IV
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.