Brickdust Row
Blinker was displeased. A man of less culture and poise and wealthwould have sworn. But Blinker always remembered that he was agentleman--a thing that no gentleman should do. So he merely lookedbored and sardonic while he rode in a hansom to the center ofdisturbance, which was the Broadway office of Lawyer Oldport, whowas agent for the Blinker estate."I don't see," said Blinker, "why I should be always signingconfounded papers. I am packed, and was to have left for the NorthWoods this morning. Now I must wait until to-morrow morning. I hatenight trains. My best razors are, of course, at the bottom of someunidentifiable trunk. It is a plot to drive me to bay rum and amonologueing, thumb-handed barber. Give me a pen that doesn'tscratch. I hate pens that scratch.""Sit down," said double-chinned, gray Lawyer Oldport. "The worst hasnot been told you. Oh, the hardships of the rich! The papers are notyet ready to sign. They will be laid before you to-morrow at eleven.You will miss another day. Twice shall the barber tweak the helplessnose of a Blinker. Be thankful that your sorrows do not embrace ahaircut.""If," said Blinker, rising, "the act did not involve more signing ofpapers I would take my business out of your hands at once. Give me acigar, please.""If," said Lawyer Oldport, "I had cared to see an old friend's songulped down at one mouthful by sharks I would have ordered you totake it away long ago. Now, let's quit fooling, Alexander. Besidesthe grinding task of signing your name some thirty times to-morrow,I must impose upon you the consideration of a matter of business--ofbusiness, and I may say humanity or right. I spoke to you aboutthis five years ago, but you would not listen--you were in a hurryfor a coaching trip, I think. The subject has come up again. Theproperty--""Oh, property!" interrupted Blinker. "Dear Mr. Oldport, Ithink you mentioned to-morrow. Let's have it all at one doseto-morrow--signatures and property and snappy rubber bands and thatsmelly sealing-wax and all. Have luncheon with me? Well, I'll tryto remember to drop in at eleven to-morrow. Morning."The Blinker wealth was in lands, tenements and hereditaments, as thelegal phrase goes. Lawyer Oldport had once taken Alexander in hislittle pulmonary gasoline runabout to see the many buildings androws of buildings that he owned in the city. For Alexander wassole heir. They had amused Blinker very much. The houses looked soincapable of producing the big sums of money that Lawyer Oldportkept piling up in banks for him to spend.In the evening Blinker went to one of his clubs, intending to dine.Nobody was there except some old fogies playing whist who spoke tohim with grave politeness and glared at him with savage contempt.Everybody was out of town. But here he was kept in like a schoolboyto write his name over and over on pieces of paper. His wounds weredeep.Blinker turned his back on the fogies, and said to the club stewardwho had come forward with some nonsense about cold fresh salmon roe:"Symons, I'm going to Coney Island." He said it as one might say:"All's off; I'm going to jump into the river."The joke pleased Symons. He laughed within a sixteenth of a note ofthe audibility permitted by the laws governing employees."Certainly, sir," he tittered. "Of course, sir, I think I can seeyou at Coney, Mr. Blinker."Blinker got a pager and looked up the movements of Sundaysteamboats. Then he found a cab at the first corner and drove to aNorth River pier. He stood in line, as democratic as you or I, andbought a ticket, and was trampled upon and shoved forward until,at last, he found himself on the upper deck of the boat staringbrazenly at a girl who sat alone upon a camp stool. But Blinker didnot intend to be brazen; the girl was so wonderfully good lookingthat he forgot for one minute that he was the prince incog, andbehaved just as he did in society.She was looking at him, too, and not severely. A puff of windthreatened Blinker's straw hat. He caught it warily and settled itagain. The movement gave the effect of a bow. The girl nodded andsmiled, and in another instant he was seated at her side. She wasdressed all in white, she was paler than Blinker imagined milkmaidsand girls of humble stations to be, but she was as tidy as a cherryblossom, and her steady, supremely frank gray eyes looked out fromthe intrepid depths of an unshadowed and untroubled soul."How dare you raise your hat to me?" she asked, with a smile-redeemedseverity."I didn't," Blinker said, but he quickly covered the mistake byextending it to "I didn't know how to keep from it after I saw you.""I do not allow gentlemen to sit by me to whom I have not beenintroduced," she said, with a sudden haughtiness that deceived him.He rose reluctantly, but her clear, teasing laugh brought him downto his chair again."I guess you weren't going far," she declared, with beauty'smagnificent self-confidence."Are you going to Coney Island?" asked Blinker."Me?" She turned upon him wide-open eyes full of bantering surprise."Why, what a question! Can't you see that I'm riding a bicycle inthe park?" Her drollery took the form of impertinence."And I am laying brick on a tall factory chimney," said Blinker."Mayn't we see Coney together? I'm all alone and I've never beenthere before." "It depends," said