And then he thought of the housekeeper.
He ran from the haunted room downstairs and to a door that showed a crack of light. She came out to his knock. He smothered his excitement as best he could.
Will you tell me, madam, he besought her, who occupied the room I have before I came?
Yes, sir. I can tell you again. Twas Sprowls and Mooney, as I said. Miss Bretta Sprowls it was in the theatres, but Missis Mooney she was. My house is well known for respectability. The marriage certificate hung, framed, on a nail over
What kind of a lady was Miss Sprowls in looks, I mean?
Why, black-haired, sir, short, and stout, with a comical face. They left a week ago Tuesday.
And before they occupied it?
Why, there was a single gentleman connected with the draying business. He left owing me a week. Before him was Missis Crowder and her two children, that stayed four months; and back of them was old Mr. Doyle, whose sons paid for him. He kept the room six months. That goes back a year, sir, and further I do not remember.
He thanked her and crept back to his room. The room was dead. The essence that had vivified it was gone. The perfume of mignonette had departed. In its place was the old, stale odour of mouldy house furniture, of atmosphere in storage.
The ebbing of his hope drained his faith. He sat staring at the yellow, singing gaslight. Soon he walked to the bed and began to tear the sheets into strips. With the blade of his knife he drove them tightly into every crevice around windows and door. When all was snug and taut he turned out the light, turned the gas full on again and laid himself gratefully upon the bed.
It was Mrs. McCools night to go with the can for beer. So she fetched it and sat with Mrs. Purdy in one of those subterranean retreats where house-keepers foregather and the worm dieth seldom[224].
I rented out my third floor, back, this evening, said Mrs. Purdy, across a fine circle of foam. A young man took it. He went up to bed two hours ago.
Now, did ye, Mrs. Purdy, maam? said Mrs. McCool, with intense admiration. You do be a wonder for rentin rooms of that kind. And did ye tell him, then? she concluded in a husky whisper, laden with mystery.
Rooms, said Mrs. Purdy, in her furriest tones, are furnished for to rent. I did not tell him, Mrs. McCool.
Tis right ye are, maam; tis by renting rooms we kape alive. Ye have the rale sense for business, maam. There be many people will rayjict[225] the rentin of a room if they be tould a suicide has been after dyin in the bed of it.
As you say, we has our living to be making, remarked Mrs. Purdy.
Yis, maam; tis true. Tis just one wake ago this day I helped ye lay out the third floor, back. A pretty slip of a colleen she was to be killin herself wid the gas a swate little face she had, Mrs. Purdy, maam.
Shed a-been called handsome, as you say, said Mrs. Purdy, assenting but critical, but for that mole she had a-growin by her left eyebrow. Do fill up your glass again, Mrs. McCool.
The Brief Début of Tildy
If you do not know Bogles Chop House and Family Restaurant it is your loss. For if you are one of the fortunate ones who dine expensively you should be interested to know how the other half consumes provisions. And if you belong to the half to whom waiters checks are things of moment, you should know Bogles, for there you get your moneys worth in quantity, at least.
Bogles is situated in that highway of bourgeoisie, that boulevard of Brown-Jones-and-Robinson, Eighth Avenue. There are two rows of tables in the room, six in each row. On each table is a caster-stand, containing cruets of condiments and seasons. From the pepper cruet you may shake a cloud of something tasteless and melancholy, like volcanic dust. From the salt cruet you may expect nothing. Though a man should extract a sanguinary stream from the pallid turnip, yet will his prowess be balked when he comes to wrest salt from Bogles cruets. Also upon each table stands the counterfeit of that benign sauce made from the recipe of a nobleman in India.
At the cashiers desk sits Bogle, cold, sordid, slow, smouldering, and takes your money. Behind a mountain of toothpicks he makes your change, files your check, and ejects at you, like a toad, a word about the weather. Beyond a corroboration of his meteorological statement you would better not venture. You are not Bogles friend; you are a fed, transient customer, and you and he may not meet again until the blowing of Gabriels dinner horn[226]. So take your change and go to the devil if you like. There you have Bogles sentiments.
The needs of Bogles customers were supplied by two waitresses and a Voice. One of the waitresses was named Aileen. She was tall, beautiful, lively, gracious and learned in persiflage. Her other name? There was no more necessity for another name at Bogles than there was for finger-bowls.
The name of the other waitress was Tildy. Why do you suggest Matilda? Please listen this time Tildy Tildy. Tildy was dumpy, plain-faced, and too anxious to please to please. Repeat the last clause to yourself once or twice, and make the acquaintance of the duplicate infinite.
