Madge Morton's Victory Part 2

The young man paid not the slightest attention to her apology.

"Hurry, Nellie," advised Madge, "it is nearly time for us to get off the train and your hat is on crooked. Don't be such a timid little goose! You are actually trembling. Of course Tom or some one will meet us, and if they don't I shall not be in the least frightened." Madge announced this grandly. "That whistle means we are entering Jersey City. We will find Tom waiting for us at the gate."

Eleanor obediently followed Madge out of their coach. The little captain seemed older and more self-confident since she had been graduated at Miss Tolliver's, but Nellie hoped devoutly that her cousin would not become imbued with the impression that she was really grown-up. It would spoil their good times.

The two girls had never seen such a headlong rush of people in their lives. They clung desperately to their bags when a porter attempted to carry them. A man b.u.mped violently against Madge, but he made no effort to apologize as he rushed on through the crowd.

"I never saw so many people in such a hurry in my life," declared Nellie pettishly. "They behave as though they thought New York City were on fire and they were all rushing to put the fire out. I shall be glad when Tom takes charge of us."

Once through the great iron gates the girls looked anxiously about for Tom, but saw no trace of him.

"I suppose Tom must have missed the ferry," declared Madge with pretended cheerfulness. "We shall have to wait here for only about ten minutes until the next ferry boat comes across from New York."

When fifteen minutes had pa.s.sed and there was still no sign of Tom, Madge began to feel worried.

"Madge, I am sure you have made some kind of mistake," argued Eleanor plaintively. "I know Mrs. Curtis would not fail to have some one here on time to meet us for anything in the world. Perhaps Tom wrote for us to come across the ferry, and that he would meet us on the New York side.

Where is his letter?"

"It is in my trunk, Nellie," replied Madge in a crestfallen manner. She was not nearly so grown-up or so sure of herself as she had been half an hour before. "I know it was silly in me not to have brought Tom's letter with me, but I was so sure that I knew just what it said. Perhaps we had better go on over to New York. Let's hurry. Perhaps that boat is just about to start."

The two young women hurried aboard the boat, which left the dock a moment later, just as a tall, fair-haired young man, accompanied by two girls, hurried upon the scene. The young man was Tom Curtis and the young women were Phyllis Alden and Lillian Seldon.

In the meantime Madge and her cousin had crossed the river and had landed on the New York side. What was the dreadful roar and rumble that met their ears? It sounded like an earthquake, with the noise of frightened people shrieking above it. After a horrified moment it dawned on the two little strangers that this was only the usual roar of New York, which Tom Curtis had so often described to them.

"There isn't any use of our staying here very long, Eleanor," declared Madge, feeling a great wave of loneliness and fear sweep over her. "An accident must have happened to Tom's automobile on his way to the train to meet us. I am afraid we were foolish not to have stayed at the Jersey City station. I am sure Tom wrote he would meet us there. I have behaved like a perfect goose. It is because I boasted so much about not being frightened and knowing what to do. But I _do_ know Mrs. Curtis's address.

We can take a cab and drive up there."

Eleanor would fall in with Madge's plans to a certain point; then she would strike. Now she positively refused to get into a cab. Her mother and father and Miss Jenny Ann had warned her never to trust herself in a cab in a strange city. New York was too terrifying! Eleanor would search for Mrs. Curtis's home on foot, in a car, or a bus, but in a cab she would not ride.

Madge was obliged to give in gracefully. A policeman showed the girls to a Twenty-third Street car. He explained that when they came to the Third Avenue L they must get out of the car and take the elevated train uptown, since Madge had explained to him that Mrs. Curtis lived on Seventieth Street between Madison and Fifth Avenues.

There was only one point that the policeman failed to make clear to Eleanor and Madge. He neglected to tell them that elevated trains, as well as other cars, travel both up and down New York City, and the way to discover which way the "L" train is moving is to consult the signs on the steps that lead up to the elevated road. The policeman supposed that the two young women would make this observation for themselves. Of course, under ordinary circ.u.mstances, Madge and Nellie would have been more sensible, but they were frightened and confused at the bare idea of being alone in New York and consequently lost their heads, and they dashed up the Third Avenue elevated steps without looking for signs, settled themselves in the train and were off, as they supposed, for Seventieth Street.

They were too much interested in gazing into upstairs windows, where hundreds of people were at work in tiny, dark rooms, to pay much attention to the first stops at stations that their train made. They knew they were still some distance from Mrs. Curtis's. Madge was completely fascinated at the spectacle of a fat, frowsy woman holding a baby by its skirt on the sill of a six-story tenement house. Just as the car went by the baby made a leap toward the train. Madge smothered her scream as the woman jerked the child out of danger just in time. Then it suddenly occurred to her that this was hardly the kind of neighborhood in which to find Mrs. Curtis's house. The sign at the next stop was a name and not a street number. It could not be possible that she and Eleanor had made another mistake!

Madge hurried back to the end of the car to find the conductor.

"We wish to get out at the nearest station to Seventieth Street and Lexington Avenue," she declared timidly.

The man paid not the slightest attention to her. Madge repeated her question in a somewhat bolder tone.

"You ain't going to get off near Seventieth Street for some time if you keep a-traveling away from it," retorted the conductor crossly. "You've got on a downtown 'L' 'stead of an up. Better change at the next station.

You'll find an uptown train across the street," the man ended more kindly, seeing the look of consternation on Madge's white face.

