"Shouldn't you think she would take cold? She will get her death there. Oughtn't we to do something?" the daughter asked, but she left it to the father, and he said: "Probably somebody will come by." "That we could leave her to?" the daughter pursued. "We could do that without waiting," the son commented. "Well, yes," the father assented; but they did not go on. They waited, helplessly, and then somebody came by. It was a young girl, not very [Pg 95] definite in the dusk, except that she was unmistakably of the working class; she was simply dressed, though with the New York instinct for clothes. Their having stopped there seemed to stay her involuntarily, and after a glance in the direction of their gaze she asked the daughter: [Pg 95] "Is she sick, do you think?" "We don't know what's the matter. But she oughtn't to stay there." Something velvety in the girl's voice had made its racial quality sensible to the ear; as she went up to the crouching woman and bent forward over her and then turned to them, a street lamp threw its light on her face, and they saw that she was a light shade of colored girl. "She seems to be sleeping." "Perhaps," the son began, "she's not quite—" But he did not go on. The girl looked round at the others and suggested, "She must be somebody's mother!" The others all felt abashed in their several sorts and degrees, but in their several sorts and degrees they all decided that there was something romantic, sentimental, theatrical in the girl's words, like something out of some cheap story-paper story. The father wondered if that kind of thing was current among that kind of people. He had a [Pg 96] sort of esthetic pleasure in the character and condition expressed by the words. [Pg 96] "Well, yes," he said, "if she has children, or has had." The girl looked at him uncertainly, and then he added, "But, of course—" The son went up to the woman again, and asked: "Aren't you well? Can we do anything for you? It won't do to stay here, you know." The woman only made a low murmur, and
Prev.
Back
Top