, close-fitting coat of dark green, having many little capes, each edged with grey fur; and a small black hat shaped like a shell clinging to her head.

The cab came rattling and banging around the corner, and the old horse slid to a stand on his shaky legs. The crowd opened a way through for the lady. She surveyed the rusty vehicle, the furry beast that drew it, and the boozy driver on the box in unmixed alarm. The smell of the outfit came clear across the sidewalk.

“S’all right! S’all right!” Joe repeated. “Of course the swellest turnouts was already out, but I know this driver. He’s a safe driver. . . . Stand up on your good leg, lady, and lean on me. . . . Here you, take her other arm.”

Supported on either side, the lady hopped across the sidewalk on one foot. Somehow they got her bundled in. Joe shouldered his helper to one side. Keeping his hand on the handle of the door, he stuck his head inside.

“Where to, Lady?”

“Nineteen West Eleventh street,” she said faintly.

Nineteen; that’s near Fifth avenue; thought Joe with satisfaction. Repeating the number to the driver, he climbed nimbly after the lady, and pulled the door to. The cab jerked into motion.

“Oh!” she gasped from her corner. “You needn’t have come!”

“S’all right,” said Joe. “Don’t cost no more for two than one. You need me to help you out, see? The driver maybe can’t leave his horse stand.”

The old cab lurched and swayed. Talking was well-nigh impossible until they turned into an asphalt paved street. Joe had seldom ridden in a cab, but he had only a side glance of his mind for that experience. He was preoccupied with the little lady, pressing herself into her corner. Frightened, it seemed. He greatly desired to improve his opportunity, but was afraid of queering himself. If he could only make her talk he could get a line on her! Finally he ventured politely:

“You was a long way from home, lady.”

“Thursday nights I teach sewing to working girls in the White Door Settlement,” she said nervously.

“Oh, I see,” said Joe. “Them settlement houses does a lot of good.”

No response. She looked obstinately out of the window.

However “Settlement” had given Joe his line. He had heard all about those Christers who came down from up-town to lift up the poor. “On’y wisht I could go to one,” he said mournfully. “I’m so darn ign’rant.”

She did not rise to it.

Joe persevered. “I got no time for it. I gotta work nights as well as daytimes. . . .”

“What is your work?”

Joe smiled to himself. He had forced her to ask that. “Oh, I got a regular job in the daytime. Nights I sell papers to help out. I got heavy expenses. . . .” He left his sentence teasingly in the air.

“Expenses? A boy like you? . . . Huh? I suppose you mean you have to help out at home?”

Joe felt assured now that he could handle her. He proceeded to spread himself. “Oh, I ain’t got no regular home, like. I just sleep around where I can get the cheapest bed. Summer nights I often sleep in the park to save the price of a bed. I got a kid brother, you see. I got him boardin’ wit’ a nice family on East Broadway. I was just comin’ from there, when I seen you. Three dollars a week, I pay for him. That’s what keeps me hustlin’. . . . Besides his clo’es and all. . . .”

The lady came partly out of her corner. She was interested. “Why . . .” she said. “What stories one hears! . . . I don’t know. . . . It seems terrible. . . . Huh? Have you no father and mother?”

“Dead, ma’am,” said Joe, sadly. “My old man, he was killed in a boiler explosion; and me mutter, she just wasted away, like, after.”

“Oh, dear!” she said. “And the whole burden fell on you! . . . Huh? . . . You poor boy!”

“Oh, I don’t mind, ma’am,” said Joe quickly. “I’m a bugger for work. . . . He’s a real cute little feller. . . .”

“How old?”

“Nine.”

“What’s his name?”

“Malcolm, ’m.”

There was no lack of conversation during the rest of the drive.

When they drew up at the address given, Joe perceived to his satisfaction that it was a fine neighborhood; quiet and genteel. Number Nineteen was one of three houses in a row; smaller than their neighbors, but having a neat, choice look. The red bricks were set off with a white wood trim; there were elegant lace curtains in the windows.

Between them Joe and the cabman helped the lady up the steps. The outer door of the house was closed. In response to their ring, it was presently opened by another little lady, very like the first, but having a more sensible look. Joe was relieved; a man might have been difficult to deal with.

The lady at the door gasped in dismay. Joe’s lady pretended to make out that it was nothing at all, but all the time she was letting on that she was real bad off. This one had such a funny way of talking. She couldn’t say anything right through, but always run out of breath in the middle, and fetched a little gasp. Huh? Very often she ended up with something quite different from the beginning. An Irish maid came, and all three talked at once, or made clucking noises. A houseful of women; what luck! thought Joe.

The sister and the maid received the sufferer from the hands of Joe and the cabman. To the cabman Joe said out of the corner of his mouth: “You’ve got your pay; cheese it!” The man went down the steps. Joe himself insinuated his body inside the door, and closed it. He made himself inconspicuous in the dark vestibule. The two women were making their way towards the stairs, supporting the sufferer between them. Intent upon her, they paid no attention to Joe.

