 STORY 5. THE KITCHEN SIDE OF THE DOOR The city was celebrating New Year's Eve. Spelled thus, with a capital C, know it can mean but New York. In the pink fountain-room of the newest hotel, all those grand old forms and customs handed down to us for the occasion were being rigidly observed, in all their original quaintness. The van dyked man, who looked like a Russian grand duke—he really was a chyrotopist—had drunk champagne out of the pink satin slipper of the lady who behaved like an actress. She was for a lady at Schmouse's wholesale millnery, Eighth Floor. The two respectable married ladies, there in the corner, had been kissed by each other's husbands. The slim, puritan-faced woman in white, with her black hair so demurely parted and coiled in a sleek knot, had risen suddenly from her place and walked indolently to the edge of the plashing pink fountain in the centre of the room, had stood contemplating its shallows with a dreamy half-smile on her lips, and then had lifted her slim legs slowly and gracefully over its fur-infringed basin, and had waded into its chilling midst, trailing her exquisite white satin and chiffon draperies after her, and scaring the goldfish into fits. The loudest scream of approbation had come from the yellow-haired, loose-lipped youth who had made the waiter and lost it. The heavy blonde and the inevitable violet draperies showed signs of wanting to dance on the table. Her companion, a structure made up of layer upon layer, and fold upon fold of flabby tissue, knew all the waiters by their right names, and insisted on singing with the orchestra and beating time with a rye roll. The clatter of dishes was giving way to the clink of glasses. In the big, bright kitchen-back of the pink fountain-room, Miss Gussie Fink sat at her desk, calm, watchful, insolent-eyed, a goddess sitting in judgment. On the payroll of the newest hotel, Miss Gussie Fink's name appeared as kitchen-checker, but her regular job was goddessing. Her altar was a high desk in a corner of the busy kitchen, and it was an altar of incense, of burnt offerings, and of showbread. Inexorable as a goddess of the ancients was Miss Fink, and ten times as difficult to appease, for this is the rule of the newest hotel. That no waiter may carry his laden tray restaurant word until its contents have been viewed and duly checked by the eye and hand of Miss Gussie Fink or her assistance. Flat upon the table must go every tray, off must go each silver dish cover, lifted must be each napkin to disclose its treasure of steaming corn or hot rolls, clouds of incense rose before Miss Gussie Fink, and she sniffed it unmoved, her eyes beneath level brows regarding savoury broiler or cunning ice with equal indifference, appraising alike lobster cocktail or onion soup, travelling from blue-points to brie. Things Allah and things Glace were all one to her. Gazing at food was Miss Gussie Fink's occupation, and just to see the way she regarded a boneless squab made you certain that she never ate. In spite of the I don't know how many, see, ads, New Year's Eve diners for whom food was provided that night, the big busy kitchen was the most orderly, shining, spotless place imaginable. But Miss Gussie Fink was the neatest, most immaculate object in all that great clean room. There was that about her which suggested daisies in a field, if you know what I mean. This may have been due to the fact that her eyes were brown while her hair was gold, or it may have been something about the way her colors fitted high and tight and smooth, or the way her close white sleeves came down to meet her pretty hands, or the way her shining hair sprung from her forehead. Also the smooth creaminess of her skin may have had something to do with it, but privately, I think it was due to the way she wore her shirt-waists. Miss Gussie Fink could wear a starched white shirt-waist under a close-fitting winter coat, remove the coat, run her right forefinger along her collar's edge, and her left thumb along the back of her belt, and disclose to the admiring world a blouse as unwrinkled and unsullied as though it had just come from her own skillful hands at the ironing board. Miss Gussie Fink was so innately, flagrantly, beautifully clean-looking that well. There must be a stop to this description. She was the kind of girl you'd like to see behind the counter of your favorite delicatessen, knowing that you need not shutters, her fingers touch your Sunday night supper slices of tongue and Swiss cheese and ham. No girl had ever dreamed of refusing to allow Gussie to borrow her chamois for a second. Tonight Miss Fink had come in at ten p.m., which was just two hours later than usual. She knew that she was to work until six a.m., which may have accounted for the fact that she displayed very little of what the fans call ginger, as she removed her hat and coat and hung them on the hook behind the desk. The prospect of that all night, eight hours stretch, may have accounted for it, I say. But privately, an entre new, it didn't. For here you must know of Hiney. Hiney, alas, now Henri. Until two weeks ago, Henri had been Hiney, and Miss Fink had been kid. When Henri had been Hiney, he had worked in the kitchen at many things, but always with a loving eye on Miss Gussie Fink. Then one wild night there had been a waiter strike wages or hours or tips for all three. In the confusion that followed, Hiney had been pressed into service and a chopped coat. He had fitted into both with unbelievable nicety, proving that waiters are born, not made. Those little tricks and foibles that are characteristic of the genus waiter seemed to envelop him as though a fairy garment had fallen upon his shoulders. The folded napkin under his arm seemed to have been placed there by nature, so perfectly did it fit into place. The ghostly tread, the little whisking, skip the half-simper, the deferential bend that had in it at the same time something of insolence, all were there. The very, yes, Miss, and very good, sir, rose automatically and correctly to his untrained lips. Cinderella rising resplendent from her astroon hearth was not more completely transformed than Hiney in his role of Henri. And with the transformation Miss Gussie Fink had been left behind her desk disconsolate. Kitchens are as quick to seize upon these things and gossip about them as drawing rooms are. And because Miss Gussie Fink had always worn a little air of aloofness to all except Hiney, the kitchen was the more eager to make the most of its morsel. Each turned it over under his tongue. Tony, the crook whom Miss Fink had scorned, Francois the entree-cook who often forgot he was married, Miss Sweeney the bar-checker who was jealous of Miss Fink's complexion, Miss Fink heard and said nothing. She only knew that there would be no dear figure waiting for her when the night's work was done. For two weeks now she had put on her hat and coat and gone her way at one o'clock alone. She discovered that to be taken home night after night under Hiney's tender escort had taught her a ridiculous terror at the streets at night, now that she was without protection. Always the short walk from the car to the flat where Miss Fink lived with her mother had been a glorious, starlit, all too brief moment. Now it was an endless and terrifying trial, a thing of shivers and dread fraught with horror of passing the alley just back of Cassidy's buffet. There had even been certain little half-series, half-gesting talks about the future into which there had entered the subject of a little delicatessen and restaurant in a desirable neighbourhood, with Hiney in the kitchen and a certain blonde, neat, white, shirt-waisted person in charge of the desk and front shop. She and her mother had always gone through a little formula upon Miss Fink's return from work. They never used it now. Gussie's mother was a real mother, the kind that wakes up when you come home. That you, Gussie? Ma Fink would call from the bedroom at the sound of the key in the lock. It's me, Ma. Hiney, bring you home? Sure. Happily. There's a bit of sausage left and some pie if- Oh, I ain't hungry. We stopped at Joey's downtown and had a cup of coffee and a ham on rye. Did you remember to put out the milk bottle? For two weeks there'd been none of that. Gussie had learned to creep silently into bed, and her mother, being a mother, feigned sleep. Tonight at her desk Miss Gussie Fink seemed a shade cooler, more self-contained and daisy-like than ever. From somewhere at the back of her head she could see that Hiney was avoiding her desk and was using the services of the checker at the other end of the room. And even as the poison of this was eating into her heart she was tapping her forefinger imperatively on the desk before her and saying to Tony, the crook, down on that table with that tray, Tony, flat, this may be a busy little New Year's Eve, but you can't come any of your sleight of hand stuff on me. For Tony had a little trick of concealing a dollar and a quarter sirloin by the simple method of slapping the platter close to the underside of his tray and holding it there with long, lean fingers outspread, the entire bit of neighbouring being concealed in the folds of a flowing white napkin in the hand that balanced the tray. Into Tony's eyes there came a baleful gleam, his lean jaw jutted out threateningly. You're a real Weisenheimer kid, ain't you? He sneered. Never mind, I'll get you a recess. Someday, drawled Miss Fink checking the stake, the house will get wise to your stuff and then you'll have to go back to the coal wagon. I know so much about you it's beginning to make me uncomfortable. I hate to carry around a burden of crime. Mieris sorehead because Heinie turned you down and now move on there, snap Miss Fink, or I'll call the steward to settle you. Maybe he'd be interested to know that you've been counting in the date and your waiter's number and adding him at the bottom of your check. Tony the crook turned and skimmed away toward the dining room, but the taste of victory was bitter in Miss Fink's mouth. Midnight struck. There came from the direction of the pink fountain room a clamour and din which penetrated the thickness of the padded doors that separated the dining room from the kitchen beyond. The sound rose and swelled above the blare of the orchestra, chairs scraped on the marble floors as hundreds rose to their feet. The sound of clinking glasses became as the jangling of a hundred bells. There came the sharp spat of hand-clapping, then cheers, yells, ha-zahs. Through the swinging doors at the end of the long passageway, Miss Fink could catch glimpses of dazzling colour, of shimmering gowns, of bare arms uplifted of flowers and plumes and jewels with the rosy light of the famed pink fountain casting a gracious glow over all. Once she saw a tall young fellow throw his arm about the shoulder of a glorious creature at the next table, and though the door swung shut before she could see it, Miss Fink knew that he had kissed her. There were no New Year's greetings in the kitchen back of the pink fountain room. It was the busiest moment in all that busy night. The heat of the ovens was so intense that it could be felt as far as Miss Fink's remote corner. The swinging doors between dining room and kitchen were never still. A steady stream of waiters made for the steam tables before which the white-clad chef stood ladling, carving, basting, serving, gave their orders, received them, stopped at the checking desk, and sped dining room word again. Tony, the crook, was cursing at one of the little Polish vegetable girls who had not been quick enough about the garnishing of a salad, and she was saying over and over again in her thick tongue, oh, shut up your mouth. The thud-thud of Miss Fink's checking stamp kept time to flying footsteps, but even as her practised eye swept over the tray before her, she saw the steward direct Henri toward her desk, just as he was about to head in the direction of the minor checking desk. Beneath downcast lids she saw him coming. There was about Henri tonight a certain radiance, a sort of electrical elasticity so nimble, so tireless, so exuberant, was he. In the eyes of Miss Gussie Fink, he looked heart-breakingly handsome in his waiter's uniform—handsome, distinguished, remote, and infinitely desirable. And just behind him, revenge in his eye, came Tony. The flat surface of the desk received Henri's tray. Miss Fink regarded it with a cold and business-like stare. Henri whipped his napkin from under his left arm and began to remove covers dexterously. Off came the first silver-dome-shaped top. Ginny Hen said, Henri, I've seen her looking at you when you served the little necks. Came from Tony as though continuing a conversation begun in some past moment of pause. And she's some lovely dob, eh me? Miss Fink scanned the Ginny Hen thoroughly, but with a detached air and selected the proper stamp from the box at her elbow. Thump. On the broad-paceboard sheet before her appeared the figure's one dollar seventy-five cents after Henri's number. Fink