New York (State) -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
Rage made Miss Silsby generous. She paid Kedzie an extra week and her
fare to New York. Kedzie had no pocket to put her money in. She carried
it in her hand and laid it on the table in the tent as she bent to whip
her lithe form out of her one dripping garment.
The other nymphs followed her into the tent and made a Parthenonian
frieze as they writhed out of their tunics and into their petticoats.
They gathered about Kedzie in an ivory cluster and murmured their
sympathy--Miss Silsby not being within ear-shot.
Kedzie blubbered bitterly as she glided into her everyday things,
hooking her corsets askew, drawing her stockings up loosely, and lacing
her boots all wrong. She was still jolted with sobs as she pushed the
hat-pins home in her traveling-hat.
She kissed the other girls good-by. They were sorry to see her go, now
that she was going. And she was very sorry to go, now that she had to.
If she had lingered awhile Miss Silsby would have found her there when
she relented from sheer exhaustion of wrath, and would have restored her
to favor. But Kedzie had stolen away in craven meekness.
To reach the trade-entrance Kedzie had to skirt the accursed pool of her
destruction. Charity Coe was near it, seated on a marble bench alone.
She was pensive with curious thoughts. She heard Kedzie's childish
snivel as she passed. Charity looked up, recognized the girl with
difficulty, and after a moment's hesitation called to her:
“What's the matter, you poor child? Come here! What's wrong?”
Kedzie suffered herself to be checked. She dropped on the bench
alongside Charity and wailed:
“I fell into that damn' pool, and I've lost my jah-ob!”
Charity patted the shaken back a moment, and said, “But there are other
jobs, aren't there?”
“I don't know of any.”
“Well, I'll find you one, my dear, if you'll only smile. You have such a
pretty smile.”
“How do you know?” Kedzie queried, giving her a sample of her best.
Charity laughed. “See! That proves it. You are a darling, and too pretty
to lack for a job. Give me your address, and I'll get you a better place
than you lost. I promise you.”
Kedzie ransacked her hand-bag and found a printed card, crumpled and
rouge-stained. She poked it at Charity, who read and commented:
“Miss Anita Adair, eh? Such a pretty name! And the address, my dear--if
you don't mind. I am Mrs. Cheever.”
“Oh, are you!” Kedzie exclaimed. “I've heard of you. Pleased to meet
you.”
Then Kedzie whimpered, and Charity wrote the address and repeated her
assurances. She also gave Kedzie her own card and asked her to write
to her. That seemed to end the interview, and so Kedzie rose and said:
“Much obliged. I guess I gotta go now. G'-by!”
“Good-by,” said Charity. “I'll not forget you.”
Kedzie moved on humbly. She looked back. Charity had fallen again into
a listless reverie. She seemed sad. Kedzie wondered what on earth she
could have to be sorry about. She had money and a husband, and she was
swagger.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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