was strong.
“Didn’t find anything, eh?” said Hanson.
“No.”
He turned to his eating again, the thought that it was a burden to have her here dwelling in his mind. She would have to go home, that was all. Once she was away, there would be no more coming back in the spring.
Carrie was afraid of what she was going to do, but she was relieved to know that this condition was ending. They would not care. Hanson particularly would be glad when she went. He would not care what became of her.
After dinner she went into the bathroom, where they could not disturb her, and wrote a little note.
“Good-bye, Minnie,” it read. “I’m not going home. I’m going to stay in Chicago a little while and look for work. Don’t worry. I’ll be all right.”
In the front room Hanson was reading his paper. As usual, she helped Minnie clear away the dishes and straighten up. Then she said:
“I guess I’ll stand down at the door a little while.” She could scarcely prevent her voice from trembling.
Minnie remembered Hanson’s remonstrance.
“Sven doesn’t think it looks good to stand down there,” she said.
“Doesn’t he?” said Carrie. “I won’t do it any more after this.” She put on her hat and fidgeted around the table in the little bedroom, wondering where to slip the note. Finally she put it under Minnie’s hair-brush.
When she had closed the hall-door, she paused a moment and wondered what they would think. Some thought of the queerness of her deed affected her. She went slowly down the stairs. She looked back up the lighted step, and then affected to stroll up the street. When she reached the corner she quickened her pace.
As she was hurrying away, Hanson came back to his wife.
“Is Carrie down at the door again?” he asked.
“Yes”, said Minnie; “she said she wasn’t going to do it any more.” He went over to the baby where it was playing on the floor and began to poke his finger at it.
Drouet was on the corner waiting, in good spirits.
“Hello, Carrie,” he said, as a sprightly figure of a girl drew near him. “Got here safe, did you? Well, we’ll take a car.”
Chapter VIII
Intimations by Winter: An Ambassador Summoned
When Minnie found the note next morning, after a night of mingled wonder and anxiety, which was not exactly touched by yearning, sorrow, or love, she exclaimed:
“Well, what do you think of that?”
“What?” said Hanson.
“Sister Carrie has gone to live somewhere else.”
Hanson jumped out of bed with more celerity than he usually displayed and looked at the note. The only indication of his thoughts came in the form of a little clicking sound made by his tongue; the sound some people make when they wish to urge on a horse.
“Where do you suppose she’s gone to?” said Minnie thoroughly aroused.
“I don’t know,” a touch of cynicism lighting his eye.
“Now she has gone and done it.”
Minnie moved her head in a puzzled way.
“Oh, oh,” she said, “she doesn’t know what she has done.”
“Well,” said Hanson after a while, sticking his hands out before him, “what can you do?”
Minnie’s womanly nature was higher than this. She figured the possibilities in such cases.
“Oh,” she said at least, “poor Sister Carrie!”
At the time of this particular conversation, which occurred at 5 a.m., that little soldier of fortune was sleeping in rather troubled sleep in her new room, alone.
Carrie’s new state was remarkable in that she saw possibilities in it. She was no sensualist, longing to drowse sleepily in the lap of luxury. She turned about, troubled by her daring, glad of her release, wondering whether she would get something to do, wondering what Drouet would do. That worthy had his future fixed for him beyond a peradventure. He could not help what he was going to do. He could not see clearly enough to wish to do differently. He was drawn by his innate desire to act the old pursuing part. He would need to delight himself with Carrie as surely as he would need to eat his heavy breakfast. He might suffer the least rudimentary twinge of conscience in whatever he did, and in just so far he was evil and sinning. But whatever twinges of conscience he might have would be rudimentary, you may be sure.
The next day he called upon Carrie, and she saw him in her chamber. He was the same jolly, enlivening soul.
“Aw,” he said, “what are you looking so blue about[32]? Come on out to breakfast. You want to get your other clothes to-day.”
Carrie looked at him with the hue of shifting thought in her large eyes.
“I wish I could get something to do,” she said.
“You’ll get that all right,” said Drouet. “What’s the use worrying right now? Get yourself fixed up. See the city. I won’t hurt you.”
“I know you won’t,” she remarked, half truthfully.
“Got on the new shoes, haven’t you? Stick’em out. George, they look fine. Put on your jacket.”
Carrie obeyed.
“Say, that fits like a T[33], don’t it?” he remarked, feeling the set of it at the waist and eyeing it from a few paces with real pleasure. “What you need now is a new skirt. Let’s go to breakfast.”
Carrie put on her hat.
“Where are the gloves?” he inquired.
“Here,” she said, taking them out of the bureau drawer.
“Now, come on,” he said.
Thus the first hour of misgiving was swept away.
It went this way on every occasion. Drouet did not leave her much alone. She had time for some lone wanderings, but mostly he filled her hours with sight-seeing. At Carson, Pirie’s he bought her a nice skirt and shirt waist. With his money she purchased the little necessaries of toilet, until at last she looked quite another maiden. The mirror convinced her of a few things which she had long believed. She was pretty, yes, indeed! How nice her hat set, and weren’t her eyes pretty. She caught her little red lip with her teeth and felt her first thrill of power. Drouet was so good.
They went to see “The Mikado” one evening, an opera which was hilariously popular at that time. Before going, they made off for the Windsor dinning-room, which was in Dearborn Street, a considerable distance from Carrie’s room. It was blowing up cold, and out of her window Carrie could see the western sky, still pink with the fading light, but steely
…