so, grinned Henri, and removed another cover. One candied sweet. I bet someday we'll see you in the Sunday papers, heiny, went on Tony. With a piece of unhandsome waiter running away with beautiful society, girl. Say, you're too perfect even for a waiter. Thump. Thirty cents. Quit your kidding, said the flattered Henri. One end-eye French dressing. Thump. Next, said Miss Fink, dispassionately, yawned and smiled fleetingly at the entree cook who wasn't looking her way. Then as Tony slid his tray toward her. How's business, Tony? How many two-bit cigar bands have you slipped onto your own private collection of nickel straits and made a twenty-cent rake off? But there was a mist in the bright brown eyes as Tony the crook turned away with his tray. In spite of the satisfaction of having had the last word, Miss Fink knew in her heart that Tony had got her at recess, as he had said he would. Things were slowing up for Miss Fink. The stream of hurrying waiters was turned in the direction of the kitchen-bar now. From now on the eating would be light and the drinking heavy. Miss Fink, with time hanging heavy, found herself blinking down at the figures stamped on the paste-board sheet before her, and in spite of the blinking, two marks that never were intended for a checker's report splash down just over the one dollar seventy-five cents after Henri's number. A lovely doll. And she had gazed at Heiney. Well, that was to be expected. No woman could gaze unmoved upon Heiney. A lovely doll. Hi, Miss Fink! It was the steward's voice. We need you over in the bar to help Miss Sweeney check the drinks. They're coming too swift for her. Eating will be light from now on. Just a little something salty now, then. So Miss Fink dabbed covertly at her eyes, and but took herself out of the atmosphere of roasting and broiling and frying and stewing. Away from the sight of great copper kettles and glowing coals and hissing pans, into a little world fragrant with mint, breathing of orange and lemon peel, perfumed with pineapple, redolent of cinnamon and clove, reeking with things spiritous. Here the splutter of the broiler was replaced by the hiss of the siphon and the pop-pop of corks and the tinkle and clink of ice against glass. Hello, dearie! Cued Miss Sweeney in greeting, staring hard at the suspicious redness around Miss Fink's eyelids. Ain't you sweet to come over here in the headache department and help me out? Here's the wine-list you probably need it. Say, who do you suppose invented New Year's Eve? They must have had imagination like a Greek busboy. I'm limp as a rag now, and it's only two-thirty. I've got a regular cramp in my wrist from checking quarts. Say, did you hear about Heine's crowd? No, said Miss Fink evenly, and began to study the first page of the wine-list under the heading Champagnes of noted vintages. Well, went on Miss Sweeney's little thin, malicious voice. He's fell and soft. There's a table of three, and they're drinking 1874 Imperial Crown at twelve dollars per, like it was Waukesha Ale. And every time they finish a bottle, one of the guys pays for it, with a brand new ten and a brand new five, and tells Heine to keep the change. Can you beat it? I hope, said Miss Fink pleasantly, that the supply of 1874 will hold out till morning. I'd hate to see them have to come down to ten dollar wine. Here you, Tony, come back here. I may be a new hand in this department, but I'm not so green that you can put a gold label over on me as a yellow label. Notice that I'm checking you another fifty cents. Ain't he the grafter? Laughed Miss Sweeney. She leaned toward Miss Fink and lowered her voice discreetly. Though I'll say this for him, if you let him get away with it now and then, he'll split even with you. I'll want that don't get so high and mighty. The management expects it in this department. That's why they pay starvation wages. An unusual note of color crept into Miss Gussie Fink's smooth cheek. It deepened and glowed as Heine darted around the corner and up to the bar. There was about him an air of suppressed excitement, suppressed because Heine was too perfect a waiter to display emotion. Not another! chanted the bartenders in chorus. Yes, answered Henri solemnly and waited while the wine cellar was made to relinquish another rare jewel. Oh, you Heine! called Miss Sweeney. Tell us what she looks like. If I had time, I'd take a peek myself. From what Tony says she must look something like Maxine, Elliot, only brighter. On returned, he saw Miss Fink. A curious little expression came into his eyes, a Heine look it might have been called, as he regarded his erstwhile sweethearts unruffled attire and clear skin and steady eye and glossy hair. She was looking past him in that baffling maddening way that angry women have. Some of Henri's poise seemed to desert him in that moment. He appeared a shadeless debonair as he received the precious bottle from the wine man's hands. He made for Miss Fink's desk and stood watching her while she checked his order. At the door he turned and looked over his shoulder at Miss Sweeney. Sometime, he said deliberately, When there's no ladies around, I'll tell you what I think she looks like. And the little glow of color in Miss Gussie Fink's smooth cheek became a crimson flood that swept from brow to throat. Oh, well, snickered Miss Sweeney to hide her own discomforture. This is little Heine's first New Year's Eve in the dining room. Honest, I believe he's shocked. He don't realize to celebrate New Year's Eve is like eating oranges. You gotta let go your dignity to really enjoy him. Three times more did Henri enter and demand a bottle of the famous vintage, and each time he seemed a shadeless buoyant. His elation diminished as his tips grew greater until, as he drew up at the bar at six o'clock, he seemed wrapped in impenetrable gloom. Them hogs sowsing yet? Shrilled Miss Sweeney. She and Miss Fink had climbed down from their high stools and were preparing to leave. Henri nodded, drearily, and disappeared in the direction of the pink fountain room. Miss Fink walked back to her own desk in the corner near the dining room door. She took her hat off the hook and stood regarding it thoughtfully. Then, with a little air of decision, she turned and walked swiftly down the passageway that separated dining room from kitchen. Tilly, the scrub woman, was down on her hands and knees in one corner of the passage. She was one of a small army of cleaners that had begun the work of clearing away the debris of the long night's revel. Miss Fink lifted her neat skirts high as she tiptoed through the little soapy pool that followed in the wake of Tilly, the scrub woman. She opened the swinging doors a cautious little crack and peered in. What she saw was not pretty. If the words Sordid and Baknalian had been part of Miss Fink's vocabulary, they would have risen to her lips then. The crowd had gone. The great room contained not more than half a dozen people. Confetti littered the floor. Here and there a napkin crushed and bedraggled into an unrecognizable ball lay under a table. From an overturned bottle the dregs were dripping drearily. The air was stale, stifling, poisonous. At a little table in the centre of the room, Henri's three were still drinking. They were doing it in a dreadful and business-like way. There were two men and one woman. The faces of all three were mahogany-coloured and expressionless. There was about them an awful sort of stillness. Something in the sight seemed to sicken, Gussie Fink. It came to her that the wintry air outdoors must be gloriously sweet and cool and clean in contrast to this. She was about to turn away, with a last look at Heinie yawning behind his hand, when suddenly the woman rose unsteadily to her feet, balancing herself with her fingertips on the table. She raised her head and stared across the room with dull, unseeing eyes and licked her lips with her tongue. Then she turned and walked half a dozen paces, screamed once with horrible shrillness, and crashed to the floor. She lay there and still crumpled heap the folds of her exquisite gown rippling to meet a little stale pool of wine that had splashed from some broken glass. Then this happened. Three people ran toward the woman on the floor, and two people ran past her and out of the room. The two who ran away were the men with whom she had been drinking, and they were not seen again. The three who ran toward her were Henri, the waiter, Miss Gussie Fink, checker, and Tilly, the scrubwoman. Henri and Miss Fink reached her first. Tilly, the scrubwoman, was a close third. Miss Gussie Fink made as though to slip her arm under the poor bruised head, but Henri caught her wrist fiercely for a waiter, and pulled her to her feet almost roughly. You leave her alone, kid, he commanded. Miss Gussie Fink stared, indignation choking her utterance, and as she stared, the fierce light in Henri's eyes was replaced by the light of tenderness. We'll tend to her, said Henri. She ain't fit for you to touch. I wouldn't let you soil your hands on such truck. And while Gussie still stared, he grasped the unconscious woman by the shoulders, while another waiter grasped her ankles with Tilly the scrubwoman, arranging her draperies, pittingly around her, and together they carried her out of the dining-room to a room beyond. Back in the kitchen, Miss Gussie Fink was preparing to don her hat, but she was experiencing some difficulty because of the way in which her fingers persisted in trembling. Her face was turned away from the swinging doors, but she knew when Henri came in. He stood just behind her, in silence. When she turned to face him, she found Henri looking at her, and as he looked all the heiny in him came to the surface and shone in his eyes. He looked long and silently at Miss Gussie Fink, at the sane, simple wholesomeness of her, at her clear brown eyes, at her white forehead from which the shining hair sprang away in such a delicate line, at her immaculately white shirt waist, and her smooth snug-fitting collar that came up to the lobes of her little pink ears, at her creamy skin, at her trim belt. He looked as one who would rest his eyes, eyes weary of gazing upon satins and jewels and rouge in carmine and white arms and bosoms. Gee, kid, you look good to me, he said. Do I, heiny? whispered Miss Fink. Believe me, replied heiny fervently, it was just a case of swelled head. Forget it, will ya? Say, that gang in there, tonight. Why, say, that gang, I know, interrupted Miss Fink. Going home, asked heiny. Yes, suppose we have a bite of something to eat first, suggested heiny. Miss Fink glanced round the great deserted kitchen. As she gazed, a little expression of disgust wrinkled her pretty nose, the nose that perforce had sniffed the scent of so many rare and exquisite dishes. Sure, she assented joyously, but not here. Let's go around the corner to Joey's. I could get real chummy with a cup of good-hot coffee and a ham on rye. He helped her on with her coat, and if his hands rested a moment on her shoulders, who was there to see it? A few sleepy one-eyed waiters and Tillie, the scrubwoman. Together they started toward the door. Tillie, the scrubwoman, had worked her wet way out of the passage and into the kitchen proper. She and her pale blocked their way. She was sopping up a soapy pool with an all-encompassing gray scrub rag. Heiny and Gussie stopped a moment perforce to watch her. It was rather fascinating to see how that artful scrub rag craftily closed in upon the soapy pool until it engulfed it. Tillie sat back on her knees to wring out the water-soaked rag. There was something pleasing in the sight. Tillie's blue calico was faded white in patches, and at the knees it was dark with soapy water. Her shoes were turned up ludicrously at the toes, as scrubwoman's shoes always are. Tillie's thin hair was wadded back into a moist knob at the back, and skewered with a gray black hairpin. From her parboiled, shriveled fingers to her ruddy, perspiring face, there was nothing of grace or beauty about Tillie. And yet Heiny found something pleasing there. He could not have told you why, so how can I? Alas, to say that it was, perhaps, for much the same reason that we rejoice in the wholesome, safe, reassuring feel of the gray woolen blanket on our bed when we wake from a horrid dream. A happy new year to you, said Heiny gravely, and took his hand out of his pocket. Tillie's moist right hand closed over something. She smiled so that one saw all her broken black teeth. The same to you, said Tillie, the same to you. End of Story Five. The kitchen side of the door. Story Six. One of the Old Girls. Of Buttered Side Down. All of those ladies who end their conversation with you by wearily suggesting that you go down to the basement to find what you've seen, do not receive a meager seven dollars a week as a reward for their efforts. Neither are they all obliged to climb five weary flights of stairs to reach the dismal little courtroom, which is their home. And there are several who need not walk thirty-three blocks