Chapter 14

"Well," Lizette yawned, "I'm so sleepy I can hardly hold my eyes open. Let's wash the dishes and then I'm going straight to bed."

She came in to breakfast the next morning in a different mood.

"Didn't we have a glorious rain in the night!" she cried gaily. "And it left a lovely cool breeze behind it. Last night I felt like a wet rag, but this morning I'm a different creature. It _is_ good to be 'home' again, Olga, and I don't mind going back to the shop."

"That's good!" Olga's eyes were shining as they had shone the night before.

The two set off together after breakfast, and wished each other good luck as they parted at the door of Miss Bayly's shop. Lizette came back at night jubilant. "I got my good luck, Olga," she cried. "I'm to have eight a week now. Isn't that fine?"

"Indeed it is--congratulations, Lizette. And I had my good luck too--better than I dared hope for--two splendid orders. Now we can both settle down to work and get a nice start before the next Camp Fire meeting. I'm going to try to keep half a day a week free for our 'learning Washington' trips."

"Personally conducted?" Lizette laughed.

"Personally conducted. Your company is solicited, Miss Stone, whenever your other engagements will permit."

Over the tea-table they talked of work and Camp Fire plans, and then Lizette went off to her own "corner" and Olga took up a book. She had been reading for an hour when her quick ears caught the sound of hesitating steps outside her door--steps that seemed to linger uncertainly. Thinking that some stranger might have wandered in from the street, she rose and quietly slipped her bolt. As she did so there came a knock at the door. She stood still, listening intently. No one ever came to her door except the landlady or the Camp Fire Girls, and none of them would knock in this hesitating fashion. She was not in the least timid, and when the knock was repeated she opened the door. She found herself facing a woman, young, in a soiled and wrinkled dress and shabby hat, and carrying a baby in her arms.

"Olga--it is Olga?" the woman exclaimed half doubtfully.

Olga did not answer. She stood staring into the woman's face and suddenly her own whitened and her eyes widened with dismay.

"You?" she said under her breath. "_You!_"

"Yes, I--Sonia. Aren't you going to let me in?"

For an instant Olga hesitated, then she stood aside, but in that moment all the happy hopefulness seemed to melt out of her heart. It was as if a black shadow of disaster had entered the quiet room at the heels of the draggled woman and her child.

"This is a warm welcome, I must say, to your own sister," Sonia said in a querulous tone, as she dropped into the easiest chair and laid the child across her knees. It made no sound, but lay as it was placed, its eyes half closed and its tiny face pinched and colourless.

"I--I can't realise that it is really--you," Olga said. "Where did you come from, and how did you find me?"

"I came from--many places. As to finding you--that was easy. You are not so far from the old neighbourhood where I left you."

"Yes--you left me," Olga echoed slowly, her face dark with the old sombre gloom. "You left me, a child of thirteen, with no money, and mother--dying!"

"I suppose it was rather hard on you, but you were always a plucky one, and I knew well enough you would pull through somehow. As to mother, of course I didn't know--she'd been ailing so long," Sonia defended herself, "and Dick wouldn't take 'no' for an answer. I _had_ to go with him."

Olga was silent, but in her heart a fierce battle was raging. She knew her sister--knew her selfish disregard of the rights or wishes of others, and she realised that much might depend on what was said now.

"Well?" Sonia questioned, breaking the silence abruptly.

Olga drew a long weary breath. "I--I can't think, Sonia," she said. "You have taken me so by surprise. I don't know what to say."

"I suppose you're not going to turn us into the street to-night--the baby and me?"

"Of course not," Olga answered, and added, "Is the baby sick?"

Sonia's eyes rested for a moment on the small pallid face, but there was no softening in them when she looked up again. "She's never been well. The first one died--the boy. This one cried day and night for weeks after she came. Dick couldn't stand it, and no wonder. That's the reason he cleared out--one reason."

"His own child!" cried Olga indignantly, and as she looked at the pitiful white face her heart warmed towards the little creature, She held out her hands. "Let me take her."

Sonia promptly transferred the baby to her sister's arms, and rising, crossed to the small sleeping-room.

"You're pretty well fixed here, with two rooms," she remarked.

