She was alone. She had never felt so much alone when miles from any other human being, as she sometimes had been on the range. What had Dud said about this? That one could be very much alone in the big city? Dud was right.
She wished that she had Dud Stone’s address. She surely would have communicated with him now, for he was probably back in New York by this time.
However, there was just one person whom she had met in New York who seemed to the girl from Sunset Ranch as being “all right.” And when she made up her mind to do as her uncle had directed about the new frock, it was of this person Helen naturally thought.
Sadie Goronsky! The girl who had shown herself so friendly the night Helen had come to town. She worked in a store where they sold ladies’ clothing. With no knowledge of the cheaper department stores than those she had seen on the avenue, it seemed quite the right thing to Helen’s mind for her to search out Sadie and her store.
So, after an early breakfast taken in Mr. Lawdor’s little room, and under the ministrations of that kind old man, Helen left the house—by the area door as requested—and started downtown.
She didn’t think of riding. Indeed, she had no idea how far Madison Street was. But she remembered the route the taxicab had taken uptown that first evening, and she could not easily lose her way.
And there was so much for the girl from the ranch to see—so much that was new and curious to her—that she did not mind the walk; although it took her until almost noon, and she was quite tired when she got to Chatham Square.
Here she timidly inquired of a policeman, who kindly crossed the wide street with her and showed her the way. On the southern side of Madison Street she wandered, curiously alive to everything about the district, and the people in it, that made them both seem so strange to her.
“A dress, lady! A hat, lady!”
The buxom Jewish girls and women, who paraded the street before the shops for which they worked, would give her little peace. Yet it was all done good-naturedly, and when she smiled and shook her head they smiled, too, and let her pass.