Корнелл Вулрич - A Treasury of Stories (Collection of novelettes and short stories)

“Then let’s go to some other place, shall we?” he suggested eagerly. “Someplace where we can be by ourselves and really talk to one another.”

This was not the first time anyone had suggested her going out with him. It was the first time, however, that she would go. This was different, this was all right. It had to be, or there wasn’t any sun anywhere, there weren’t any blue skies, there wasn’t any love, there wasn’t anything good and decent in the whole wide world. She knew she couldn’t be wrong; there was just one man who would and could love her the way she wanted to be loved — and this was the man. She’d waited a long time but he’d come. She was perfectly willing to go with him wherever he suggested.

“You’ll have to buy two dollars’ worth of tickets if you want to take me out before the session’s over,” she said. She blushed while she said it. He missed seeing that; he missed seeing a miracle on Broadway — the blush of a taxi-dancer. She blushed because — well, everyone knew what it meant when a customer took one of the hostesses out. Only this time they were wrong; it didn’t mean that. Let them think what they wanted to. She knew better.

“I won’t be a minute,” she said, and went to get her hat and coat. She found Trixie recuperating in the alcove, one leg crossed high above the other, mournfully rubbing her instep.

“Did the stretcher-bearers get here yet?” Trixie wanted to know. “I’m going to try arnica first, and if that doesn’t work, Christian Science. Well, how are you two getting along?” was the next thing she asked, getting up and ludicrously pretending to limp toward the mirror.

“I’m going out with him,” Faith said, starry-eyed.

Trixie, that peerless judge of the heart’s emotion, darted a swift keen glance at her.

“So you’ve fallen at last!” She acted sort of worried, Faith thought. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” she went on. “Listen, kid. I’m your friend. I’m the only one here that knows for a fact what the others don’t want to believe about you — that you’re straight, not like the rest of us. The only reason you’ve gotten away with it is that it never entered the heads of all the guys that hang around here that there could be such an animal as a virgin dancing in a dime-mill; otherwise you would have taken the count long ago. Many a time, without you knowing it, I’ve steered the manager himself away from you by telling him that you were the private property of a guy that went around carrying two guns and wouldn’t think anything of turning this place into a shooting-gallery if anyone made a pass at you. Don’t ask me why, or what I get out of it. Maybe I’m not so tough underneath. Maybe I keep thinking how I was just like you five or six years ago, and I don’t want the same thing to happen to you that did to me.” She bent her fingers and looked down at her five bright red nails. When she raised her eyes, they were all wet and shiny.

“Honey,” she went on quietly, “there’s nothing so lovely in the whole wide world as an on-the-level kid. Stay that way. I don’t know why, but just stay that way! Maybe it makes the tough grind a little easier for me to know you’re like you are.”

“But I am staying that way,” protested Faith. “Don’t you see? He’s not like the others. I know. I know! For months he’s been talking to me on the telephone and never said anything he shouldn’t, never tried to see me, never tried to suggest anything out of the way. He’s the one, the one I’ve been waiting for, I tell you! I couldn’t pass this by. It would never come again.” She choked. “I’m sick of dancing night after night, sick of being pawed and kneed, sick of running the gauntlet downstairs at the door to get home alone each night. He’s so sweet! Oh, I knew he was waiting for me someplace or other along the way. It all seems too good to be true.”

“That’s the trouble; it probably is,” said Trixie dismally. She laughed but without much enjoyment. Her cynicism, briefly discarded, had returned. “Wet your finger like this and run it down the side of his face; if it’s rough and scratchy — and if he talks way down deep in his throat and, and if he’s got on a collar and tie and big flat shoes — go home alone. I wouldn’t trust anything in pants as far as I could throw that big bass drum out there!”

“They aren’t all on the make,” protested Faith impatiently. “They aren’t all like that—”

“No,” agreed Trixie, “but those that aren’t haven’t been born yet or they’re dead already. So you won’t listen to me?”

“No, I won’t listen, because for once you’re wrong.”

“Then my advice to you,” murmured Trixie, “is to keep your fingers crossed and don’t walk under ladders!” And she gripped Faith’s arm for a moment, then seeing it was useless, dropped the subject. “Incidentally, who do you think is waiting around outside to take me home? That dark horse you steered me into tonight. Remember him?”

“Is he pretty awful?” Faith asked vaguely. She hardly remembered him any more by now. Just someone who had asked her what color her dress was and hadn’t worn a flower in his coat.

“Awful or not,” promised Trixie vengefully, “he’s going to be taken for a sleigh-ride he’ll never forget. I’m going to lead him to that chop suey joint that has a fire-escape right outside the ladies’ room — know the one I mean? I’m going to eat my fill of fried noodles, and then when he thinks it’s about time to get some return on his investment, I’m going to leave him for a minute and go powder my nose. Long after I’m home asleep in my little beddsie-weddsie, he’ll still be sitting there waiting for me to come out.”

Faith laughed as she turned to go.

“One of these times one of them is going to come around here the night after and give you a black eye.”

“None of ’em has yet,” Trixie called after her. “They wouldn’t want anyone to know what a fool I made out of them.” But as the curtains fell back in place and Faith was gone, her face sobered up again. She stared moodily into the glass. It won’t work out, she thought. It never has since Broadway stopped being a cow-path, and it won’t tonight. I know what’s going to happen just as though I was there in her place. That kid’s in for a tough time of it tonight. And tomorrow at this time, just another busted heart — just another little tramp like the rest of us, wiggling at a dime a throw. She shook her fist at the saxophone blaring its summons outside. “Coming, damn you, coming!” she growled.

Faith went up to where the man stood waiting with that carnation in his lapel and gave him a happy smile and said: “I’m ready.” Strangely enough she wasn’t tired any more, even though she’d danced miles already tonight. He offered her his arm, the way a sweetheart should, a lover should, and side by side they went down the stairs. He and Faith — Faith of the appropriate name, who had always believed a night like this would come, when there would be someone waiting to take her home, someone special, someone she could look up to and respect, admire and adore. Oh, this was the way to go home all right! The snakes were all coiled up at the door as usual, but tonight she passed through them unscathed, unafraid, head in air. No winks, no leers tonight, no wise remarks, no clutching hands to buck, no one to follow her and try to find out where she lived. She could feel their stares following her as she walked along beside him, could almost but not quite catch what they were saying to one another in whispered undertones. Maybe it would have been better if she had heard, but she didn’t know that.

She wouldn’t have listened anyway, any more than she had to Trixie.