the girl, "on how nicely youbehave. I'll consider your application until we get there."Blinker took pains to provide against the rejection of hisapplication. He strove to please. To adopt the metaphor of hisnonsensical phrase, he laid brick upon brick on the tall chimney ofhis devoirs until, at length, the structure was stable and complete.The manners of the best society come around finally to simplicity;and as the girl's way was that naturally, they were on a mutualplane of communication from the beginning.He learned that she was twenty, and her name was Florence; that shetrimmed hats in a millinery shop; that she lived in a furnished roomwith her best chum Ella, who was cashier in a shoe store; and thata glass of milk from the bottle on the window-sill and an egg thatboils itself while you twist up your hair makes a breakfast goodenough for any one. Florence laughed when she heard "Blinker.""Well," she said. "It certainly slows that you have imagination. Itgives the 'Smiths' a chance for a little rest, anyhow."They landed at Coney, and were dashed on the crest of a great humanwave of mad pleasure-seekers into the walks and avenues of Fairylandgone into vaudeville.With a curious eye, a critical mind and a fairly withheld judgmentBlinker considered the temples, pagodas and kiosks of popularizeddelights. Hoi polloi trampled, hustled and crowded him. Basketparties bumped him; sticky children tumbled, howling, under hisfeet, candying his clothes. Insolent youths strolling among thebooths with hard-won canes under one arm and easily won girls onthe other, blew defiant smoke from cheap cigars into his face. Thepublicity gentlemen with megaphones, each before his own stupendousattraction, roared like Niagara in his ears. Music of all kinds thatcould be tortured from brass, reed, hide or string, fought in theair to grain space for its vibrations against its competitors. Butwhat held Blinker in awful fascination was the mob, the multitude,the proletariat shrieking, struggling, hurrying, panting, hurlingitself in incontinent frenzy, with unabashed abandon, into theridiculous sham palaces of trumpery and tinsel pleasures, Thevulgarity of it, its brutal overriding of all the tenets ofrepression and taste that were held by his caste, repelled himstrongly.In the midst of his disgust he turned and looked down at Florenceby his side. She was ready with her quick smile and upturned, happyeyes, as bright and clear as the water in trout pools. The eyes weresaying that they had the right to be shining and happy, for wastheir owner not with her (for the present) Man, her Gentleman Friendand holder of the keys to the enchanted city of fun?Blinker did not read her look accurately, but by some miracle hesuddenly saw Coney aright.He no longer saw a mass of vulgarians seeking gross joys. He nowlooked clearly upon a hundred thousand true idealists. Theiroffenses were wiped out. Counterfeit and false though the garishjoys of these spangled temples were, he perceived that deepunder the gilt surface they offered saving and apposite balm andsatisfaction to the restless human heart. Here, at least, was thehusk of Romance, the empty but shining casque of Chivalry, thebreath-catching though safe-guarded dip and flight of Adventure, themagic carpet that transports you to the realms of fairyland, thoughits journey be through but a few poor yards of space. He no longersaw a rabble, but his brothers seeking the ideal. There was no magicof poesy here or of art; but the glamour of their imagination turnedyellow calico into cloth of gold and the megaphones into the silvertrumpets of joy's heralds.Almost humbled, Blinker rolled up the shirt sleeves of his mind andjoined the idealists."You are the lady doctor," he said to Florence. "How shall we goabout doing this jolly conglomeration of fairy tales, incorporated?""We will begin there," said the Princess, pointing to a fun pagodaon the edge of the sea, "and we will take them all in, one by one."They caught the eight o'clock returning boat and sat, filled withpleasant fatigue, against the rail in the bow, listening to theItalians' fiddle and harp. Blinker had thrown off all care. TheNorth Woods seemed to him an uninhabitable wilderness. What a fusshe had made over signing his name--pooh! he could sign it a hundredtimes. And her name was as pretty as she was--"Florence," he said itto himself a great many times.As the boat was nearing its pier in the North River a two-funnelled,drab, foreign-looking sea-going steamer was dropping down toward thebay. The boat turned its nose in toward its slip. The steamer veeredas if to seek midstream, and then yawed, seemed to increase itsspeed and struck the Coney boat on the side near the stern, cuttinginto it with a terrifying shock and crash.While the six hundred passengers on the boat were mostly tumblingabout the decks in a shrieking panic the captain was shouting at thesteamer that it should not back off and leave the rent exposed forthe water to enter. But the steamer tore its way out like a savagesawfish and cleaved its heartless way, full speed ahead.The boat began to sink at its stern, but moved slowly toward theslip. The passengers were a frantic mob, unpleasant to behold.Blinker held Florence tightly until the boat had righted itself.She made no sound