to save car fare, only to spend wretched evenings washing out handkerchiefs and stockings in the cracked little washbowl, while one year is cucked for the stealthy tread of the lady who objects. Story Seven. The Old Girls. Of Buttered Side Down. The earnest compiler of Working Girls' Budgets would pass Effie Bauer hurriedly by. Effie's budget bulged here and there with such pathetic items as hand embroidered blouses, thick club steaks, and parquet tickets for Maud Adams. That you may visualize her at once, I may say that Effie looked twenty-four, from the rear. All women do these days. Her skirts never sat. Her shirt-waists were marvels of plainness and fit, and her switch had cost her sixteen dollars, wholesale, a lady-friend in the business. Oh, there was nothing tragic about Effie. She had a plump, assured style, a keen blue eye, a gift of repartee, and a way of doing her hair. Effie knew to the minute when coral beads went out and pearl beads came in, and just by looking at her blouses you could tell when Clooney died and Irish was born. Meeting Effie Bauer, she knew that she had a plump, assured style, a keen blue eye, a gift of repartee, and a way of doing her hair so that the gray at the side of her blouses you could tell when Clooney died and Irish was born. Meeting Effie on the street, you would have put her down as one of the many well-dressed, prosperous-looking women shoppers, if you hadn't looked at her feet. Veteran clerks and policemen cannot disguise their feet. Effie Bauer's reason for not marrying when a girl was the same as that of most of the capable wise-eyed, good-looking women one finds at the head of departments. She had not had a chance. If Effie had been as attractive at twenty, as she was at—there, we won't betray confidences—still, it is certain that if Effie had been as attractive when a young girl, as she was when an old girl, she never would have been an old girl and head of Spiegel's corset department at a salary of something very comfortably over one hundred and twenty-five a month and commissioned. Effie had improved with the years and ripened with experience. She knew her value. At twenty, she had been pale, anemic, and bony, with a startled fawn manner and bad teeth. Years of saleswomen'ship had broadened her, mentally and physically, until she possessed a wide and varied knowledge of that great and diversified subject known as human nature. She knew human nature all the way from the fifty-nine cent girdles to the twenty-five dollar made-to-orders. And if the years had brought, among other things, a certain hardness about the jaw and a line or two at the corners of the eyes, it was not surprising. You can't rub up against the sharp edges of this world and expect to come out without a scratch or so. So much for Effie. Enter the hero. Webster defines a hero in romance as the person who has the principal share in the transactions related. He says nothing which would debar a gentleman just because he may be a trifle bald and in the habit of combing his hair over the thin spot. And he raises no objections to a matter of thickness and color in the region of the back of the neck. Therefore Gabe I. Marks qualifies. Gabe was the gentleman about whom Effie permitted herself to be guide. He came to Chicago on business four times a year and he always took Effie to the theater and to supper afterward. On those occasions Effie's gown, wrap, and hat were as correct in texture, lines, and paradise egrets as those of any of her non-working sisters about her. On the morning following these excursions into Lobsterdom, Effie would confide to her friend Miss Weinstein of the lingerie and negligence. I was out with my friend Mr. Marks last evening. We went to Rectors after the show. Oh, well, it takes a New Yorker to know how. Honestly, I feel like a queen when I go out with him. Hmm? Oh, nothing like that, girly. I never could see that marriage thing. Just good friends. Gabe had been coming to Chicago four times a year for six years. Six times four are twenty-four and one is twenty-five. Gabe's last visit made the twenty-fifth. Well Effie, Gabe said when the evening's entertainment had reached the restaurant stage. This is our twenty-fifth anniversary. It's our silver wedding without the silver in the wedding. We'll have a bottle of champagne. That makes it almost legal. And then suppose we finish up by having the wedding? The silver can be omitted. Effie had been humming with the orchestra, holding a lobster claw in one hand and wielding the little two-pronged fork with the other. She dropped claw, fork, and popular air to stare open-mouthed at Gabe, then a slow, uncertain smile crept about her lips, although her eyes were still unsmiling. Stop your joking, Gabey, she said. Someday you'll say those things to the wrong lady, and then you'll have a breach of promise suit on your hands. This ain't no joke, Effie, Gabe had replied. Not with me, it ain't. As long as my mother, Sally, lived, I wouldn't ever marry a goy. It would have broken her heart. I was a good son to her, and good sons make good husbands, they say. Well Effie, you want to try it out? Well, there was something almost solemn in Effie's tone and expression. Gabey, she said slowly. You're the first man that's ever asked me to marry him. That goes double, answered Gabe. Thanks, said Effie. That makes it all the nicer. Then Gabe's face was radiant, but Effie shook her head quickly. You're just 20 years late, she said. Late, expostulated Gabe. I ain't no dead one yet. Effie pushed her plate away with a little air of decision. Folded her plump arms on the table, and leaning forward, looked Gabe's eye marks squarely in the eyes. Gabey, she said gently. I'll bet you haven't got a hundred dollars in the bank, but interrupted Gabe. Wait a minute, I know you boys on the road. Besides your diamond scarf pin and your ring and watch, have you got a cent over your salary? Nix, you carry just about enough insurance to bury you, don't you? You're 50 years old if you're a minute, Gabey. And if I ain't mistaken, you'd have a pretty hard time of it getting $10,000 insurance after the doctors got through with you. 25 years of pinocchio and poker and the fat of the lands haven't added up any bumps in the old stocking under the mattress. Say, look at here, Objective Gabe, more red-faced than usual. I didn't know was proposing an old senatorial investigating committee. Say, you talk about them foreign noblemen being mercenary. Why, they ain't in it with you girls today. A fellow has got to propose to you with this bankbook in one hand and a bunch of life insurance policies in the other. You're right, I ain't saved much, but my selling always had everything she wanted. Say, when a man marries it's different, he begins to save. There, said Effie quickly, that's just it. 20 years ago I'd have been glad and willing to start like that. Saving and scrimping and loving a man and looking forward to the time when four figures showed up in the bank account where but three bloomed before. Give me a yard or so of Cretone and a photo of my married sister down in Iowa, and I can make even a boarding house inside bedroom look like a place where a human being could live. If I had been as wise at 20 as I am now, Gaby, I could have married any man I pleased, but I was what they call capable, and men aren't marrying capable girls. They pick little yellow-headed blue-eyed idiots that don't know a lamb stew from a soup bone when they see it. Well, Mr. Man didn't show up, and I started into clerk at six per. I'm earning as much as you are now. More. No. Don't misunderstand me, Gabe. I'm not throwing bouquets at myself. I'm not that kind of girl. But I could sell a style 743 slim shape to the Venus de Milo herself. The Lord knows she needed one with those hips of hers. I worked my way up alone. I'm used to it. I like the excitement down at the store. I'm used to luxuries. I guess if I was a man I'd be the kind they call a good provider. The kind that opens wine every time there's half an excuse for it, and when he dies his widow has to take in borders. And, Gabe, after you've worn tailored suits every year for a dozen years, you can't go back to $25 ready-maids and be happy. You could, if you loved a man, said Gabe stubbornly. The hard lines around the jaw and the experienced lines about the eyes seem suddenly to stand out on Effie's face. Love's young dream is all right, but you've reached the age when you let your cigar ass dribble down onto your vest. Now me? I've got a kimono nature, but a straight front job, and it's kept me young. Young? I've got to be. That's my stock and trade. You see, Gabe, we're just 20 years too late, both of us. They're not going to boost your salary. These days they're looking for kids on the road. Live wires with a lot of nerve and a quick comeback. They don't want old timers. Say, Gabe, if I was to tell you what I spend in face powder and toilet water and hairpins alone, you'd think I'd made a mistake in giving you the butcher bill instead. And I'm no professional beauty, either. Only it takes money to look cleaned and pressed in this town. In the seclusion of the cafe corner, Gabe laid one plump, highly manicured hand on Effie's smooth arm. You wouldn't need to stay young for me, Effie. I like you just as you are. Without the powder or the toilet water or the hairpins. His red, good-natured face had an expression upon it that was touchingly near patient resignation, as he looked up into Effie's sparkling countenance. You never look so good to me as you do this minute, oh girl. And if the day comes when you get lonesome, won't change your mind, or Effie shook her head and started to draw on her long white gloves. I guess I haven't refused you the way the dames and the novels do it. Maybe it's because I've had so little practice, but I want to say this, Gabe. Thank God I don't have to die knowing that no man ever wanted me to be his wife. Honestly, I'm that grateful that I'd marry you in a minute if I didn't like you so well. I'll be back in three months, like always, was all that Gabe said. I ain't going to write. When I get here, we'll just take in a show. And the younger you look, the better I'll like it. But on the occasion of Gabe's spring trip, he encountered a statuesque blonde person where Effie had been want to reign. Miss Bauer out of town? The statue melted a trifle in the sunshine of Gabe's ingratiating smile. Miss Bauer's ill. The statue informed him using a heavy eastern accent. Anything I can do for you? I'm taking her place. Why, uh, not exactly, no, said Gabe. Just a temporary indisposition, I suppose. Well, you wouldn't hardly call it, Dad, seeing that she's been sick with typhoid for seven weeks. Typhoid? shouted Gabe. Well, I'm not in the habit of asking gentlemen their names. I'd like to inquire if yours happens to be Mark's. Gabe I. Mark's? Sure, said Gabe. That's me. Miss Bauer's nurse telephoned down last week that if a gentleman named Mark's, Gabe I. Mark's, dropped sin and inquires for Miss Bauer, I'm to tell him that she's changed her mind. On the way from Spiegel's corset department to the car, Gabe stopped only for a bunch of violets. Effie's apartment house reached. He sent up his card, the violets, and a message. That the gentleman was waiting. There came back a reply that sent Gabe up before the violets were relieved of their first layer of tissue paper. Effie was sitting in a deep chair by the window. A flowered quilt bunched about her shoulders. Her feet ingrained knitted bedroom slippers. She looked every minute of her age, and she knew it, and didn't care. The hand that she held out to Gabe was a limp, white, fleshless thing that seemed to bear no relation to the plump, firm member that Gabe had pressed on so many previous occasions. Gabe stared at this pale wreath in a moment of alarm and dismay. Then, you're looking great, he stammered. Great! Nobody believe you've been sick a minute. Guess you've just been stalling for a beauty rest, what? Effie smiled, a tired little smile. And shook her head slowly. You're a good kid, Gabe eats a lie to me, like that just to make me feel good. But my nurse left yesterday, and I had my first real squint at myself in the mirror. She wouldn't let me look while she was here. After what I saw staring back at me from that glass, a whole ballroom full of French courtiers whispering sweet nothings in my ear couldn't make me believe that I look like anything but a hunk of rope for green spots included. When I think of how my clothes won't fit, it makes me shiffer. Oh, you'll be back at the store as good as new. They fatten up something wonderful after typhoid. Why, I had a friend. Did you get my message? Interrupted Effie. I was only talking to hide my nervousness, said Gabe and started forward. But Effie waved him away. Sit down, she said. I've got something to say. She looked thoughtfully down at one shining fingernail. Her lower lip was caught between her teeth. When she looked up again, her eyes were swimming in tears. Gabe started forward again. Again