The strong servant picked up her mistress bodily, and started up the stairs. The other lady followed with her arms outstretched as if she expected them to fall over backwards, and clucking all the way. Joe entered the house, softly closing the inner door, and eagerly looked around him. His first feeling was one of disappointment; the carpet was worn. Still . . . the place was fixed up real nice; nothing grand, of course.

The gas was burning inside a fancy red lantern; there was a funny carved oak hat-stand with brass hooks; and on the other side of it a table with a silver plate on it, full of cards with people’s names on them. Joe took note of how the stair carpet was fastened down by a brass rail running across each step. That was a neat rig, now. The door into the parlor at his right hand, was open, but that room was dark. However, enough light came in from the street to show him that it was a real nice room, crowded with pretty fixings.

Hearing a stir overhead, Joe hastily smoothed his hair down with his hands, and sat down in the hall with a Christly expression. The sister of the hurt lady came tripping down the stairs at a great rate. She had a worried look; evidently it had just occurred to her that Joe had not been disposed of. She saw him and stopped on the stairs. “Oh!” she said. She was a little older than her sister, yet somehow had a fresher look. But not a woman who was accustomed to dealing with men. She had a smooth oval face, and pretty sloping shoulders like a girl.

“I brought her home,” said Joe, modestly, to help her out.

“Oh, yes! Of course!” she said. “Just wait a moment till I fetch my purse.”

“No, lady, no,” said Joe. “I don’t want nottin’ off yeh. I was just waitin’ to hear if your sister was bad hurted. I t’ought maybe I could run for the doctor.”

“Oh!” said the lady. She came slowly down the rest of the stairs. She was looking at Joe with little wrinkles in her forehead. Joe could read her thoughts. He had put her in the wrong by refusing the tip she had offered him. Now she didn’t know what to do with him. She didn’t like him, but she felt that she ought to like such a true-hearted lad as he was making out to be. Well, Joe didn’t care whether she liked him or not, so he could make her do what he wanted.

“Shall I go for the doctor?” he asked.

“Oh, no!” she said, recollecting herself. “It is not serious. It has happened before, and I know just what to do.”

“Then I’ll be stepping,” said Joe. He lingered, allowing his glance to travel wistfully around the pleasant interior.

“I’m sure we both thank you,” said the lady uneasily. “I wish. . . .”

Joe looked up encouragingly, but she didn’t go on.

“We both thank you very much indeed!”

“Don’t mention it, ma’am,” said Joe. “. . . My name is Joseph Kaplan,” he added suggestively, and lingered still.

“Yes?” she said with a strained smile.

She became very uncomfortable, but Joe couldn’t get her over the sticking point. There was nothing more he could do without showing his hand. He thought: Oh, well, I can come back to ask how the other one is getting on. He said softly:

“Good-night, lady,” and with a wistful glance in her face, let himself out of the door.

She was left standing in the hall looking unhappy. As soon as he was gone, she could not understand how she could have shown such a lack of proper feeling toward that poor boy. She wanted to call him back.

V

“The sight of so much sin and suffering . . .” said the lady with the sprained ankle. “Hum; there were fleas in that cab. . . . I don’t know; they don’t seem to realize! . . . Huh? And the most of it falls on the innocent!”

“If they was more like you we’d be a hull lot better off,” said Joe.

“Not like me, Joe, no! . . . That horse ought to have been reported to the S.P.C.A. Oh, dear! There are so many things one ought to . . . Joe, you should say: ‘If there were more’—if you don’t mind my telling you. . . . Huh? . . .”

“No’m. I’m crazy to learn. Ain’t had no chances. If there were more like you. . . .”

“No, Joe! . . . I’m sure it had some terrible disease . . . I’m but a poor weak vessel! One night a week . . . Huh? The air is so bad! . . . Yes; if I was made of sterner stuff I would give up everything I possess and . . . I don’t know. . . .”

“If you gave away ev’yt’ing, ’m, you wouldn’t have nottin’ to give to the poor.”

“Oh, I don’t believe in . . . Huh? You must practice your th’s. Like this: ‘Everything; nothing.’ Huh? . . . It is yourself that you must give. . . . They don’t seem to appreciate. . . .”

They were sitting in the parlor of the little house on West Eleventh street—only they called it drawing-room, Joe had learned. The little lady was seated on a sofa by the window, with her injured foot on a stool before her; a silk scarf thrown over her ankle. It was after five on Sunday afternoon, and the servant had just lighted a tall lamp which stood beside the old-fashioned piano at the back of the room. The lamp had a very large shade made of yellow crinkled paper, which spread an agreeable glow around. It was like a play.

