But for a minute McDowell Sutro could read no further. His eyes had filled with tears.
(1895.)
AN IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT
HE summer sun had blazed down all day on the low wooden roof of the old shed lately used as an ice-cream saloon, and now hastily altered to accommodate a post of the Salvation Army. Placards at the wide doorway proclaimed that All were Welcome, and besought the stranger to Come in and be Saved. The tall tenements that lined the side-streets east and west had emptied their hundreds of inhabitants out into the avenue that evening, and the sidewalks were thronged with men and women languid from the heat of the day, and longing for the lazy breeze that sometimes creeps into the city with nightfall; but few of them cared to enter the stifling hall where the song-service was about to begin, and that night especially there were many counter-attractions out-doors. Already were the rockets beginning to burst far above the square where the fireworks were to be displayed; and now and again a boy (who had more than boyish self-control) produced a reserve pack of fire-crackers, and dropped them into a barrel, and capered away with delight as the owner of the barrel was called to his door by the rattle of their explosion.
A pale and thin young woman, in the uniform of the Salvation Army, stood wearily in the entrance, proffering the War Cry to all those who came near. She looked as though she had been pretty when she was a girl. Now she was obviously worn and weak, like one recovering from a long illness. High up over her head appeared a shower of colored stars shot forth from a bomb; and then she remembered how she had seen the fireworks on the last Fourth of July, only a year before, lying on her bed which Jim had pulled to the window before he went down to conduct the meeting. She had lain there peacefully with her two-weeks-old baby in her arms, and it had seemed to her as though the glowing wheels that revolved in the air, and the curving lines of fire that rose and fell again, were but a prefiguration of a golden future where all would be splendor and glory. How that vision had faded into blackness in the months that followed!—when the baby sickened because they had not proper food for him, and when Jim broke down also; and she had had to get up, feeble as she was, and nurse them both until they died, one after another. When she let herself think of those days of despair, she had always to make a resolute effort if she did not wish to give way and go into a fit of sobbing that left her exhausted for the next twenty-four hours.
She mastered her rising emotion and turned for relief to the duty of the moment. For five minutes no one had bought a paper from her, and the time had come to go into the hall to take part in the service of song.
She pushed inside the swinging-door and found that perhaps a score of visitors had gathered, and that already half a dozen members of the Salvation Army had taken their seats at the edge of the low platform at the end of the shallow hall. Captain Quigley was standing there, with his shiny black hair carefully curled and his pointed beard carefully combed. He was waiting, ready to begin, with his accordion in his hands.
She wondered why it was that she was always sorry to have Captain Quigley lead the service. She would not deny that he led well, giving a swing to the tunes he played that carried all the people off their feet; he sang sweetly and he spoke feelingly. But she did not altogether like his manner, which was almost patronizing; and then he had a way of bringing her suddenly into his remarks and of calling her forward needlessly. Even after her two years' service she shrank from personalities and from self-exhibition. Yet there was no doubt that he meant to be kind to her, and she knew that he had allowed her special privileges more than once. With motherly kindness Adjutant Willetts had asked her only a week before if she really liked Captain Quigley, telling her that if she did not like him, she ought to be careful not to encourage him, and since that talk with the adjutant her distaste for the captain had been intensified.
It was as though Captain Quigley had been waiting for her to appear, for he began to speak as soon as he saw her. In a high nasal voice and with an occasional elided aspirate, he welcomed those present and told them he was glad that they had come. He asked them all to take part in singing the grand old hymn, "There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood." He set the tune with his accordion, and lined out the first stanza and led in the singing. Only three or four of the chance visitors joined in the song, the burden of which was borne by the members of the Salvation Army.