The Promised Land

by Mary Antin

I did cry when I got outside, and I didn't care if I was noticed. What was the use of anything? Everything I did was wrong. Everything I tried to do for Mrs. Hutch turned out bad. I tried to sell papers, for the sake of the rent, and nobody wanted the "Searchlight," and I was told it was not a nice business. I wanted to take her into my confidence, and she wouldn't hear a word, but scolded and called me names. She was an unreasonable, ungrateful landlady. I wished she would put us out, then we should be rid of her.—But wasn't it funny about that tidy? What made me do that? I never meant to. Curious, the way we sometimes do things we don't want to at all.—The old lady must be deaf; she didn't say anything all that time.—Oh, I have a whole book of the "Æneid" to review, and it's getting late. I must hurry home.

It was impossible to remain despondent long. The landlady came only once a week, I reflected, as I walked, and the rest of the time I was surrounded by friends. Everybody was good to me, at home, of course, and at school; and there was Miss Dillingham, and her friend who took me out in the country to see the autumn leaves, and her friend's friend who lent me books, and Mr. Hurd, who put my poems in the "Transcript," and gave me books almost every time I came, and a dozen others who did something good for me all the time, besides the several dozen who wrote me such nice letters. Friends? If I named one for every block I passed I should not get through before I reached home. There was Mr. Strong, too, and he wanted me to meet his wife and little girl. And Mr. Pastor! I had almost forgotten Mr. Pastor. I arrived at the corner of Washington and Dover Streets, on my way home, and looked into Mr. Pastor's showy drug store as I passed, and that reminded me of the history of my latest friendship.

My cough had been pretty bad—kept me awake nights. My voice gave out frequently. The teachers had spoken to me several times, suggesting that I ought to see a doctor. Of course the teachers did not know that I could not afford a doctor, but I could go to the free dispensary, and I did. They told me to come again, and again, and I lost precious hours sitting in the waiting-room, watching for my turn. I was examined, thumped, studied, and sent out with prescriptions and innumerable directions. All that was said about food, fresh air, sunny rooms, etc., was, of course, impossible; but I would try the medicine. A bottle of medicine was a definite thing with a fixed price. You either could or could not afford it, on a given day. Once you began with milk and eggs and such things, there was no end of it. You were always going around the corner for more, till the grocer said he could give no more credit. No; the medicine bottle was the only safe thing.

I had taken several bottles, and was told that I was looking better, when I went, one day, to have my prescription renewed. It was just after a hard rain, and the pools on the broken pavements were full of blue sky. I was delighted with the beautiful reflections; there were even the white clouds moving across the blue, there, at my feet, on the pavement! I walked with my head down all the way to the drug store, which was all right; but I should not have done it going back, with the new bottle of medicine in my hand.

In front of a cigar store, halfway between Washington Street and Harrison Avenue, stood a wooden Indian with a package of wooden cigars in his hand. My eyes on the shining rain pools, I walked plump into the Indian, and the bottle was knocked out of my hand and broke with a crash.

I was horrified at the catastrophe. The medicine cost fifty cents. My mother had given me the last money in the house. I must not be without my medicine; the dispensary doctor was very emphatic about that. It would be dreadful to get sick and have to stay out of school. What was to be done?

I made up my mind in less than five minutes. I went back to the drug store and asked for Mr. Pastor himself. He knew me; he often sold me postage stamps, and joked about my large correspondence, and heard a good deal about my friends. He came out, on this occasion, from his little office in the back of the store; and I told him of my accident, and that there was no more money at home, and asked him to give me another bottle, to be paid for as soon as possible. My father had a job as night watchman in a store. I should be able to pay very soon.

"Certainly, my dear, certainly," said Mr. Pastor; "very glad to oblige you. It's doing you good, isn't it?—That's right. You're such a studious young lady, with all those books, and so many letters to write—you need something to build you up. There you are.—Oh, don't mention it! Any time at all. And lookout for wild Indians!"

Of course we were great friends after that, and this is the way my troubles often ended on Dover Street. To bump into a wooden Indian was to bump into good luck, a hundred times a week. No wonder I was happy most of the time.