CHAPTER XXXVI.

KILLJOY HOUSE.

The French in their superficial way speak of a bagnio as a maison de joie, which may be translated literally as a house of joy. It would be impossible to conceive of a more false description of these habitations of vice. Riotous exhilaration produced by drink there is, hideous hysterical hilarity there is—but joy, none. The merriment of the inmates of such a house has a commercial value, and they do not use any of it when the men who pay for it are not about.

“I have often thought,” said a man who was connected with the city police for some ten years, a man of great good sense and wide general reading, “that the people who speak in condemnation of the social evil do not dwell sufficiently on the actual revolting facts connected with the life of a woman of the town. I have read sensational newspaper articles, and I have heard preachers’ sermons on the subject, but in all there is a lack of practical treatment. After you have read or heard them, a person who does not know the facts would think that a house of ill-fame was the abode of wicked and unholy but yet picturesque passion. In spite of themselves they succeed in surrounding the unsavory mess with a halo of romance, than which there could be nothing further from the facts. There is no romance in the lives of evil women. Everything about them is gross, sordid and mercenary. The master passion of their lives is not sensuality, but a greed for money and display conjoined with envy and all uncharitableness. They are the slaves of the vile women who keep the houses in which they live. While they are new to the life, pretty and popular, they are allowed certain latitude. These are the ones whom you see parading the streets, sitting in the houses of entertainment, and driving to the races. But when

THEIR WITHERING LIVES

begin to tell upon their good looks, their days of merriment are over. They now become slaves in the vilest sense of the word. The money for which they sell their souls is the constant prey of the hoary old brothel-keeper to whom they are in bondage. The majority of the men who visit their dens are in liquor. Is there anything picturesque about half-a-dozen dull-eyed creatures being roused out of their sleep in the small hours of the morning to be marshalled before an old brute with rum-laden breath and filthy person whose sottish fancy has led him here? Is it possible to conceive a woman with a single vestige of pride left consenting to be at the pick and choose of such a loathsome creature? Yet this is a frequent sight in these houses of hell. Is there any romance about that? And when the choice is made the other five are eaten with envy. But it is envy, spitefulness, and all uncharitableness, morning, noon and night with them. The demon of hatred is the presiding spirit of their sunless habitations. She who has good looks and youth is a continual eyesore to the woman whose lustre of girlhood is a thing now of memory. She is hated and slandered, and she glories in the fact because it is a tribute to qualities which she has that they have not. But her hour comes too soon and too surely, and a younger rival hurries her down the slope, to be herself displaced in turn as the months go by, leaving their impress of dissipation.

Envy and hatred of each other are common characteristics, and the same may be said of lying, intemperance and profanity. Lying is part of their trade, and is a necessity of their existence, and so much of a habit does the practice become that they

LIE BY PREFERENCE.

If the truth were equally profitable, they would lie by choice. I have often heard them relate the stories of their lives to officers of charities or prisons, and in almost all cases the statements were wildly improbable. One of them spoke of being of good family and having been educated in a convent, when it was discovered that she could neither read nor write. The story of their downfall, as told by themselves, is always attributed to being the result of loving not wisely, but too well. In many cases I have heard this claim made, when the men in the force knew the whole history of the dame, and knew her representations to be absurdly false.”

“Well, you don’t mean to say that in your experience you haven’t met women who owed their downfall to the seductive wiles of men.”

“I am only speaking of these women in the aggregate, and giving you their general characteristics. I look upon them all as unfortunate, and some more so than others. Some deserve the description of unfortunates in the same degree as the burglars and thieves in the prisons do. Others undoubtedly are led into the life by a cruel fate. Indeed I know of such a case. Five years ago there lived near me a family, consisting of a husband and wife, and a son and daughter. The husband was a useless old moke, who didn’t even have energy enough to get drunk, but his wife had, and did. The boy, who was the eldest of the two children, was a rough, and got into a fight aboard an excursion boat, and came near killing a man. He fled to the States, and as far as I know has never been heard of in this city since. Mary was the only one of the family for whom the neighbors had any respect. She was a shy girl and seemed to

KNOW NOTHING BUT TO WORK

away at an old sewing machine, making overalls for a factory. Any time that Mary was seen outdoors was carrying great big bundles wrapped in a brown piece of linen, which she brought back full of work, and was seen no more till that dole of labor was completed. The neighbors tolerated the family on Mary’s account. Mary’s dress was about as uninteresting as the brown lining which invariably encircled her work, but those who look for beauty unadorned saw in her dark eyes and delicate complexion things that were pleasant to look upon. But the chief glory of humble little Mary was her brown hair, which fairly flowed in a cataract down her back. She was very much ashamed of these unruly locks, and when she went abroad they were tucked away in as small a knot as they could be squeezed into at the back of her head. But people caught glimpses of them at odd times, and the fame of Mary’s ringlets spread abroad on the street.

Suddenly there came a change in her ways. She commenced to exhibit some coquetry in dress. But I need not weary you with the details of her decline and fall. Suffice it to say that Mary was missed from home one day and her mother bewailed in her cups that her daughter had gone to the bad.

