Mollie Merk was Mr. Hurd's most sensational woman reporter--the one who went up in air-ships and described her sensations, or purposely fell in front of trolley-cars to prove that the fenders would not work. She was what she herself called a "breezy writer," but her breeziness did not exhaust itself in her literature. She was a breezy person generally--small and thin and dark, and so full of vitality that she always arrived anywhere as if she had been projected by some violent mechanical force. She spoke very rapidly, in short explosive sentences. She openly despised the young and made epigrams about them to show her scorn. Before I had been on the _Searchlight_ a week she announced that I would be endurable if I had a redeeming vice; and our fellow-reporters went around quoting that remark and grinning over it.

After I had written a few "big stories" her manner changed to one of open wonder, and she began to call me "the convent kid" and give me advice, addressing me as if I were an infant cla.s.s. When she was in the same room with me I felt that she was mentally patting my head. I appreciated her kind heart and her value to the _Searchlight_; but I did not really like Mollie Merk.

Usually when she catapulted into the office she exchanged a few shouts of greeting with "the boys" and then went directly to her desk, where she dropped into her chair like a bag of ballast from a balloon, and began to write with a pen that scratched louder than any other. But to-night she followed the _peau d'Espagne_ across the room to me and clapped her hand on my shoulder.

"'Lo, Iverson," she said, in her loud and breathless way. "Still on the job? 'Can' it. I'm your vesper-bell."

I felt myself instinctively drop away from her hand. In her greeting she had done two things I particularly disliked. She had called me "Iverson"--it was a vulgar habit of hers to address other women by their last names--and she had spoken of something connected with my convent life, which was too sacred to be joked about. Still, I knew she meant well. I looked up at her and tried to smile, but all I could do was to drag one side of my mouth down to my chin in humble imitation of Mr. Hurd when he is talking to a member of the staff.

Mollie Merk seemed to appreciate it. She roared, and her hand clapped my shoulder again.

"Cheer up, Iverson," she said. "Worst's yet to come." And she added, all in one breath, "I'm-going-to-give-a-party-for-you!"

I dropped my pen and turned in my chair to stare at her.

"Been meaning to do it right along," she jerked out. "Couldn't pull it off. To-night's my chance. Nothing to do. Fell down on my story.

Hurrah! Give you a Bohemian dinner. Show you life outside the cloister. Purple pasts. Crimson presents. All the rest of it. Make your hair curl and your eyes stick out. Come on!"

Her words gave me a thrill, on which I immediately put down the stern brake of conscience. As a student of life I wanted to see and learn all I could--especially as I intended to be a nun in three years and would have no further chances. But was I justified in deliberately turning aside to seek such knowledge, when in the broad path of my daily duty I was already acquiring more than one person could understand? Also, would it be right to accept Mollie Merk's hospitality when I did not approve of her? I decided that it would not; and I tried to think of some polite and gracious way of declining her invitation, but the right words did not come. I had no social engagements, for I was still a stranger in New York, and Mollie Merk knew it; and I had not learned to tell lies with unstudied ease.

Finally an inspiration came to me. I could make an engagement and then keep it. I thanked Miss Merk and told her I intended to dine with my cla.s.smates Maudie Joyce and Kittie James. They had come to New York the day before with Kittie's sister, Mrs. George Morgan; and as they were only to stay a week, I felt that I must see all I could of them.

As a matter of fact, I had dined with them the previous night, but that did not matter. I knew they would be glad to see me, even two nights in succession.

Mollie Merk was interested as soon as I spoke of them. "Cla.s.smates?"

she yelped. "Two more convent kids?"

I admitted coldly that Maudie and Kittie had been graduated with me from St. Catharine's the month before.

"All right," said Mollie Merk. "Have 'em with us. Great. More convent kids the merrier. Invite their chaperon, too. I'll get Mrs. Hoppen.

Hen-party of six."

I hesitated. Mrs. George Morgan would hardly approve of Mollie Merk, but she would find her a new type. Mrs. Morgan liked new types and strange experiences, and had seen many of them, for her husband was a wealthy Chicago man who wrote plays. Moreover, Mrs. Hoppen would be with us, and Mrs. Morgan would surely like her. Mrs. Hoppen was the city editor's star woman reporter, and very old--older even than Mollie Merk, who was at least twenty-five. Mrs. Hoppen, I had heard, was over thirty. She was rather bitter and blase at times, but usually she had charming manners. I told Miss Merk I would get Mrs. Morgan on the telephone and ask if she and the girls could come, and within five minutes I was in the _Searchlight's_ telephone-booth calling up her hotel.

