"My boy, I'm rich so long as there are millions of people in the world poorer than I am."
Perhaps there was an antidote better than this poison. If he could lift the curtain for a single moment in another life more hopeless and wretched than his? It was worth trying.
He rose, left the liquor untouched, and in a few minutes was treading his way through the throngs of the lower East Side. The pathetic figure of a sleeping boy curled up beside a doorstep caught his eye—he stopped and looked at him. Somewhere on this green earth a mother had bent over the cradle of each of these little wild arabs and taught them human speech at least! Now they were as the beasts of the field—and worse—for the fields in which beasts roam at least are free. A great wave of pity swept his heart and the hurt of his own tragedy began to ease before the greater pain of the world. How happy his fate after all—a sound mind in a sound body, youth, strength, power, friends, culture, the inheritance of proud, untainted blood—what a fool he had been an hour ago!
His eye caught the light streaming from a basement saloon on the corner. Crowds of ugly looking wretches were hurrying down the rickety stairs, and the sound of wheezy dance-hall music floated up from below. He pulled his hat down over his eyes and entered.
The ceiling was low, and a crowd of more than fifty half-drunken men and women, smoking and drinking stale beer, sat at the little tables which were placed against the walls. The centre of the room was kept clear for the dancers. He was amazed to find among them a lot of boys and girls not out of their teens. Many of the dark-visaged brutes who sat at the tables watching the dancers were beyond a doubt professional thieves and crooks.
Here and there he saw one of them nod to a girl who was dancing with a boy under age. He knew the meaning of that signal. She was his slave and he lived on her wages. Was there no crime in all the catalogue of human infamy to which man would not stoop for money!
The wheezy little orchestra of three pieces began a waltz, and the dancers swung around the tobacco-fogged room. Stuart rose in disgust to go, when he stopped near the door suddenly frozen to the spot. A fat beastly Negro swept by encircling the frail figure of a while girl. Her dress was ragged and filthy, but the delicate lines of her face, with its pure Grecian profile, and high forehead bore the stamp of breeding and distinction. Two red spots on her cheeks and the unnatural brightness of her big blue eyes told only too plainly that Death had marked her as his own.
To the young Southerner the sight was one of incredible horror. His first impulse on recovery from this surprise was to rush in, knock this Negro down and take the girl to a place of safety.
He looked about among all the men who filled the room, for a single face in which was left a trace of human pride. With one to stand by him, it could be done. He looked in vain. To strike alone in such a den of beasts would be the act of a madman.
Quivering with rage he took a seat and watched the Negro send this girl from side to side of the room to do his bidding. He made up his mind to track the brute to his lair and tear her from his claws, no matter what the cost. The Negro suddenly beckoned to the girl and she left with him.