Helen of the Old House Part 37

"Every strike has to do with all work everywhere, child," returned the man in the wheel chair, while his busy fingers wove the fabric of a basket. "Every idle hand in the world, Helen, whatever the cause of its idleness, compels some other's hand to do its work. The work of the world must be done, child--somehow, by some one--the work of the world must be done. The little Maggies and Bobbies of the Flats down there must be fed, you know--and their mother too--yes, and Sam Whaley himself must be cared for. And so you see, because of the strike, Billy and I must work overtime."

Certainly there was no hint of rebuke in the old basket maker's kindly voice, but the daughter of Adam Ward felt her cheeks flush with a quick sense of shame. That her old friend in the wheel chair should so accept the responsibility of his neighbor's need and give himself thus to help them, while she--

"Is there," she faltered, "is there really so much suffering among the strikers?"

Without raising his eyes from his work, he answered, "The women and children--they are so helpless."

"I--I did not realize," she murmured. "I did not know."

"You were not ignorant of the helpless women and children who suffered in foreign lands," he returned. "Why should you not know of the mothers and babies in Millsburgh?"

"But McIver says--" she hesitated.

The Interpreter caught up her words. "McIver says that by feeding the starving families of the strikers the strike is prolonged. He relies upon the hunger and cold and sickness of the women and children for his victory. And Jake Vodell relies upon the suffering in the families of his followers for that desperate frenzy of cla.s.s hatred, without which he cannot gain his end. Does McIver want for anything? No! Is Jake Vodell in need? No! It is not the imperialistic leaders in these industrial wars who pay the price. It is always the little Bobbies and Maggies who pay. The people of America stood aghast with horror when an unarmed pa.s.senger s.h.i.+p was torpedoed or a defenseless village was bombed by order of a ruthless Kaiser; but we permit these Kaisers of capital and labor to carry on their industrial wars without a thought of the innocent ones who must suffer under their ruthless policies."

He paused; then, with no trace of bitterness, but only sadness in his voice, he added, "You say you do not know, child--and yet, you could know so easily if you would. Little Bobby and Maggie do not live in a far-off land across the seas. They live right over there in the shadow of your father's Mill--the Mill which supplies you, Helen, with every material need and luxury of your life."

As if she could bear to hear no more, Helen rose quickly and went from the room to stand on the balcony-porch.

It was not so much the Interpreter's words--it was rather the spirit in which they were spoken that moved her so deeply. By her own heart she was judged. "For every idle hand," he had said. Her hands were idle hands. Her old white-haired friend in his wheel chair was doing her work. His crippled body drooped with weariness over his task because she did nothing. His face was lined with care because she was careless of the need that burdened him. His eyes were filled with sadness and pain because she was indifferent--because she did not know--had not cared to know.

The sun was almost down that afternoon when Bobby Whaley came out of the wretched house that was his home to stand on the front doorstep.

The dingy, unpainted buildings of the Flats--the untidy hovels and shanties--the dilapidated fences and broken sidewalks--unlovely at best, in the long shadows of the failing day, were sinister with the gloom of poverty.

High above the Mill the twisting columns of smoke from the tall stacks caught the last of the sunlight and formed slow, changing cloud-shapes--rolling hills of brightness with soft, shadowy valleys and canons of mysterious depths between--towering domes and crags and castled heights--grim, foreboding, beautiful.

The boy who stood on the steps, looking so listlessly about, was not the daring adventurer who had so boldly led his sister up the zigzag steps to the Interpreter's hut. He was not the Bobby who had ridden in such triumph beside the princess lady so far into the unknown country.

His freckled face was thin and pinched. The skin was drawn tight over the high cheek bones and the eyes were wide and staring. His young body that had been so st.u.r.dy was gaunt and skeletonlike. The dirty rags that clothed him were scarcely enough to hide his nakedness. The keen autumn air that had put the flush of good red blood into the cheeks of the golfers at the country club that afternoon whirled about his bare feet and legs with stinging cruelty. His thin lips and wasted limbs were blue with cold. Turning slowly, he seemed about to reenter the house, but when his hand touched the latch he paused and once more uncertainly faced toward the street. There was no help for him in his home. He knew no other place to go for food or shelter.

As the boy again looked hopelessly about the wretched neighborhood, he saw a woman coming down the street. He could tell, even at that distance, that the lady was a stranger to the Flats. Her dress, simple as it was, and her veil marked her as a resident of some district more prosperous than that grimy community in the shadow of the Mill.

A flash of momentary interest lighted the hungry eyes of the lad. But, no, it could not be one of the charity workers--the charity ladies always came earlier in the day and always in automobiles.

