Mrs. Mullarkey’s two aids, the officer and the priest, could give her no further counsel. But she herself knew of another resource in the person of a young man, about twenty-two years old, a gangster and political scullion, whom she had known from early boyhood. To him she made her appeal for old acquaintance’ sake. “For God’s sake, Petey,” she said, “you are the only one that can get Fannie. Find out where she is.” Moved by the appeal and nothing loath to show his power, Petey promised that he would find the girl; only he stipulated that Mrs. Mullarkey must “leave Fannie be” when once she had her. Mrs. Mullarkey agreed and Petey went forth on his quest. In a couple of hours he returned with the culprit and commanded her to tell her mother where she had been. At first she refused; but Petey, once enlisted on the mother’s side, was a stern and unyielding ally. He brought out a knife and threatened her, so that the poor girl was terrified and stammered forth a confession of how she and her friend had been staying together in a furnished room. Mrs. Mullarkey was so outraged by what she heard that she altogether forgot her promise to Petey. After he had gone she summoned an officer and had the girl taken to court. Fannie was locked up in a cell for twenty-four hours “to cool off.” When she came up before the judge the following day she was “as brazen as could be, not a tear in her eye.” At last, however, she said she wanted to go home, and the judge placed her on probation.
We knew a sorry scrap of a child, five years old, who was already getting her instruction. She was a thin, sharp-featured little creature, uncommunicative, but very watchful out of her clear, bright blue eyes. Her clothing, hands, and face were always unclean. She gave an uncomfortable sense of possessing a great deal of unnatural knowledge for her age. Her home was a kitchen with two windows, and two tiny dark bedrooms, as hopelessly unkempt and dirty as herself. It was the abode of six people and nine cats. Her father was the last of three husbands, all of doubtful legal status. Her mother, who drank heavily on occasion, was unreliable. “Patsy” was the frequent companion of her sister of fifteen. This girl, who had an unusual, vivid, and forceful personality, was alternately sought out by the fellows of the block and censured with their disapproval. She ruled Patsy as an autocrat, petting and punishing her, allowing her to “tag around” and constantly using her as a go-between. There will be no question of a “fall” for Patsy. As she was being taught, so in time she will naturally develop.
With girls from such homes, childhood is the crucial time. It is not temptation, circumstance, or delusion that gets them into “trouble.” It is the faulty moral and mental training which simply expresses itself later in the almost inevitable, natural fashion. A smattering of conventional morality given by the church or by school is of little practical force against the tenor of their lives. “Reform” for such girls does not mean a return to abandoned ideals and desires. This is hard to achieve, but what is required here is still more difficult. It is the graft of new habits and a new outlook. It is the patient training away from the easy ways into the strict new law. Even fourteen or fifteen may be too late an age at which to begin this.
But actual immorality is not the only fruit of the dingy, sordid happenings which compose so large a part of the life of this community. There are girls who grow up in the midst of vicious surroundings with an inward security against harm. They are as trustworthy as the most carefully trained and guarded child—and hardier. For with them there is truth in the familiar boast, “I’m able to take care of myself.” But they pay a price for this fortitude. They are not taught, cleanly and rightly, straight from the shoulder. The taint and grime around them reach to their thoughts and feeling, and they suffer in their conceptions of life and of human experience.
We hear a great deal of the precocious development of New York children. It is most noticeable in girls from homes like these. In spite of the essential helplessness of their age, they acquire a surface hardihood which marks them out from normal children. They have grown up to have a settled distrust of life. They have a lurking bitterness which may be unavoidable in the adult but which ought never to play a part in childhood.
Yet, granting all the untoward conditions and influences which she must face, the problem of our West Side girl is by no means a hopeless one. Watch her as she swings through the streets, lovely through all her tawdriness, fine through all her vulgarity, gentle through all her “toughness.” Seeing her thus we cannot but see also her hopeful possibilities, in spite of the sordidness and evil which have encompassed her.
To strengthen the best elements of the home—this is the surest and most fundamental way to help this girl. The dangers for her family are the most deeply rooted menace to her. And here they are manifold. We may safeguard her recreation; we may improve her schooling; we may regulate her working conditions. But we must remember that she is seldom to be regarded entirely as an individual; she is one of a family group, a unit of a community. Unless she drifts to the streets she will probably remain so. And whatever can lighten and beautify the grimy life of the district, or relieve the intense pressure on family comfort, will give her a better chance.
CHAPTER VII
THE ITALIAN GIRL
By Josephine Roche
From out the big candy factories of the Middle West Side throngs of workers, one Saturday night, came hurrying into the December darkness. Eagerly they turned their steps toward their tenement homes. Many of them were Italian girls, and very young.