The Voice at Bogles was invisible. It came from the kitchen, and did not shine in the way of originality. It was a heathen Voice, and contented itself with vain repetitions of exclamations emitted by the waitresses concerning food.
Will it tire you to be told again that Aileen was beautiful? Had she donned a few hundred dollars worth of clothes and joined the Easter parade, and had you seen her, you would have hastened to say so yourself.
The customers at Bogles were her slaves. Six tables full she could wait upon at once. They who were in a hurry restrained their impatience for the joy of merely gazing upon her swiftly moving, graceful figure. They who had finished eating ate more that they might continue in the light of her smiles. Every man there and they were mostly men tried to make his impression upon her.
The Voice at Bogles was invisible. It came from the kitchen, and did not shine in the way of originality. It was a heathen Voice, and contented itself with vain repetitions of exclamations emitted by the waitresses concerning food.
Will it tire you to be told again that Aileen was beautiful? Had she donned a few hundred dollars worth of clothes and joined the Easter parade, and had you seen her, you would have hastened to say so yourself.
The customers at Bogles were her slaves. Six tables full she could wait upon at once. They who were in a hurry restrained their impatience for the joy of merely gazing upon her swiftly moving, graceful figure. They who had finished eating ate more that they might continue in the light of her smiles. Every man there and they were mostly men tried to make his impression upon her.
Aileen could successfully exchange repartee against a dozen at once. And every smile that she sent forth lodged, like pellets from a scatter-gun, in as many hearts. And all this while she would be performing astounding feats with orders of pork and beans, pot roasts, ham-and, sausage-and-the-wheats, and any quantity of things on the iron and in the pan and straight up and on the side. With all this feasting and flirting and merry exchange of wit Bogles came mighty near being a salon, with Aileen for its Madame Récamier.
If the transients were entranced by the fascinating Aileen, the regulars were her adorers. There was much rivalry among many of the steady customers. Aileen could have had an engagement every evening. At least twice a week someone took her to a theatre or to a dance. One stout gentleman whom she and Tildy had privately christened The Hog presented her with a turquoise ring. Another one known as Freshy, who rode on the Traction Companys repair wagon, was going to give her a poodle as soon as his brother got the hauling contract in the Ninth. And the man who always ate spareribs and spinach and said he was a stock broker asked her to go to Parsifal[227] with him.
I dont know where this place is, said Aileen while talking it over with Tildy, but the wedding-rings got to be on before I put a stitch into a travelling dress aint that right? Well, I guess!
But, Tildy!
In steaming, chattering, cabbage-scented Bogles there was almost a heart tragedy. Tildy with the blunt nose, the hay-coloured hair, the freckled skin, the bag-o-meal figure, had never had an admirer. Not a man followed her with his eyes when she went to and fro in the restaurant save now and then when they glared with the beast-hunger for food. None of them bantered her gaily to coquettish interchanges of wit. None of them loudly jollied her of mornings as they did Aileen, accusing her, when the eggs were slow in coming, of late hours in the company of envied swains. No one had ever given her a turquoise ring or invited her upon a voyage to mysterious, distant Parsifal.
Tildy was a good waitress, and the men tolerated her. They who sat at her tables spoke to her briefly with quotations from the bill of fare; and then raised their voices in honeyed and otherwise-flavoured accents, eloquently addressed to the fair Aileen. They writhed in their chairs to gaze around and over the impending form of Tildy, that Aileens pulchritude might season and make ambrosia of their bacon and eggs.
And Tildy was content to be the unwooed drudge if Aileen could receive the flattery and the homage. The blunt nose was loyal to the short Grecian[228]. She was Aileens friend; and she was glad to see her rule hearts and wean the attention of men from smoking pot-pie and lemon meringue. But deep below our freckles and hay-coloured hair the unhandsomest of us dream of a prince or a princess, not vicarious, but coming to us alone.
There was a morning when Aileen tripped in to work with a slightly bruised eye; and Tildys solicitude was almost enough to heal any optic.
Fresh guy, explained Aileen, last night as I was going home at Twenty-third and Sixth. Sashayed up, so he did, and made a break. I turned him down, cold, and he made a sneak; but followed me down to Eighteenth, and tried his hot air again. Gee! but I slapped him a good one, side of the face. Then he give me that eye. Does it look real awful, Til? I should hate that Mr. Nicholson should see it when he comes in for his tea and toast at ten.