Effie waved him away. It's all right, Gabey. I don't blubber as a rule. This fever leaves you as weak as a rag, unready to cry if anyone says boo. I've been doing some high pressure thinking since mercy left. I had plenty of time to do it in sitting here by this window all day. My land, I never knew there was so much time. There's been days when I haven't talked to a soul except the nurse and the chambermaid. Lonesome, say the amount of petting I could stand would surprise you. Of course, my nurse was a perfectly good nurse at twenty-five per. But I was just a case to her. You can't expect a nurse to ooze sympathy over an old maid with the fever. I tell you, I was dying to have someone say shh-shh-shh. When there was a noise, just to show they were interested. Whenever I'd moaned, the nurse would come over and stick a thermometer in my mouth and write something down on a chart. The boys and girls at the store sent flowers. They'd have done the same if I'd died. When the fever broke, I just used to lie there and dream. Not feeling anything in particular. And not caring much whether it was day or night. Know what I mean? Gabie shook a sympathetic head. There was a little silence, then Effie went on. I used to think I was pretty smart, earning my own living, dressing as well as the next one, and able to spend my vacation in Atlantic City if I wanted to. I didn't know I was missing anything. But while I was sick, I got to wishing that there was somebody that belonged to me. Somebody to worry about me, and to sit up nights. Somebody that just naturally felt they had to come tiptoeing into my room every three or four minutes to see if I was sleeping, or had enough covers on, or wanted a drink, or something. I got to thinking what it would have been like if I had a husband and a home. You'll think I'm daffy, maybe. Gabie took Effie's limp white hand in his and stroked it gently. Effie's face was turned away from him, toward the noisy street. I used to imagine how he'd come home at six, stamping his feet, maybe, and making a lot of noise the way men do. And then he'd remember and come creaking up the steps, and he'd stick his head in at the door in the funny, awkward, pathetic way men have in a sick room. And he'd say, how's the old girl tonight? I'd better not come near you now, Puss, because I'll bring the cold with me. Been lonesome for your old man. And I'd say, oh, I don't care how cold you are, dear. The nurse is downstairs getting my supper ready. And then he'd come tiptoeing over to my bed. And stoop down and kiss me. And his face would be all cold and rough. And his mustache would be wet. And he'd smell outdoorsy and smoky, the way husbands do when they come in. And I'd reach up and pat his cheek and say, you need a shave, old man. I know it, he'd say, rubbing his cheek up against mine. Hurry up and wash now. Supper'll be ready. Where are the kids, he'd ask. The house is as quiet as the grave. Hurry up and get well, kid. Star and lonesome without you at the table. And the children's manners are getting something wild. And the children's manners are getting something awful. And I never can find my shirts. Lordy, I guess we won't celebrate when you get up. Can't you eat a little something nourishing for supper? Beef steak or a good plate of soup or something? Men are like that, you know. So I'd say then, run along, you old goose. You'll be suggesting sauerkraut and wieners next. Don't you let Millie have any marmalade tonight. She's got a spoiled stomach. And then he'd pound off down the hall to wash up. And I'd shut my eyes and smile to myself. And everything would be all right because he was home. There was a long silence. Effie's eyes were closed. But two great tears stole out from beneath each lid. And coursed their slow way down her thin cheeks. She did not raise her hand to wipe them away. Gabie's other hand reached over and met the one that already clasped Effie's. Effie, he said, in a voice that was as hoarse as it was gentle. Hmm, said Effie. Will you marry me? I shouldn't wonder, replied Effie, opening her eyes. No, don't kiss me. You might catch something. But say, reach up and smooth my hair away from my forehead, will you? And call me a couple of full names. I don't care how clumsy you are about it. I could stand an awful fuss being made over me without being spoiled any. Three weeks later, Effie was back at the store. Her skirt didn't fit in the back. And the little hollow places in her cheeks did not take the customary dash of rouge as well as when they had been plumper. She held a little impromptu reception that extended down as far as the lingerie's and up as far as the rugs. The old sparkle came back to Effie's eye. The old assurance and vigor seemed to return. By the time that Miss Weinstein of the French lingerie's arrived breathless to greet her, Effie was herself again. Well, if you're not a cypress or eyes, dearie, exclaimed Miss Weinstein, my goodness, how grand and thin you are. I'd be willing to take a course in typhoid myself if I thought I could lose 25 pounds. I have an arrack that fits me, Effie announced proudly. Miss Weinstein lowered her voice discreetly. Dearie, can you come down to my department for a minute? We're going to have a sale on imported lingerie blouses, slightly soiled from 9 to 11 tomorrow. There's one you positively must see. Hand embroidered, Irish motes, and eyeleted from soup to nuts, and only 8.50. I've got a fine chance of buying handmade wastes, no matter how slightly soiled. Effie made answer. Would the doctor and nurses bill as long as your arm? I'll run along, scoffed Miss Weinstein. A person would think you had a husband to get a grouch every time you get reckless to the extent of a new waist. You're your own boss, and you know your credit's good. Honestly, it would be a shame to let this chance slip. You're not getting tight in your old age, are you? No, no, faltered Effie. But then come on, urged Miss Weinstein energetically, and be thankful you haven't got a man to raise the dickens when the bill comes in. Do you mean that? Asked Effie slowly, fixing Miss Weinstein with a thoughtful eye. Sureest thing you know. Say, girly, let's go over to clients for lunch this noon. They have pot roast with potato found cooking on Tuesdays, and we can split an order between us. Hold that waist till tomorrow, will you? Said Effie. I've made an arrangement with a friend that might make new clothes impossible just now, but I'm going to wire my party that the arrangement is all off. I've changed my mind. I ought to get an answer tomorrow. Did you say it was a thirty-six? End of Story Six. One of the Old Girls of Butterside Down. Story Seven. Mameys from Cuba of Butterside Down. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Madeira. Buttered side down by Edna Furber. Story Seven. Mameys from Cuba. There is nothing new in this. It has all been done before. But tell me, what is new? Does the inspiring and perspiring summer vaudeville artist flatter himself that his stuff is going big? Then does the stout man with the oyster colored eyelids in the first row left turn his bullet head on his fat creased neck to remark huskily to his companion? The hook for him rotten! The last one was an old Weber and Fields gag. They've discarded it back in ninety-one. Say, the good ones is all dead anyhow. Take old Salvini now and Dan Rice them was actors. Come on out and have something. Does the short story writer felicitate himself upon having discovered a rare species in humanity's garden? The blasé reader flips the pages between his fingers, yawns, stretches, and remarks to his wife. That's a clean lift from Kipling. Where is it Conan Doyle? Anyway, I've read something just like it before. Say, kid, guess what these magazine guys get for a full page ad? Knicks. That's just like a woman. Three thousand straight. Fact. To anticipate the delver into the past it may be stated that the plot of this one originally appeared in the eternal bestseller under the heading he asked you for bread and ye gave him a stone. There may be those who could not have traced my plagiarism to its source. Although the book has had an unprecedentedly long run it is said to be less widely read than of your. Even with this preparation I hesitate to confess that this is the story of a hungry girl in a big city. Well, now wait a minute, conceding that it has been done by every scribbler from Tyro to bestseller expert you will acknowledge that there is the possibility of a fresh viewpoint. Twist. What is it, the sporting editors call it? Oh yes, slant. There is the possibility of getting a new slant on an old idea. That may serve to deflect the line of the deadly parallel. Just off State Street there is a fruiterer and importer who ought to be arrested for cruelty. His window is the most fascinating and the most heartless in Chicago. A line of open-mouthed, wide-eyed gazers is always to be found before it. Despair, wonder, envy, and rebellion smolder in the eyes of those gazers. No shop windows show should be so diabolically set forth as to arouse such sensations in the breast of the beholder. It is a work of art, that window. A breeder of anarchism, a destroyer of contentment, a second feast of tantalus. It boasts peaches, dewy, and golden, when peaches have no right to be. Plathoric purple bunches of English hot-house grapes are there to taunt the ten-dollar-week clerk whose sick wife should be in the hospital. Strawberries glow therein when shortcake is a last summer's memory, and forced cucumbers remind us that we are taking hours in the form of dill pickles. There is perhaps a choice head of cauliflower so exquisite in its ivory and green perfection as to be fit for a bride's bouquet. There are apples so flawless, that if the Garden of Eden grew any as perfect it is small wonder that Eve fell for them. There are fresh mushrooms and jumbo coconuts and green almonds, costly things in beds of cotton nestled next to strange and marvellous things in tissue wrappings. Oh, that window is no place for the hungry, the dissatisfied, or the man out of a job. When the air is filled with snow, there is that in the sight of muskmelons which incites crime. Clearly enough, the gazers before that window foot up the same year in and year out, something after this fashion. Item. One anemic little milliner's apprentice in coat and shoes that even her hat can't redeem. Item. One sandy-haired, gritty, complexioned man with a drooping ragged moustache, a tin dinner bucket and lime on his boots. Item. One thin mail carrier with an empty mail sack, gaunt, cheeks, and a habitual droop to his left shoulder. Item. One errand boy troubled with a chronic sniffle, a shrill impiping whistle, and a great deal of shuffling footwork. Item. One negro wearing a spotted tan top coat, frayed trousers, and no collar. His eyes seem all whites as he gazes. Enough of the window. But bear it in mind while we turn to Jenny. Jenny's real name was Janet, and she was Scotch. Kenny, not necessarily or why should she have been hungry and out of a job in January, Jenny stood in the row before the window and stared. The longer she stared, the sharper grew the lines that fright and underfeeding had chiseled about her nose and mouth and eyes. When your last meal is an eighteen-hour old memory, and when that memory has only near coffee and a roll to dwell on, there is something in the sight of January peaches and great strawberries carelessly spilling out of a tipped box, just like they do in the fruit picture on the dining-room wall that is apt to carve sharp lines in the corners of the face. The tragic line dwindled, going about its business. The man with the dinner pail and the lime on his boots spat, drew the back of his hand across his mouth, and turned away with an ugly look. Pork was up to fourteen dollars twenty-five cents dressed. The errand boy's blithe whistle died down to a mournful dirge. He was window-wishing. His choice wavered between the juicy pears and the foreign-looking red things that looked like oranges and weren't. One hand went into his coat pocket, extracting an apple that was to have formed the peace de resistance of his noonday lunch. Now he regarded it with a sort of pitying disgust, and bit into it with the middle of the morning contempt that it deserved. The mail-carrier pushed back his cap and reflectively scratched his head. How much, over his month's wage, would that green basket piled high with exotic fruit come to? Jenny stood and stared after they had left, and another line had formed. If you could have followed her gaze with dotted lines as they do in the cartoons, you would have seen that it was not the peaches, or the prickly pears, or the strawberries, or the musk melon, or even the grapes that held her eye. In the center of that wonderful window was an oddly woven basket. In the basket were brown things that looked like sweet potatoes. One knew that they were not. A sign of the basket informed the puzzled gazer that these were maymays from Cuba. Maymays from Cuba. The humor of it might have struck