It was Maudie Joyce who answered, and she uttered a cry of joy when I told her of Mollie Merk's invitation. She said Mrs. Morgan had gone to bed with a sick-headache, and that she and Kittie James had been just about sick, too, over the prospect of a whole evening shut up alone in hotel rooms when so much Life was going to waste in the outer world.

Then she turned from the telephone and repeated Mollie's message. I observed that she did not say anything about the dinner being Bohemian and making our eyes stick out, though I had faithfully repeated our hostess's words. Almost immediately her voice, breathless with joy, came over the wire again, telling me that she and Kittie could dine with us, and that Mrs. Morgan was very grateful to Miss Merk for saving her young friends from a lonely evening.

The girls were waiting when we three reached the hotel, and my heart swelled with pride as I introduced them. Mrs. Hoppen and Mollie Merk and I were, of course, in our office clothes, as we had not gone home to dress; but Kittie and Maudie were beautifully gowned for the evening. They were both as charming as h.e.l.leu drawings, and in the same exquisitely finished way; and their manners were so perfect that I could almost hear Mollie Merk trying to climb up to them. By the time the five of us had crowded into the taxi-cab, with the little bustle and confusion the effort caused, everybody liked everybody else. Maudie and Kittie were very proud of being with three newspaper women, and showed it; and they were so fascinated by Mollie Merk that they could not keep their eyes off her.

Of course, too, they were quivering with delight over the throngs, the noise, the brilliant electric signs, the excitement on every side, and the feeling that they were in the midst of it. Even I, though I had been in New York for a whole month and was a reporter at that, felt an occasional thrill. But as I leaned back and watched the faces of my two friends, I realized that, though we three were about the same age, in experience I was already a thousand years in advance of them. So many things had happened in the past month--things we girls at St.

Catharine's had never heard of--things I could not even mention to Kittie and Maudie. I felt that I had lost a great deal which they still retained, and I expected a deep sadness to settle upon my soul.

But someway it did not.

The cab stopped at a restaurant ornamented by a huge electric sign, and we got out and walked into a marble-lined vestibule. Mollie Merk and Mrs. Hoppen led the way, and I followed them with an easy, accustomed step. To dine at a great New York restaurant was just as novel to me as it was to Maudie and Kittie, but they did not know this, and I sincerely hoped they would not find it out.

A maid took our wraps in the anteroom, and sent us in single file along a narrow hall to enter a huge room at the end of it, ablaze with electric light, and full of smoke and music and little tables with people sitting at them. All the tables were cl.u.s.tered close together around the four sides of the room, leaving a big square s.p.a.ce in the center, roped off by a heavy red cord. It was empty, and I wondered what it was for. Above there was a balcony with more tables and people at them. There was laughter everywhere, some of it quite loud, and many voices were speaking in many tongues. Above it all the band at the head of the room poured forth gay music. I could hear Maudie and Kittie draw quick breaths of delight, and my own feet hardly touched the ground as we followed the head waiter to the table reserved for us.

There were bottles and gla.s.ses on most of the tables, and even the women were helping to empty them. But I knew that many good people drink wine in moderation, so I was not greatly shocked. After all, this was New York--Bohemia, a new world. We were in it, and I at least was of it. The reflection sent a thrill down my spine--the kind that goes all the way. I felt almost wicked, and strangely happy.

When we were seated at our table Mollie Merk asked if we would have c.o.c.ktails. She spoke with a very casual air, and we tried to decline in the same manner, though I am sure that Maudie and Kittie felt their hair rise then and there. Even my own scalp p.r.i.c.kled. I explained in an offhand way that we never drank anything but water, so Mollie Merk ordered some Apollinaris for us, and two c.o.c.ktails "with a dash of absinthe in them" for Mrs. Hoppen and herself. For five minutes afterward Kittie and Maudie and I did not speak. We were stunned by the mere sound of that fatal word.

Mollie Merk seemed to understand our emotions, for she began to tell us about her first experience with absinthe, years ago, in Paris, when she drank a large gobletful as if it had been a gla.s.s of lemonade. She said it was the amount a Frenchman would spend an entire afternoon over, sipping it a few drops at a time at a little sidewalk table in front of some cafe; but that she gulped it down in a few swallows, and then had just enough intelligence left to get into a cab and tell the _cocher_ to drive her around for three hours. She said she had ordered the man to keep to the Boulevards, but that he had taken her through the Milky Way and to the places where the morning stars sang together, and that she had distinctly heard them sing. Afterward, she added, she had traveled for centuries through s.p.a.ce, visiting the most important objects in the universe and admiring color effects, for everything was pulsing with purple and gold and amethyst lights.

