Writing|O? Henry
Mr. Tolles Chandler was ironing his tuxedo in his bedroom, partitioned off from the hallway. One iron burns on a small gas burner, the other is held in his hand and pushed back and forth vigorously to press a pleat that will be seen later in two straight lines from Mr. Chandler's patent-leather shoes to the hem of his low-collar shawl. This is all we can learn about the grooming of this leading man. The rest is left to the speculations of those who, being both down and out and preoccupied with grandeur, are obliged to think of shabby workarounds. When we see him again, he's all dressed up, meticulously, serenely, graciously, and dashingly down the steps of his boardinghouse -- as the typical New York gentry does, with a slightly bored look, out to seek an evening's diversion.
Chandler's fee was eighteen dollars a week. He worked in the office of an architect. He was only twenty-two years old; he believed that architecture was a true art; and did believe--though dared not say so in New York--that the design of the steel-and-concrete Flat Irving Building was inferior to that of the Milan Cathedral.
Chandler set aside a dollar from each week's income. After rounding up ten weeks, he uses this accumulated extra money to buy a gentlemanly rowdy night out in the cheap goods department of the miserly Time Lord. He dresses himself up as a millionaire or a general manager and makes one trip to a place where life is very splendid and glorious, and there he has an exquisite and luxurious dinner. A man with ten dollars can weekly act as a wealthy, idle class for a few hours. It is enough to cover a carefully considered meal, a decent bottle of wine, a proper tab, a cigar, car fare, and general incidentals.
Capturing one pleasant evening out of every seventy dreary ones is, for Chandler, a source of happiness that will last through the ages. Famous ladies make their first foray into society only once in their lives, when they first come of age; and even in their gray hairs, they still think of the glamor of that first time as the only thing worth remembering. But for Chandler the joy of every tenth week was still as intense, exciting, and fresh as the first. What was a young girl's first dance and short-sleeved muslin dress compared to sitting in a palm-covered, musical setting with people who cared about food and drink, looking out at the regular patrons of such a paradise on earth, while making themselves the objects of their gaze?
Chandler walked down Broadway as if he had joined an evening parade in formal dress. Tonight, he was not only a spectator, but a figure for viewing. For the next sixty-nine nights, he would wear tweed pants and a woolen sweater, eat a guest dinner at a crappy diner or a quick meal at a small food stand, or nibble on sandwiches and drink beer in his bedroom. He was willing to do this because he was a true son of the big city where the nights were metropolitan. For him, one night out in the limelight was enough to make up for many a bleak day.
Chandler slowed his pace until he reached the point where Forty-oddth Street began to join the gleamingly lit Pleasant Street. It was still early, and the man who spent only one day in fashionable society every seventy days always loved to prolong his joy. Eyes of all kinds, bright, sinister, curious, envious, provocative and charming, were cast upon him, for his dress and bearing suggested that he was a believer in the importance of timely pleasures.
He stood still on a corner, calculating in his mind whether or not to turn back to the luxurious and fashionable diner he tended to tend on particularly profligate evenings. At that moment, a girl ran briskly across the corner, slipped on a patch of frozen snow, and fell to the sidewalk with a thud.
Chandler rushed to help her up with concern and courtesy. The girl limped toward a house, leaned against a wall, and thanked him demurely.
"I probably sprained my ankle." She said. "Cracked it when I fell."
"Does it hurt much?" Chandler asked.
"It only hurts when I land on it. I think I'll be able to walk after a little while."
"If there's anything else I can do to help," the young man suggested, "like hiring a car, or-"
"Thank you." The girl whispered pleadingly. "You mustn't bother. I only blame myself for being careless. I can't blame my heels for my shoes being any more practical."
Chandler surveyed the girl for a moment, and found himself quickly taken with her. She had a skilful beauty; her glance was pleasant and kindly. She wore a plain black dress, like that of the average shopgirl. Her glossy dark-brown curls showed under her cheap black straw hat, which was ornamented with nothing but a bow of velvet ribbon. She could well have been the finest example of the self-supporting working woman.
A thought occurred to the young architect. He would ask this girl to go to dinner with him. His periodic feats were painful, but they were always draining in the absence of one element; now that element was at hand. If he could have the company of an educated young lady, his short-lived grandeur would be redoubled. He was sure that the girl was cultured-her manner and conversation showed it. Despite her plain dress, Chandler found it pleasant to dine with her.
These thoughts flew through his mind and he decided to invite her. True, it was not very polite, but working women tended to be informal in such matters. They were generally shrewd when it came to judging men; and valued their ability to do so above the weight of frivolous customs. His ten dollars, if properly used, would have been enough for a good meal for both of them. No doubt the meal would have been an unexpected experience in the girl's dull, stereotyped life; and her deep gratitude for it would have added to his complacency and pleasure.
"I think," he said to her, frankly and solemnly, "that your foot has needed rest longer than you think. Now I'm going to propose a two-fold solution, where you can give it a rest and reward me at the same time. When you ran around the corner and fell just now, I was on my way to dinner alone. Why don't you come with me, and let's have a comfortable meal and a pleasant chat. After dinner, I think your sprained ankle will be up to the task of happily taking you home."
The girl looked up quickly at Chandler's clear, kindly face. Her eyes flashed very brightly and she smiled innocently.
"But we don't know each other - that's not very nice, is it?" She said hesitantly.
"There's nothing wrong with it." The young man said bluntly. "Allow me to introduce myself - Thors Chandler. I shall make our meal as satisfactory as possible, and afterward I will part with you and bid you farewell, or accompany you home, as you like."