"It's hardly more than one--the bedroom is so small."

"What do you do for a living?" Sonia demanded.

Olga told her.

"Hm. Any money in it?"

"I make a living, but I had a long sickness last summer and it took all I had and more to pay the bills."

"O well," replied Sonia carelessly, "you'll earn more. You look well enough now." She stretched her arms and yawned. "I'm dead tired. How about sleeping? That single bed won't hold the three of us."

"You can sleep there--I'll sleep on the floor to-night. There's no other way," Olga answered.

"All right then. I'll get to bed in a hurry," and taking the child from her sister, Sonia undressed it as carelessly as if it had been a doll. The baby half opened its heavy eyes and whimpered a little, but did not really awaken.

When Sonia and the child were in bed, Olga went across to Lizette's room. Lizette's welcoming smile vanished at sight of the stern set face, and she drew Olga quickly in and shut the door.

"O, what is it? What has happened, Olga?" she cried anxiously.

"My sister has come with her baby. I don't know how long she will stay." Olga spoke in a dull lifeless voice. "I came to tell you, so that you could get your breakfast somewhere else. You wouldn't enjoy having it with me--now."

"O Olga, I'm so sorry--so _sorry_!" Lizette cried, her hands on her friend's shoulders, her voice full of warm sympathy.

"I know, Lizette," Olga answered, a quivering smile stirring for an instant the old hard line of her set lips. Then she turned away, forgetting to say good-night. When the door closed behind her, Lizette's eyes were full of tears.

"O, it's a shame--a shame!" she said aloud. "To think how happy she was only last night, and now--now she looks as she did a year ago before Elizabeth went to the camp. O, I wonder why that sister had to come back!"

Lizette lay awake long that night, her heart full of sympathy for her friend, and Olga, lying on her hard bed on the floor, did not sleep at all. She went out early to the market, and coming back, prepared breakfast, but when she called her sister, Sonia answered drowsily:

"I'm too tired to get up, Olga. Bring me some coffee and toast here, will you?"

Olga carried her a tray, and Sonia ate and drank and then turned over and went to sleep again, and Olga, having washed the dishes, went off to the school. All day she worked steadily, forcing back the thoughts that crowded continually into her mind; but when she turned homewards the dark thoughts swooped down upon her like a flock of ravens, blotting out all her happy hopes and joyous plans, for she knew--only too well she knew--what she had to expect if Sonia remained.

"Well, you've come at last!" was her sister's greeting. "I hope you've brought something nice for supper. I'm nearly starved. And you didn't leave half enough milk for the baby."

"I left plenty for your dinner," Olga answered, "and I thought you could get more milk for the baby if you wanted it."

"Get more! How could I get it without money? And you didn't leave me a penny," Sonia complained.

Olga brought out a bottle of malted milk. "That will do for to-night, won't it?" she said, trying to speak cheerfully.

"I don't know anything about this stuff." Sonia was reading the label with a scowl. "You'll have to fix it; and do hurry, for she's been fretting for an hour."

Without a word, Olga prepared the food and handed it to her sister; then she set about getting supper; but when it was ready she felt suddenly too tired to eat. Sonia ate heartily, however, remarking with a glance at Olga's empty plate, "I suppose you got a good dinner down town."

"I haven't eaten a mouthful since breakfast," Olga told her wearily.

"O well," Sonia returned, "some folks don't need much food, but I do. If I don't have three solid meals a day I'm not fit for anything." Then looking at the baby lying on a pillow in a chair beside her, she added, "Really she seems to like that malted stuff. You'd better bring back another bottle to-morrow. There isn't much left in this one."

"Isn't that my dress you have on?" Olga asked suddenly.

"Yes, I had to have something fresh--mine was so mussed and dirty," Sonia replied lightly. "Lucky for me we're about the same size."

"But not lucky for me," was Olga's thought.

For a week things went on so--Sonia occasionally offering to wash the dishes, but leaving her sister to do everything else. Then one night Olga found her best suit in a heap on the closet floor. Picking it up she spoke sharply. "Sonia, have you been wearing this suit of mine?"

"Well, what if I have? You needn't look so savage about it!" Sonia retorted. "I have to have something decent to wear on the street, don't I?"