Joe, his hair well slicked down, had the air of being established in the house, and he knew it. He kept his eyes lowered so as not to betray his satisfaction. Handling the old maid was as easy as eating pie. She could take any amount of soft sawder. On a stand beside the sofa was a vase containing three damaged pink roses, wired to their stems. Every now and then she glanced at them with a softened look. The other sister was in and out of the room. The one was called Miss May Gittings; the other, Mrs. Fanny Boardman.

Miss Gittings continued, her hazy grey eyes shining on something far away: “Sympathy; understanding; encouragement; that is the message I try to . . . Huh? And plain sewing . . . oh, dear! they seem to have no womanly feeling for the needle. . . . The worst of misfortune is, it breeds a callous spirit. . . . I don’t know. . . . When they jeer at me I tell myself it is but the anguish of their souls peeping out. Every Thursday I find it harder and harder to work myself up to . . . Ah, yes! . . . Poor dear girls. . . . Huh? . . .”

“If I was there, I’d learn them!” said Joe doubling his fist.

“Oh, Joe! you wouldn’t hit a girl . . . !”

“Of course I wouldn’t _hit_ them,” he said quickly. “But I’d give ’em a good layin’ out.”

“No, you can’t do away with poverty!” said Miss Gittings. “There’s one or two of them _would_ be the better for a good whipping. . . . Huh? . . . The great thing is to teach the poor to be more spiritual-minded. . . . They chew gum with their mouths open. They know it annoys me. . . . Huh? . . . So they can trample on the ills of the flesh. We are all equal sharers in the things of the spirit. . . . And I know some of them smoke cigarettes. . . . Huh?”

“You talk beautiful,” murmured Joe.

“I can talk to you. You’re the first poor person that ever understood me. . . . Huh? . . . You’re only a boy, but you’ve been through the fire. . . . You should say: ‘Talk beautifully’. . . . And your spirit is refined like. . . . Huh? . . . whatever shortcomings your exterior . . . but that’s not your fault. . . .”

* * * * *

Mrs. Boardman was a more practical-minded person than her sister—but not much more. She had an easy-going sensible look. She had been married only three months, and that twenty years ago, Joe had learned, but the experience, brief as it was, apparently enabled her to keep her feet on the ground, while the sister, who had never known a man, pursued her batlike flights through the air. But a funny thing was, as Joe was quick to see, the batty one was the leading spirit of the two. Apparently there was more force in her notions than in the other’s commonsense. Mrs. Boardman followed contentedly wherever Miss Gittings led. Therefore, if you made yourself solid with the old maid, you would be all right with the widow.

“Don’t you spend your Sunday afternoons with Everard, Joe?” asked Miss Gittings. “You might bring . . . Huh? . . . Is he a very destructive child?”

“No ’m. You mean Malcolm. I t’ought I hadn’t oughta keep him outa Sunday School, like.”

“You mustn’t run your words together. . . . Of course; quite right. . . . Say that sentence again, slowly.”

Joe obeyed very willingly. This was useful.

“Don’t you go to Sunday School, Joe?” asked Mrs. Boardman.

“I’ll tell you the troot . . . truth, ’m, I ain’t got the face. I’m so ignorant, they’d put me amongst the littlest kids.”

“But if Malcolm is only nine, you must have been at least six or seven when your mother died. Didn’t she give you any religious instruction?”

“Yes’m,” said Joe vaguely. “. . . She was a good woman.”

“Do you remember her clearly?”

“Yes’m, I kin see her now!”

Miss Gittings exchanged a look with her sister. “But Fanny, that is psychic!” she said, opening her eyes.

Joe had no idea what the funny-sounding word meant. Evidently it was a word which excited them. He waited with stretched ears for some clue to its meaning.

“Do you mean that merely in a manner of speaking,” asked Mrs. Boardman of Joe; “or do you mean you can actually see her as if she were a living person?”

Joe had no doubt of the answer required to this question. “I kin see her just as plain as I see you ’m.” He closed his eyes, and went on: “She was a tall woman and she gen’ally wore a grey dress, real full in the skirt. She had real black hair, parted in the middle, and brushed down flat, and she wore a little gold cross hangin’ round her neck, and a gold ring on her finger. We wasn’t so poor then.”

“An authentic spirit portrait. . . . Huh? . . .” murmured Miss Gittings to her sister. “Tell me,” she asked Joe in some excitement, “under what circumstances does she usually . . . Huh? . . . how? when? where?”

“Oh, she comes most any time,” said Joe, “but gen’ally at night. She shows brighter in the dark, seems like.”

“What a spirit touch!” murmured the sisters.

“She most allus comes when I’m feelin’ bad,” Joe went on. “When I ain’t had no supper; or when I gotta sleep on a park bench. Then I see her beside me, bendin’ over. She puts her hand on my wrist. . . .”

“Can you _feel_ her hand?” demanded Miss Gittings breathlessly. “This is important. . . . Huh?”

“Surest thing you know ’m! Just like this!” Joe grasped his own wrist.

