Part 10

After the man had gone, all my lassitude vanished. I felt like dancing and screaming, I was so relieved and happy. Here I was engaged for six hours’ work a day for all of the summer. I rushed over to tell the good news to Rose St. Denis. She said:

“I think it is too good to be true. It looks too easy. I think he will want the model to pose nude, ha? You will not do so yet?” As I shook my head, she said with a nod: “You will make very poor living if you don’t do so, mon enfant. The artists have not enough to keep one model in work in the costume, and then there are so many doing the same thing. Every girl--all ze actress and ze chorus girl--even ze frien’ of ze artists, she will pose in ze costume. Ze model cannot get enough work to keep her, unless she is friend of some one or, maybe, she is complaisante to ze artist--yes. Only when she pose nude in ze schools--see--she get ze work, so long as she have ze belle figure. It is so. Now, which a model prefer? Pose in nude, starve--or perhaps be maitresse to somebody--which is ze same thing,” she added with a shrug as “aller au diable!” (to go to the devil!)

“Which would you prefer?” I asked her.

“Mon dieu! some funny question you ask,” said the French girl. “It is because I love my Alfred (Alfred was her fiancé) that I pose nude for ze other mens; for because I pose comme ça I can keep myself good and pure for only him. It would be more easy if I were not good. Do you not see, enfant? I pose and stand on my poor feet for three, four, and sometimes nine heures a day--nine heures when I do night work, and for zat I get me fifty cent one heure. The bad girl she get very liddle time more moneys than I; but me? I keep me my respect. Yes--it is so. Soon my Alfred, he will come from France and we will marry. Then, enfant, ah! we will be happy like cheeldren.”

Somehow when she was speaking, this model who posed in the nude, she looked like the Virgin Mary, and I put my arms around her and kissed her. She said:

“Pauvre enfant! Me? I know eet is hard for you! I have ze pity for you; but dat will not put ze food in ze stomach! Non! Soon you will see!”

Happily I awoke next morning. I was going to start at good, steady work. Now, I thought, I would pay Lu Frazer back all I owed her, and I’d send mama some money every week, and Reggie’s letters should go unanswered. He had written me saying that he was coming soon to Boston to bring me home, unless I returned myself. And, I thought, I would buy myself a new hat, and trim it with violets.

I went into the basement dining-room to get my breakfast, and the landlady put a bill at my plate. It was for three dollars for meals I had had. I told her I would pay her sure in a few days.

I had exactly five cents in my pocketbook when I started for Brookline, but I intended to ask the artist to pay me a little in advance. They often did that, and as I was to have steady work, I was sure he would not object. I could not help thinking of a remark of my father’s, that something always “turned up” and I felt that my something had come in the nick of time.

It was three-quarters of an hour’s ride to the street in Brookline he had marked on the card. I got off at last, and walked down the street, looking at the numbers. I went up and down twice, but I could find no such address. I went to nearly every second house on the street, but no one knew the name I inquired for, and the clerk in the drug store where I also inquired said there was no such man in the vicinity. Again and again I looked, and then a sick sense of apprehension stole over me, and I began to realize that I was the victim of some beastly hoax.

What in heaven’s name was I to do? I had no carfare even, and it was too far to walk. I wandered about distractedly, and then I finally resolved to get on the car, and when the conductor should ask for my fare, I would pretend I had lost it. Then, I thought, “even if he puts me off, I will be that much nearer home, and I will try another car.”

So I got on a car, but I suffered the shame of a cheat, when the conductor finally came up to me, and I almost cried as I pretended to search through my empty pocketbook. Then I heard the conductor’s voice. He was a big red-faced Irishman, with freckles on his face, and he grinned down at me:

“Aw, dat’s all right, kid!” he said, and taking a nickel from his own pocket, he rang up my fare. When I was getting off, I said:

“Thank you, I’ll send it back to you, if you give me your name.”

He laughed:

“Dat’s all right, kid,” he said, and then leaning to my ear, he added: “Say, do you want another nickel, sissy?”