Jenny if she had not been so scotch and so hungry. As it was, a slow, sullen, heavy scotch wrath rose in her breast. Maymays from Cuba. The wantonness of it. Peaches, yes, grapes even, and pears and cherries in snow time, but maymays from Cuba? Why, one did not even know if they were to be eaten with butter or with vinegar or in the hand like an apple. Who wanted maymays from Cuba? They had gone all those hundreds of miles to get a fruit or vegetable thing, a thing so luxurious, so out of all reason that one did not know whether it was to be baked or eaten raw. There they lay in their foreign-looking basket taunting Jenny who needed a quarter. Have I told you how Jenny happened to be hungry and jobless? Well, then I shan't. It doesn't really matter, anyway. The fact is enough. If you really demand to know, you might inquire of Mr. Felix Klein. You will find him in a mahogany office on the sixth floor. The door is marked Manager. It was his idea to import Scotch Lassie's from Dunfermline for his Scotch Linen department. The idea was more fetching than feasible. There are people, who will tell you, that no girl possessing a grain of common sense and a little nerve need go hungry, no matter how great the city. Don't you believe them? The city has heard the cry of wolves so often, that it refuses to listen when he is snarling at the door, particularly when the door is next door. Where did we leave Jenny? Still standing on the sidewalk before the fruit and fancy good shop, gazing at the mamies from Cuba. Finally, her Scotch bump of curiosity could stand at no longer. She dug her elbow into the arm of the person standing next in line. What are those? she asked. The next in line happened to be a man. He was a man without an overcoat, and with his chin sunk deep into his collar, and his hands thrust deep into his pockets. It looked as though he were trying to crawl inside himself for warmth. Those? The sign says the mamies from Cuba. I know. Persisted Jenny. But what are they? Search me. Say, I ain't bothering about mamies from Cuba. A couple of hot Murphy's from Ireland served with a lump of butter would look good enough to me. Do you suppose anyone buys them? Marvel Jenny. Sure thing you know. Some rich dame coming by here, wondering what she can have for dinner to tempt the jaded pallets of her dear ones. She sees them Cuba mamies. The very thing, she says. I'll have them served just before the salad. And she sails in and buys a pound or two. I wonder now, do you eat them with a fruit knife or with a spoon? Jenny took one last look at the woven basket with its foreign contents. Then she moved on slowly. She had been moving on for hours, weeks. Most people have acquired the habit of eating three meals a day. In a city of some few millions, the habit has made necessary the establishing of many thousands of eating places. Jenny would have told you that there were billions of these. To her the world seemed composed of one huge glittering restaurant, with myriads of windows through which one caught maddening glimpses of ketchup bottles, and nickel coffee heaters, and piles of donuts in scurrying waiters in white, and people critically studying menu cards. She walked in a maze of restaurants, cafes, eating houses, tables and diners, loomed up at every turn on every street, from Michigan Ammoner's rose-shaded, Louis the something palaces, where every waiter owns his man, to the white tile mausoleums, where every man is his own waiter. Everywhere there were windows full of lemon cream pies, and pans of baked apples swimming in lakes of gold and syrup, and pots of baked beans with the pink and crispy slices of pork just breaking through the crust. Every dairy lunch mocked one with the sign of wheat cakes with maple syrup and country sausage twenty cents. There are those who will say that for cases like Jenny's there are soup kitchens, YWCA's, Relief Associations, policemen, and things like that. And so there are. Unfortunately, the people who need them aren't up on them. Try it. Plant yourself, penniless, in the middle of State Street on a busy day. Dive into the howling, scrambling, pushing maelstrom that hurls itself against the mountainous and impregnable form of the crossing policeman, and see what you'll get out of it, provided you have the courage. Desperation gave Jenny a false courage. On the strength of it she made two false starts. The third time she reached the arm of the crossing policeman and clutched it. That imposing giant removed the whistle from his mouth and majestically inclined his head without turning his gaze upon Jenny, one eye being fixed on a red automobile that was showing signs of sulking at its enforced pause, the other being busy with a cursing drayman who was having an argument with his off-horse. Jenny mumbled her question, said the crossing policeman. Get your car on Wabash, ride the empty second, transfer get off at Blank Street, and walk three blocks south. Then he put the whistle back in his mouth, blew two shrill blasts, and the horde of men, women, motors, drays, trucks, cars, and horses swept over him, threw him past him, leaving him miraculously untouched. Jenny landed on the opposite curbing, breathing hard. What was that street? Empty what? Well, it didn't matter anyway. She hadn't the nickel for car fare. What did you do next? You begged from people on the street? Jenny selected a middle-aged, prosperous, motherly-looking woman. She framed her plea with stiff lips. Before she had finished her sentence she found herself addressing empty air. The middle-aged, prosperous, motherly-looking woman had hurried on. Well, then you tried a man. You had to be careful there. He mustn't be the wrong kind. There were so many wrong kinds. Just an ordinary-looking family man would be best. Ordinary-looking family men are strangely in the minority. There are so many more bullnecked, tan-shoe'd ones. Finally, Jenny's eye, grown sharp with want, saw one. Not too well dressed, kind-faced, middle-aged. She fell in a step beside him. Please, can you help me out with a shilling? Jenny's nose was red and her eyes watery. Said the middle-aged family man with the kindly face. Beat it! You've had about enough, I guess. Jenny walked into a department store, picked out the oldest and most stationary-looking floor walker, and put it to him. The floor walker bent his head, caught the word food, swung about, and pointed over Jenny's head. Grocery department on the seventh floor. Take one of those elevators up. Anyone but a floor walker could have seen the misery in Jenny's face. But to floor walkers, all women's faces are horrible. Jenny turned and walked blindly toward the elevators. There was no fight left in her. If the floor walker had said, silk negligés on the fourth floor, take one of those elevators up, Jenny would have ridden up to the fourth floor and stupidly gauged at pink silk and val-laced negligés in glass cases. Tell me, have you ever visited the grocery department of a great store on the wrong side of State Street? It's a mouth-watering experience. A department store grocery is a glorified mixture of delicatessen shop, meat market, and vaudeville. Starting with the live lobsters and crabs, you work your hungry way right around past the cheeses and the sausages and the hams and tongs and head cheese, past the blonde person in white who makes marvellous and un-eat-able things out of gelatin, through a thousand smells and scents, smells of things smoked and pickled and spiced and baked and preserved and roasted. Jenny stepped out of the elevator, licking her lips. She sniffed the air eagerly as a hound sniffs the scent. She shut her eyes when she passed the sugar-cured hands. A woman was buying a slice from one and the butcher was extolling its merits. Jenny caught the words juicy and corn-fed. That particular store prides itself on its cheese department. It boasts that there one can get anything in cheese from the simple cottage variety to imposing mottled stilton. There are cheeses from France, cheeses from Switzerland, cheeses from Holland. Brick and Parmesan, Edam and Limburger perfumed the atmosphere. Behind the counters were big, full-fed men in white aprons and coats. They flourished keen bright knives. As Jenny gazed, one of them, in a moment of idleness, cut a tiny wedge from a rich yellow Swiss cheese and stood nibbling it absently, his eyes wandering toward the blonde gelatin demonstrator. Jenny swayed and caught the counter. She felt horribly faint and queer. She shut her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, a woman, a fat, house-wifely, comfortable-looking woman, was standing before the cheese counter. She spoke to the cheeseman. Once more his sharp knife descended and he was offering the possible customer a sample. She picked it off the knife's sharp tip, nibbled thoughtfully, shook her head and passed on. A great, glorious world of hope opened out before Jenny. Her cheeks grew hot and her eyes felt dry and bright as she approached the cheese counter. A bit of that, she said, pointing, it doesn't look just as I like it. Very fine, madam. The man assured her and turned the knife point toward her with the infinitesimal wedge of cheese reposing on its blade. Jenny tried to keep her hand steady as she delicately picked it off, nibbled as she had seen that other woman do it, her head on one side, before it shook a slow negative. The effort necessary to keep from cramming the entire piece into her mouth at once left her weak and trembling. She passed on as the other woman had done around the corner and into a world of sausages. Great, rosy mounds of them filled counters and cases. Sausage. Snir, you pâté de foie gras, but may you know the day when hunger will have you. And on that day may you run into linked temptation in the form of Brown's Figer Metaverse. May you know the longing that causes the eyes to glaze at the sight of Thuringer Sausage and the mouth to water at the scent of Carvelat Wurst and the fingers to tremble at the nearness of smoked liver. Jenny stumbled on through the smells and the sights. That nibble of cheese had been like a drop of human blood to a man-eating tiger. It made her bold, cunning, even while it maddened. She stopped at this counter and demanded a slice of summer sausage. It was paper thin but delicious beyond belief. At the next counter there was corned beef, streaked fat and lean. Jenny longed to bury her teeth in the succulent meat and get one great soul satisfying mouthful. She had to be content with her judicious nibbling. To pass the golden brown breaded pigs feet was torture. To look at the codfish balls was agony. And so Jenny went on sampling, tasting the scraps of food acting only as an aggravation. Up one aisle and down the next she went. And then just around the corner she brought up before the grocery department's pride and boast. The Scotch Bakery. It is the store's star vaudeville feature. All day long the gaping crowd stand before it watching David the scone man as with sleeves rolled high above his big arms he needs and slaps and molds and thumps and shapes the dough into toothsome Scotch confections. There was a crowd around the white counters now and the flat baking surface of the gas stove was just hot enough and David the scone man, he called them scons, was whipping about here and there turning the baking oat cakes filling the shelf above the stove when they were done to a turn rolling out fresh ones waiting on customers. His nutcracker face almost allowed itself a pleased expression but not quite. David the scone man was Scotch. I was going to add diggie ken but I would not. Jenny wondered if she really saw those things. Mutton pies, scons, Scotch shortbread, oat cakes. She edged closer, wriggling her way through the little crowd until she stood at the counter's edge. David the scone man, his back to the crowd was turning the last batch of oat cakes. Jenny felt strangely light-headed and unsteady and airy. She stared straight ahead a half smile on her lips while a hand that she knew was her own and that yet seemed no part of her stole out very, very slowly and cunningly and extracted a hot scone from the pile that lay in the tray on the counter. That hand began to steal back more quickly now but not quickly enough. Another hand grasped her wrist. A woman's high shrill voice, why will women do these things to each other, said excitedly. Say, scone man, scone man, this girl is stealing something. A buzz of exclamations from the crowd. A closing in upon her. A whirl of faces and counter and trays and gas stove. Jenny dropped with a crash. The warm scone still grasped in her fingers. Just before the ambulance came it was the blonde lady of the impossible gelatins who caught the murmur that came from Jenny's white lips. The blonde lady bent her head closer, closer still. When she raged her face to those other faces crowded near, her eyes were round with surprise. So far as I can make out she says her name's Mamie and she's from Cuba. Wow, wouldn't that eat you? I always thought they were dark-complected. End