“How truly remarkable!”

“And she says: ‘Fight the good fight, Joe!’ Or: ‘Stick it out, son; your mutter is watchin’ you.’ Or somepin like that. Then I feel all right again.”

“A genuine psychic!” murmured Miss Gittings breathlessly. “. . . Huh? . . . This rude, uninstructed . . . The veriest sceptic must be . . . Oh, sister! . . . Tell us more,” she said to Joe, “my sister and I are extremely interested in such phenomena. We ourselves . . . go on! go on!”

By this time, of course, Joe had grasped the sense of the funny-sounding word. Spirits! Well, he could feed ’em as much as they’d take. “Wuncet,” he resumed solemnly, “things was real bad with me. Malcolm was sick, and had to have the doctor, and the folks he lives with was after me for the two dollars to pay him; and I didn’t have it; and I didn’t dast go to see how he was, wit’out it; and I was near crazy, you bet! And I happened to be goin’ troo Rivington street where the pushcart market is, and they was all kinds of things on the pushcarts that a feller could pick up; hats and fur-pieces and women’s jackets and all; and I made up my mind to snitch a baby’s jacket for Malcolm’s sake. . . .”

“But what could you have done with that?”

“Oh, there’s places you kin sell them things. There’s plenty bad fellers on the East Side makes a business of it, and they’re allus askin’ yeh to go in wit’ ’em. But I don’t have no truck wit’ ’em.”

“Go on!” said both sisters together.

“Well, while I was standin’ there waitin’ for the man to turn his back so’s I could prig the jacket, all of a sudden I seen me mutter beside me. She didn’t say nottin’ that time, but she looked real bad. She just took aholt of me and pulled me away from the pushcart. She pulled me around the corner into Ridge street, and down the hill to the church there, and inside the church. It was all dark awmost, except the candles on the altar. And she took holy water, and put it on me—honest, I could feel the very drops! and she made me kneel down beside her, and she prayed to God! to make me a good feller, and keep me from sin. And say, there was all a faint sort of light around her head, like there was a candle behind her head, only there wasn’t no candle. . . .”

Mrs. Boardman glanced at her sister a little dubiously, and Joe perceived that he was laying it on too thick. You fool! he said to himself, why can’t you leave a thing lay, when it’s doin’ well.

However, he had Miss Gittings locoed with the story. The big grey eyes were full of wonder like a child’s. “Go on!” she said. . . . “Huh?”

“Well, when I looked again, she was gone,” said Joe. “But I felt all light, like, inside. I come out of the church, and went right to see the doctor, and when I told him I hadn’t no money, he said sure, he’d go see the kid, as often as would be necessary, and I could pay him when I earned it.”

“Fanny,” said Miss Gittings impressively, “we must report this extraordinary case to the circle. . . . Huh? . . . Let scoff who will! . . . We can produce the boy. . . .”

“Yes, sister.”

The front door opened and closed, and a slender shadow fell in the hall. Joe was instantly all attention. Another member to this household! The whole problem was altered.

“Wilfred, come here,” said Miss Gittings.

No response.

“Wilfred!” she repeated, raising her voice a little.

A boy of Joe’s own age came into the room with rather a sullen air; on the defensive. Joe perceived that it was that same white-faced boy. . . . God! _that_ kid! All the ground was cut from under his feet. For an instant he thought of flight.

But only for an instant. It steadied him to perceive that the kid was a lot worse upset by the meeting than he was. The kid’s eyes were fixed and crazy, like. He was looking at Joe as if he saw a headless ghost rising out of the grave. It almost made Joe laugh. What the hell! he said to himself; the kid wouldn’t dare to name anything to the women. And anyhow, he didn’t see nothing but what his own dirty mind imagined. . . . He’s no better than me himself. I can handle him, too.

“This is my nephew, Wilfred Pell,” said Miss Gittings, pleasantly.

“Please to meet yeh,” said Joe affably.

The frantic look in the kid’s eyes warned Joe not to put out his hand. He _might_ explode.

* * * * *

Wilfred had been down to Staten Island. The Aunts approved of these Sunday excursions. For once they were of a mind with Wilfred about something. To-day he had discovered a lovely spot called Willow Brook, which in its wild beauty and solitude might have been a thousand miles from New York, instead of actually within the city limits. It had been a good day.

Upon entering the house, his heart sank, recognizing from the tones of his Aunt’s voice that there were strangers in the drawing-room. One could not get past the open door without being seen. And he did want to get to his own room to think. He debated sneaking out again, and entering by the basement, but his Aunt called him in her company voice. The second time she called, he was obliged to enter the room.

He was astonished to see a boy of his own age, sitting with his back to the windows. He examined him with eager curiosity. When the boy arose and came towards him, Wilfred’s heart failed him. That boy of the East Side!—cleaner now, and better dressed, but the same boy! Wilfred turned sick inside. This was a hallucination, of course; that wicked, bold, long-nosed face had haunted him, these past weeks. This was the Tempter; the destroyer of his peace! Well, it was all over then; this was the end; he was done for!