XXXIV

I borrowed a dollar from Evans, the student who was a friend of Jimmy’s. I bought the morning papers, and scanned the columns of advertisements. I was determined to look for some other kind of work, yet I realized that I was a “Jack of all trades and master of none,” unless it be that of the model. I found one advertisement that seemed to be pretty good:

“WANTED: A smart, pretty young lady for light, easy work. Experience not necessary.”

I started down town to answer that advertisement at once. The address was in the old building Washington Street, and there seemed to be all kinds of business carried on there. On the door of the place I was to apply was some name, and the word “Massage.” I had a dim idea what massage meant. I associated it in some way in my mind with illness. I pushed the bell, and the door was quickly opened. A stout, matronly woman stood smiling at me.

“Come in, dearie,” she said, as though she were expecting me.

I found myself in a room that looked like the average boarding-house parlor. It was stuffy and dark. The woman set herself down in a rocker, and she was still smiling at me.

“I came in answer to the advertisement. What do you require me to do?”

Patting me on the arm, she said:

“Easy, easy, dear. Don’t talk so loud. It is massage work, dearie.”

“I can’t do it,” I said, “but I might be able to learn.”

She kept on grinning and winking at me, and I don’t know why, I suddenly felt terribly afraid of her. I said tremulously:

“Will I have to wear aprons?”

She got out of the rocking chair and poked me in the side.

“Now, dearie, if you are really a good girl, I don’t want you to come at all. I rather have a young married lady. I had a sweet little married lady before, but her husband got on to us and--”

I had begun to back toward the door, and with my hand behind me, I found the knob. I ran out into the hall, and down those stairs as quickly as I could get. Oh, how good the air did seem, when I found myself at last on the street.

When I got back to my room, I found a note on my table. It was from Miss Darling, and was as follows:

“DEAR MISS MARION:

I don’t want to press you, but could you let me have the rent? I would not bother you, but I have expenses to meet, and even if you could let me have a part of it if you cannot let me have it all, I would be obliged.

C. DARLING.”

There was a letter, too, from Reggie. I opened it with my hatpin, and, oh! I think if I could have pierced Reggie instead of that letter just then I would have liked to do it.

“DARLING GIRLIE:

I met your sister Ada on the street, and she tells me you are doing awfully well in Boston with your painting. I hope, however, you are not forgetting your old sweetheart. Ada tells me you are coming home this summer. Darling, I shall try to arrange to go to Boston, and we will come back to Montreal together. I am longing for the moment when I can hold my own little Marion in my arms again, and tell her how much I love her.

Everything’s going my way lately, and you’ll see me a Q. C. before many years have passed.

Your own,

REGGIE.”

Somehow I blamed Reggie for all I had suffered and as I stared out at the darkening night descending upon the streets, I muttered to myself:

“Now it is your fault that I am compelled to pose nude.”

It had come to this at last. There was nothing else for me to do, and Miss Darling must be paid. She had been so good to me.

As I went out I knocked at Miss Darling’s door. She put out her head and I said:

“Dear Miss Darling, it’s all right. I’m going to pay you in a few days.”

She said: “All right, dear, I know you will keep your word.”

Yes, I would keep my word! I was on my way to Miss St. Denis to tell her what I was now willing to do. I found her in, but she was not feeling well. She had been posing at a class the previous night, she told me, and also three hours in the afternoon.

“See my feet,” she said, thrusting them out, “Mon dieu! they are so sick. All ze night I have put me some vaseline and it is no good. They are all grown so beeg again.”

Her poor, bare feet were badly swollen. I begged her to let me bathe them in hot water. Mama always bathed our feet in hot water when we had colds or our feet hurt.

“Bien!” she said. “Do so, enfant, if you wish, but it is so hard to get hot water in dese boarding-houses. Ah! very soon I will have dat little house of all my own, and den, you will see, enfant, what it is to be très happy!”

She sighed, as if she were inexpressibly tired, and lay there with her dark eyes closed, and her beautiful soft, dark hair all about her lovely oval face, and I thought to myself again: “She looks like a picture of the Virgin,” and I felt sure that although she was just a poor model, she was pure and good like the Virgin. She opened her eyes after a moment and smiled at me, and she said:

“When I have my little house, enfant, then always ze water will be hot. There will be ze gas on ze stove, and it will give beeg flame. I will have plenty for heat my water. Here, me, I stand and hold for eternity ze little pot to make some water hot on ze little gas jet. It is all stuff up full!” and she closed her eyes again.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “I’ll go and ask your landlady for hot water.”