of Story 7. Maymays from Cuba. Recording by Madeira. Story 8. The Leading Lady of Buttered Side Down. This Leigh Brevox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Madeira. Buttered Side Down by Edna Ferber. Story 8. The Leading Lady. The Leading Lady lay on her bed and wept. Not as you have seen Leading Lady's weep, becomingly with eyebrows, pathetically V-shaped, mouth quivering, sequined bosom heaving. The Leading Lady lay on her bed in a red and blue striped kimono and wept as a woman weeps, her head burrowing into the depths of the lumpy hotel pillow, her teeth biting the pillow case to choke back the sound so that the grouch in the next room might not hear. Presently, the Leading Lady's right hand began to grope about on the bedspread for her handkerchief. Failing to find it, she sat up wearily, raising herself on one elbow and pushing her hair back from her forehead. Not as you have seen Leading Lady pass a lily hand across her alabaster brow, but as a heart-sick woman does it. Her tears and sniffles had formed a little oasis of moisture on the pillow's white bosom so that the ugly stripe of the ticking showed through. She gazed down at the damp circle with smarting, swollen eyes, and another lump came up into her throat. Then she sat up resolutely and looked about her. The Leading Lady had a large and saving sense of humour, but there is nothing that blunts the sense of humour more quickly than a few months of one-night stands. Even O'Henry could have seen nothing funny about that room. The bed was of green enamel with fly-specked gold trimmings. It looked like a huge frog. The wallpaper was a crime. It represented an army of tan-mustered plasters climbing up a chocolate fudge wall. The Leading Lady was conscious of a feeling of nausea as she gazed at it, so she got up and walked the window. The room faced west, and the hot afternoon sun smote full on her poor, swollen eyes. Across the street the red brick walls of the engine house caught the glare and sent it back. The firemen, in their blue shirt sleeves, were seated in the shade before the door. Their chairs tipped at an angle of sixty. The Leading Lady stared down into the sun-baked street, turned abruptly, and made as though to fall upon the bed again, with a view to forming another little damp oasis on the pillow. But when she reached the centre of the stifling little bedroom, her eye chanced on the electric call-button near the door. Above the electric bell was tacked a printed placard giving information on the subjects of laundry, ice-water, bellboys, and dining-room hours. The Leading Lady stood staring at it a moment thoughtfully. Then, with a sudden swift movement, she applied her forefinger to the button and held it there for a long half-minute. Then she sat down on the edge of the bed. Her kimono folded about her and waited. She waited until a lank bellboy in a brown uniform that was some sizes too small for him had ceased to take any interest in the game of chess, which Bauer and Merkel, the champion fireman chess players, were contesting on the walk before the open doorway of the engine house. The proprietor of the Burke House had originally intended that the brown uniform be worn by a diminutive bellboy, such as one sees in musical comedies, but the available supply of stage-size bellboys in our town is somewhat limited and was soon exhausted. There followed a succession of lank bellboys, with arms and legs sticking ungracefully out of sleeves and trousers. Come! called the Leading Lady quickly and answered the lank youth's footsteps and before he had time to knock. Ring! asked the boy, stepping into the torrid little room. The Leading Lady did not reply immediately. She swallowed something in her throat and pushed back the hair from her moist forehead again. The brown uniform repeated his question, a trifle irritably, whereupon the Leading Lady spoke desperately. Is there a woman about this place? I don't mean dining room girls or the person behind the cigar counter. Since falling air to the brown uniform, the lank youth had heard some strange requests. He had been interviewed by various ladies in vericolored kimonos relative to liquid refreshment, laundry, and the cost of hiring a horse and rig for a couple of hours. One had even summoned him to ask if there was a Bible in the house, but this latest question was a new one. He stared, leaning against the door and thrusting one hand into the depths of his very tight breech's pocket. Why, there's pearly sheltz, he said at last with a grin. Who's she, the Leading Lady, sat up expectantly? Steno, the expectant figure, drooped. Blonde and Irish crochet-collar with a black velvet bow on her chest? Oh, pearly? Nah. You mustn't give pearly mixed up with a common or garden variety of stenoes. Pearly is fat and she wears specks and she's got a double chin. Her hair is skimpy and she don't wear no rat. Why, no traveling man has ever tried to flirt with pearly yet. Pearly's what you'd call a woman all right. You wouldn't ever make a mistake and think she'd escape from the first row in the chorus. The Leading Lady rose from the bed, reached out for her pocketbook, extracted a dime, and held it out to the bellboy. Here, will you ask her to come up here to me? Tell her I said please. After he had gone, she seated herself on the edge of the bed again, with a look in her eyes like that which you have seen in the eyes of a dog that is waiting for a door to be opened. Fifteen minutes passed. The look in the eyes of the Leading Lady began to fade. Then a footstep sounded down the hall. The Leading Lady cocked her head to watch it and smiled blissfully. It was a heavy, comfortable footstep, under which a board or two creaked. There came a big, sensible thump-thump-thump at the door, with stout knuckles. The Leading Lady flew to answer it. She flung the door wide and stood there, clutching her kimono at the throat and looking up into a red, good-natured face. Pearly Schultz looked down at the Leading Lady kindly and benignantly, as a mastiff might look at a terrier. Lonesome for a bosom to cry on, asked she and stepped into the room, walked to the west windows and jerked down the shades, with a zip-zip shutting off the yellow glare. She came back to where the Leading Lady was standing and patted her on the cheek lightly. You tell me all about it, she said, smiling. The Leading Lady opened her lips, gulped, tried again, gulped again. Pearly Schultz shook a sympathetic head. Ain't had a decent close to nature-power with a woman for weeks and weeks, have you? How did you know? cried the Leading Lady. You've got that hungry look. There was a lady drummer here last winter, and she had the same expression. She was so dead sick of eating her supper and then going up to her ugly room and reading and sewing all evening that it was a wonder she'd stayed good. She said it was easy enough for the men. They could smoke and play pool and go to a show and talk to anyone that looked good to them. But if she tried to amuse herself, everybody'd say she was tough. She cottoned to me like a bird to a wool skirt. She traveled for a perfumery house and she said she hadn't talked to a woman except the dry goods clerks who were nice to her trying to work her for perfume samples for weeks and weeks. Why, that woman made crochet by the bolt and mended her clothes evenings whether they needed it or not and read till her eyes come near going back on her. The Leading Lady seized Perley's hand and squeezed it. That's it. Why, I haven't talked really talk to a real woman since the company went out on the road. I'm Leading Lady of the Second Wife Company, you know. It's one of those small cast plays with only five people in it. I play the wife and I'm the only woman in the cast. It's terrible. I ought to be thankful to get the part these days and I was too but I didn't know it'd be like this. I'm going crazy. The men in the company are good kids but I can't go trailing around after them all day. Besides, it wouldn't be right. They're all married except Billy who plays the kid and he's busy writing a vaudeville skit that he thinks the New York managers are gonna fight for when he gets home. We were to play Athens Wisconsin tonight but the house burned down night before last and that left us with an open date. When I heard the news you'd have thought I'd lost my mother. It's bad enough having a whole day to kill but when I think of tonight, the Leading Lady's voice took on a note of hysteria. It seems as though I'd say, Perley interrupted abruptly, you ain't got a real good corsia cover pattern, have you? One that fits smooth over the bust and don't slip off the shoulders? I don't seem to be able to get my hands on the kind I want. Have I? yelled the Leading Lady and made a flying leap from the bed to the floor. She flapped back the cover of a big suitcase and began burrowing into its depths, strewing the floor with lingerie, newspaper clippings, blouses, photographs, and Dutch collars. Perley came over and sat down on the floor in the midst of the litter. The Leading Lady dived once more, fished about in the bottom of the suitcase, and brought a crumpled piece of paper triumphantly to the surface. This is it. It only takes a yard in five-eighths and fits, like Anna held skirts, comes down in a V-front and back, like this, see? And no fullness. Wait a minute. I'll show you my princess slip. I made it all by hand, too. I'll bet you couldn't buy it under fifteen dollars and it cost me four dollars and eighty cents with the lace and all. Before an hour had passed, the Leading Lady had displayed all her treasures from the photograph of her baby that died to her new blanch-ring curl cluster, and was calling Perley by her first name. When a bell somewhere booned six o'clock, Perley was being instructed in a new exercise calculated to reduce the hips an inch a month. My land! cried Perley aghast and scrambled to her feet as nimbly as any woman can who weighs two hundred pounds. Supper time and I've got a bunch of letters an inch thick to get out. I'd better reduce that sum before I begin on my hips, but say I've had a lovely time. The Leading Lady clung to her. You've saved my life. Why, I forgot all about being hot and lonely in a couple of thousand miles from New York. Must you go? Got to, but if you'll promise you won't laugh. I'll make a date for this evening that'll give you a new sensation anyway. There's going to be a strawberry social on the lawn of the parsonage of our church. I've got a booth. You shed that kimono and put on a thin dress and those curls and some powder, and I'll introduce you as my friend Miss Evans. You don't look Evans, but this is a Methodist Church Strawberry Festival, and if I was to tell them that you are Leading Lady of the Second Wife Company, they'd excommunicate my booth. A strawberry social? Gassed the Leading Lady. Do they still have them? She did not laugh. Why? I used to go to strawberry festivals when I was a little girl and careful you'll be given away your age, and anyway, you don't look it. Fashions and strawberry socials ain't changed much. Better bathe your eyes and order cologne or whatever it is. They're always dabbing on them in books. See you at eight. At eight o'clock, Perley's thump thump sounded again, and the Leading Lady sprang to the doors before Perley stared. This was no tear-stained, heat-bedraggled creature in an unbecoming red-striped kimono. It was a remarkably pretty woman in a white lingerie gown over a pink slip. The Leading Lady knew a thing or two about the gentle art of making up. That just goes to show, remarked Perley, that you must never judge a woman in a kimono or bathing suit. You look nineteen. Say, I forgot something downstairs. Just get your handkerchief and chamois together and meet me in my cubbyhole next to Lobby, will you? I'll be ready for you. Downstairs, she summoned the lank bellboy. You go outside and tell Sid Strang I want to see him, will you? He's on the bench with the baseball bunch. Perley had not seen Sid Strang outside. She did not need to. She knew he was there. In our town all the young men dress up in their pale gray suits and lavender striped shirts after supper on summer evenings. Then they stroll down to the Burke House, buy a cigar, and sit down on the benches in front of the hotel to talk baseball and watch the girls go by. It is astonishing to note the number of our girls who have letters to mail after supper. One would think that they must drive their pens fiercely all the afternoon in order to get out such a mass of correspondence. The obedient Sid reached the door of Perley's little office just off the lobby as the Leading Lady came down the stairs with a spangled scarf trailing over her arm. It was an effective entrance. Why, hello, said Perley looking up from her typewriter as though Sid Strang were the last person in the world she expected to see. What do you want here? Ethel, this is my friend, Mr. Sid Strang, one of our rising young lawyers. His neckties always match his socks. Sid, this is my