Then his Aunt May introduced them to each other in her silly-sounding voice, and Wilfred realized that Joe was no apparition. He looked at him in helpless confusion. By what trick of fate had he come to be sitting in the drawing-room of the prim Aunts as if he belonged there? The explanation when it came was natural enough:

“This is the boy who brought me home when I sprained my ankle on Thursday night.”

Wilfred’s heart sank lower still; for this looked like the direct interposition of Fate or whatever Power there was, on the side of the enemy. If this boy had actually gained a footing in his own home, how could he, Wilfred, hope to withstand him, and all that he represented? . . . He didn’t want to withstand him. He was lost. After the first glance, the black-haired boy avoided looking at Wilfred. He was as demure as a cat. He knew his own power. Wilfred glanced at the roses with a painful sneer. Faded ones, of course, because they were more pathetic.

An awkward constraint fell upon the quartette. Aunt May, having introduced the two boys with as much as to say: You two ought to be friends, had become silent and fidgety. It must be apparent now, even to her fuzzy wits, that we couldn’t be friends, thought Wilfred. There was some desultory conversation between Joe and Aunt Fanny. The black-haired boy was exercising a horrible fascination over Wilfred. Fairly well dressed now, Wilfred perceived how good-looking he was. A healthy, pink color showed in the bold, thin profile; the whole head expressed a power of cynical hardihood. This boy doesn’t care _what_ he does! thought Wilfred. In body, too, Joe’s shoulders were wider than Wilfred’s, and under the shoddy pants the line of a trim thigh was revealed. Joe’s comeliness sickened Wilfred. He has every advantage of me! he thought despairingly.

As from a distance, Wilfred heard his Aunt May saying to him in the manner of a rebuke: “Joseph has been telling us about himself. He has had a hard life. . . . I don’t know. . . . It is very interesting to hear. . . . Huh?”

“Wilfred has been so sheltered!” put in Aunt Fanny.

Wilfred listened woodenly. A screech of laughter sounded through him. Oh my Lord! they are on the way to make a hero of Joe!

“Very interesting. . . .” Aunt May repeated vaguely. “. . . Huh?” The presence of Wilfred forced her to look at Joe anew, and to ask herself what was to come of his being in the house. An unfortunate boy, and not to be blamed in any way; still . . . a great boy like that . . . almost a man . . .

An uncomfortable situation. Joe was master of it. He stood up, saying easily:

“I gotta go now. Malcolm’ll be lookin’ for me.”

A feeling of relief pervaded the other three. Joe, with eyes modestly cast down, waited for the ladies to invite him to call again. They felt strongly the suggestion to do so, but with Wilfred standing there, resisted it; and were glad that they had resisted it as soon as Joe was out. But all three inmates of the house knew by instinct that they had not seen the last of Joe. The sisters looked at each other with eyes eloquent of relief. Nevertheless, Aunt May said:

“A deserving boy, sister. . . . Huh? . . . We must do something for him.”

And Aunt Fanny answered: “Yes; and gifted with a strange power, May.”

It fell to Wilfred’s part to show Joe out of the front door. When they got out in the hall Wilfred’s heart was pounding, and he had a difficulty in getting his breath. Not for anything would he have looked at Joe; he knew without looking, how Joe’s hard, bright, all-knowing eyes were fixed on his face; and Joe’s thin protuberant upper lip was flattened in a zestful grin. As Wilfred stood holding the door open, Joe came so close to him that he could feel the warmth of his body, and stood there, trying to make Wilfred look at him. But Wilfred would not.

“Goin’ to take a walk to-night?” Joe murmured.

Wilfred, nearly suffocated by the beating of his heart, silently shook his head.

“Well . . . any time you feel like it . . . come on down. You’ll find me somewheres around those corners. . . . I’ll show you ’round.”

Joe ran down the steps thinking: Funny look that kid’s got. But I got him going. Wonder why he takes it so hard? . . . Oh, to hell with them; the whole three of them is easy! I can get what I want out of them. . . .

Wilfred closed the door, and leaned his forehead against the ornamental glass pane. It had a sort of Gothic arch cut in the glass, from which depended a number of meaningless tails, each winding up in a curlicue. Wilfred, nauseated, was thinking:

“Any time . . . any time . . . that means I’ll have to fight it every night. . . . Wouldn’t it be better to give in at once, and save all that? . . . Disgust might cure me. . . .”

From the drawing-room Aunt May called him.

VI

Mrs. Boardman poured her sister a second cup of coffee. Wilfred had just departed for school, and the sisters were able to talk more freely.

“Sister,” said Mrs. Boardman, looking very uncomfortable, “do you . . . do you entirely believe Joe’s story?”

