For Gold or Soul? Part 14

"That is a dreadful life for a girl," went on the man, very quietly. "It is agony for the poor things, both of mind and body!"

"You are right, sir," cried Faith, who had thought instantly of Miss Jennings. "The shop girls' life is one continuous drudgery. She is the slave of circ.u.mstances and the victim of conditions."

"I am surprised that so many enter the life. There are surely other vocations. They choose the hardest one possible."

"But do they choose?" asked Faith, who had become interested in spite, of herself. "Are they not driven this way or that, according to their opportunities? In my case there was no choice. I had tried everything else. Hard as it is, I am thankful for my present employment."

The man looked at her sharply. There was genuine sympathy in his face.

Almost involuntarily he broke out in violent sentences.

"You girls are to blame in great measure for all this, and where the fault is not yours it lies with your parents! Instead of cultivating your graces you bedraggle them with labor! Instead of marketing your smiles you trade in blood and sinew! Every day in that store means a year off of your life; every anxious moment means an inroad into your rightful happiness! Why will you not see the folly of your ways? Why can you not understand that it is a false morality which is killing you?

Why, if I were a girl"--his voice had dropped to the most persuasive cadence--"I should value my beauty too highly to hide it behind a counter, and my subsistence should be the boundless reward of affection, rather than the n.i.g.g.ardly recompense for wasted tissues! Of course, I shock you, because you have done no thinking for yourself. A lot of narrow souled ancestors have done thinking for you. They have brought you here to let you shift for yourself, but woe to you if you offend one of their petty notions of honor. See, child! I have money, I have constant ease. Could you blame me for offering to share it with youth and beauty?"

As he breathed these words he gazed at Faith eagerly. The soul in the man had vanished. He was dangerously in earnest.

The thrill that flowed through Faith's veins as he spoke was not of fear, for, child that she was, she understood his meaning, and his words stirred the deepest channels of her soul--she was more grieved than shocked at the man's distorted reasoning.

"You are all wrong," she said, sadly. "You cannot understand! There are some things more precious than gold to us, more precious even than comfort or affection. Not for the world would I lose this 'something'

which I possess! It is the haven of my soul at the hour of every trial.

It is the one solace of my life in the desperate condition that I have reached. You, a man of years, should not argue so wrongfully. It is wicked to place temptations before the young and wretched."

She had regained her composure as she finished speaking, and a tinge of righteous indignation made her voice vibrate strangely.

"Is it wrong to do good?" asked the man, a trifle sullenly. "Surely comfort, ease, health are the best a man can offer. Nature did not create you girls for a life of toil. You were made for love, for homage and adoration. Yet when one offers you these you turn to your nameless 'something' and, like the martyrs of old, suffer torture and death rather than accept what is your due. It is incomprehensible, truly!"

"Hush! Your words are an insult! I will not hear them. It is true that my knowledge of the world is limited, but this much I know: the G.o.d of righteousness has placed me here for a purpose, and that purpose is not to play the coward in time of trouble or to prove traitor to the highest, holiest instincts which permeate my being! Working girl I am and may always be, but my lot is a queen's beside what you suggest! G.o.d pity the poor women who have not the wisdom to see it."

She was standing before him now like a beautiful statue, one arm uplifted to emphasize her utterances.

"My G.o.d! You are superb! Magnificent!" muttered the man involuntarily.

"I would give my life to be worthy of such a woman!"

Faith's arm dropped suddenly, and she drew away with a gasp. There was a look in the man's face that frightened her for a moment.

"You have taught me a lesson," he said, almost hoa.r.s.ely. "I thank you, child, and I bid you good-evening."

"But the number," cried Faith, as he was turning away. "You wished me to direct you to a certain number."

"Never mind it now. I can find it," was the answer.

He was walking swiftly away in the darkness of the street, when a figure approached him from the opposite direction.

The two met directly under the gas lamp where Faith had been standing a moment before, and as they met Faith heard a sharp exclamation.

Her sharp eyes recognized the newcomer at once. It was no other than Bob Hardy, the store detective.

CHAPTER XIII.

A HEAVENLY INSPECTOR.

