Sister Carrie, by Theodore Dreiser

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"I'd like to for a week or so, if you don't mind," ventured
Carrie.

"Could you pay two dollars?" asked Minnie.

Carrie readily acquiesced, glad to escape the trying situation,
and liberal now that she saw a way out. She was elated and began
figuring at once. She needed a hat first of all. How Minnie
explained to Hanson she never knew. He said nothing at all, but
there were thoughts in the air which left disagreeable
impressions.

The new arrangement might have worked if sickness had not
intervened. It blew up cold after a rain one afternoon when
Carrie was still without a jacket. She came out of the warm shop
at six and shivered as the wind struck her. In the morning she
was sneezing, and going down town made it worse. That day her
bones ached and she felt light-headed. Towards evening she felt
very ill, and when she reached home was not hungry. Minnie
noticed her drooping actions and asked her about herself.

"I don't know," said Carrie. "I feel real bad."

She hung about the stove, suffered a chattering chill, and went
to bed sick. The next morning she was thoroughly feverish.

Minnie was truly distressed at this, but maintained a kindly
demeanour. Hanson said perhaps she had better go back home for a
while. When she got up after three days, it was taken for
granted that her position was lost. The winter was near at hand,
she had no clothes, and now she was out of work.

"I don't know," said Carrie; "I'll go down Monday and see if I
can't get something."

If anything, her efforts were more poorly rewarded on this trial
than the last. Her clothes were nothing suitable for fall
wearing. Her last money she had spent for a hat. For three days
she wandered about, utterly dispirited. The attitude of the flat
was fast becoming unbearable. She hated to think of going back
there each evening. Hanson was so cold. She knew it could not
last much longer. Shortly she would have to give up and go home.

On the fourth day she was down town all day, having borrowed ten
cents for lunch from Minnie. She had applied in the cheapest
kind of places without success. She even answered for a waitress
in a small restaurant where she saw a card in the window, but
they wanted an experienced girl. She moved through the thick
throng of strangers, utterly subdued in spirit. Suddenly a hand
pulled her arm and turned her about.

"Well, well!" said a voice. In the first glance she beheld
Drouet. He was not only rosy-cheeked, but radiant. He was the
essence of sunshine and good-humour. "Why, how are you, Carrie?"
he said. "You're a daisy. Where have you been?"

Carrie smiled under his irresistible flood of geniality.

"I've been out home," she said.

"Well," he said, "I saw you across the street there. I thought it
was you. I was just coming out to your place. How are you,
anyhow?"

"I'm all right," said Carrie, smiling.

Drouet looked her over and saw something different.

"Well," he said, "I want to talk to you. You're not going
anywhere in particular, are you?"

"Not just now," said Carrie.

"Let's go up here and have something to eat. George! but I'm
glad to see you again."

She felt so relieved in his radiant presence, so much looked
after and cared for, that she assented gladly, though with the
slightest air of holding back.

"Well," he said, as he took her arm--and there was an exuberance
of good-fellowship in the word which fairly warmed the cockles of
her heart.

They went through Monroe Street to the old Windsor dining-room,
which was then a large, comfortable place, with an excellent
cuisine and substantial service. Drouet selected a table close by
the window, where the busy rout of the street could be seen. He
loved the changing panorama of the street--to see and be seen as
he dined.

"Now," he said, getting Carrie and himself comfortably settled,
"what will you have?"

Carrie looked over the large bill of fare which the waiter handed
her without really considering it. She was very hungry, and the
things she saw there awakened her desires, but the high prices
held her attention. "Half broiled spring chicken--seventy-five.
Sirloin steak with mushrooms--one twenty-five." She had dimly
heard of these things, but it seemed strange to be called to
order from the list.

"I'll fix this," exclaimed Drouet. "Sst! waiter."

That officer of the board, a full-chested, round-faced negro,
approached, and inclined his ear.

"Sirloin with mushrooms," said Drouet. "Stuffed tomatoes."

"Yassah," assented the negro, nodding his head.

"Hashed brown potatoes."

"Yassah."

"Asparagus."

"Yassah."

"And a pot of coffee."

Drouet turned to Carrie. "I haven't had a thing since breakfast.
Just got in from Rock Island. I was going off to dine when I saw
you."

