Mrs. Gerhardt was no weakling. For a time she took in washing, what little she could get, devoting the intermediate hours to dressing the children, cooking, seeing that they got off to school, mending their clothes, waiting on her husband, and occasionally weeping. Not infrequently she went personally to some new grocer, each time farther and farther away, and starting an account with a little cash, would receive credit, until other grocers warned the philanthropist of his folly. Corn was cheap. Sometimes she would make a kettle of lye hominy, and this would last, with scarcely anything else, for an entire week. Corn-meal also, when made into mush, was better than nothing, and with a little milk, sometimes seemed rich. Potatoes fried was the nearest they ever came to luxurious food, and coffee was a treat. Coal was got by picking it up in buckets and baskets along the maze of tracks in the nearby railroad yard. Wood, by similar journeys to surrounding lumber yards. Thus they lived from day to day, each hour hoping their father would get well and that the glass works would start up. The whole commercial element seemed more or less paralyzed in this district. Gerhardt was facing the approaching winter and felt desperate.
“George,” he would say, when the oldest of those attending school would come home at four o’clock, “we must have some more coal,” and seeing Martha, William and Veronica unwillingly gather up the baskets, would hide his face and wring his hands. When Sebastian, or “Bass,” as his associates had transformed it, would arrive streaked and energetic from the shop at half-past six, he would assume a cheerful air of welcome.
“How are things down there?” he would inquire. “Are they going to put on any more men?”
Bass did not know, and had no faith in its possibility, but he went over the ground with his father and hoped for the best.
“I must get out of this now pretty soon,” was the sturdy Lutheran’s regular comment, and his anxiety found but weak expression in the modest quality of his voice.
To add to all this trouble little Veronica took the measles, and, for a few days, it was thought that she would die. The mother neglected everything else to hover over her and pray for the best. Dr. Ellwanger came every day, out of humane sympathy, and gravely examined the child. The Lutheran minister, Pastor Wundt, called to offer the consolation of the Church. Both of these men brought an atmosphere of grim ecclesiasticism into the house. They were the black-garbed, sanctimonious emissaries of superior forces. Mrs. Gerhardt felt as if she were going to lose her child, and watched sorrowfully by the cot-side. After three days the worst was over, but there was no bread in the house. Sebastian’s wages had been spent for medicine. Only coal was free for the picking, and several times the children had been scared from the railroad yards. Mrs. Gerhardt thought of all the places to which she might apply, and despairingly hit upon the hotel. Her son had often spoken of its beauty, and she was a resourceful woman. Genevieve helped her at home, why not here?
“How much do you charge?” the housekeeper asked her.
Mrs. Gerhardt had not thought this would be left to her, but need emboldened her.
“Would a dollar a day be too much?”
“No,” said the housekeeper. “There is only about three days’ work to do every week. If you would come every afternoon you could do it.”
“Very well,” said the applicant. “Shall we start today?”
“Yes. If you’ll come with me now, I’ll show you where the cleaning things are.”
The hotel into which they were thus summarily introduced, was a rather remarkable specimen for the time and place. Columbus, being the state capital, and having a population of fifty thousand, and a fair passenger traffic, was a good field for the hotel business, and the opportunity had been improved; so at least the Columbus people proudly thought. The structure, five stories in height, and of imposing proportions, stood at one comer of the central public square, where were the capitol building and principal stores, and, naturally, the crowd and hurry of life, which, to those who had never seen anything better, seemed wondrously gay and inspiriting. Large plate-glass windows looked out upon both the main and side streets, through which could be seen many comfortable chairs scattered about for those who cared to occupy them. The lobby was large, and had been recently redecorated. Both floor and wainscot were of white marble, kept shiny by frequent polishing. There was an imposing staircase with hand-rails of walnut and toe strips of brass. An inviting comer was devoted to a news and cigar stand. Where the staircase curved upward the clerk’s desk and offices had been located, all done in hardwood and ornamented by novel gas fixtures. One could see through a door at one end of the lobby to the barber-shop, with its chairs and array of shaving mugs. Outside were usually to be seen two or three buses, arriving or departing in accordance with the movement of the trains.
To this caravansary came the best of the political and social patronage of the state. Several governors had made it their permanent abiding place during their terms of office. The two United States Senators, whenever business called them to Columbus, invariably maintained parlor chambers at the hotel. One of them, Senator Brander, was looked upon by the proprietor as more or less of a permanent resident, because he was not only a natural inhabitant of the city, but an otherwise homeless bachelor. Other and more transient guests were congressmen, state legislators and lobbyists, merchants, professional men, and, after them, the whole raft of indescribables, who, coming and going, make up the glow and stir of this kaleidoscopic world.
Mother and daughter, brought into this realm of brightness, saw only that which was far off and immensely superior. They went about too timid to touch anything, for fear of giving offense. The great red-carpeted hallway, which they were set to sweep, overawed them so that they constantly kept their eyes down and spoke in their lowest tones. When it came to scrubbing the steps, and polishing the brass work of the splendid stairs, both needed to steel themselves, the mother against her timidity, the daughter against her shame at so public an exposure. Wide beneath lay the imposing lobby, and men, lounging, smoking, passing constantly in and out, could see them both.
“Isn’t it fine?” said Genevieve nervously, more to be dulling the sound of her own conscience than anything else.
“Yes,” returned her mother, who, upon her knees, was wringing out her cloth with earnest but clumsy hands.
“It must cost a good deal to live here, don’t you think?”
“Yes,” said her mother. “Don’t forget to rub into these little corners. Look here what you’ve left.”
Jennie, actually reassured by this correction, fell earnestly to her task, and polished vigorously without lifting her eyes.
In this manner they worked carefully downward until about five o’clock, when it was dark outside, and all the lobby was brightly lighted. Now they were very near the bottom of the stairway.
Through the big swinging doors there entered from the chilly world without a tall, distinguished, middle-aged gentleman, whose silk hat and loose military cape-coat marked him at once, among the crowd of general idlers, as some one of importance. His face was of a dark and solemn cast, but broad and sympathetic in its lines, and his bright eyes were heavily shaded with thick, bushy, black eye-brows. He carried a polished walking-stick, evidently more for the pleasure of the thing than anything else. Passing to the desk, he picked up the key that had already been laid out for him, and coming to the staircase, started up.
The middle-aged woman, scrubbing at his feet, he acknowledged by not only walking around her, but by graciously waving his hand, as much as to say, “Don’t move for me.”
The daughter, however, caught his eye by standing up, her troubled glance showing that she feared that she was in his way.
He bowed, smiled pleasantly,