As a student of Life I admired the unerring instinct with which Mollie Merk had chosen her subject when she started in to make our eyes stick out. But if this was the beginning, what would be the end? At last Maudie Joyce, who had always had the manner of a woman of the world, even when she was a school-girl, pulled herself together and asked smilingly if Miss Merk's c.o.c.ktail had swept her into s.p.a.ce this time.

Mollie Merk sighed and said, alas, no; those were the joys of yesteryear, and that the most a c.o.c.ktail could do for her at present was to make her forget her depression after she had received a letter from home. Then a calcium light blazed from above, making a brilliant circle on the floor inside the red ropes. The musicians struck into wild Oriental music, and two mulattoes came into the limelight and began to dance.

They were a man and a woman, very young, and in evening dress. They padded into the ring like two black panthers, the woman first, circling slowly around in time to the music, which was soft and rather monotonous, and the man revolving slowly after her. At first she seemed not to see him, but to be dancing by herself, for the love of it, and there was beauty in every movement she made. I forgot all about the dinner, the people, my friends and my hostess, and leaned forward, watching.

Suddenly she looked over her shoulder and discovered the man. She quickened her steps a little, and the musicians played faster, while she circled in and out, as if through the tangled growths of some dense jungle. I could almost see it springing up around her and hear the sound of animals moving near her--wild things like herself. She was very sure of herself as she writhed and twisted, and she had reason to be; for, however fast the man came toward her, she was always a little in advance of him. The music swelled into a sudden crash of sound as he gave a leap and caught her. But she dipped and slipped out of his hands and whirled away again, sometimes crouching close to the ground, sometimes revolving around him with a mocking smile. Once, as he leaped, she bent and let him go over her; again he caught her, but a second time she slipped away.

At last the violins sent forth only a queer, muted, barbaric hum, broken by a crash of cymbals as the man made his final spring and captured the woman, this time holding her fast. There was a delirious whirl of sound and motion while he held her up and performed a kind of jungle _pas seule_ before he carried her away. The music grew slower and slower and finally stopped; but for an instant or two after the dancers had disappeared it seemed to me that I could still see the man bearing his burden steadily through strange tropical growths and under trees whose poisonous branches caught at him as he pa.s.sed.

I turned and looked at Maudie and Kittie. They were sitting very still, with their eyes fixed on the spot where the dancers had been. I knew what they were thinking, and they knew I knew; but when they caught my glance they both began to speak at once, and eagerly, as if to rea.s.sure me. Maudie said the woman's clothes were in excellent taste, and Kittie murmured that such violent exercise must be very reducing. Kittie is extremely plump, and she loves good food so much that she is growing plumper all the time. In her interest in the dance she had forgotten her dinner, and now the waiter was taking away a portion of salmon with a delicious green sauce before she had eaten even a mouthful of it. That agonizing sight immediately diverted Kittie's mind, and I was glad.

Mollie Merk met my startled eyes and grinned. "Cheer up, Iverson!" she exclaimed. "Worst's yet to come, you know."

I managed to smile back at her. This was Life, and we were seeing it, but I began to feel that we had seen enough for an evening. I tried to remind myself again that we were in Bohemia, but under the look in Maudie's eyes I felt my face grow hot. It was I who had brought her and Kittie here--I and my new friends. What would Sister Irmingarde think of me if she knew?

I had little time for such mournful reflections. There was a stir on the musicians' platform as all the players but one laid aside their instruments and filed out through a side door. This one, the first violin, came down on the floor and walked about among the diners, stopping at different tables. Every time he stopped, I discovered, it was to play to some particular woman who had caught his eye. He was tall and good-looking in his gipsy costume, with a wide red sash around his waist, a white-silk shirt open at the neck, short velvet trousers, and a black-velvet coat. Under his dark mustache his teeth looked very white as he smiled, and he smiled often, or sighed and made eyes at the women as he played to them.

I glanced at Kittie and Maudie. They were watching the gipsy with absorbed interest.

He must have caught Maudie's eye, for suddenly he crossed to our table and began to play to her--turning occasionally to Kittie and me for a second only, while his violin shrieked and moaned and sighed and sang in a way that made our hearts turn over. I could see by their faces, which were pink with excitement, and by their shining eyes, what emotions the moment held for my young friends, and certainly it was thrilling enough for three girls just out of school to have a genius playing to them alone in one of the gayest restaurants in New York.

For a few moments I was delighted with the gipsy and his music. Then I began to notice the way he looked at us, alternately half-closing and slowly opening his eyes as he put his soul into his music. He seemed to be immensely interested in Maudie, and played to her much longer than he did to any one else. Several times he came so close to her that I was afraid he would touch her.