Carrie smiled and smiled.

"What have you been doing?" he went on. "Tell me all about
yourself. How is your sister?"

"She's well," returned Carrie, answering the last query.

He looked at her hard.

"Say," he said, "you haven't been sick, have you?"

Carrie nodded.

"Well, now, that's a blooming shame, isn't it? You don't look
very well. I thought you looked a little pale. What have you
been doing?"

"Working," said Carrie.

"You don't say so! At what?"

She told him.

"Rhodes, Morgenthau and Scott--why, I know that house. over here
on Fifth Avenue, isn't it? They're a close-fisted concern. What
made you go there?"

"I couldn't get anything else," said Carrie frankly.

"Well, that's an outrage," said Drouet. "You oughtn't to be
working for those people. Have the factory right back of the
store, don't they?"

"Yes," said Carrie.

"That isn't a good house," said Drouet. "You don't want to work
at anything like that, anyhow."

He chatted on at a great rate, asking questions, explaining
things about himself, telling her what a good restaurant it was,
until the waiter returned with an immense tray, bearing the hot
savoury dishes which had been ordered. Drouet fairly shone in
the matter of serving. He appeared to great advantage behind the
white napery and silver platters of the table and displaying his
arms with a knife and fork. As he cut the meat his rings almost
spoke. His new suit creaked as he stretched to reach the plates,
break the bread, and pour the coffee. He helped Carrie to a
rousing plateful and contributed the warmth of his spirit to her
body until she was a new girl. He was a splendid fellow in the
true popular understanding of the term, and captivated Carrie
completely.

That little soldier of fortune took her good turn in an easy way.
She felt a little out of place, but the great room soothed her
and the view of the well-dressed throng outside seemed a splendid
thing. Ah, what was it not to have money! What a thing it was
to be able to come in here and dine! Drouet must be fortunate.
He rode on trains, dressed in such nice clothes, was so strong,
and ate in these fine places. He seemed quite a figure of a man,
and she wondered at his friendship and regard for her.

"So you lost your place because you got sick, eh?" he said.
"What are you going to do now?"

"Look around," she said, a thought of the need that hung outside
this fine restaurant like a hungry dog at her heels passing into
her eyes.

"Oh, no," said Drouet, "that won't do. How long have you been
looking?"

"Four days," she answered.

"Think of that!" he said, addressing some problematical
individual. "You oughtn't to be doing anything like that. These
girls," and he waved an inclusion of all shop and factory girls,
"don't get anything. Why, you can't live on it, can you?"

He was a brotherly sort of creature in his demeanour. When he had
scouted the idea of that kind of toil, he took another tack.
Carrie was really very pretty. Even then, in her commonplace
garb, her figure was evidently not bad, and her eyes were large
and gentle. Drouet looked at her and his thoughts reached home.
She felt his admiration. It was powerfully backed by his
liberality and good-humour. She felt that she liked him--that
she could continue to like him ever so much. There was something
even richer than that, running as a hidden strain, in her mind.
Every little while her eyes would meet his, and by that means the
interchanging current of feeling would be fully connected.

"Why don't you stay down town and go to the theatre with me?" he
said, hitching his chair closer. The table was not very wide.

"Oh, I can't," she said.

"What are you going to do to-night?"

"Nothing," she answered, a little drearily.

"You don't like out there where you are, do you?"

"Oh, I don't know."

"What are you going to do if you don't get work?"

"Go back home, I guess."

There was the least quaver in her voice as she said this.
Somehow, the influence he was exerting was powerful. They came
to an understanding of each other without words--he of her
situation, she of the fact that he realised it.
"No," he said, "you can't make it!" genuine sympathy filling his
mind for the time. "Let me help you. You take some of my
money."

"Oh, no!" she said, leaning back.

"What are you going to do?" he said.

She sat meditating, merely shaking her head.

He looked at her quite tenderly for his kind. There were some
loose bills in his vest pocket--greenbacks. They were soft and
noiseless, and he got his fingers about them and crumpled them up
in his hand.

"Come on," he said, "I'll see you through all right. Get yourself
some clothes."

It was the first reference he had made to that subject, and now
she realised how bad off she was. In his crude way he had struck
the key-note. Her lips trembled a little.

She had her hand out on the table before her. They were quite
alone in their corner, and he put his larger, warmer hand over
it.

"Aw, come, Carrie," he said, "what can you do alone? Let me help
you."

He pressed her hand gently and she tried to withdraw it. At this
he held it fast, and she no longer protested. Then he slipped
the greenbacks he had into her palm, and when she began to
protest, he whispered:

"I'll loan it to you--that's all right. I'll loan it to you."

He made her take it. She felt bound to him by a strange tie of
affection now. They went out, and he walked with her far out
south toward Polk Street, talking.

"You don't want to live with those people?" he said in one place,
abstractedly. Carrie heard it, but it made only a slight
impression.

"Come down and meet me to morrow," he said, "and we'll go to the
matinee. Will you?"

Carrie protested a while, but acquiesced.

"You're not doing anything. Get yourself a nice pair of shoes
and a jacket."

She scarcely gave a thought to the complication which would
trouble her when he was gone. In his presence, she was of his
own hopeful, easy-way-out mood.

"Don't you bother about those people out there," he said at
parting. "I'll help you."

Carrie left him, feeling as though a great arm had slipped out
before her to draw off trouble. The money she had accepted was
two soft, green, handsome ten-dollar bills.

Chapter VII

THE LURE OF THE MATERIAL--BEAUTY SPEAKS FOR ITSELF

The true meaning of money yet remains to be popularly explained
and comprehended. When each individual realises for himself that
this thing primarily stands for and should only be accepted as a
moral due--that it should be paid out as honestly stored energy,
and not as a usurped privilege--many of our social, religious,
and political troubles will have permanently passed. As for
Carrie, her understanding of the moral significance of money was
the popular understanding, nothing more. The old definition:
"Money: something everybody else has and I must get," would have
expressed her understanding of it thoroughly. Some of it she now
held in her hand--two soft, green ten-dollar bills--and she felt
that she was immensely better off for the having of them. It was
something that was power in itself. One of her order of mind
would have been content to be cast away upon a desert island with
a bundle of money, and only the long strain of starvation would
have taught her that in some cases it could have no value. Even
then she would have had no conception of the relative value of
the thing; her one thought would, undoubtedly, have concerned the
pity of having so much power and the inability to use it.

The poor girl thrilled as she walked away from Drouet. She felt
ashamed in part because she had been weak enough to take it, but
her need was so dire, she was still glad. Now she would have a
nice new jacket! Now she would buy a nice pair of pretty button
shoes. She would get stockings, too, and a skirt, and, and--
until already, as in the matter of her prospective salary, she
had got beyond, in her desires, twice the purchasing power of her
bills.

She conceived a true estimate of Drouet. To her, and indeed to
all the world, he was a nice, good-hearted man. There was
nothing evil in the fellow. He gave her the money out of a good
heart--out of a realisation of her want. He would not have given
the same amount to a poor young man, but we must not forget that
a poor young man could not, in the nature of things, have
appealed to him like a poor young girl. Femininity affected his
feelings. He was the creature of an inborn desire. Yet no
beggar could have caught his eye and said, "My God, mister, I'm
starving," but he would gladly have handed out what was
considered the proper portion to give beggars and thought no more
about it. There would have been no speculation, no
philosophising. He had no mental process in him worthy the
dignity of either of those terms. In his good clothes and fine
health, he was a merry, unthinking moth of the lamp. Deprived of
his position, and struck by a few of the involved and baffling
forces which sometimes play upon man, he would have been as
helpless as Carrie--as helpless, as non-understanding, as
pitiable, if you will, as she.

Now, in regard to his pursuit of women, he meant them no harm,
because he did not conceive of the relation which he hoped to
hold with them as being harmful. He loved to make advances to
women, to have them succumb to his charms, not because he was a
cold-blooded, dark, scheming villain, but because his inborn
desire urged him to that as a chief delight. He was vain, he was
boastful, he was as deluded by fine clothes as any silly-headed
girl. A truly deep-dyed villain could have hornswaggled him as
readily as he could have flattered a pretty shop-girl. His fine
success as a salesman lay in his geniality and the thoroughly
reputable standing of his house. He bobbed about among men, a
veritable bundle of enthusiasm--no power worthy the name of
intellect, no thoughts worthy the adjective noble, no feelings
long continued in one strain. A Madame Sappho would have called
him a pig; a Shakespeare would have said "my merry child"; old,
drinking Caryoe thought him a clever, successful businessman. In
short, he was as good as his intellect conceived.

