“I don’t want to marry him. That’s the reason why.” How I wished that was the truth!
“Well, say, girlie, let’s you and I get married on the Q. T. Then I’ll go West, as they’re talking of shunting me out there, and as soon as I’ve made good you can join me. How’s that for a scheme?”
“It sounds pretty nice, Jimmy, but I’d rather do the marrying after you’ve made good.”
“Oh, it’ll be dead easy,” declared Jimmy. “I’ve an uncle out there with a ranch as big as a whole county. It’ll just be like dropping into a soft snap, don’t you see?”
“‘Making good’ isn’t merely dropping into soft snaps, Jimmy,” I said sadly.
Jimmy suddenly whistled under his breath, and I saw him looking at a couple of women who were coming toward us. He raised his hat as they passed us, but although the younger woman returned his bow, the older one stared at him indignantly, and then she gave me a very severe and condemning glance. All of a sudden I knew who that woman was. I recognized her by her hat. She was Jimmy’s mother!
The following day, I had a letter from her. She said I was ruining her son’s future, and if I did not give him up he would soon be without a home. She said that he was in serious trouble with his father, and that the latter intended to send him out West, and that she hoped I would do nothing to prevent her son from going. Finally she said that if her son were to marry a model the family would never forgive him and that such a disgrace would break all of their hearts, besides ruining him.
I did not answer her letter. I sat for a very long time thinking about my life. What was there wrong about being a model, then, that society should have cast the bar sinister upon it? Surely, there was no disgrace in one who had beauty having that beauty transferred to canvas. I had long ago ceased to despise the profession myself. The more I posed, the more I felt even a sort of pride in my work, though I still thought one was “beyond the pale” when one posed completely nude.
Miss Darling knocked at my door, and brought in a telegram. I thought at first it was from Reggie—that he was at last coming, as he had been threatening in all of his letters to do, and my hands were trembling when I broke the flap. But it was from poor Jimmy—Jimmy en route to Colorado, entreating me to write to him and assuring me that he never would forget his “own little Marion,” and that he would “make good” and I’d be proud of him yet. I sat down to write an impulsive answer to the boy, and then my eye fell upon his mother’s letter. No! I would not ruin her son’s life. Jimmy should have his opportunity, but I said to myself with a sob: