A COMMITTEE FROM KELLY'S
By J.V.Z. Belden
"Katherine—give it up, dear—" The man looked down into the earnest eyes of the girl as she sat in the shadow of a palm in the conservatory at the Morrison's. Strains of music from the ball-room fell on unheeding ears and she sighed as she looked up at him.
"I can not turn back now, Everett," she said. "Ever since that day I spent down on the east side I have looked at life from a different standpoint. A message came to me then and I must listen. For a year I have been preparing myself to take my part in this work. To-morrow I take possession of what is called a model flat, and I hope to teach those poor little children something besides the three R's. To tell them how to take a little sunshine into their dismal homes." She looked like some fair saint with her face illumined with love of humanity.
"Might I venture to suggest that there is plenty of room for sunshine in an old house up the Avenue," said the man wistfully.
The girl looked up quickly—"Don't, Everett, give me six months to see what I can do—then I will answer the question you asked me last night."
"Oh, my dear, my dear," he said, "you do not know how I hate to have you go down there. My sympathy with the great unwashed is not deep enough for me to be willing to have you mingle with them. Then, to be quite honest, I have found them rather a happy lot."
"Listen, Everett," said the girl. "Come down to me a month from to-night and I will show you that I am right and you are wrong."
"A whole month!" the man protested.
"Yes, a whole month—"
The sun was shining into the front windows of a room on the first floor of a high tenement down on the east side. A snow-white bed stood far enough from the wall to allow it to be made up with perfect ease. In front of it stood a screen covered with pretty chintz; white muslin curtains hung at the windows; everything was spotless from the kalsomined ceiling to the oiled floors, where a few bright-colored rugs made walking possible. As Katherine Anderson explained to some scoffing friends who came down to take luncheon with her.
"Everything is clean and in its proper place and the object-lesson is invaluable to these poor children. If you go into their homes you will find that the bed is a bundle of rags in some dark closet, while the front room is kept for company. Here I show them how easily this sunny room is made into a sitting-room by putting that screen in front of the bed and then there is a healthful place to sleep. You may think that I am over-enthusiastic, but I enjoy my classes and I assure you they are all day long, for besides the usual schoolroom work we have cooking classes, physical culture, nature classes and little talks about all sorts of things. I have one girl who I know is going to be a great novelist, she has such an imagination," said Katherine. "Her big sister always has a duplicate of anything of mine the child happens to admire, and the other day she came rushing in with the tale that 'burglars' had broken into their house the night before and stolen twenty bottles of ketchup and 'some preserts.'"
"Had they?" asked the guest. "What peculiar taste in burglary!"
"No," laughed Katherine; "she has no big sister and their house is one back room four flights up."
Four weeks had passed since the Morrison dinner, and Katherine was tired. Then, too, she was not altogether sure that her mission was a success. Was she wishing for the fleshpots of upper Fifth Avenue, or was it just physical weariness that would pass with the night? She had sent off a note in the morning:
"My Dear Everett—The work of the model flat is still in existence, and it is almost a month—a whole month. On Saturday afternoon I am expecting some of the mothers to come and tell me what they think of the work we are doing for their children. They will probably be gone by five o'clock, and if you care to come down at that time I might be induced to go out to dinner with you. Don't bother about a chaperon. As I feel now, I could chaperon a chorus girl myself.
"Cordially,
"Katherine."
Whether the meeting at Mrs. Kelly's had been called together by engraved cards, by postals, or simply by shrieking from one window to another, I do not know, but there was evidently some excitement, some deep feeling which needed expression among the little crowd of women in the fourth floor, back.
"I tell ye," shouted Mrs. Kelly, to make herself heard above the din of many voices, "I tell ye we must organize, an' Tim Kelly himself says it. Only last Satady night, an' him swearin' wid hunger, an' me faintin' wid the big wash I had up the Avenoo, what did we come home to but hull wheat bred an' ags olla Beckymell. There stood my Katy, wid her han's on her hips, a-sayin' as 'teacher said' them things was nourishiner than b'iled cabbage. Well, Tim was that mad he broke every plate on the table an' then went and drank hisself stiff in Casey's saloon."
"And what do ye think," cried Mrs. McGinniss, as Mrs. Kelly stopped for breath, "the other night, when me an' some frinds was comin' in for a quiet avenin', we found my Ellen Addy had hauled the bed into the front room, an' she an' the young ones was all asleep, an' up to the winders was my best petticut cut in two. When I waked her up she whined, 'Teacher says it ain't healthy to sleep in back.' Did ye ever hear the like of that? an' every blessed one of them kids born there!"
"Now, wha' d'ye think o' that?" murmured the crowd.
Mrs. Kelly caught her breath and began again. "I've axed ye to come here because teacher sent word that she'd like the mothers to come of a Satady and tell her how they liked what she was doin' for the young ones. Tim says as they sends a committee from men's meetings, and I think if Mrs. McGinniss, Mrs. McGraw and me was to riprisint this gatherin' we could tell her how we all feels."
It was Saturday afternoon, and the model flat was in perfect order, while the little servant, called "friend" by Miss Anderson, waited in her spotless apron to answer the bell. Another object-lesson for the mothers who were expected. The bell rang and three women walked soberly into the little hall.
"I am so glad to see you, Mrs. Kelly, and you, Mrs. McGinniss." She hesitated at the third name.
"'Tis Mrs. McGraw," said Mrs. Kelly.
"Bring the tea, Louisa," said Miss Anderson, "and then I want to show you how pleasant my home is here."
Mrs. Kelly gave a sniff. "Hum, yessum, it's sunny, but I've seen your home up town, and it's beyond the likes of me to see why you're down here at all, at all."
"Yes," said Mrs. McGinniss, "an' I've come to say that you'd better stay up there an' stop teachin' my childer about their insides. I'm tired of hearin' 'I can't eat this an' I can't eat that, cause teacher says there ain't no food walue.' An' there's Mrs. Polinski, down the street, says she'll have no more foolishness."
Mrs. Kelly had caught her breath again. "Her Rebecca come home only yestidy an' cut all the stitches in Ikey's clo'es, an' him sewed up for the winter."
Just then a woman with a shawl over her head came in without knocking. With a nod to the three women, she faced the teacher. "Now, I'd like to know one thing," she said; "you sent my Josie home this morning to wash the patchouly offen her hair; now, I want to know just one thing—does she come here to be smelt or to be learnt?"
"There's another thing, too," said Mrs. Kelly; "I want that physical torture business stopped. The young ones are tearin' all their clo'es off, an' it's got to be stopped!"
Katherine looked a little dazed and her voice trembled a bit as she said: "Wouldn't you like to look at the flat?"
"No, Miss, we wouldn't," said Mrs. Kelly. "You're a nice young woman, and you don't mean no harm, but it's the sinse av the committee that you're buttin' in. Good day to ye." And they filed slowly out.
Katherine, with cheeks aflame, turned toward the door. There was a twinkle in Landon's eyes as he said:
"Are you quite ready for dinner, dear?"
There was a little break in her voice, and she gave him both her hands.
"Quite ready for—for anything, Everett."