I found my way down to the basement, and very politely I said to the landlady:

“Miss St. Denis has a very bad foot. Will you be so kind to let me have a pitcher of hot water?”

She snapped back at me:

“I guess I give my roomers more hot water than they pay for. Does she think she is paying hotel prices?”

In a begrudging manner, she poured me out half a pitcherful from the kettle on the range. Thanking her, I started to carry it up, but a loose piece of carpet at the foot of the stairs caught my feet. I slipped, and all my precious hot water was lost. The landlady had picked up the pitcher, which fortunately was not broken, and when she saw me crying, she began to laugh uproariously, and seemed to be suddenly good-natured, for she refilled the pitcher.

I bathed Rose St. Denis’ feet, and made her comfortable, and she thanked me very sweetly and seemed to be grateful. I sat beside her bed for a while, smoothing her forehead. She was not really ill, just tired out. Presently I said:

“Now the time has come for me to pose nude, too, or as you say, starve or go to the devil.”

She opened her eyes with a start, and she said:

“Dieu! But you say things so suddenly, enfant. You are funniest girl. You say sometime ze ting I would not dare to speak, for if I did I would have to confess to my priest; and den you are so afraid to do some tings dat is nuttings wrong, and you mek one beeg fuss for dat.”

She sat up in the bed, with her knees drawn up, and regarded me with the benignant tolerant glance of a wise young mother. She could understand my viewpoint in regard to posing nude, but she believed I was simply wrong and my stubbornness in the matter had always puzzled her. She did not waste any time on pitying me now. On the contrary she urged me to do the work.

“Now you have come,” she said, “at a very good time, for me. I am not able to go to dat night class, and I have made engagement for all of dis week. You will take my place, voilà! First you will go to ze master of ze school, and you will tell him you have pose bi-fore, dat you have ze belle figure--yes, you must say dat. If necessaire you will show him.” As I shook my head, she nodded at me and said: “Yes, yes, you will do dat, if necessaire. Mebbe he will not require. You must not tell him dat you have not pose bi-fore in dat altogedder. He will tink you ‘greenhorn,’ as you say, den. Tell him you are one professional model, and dat you are frien’ to Rose St. Denis, and dat you will tek my place. I tink he will be satisfy. You look liddle bit like me--like you are liddle sister to me. Yes, dat is so.”

She patted my hand, smiling comfortingly at me. Then she went on with her instructions. It was only Tuesday, and I would have five evenings’ work and earn seven dollars and fifty cents. I would probably also be engaged for the following

week, and for the day classes of the summer school. A model as much in demand as was Rose St. Denis sometimes got steady work of nine hours a day. Three in the morning, three in the afternoon, and three at night. She assured me that I would be soon as much in demand as she was, perhaps more so, since I was younger than she.

The seven dollars and fifty cents I felt would be a godsend at this time. I would be able to pay the boarding-house woman. She had stopped me on the street only that morning and said:

“If you don’t pay me, Miss Ascough, you will have no good luck.”

Then there was Miss Darling. I must keep my word to her. Moreover, Ada had been writing me urgent letters insisting that I should send something home, for Wallace, Ellen’s husband, was very ill, and, of course, no help was coming from them now. As I looked at Miss St. Denis, I thought to myself that after all it could not be such dreadful work, or she would not do it. She seemed to me the embodiment of sweetness and refinement, and I could not imagine her doing anything that was gross or impure. I remembered that even the time I saw her posing nude before the class, I had not felt revolted in the way I had that time when Lil Markey had skipped about the Count’s studio. The amateur model, Lil, had been simply brazen. The professional one was seriously doing her honest duty. There were many other girls in Boston I had met who were doing the same work, and most of them were good girls. Mr. Sands had said that modesty and virtue did not always go hand in hand, and that it was his experience that some of the most immoral women appeared to be the most modest and shy.

