Fifteen Years with the Outcast Part 33

"'You're right, lady. That's so. It was that way with me. I was started wrong, and everybody helped to grease the hill I was sliding down, and I soon reached the bottom.'

"The girls are decoyed by some man friend, who has so compromised the girl that she feels she is being shunned, to the house of a 'kind woman who will protect her.' She is ruined. She begins smoking and drinking and soon unless she takes great care of herself, she is sent from a first-cla.s.s house to a second cla.s.s, then a third cla.s.s, then lower and lower, until she ends in some vile dance-hall, compared to which the orthodox h.e.l.l is a paradise. Five years altogether Is the average life in this business.

NO-SCREEN LAW.

"One thing I found here that I have found nowhere else, and that is the rigid enforcement of the no-screen law. Everything was open. I shall speak of it in other places. And then the law forbidding the sale of spirituous liquors means so much to the girls, the poor, poor girls, who are so bitter against the whole world, and who are suspicious of every woman.

"A barkeeper asked me, lady, what are you doing in a place like this?'

"'I am here to do some good if I can. I am a mother.'

"'Well,' he replied, 'this is no place for decent people.'

"Just then a rough-looking customer spoke up, 'Don't you leave because he wants you to. Do all the good you can'

"I am afraid some of the girls thought I was there out of mere vulgar curiosity. No, indeed. I have seen the worst places in the State, I have visited the girls, talked with them, eaten with them, and praise G.o.d, have helped some of them to do better."

CHRISTIANITY

Mrs. Roberts has no use for so-called Christianity that forgets the virtue named charity. She tells a story of a young girl who was won from the tenderloin by a Salvation Army la.s.sie.... [Here follows the story of Dollie, found between these pages.]

WORST RESORTS

"As I said before," continued Mrs. Roberts, "we visited all the houses, but were not admitted to all. They are very superst.i.tious, and to admit visitors on Monday would 'hoodoo' the business for the rest of the week. None of the houses were attractive. We learned the name of only one, which, the girls tell me, is the worst in the whole district.

"There is one place, though, that I must mention. It is most attractive with lights, mirrors, and music. But I a.s.sure you it is the first step of its kind downward. [A first-cla.s.s saloon.]

"This place has a most appropriate electric sign, a winding, twisting snake. 'There is one thing more I must tell you,' I said to a young, attractive-looking boy, 'What attracts you here?'

"'For the life of me I can't tell you, except that there's no other place where we fellows can enjoy ourselves.'

"What an opportunity for an immense, well-equipped reading-room, where the boys can have games, books, and all sorts of harmless amus.e.m.e.nts."

Mrs. Roberts will be here for some little time, and she expects to speak several times before she leaves. She spoke at the Central Christian church yesterday to a large audience.

Among other things at this meeting I mentioned this incident:

In one of the Northern towns, the chief of police, knowing I was in the town, sent for me to confer with him on a case of "strictest privacy."

Wondering what was the matter, I hastened, and soon was hearing this:

"In one of the houses on ---- Street, I have just learned from one of my men, who was told by a near-by saloon-keeper, of a young girl inmate who has been constantly in tears for the past two weeks, a new-comer aged about sixteen. I want some one to get her away from there. My political situation is such at the present time that it will never do for me to figure in this matter; at the same time I am aware if you are conspicuous in it, those doors will be closed upon you, and that will be unwise, seeing these landladies are more or less kindly disposed toward you.

"I understand this girl is from San Francisco, where she has a mother, who ought to be notified and the daughter at once sent home to her; but I'm in a quandary how to proceed so as not to incur ill-feeling with the politicians of that neighborhood. [He was a candidate for reelection.] What would you suggest?"

Quickly I replied: "If that landlady does not know your voice, 'phone, asking if she has any new girls at present? Then ask her to send the new one to the 'phone. If she does so, have a talk with the girl of a nature calculated to lead the landlady to infer you are friendly, and as soon as it is safe to do so, tell her, the new girl, that she is to come out presently as though to go to a restaurant for breakfast, that friends are going to rescue her from her awful predicament, but that she must be very cautious for fear of creating suspicion. Tell her to look on the corner of Fourth and L---- Streets for a lady wearing a small black bonnet trimmed with white and to follow her into the building where she sees her disappear. Tell her to act as though she were making arrangements for an evening engagement."

In less than half an hour that poor child was closeted with the chief and me in his private office. Soon, after rea.s.suring her, he left us alone in order that I could freely interrogate, and this, after many tears, was the sum and substance of what she told:

"I've a very comfortable home, a dear mama and two little brothers.

Perhaps I have a stepfather now, for mama was intending to marry again.

He's a chef in ---- Hotel."

"Is your papa long dead, dear?" I inquired.

"Papa isn't dead. Mama got a divorce from him a little while ago. He wouldn't support us ---- and ----."

"Has your mama known this chef very long?" I asked.