friend, Miss Ethel Evans of New York. We're going over to the strawberry social at the Emmy Parsonage. Don't suppose you care about going? Mr. Sid Strang gazed at the Leading Lady in the white lingerie dress with the pink slip and the V-shaped neck and the spangled scarf and turned to Perley. Why, Perley Schultz, he said reproachfully. How can you ask? You know what a strawberry social means to me. I haven't missed one in years. I know it, replied Perley with a grin. You feel the same way about Thursday evening prayer meeting, too, don't you? You can walk over with us if you want to. We're going now. Miss Evans and I have got a booth. Sid walked. Perley led them determinately past the rows of gray suits and lavender and pink shirts on the benches in front of the hotel. And as the Leading Lady came into view, the gray suits stopped talking baseball and sat up and took notice. Perley had known all of those young men inside of the swagger suits in the days when their summer costume consisted of a pair of dad's pants cut down to a doubtful fit and a nondescript shirt damped from the swimming hole. So she called out cheerily, We're going over to the Strawberry Festival. I expect to see all you boys there to contribute your might to the church carpet. The Leading Lady turned to look at them and smiled. They were such a dapper, pink, cheeked, clean looking lot of boys, she thought. At that the benches rose to a man and announced that they might as well stroll over right now. Whenever a new girl comes to visit an hour-town, our boys make a concerted rush at her and develop a case immediately, and the girl goes home when her visit is over with her head swimming and forever after bores the girls of her hometown with tales of her conquests. The ladies of the First M.E. Church still talk of the money they garnered at the Strawberry Festival. Perley's out-of-town friend was Garnerer in chief. You take a cross-eyed, park-marked girl and put her in a white dress with a pink slip on a green lawn under a string of rose-coloured Japanese lanterns, and she'll develop an almost oriental beauty. It is an ideal setting. The Leading Lady was not cross-eyed or park-marked. She stood at the lantern-illumined booth with Perley in the background and dispensed an unbelievable amount of strawberries. Sid Strang in the hotel bench brigade assisted. They made engagements to take Perley and her friend down river next day and to the ball game and planned innumerable picnics gazing meanwhile into the Leading Lady's eyes. There grew in the cheeks of the Leading Lady a flush that was not brought about by the pink slip or the Japanese lanterns or the skillful application of rouge. By nine o'clock the strawberry supply was exhausted and the President of the Foreign Missionary Society was sending wildly downtown for more ice-cream. I call it an outrage! puffed Perley happily lent—sorry, ladling—ice-cream like mad, making a poor working girl like me slave all evening. How many was that last order? Four? My land, that's the third dish of ice-cream Ed White's had. You'll have something to tell the villagers about when you get back to New York. The Leading Lady turned a flushed face toward Perley. This is more fun than the actor's fair. I had the photograph booth last year and I took in nearly as much as Lil Russell and goodness knows all she needs to do at a fair is to wear her diamond and pearl stomacher and her set piece smile and the men just swarm around her like the pictures of a crowd in a McCutcheon cartoon. When the last Japanese lantern had guttered out, Perley Schultz and the Leading Lady prepared to go home. Before they left, the ME ladies came over to Perley's booth and personally congratulated the Leading Lady and thanked her for the interest she had taken in the cause and the Secretary of the Upworth League asked her to come to the tea that was to be held at her home the following Tuesday. The Leading Lady thanked her and said she'd come if she could. Escorted by a bodyguard of gray suits and lavender-striped shirts, Perley and her friend Miss Evans walked toward the hotel. The attentive bodyguard confessed itself puzzled. Aren't you staying at Perley's house, acid tenderly when they reached the Burke House? The Leading Lady glanced up at the windows of the stifling little room that phased west. No! answered she and paused at the foot of the steps to the ladies' entrance. The light from the electric globe over the doorway shone on her hair and sparkled in the folds of her spangled scarf. I'm not staying at Perley's because my name isn't Ethel Evans. It's Amy Fox, with a little French accent mark over the double E. I'm Leading Lady of the Second Wife Company and old enough to be—well, your auntie, anyway. We go out at one-thirty tomorrow morning. End of Story Eight. The Leading Lady. Recording by Madeira. Story Nine. That hometown feeling of Buttered Side Down. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Madeira. Story Nine. That hometown feeling of Buttered Side Down by Edna Ferber. We all have our ambitions. Mine is to sit in a rocking chair on the sidewalk, the corner of Clark and Randolph streets, and watch the crowds go by. South Clark Street is one of the most interesting and cosmopolitan thoroughfares in the world. New Yorkers, please sniff. If you are from Paris, France, or Paris, Illinois, and should chance to be in that neighborhood, you will stop at Tony's newsstand by your hometown paper. Don't mistake the nature of this story. There is nothing of the shivering newsboy wave about Tony. He has the voice of a foghorn, the purple-striped shirt of a sport, the diamond scarf-pin of a racetrack tout, and the savoire of the gutter bread. You'd never pick him for a newsboy if it weren't for his chapped hands and the eternal cold sore on the upper left corner of his mouth. It is a fascinating thing, Tony's stand. A high wooden structure rising tear on tear, containing papers from every corner of the world. I'll defy you to name a paper that Tony doesn't handle, from Timbuktu to Tarry Town, from South Bend to South Africa. A paper marked Christiania, Norway, nestles next to a sheet from Kalamazoo, Michigan. You can get the War Cry or Le Figaro. With one hand Tony will give you the Berlin Tag of Blatt, and with the other the Times from Nina, Wisconsin. Take your choice between the bulletin from Sydney, Australia, or the bee from Omaha. But perhaps you know South Clark Street. It is honeycombed with good copy, man-sized stuff. South Clark Street reminds one of a slatternly woman, brave in silks and velvets on the surface, but ragged and rumpled and none too clean as to nether garments. It begins with a tenement so vile, so filthy, so repulsive that the municipal authorities deny its very existence. It ends with a brand new hotel, all red brick and white tiling, and Louis Quince furniture, and sour cream-colored marble lobby, and oriental rugs lavishly scattered under the feet of the unappreciative guest from Kansas City. It is a street of signs, is South Clark. They vary all the way from Banca Italiana, done in fat fly-spec letters of gold, to Song Yuan, scrawled in Chinese red and black. Spaghetti and chop suey and dairy lunches nestle side by side. Here an electric sign blazes forth the tempting announcement of lunch. Just across the way, delicately suggesting a means of availing one's self of the invitation, is another which announces loans. South Clark Street can transform a winter overcoat into hamburger and onion so quickly that the eye can't follow the hand. Do you gather from this that you are being taken slumming? Not at all. For the passerby on Clark Street varies as to color, nationality, raiment, fingernails, and haircut according to the locality in which you find him. At the tenement end the feminine passerby is apt to be shawl, swarthy, down at the heel and dragging a dark-eyed fretting baby in her wake. At the hotel end you will find her blonde of hair, velvet of boot, plumed of headgear, and prone to have at her heels a white woolly pink-eyed dog. The masculine Clark Streeter? I throw up my hands. Pray remember that South Clark Street embraces the dime lodging-house, pawn-shop, hotel, theater, chop suey, and railway office district all within a few blocks. From the sidewalk in front of his groggery, Bath House John can see the city hall. The trim khaki-garbed enlistment officer rubs elbows with the lodging-house bum. The masculine Clark Streeter may be of the kind that begs a dime for a bed, or he may lull in manicured luxury at the marble-lined hotel. South Clark Street is so splendidly indifferent. Copy-hunting I approach Tony with hope in my heart, a smile on my lips, and a nickel in my hand. Philadelphia, a inquirer? I asked, those being the city and paper which fire my imagination least. Tony whipped it out dexterously. I looked at his keen blue eye, his lean brown face, and his punishing jaw, and I knew that no airy purseflage would deceive him. Boldly I waited in. I write for the magazine, said I. Do they know it? grinned Tony. Just beginning to be faintly aware, your stand looks like a story to me. Tell me, does one ever come your way? For instance, don't they come here asking for their hometown paper, sobs in their voice, grasps the street with trembling hands, typeswins in a misty haze before their eyes, turn aside to brush away a tear, all that kind of stuff, you know? Tony's grin threatened his colesaur. You can't stand on the corner of Clark and Randolph all those years without getting wise to everything there is. I'm on, he said, but I'm afraid I can't accommodate girly. I guess my ear ain't attuned to that sob stuff. What's that? Yes, sir. No, sir. Fifteen cents. Well, I can't help that. Fifteen's a regular price of foreign papers. Thanks. There, did you see that? I bet that gink gave up fifteen of his last two bits to get that paper. Oh, well, sometimes they look happy, and then again, sometimes they... Yes, them? Mississippi? Five cents. Las Vegas Optic right here. Hey there! You forgetting to change? And then again, sometimes they look all to the doleful. Say, stick around. Maybe somebody'll start something you never can tell. And then this happened. A man approached Tony's new stand from the north, and a woman approached Tony's new stand from the south. They brought my story with them. The woman reeked of the city. I hope you know what I mean. She wore the stamp and seal and imprint of it. It had ground its heel down on her face. At the front of her coat she wore a huge bunch of violets with a fleshly tuberose rising from its center. Her furs were voluminous. Her hat was hidden beneath the cascades of a green willow plume. A green willow plume would make Etna May look sophisticated. She walked with that humping hip movement which city women acquire. She carried a jangling handful of useless gold trinkets. Her heels were too high, and her hair too yellow, and her lips too red, and her nose too white, and her cheeks too pink. Everything about her was too. From the black stitching on her white gloves, to the buckle of brilliance in her hat, the city had her body and soul, and had fashioned her in its metallic cast. You would have sworn that she had never seen flowers growing in a field. She said to Tony, God, a Kawaskum courier! As she said it, the man stopped at the stand and put his question. To present this thing properly, I ought to be able to describe them both at the same time, like a jeppeler keeping two balls in the air at once. Kindly carry the lady in your mind's eye. The man was tall and raw-boned, with very white teeth, very blue eyes, and an open-faced collar that allowed full play to an objectionably apparent Adam's apple. His hair and moustache were sandy, his gate loping, his manor clothes and complexion breathed a Waco Texas. Or is it Arizona? Said he to Tony. Let me have the London Times. Well, there you are. I turned an accusing eye on Tony. And you said no stories came your way. I murmured reproachfully. Help yourself! said Tony. The blonde lady grasped the Kawaskum courier. Her green plume appeared to be unduly agitated as she searched its columns. The sheet rattled. There was no breeze. The hands and the two black stitched gloves were trembling. I turned from her to the man just in time to see the Adam's apple leaping about unpleasantly and convulsively, whereupon I jumped to two conclusions. Conclusion one. Any woman whose hands can tremble over the Kawaskum courier is homesick. Conclusion two. Any man, any part of whose anatomy can become convulsed over the London Times is homesick. She looked up from her courier. He glanced away from his times. As the novelists have it, their eyes met. And there, in each pair of eyes, there swam that misty haze about which I had so earnestly consulted Tony. The green plume took an involuntary step forward. The Adam's apple did the same. They spoke simultaneously. They're going to pave Main Street, said the green plume. And Mrs. Wilcox, that was Jerry Myers, has got another baby girl, and the ladies of the first ME made