Miss St. Denis was lying back again among her pillows, with her white hands--the hands Mr. Sands had said were the most beautiful in America--clasped at the back of her head. She was watching me, and I suppose she knew I was turning the matter over in my mind, and I do not doubt but what she realized somewhat of the struggle that was wrestling in my heart. After a while she said:

“Enfant, pass me dat bottle on ze dresser.”

I did so, and she pressed it back into my hand.

“See,” she said, “it is ze spirit dat will give you courage. I will give it to you. The moment dat you all undress yourself, tek one good long drink, and den, enfant, you will forget dat you have no clothes on your body, and dat tout le monde, he is look at you--your feet, your legs, your stomach, and every piece of you dat you do not like them to see. It will be joost like little dream. Dat firs’ time, also, I am feel ze shame--but soon it pass--and it is all forget. Courage, enfant!”

“No, no, Miss St. Denis. Oh, I can’t do it! I can’t!” I began to cry, and then she seized hold of my hands fiercely and pulled herself up in bed.

“Ah, you are ze coward--renegade! You will not help me.”

“Oh, Miss St. Denis, I might just as well go to the devil completely. Oh, I can never, never do it! Oh, if my people found out, I would be eternally disgraced and Reggie--he would never speak to me again. Then, surely, he would _never_, never marry me, and there would go my last hope.”

“You are hystérique,” she said gently. “I t’ink you have not eat so much--yes?”

I told her I had had my dinner, which was not true, and after a while, when I had dried my tears and was feeling more composed, she resumed, just as if I had not said I would not do it.

“It is not so hard as you t’ink. You will yourself undress behind ze screen dat they provide, wiz one chair for you to rest upon. Nobody look at you when you take off dose clothes. Dere also is one wrapper for you to cover over your body, and when ze monitor he call: ‘Pose!’ you will walk wiz ze wrapper on top you to ze model stage, and only den you will drop ze wrapper. Listen, enfant! If you have take dat dreenk I am tell you ’bout, you will forget dat it is your body, and dat you have on no clothes. You will say to yourself: ’Dis is not me. Dis is jus’ some statue--so many lines for dem to draw and paint, to make some peecture. Ze real me, I am lef’ in my clothes dat are behind dat screen. Voilà, enfant?”

I was beginning to get her spirit, and I said:

“Why, yes, I do see. It’s like acting, isn’t it? I _will_ forget it is I.” I tried to laugh and added: “I will say: ‘O Lord, have mercy on me, this is none of me!’ That’s an old Mother Goose rhyme, Miss St. Denis.” Because I could see she had fatigued herself on my account, and it was my turn now to comfort and reassure her, I put my arms about her and hugged and kissed her. Tears came into my eyes, and she murmured:

“Pauvre petite enfant! You look like ma petite sœur!”

XXXV

I went directly from Miss St. Denis’ to the school. I asked to speak to Mr. Lawton, the master, and he came out to the little anteroom and looked at me sharply while I spoke. I knew my voice was trembling but I said as bravely as I could:

“I have come from Miss St. Denis. She is ill; but I will take her place.”

“You have posed nude before?” he asked, his eye seeming to scan me from head to foot.

“I am a professional model,” I answered.

“Hm! Yes, I think you will do.”

I was behind the screen. I had taken off all of my clothes, and I was wrapped up in the wrapper which I found to be very dirty. I wondered how many girls had wrapped it about them.

I could hear the students entering the class-room. I peeped out, and already there were about fifteen men of various ages, and there were about thirty easels and stools. More students were coming in. There was one elderly man with white hair, and two young boys, one only about thirteen. He looked like my little brother, Randle. I began to redress. I could never go out before those men and the little boy! Merciful God, no!

Then I remembered my promise to Miss Darling. I thought of my father, who was ill, of Ada’s insistent demands, of my empty pocketbook, and then I thought of the bottle that Miss St. Denis had given to me. I undressed again. I heard a voice saying:

“Where’s the model?”

Then the voice of the monitor called sharply: “Pose! Pose, please!”

I drained that bottle dry. I stepped from behind that screen. I walked up to the platform, and I flung off the wrapper. I heard a voice saying, as from a distance:

“Stand a little to the left.” I obeyed.

“Take some poses,” said the voice. I obeyed.

I stood there immovable. I felt like a slave who was to be burned as an offering by some savages. It seemed as if I were turning to stone. There was a vague ringing in my ears, and then, as Miss St. Denis had foretold, I forgot that class. I did not see it. I was back in Hochelaga, and Charles was dragging me along on a sleigh. The snow was thick on our clothes. Mama was brushing it off. Charles was pulling off his mittens, and I heard him say to mama--as, oh! he had said a hundred years ago, it seemed--“Mama, I’ll never take that Marion with me again. When we pass the Catholic store with all those images of saints, she makes me so ashamed. She will stop to look at the naked Jesuses. I couldn’t make her come away.”

“Rest! Rest!”

The voice of the monitor! I awoke. Mechanically I pulled the wrapper over me. Somebody said:

“The model is crying.”

I walked behind the screen. My head still swam, and I still saw dim visions of my home. I seemed to have been there only five seconds--it was five minutes--when again came the command:

“Pose!”

Now I felt angry. I stepped on that stage again, and once more I threw off the wrapper. Somebody said:

“Put the left foot further back.”

My anger was mounting. The dream had all vanished and I was conscious only of a vague fury. I know not why, but, oh! I hated all of those men. They were looking at me, I thought, like cruel tormentors. I wanted to hurt them all, as they were hurting me. Their intent looks, some with their eyes narrowed to see better, others measuring me with a plumb string, seemed to be mocking at my pain. Somebody said:

“She looks cross.”

I seized the wrapper and savagely I wrapped it about me. I ran for the screen, shouting:

“Oh! you devils! You beasts! You shall not torment me any more.”

Again I was behind the screen, and with mad, hurrying, fumbling hands I was dressing myself. There was the scraping of boots and stools, and several whistles from the class-room, after that first silence.

Then the master came behind the screen.

“What does this mean, Miss Ascough?” he demanded. I was crying bitterly. “Did anyone say or do anything to offend you? If so, I’ll put him out of the class.”

I said:

“Oh, yes, they are not gentlemen. They all stared at me and talked about me.”

There was an indignant murmur of denials from the students. Mr. Lawton put his head over the screen and I saw him wink to the students. Then he turned to me and said in a coaxing voice:

“Now, now, be a good girl. We want you to finish the pose. If anybody dares to be rude to you, you just tell me about it, and I’ll put him out.”

“No, no,” I said. “I’ll not do it again.”

“Now please, won’t you for my sake? It’s instruction night, and I am here to give criticisms.

Please resume the pose like a good girl. Yours is just the kind of figure we need. Come, now.”

“No--no--I am through forever!”

I was all dressed. Oh, my beloved clothes! Never again would I remove them.

The teacher was now thoroughly provoked.

“What do you mean by taking an engagement and wasting our time like this?”

“I don’t know,” I answered, and I ran out of the room.

I owe an apology to that class.

XXXVI

We were all sitting around the big hall stove, and papa said:

“Put your feet on the fender, Marion, and get them warm.”

Mama was feeding me with a big spoon of ice-cream, which Reggie tried to snatch away, and then he would throw red-hot coals in my face. Screaming:

“Reggie! Reggie! Stop! Stop!” I woke up.

A man was sitting on the bed in my little room, and he was holding my wrist. I recognized him as a young doctor who had attended Miss Darling when she had the grippe. He had straight blond hair and a gentle expression. Standing by him was the girl who had taken the big room on the first floor a few days before. I had noticed her, because she dressed so well and had so many visitors. Now she was holding some ice on my head, and I heard her say to the doctor that she had just put a hot-water bag on my feet. She was not beautiful like Rose St. Denis, for she was short and stout, but she had a large, generous mouth, which, when she laughed, showed the most beautiful teeth, and she laughed a great deal so that one could not help liking her. “How is she, doctor?” she asked, and he replied:

“She ought to stay in bed some time. Her temperature is a hundred and five. I’m afraid of her being left alone. Has she no one to take care of her?”

“No, no,” I moaned weakly. “I have nobody. They are all dead.”

“Who was that ‘Reggie’ you were calling for?” asked the girl, and I said:

“He’s dead, too.”

My eyes felt very heavy, and I could not keep them open. I heard their voices as if in a dream.