Miss Gittings looked no less uncomfortable, but answered quickly: “I see no reason. . . . Huh? . . . Obviously Joe was too ignorant to . . . anyhow, you and I agreed long ago that it was better to be deceived than to be sceptical!”

“Wilfred says. . . .”

Miss Gittings caught her up. “And since when have we been taking Wilfred as an. . . . Huh? . . . Oh, Wilfred is so . . . I declare, Fanny! You know it as well as I do!”

“But Joe’s story does vary, sister.”

“That signifies nothing. A spiritual experience is susceptible of various. . . . Huh?”

“Well, very likely you’re right. . . . What are you going to do about him?”

“Do about him?”

“Well, he keeps coming here. . . .”

“I don’t see why you should put the entire responsibility up to me!” said Miss Gittings tartly.

“You brought him here the first time.”

“I didn’t!”

“Sister!”

“He brought me. . . . Huh? . . .”

“Oh, he makes me so uncomfortable!” cried Mrs. Boardman from her heart. “And you, too, sister! It is useless for you to deny it!”

Miss Gittings did not deny it. She merely stirred her coffee. After awhile she said: “I think my first plan. . . . Huh? . . . A strangely pertinacious boy! . . . Let us take him. . . . That must be his Jewish blood . . . to a meeting of the circle. If Professor Boiling or Mr. Latham should happen to. . . . Huh? They being men . . . it would be more suitable. . . .”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Boardman with a sigh. “Certainly he is too much for us! . . . But sister,” she objected. “If we took him to one of the meetings wouldn’t it look as if we were prepared to vouch for him?”

“Vouch for him?” echoed Miss Gittings, startled. “Huh? . . . Well, what alternative is there?”

“I thought we might just mention Joe to Professor Bolling, without taking any responsibility for him, and ask the Professor here some night to question Joe.”

Miss Gittings considered the suggestion. “Yes,” she said, “letting the professor understand of course that our minds were quite. . . . Huh? We might ask Mr. Latham the same night; and Mrs. Van Buren; but not the other members of the circle with whom we are not exactly on. . . . Yes! And we might ask two or three people from outside the circle to whom we wish to show some little. . . . Quite informally. . . . Huh? . . . But Joe himself, sister, do you think. . . . Huh? . . .”

“Oh, I’m sure he will behave admirably,” said Mrs. Boardman, not without a touch of bitterness. “He is so quick to adapt himself.”

“It must all be very informal. . . . You might make one of your Spanish buns. . . . Huh?”

“Do you think we could pass wine? In father’s day. . . .”

“I think that would be an affectation now. Everybody knows that we do not keep wine in the house. . . . It would give us an opportunity of asking Cousin Emily Gore here. . . . Huh? . . . She affects to be interested in. . . . And we cannot entertain such rich people in any formal way.”

“Do you suppose Amasa Gore would come?” asked Mrs. Boardman eagerly.

“Naturally; if it was in the evening. Cousin Emily is not the sort of woman who goes out in the evening without her husband.”

“Oh! in that case he could meet Wilfred, without it seeming to have been contrived! Oh, sister! if Mr. Gore would only take an interest in Wilfred, the boy’s future would be secure! . . . But Wilfred is _so_ difficult!”

“I will prepare him beforehand,” said Miss Gittings.

“No! No! sister. I confess I do not understand the boy, but I am sure that would be a mistake! He becomes so cynical and obstinate when we try to point out a proper course of action to him. Say nothing to him beforehand. It is the only way!”

“Oh well, in any case Mr. Gore must do _something_. . . . Huh? . . . We may properly let them see that we expect it. . . . His wife’s first cousin only once removed! . . . A pitcher of lemonade will be much more suitable. . . .”

“What about a bottle of whiskey for the gentlemen?”

“Cousin Emily would hardly approve. She has strong views. . . .”

VII

Miss Gittings had asked Joe if he would come on such and such a night, and let a college professor question him about his “psychical” experiences. There would be a few other friends present, she said. When Joe had suggested that his clothes were hardly suitable for an evening party, he had been met with silence and pained looks. He had not really expected to get a new suit out of it; he had discovered before this that these people, though they lived nice, were poor in the sense that they had to look twice at every dollar. He had begun to ask himself if they were worth bothering about; he hadn’t got anything out of it; but now he decided that the chance of meeting their friends was worth one more night of his time.

Joe conceived the idea of bracing Isador Cohen for a new suit on the strength of his rise in society. Cohen kept the best-known secondhand store in town on lower Sixth avenue, and Joe had had various dealings with him. There were fine clothes in his store, too. So Joe had told his story to Cohen, offering to prove it by letting Izzy see him go into the Eleventh street house by the front door. Izzy took him up; and not only did he see Joe admitted to the house; but a moment later he received a greeting from Joe through the parlor window. Izzy subsequently allowed, that Joe was a smart feller, and advanced him a suit, and all the fixings. Joe picked out a neat blue cheviot of good quality, and was fitted and sewed up on the spot. At Izzy’s they specialized in providing a man with a quick change.