When Faith Marvin reached home after her unpleasant interview with the well-dressed stranger, she was in a state of nervousness that nearly bordered upon hysterics. The fact that Bob Hardy was a witness to what she had supposed was a mere accidental meeting gave her an instinctive clue to the ident.i.ty of the man, and her cheeks flushed with shame as she connected him in her thoughts with that insulting proposition of the detective.

She had tried to compose herself, as usual, before going into her mother's presence, and succeeded so well that when they retired Mrs.

Marvin had no suspicion of the interview. Neither did Faith acquaint her with the extraordinary suspicions against Mr. Watkins, which she now felt ashamed to think she had harbored for a second.

She was much troubled in mind about the latter, for while she felt in her heart that Mr. Watkins was innocent she could not help thinking that he, too, was shielding a thief. She wondered if it was because he felt the same on the subject as had his sweetheart, Miss Jennings. She said her prayers quietly and felt more tranquil after. There was a balm in religion for her trusting heart, which she begged with all her soul to share with others.

It was during this hour that she thought of Mr. Forbes, whom she knew was to bury his only son on the morrow. Suddenly the thought flitted through her head that perhaps employees were somewhat to blame for not expressing more sympathy for their employers in all serious matters.

"Perhaps they think us as heartless as we think them," she whispered to herself; then the impulse came over her to write Mr. Forbes a letter.

She rose quietly, so as not to wake her mother, and penned him the note.

It came straight from her heart. She told him she was sorry for his sorrow. Early the next morning she went out and mailed it. Little d.i.c.k went with her, hobbling along on clumsy crutches. The child had fallen in love with her at once, and, although he often cried for his sister, Faith could always cheer him and change his tears to laughter.

Late in the afternoon she rode down to the undertaker's. She had not become reconciled yet to parting with Miss Jennings.

As she reached the door two women were just leaving; they were Miss Fairbanks, the buyer, and Maggie Brady. Faith was startled for a minute, for she could not understand their interest. Neither one of them had ever shown the faintest liking for the dead girl, but now she noticed with surprise that they had both been crying. "Truly, every cloud has a silver lining," she murmured to herself, "and who knows but what this is the first glimpse of the lining! Oh, I do hope it will soon show itself to poor Mr. Watkins."

The two women had pa.s.sed her with a mere nod of the head. She opened the door of the establishment and confronted Mr. Watkins.

"Oh, what is it?" she cried, involuntarily, as she saw his face. "Don't, dear Mr. Watkins; don't take it so badly."

Mr. Watkins put his hand on her arm as she spoke. He was so faint and weak that he seemed obliged to lean on something.

"I--I have explained that matter about the money," he whispered, hoa.r.s.ely. "Hardy will not annoy you any longer. The thief has been discovered."

He looked so wretched that the tears sprang to Faith's eyes.

"I am glad it is explained," she answered, hastily, "but you are ill, Mr. Watkins. You should go home this minute."

"Home--home!" repeated Mr. Watkins in a vacant manner.

Then with a fearful groan of agony he collapsed completely. As he fell to the floor several of the undertaker's clerks rushed forward and lifted him up.

"Another victim of conditions, of greed and avarice," said a voice in Faith's ear.

She turned quickly and recognized Miss Alma Dean, the woman inspector, whose card she had in her pocket.

Without waiting for Faith to answer, the lady went on speaking. The men were laying Mr. Watkins on a sofa not twenty feet away from the body of his dead sweetheart.

"That poor fellow was a picture of health two years ago, before he entered the employ of Denton, Day & Co. I know his mother well; she is a lovely woman, and he has a younger brother who is also in that store, and liable to follow in this poor chap's footsteps. I just came in to look at that poor girl. I want to stamp her face indelibly upon my memory. Thank fortune I am in a position to remedy some of the evils in this world. As Government Inspector I can do considerable, but I must learn the length and breadth of the evil before I am fit to attack it."

Faith listened breathlessly to every word. The proprietor of the place was also listening, and as she finished, he nodded his head as though he quite agreed with her.

Mr. Watkins was rapidly reviving under the kind care bestowed upon him, but before he was fairly alive to his surroundings Miss Dean took Faith's hand and led her out on to the sidewalk.