The girls walked sadly down the elevated steps, dragging their bags, which seemed to grow heavier with every moment. They found themselves in one of the downtown foreign slums of New York City. It was a bright, early summer afternoon. The streets were swarming with grown people and children. Pushcarts lined the sidewalks. On an opposite corner a hand organ played an Italian song. In front of it was a small open s.p.a.ce, encircled by a group of idle men and women. Before the organ danced a little figure that Madge and Eleanor stopped to watch. They forgot their own bewilderment in gazing at the strange sight. The dancer was a little girl about twelve years old, as thin as a wraith. Her hair was black and hung in straight, short locks to her shoulders. Her eyes were so big and burned so brightly that it was difficult to notice any other feature of her face. The child looked like a tropical flower. Her face was white, but her cheeks glowed with two scarlet patches. She flung her little arms over her head, pirouetted and stood on her tip toes. She did not seem to see the curious crowd about her, but kept her eyes turned toward the sky.

Her dancing was as much a part of nature as the summer sunshine, and Madge and Eleanor were bewitched.

A rough woman came out of a nearby doorway. She stood with her hands on her hips looking in the direction of the music. "Tania!" she called angrily. Elbowing her way through the crowd, she jostled Madge as she pa.s.sed by her. "Tania!" she cried again. The men and women spectators let the woman make her way through them as though they knew her and were afraid of her heavy fist. Only the child appeared to be unconscious of the woman's approach. Suddenly a big, red arm was thrust out. It caught the little girl by the skirt. With the other hand she rained down blows on the child's upturned face. One blow followed the other in swift succession. The little dancer made no outcry. She simply put one thin arm over her head for protection.

The music went on gayly. No one of the watching men and women tried to stop the woman's brutality. But Madge was not used to the indifference of the New York crowd. Like a flash of lightning she darted away from Eleanor and rushed over to the woman, who was dragging the child along and cuffing her at each step.

"Stop striking that child!" she ordered sharply. "How can you be so cruel? You are a wicked, heartless woman!"

The woman paid no attention to Madge. She did not seem even to have heard her, but lifted her big, coa.r.s.e arm for another blow.

Madge's breath came in swift gasps. "Don't strike that child again," she repeated. "I don't know who she is, nor what she has done, but she is too little for you to beat her like that. I won't endure it," the little captain ended in sudden pa.s.sion.

The woman turned her cruel, bloodshot eyes slowly toward Madge. She was one of the strongest and most brutal characters in the slums of New York, and few dared to oppose her. She was even a terror to the policemen in the neighborhood.

"Git out!" she said briefly.

Her arm descended. It did not strike the child. Quick as a flash, Madge Morton had flung herself between the woman and the child. For a moment the blow almost stunned the girl. The East Side crowd closed in on the girl and the woman. If there was going to be a fight, the spectators did not intend to miss it. Eleanor was numb with fear and sympathy. She did not know whether to be more frightened for Madge than sorry for the child.

The woman's face was mottled and crimson with anger. Madge's face was very white. She held her head high and looked her enemy full in the face.

"Git out of this and stop your interferin'!" shouted the virago. "This here child belongs to me and I'll do what I like with her. If you are one of them social settlers coming around into poor people's places and meddlin' with their business, you'd better git back where you belong or I'll social-settle you."

At this moment a thin, hot hand caught hold of Madge's and pulled it gently. Madge gazed down into a little face, whose expression she never forgot. It was whiter than it had been before. The scarlet color had gone out of the cheeks and the big, black eyes burned brighter. But there was not the slightest trace of fear in the look. Instead, the child's lips were curved into an elf-like smile.

"Don't stay here, lady, please," she begged. "The ogress will be horrid to you. She can't hurt me. You see, I am an enchanted Princess."

An instant later the child received a savage blow from the woman's hard hand full in the face without shrinking. It was Madge who winced. Tears rose to her eyes. She put her arms about the child and tried to shelter her.

"Don't be calling me no names, Tania," the woman cried, dragging at the child's thin skirts. "Jest you come along home with me and you'll git what is comin' to you, you good-for-nothin' little imp."

"Is she your mother?" asked Madge doubtfully, gazing at the brutal woman and the strange child.

Tania shook her black head scornfully. "Oh, dear, no," she answered. "It is only that I have to live with her now, while I am under the enchantment. Some day, when the wicked spell is broken, I shall go away, perhaps to a wonderful castle. My name is t.i.tania. I think it means that I am the Queen of the Fairies."

The woman laughed brutishly. "Queen of gutter, you are, Miss Tania. I'll tan you," she jeered, as she dragged the little girl from Madge's arms.

The little captain looked despairingly about her. There, a calm witness of the entire scene, was a big New York policeman. "Officer," commanded Madge indignantly, "make that woman leave that child alone."

The big policeman looked sheepish. "I can't do nothing with Sal," he protested. "If I make her stop beating Tania now, she'll only be meaner to her when she gets her indoors. Best leave 'em alone, I think. I have interfered, but the child says she don't mind. I don't think she does, somehow; she's such a queer young 'un'."

Sal was now engaged in shaking Tania as she pushed her along in front of her. Madge and Eleanor were in despair.

Suddenly a well-dressed young man appeared in the crowd. There was something oddly familiar in his appearance to Eleanor, but she failed to remember where she had seen him before. "Sal!" he called out sharply, "leave Tania alone!"

Instantly the woman obeyed him. She slunk back into her open doorway. The crowd melted as though by magic; they also recognized the young man's authority. A moment later he was gone. Madge, Eleanor, and the strange little girl stood on the street corner almost alone.

CHAPTER IV

THE UNINVITED GUEST