"Ouch!" The girl said, glancing toward Chandler's immaculate clothes, "Do I go to dinner in these old clothes and this old hat!"
"What does that matter." Chandler said briskly. "I daresay you're going to be more genteel dressed just like that than anyone we'll see in the most elaborate party dress."
"My ankle does still hurt." The girl tried a step and admitted. "I think I would like to accept your invitation, Mr. Chandler. You may as well call me - Miss Marianne."
"Come on then, Miss Marian," said the young architect, exuberantly yet very politely, "you won't have to walk very far. There's a very nice restaurant just a block away. I'm afraid you'll have to take my arm--that's right--and walk slowly. It's so boring to eat alone. You kind of made me whole when you slipped on the ice."
The two of them were seated at a well-set table, with an able waiter attentive nearby. It was at this point that Chandler began to feel the true pleasure that his regular outings had always brought him.
The restaurant was not quite as ornate and expansive as the one he had always liked, a little further down Broadway, but it was not far off. It was full of well-dressed patrons, and there was a good band, playing music soft enough to make conversation a pleasure; besides, the cooking and hospitality were beyond reproach. His companion, though not very well dressed, had a charm of her own, which set off the natural femininity of her features and figure in a most remarkable manner. It is safe to say that a look of something approaching adoration passed over her own pretty face as she gazed at Chandler's angry and composed manner, his burning and frank blue eyes.
Then the madness of Manhattan, the riot of mediocrity and complacency, the bacillus of braggadocio, the epidemic of pretense infected Toles Chandler. At this moment he was on the Broadway road, surrounded by bustle, not to mention many eyes watching him. On that comedy stage he assumed that his role that night would be that of a fashionable fop and a wealthy and interesting member of the leisure class. He had put on the costume of this character and had to perform; all the guardian angels could not stop him.
So he began to tell Miss Marianne about the clubs, the tea parties, the golf, the horseback riding, the hunting, the ballroom dancing, the trips abroad, and so on, all the while making vague references to a private yacht moored in the mouth of Larchmont Harbor. He found this uninvolved conversation so y moving that he enhanced the performance by making up a few more words alluding to great wealth and intimately suggesting a few names that gave the proletariat a headache. This was Chandler's brief but rare opportunity, and he seized the moment to milk it for as much fun as he could. His self-absorption cast a web of fog between him and everything, and yet once or twice he saw the girl's innocence shining through it.
"This way of life you speak of," she said, "how empty and meaningless it sounds. Is there no other work you can do in the world that interests you more?"
"My dear Miss Marianne," he yelled, "work! Just think of it, changing gowns every day for dinner, walking five or six strings of houses in an afternoon--with a policeman watching you on every street corner, who jumps in and takes you to the police station as soon as your automobile drives a little faster than a donkey-cart. Idlers like us are the hardest working people in the world."
Dinner over, and having graciously dismissed the waiter, the two of them came around the corner where they had just met. By this time, Miss Marianne was walking well enough to see no inconvenience in her gait.
"Thank you for your hospitality," she said sincerely, "Now I must hurry home. I have greatly appreciated this meal, Mr. Chandler."
He smiled graciously and shook her hand goodbye, mentioning that he had another bridge play at the club. He glanced toward her back for a moment and darted east before hiring a carriage and taking his time getting home.
In his chilly bedroom, Chandler stowed away his evening gown to rest for sixty-nine days. He did so contemplatively.
"An amazing girl." He said to himself. "Even if she had to work for a living, I'd wager that she's far enough. If I hadn't blabbed like that and told her the truth, we might have - but, screw it! I've got to match what I say with my clothes."
These were the words of a warrior who had grown up in the huts of a Manhattan tribe.
The girl parted from the man who had invited her to dinner and walked swiftly through the city to a beautiful and peaceful mansion. The mansion was two squares away from the eastern district, facing the road where the god of wealth and the rest of the secondary gods frequented. She hurried inside and ran upstairs to a room where a young, beautiful woman in elegant civilian clothes was looking anxiously out the window.
"Yo, you crazy girl," the woman, slightly older than her, yelled as she entered. "When are you going to change when you keep scaring us like that? It's been two hours since you've been running around in that raggedy old dress and Mary's hat. Mom was terrified. She ordered Louis to take the automobile to look for you. You're a bad girl with no brains."
The older girl pressed the electric button and immediately an envoy came.
"Mary, tell the missus that Miss Marianne has returned."
"Don't send me wrong, sister. I merely made a trip to Mrs. Theo's store to inform her not to have pink inlays, but fuchsia ones. My old suit and Mary's bonnet fitted well. I'm sure anyone thought I was a shopgirl."
"Honey, dinner's already on and you've been out too long."
"I know, I slipped on the sidewalk and sprained my ankle. I couldn't walk, so I went to a diner to sit down and wait until I was better before I came back, that's why it took so long."
The two girls sat in front of the window, looking out at the street with its lights and traffic. The younger one nestled her head in her sister's lap.
"We'll both have to get married someday," she said imaginatively, "We're rich like this, and society is looking at us, we can't afford to let everyone down. Shall I tell you which one I would fall in love with, sister?"
"Tell me, you silly girl." The other smiled.
"I would fall in love with a man with kind, dark blue eyes, who is considerate and respectful of poor girls, and who is pretty, and kind, and doesn't show off. But he always has to live with an ambition, a goal, a job to do, for me to love him. I don't care how poor he is as long as I can help him build a business. But, my dear sister, we are always running into that sort of man-that sort of man who goes about mediocrely in societies and clubs-and I can't fall in love with that sort of man, even if his eyes are blue, and even if he is so amiable to the poor girls he meets in the street. "