XVI
ENTER—JIM
It was with a light heart that Rose-Marie started back to the tenement. The tears had cleared her soul of the months of evasion that had so worried her—she felt suddenly free and young and happy. It was as if a rainbow had come up, tenderly, out of a storm-tossed sky; it was as if a star was shining, all at once, through the blackness of midnight. She felt a glad assurance of the future—a faith in the Hand of God, stretched out to His children. "Everything," she sing-songed, joyously, to herself, "will come right, now. Everything will come right!"
It was strange how she suddenly loved all of the people, the almost mongrel races of people, who thronged the streets! She smiled brightly at a mother, pushing a baby-buggy—she thrust a coin into the withered hand of an old beggar. On a crowded corner she paused to listen to the vague carollings of a barrel organ, to pat the head of a frayed looking little monkey that hopped about in time to the music. All at once she wanted to know a dozen foreign languages so that she could tell those who passed her by that she was their friend—their friend!
And yet, despite her sudden feeling of kinship to these people of the slums, she did not loiter. For she was the bearer of a message, a message of hope! She wished, as she sped through the crowded streets, that her feet were winged so that she might hurry the faster! She wanted to see the expression of bewilderment on Mrs. Volsky's face, she wanted to see a light dawn in Ella's great eyes, she wanted to whisper a message of—of life, almost—into Lily's tiny useless ear. And, most of all, she wanted to feel Bennie's warm, grubby little fingers touching her hand! Jim—she hoped that Jim would be out when she arrived. She did not want to have Jim throw cold water upon her plans—which did not include him. Well she knew that the arrangement would make no real difference to him—it was not love of family that kept him from leaving the dirty, crowded little flat. It was the protection of a family, with its pseudo-respectability, that he wanted. It was the locked room, which no one would think of prying into, that he desired.
She went in through the mouth-like tenement door—it was no longer frightful to her—with a feeling of intense emotion. She climbed the narrow stairs, all five flights of them, with never a pause for breath. And then she was standing, once again, in front of the Volskys' door. She knocked, softly.
Everything was apparently very still in the Volsky flat. All up and down the hall came the usual sounds of the house; the stairs echoed with noise. But behind the closed door silence reigned supreme. As Rose-Marie stood there she felt a strange mental chill—the chill of her first doubt. Perhaps the Volskys would not want to come with her to the Settlement House, perhaps they would resent her attitude—would call it interference. Perhaps they would tell her that they were tired of her—and of her plans. Perhaps—But the door, swinging open, cut short her suppositions.
Jim stood in the doorway. He was in his shirt sleeves but—even divested of his coat—he was still too painfully immaculate—too well groomed. Rose-Marie, looking at him, felt a sudden primitive desire to see him dirty and mussed up. She wished, and the wish surprised her, that she might sometime see him with his hair rumpled, his collar torn, his eye blackened and—she could hardly suppress a hysterical desire to laugh as the thought struck her—his nose bleeding. Somehow his smooth, hard neatness was more offensive to her than his mother's dirty apron—than his small brother's frankly grimy hands. She spoke to him in a cool little voice that belied her inward disturbance.
"Where," she questioned, "are your mother and Ella? I want to see them."
With a movement that was not ungraceful Jim flung wide the door. Indeed, Rose-Marie told herself, as she stepped into the Volsky flat, Jim was never ungraceful. There was something lithe and cat-like in his slightest movement, just as there was something feline in the expression of his eyes. Rose-Marie often felt like a small, helpless mouse when Jim was staring at her.
"Where are your mother and Ella?" she questioned again as she stepped into the room. "I do want to see them!"
Jim was dragging forward a chair. He answered.
"Then yer'd better sit down 'n' make yourself at home," he told her, "fer they've gone out. They're down t' th' hospital, now, takin' a last slant at Pa. Ma's cryin' to beat th' band—you'd think that she really liked him! An' Ella's cryin', too—she's fergot how he uster whip her wit' a strap when she was a kid! An' they've took Bennie; Bennie ain't cryin' but he's a-holdin' to Ma's hand like a baby. Oh," he laughed sneeringly, "it's one grand little family group that they make!"
Rose-Marie sat down gingerly upon the edge of the chair. She did not relish the prospect of spending any time alone with Jim, but a certain feeling of pride kept her from leaving the place. She would not let Jim know that she feared him—it would flatter him to think that he had so much influence over her. She would stay, even though the staying made her uneasy! But she hoped, from the bottom of her heart, that the rest of the family would not be long at the hospital.
"When did they go out?" she questioned, trying to make her tone casual.
"Do you expect them back soon?"
Jim sat down in a chair that was near her own. He leaned forward as he answered.
"They haven't been gone so awful long," he told her. "An'—say—what's th' difference when they gets back? I never have no chance to talk wit' you—not ever! An'," he sighed with mock tragedy, "an' I have so much t' say t' yer! You never have a word fer me—think o' that! An' think o' all th' time yer waste on Bennie—an' him too young t' know a pretty girl when he sees one!"
Rose-Marie flushed and hated herself for doing it. "We'll leave personalities out of this!" she said primly.
Jim was laughing, but there was a sinister note in his mirth.
"Not much we won't!" he told her. "I like you—see? You're th' best lookin' girl in this neck o' woods—even if you do live at the Settlement House! If you'd learn to dress more snappy—t' care more about hats than yer do about Bible Classes—you'd make a big hit when yer walked out on Delancy Street. There ain't a feller livin' as wouldn't turn t' look at yer—not one! Say, kid," he leaned still closer, "I'm strong fer yer when yer cheeks get all pink-like. I'm strong fer yer any time a-tall!"
Rose-Marie was more genuinely shocked than she had ever been in her life.
The flush receded slowly from her face.
"You'd like me to be more interested in clothes than in Bible Classes!" she said slowly. "You'd like me to go parading down Delancy Street …" she paused, and then—"You're a fine sort of a man," she said bitterly—"a fine sort of a man! Oh, I know. I know the sort of people you introduce to Ella—and she's your sister. I've seen the way you look at Lily, and she's your sister, too! You wouldn't think of making things easier for your mother; and you'd give Bennie a push down—instead of a boost up! And you scoff at your father—lying dead in his coffin! You're a fine sort of a man…. I don't believe that you've a shred of human affection in your whole make-up!"
Jim had risen slowly to his feet. There was no anger in his face—only a huge amusement. Rose-Marie, watching his expression, knew all at once that nothing she said would have the slightest effect upon him. His sensibilities were too well concealed, beneath a tough veneer of conceit, to be wounded. His soul seemed too well hidden to be reached.
"So that's what you think, is it?" he asked, and his voice was almost silky, it was so smooth, "so that's what you think! I haven't any 'human affection in my make-up,'" he was imitating her angry voice, "I haven't any 'human affection'!" he laughed suddenly, and bent with a swift movement until his face was on a level with her face. "Lot yer know about it!" he told her and his voice thickened, all at once, "lot yer know about it! I'm crazy about you, little kid—just crazy! Yer th' only girl as I've ever wanted t' tie up to, get that? How'd yer like t' marry me?"
For one sickening moment Rose-Marie thought that she had misunderstood. And then she saw his face and knew that he had been deadly serious. Her hands fluttered up until they rested, like frightened birds, above her heart.