"Not if you have nothing decent of your own," Olga flashed back. "Sonia, you have no _right_ to wear my things so--without asking!"

With a provoking smile Sonia responded, "I knew better than to ask. I knew you'd make a fuss about it. If you don't want me to wear your clothes why don't you give me money to buy something decent for myself? Then I wouldn't need to borrow."

Olga's thoughts were in such an angry whirl that for a moment she dared not trust herself to speak. She shook out the suit and hung it up, then she went slowly across the room and sat down facing her sister.

"Sonia," she began, "we can't go on in this way--I cannot endure it. Now let us have a plain understanding. You came here of your own choice--not on my invitation. What are your plans? Do you mean to stay on here indefinitely?"

"Why, of course. Where else should I stay?"

"Then," said Olga decidedly, "you must help pay our expenses. You are well and strong. Why should you expect me to support you?"

"Why? Because you have a trade and I have not, for one reason. And besides, there's the baby--I can't leave her to go out to work." There was a note of triumph in Sonia's voice.

"You could get work to do at home--sewing, embroidery, knitting--or something."

"'Or something!'" There was fretful impatience now in Sonia's tone. "I hate sewing--any kind of sewing. You know I always did."

"Then what will you do?"

Sonia sat looking down in sulky silence at the baby.

Olga went on, "If there is no work you can do at home, you must find something outside. You can go into a store as you did before you were married."

"And I guess," Sonia broke out angrily, "if you'd ever stood behind a counter from eight in the morning to six at night, you'd know how nice _that_ is! You earn enough. I think it's real mean and stingy of you to grudge a share of it to this poor sick baby--and me. I do so!"

"I don't grudge anything to the baby, Sonia, though I do think it is your business to provide for her, not mine. But I say again it is not right for me to have to support you, and I am not willing to do it. It is best to speak plainly once for all."

"Well, I should say you _were_ speaking plainly," Sonia flung out with an unpleasant smile. She rocked with a quick motion, her brows drawn into a frown. "How can I go into a store, even if I could get a place? I couldn't take the baby with me," she muttered.

"I could bring my work home--most of it--and you could leave the baby with me."

"Ah ha! I knew it. I knew you could do your work here if you wanted to," Sonia triumphed, pointing to the bench in the corner. "You just don't want to stay here with me." Olga made no denial and her sister went on in a complaining tone, "Anyhow I'd like to know how I'm going to get a place anywhere when I've no decent clothes. You know it makes all the difference how one is dressed."

"That is true," Olga admitted, "but, Sonia, I cannot buy you a suit. I haven't the money."

"You could borrow it."

Olga's face flushed. "I've never borrowed a cent in my life or bought _any_thing on credit, except--mother's coffin," she said passionately. "And I did night work till I paid for that. I cannot run in debt. I _will_ not!"

Sonia shrugged her shoulders. "Well then, if you want me to get a place, you'll just have to let me wear that suit of yours that you are so choice of."

Olga was silent. It was true that Sonia's chance of securing employment would be small if she sought it in the shabby clothes which she had. But Olga needed that suit. The money which would have bought a new one had paid her doctor's bill. Still--the important thing was to get Sonia to work. "I suppose," she said slowly, "I shall have to let you wear it, but, Sonia, you _must_ realise how it is, and do your best to find a place soon. Will you do that?"

"Why, of course," returned Sonia with the light laugh that always irritated her sister. "You don't suppose I like being dependent on you, do you?"

"I don't think you'd mind, if I would give you money whenever you want it."

Again Sonia laughed. "But that's not imaginable, you know," she answered airily. "It's like drawing eyeteeth to get a dollar out of you. You're a perfect miser, Olga Priest."

Olga let that pass. "I had intended to keep my suit in Lizette's closet after this, but I will leave it here if you will promise to begin to-morrow to look for work. Will you promise?"

"You certainly are the limit!" Sonia cried impatiently. "I believe you grudge me every mouthful I eat, and the baby her milk too--poor little soul!" She caught up the baby and kissed it.

"Will you promise, Sonia?" Olga repeated.