"Oh, yes, quite a while. I never saw much of him though, 'cause Mama would rather I wasn't around when he called; so she often used to let me go to the nickelodeon or the dance with some of the girls I know, when she expected him to spend the evening."

"How did it happen you came here, my child?" was the next question.

"It was this way. I got acquainted with a fine-looking young lady, a swell dresser, too, at ----Hall. We took a 's.h.i.+ne' to each other on sight, and I asked her to call on me, 'cause I wanted Mama to meet her.

Mama liked her, too. She told us she lived with her aunt, Miss Clark, on Post Street, who was quite nicely fixed. Said she must take me to see her soon.

"Well, we met often after that, _and Mama was pleased because I now had a companion old enough to take good care of me._ One day when I went home with Tessie, to take tea, her aunt said to her, 'I've just received a letter from Louise, and she wants to know when you are coming to make her a visit.' Tessie said, 'Oh, I'd like to go next week. Mamie, I wonder if you couldn't come, too? Louise is my cousin; she's well off, and will give us a good time. You ask your mama and I'll write Louise.' Mama was willing. Tessie's aunt soon got another letter saying Cousin Louise would be pleased to have me come, so we made arrangements. I was to meet Tessie at the boat Monday morning at ten o'clock. Mama wasn't very well, so I went down alone on the car with my suitcase. We'd bought our tickets Sat.u.r.day, and for fear of accidents Tessie gave me mine for safekeeping.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SOME MOTHER'S WANDERING GIRL.]

"I went on board the boat and waited and waited, but up to the last minute Tessie didn't come, but a messenger boy did--with a note saying her aunt was sick, but for me to go and she'd come on the next boat.

Louise would be dressed--and described how I would know her, for she was to meet us. Tessie never came, neither did her cousin. This woman I'm with is named Louise, but she says she doesn't know Tessie. I don't know what to make of it, do you?"

Then she told me exactly what kind of life she had been forced to lead for over two weeks, and that when she first came the landlady dictated a letter which she (Mamie) wrote to her mother.

"As big a lie as ever was told," said Mamie; "but I had to do as Miss Louise said, and she mailed it. I haven't written Mama since, 'cause I didn't want to spoil her pleasure. Guess she's safely married now, 'cause she expected to be."

"My dear child," I said, "will you give me your San Francisco address, your mother's name and initials? You are going home on the next steamer. I am going to have her meet you at the wharf. I know the stewardess, who is a good woman. She will not let you out of her sight until she hands you over to your mother."

Poor, frail, pretty, little, sixteen-year-old Mamie wept with joy. The next morning, long before it was time to sail, she was safely hidden away on board the steamer. The mother, in response to the telegram, was on hand when the s.h.i.+p reached the San Francisco wharf, and unless she is different from other women of that caliber, she can not, I think, ever forget that registered letter, in which some good wholesome advice was given and such motherhood as she represented was so scathingly denounced as to upset her honeymoon. Furthermore, I did not hesitate to inform her that her little daughter was both physically and morally ruined and that G.o.d would hold her (the mother) and her alone responsible. Was that all? No. The right persons were put on the track of Tessie and her aunt. Unfortunately, however, they were never, on account of some technicality, made to suffer, aside from having to take their immediate departure. However, the just G.o.d is taking cognizance of all these things. Nothing escapes him. "Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord."

Dear reader, I generally leave my audience with a heavy load on my heart. Why? Because, as other public workers and speakers, I find few, very few, comparatively speaking, who heed the warnings which observation and practical experience have prompted me to give out. Once as I was walking out of a church, two ladies directly behind me were conversing on the address just finished. One said to the other, "Weren't you immensely interested in those dreadful word-pictures from real life?" "Yes," replied the other, "but that work is very unpopular, and requires peculiarly adapted people, entirely different from you and me." I silently thanked G.o.d for so richly endowing a few of us with sufficiently peculiar qualities to seek for wonderful, priceless jewels among the fallen who, through lack of proper home training and companions.h.i.+p, have taken the downward course. Many of these outcasts, if sought and cared for, will some day occupy an exalted place in the Master's kingdom.

CHAPTER XLII.

LOS ANGELES DANCE-HALLS AND OTHER PLACES.

Well, you may call them first-cla.s.s if you like; I call them first-cla.s.s stepping-stones to an everlasting h.e.l.l. Furthermore, I will prove my statement.

On July 24 of that year (1908) I was again in Los Angeles. As usual, I was interviewed, this time by a _Times_ editor. Among other things I made mention of the fact that many mothers did not know what their children were doing after school-hours, and stated that such women had better play less whist and give their children more attention. And oh!

the terrifying iniquities of society. Do you know, the worst enemy a girl who has fallen into error has is her own s.e.x. Women simply will not have anything to do with her, and that is what keeps the world back. The cause? Selfishness, of course.

"Yes, I believe there are too many marriages of convenience. And oh!

the dreadful race suicide that I know is going on around me on every hand. It sounds the doom of the American race. We are indeed on the downward path."