“Oh, I don't need any one to show me around these streets!”
“I will see you home,” I said.
So we walked quickly along the street together.
“Here it is,” she said finally, pointing to a dark, mean-looking, one-story house, set in a dingy, barren areaway.
“Well, good night, Maggie,” I said, “and good luck to you.”
“Good night,” she said faintly.
When I had walked to the corner, I stopped and looked back. She was standing stock-still just where I had left her—a figure I shall never forget.
I have hesitated about telling of a further strange thing that happened to me that night—but have decided at last to put it in. I did not accept Mr. Vedder's invitation: I could not; but I returned to the room in the tenement where I had spent the previous night with Bill Hahn the Socialist. It was a small, dark, noisy room, but I was so weary that I fell almost immediately into a heavy sleep. An hour or more later I don't know how long indeed—I was suddenly awakened and found myself sitting bolt upright in bed. It was close and dark and warm there in the room, and from without came the muffled sounds of the city. For an instant I waited, rigid with expectancy. And then I heard as clearly and plainly as ever I heard anything:
“David! David!” in my sister Harriet's voice.
It was exactly the voice in which she has called me a thousand times. Without an instant's hesitation, I stepped out of bed and called out: