Chapter 11

One bright, breezy October afternoon, Sam Kimper's daughter Jane got "an hour off" from her duties at the hotel, and proceeded to devote it to her highest ideal of possible enjoyment. There were many other pleasures for which she longed, but, as they were unattainable just then, she made the most of that which was within her reach for the time being. It was to array herself in her best and saunter to and fro in the principal streets, look into shop windows, and exchange winks and rude remarks with young men and women with whom she was acquainted.

Although her attire was about what one would expect of a drunkard's child who had spent her later years in the kitchen and corridors of a hotel, Jane was not an unsightly creature. There must have been good physical quality in one side or other of her family, in past generations, which was trying to reappear, for Jane had a fine figure, expressive eyes, and a good complexion. Had any one followed her during her afternoon stroll, and observed her closely during her successive chance meetings with young men and women of her acquaintance, he would have seen hard lines, coarse lines, ugly lines, in her face; yet when in repose the same face was neither unwomanly nor without an occasional suggestion of soul. It was a face like many others that one may see on the streets,--entirely human, yet entirely under the control of whatever influence might be about it for the time being,--the face of a nature untrained and untaught, which would have followed either Jesus or Satan, or both by turns, had both appeared before it in visible shape.

During a moment or two of her afternoon out, Jane found herself approaching Mrs. Prency and Eleanor, those ladies being out on one of those serious errands known collectively as "shopping."

"Do see that dreadfully dowdy girl!" exclaimed Miss Eleanor, whose attire was always selected with correct taste.

"She has never had any one to teach her to dress properly, my dear," suggested the mother.

"She might have some one who cared enough for her to keep her from appearing in public in red hair and a blue ribbon," said the daughter.

"Such girls have no one to keep them from doing anything they like, my dear. Let us try to be sorry for them, instead of being disgusted."

"But, mother--"

"Sh-h! she'll hear you. I'm going to bow to her; I wish you'd do the same."

"Mother!"

"To oblige me; I'll explain afterwards."

The couple were now within several steps of Jane, who, with an odd mixture of wistfulness and scare, had been studying Eleanor's attire. When she saw both women looking at her, she began to take a defiant attitude, but the toss of her head was met by one of Mrs. Prency's heartiest smiles, accompanied by a similar recognition from Eleanor. Short as was the time that could elapse before the couple had passed her, it was long enough to show a change in Jane's face,--a change so notable that Eleanor whispered,--

"Did you ever see any one alter looks so quickly?"

"Never; but I sha'n't lose any opportunity to see it again," said Mrs. Prency.

"Mother, dear," said Eleanor, "I hope you're not suddenly going to recognize every common person you may meet on the street. You're so enthusiastic."

"And so different from my daughter in that respect,--eh, dear?"

"But, mother, you've always been so careful and fastidious about your associations and mine. I remember the time, only a year or two ago, while I was at school, when you would have been horrified if I'd had anything to do with a creature like that."

"You were a child then, my dear; you're a woman now. That girl is the daughter of the poor fellow--"

"Sam Kimper?--that you and father talk of so frequently? Yes, I know; she was a horrid little thing in school, two classes below me. But, mother, I don't see why we ought to recognize her just because her father has been in the penitentiary and behaved himself since he came back."

"Because she _needs_ recognition, dear child; because she gets it from plenty of people of her own class, and if she has it from no others she never will be any better than she is; perhaps she will become worse."

"Oh, mother!" exclaimed Eleanor, with a toss of her handsome head, "such people never change. There were plenty of such girls in the same class with me in the public school, and they've all gone off and married common low fellows. Some of them were real pretty girls while they were young, too."

"All the more reason why others of the same kind should have some encouragement to do better, my child."

"But, mother," persisted Eleanor, "what possible good will it do that Kimper girl for us merely to recognize her in the street?"

"You may do as much more for her as you choose, if you think mere courtesy is not enough. Eleanor, you are a healthy, happy girl; you know--and I remember--all a girl's natural fancies and longings. Do you imagine that being badly born and reared can keep that girl from having the same feelings? She probably wishes she could dress as well as the best, attract attention, be respected, have a real fine fellow fall in love with her--"

"The idea!" exclaimed Eleanor, laughing merrily. "But suppose it were all true; how can mere notice from us help her? I'm sure the minute we passed her she made a face and envied me my better clothes."