The best proof that there was something open and commendable
about the man was the fact that Carrie took the money. No deep,
sinister soul with ulterior motives could have given her fifteen
cents under the guise of friendship. The unintellectual are not
so helpless. Nature has taught the beasts of the field to fly
when some unheralded danger threatens. She has put into the
small, unwise head of the chipmunk the untutored fear of poisons.
"He keepeth His creatures whole," was not written of beasts
alone. Carrie was unwise, and, therefore, like the sheep in its
unwisdom, strong in feeling. The instinct of self-protection,
strong in all such natures, was roused but feebly, if at all, by
the overtures of Drouet.

When Carrie had gone, he felicitated himself upon her good
opinion. By George, it was a shame young girls had to be knocked
around like that. Cold weather coming on and no clothes. Tough.
He would go around to Fitzgerald and Moy's and get a cigar. It
made him feel light of foot as he thought about her.

Carrie reached home in high good spirits, which she could
scarcely conceal. The possession of the money involved a number
of points which perplexed her seriously. How should she buy any
clothes when Minnie knew that she had no money? She had no
sooner entered the flat than this point was settled for her. It
could not be done. She could think of no way of explaining.

"How did you come out?" asked Minnie, referring to the day.

Carrie had none of the small deception which could feel one thing
and say something directly opposed. She would prevaricate, but
it would be in the line of her feelings at least. So instead of
complaining when she felt so good, she said:

"I have the promise of something."

"Where?"

"At the Boston Store."

"Is it sure promised?" questioned Minnie.

"Well, I'm to find out to-morrow," returned Carrie disliking to
draw out a lie any longer than was necessary.

Minnie felt the atmosphere of good feeling which Carrie brought
with her. She felt now was the time to express to Carrie the
state of Hanson's feeling about her entire Chicago venture.

"If you shouldn't get it--" she paused, troubled for an easy way.

"If I don't get something pretty soon, I think I'll go home."

Minnie saw her chance.

"Sven thinks it might be best for the winter, anyhow."

The situation flashed on Carrie at once. They were unwilling to
keep her any longer, out of work. She did not blame Minnie, she
did not blame Hanson very much. Now, as she sat there digesting
the remark, she was glad she had Drouet's money.
"Yes," she said after a few moments, "I thought of doing that."

She did not explain that the thought, however, had aroused all
the antagonism of her nature. Columbia City, what was there for
her? She knew its dull, little round by heart. Here was the
great, mysterious city which was still a magnet for her. What
she had seen only suggested its possibilities. Now to turn back
on it and live the little old life out there--she almost
exclaimed against the thought.

She had reached home early and went in the front room to think.
What could she do? She could not buy new shoes and wear them
here. She would need to save part of the twenty to pay her fare
home. She did not want to borrow of Minnie for that. And yet,
how could she explain where she even got that money? If she
could only get enough to let her out easy.

She went over the tangle again and again. Here, in the morning,
Drouet would expect to see her in a new jacket, and that couldn't
be. The Hansons expected her to go home, and she wanted to get
away, and yet she did not want to go home. In the light of the
way they would look on her getting money without work, the taking
of it now seemed dreadful. She began to be ashamed. The whole
situation depressed her. It was all so clear when she was with
Drouet. Now it was all so tangled, so hopeless--much worse than
it was before, because she had the semblance of aid in her hand
which she could not use.

Her spirits sank so that at supper Minnie felt that she must have
had another hard day. Carrie finally decided that she would give
the money back. It was wrong to take it. She would go down in
the morning and hunt for work. At noon she would meet Drouet as
agreed and tell him. At this decision her heart sank, until she
was the old Carrie of distress.

Curiously, she could not hold the money in her hand without
feeling some relief. Even after all her depressing conclusions,
she could sweep away all thought about the matter and then the
twenty dollars seemed a wonderful and delightful thing. Ah,
money, money, money! What a thing it was to have. How plenty of
it would clear away all these troubles.