Then he saw the stranger stop and speak to a boy in front of a house two doors away. The neighbor boy pointed toward Bobby and the lady came on, walking quickly as if she were a little frightened at being alone amid such surroundings.

At the gap where once had been a gate in the dilapidated fence, she turned in toward the house and the wondering boy on the front step. She was within a few feet of the lad when she stopped suddenly with a low exclamation.

Bobby thought that she had discovered her mistake in coming to the wrong place. But the next moment she was coming closer, and he heard, "Bobby, is that really you! You poor child, have you been ill?"

"_I_ ain't been sick, if that's what yer mean," returned the boy. "Mag is, though. She's worse to-day."

His manner was sullenly defiant, as if the warmly dressed stranger had in some way revealed herself as his enemy.

"Don't you know me, Bobby?"

"Not with yer face covered up like that, I don't."

She laughed nervously and raised her veil.

"Huh, it's you, is it? Funny--Mag's been a-talkin' about her princess lady all afternoon. What yer doin' here?"

Before this hollow-cheeked skeleton of a boy Helen Ward felt strangely like one who, conscious of guilt, is brought suddenly into the presence of a stern judge.

"Why, Bobby," she faltered, "I--I came to see you and Maggie--I was at the Interpreter's this afternoon and he told me--I mean something he said made me want to come."

"The Interpreter, he's all right," said the boy. "So's Mary Martin."

"Aren't you just a little glad to see me, Bobby?"

The boy did not seem to hear. "Funny the way Mag talks about yer all the time. She's purty sick all right. Peterson's baby, it died."

"Can't we go into the house and see Maggie? You must be nearly frozen standing out here in the cold."

"Huh, I'm used to freezin'--I guess yer can come on in though--if yer want to. Mebbe Mag 'd like to see yer."

He pushed open the door, and she followed him into the ghastly barrenness of the place that he knew as home.

Never before had the daughter of Adam Ward viewed such naked, cruel poverty. She shuddered with the horror of it. It was so unreal--so unbelievable.

A small, rusty cookstove with no fire--a rude table with no cloth--a rickety cupboard with its shelves bare save for a few dishes--two broken-backed chairs--that was all. No, it was not all--on a window ledge, beneath a bundle of rags that filled the opening left by a broken pane, was a small earthen flowerpot holding a single scraggly slip of geranium.

Helen seemed to hear again the Interpreter saying, "A girl with true instincts for the best things of life and a capacity for great happiness."

At Bobby's call, Mrs. Whaley came from another room.

The boy did not even attempt an introduction but stood sullenly aside, waiting developments, and the mother in her pitiful distress evidently failed to identify their visitor when Helen introduced herself.

"I'm pleased to meet you, ma'am," she said, mechanically, and gazed at the young woman with a stony indifference, as though her mind, deadened by fearful anxiety and physical suffering, refused even to wonder at the stranger's presence in her home.

Helen did not know what to say--in the presence of this living tragedy of motherhood she felt so helpless, so overwhelmed with the uselessness of mere words. What right had she, a stranger from another world, to intrude unasked upon the privacy of this home? And yet, something deep within her--something more potent in its authority than the conventionalities that had so far ruled her life--a.s.sured her that she had the right to be there.

"I--I called to see Bobby and Maggie," she faltered. "I met them, you know, at the Interpreter's."

As if Helen's mention of the old basket maker awakened a spark of life in her pain-deadened senses, the woman returned, "Yes, ma'am--take a chair. No, not that one--it's broke. Here--this one will hold you up, I guess."

With nervous haste she dusted the chair with her ap.r.o.n. "You'd best keep your things on. We don't have no fire except to cook by--when there's anything to cook."

She found a match and lighted a tiny lamp, for it was growing dark.

"Bobby tells me that little Maggie is ill," offered Helen.

Mrs. Whaley looked toward the door of that other room and wrung her thin, toil-worn hands in the agony of her mother fear. "Yes, ma'am--she's real bad, I guess. Poor child, she's been ailin' for some time. And since the strike--" Her voice broke, and her eyes, dry as if they had long since exhausted their supply of tears, were filled with hopeless misery.

"We had the doctor once before things got so bad; about the time my man quit his work in the Mill to help Jake Vodell, it was. And the doctor he said all she needed was plenty of good food and warm clothes and a chance to play in the fresh country air."

She looked grimly about the bare room. "We couldn't have the doctor no more. I don't know as it would make any difference if we could. My man, he's away most of the time. I ain't seen him since yesterday mornin'.