Sonia dropped the baby on her lap again. "Of _course_ I promise. I told you so before. Now for pity's sake give me a little peace!" she exclaimed.

XVIII

THE TORCH UPLIFTED

So the next day Olga brought home her work, and Sonia, wearing not only her sister's best suit but her hat, shoes, and gloves as well, set off down town. She departed with a distinctly holiday air, tossing from the doorway a kiss to the baby and a good-bye to Olga. But Olga cherished small hope of her success. She felt no confidence in her sister's sincerity, and did not believe that she really wanted to find work.

For once the baby was awake--usually she seemed half asleep, lying where she was put, and only stirring occasionally with weak whimpering cries. But this morning the blue eyes were open, and Olga stopped beside the chair in which the baby was lying and looked down at the small face, so pathetically grave and quiet.

"You poor little mortal," she said, "I wonder what life holds for you--if you live. I almost hope you won't, for it doesn't seem as if there's much chance for you."

The solemn blue eyes stared up at her as if the baby too were wondering what chance there was for her. Olga laid her face for a moment against one little white cheek; then pulling out her bench she set to work.

At twelve o'clock Sonia came back. "O dear!" she exclaimed with a swift glance around the room, "I hoped you'd have dinner ready, Olga. I'm tired to death."

Without a word Olga put aside her work and went to the gas stove. Sonia pulled off her shoes--Olga's shoes--and took off Olga's hat, and rocked until the meal was ready.

"What luck did you have?" Olga inquired when they were at the table.

"Not a bit. I tell you, Olga, you're a mighty lucky girl to have that work to do." She nodded towards the bench.

Olga ignored that. "Where did you try?" she asked.

"Well, I tried at Woodward & Lothrop's." Sonia's tone was distinctly sulky. "They hadn't any vacancy--or anyhow they said so."

"They always have a long waiting-list, I know. Did you leave your name?"

"No, I didn't. What was the use with scores ahead of me?"

"And where else did you try?"

"I didn't try _any_where else!" Sonia said with a defiant lift of her chin. "You needn't think, Olga, that you can drive me like a slave just because I am staying with you. I'm going to take my time about this business, and don't you forget it!"

Olga waited until she could speak quietly; then she said, "Sonia, there is one thing you've got to understand. I _must_ have peace. I cannot do my work if there is to be discord and friction all the time between you and me."

"It's your own fault," Sonia retorted. "I'm peaceful enough if I'm let alone. I let you alone."

"But, Sonia, don't you see that we can't go on this way?" Olga pleaded. "Don't you feel that you ought to pay half our expenses if you stay with me?"

"No, I don't. Why should I pay half?" Sonia demanded. "Your rent is no higher because I am here."

"No, but I have to sleep on the floor, and it is not very restful as you would find if you tried it once."

"Well, why don't you buy a cot then? You could get one for two dollars."

"I need the two dollars for other things," Olga answered wearily. "Do you mean, Sonia, that you are not going to look for a place anywhere else?"

"O, I'll look--but I won't be hurried about it," Sonia declared moodily.

"Well," Olga spoke with deliberation, "if that is your attitude, there is but one thing for me to do, and that is to go away from here."

"Olga! You couldn't be that _mean_!" Sonia sat up straight and stared with startled eyes at the grave face opposite her.

"Think, Sonia," said Olga in a low voice, though her heart was beating furiously, "how it would seem to you if I should refuse to work and expect you to support me."

"That's different," Sonia muttered sullenly.

"How is it different?"

"Because you've got your work--I haven't any."

"But you might have if you would."

"Much you know about it! Did you ever try to find a place in a store?"

"When I was thirteen and you left mother and me"--Olga's voice was very low now, but it thrilled with bitter memories--"I walked the streets for three long days hunting for work, and I found it at last in a laundry where I stood from seven in the morning till six at night, with only fifteen minutes at noon. And I stayed there while mother lived, going back to her to care for her through those long dreadful nights of misery. That is what I know about hard work, Sonia!"

It was Sonia's turn now to be silent. There was something in Olga's white face and blazing eyes that stilled even her flippant tongue. For a moment her thoughts drifted back, and perhaps for the first time she fully realised what her going then had meant to the little sister upon whose shoulders she had left the heavy burden. But she banished these unpleasant memories with a shrug. "O well, all that's past and gone--no use in raking it up again," she declared.