"You will think differently when you have more experience, my dear. When I was as young as you, I thought--"

"Oh, mother, there she is again," said Eleanor, "crossing the street; she's turning right towards us. And," murmured the young lady, after assuring herself that it was really the same combination of red hair and blue ribbon, "how different she looks!"

"Because two women of some standing and position chanced to notice her. Let's help the good work along, daughter." Then, before Miss Eleanor had time to object, and just as the cobbler's daughter was in front of them, Mrs. Prency stopped, extended her neatly gloved hand, and said, with a pleasant smile,--

"How these girls do grow! You were little Jane only a year or two ago, Miss Kimper."

Never before had Jane Kimper been addressed as "Miss." The appellation sent color flying into her face and brightness into her eyes as she stammered out something about growing being natural.

"You haven't grown fast enough, though, to neglect good looks," continued Mrs. Prency, while Eleanor, endeavoring to act according to her mother's injunctions, drawled,--

"No, indeed!"

Then the cobbler's daughter flushed deeper and looked grateful, almost modest, for girls read girls pretty fairly, and Jane saw that Eleanor was regarding her face with real admiration.

"You girls of the new generation can't imagine how much interest we women who used to be girls have in you," said the judge's wife. "I'm afraid you'd be vain if you knew how much Eleanor and I have looked at you and talked about you."

"I didn't s'pose any lady that was anybody ever thought anything about girls like me," Jane finally managed to say.

"You're greatly mistaken, my dear girl," said the lady. "Nearly every one in this world talks a good deal about every one else whom they know by sight. You really can't imagine how much good it does me to see you looking so well and pretty. Keep right on looking so, won't you? The girls of to-day must be our women a few years hence; that's what I keep impressing upon my daughter day by day,--don't I, dear."

"Indeed you do, mother." Eleanor said it with a look at Jane which was almost a signal for sympathy: the cobbler's daughter was greatly mystified by it.

"I don't see," said Jane, after standing awkwardly for a moment in meditation, "how a girl's goin' to be much of a woman that amounts to anything one of these days if she's nothin' to do now but dirty work at a hotel."

"Maybe she could change her work," suggested the lady.

Jane's lips parted into some hard and ugly lines, and she replied,--

"Some things is easier sayin' than doin'."

"Should you like a different position?" asked Mrs. Prency. "I'm sure it could be had if people knew you wanted it. For instance, I need some one every day for weeks to come to help my daughter and me with our sewing and fitting. There are always so many things to be done as winter approaches. I sometimes feel as if I were chained to my sewing-machine, and have so much to do. But I'm afraid such work would seem very stupid to you. It would mean sitting still all day, you know, with no one to talk to but Eleanor and me."

Jane looked wonderingly at the two women before her. No one but them to talk to! She never had imagined an opportunity to talk to such people at all. She supposed all such women regarded her as part of the scum of the earth, yet here they were speaking pleasantly to her,--Mrs. Prency, a woman who naturally would fill the eye of an impulsive animal like Jane,--Eleanor, the belle of the town,--two women whom no one could look at without admiration. No one but them to talk to! All her associates faded from Jane's mind like a fleck of mist under a sunburst, as she answered,--

"If there's anything you want done that I can do, Mrs. Prency, I'd rather work for you for nothin' than for anybody else for any money."

"Come to my house as soon as you like, then, and we'll promise to keep you busy: won't we, daughter?"

"Yes, indeed," murmured Eleanor, who saw, in her mind's eye, a great deal of her work being done without effort of her own.

"You sha'n't do it for nothing, however; you shall earn fully as much as you do now. Good day," Mrs. Prency said, as she passed on, and Eleanor gave Jane a nod and a smile.

The hotel drudge stood still and looked after the couple with wondering eyes. The judge's wife dropped something as she walked. Jane hurried after her and picked it up. It was a glove. The girl pressed it to her lips again and again, hurried along for a few steps to return it, stopped suddenly, thrust it into her breast, and then, passing the back of her ungloved hand across her eyes, returned to the hotel, her eyes cast down and her ears deaf to occasional remarks intended specially for them.