The party was for eight o’clock. Joe was the first to arrive. The ladies of the house were greatly pleased with his improved appearance; but the white-faced boy walked out of the room when Joe entered, and did not appear again, until the other guests had come, and his Aunt went up-stairs to fetch him. The college professor proved to be a young man, tall; elegantly-dressed; and having a sort of childlike, wild eye. The other guests were mostly elderly. They were all solemn. Joe had not the slightest anxiety on the score of fooling them; because they obviously wanted to be fooled; and expected it. He made out to be quiet and bashful among the strangers. The white-faced boy was watching everything he did with a sneering smile: he was on to Joe. What of it? Joe was on to him, too.

Joe was reminded of a Broadway play by the way all the people sat and stood around the drawing-room, talking in fancy voices with the idea of letting each other know what fine people they were. Like kids at a sidewalk game. It was funny to see full-grown men standing for it.

The last pair of guests drove up to the house in a handsome carriage with two dummies on the outside seat, wearing tall hats with ornaments at the sides, and dark green overcoats with silver buttons. Joe watched them from the window. One dummy jumped down from his seat before the carriage quite stopped, as if he was worked by clockwork, and ran around behind the carriage to be ready to open the door. That’s what I call style, thought Joe.

The entrance of this pair into the drawing-room changed the whole atmosphere of the party. It was clear to Joe from the silky quality that appeared in the attitude of everybody present, that these were not just ordinary rich people, but something exceptional. The professor was nowhere now. Seeing this, all Joe’s faculties sharpened. He recognized a great opportunity. His whole nature went out to the new arrivals. He became one great yearning; to get next! to get next! The other people in the room ceased to exist for him.

The gentleman was a handsome, middle-aged man, somewhat soft in face and body. He wore a fine dress suit; and sported a neat, pointed beard. His expression was inclined to be sulky; his eyes gave nothing away. The lady was a tall, spare, faded blonde; wearing an expensive, ugly green silk dress, and a good deal of jewelry. She had a proud, sour look; and took all the smiles and bows of the people present as her right; whereas the gentleman was indifferent to them. Joe hung around them, hoping to be taken notice of. He had not been brought to the attention of any of the guests yet. The lady put up her glasses, and looked at him as if he had been something in the menagerie; the gentleman took no notice of him whatever.

Joe soon gave the lady up. She was not in his line at all. He concentrated passionately on the gentleman. He surrendered himself, that, by entering into this other nature, he might command it. By degrees Joe became aware that the gentleman scorned spirits and spiritualists: that he had been brought there against his will: that rich though they might be, his wife had him tied fast to her strings: that behind his grand front lurked a timid soul. He was an intensely respectable party; his clothes; his expression; his whole bearing showed how conscious he was of being respectable: and yet! . . . and yet! . . . The sharpened Joe at certain moments perceived a pained roll to the man’s eyeballs, such as you see sometimes in a horse. He had a trick of wetting his lips with his tongue; and when he did so, Joe took note between mustache and beard of how fleshy and dark those lips were. Joe glanced at the sour-faced wife, and smiled inwardly. Hope dawned. With a man so respectable as that, you’d have to be damn careful what you _said_; but you could let him see things without saying them.

Oblivious to the clack of voices in the room, and the moving about, Joe, quietly, with all the force of which he was capable, desired the gentleman to look at him. Since the rich pair were the centers of attraction in the room; everybody trying to bespeak their notice by word or smile, his task was difficult. Joe was patient. It doesn’t matter how long it takes, he said to himself; he must look at me in the end . . . he _must_ look, because I want him to.

In the midst of a conversation with somebody else, the gentleman’s bored glance suddenly swerved to Joe. Joe, outwardly the quiet, abashed boy, let a world of meaning appear in his eyes for him alone. The gentleman was startled; he hastily turned away his glance. He changed color; puffed out his cheeks a little; twirled the ornament on his watch chain. By and by his eyes came creeping back to Joe’s face, and found Joe’s eyes waiting. The two pairs of eyes embraced, and were quickly cast down. I’ve got him going! thought Joe exultantly.

Joe had heard the gentleman addressed as Mr. Gore. That suggested nothing to him; Gore was a common enough name. But later, he heard the lady call her husband Amasa, and when he put the two names together, a great light broke on him. Amasa Gore! Joe had read plenty about _him_ in the newspapers. One of the sons of Isaac Gore, with whose story every boy of the streets was familiar. The smartest guy America had ever produced; the little wizard of finance; the railroad wrecker; who used to throw Wall street into a panic by holding up a finger; and who died leaving a hundred million dollars. For an instant Joe’s heart failed him at the bigness of the game he had cut out for himself; _Amasa Gore_! But he stole another look into the gentleman’s face, and confidence came winging back. He was only a man like any other. He was easy!

