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<h2 id="id01071" style="margin-top: 4em">CHAPTER XXVII</h2> For two weeks Etta Blake refused to come to Mrs. Mundy's, refused to see the latter when she went to see her, to see me when I went; but yesterday she came to both of us. Ten days ago Harrie was taken to Selwyn's home and is now practically well. Mr. Guard tells me he is going away; going West. I have seen Selwyn but twice since he learned where Harrie was found, and then not alone. Both times some one was here and he stayed but a short while. He has bitten dust of late and even with me he is incased in a reserve that is impenetrable. There has been no chance to mention Harrie's name had he wished to do so. I do not know that he will ever mention it again. Selwyn is the sort of person who rarely speaks of painful or disgraceful things. I was in my sitting-room when Mrs. Mundy came up with Etta. As the latter stood in the doorway prayer sprang in my heart that I would not shrink, but the heritage of the ages was upon me, and for a half-minute I could only think of her as one is taught to think—as a depraved, polluted creature, hardly human, and then I saw she was a suffering, sinful child, and I took her hands in mine and led her to the fire. To see clearly, see without confusion, and with no blinding of sentimental sympathy, but as woman should see woman, I had been trying to face life frankly for some months past; yet when I saw Etta I realized I had gone but a little way on the long and lonely road awaiting if I were to do my part. And then I remembered Harrie. He had gone back to the proudest, haughtiest home in town; and Etta—where could Etta go? Hatless, and in a shabby dress, with her short, dark, curly hair parted on the side, she looked even younger than when I had first seen her, but about her twisting mouth were lines that hardened it, and in her opalescent eyes, which now shot flame and fire and now paled with weariness, I saw that which made me know in bitter knowledge she was old and could never again be young. Youth and its rights for her were gone beyond returning. She would not sit down; grew rigid when I tried to make her. "You want to see me?" She looked from me to Mrs. Mundy and back again to me. "What do you want to see me about? Why did you want me to come here?" "We want to talk to you, to see what is best for you to do." I spoke haltingly. It was difficult to speak at all with her eyes upon me. They were strange eyes for a girl of eighteen. "Best for me to do?" She laughed witheringly and turned from the fire, her hands twisting in nervous movements. "There are only two things ahead of me. Death—or worse. Which would you advise me—to do?" Without waiting for answer the slight shoulders straightened and went back. Scorn, hate, bitterness were in her unconscious pose, and from her eyes came fire. "If you sent for me to preach you can quit before you start. There ain't anything you can do for me. I'm done for. What do people like you care what becomes of girls like us? Maybe we send ourselves to hell, but you see to it that we stay there. You're good at your job all right. I hate you—you good women! Hate you!" I heard Mrs. Mundy's indrawn breath, saw her quick glance of shock and distress, then I went over to Etta. She was trembling with hot emotion long repressed, and, as one at bay, she drew back, reckless, defiant, and breathing unsteadily. "I do not wonder that you hate us. I am sorry—so sorry for you, Etta." For a full minute she stared at me as if she had not heard aright and the dull color in her face deepened into crimson, then with a spring she was at the door, her face buried in her arms. Leaning heavily against it, she made convulsive effort to keep back sound. "Sorry—oh, my God!" In a heap she crumpled on the floor, her face still hidden in her hands. "I did not know—in all the world—anybody was sorry. You can't be sorry—I'm a—" I motioned Mrs. Mundy to go out. "Leave her with me," I said. "Come back presently, but leave her awhile with me." Going over to the window, I stood beside it until the choking sobs grew fainter and fainter, and then, turning away, I drew two chairs close to the fire and told Etta to come and sit by me. For a while neither of us spoke, and when at last she tried to speak it was difficult to hear her. "I didn't mean to let go like that. I wouldn't have done it if you hadn't said—you were sorry. You've no cause to be sorry for me. I'm not worth it. I was crazy—to care as I cared. I ought to have known gentlemen like him don't marry girls like me, but I didn't have the strength to—to make him leave me, or to go away myself. And then one day he told me it had to be a choice between him and the baby. He seemed to hate the sight of the baby. He said I must send it away." Swaying slightly, she caught herself against the side of the table close to her, and again I waited. "She's a delicate little thing, and I couldn't put her in a place where I didn't know how they'd treat her. He told me it had to be one or the other—and I'd rather he'd killed me than made me say which one. But I couldn't give the baby up. She needed me." "And then—" My voice, too, was low. "He got mad and went away. I thought I hated him, but I can't hate him. I've tried and I can't. When he came back and found where I was living—" A long, low shiver came from the twisting lips. "About five weeks ago I moved to where he was taken sick. And now—now he has gone home again and I—" She got up as if the torment of her soul made it impossible for her to sit still, and again she faced me. "It doesn't matter what becomes of me. What do rich people and good people and people who could change things care about us? And neither do they care what we think of them, and specially of good women. Do you suppose we think you really believe in the Christ who did not stone us? We don't. We laugh at most Christians, spit at them. We know you don't believe in Him or you'd remember what He said." She turned sharply. Mrs. Mundy with Kitty behind her was at the door. The latter hesitated, and, seeing it, Etta nodded to her. "Come in. I won't hurt you. You need not be afraid." Speaking first to Etta, Kitty kissed me, and I saw she had come up-stairs because she, too, was wondering if there was something she could do. Kitty is no longer the child she once was. She is going, some day, to be a brave and big and splendid woman. At the window she sat down, and as though she were not in the room Etta turned toward me. "You said just now you wanted to help. Wanting won't do that!" She snapped her fingers. "You've got to stop wanting and will to do something. Men laugh at the laws men make, but we don't blame men like we blame women who let their men be bad and then smile on them, marry them, and pretend they do not know. They do not want to know. If you made men pay the price you make us pay, the world would be a safer place to live in. Men don't do what women won't stand for." Kitty leaned forward, and Etta, with twisting hands, looked at her and then at Mrs. Mundy and then at me, and in her eyes was piteous appeal. "There's no chance for me, but I've got a little baby girl. What's going to become of her? In God's name, can't you do something to make good women understand? Make them know the awfulness—awfulness—" Again the room grew still and presently, with dragging steps, Etta turned toward the door. Quickly I followed her. She must not go. I had said nothing, gotten nowhere, and there was much that must be said that something might be done. To have her leave without some plan to work toward would be loss of time. She was but one of thousands of bits of human wreckage, in danger herself and of danger to others, and somebody must do something for her. I put my hand on her shoulder to draw her back and as I did so the door, half ajar, opened more widely. Motionless, and as one transfixed, she stared at it wide-eyed, and into her face crept the pallor of death. Selwyn and Harrie were standing in the doorway. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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