When she saw that he was gone, Violet fell upon the tumbled, unmade bed and cried with all the vehemence of her unrestrained, shallow nature.
For she was sick and weary and hungry. She had given her last dollar to a policeman the night before to keep from arrest. The oldest boy had gone to school without breakfast. The little children were playing in the street--they had begged food at the neighbors" and she had no heart to stop them. At noon when little Tom came in he found his mother sitting before a number of paper sacks upon the table waiting for him.
Then the family ate out of the sacks the cold meal she had bought at the grocery store with John Dexter"s money.
That night Violet shivered out into the cold over her usual route. She was walking through the railroad yards in Magnus when suddenly she came upon a man who dropped stealthily out of a dead engine. He carried something shining and tried to slip it under his coat when he saw her.
She knew he was stealing bra.s.s, but she did not care; she called as they pa.s.sed through the light from an arc lamp:
"h.e.l.lo, sweetheart--where you going?"
The man looked up ashamed, and she turned a brazen, painted face at him and tried to smile without opening her lips.
Their eyes met, and the man caught her by the arm and cried:
"G.o.d, Violet--is this you--have you--" She cut him off with:
"Henry Fenn--why--Henry--"
The bra.s.s fell at his feet. He did not pick it up. They stood between the box cars in speechless astonishment. It was the man who found voice.
"Violet--Violet," he cried. "This is h.e.l.l. I"m a thief and you--"
"Say it--say it--don"t spare me," she cried. "That"s what I am, Henry.
It"s all right about me, but how about you, how about you, Henry? This is no place for you! Why, you," she exclaimed--"why, you are--"
"I"m a drunken thief stealing bra.s.s couplings to get another drink, Violet."
He picked up the bra.s.s and threw it up into the engine, still clutching her arm so that she could not run away.
"But, girl--" he cried, "you"ve got to quit this--this is no way for you to live."
She looked at him to see what was in his mind. She broke away, and scrambled into the engine cab and put the bra.s.s where it could not fall out.
"You don"t want that bra.s.s falling out, and them tracing you down here and jugging you--you fool," she panted as she climbed to the ground.
"Lookee here, Henry Fenn," she cried, "you"re too good a man for this.
You"ve had a dirty deal. I knew it when she married you--the snake; I know it--I"ve always known it."
The woman"s voice was shrill with emotion. Fenn saw that she was verging on the hysterical, and took her arm and led her down the dark alley between the cars. The man"s heart was touched--partly by the wreck he saw, and partly by her words. They brought back the days when he and she had seen their visions. The liquor had left his head, and he was a tremble. He felt her cold, hard hand, and took it in his own dirty, shaken hand to warm it.
"How are you living?" he asked.
"This way," she replied. "I got my children--they"ve got to live someway. I can"t leave them day times and see "em run wild on the streets--the little girls need me."
She looked up into his face as they hurried past an arc lamp, and she saw tears there.
"Oh, you got a dirty deal, Henry--how could she do it?" cried the woman.
He did not answer and they walked up a dingy street. A car came howling by.
"Got car fare," he asked. She nodded.
"Well, I haven"t," he said, "but I"m going with you."
They boarded the car. They were the only pa.s.sengers. They sat down, and he said, under the roar of the wheels:
"Violet--it"s a shame--a d.a.m.n shame, and I"m not going to stand for it.
This a Market Street car?" he asked the conductor who pa.s.sed down the aisle for their fares. The woman paid. When the conductor was gone, Henry continued:
"Three kids and a mother robbed by a Judge who knew better--just to stand in with the kept attorneys of the bar a.s.sociation. He could have knocked the shenanigan, that killed Hogan, galley west, if he"d wanted to, and no Supreme Court would have dared to set it aside. But no--the kept lawyers at the Capital, and all the Capitals have a mutual admiration society, and Tom has always belonged. So he turns you and all like you on the street, and Violet, before G.o.d I"m going to try to help you."
She looked at the slick, greasy, torn stiff hat, and the dirty, shiny clothes that years ago had been his Sunday best, and the s.h.a.ggy face and the sallow, unwashed skin; and she remembered the man who was.
The car pa.s.sed into South Harvey. She started to rise. "No," he said, stopping her, "you come on with me."
"Where are we going?" she asked. He did not answer. She sat down.
Finally the car turned into Market Street. They got off at the bank corner. The man took hold of the woman"s arm, and led her to the alley.
She drew back.
He said: "Are you afraid of me--now, Violet?" They slinked down the alley and seeing a light in the back room of a store, Fenn stopped and went up to peer in.
"Come on," he said. "He"s in."
Fenn tapped on the barred window and whistled three notes. A voice inside cried, "All right, Henry--soon"s I get this column added up."
The woman shrank back, but Fenn held her arm. Then the door opened, and the moon face of Mr. Brotherton appeared in a flood of light. He saw the woman, without recognizing her, and laughed:
"Are we going to have a party? Come right in, Marianna--here"s the moated Grange, all right, all right."
As they entered, he tried to see her face, but she dropped her head.
Fenn asked, "Why, George--don"t you know her? It"s Violet--Violet Mauling--who married Denny Hogan who was killed last winter."
George Brotherton looked at the painted face, saw the bald attempt at coquetry in her dress, and as she lifted her glazed, dead eyes, he knew her story instantly.
For she wore the old, old mask of her old, old trade.
"You poor, poor girl," he said gently. Then continued, "Lord--but this is tough."
He saw the miserable creature beside him and would have smiled, but he could not. Fenn began,
"George, I just got tired of coming around here every night after closing for my quarter or half dollar; so for two or three weeks I"ve been stealing. She caught me at it; caught me stripping a dead engine down in the yards by the round house."
"Yes," she cried, lifting a poor painted face, "Mr. Brotherton--but you know how I happened to be down there. He caught me as much as I caught him! And I"m the worst--Oh, G.o.d, when they get like me--that"s the end!"
The three stood silently together. Finally Brotherton spoke: "Well," he drew a long breath, "well, they don"t need any h.e.l.l for you two--do they?" Then he added, "You poor, poor sheep that have gone astray. I don"t know how to help you."
"Well, George--that"s just it," replied Fenn. "No one can help us. But by G.o.d"s help, George, I can help her! There"s that much go left in me yet! Don"t you think so, George?" he asked anxiously. "I can help her."
The weak, trembling face of the man moved George Brotherton almost to tears. Violet"s instinct saw that Brotherton could not speak and she cried: