Instead, she elected to carry in person to their proper destination the cash contributions already in hand, and along with them a somewhat more cumbersome offering consisting of a one-piece costume sent by a young lady in the theatrical profession—the chorus profession, to be circumstantial about it—who had accompanied the donation with a note on scented violet note [261] paper, with a crest, stating that she wished the devoted mother of those “poor birdlings”—a direct quotation, this, from Miss Gwin’s story—to have the frock, and to keep it and wear it for her very own. With the Compliments of Miss Trixie Adair, of the Gay Gamboliers Musical Comedy Company.
Thus laden, Miss Gwin descended upon Pike Street and ascended upon the Finkelsteins, bringing with her, in addition to the other things mentioned, an air of buoyancy and good cheer. As on the occasion of her former call, two days earlier, the medium of intercourse between the visitor and the heads of the household was Miriam, aged nine, the topmost round of the family stepladder, ably reenforced by her brother Solly, who was mentioned just a bit ago with particular reference to his ears. In truth I should put it the other way round; for, to be exact, it was Solly who sustained the main burden of translation, his sister being a shy little thing and he in temperament emphatically the opposite.
Besides, his opportunities for acquiring facility and a repertoire in tongues had been more extensive than hers. While Miriam frequented the hallways of the tenement, or, at best, the sidewalk in front of it, concerned with the minding of the twins—Israel and Isadore, but both called, for convenience, Izzy—it was his practice to range far and wide, risking death beneath trolley cars, capture by the law, and [262] murder at the hands of roused custodians of jobbing houses and buildings in course of construction, about which he lurked on the lookout for empty packing cases and bits of planking, and the like—such stuff as might be dragged home and there converted into household furnishings or stove fuel, depending upon whether at the moment the establishment stood more desperately in need of something to sit on than of something to burn.
Even now, at the tender age of seven, going on eight, Solly betrayed the stirrings of a restless ambition such as his sire had never known. It was an open question whether he would grow up to be a gunman or a revered captain of finance. A tug of fate might set his eager footsteps toward either goal. Already he had a flowing command of the sort of English spoken by startled and indignant motormen, pestered policemen and watchmen, tempted by provocation
entirely beyond their powers of self-control. So Solly served as chief interpreter while Miss Gwin informally tendered the presents that had been intrusted to her charge for transmission.
In the same spirit Papa and Mamma Finkelstein, who continued to entertain the vaguest of theories regarding the sources of and the reasons for these benefactions, accepted them gratefully, with no desire to look a gift horse in the mouth. Gift horses were strange livestock in their experience, anyhow.
[263]
The money—eight dollars and ninety-five cents, all told—went for fuel and food; but mainly for food. With the Finkelsteins, life was a feast or else it was a famine; in their scheme of domestic economics they sought no middle ground. As for the gown bestowed by Miss Trixie Adair, of the Gay Gamboliers, Mamma Finkelstein started wearing it right away, merely adapting it to existing conditions—conditions that were, with her, not only existent but, I may say, chronic. It was—or had been—a pale-blue evening gown of a satinlike material, with no neck and no sleeves to the upper part, but with a gracefully long train to the skirt part, and made to hook up the back.
Because of the frequency of the demands put upon the maternal resources by the newest and smallest Finkelstein, it was deemed expedient and, in fact, essential to turn the gown round backward, so as to have the bodice fastenings directly in front of Mamma Finkelstein instead of directly behind her. This necessitated drawing the train up from beneath the occupant’s feet and draping it, sash-fashion, about her waist. Mamma Finkelstein wore it so. She was wearing it so that afternoon when Mrs. F. Fodderwood Bass arrived, direct from upper Fifth Avenue, and also the next morning when Miss Godiva Sleybells came, representing, semi-officially and most competently, the Cherry Hill Neighbourhood House.
Since of these two Mrs. F. Fodderwood Bass [264] was first, firstly then we may consider her. I will begin by stating that she was a lady of augmented wealth and indubitable preeminence, being of that elect group who have ceased merely to smell society from afar off and now taste of its exclusive delights close up. For her it had been a hard climb, laboriously uphill all the way, boulder-strewn and beset by hazards, pitfalls and obstacles. But she had arrived finally upon those snow-capped peaks where the temperature is ever below freezing and life may only be maintained artificially.
Inasmuch as she had not been born to breathe the atmosphere of this rarefied altitude, but had achieved her right to breathe it by her own efforts, Mrs. F. Fodderwood Bass felt it incumbent on her to maintain her position away up there on Mount Saint Elias by such manifold and varied activities as were most aptly designed to make for publicity, which meant prominence, which meant success. For the moment she was principally concerned with living up to the rôle of good angel to the worthily indigent. Those who loved her and in return wished to be loved by her called her the Lady Bountiful of the Slums.