"No, no use," Olga admitted. "But, Sonia, I want you to realise that I mean just what I say. You have come here of your own accord. If you stay you must share our expenses. If you will not, I surely shall go away, and leave you to pay all yourself."

Seeing that her sister was determined, Sonia suddenly melted into weak tears. "You are so hard, Olga!" she sobbed. "I don't believe you have any heart at all."

"Maybe not," was the grim response. "I've thought sometimes it was broken--or frozen--five years ago."

"You keep harking back to that!" Sonia moaned. "I'm not the first girl that has gone away with the man she loved. You have no sympathy--you make no allowances. And I didn't realise how sick mother was. If I had----"

"If you had," Olga interrupted, "you would have done exactly the same. But let that pass. Are you going to give me the promise that I ask?"

"What do you want me to promise?" Sonia evaded.

"I want you to promise that you will go out every week day and look for work--that you will keep trying until you do find it. Will you?"

"It seems I can't help myself." Sonia's voice was still sulky.

"Will you? I must have your promise," Olga insisted, and finally Sonia flung out an angry,

"Yes!"

Thereafter Olga worked at home and her sister went out morning or afternoon--sometimes both; but she found no position.

"They all want younger girls--chits of sixteen or seventeen," she complained, "or else those who have had large experience. They won't give me a chance."

Olga crowded down her doubts. Perhaps it was all true--perhaps Sonia really had honestly tried, but the doubts would return, for she felt that her sister was quite content to let things remain as they were as long as Olga made no further protest. But others were not content with things as they were. Elizabeth was not, nor Lizette. Laura met Lizette on the street one day and learned all that the girl could tell her of Olga's trouble.

"She's so changed!" Lizette said, her eyes filling. "When we came home she was so happy, and so full of plans for Camp Fire work, and now--now she takes no interest in it at all. She won't talk about it, or hardly listen when I talk."

"I must see her," Laura said. "I'll take you home now," and when they reached the house, Lizette ran eagerly up the stairs to give Miss Laura's message.

"I've come to invite you to another tea party--with Jim and me," Laura said when Olga appeared. "You will come--to-morrow night?"

"Thank you, but I can't," the girl answered gravely.

"Why can't you, Olga? I want you very much," Laura urged.

"My sister is with me now. I cannot leave her."

"But just this once--please, Olga."

Laura's eyes--warm, loving, compelling--looked into Olga's, dark, sombre, and miserable; and suddenly with a little gasping sob the girl yielded because she knew if she stood there another minute she would break down.

"I'll--come," she promised, and without another word turned and hurried back into the house.

Laura was half afraid that she would not keep her promise, but at six o'clock she appeared. Jim fell upon her with a gleeful welcome, and she tried to answer gaily, but the effort with which she did it was evident, and earlier than usual Laura took the boy off to bed.

"Something is troubling Olga," she whispered as she tucked him in, "and I'm going to try to find a way to help her."

"You will," he said confidently. "You're the best ever for helping folks," and he pulled her face down to give one of his rare kisses.

Laura, going back to the other room, drew the girl down beside her. "Now, child," she said, her voice full of tenderest persuasion, "let us talk over your problems and find the way out."

For a moment the old proud reserve held the girl, but it melted under the tender sympathy in the eyes looking into hers. She drew a long breath. "It seems somehow wrong to talk about it even to you," she said. "Sonia is my sister."

"I know, dear, but sisters are not always--sisters," Laura replied, "and you are very much alone in the world. I am more truly your sister--am I not, Olga--your elder sister who loves you and wants to help?"

"O yes, yes!" the girl cried. "But I've felt I must not tell _any_ one--even you--and I've crowded it all down in my heart until----"

"Until you are worn out with the strain of it all," Laura said as Olga paused. "Now tell me the whole just as if I were your sister in very fact."

And Olga told it all, from Sonia's unexpected arrival that September night to the present--of the failure of her efforts to get her sister to do some kind of work, and of Sonia's constant demands for money and clothes.

"Do you think she has really tried to get a place in a store, Olga?"