In the morning she got up and started out a little early. Her
decision to hunt for work was moderately strong, but the money in
her pocket, after all her troubling over it, made the work
question the least shade less terrible. She walked into the
wholesale district, but as the thought of applying came with each
passing concern, her heart shrank. What a coward she was, she
thought to herself. Yet she had applied so often. It would be
the same old story. She walked on and on, and finally did go
into one place, with the old result. She came out feeling that
luck was against her. It was no use.

Without much thinking, she reached Dearborn Street. Here was the
great Fair store with its multitude of delivery wagons about its
long window display, its crowd of shoppers. It readily changed
her thoughts, she who was so weary of them. It was here that she
had intended to come and get her new things. Now for relief from
distress; she thought she would go in and see. She would look at
the jackets.

There is nothing in this world more delightful than that middle
state in which we mentally balance at times, possessed of the
means, lured by desire, and yet deterred by conscience or want of
decision. When Carrie began wandering around the store amid the
fine displays she was in this mood. Her original experience in
this same place had given her a high opinion of its merits. Now
she paused at each individual bit of finery, where before she had
hurried on. Her woman's heart was warm with desire for them.
How would she look in this, how charming that would make her!
She came upon the corset counter and paused in rich reverie as
she noted the dainty concoctions of colour and lace there
displayed. If she would only make up her mind, she could have
one of those now. She lingered in the jewelry department. She
saw the earrings, the bracelets, the pins, the chains. What
would she not have given if she could have had them all! She
would look fine too, if only she had some of these things.

The jackets were the greatest attraction. When she entered the
store, she already had her heart fixed upon the peculiar little
tan jacket with large mother-of-pearl buttons which was all the
rage that fall. Still she delighted to convince herself that
there was nothing she would like better. She went about among
the glass cases and racks where these things were displayed, and
satisfied herself that the one she thought of was the proper one.
All the time she wavered in mind, now persuading herself that she
could buy it right away if she chose, now recalling to herself
the actual condition. At last the noon hour was dangerously
near, and she had done nothing. She must go now and return the
money.

Drouet was on the corner when she came up.

"Hello," he said, "where is the jacket and"--looking down--"the
shoes?"

Carrie had thought to lead up to her decision in some intelligent
way, but this swept the whole fore-schemed situation by the
board.

"I came to tell you that--that I can't take the money."

"Oh, that's it, is it?" he returned. "Well, you come on with me.
Let's go over here to Partridge's."

Carrie walked with him. Behold, the whole fabric of doubt and
impossibility had slipped from her mind. She could not get at
the points that were so serious, the things she was going to make
plain to him.

"Have you had lunch yet? Of course you haven't. Let's go in
here," and Drouet turned into one of the very nicely furnished
restaurants off State Street, in Monroe.

"I mustn't take the money," said Carrie, after they were settled
in a cosey corner, and Drouet had ordered the lunch. "I can't
wear those things out there. They--they wouldn't know where I got
them."

"What do you want to do," he smiled, "go without them?"

"I think I'll go home," she said, wearily.

"Oh, come," he said, "you've been thinking it over too long.
I'll tell you what you do. You say you can't wear them out
there. Why don't you rent a furnished room and leave them in
that for a week?"

Carrie shook her head. Like all women, she was there to object
and be convinced. It was for him to brush the doubts away and
clear the path if he could.
"Why are you going home?" he asked.

"Oh, I can't get anything here."

They won't keep you?" he remarked, intuitively.

"They can't," said Carrie.

"I'll tell you what you do," he said. "You come with me. I'll
take care of you."

Carrie heard this passively. The peculiar state which she was in
made it sound like the welcome breath of an open door. Drouet
seemed of her own spirit and pleasing. He was clean, handsome,
well-dressed, and sympathetic. His voice was the voice of a
friend.

"What can you do back at Columbia City?" he went on, rousing by
the words in Carrie's mind a picture of the dull world she had
left. "There isn't anything down there. Chicago's the place.
You can get a nice room here and some clothes, and then you can
do something."

Carrie looked out through the window into the busy street. There
it was, the admirable, great city, so fine when you are not poor.
An elegant coach, with a prancing pair of bays, passed by,
carrying in its upholstered depths a young lady.

"What will you have if you go back?" asked Drouet. There was no
subtle undercurrent to the question. He imagined that she would
have nothing at all of the things he thought worth while.

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