The other musicians had returned by this time, and were playing an accompaniment to the violinist, who had swung into a Brahms waltz.

When he had finished the first movement he stopped playing, tucked his violin under his arm, and held out his hand to Maudie, with his most brilliant smile. She turned first red, then white, and shrank away from him in her chair, while instinctively I, too, threw out my hands to ward him off. He turned to me and took them at once, holding them tight and trying to pull me to my feet. My heart stopped beating as I resisted his drag on my wrists, and I looked at Mollie Merk and Mrs.

Hoppen, expecting them to spring up and interfere. But for a moment they both sat regarding the scene as indifferently as if they were at a play.

At last Mrs. Hoppen shook her head at the musician with her bored little smile, and he bowed and shrugged his shoulders and went off to a table some distance away, where he began to play to another woman.

Mollie Merk leaned toward me. "Say, Iverson," she exclaimed, in a tone that must have reached the diners in the balcony, "what's up? You're as white as your copy-paper. Which is it--indigestion or cold feet?"

Her words pulled me together. It was natural that I should look pale, for by this time I was frightened--not for myself, but for Kittie and Maudie. They, I could see, though embarra.s.sed and ill at ease, were not yet frightened. I knew why. _I_ was there, and they trusted me.

They were sure that nothing could harm them while I was with them. I set my teeth in the determination that nothing should.

More entertainers came into the s.p.a.ce shut off by the red cords. Every moment the room grew closer and hotter, the smoke around us became thicker, the atmosphere of excitement increased. The faces of Kittie and Maudie began to float before me in a kind of mist. I decided that if I ever got them out into a clean world again I would have nothing left to pray for. But I knew I could not wipe the evening and its incidents from their memories, and that knowledge was the hardest thing I had to bear.

In desperation I turned from the dancers and began to watch the diners. The way these accepted the dancing and the actions of the gipsy had shown me at once what they were, and now they were becoming gayer every minute and more noisy. Some of them got up occasionally and whirled about together on the dancing-floor. Many sang accompaniments to the violins. These men and women were moths, I reflected, whirling about a lurid flame of life. There were dozens of young girls in the room--many without chaperons.

Directly opposite me two persons--a man, and a girl in a white dress--sat at a table alone, absorbed in each other. At first I glanced at them only occasionally and idly, then with growing interest and at last with horror, for I began to understand. The girl had a sweet, good face, but a brief study of the man showed me what he was.

He was short and stout, with a bald head and a round, pleasure-loving face. It was not so much his appearance, however, as the way he watched the girl which betrayed him to me. He hardly took his eyes from her face. Whatever was going on in the dancing-place, he looked at her; and she, leaning a little forward in her chair, listened to him as he talked, and swayed toward him. I saw him tap her hand, which lay on the table, with his fat forefinger. The sight revolted me, but she did not draw her hand away.

As I watched her I thought of all the dreadful things I had heard and read and seen since I had been in New York, and wondered if the time would ever come when I would be old enough and wise enough to rise and go to a girl in such a situation and ask her if she needed help.

It seemed impossible that women experienced enough to do this with dignity and courage should sit around to-night, all unheeding, and let such things go on. Then looking at them again, table by table, I read the answer. They were themselves the lost and strayed--callous, indifferent, with faces and hearts hardened by the lives they had led.

I began to feel sick and faint, and for a moment I closed my eyes.

When I opened them, coming toward us slowly through the crowd was G.o.dfrey Morris, the a.s.sistant of Nestor Hurd, my chief on the _Searchlight_. It was plain that he had just entered, for he was looking around in search of a table. I shall never forget the feeling that came over me when I recognized him. Now that he was there, I felt absolutely safe. I had almost a vision of him picking up Maudie and Kittie and me and taking us bodily away, and the relief and grat.i.tude I felt showed me how great my inward panic had been. I kept my eyes on him, hoping he would turn and see me, but he was looking in another direction. Still, he was drawing nearer, and I sat tight and waited in silence, though I wanted to call out to him above the uproar around us.

It did not surprise me to see the girl in white put out her hand as he pa.s.sed her table and touch him on the arm. He stopped at once, looking a little surprised, and then stood for a moment beside her and the stout man, talking quietly to them both. I waited breathlessly. Now he was speaking to the man alone, probably urging him to leave the place. And then--I heard a sound as unexpected in that place as an altar-bell. Mr. Morris had thrown back his head and laughed, and as he laughed he smote the stout man heavily on the shoulder and dropped into a chair beside him. The stout man filled a gla.s.s. I saw Mr.