or sign of fear. He stood on a camp stool, rippedoff the slats above his head and pulled down a number of the lifepreservers. He began to buckle one around Florence. The rottencanvas split and the fraudulent granulated cork came pouring out ina stream. Florence caught a handful of it and laughed gleefully."It looks like breakfast food," she said. "Take it off. They're nogood."She unbuckled it and threw it on the deck. She made Blinker sit downand sat by his side and put her hand in his. "What'll you bet wedon't reach the pier all right?" she said and began to hum a song.And now the captain moved among the passengers and compelled order.The boat would undoubtedly make her slip, he said, and ordered thewomen and children to the bow, where they could land first. Theboat, very low in the water at the stern, tried gallantly to makehis promise good."Florence," said Blinker, as she held him close by an arm and hand,"I love you.""That's what they all say," she replied, lightly."I am not one of 'they all,'" he persisted. "I never knew any one Icould love before. I could pass my life with you and be happy everyday. I am rich. I can make things all right for you.""That's what they all say," said the girl again, weaving the wordsinto her little, reckless song."Don't say that again," said Blinker in a tone that made her look athim in frank surprise."Why shouldn't I say it?" she asked calmly. "They all do.""Who are 'they'?" he asked, jealous for the first time in hisexistence."Why, the fellows I know.""Do you know so many?""Oh, well, I'm not a wall flower," she answered with modestcomplacency."Where do you see these--these men? At your home?""Of course not. I meet them just as I did you. Sometimes on theboat, sometimes in the park, sometimes on the street. I'm a prettygood judge of a man. I can tell in a minute if a fellow is one whois likely to get fresh.""What do you mean by 'fresh?'""Why, try to kiss you--me, I mean.""Do any of them try that?" asked Blinker, clenching his teeth."Sure. All men do. You know that.""Do you allow them?""Some. Not many. They won't take you out anywhere unless you do."She turned her head and looked searchingly at Blinker. Her eyeswere as innocent as a child's. There was a puzzled look in them,as though she did not understand him."What's wrong about my meeting fellows?" she asked, wonderingly."Everything," he answered, almost savagely. "Why don't you entertainyour company in the house where you live? Is it necessary to pick upTom, Dick and Harry on the streets?"She kept her absolutely ingenuous eyes upon his. "If you could seethe place where I live you wouldn't ask that. I live in BrickdustRow. They call it that because there's red dust from the brickscrumbling over everything. I've lived there for more than fouryears. There's no place to receive company. You can't have anybodycome to your room. What else is there to do? A girl has got to meetthe men, hasn't she?""Yes," he said, hoarsely. "A girl has got to meet a--has got to meetthe men.""The first time one spoke to me on the street," she continued, "Iran home and cried all night. But you get used to it. I meet a goodmany nice fellows at church. I go on rainy days and stand in thevestibule until one comes up with an umbrella. I wish there was aparlor, so I could ask you to call, Mr. Blinker--are you really sureit isn't 'Smith,' now?"The boat landed safely. Blinker had a confused impression of walkingwith the girl through quiet crosstown streets until she stopped at acorner and held out her hand."I live just one more block over," she said. "Thank you for a verypleasant afternoon."Blinker muttered something and plunged northward till he found acab. A big, gray church loomed slowly at his right. Blinker shookhis fist at it through the window."I gave you a thousand dollars last, week," he cried under hisbreath, "and she meets them in your very doors. There is somethingwrong; there is something wrong."At eleven the next day Blinker signed his name thirty times with anew pen provided by Lawyer Oldport."Now let me go to the woods," he said surlily."You are not looking well," said Lawyer Oldport. "The trip will doyou good. But listen, if you will, to that little matter of businessof which I spoke to you yesterday, and also five years ago. Thereare some buildings, fifteen in number, of which there are newfive-year leases to be signed. Your father contemplated a change inthe lease provisions, but never made it. He intended that the parlorsof these houses should not be sub-let, but that the tenants should beallowed to use them for reception rooms. These houses are in theshopping district, and are mainly tenanted by young working girls.As it is they are forced to seek companionship outside. This row ofred brick--"Blinker interrupted him with a loud, discordant laugh."Brickdust Row for an even hundred," he cried. "And I own it. Have Iguessed right?""The tenants have some such name for it," said Lawyer Oldport.Blinker arose and jammed his hat down to his eyes."Do what you please with it," he said harshly. "Remodel it, burn it,raze it to the ground. But, man, it's too late I tell you. It's toolate. It's too late. It's too late."
Brickdust Row was featured as
TheShort Story of the Day on
Thu, May 15, 2014
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