seven dollars and sixty-nine cents on their needlework bazaar and missionary tea? I ain't been home in eleven years. Hollam is trying for Parliament. In Westchester, and the King is back at Windsor. My mother wears a lace cap down to breakfast, and the place is famous for its tapestries and newtrees and family-goes. I haven't been home in twelve years. The great, soft light of fellow-feeling and sympathy glowed in the eyes of each. The green plume took still another step forward and laid her hand on his arm, as is the way of green plumes the world over. Why don't you go, kid? She inquired softly. Adam's apple gnawed at his mustache-end. I'm the black sheep. Why don't you? The blonde lady looked down at her glove-tips. Her lower lip was caught between her teeth. What's the feminine for black sheep? I'm that. Anyway, I'd be afraid to go home for fear it would be too much of a shock for them when they saw my hair. They wasn't in on the intermediate stages when it was chestnut, auburn, titan, gold, and orange-colored. I want to spare their feelings. The last time they saw me it was just plain brown, where I come from a woman who dyes her hair when it is beginning to turn gray is considered as good as lost. Funny, ain't it? And yet I remember the minister's wife used to wear false teeth, the kind that clicks. But hair is different. Dear lady, said the blue-eyed man, it would make no difference to your own people. I know they would be happy to see you. Hair and all. One's own people. My folks? That's just it. If the prodigal son had been a daughter, they'd probably have handed her one of her sister's mother-hubboards and put her to work-washing dishes in the kitchen. You see, after Ma died, my brother married, and I went to live with him and Lil. I was an ugly little mug, and it looked all to the Cinderella for me, with the coach and four and Prince left out. Lil was the village beauty when my brother married her. And she kind of got into the habit of leaving the heavy role to me, and confining herself to thinking parts. One day I took twenty dollars and came to the city. Oh, I paid it back long ago, but I'd never been home since. But say, do you know, every time I get near a new stand like this, I grab the hometown paper. I'll bet I've kept track every time my sister-in-law's sewing circle has met for the last ten years. And the spring the paper said they'd built a new porch, I was just dying to write and ask them what they did with the Virginia creeper that used to cover the whole front and side of the old porch. Look here, said the man very abruptly, if it's money you need, what me? Do I look like a touch? Now you, finest stock farm and ranch in seven counties, I come to Chicago once a year to sell. I've got just thirteen thousand nestling next to my left floating rib this minute. The eyes of the woman with the green plume narrowed down to two glittering slits. A new look came into her face, a look that matched her hat and heels and gloves and complexion and hair. Thirteen thousand? Thirteen thousand? Say, isn't it chilly on this corner, hmm? I know a kind of restaurant just around the corner where a snow use, said the sandy-haired man gently, and I wouldn't have said that if I were you. I was going back today in the 525, but I'm sick of it all. So are you, while you won't have said what you just said. Listen, let's go back home, you and I. The sight of a Navajo blanket nauseates me. The thought of those prairies make my eyes ache. I know that if I have to eat one more meal cooked by that chink of mine, I'll hang him by his own pigtail. Those rangy western ponies aren't horse flesh fit for a man to ride. My back home our stables were—look here, I want to see a silver tea service with a coat of arms on it. I want to dress for dinner and take in a girl with a white gown and smooth white shoulders. My sister clips roses in the morning before breakfast, in a pink ruffled dress and guarding gloves. Would you believe that, here on Clark Street with a whiskey sign of her head, and the stockyard smells undernose. Oh, hell! I'm going home. Home? repeated the blonde lady. Home? The sagging lines about her flaccid chin took on a new look of firmness and mizal. The light of determination clothed in her eyes. I'll beat you to it, she said. I'm going home too. I'll be there tomorrow. I'm dead sick of this. Who cares whether I live or die? It's just one darn round of grease paint and sky blue tights and new boarding houses and humping over to the theatre every night, going on and humping back to the room again. I want to wash up some supper dishes with egg on them and set some use for bread and pop a dishpan full of corn and put a shawl over my head and run over to Millie Krause's to get her kimono sleeve pattern. I'm sour on this dirt and noise. I want to spend the rest of my life in a place so that when I die they'll put a column in the paper with a verse at the top and all the neighbors will come in and help bake up. Here—well, here I'd just be two lines on the want ad page with fifty cents extra for Kowaskam paper, please copy. The man held out his hand. Good-bye, he said. And please excuse me if I say God bless you. I've never really wanted to say it before, so it's quite extraordinary. My name's Guy Peale. The white glove, with its two conspicuous black stitching, disappeared within his palm. Mine's Mercedes Maron, late of the morning glory Berleskers, but from now on Sadie Hayes of Kowaskam, Wisconsin. Good-bye, and, well, God bless you too. Say, I hope you don't think I'm in the habit of talking to strange gents like this. I am quite sure you are not, said Guy Peale, very gravely, and bowed slightly before he went south on Clark Street, and she went north. Dear reader, will you take my hand while I assist you to make a one-year's leave? There you are. A man and a woman approached Tony's newsstand. You are quite right. But her willow plume was purple this time. A purple willow plume would make Mario Doro look sophisticated. The man was sandy-haired, raw-bone, with a loping gait, very blue eyes, very white teeth, and an objectionably apparent Adam's apple. He came from the north and she from the south. In story-books and on the stage, when two people meet unexpectedly after a long separation, they always stop short, bring one hand up to their breast, and say, You! Sometimes, especially in the case where the heroine chances on the villain they say simultaneously, You! Here! I have seen people reunited under surprising circumstances, but they never said, You! They said something quite unmelodramatic and commonplace, such as, Well, look who's here, or My land, if it ain't Ed, how's Ed? So it was that the purple willow plume and the Adam's apple stopped. Sure can't, Zen viewed one another while the plume said, I kind of thought I'd bump into you. Felt it in my bones. And the Adam's apple said, Then you're not living in Coascome, uh, Wisconsin. Not any, responded she briskly. How do you happen to be straying away from the tapestries and the yew trees and the ghost, and the pink roses and the garden gloves, and the silver tea service with the coat of arms on it? A slow grim smile overspread the features of the man. You tell yours first, he said. Well, began she. In the first place, my name's Mercedes Marin at the morning glory Berluskers, formerly Sadie Hayes of Coascome, Wisconsin. I went home next day, like I said I would. Say, Mr. Peel, you said Peel, didn't you? Guy Peel? Nice neat name. To this day, when I eat lobster late at night and have dreams, it's always about that visit home. How long did you stay? I'm coming to that. Or maybe you can figure it out yourself when I tell you I've been back eleven months. I wired the folks I was coming, and then I came before they had a chance to answer. When the train reached Coascome, I stepped off into the arms of a dowd in a homemade maid over a year before last suit, and a hat that would have been funny if it hadn't been so pathetic. I grabbed her by the shoulders, and I held her off, and looked, looked at the wrinkles, and the sallow complexion, and the coat with the sleeves in wrong, and the mashed hat. I told you Lil used to be the village peach, didn't I? And I says, for God's sakes, Lil, does your husband beat you? Steve? She shrieks, beat me, you must be crazy. Well, if he don't, he ought to, those closer grounds for divorce, I says. Mr. Guy Peel, it took me just four weeks to get wise to the fact that the way to cure home sickness is to go home. I spent those four weeks trying to revolutionize my sister-in-law's house, dress, kids, husband, wallpaper, and parlor carpet. I took all the doilies from under the ornaments, and spoke my mind on the subjects of the hand-painted lamp, and Lil hates me for it yet, and will to her dying day. I fitted three dresses for her, and made her get some corsets that she'll never wear. They have roast pork for dinner on Sundays, and they never go to the theatre, and they like bread pudding, and they're happy. I wasn't. They treated me fine, and it was home, all right, but not my home. It was the same, but I was different. Eleven years away from anything makes it shrink, if you know what I mean. I guess maybe you do. I remember that I used to think that the Grand View Hotel was a regular little Oriental palace that was almost too luxurious to be respectable, and that the traveling men who stopped there were gods, and just a prance past the hotel after supper had the Atlantic City boardwalk looking like a back alley on a rainy night. Well, everything had sort of shriveled up just like that. The popcorn gave me indigestion, and I burned the skin off my nose popping it. Needing bread gave me the backache, and the blame stuff wouldn't raise right. I got so I was crazy to hear the roar of an L train, and the sound of a crossing policeman's whistle. I got to thinking how Michigan Avenue looks downtown with the light shining down on the asphalt, and all those people eating in the swell hotels, and the autos, and the theatre crowds, and the windows, and well, I'm back. Glad I went. You said it. Because it made me so darn glad to get back. I found out one thing, and it's a great little lesson when you get it learned. Most of us are where we are because we belong there, and if we didn't, we wouldn't be. Say, that does sound mixed, don't it? But it's straight. Now you tell yours. I think you said it all, began Guy Peel. It's queer, isn't it? How twelve years of America will spoil one for afternoon tea, and yew trees, and tapestries and lace caps and roses. The martyr was glad to see me, but she said I smelled woolly. They think a Navajo blanket is a thing the Indians wear on the wall-path, and they don't know whether Texas is a state or a mineral water. It was slow—slow. About the time they were taking afternoon tea, I'd be reckoning how the boys would be rounding up the cattle for the night. And about the time we'd sit down to dinner, something seemed to whisk the dinner table, and the flowers and the men and women in evening clothes right out of sight, like magic. And I could see the boys stretched out in front of the bunk house after their supper of bacon and beans and biscuit and coffee. They'd be smoking their pipes at smell-day heaven and further, and Wing would be squealing one of his creepy old chink songs out in the kitchen, and the sky would be—say, Miss Marin, did you ever see the night sky out west? Purple, you know, and softer soap-suts, and so near that you want to reach up and touch it with your hand. Toward the end, my mother used to take me off in a corner and tell me that I hadn't spoken a word to the little girl that I had taken into dinner, and that if I couldn't forget my uncouth western ways for an hour or two, at least, perhaps I'd better not try to mingle with civilized people. I discovered that home isn't always the place where you were born and bred. Home is the place where your everyday clothes are, and where somebody or something needs you. They didn't need me over there in England. Lord, no. I was sick for the sight of another blanket. My shack's glowing with them, and my books needed me, and the boys, and the critters, and Kate. Kate? repeated Miss Marin quickly. Kate's my horse. I'm going back in the 525 to-night. This is my regular trip, you know. Came round here to buy a paper, because it has become a habit. And then, too, I sort of felt well. Something told me that you— You're a nice boy, said Miss Marin. By the way, did I tell you that I married the manager of the show the week after I got back? We go to Bloomington tonight, and then we jump to St. Paul. I came around here just as usual, because—well, because— Tony's gift for remembering faces and facts amounts to genius. With two deft movements he whisked two papers from among the many in the rack and held them out. Can we ask him courier? he suggested. Nick's, said Mercedes Marin. I'll take a Chicago scream. London Times, said Tony. No, replied Guy Peel. Give me the San Antonio Express. End of Story 9, That Hometown Feeling of Buttered Side Down.