When the psychical part of the evening was introduced, Joe accommodated himself to the wind from Mr. Gore’s quarter. If Mr. Gore had come there expecting to give the laugh to the spiritualists, naturally he would be put out if the show appeared to be a success.

So Joe turned tongue-tied and idiotic. He could relate no interesting experiences; he boggled at answering the simplest questions. The ladies of the house were astonished and shamed before their guests; the professor was nonplussed; the white-faced boy in the background though he had always mocked at the psychical experiences, looked at the distressed faces of his Aunts and was angry. However, Joe cared nothing about these people now. He saw that Mrs. Gore took the failure of the exhibition as a personal affront to herself, and that her husband was secretly pleased that she was cross. Joe was satisfied with the outcome.

The professor abruptly dropped his questioning, and the while company plunged nervously into general conversation again. Joe saw that they would have liked to kick him out, but they couldn’t, because it would not have been high-toned. Instead, they all made out from that moment that Joe was no longer present. That suited Joe very well. He remained in an obscure corner between the end of the piano and the dining-room door. At intervals Mr. Gore’s uneasy eyes crept to Joe’s face, and never failed to find Joe’s eyes waiting.

There were great difficulties in Joe’s way. Mr. Gore was so respectable and scary, he saw that it would be up to him to make all the running. In the end his man might escape him out of sheer funk. It was necessary for him to have a private word or two with Mr. Gore before the evening was over; and how was that to be managed when the millionaire was continually surrounded by admiring listeners, who obliged him to play the respectable. That’s what’s the matter with him, thought Joe, thinking of the pained roll to his eyeballs; there’s always people watching him, and he never has a chance to be bad. Well . . . !

Refreshments were served. There was a blight upon the party, and while it was still early, the ladies retired up-stairs to put on their wraps. The gentlemen had left their hats and coats on the hall-rack, and they stood in the hall talking, while they waited for the ladies. Besides Mr. Gore and the Professor, there were two others. The boy who lived in the house had disappeared. It was now or never with Joe. With a modest air he made his way out between the gentlemen. He knew Mr. Gore would look at him as he passed; and he did look. Joe gave him a speaking glance; and letting himself out the door, waited on the stoop.

It worked. Mr. Gore presently came through the door behind him, and glanced importantly below as if he had come out to make sure that his carriage was waiting. He made a great business of cutting and lighting a cigar; ignoring Joe. Joe smiled inwardly. He had but a precious second or two; no time to beat around the bush.

“I couldn’t go on with that fool business after I seen you,” he murmured. “I could see that you was on to that foolishness.”

“That was very, very wrong of you!” said Mr. Gore severely; “to deceive those good ladies!”

“I never thought of the wrong of it until after I seen you,” said Joe, making his eyes ask. “Then I was sorry all right. . . . It was them led me into it. They liked to be fooled. And I’m only a poor boy.”

“Have you no employment?” asked Mr. Gore.

Joe shook his head.

“Um! . . . Ha!” said the millionaire.

“Will you give me a job?” whispered Joe.

Mr. Gore looked scared, and puffed out his cheeks. “Impossible!” he said. “Ah . . . in my sort of business there is nothing suitable. . . .”

“Will you let me come to see you?”

“Impossible!”

“Oh, I don’t mean come to your house,” said Joe. “Of course the Madam wouldn’t like a poor boy like me comin’ round. . . . But to your office . . . ?”

“Quite impossible!” gasped the millionaire.

Joe heard the voices of the ladies within. He had but one more throw! “If you was to walk home to get the air, like,” he whispered swiftly, “I could catch up to you. And you could talk to me. If I only had a man like you to tell me what to do . . . !”

Mr. Gore gave no sign. The door opened, and the rest came streaming out on the stoop. Joe flattened himself against the balustrade, and watched. There were polite good-byes. It seemed to be the general feeling that the Gores must be allowed to get away first; and everybody else remained on the stoop, while the millionaire handed his wife down, and the footman opened the carriage door. Mr. Gore paused with a foot on the step, as if he had just had an idea.

“. . . Er, my dear,” said he to his wife, “I am smoking. I will walk home so that you may not be troubled by the fumes.”

Joe felt like God.

The footman closed the carriage door, and running around behind, climbed up nimbly as the carriage started. The turnout clip-clopped briskly down the street. Mr. Gore set off towards the Avenue, swinging his shoulders.

The long-legged young professor suddenly scampered down the steps. “Oh, Mr. Gore, if you’re walking . . . !” he cried.

In his heart Joe cursed him.

Mr. Gore paused politely. There was a brief exchange on the sidewalk which Joe could not hear. Then . . . the professor remained standing where he was with a foolish look, and Mr. Gore walked on, swinging his shoulders. Joe’s heart rebounded.