One night I was standing in the shadow of a lamp on Elizabeth street when a woman came along. I knew Mary and stopped her. She exhibited great fear and shame-facedness but I talked to her and finally gained her confidence. She was very anxious to know what the neighbors thought of her. “They are very sorry that you have forgot yourself, Mary,” I answered. “I had to do it,” she said. I tried to reach the meaning of this answer but it was only after a long time that she told me her story. She told in a singularly simple and feeling way

HER STORY.

“I am awfully sorry Mr. ⸺ for what has happened, but I couldn’t help it. My feelings were stronger than myself. There was something happened one day that changed all my life. You remember the bundles I used to carry. Well, one day, when I was on my way home it started to rain, and before I went two blocks I was soaking. Just then a car overtook me, and I hailed it. I was never on a car before, but I had money that I had just got from my boss, and I thought I could afford it. I struggled into the car with my wet bundle. There were six ladies and three gentlemen in the car. There was plenty of room for me on either side if they had sat closer, but not one of them moved. I stood there like a fool till one of the gentlemen at the far end of the car stood up and asked me to take his seat. When I went to sit down, the lady who had sat close enough to him, drew as far away from me as possible. I never before felt what a dowdy ill-dressed thing I was, but I thought so then. My face was crimson, and I could not look up for the world. Oh, how I wished I had never got on that car. It became unbearable at length, and I made a foolish attempt to get off the car before ringing the bell, and I fell on one of the ladies, and she was very indignant. The gentleman who had given me his seat picked up my bundle and carried it out, while I slunk out after him wishing that the earth would swallow me. He carried my bundle to the sidewalk and asked me which way I was going. I told him, and then when he found I had got off the car long before I was near my home, he laughed at me, and joked about the way the old cats (that’s what he called them) had treated me. That adventure was the

TURNING POINT OF MY LIFE.

That man’s appearance and voice and smile have haunted me to my ruin. I thought him a god, and when I considered that he took my part before all those ladies I would willingly have let him tramp on me or kill me. A blow from that man would have been sweeter a thousand times than the smiles of another. He did not lose sight of me. I could refuse him nothing and he was but too ready to use his power over me. What is the use of talking. You see what I am.

“Now, sir,” continued my friend “the man who ruined this girl is what I call a professional masher. He still exists to ply his arts. That was as fine a girl as ever lived, and she was led away by her better instincts, either love or gratitude, I don’t exactly know which. But I think this is an exceptional case. The great majority go astray from pure cussedness. Love of dress, indolence, licentiousness, and bad temper will be found to have more to do with the propagation of the social evil than man’s perfidy and woman’s weakness.”

“Your views are very like those of another gentleman I interviewed—all in favor of the men.”

“I haven’t said a word in favor of the men. I loathe the men who consort with these women, especially the married portion of them. When I was a policeman I became acquainted with the dirty habits of many of this class, and I felt so angry with them that when I would meet them going along the street during the day with their sanctimonious faces I would feel like slapping them. No, sir; I don’t defend the men, but neither do I want to see the woman held blameless when she deliberately chooses this life, and by her example corrupts and entraps others. But I started out to talk about the grossness of life in a bagnio, and here I have been telling stories, but that’s your own fault in interrupting me. I was looking for a thief one night when I was acting-detective. I found out where his “woman” lived, and I felt sure the way to catch him was to

WATCH WHERE SHE LIVED.

The house was neither first nor second-class, but a compromise between the two. It got very cold, and after loitering about for an hour, and getting chilled to the bone, I concluded I could watch inside as well as out. My only fear was that some of the inmates would recognize who I was. I took chances, however, and rang the bell. I was admitted without much trouble. I found that the greater number of the inmates of the house were much under the influence of liquor. There were three men in the room into which I was shown. Each had a woman seated on his knee. Three more came tripping down stairs, the first of whom threw herself into my lap and encircled my neck with her arms. I cannot say her attentions were appreciated. A sickening odor of stale beer permeated her person, and she was decidedly drunk. The other two who had come down stairs with her were not so bad, but they were evidently inclined to be sarcastic about the suddenness of her attack on me. They evidently thought she should have given me a chance to make my pick. I was anxious to find out which was the “woman” of the man I was in search of, and when the nymph who occupied my knee asked me to buy a bottle of beer I complied, the more willingly as it relieved me of her unpleasant bulk and

ODORIFEROUS BREATHINGS.

The beer was brought and I was assessed $1 for it. During its consumption I discovered the woman I wanted. A very brief conversation with her showed me that she was expecting some other society than mine that evening. “Don’t be making up to me,” she said. “I expect a ‘friend,’ and the landlady would raise Cain if I threw business for him.”

I felt pretty certain that my thief would show up shortly. By this time the drunkest of the three who had come down stairs on my entrance, was quarreling with the others and threatening all sorts of dire disasters. The profanity and sewer-talk was something frightful. At last one of them struck her with a glass, and in a moment there was a frightful commotion. There was no fight in the poor, drunken creature, and the sight of the blood which flowed from her brow frightened her into maudlin tears. She sat on the floor, while the blood dabbled her white night-dress, and rocked back and fore, moaning “Cora, I didn’t think you’d stab me.”

After this incident, although I saw no more drinking in the room, I observed that each time they re-appeared they were all getting drunker and drunker. The landlady of the house, a coarse, scowling woman, tried to keep them quiet, but they sang snatches of song, and swore, and quarreled, and blows were ever and anon freely interchanged. It was a