to calculate upon that vague basis which allows the subtraction of one sum from another without any perceptible diminution, she was happy.
When Hanson came home at seven o’clock, he was inclined to be a little crusty — his usual demeanour before supper. This never showed so much in anything he said as in a certain solemnity of countenance and the silent manner in which he slopped about. He had a pair of yellow carpet slippers which he enjoyed wearing, and these he would immediately substitute for his solid pair of shoes. This, and washing his face with the aid of common washing soap until it glowed a shiny red, constituted his only preparation for his evening meal. He would then get his evening paper and read in silence.
For a young man, this was rather a morbid turn of character, and so affected Carrie. Indeed, it affected the entire atmosphere of the flat, as such things are inclined to do, and gave to his wife’s mind its subdued and tactful turn, anxious to avoid taciturn replies. Under the influence of Carrie’s announcement he brightened up somewhat.
“You didn’t lose any time, did you?” he remarked, smiling a little.
“No,” returned Carrie with a touch of pride.
He asked her one or two more questions and then turned to play with the baby, leaving the subject until it was brought up again by Minnie at the table.
Carrie, however, was not to be reduced to the common level of observation which prevailed in the flat.
“It seems to be such a large company,” she said, at one place.
“Great big plate-glass windows and lots of clerks. The man I saw said they hired ever so many people.”
“It’s not very hard to get work now,” put in Hanson, “if you look right.”
Minnie, under the warming influence of Carrie’s good spirits and her husband’s somewhat conversational mood, began to tell Carrie of some of the well-known things to see — things the enjoyment of which cost nothing.
“You’d like to see Michigan Avenue. There are such fine houses. It is such a fine street.”
“Where is H. R. Jacob’s?” interrupted Carrie, mentioning one of the theatres devoted to melodrama which went by that name at the time.
“Oh, it’s not very far from here,” answered Minnie. “It’s in Halstead Street, right up here.”
“How I’d like to go there. I crossed Halstead Street today, didn’t I?”
At this there was a slight halt in the natural reply. Thoughts are a strangely permeating factor. At her suggestion of going to the theatre, the unspoken shade of disapproval to the doing of those things which involved the expenditure of money — shades of feeling which arose in the mind of Hanson and then in Minnie — slightly affected the atmosphere of the table. Minnie answered “yes,” but Carrie could feel that going to the theatre was poorly advocated here. The subject was put off for a little while until Hanson, through with his meal, took his paper and went into the front room.
When they were alone, the two sisters began a somewhat freer conversation, Carrie interrupting it to hum a little, as they worked at the dishes.
“I should like to walk up and see Halstead Street, if it isn’t too far,” said Carrie, after a time. “Why don’t we go to the theatre to-night?”
“Oh, I don’t think Sven would want to go to-night,” returned Minnie. “He has to get up so early.”
“He wouldn’t mind — he’d enjoy it,” said Carrie.
“No, he doesn’t go very often,” returned Minnie.
“Well, I’d like to go,” rejoined Carrie. “Let’s you and me go.”
Minnie pondered a while, not upon whether she could or would go — for that point was already negatively settled with her — but upon some means of diverting the thoughts of her sister to some other topic.
“We’ll go some other time,” she said at last, finding no ready means of escape.
Carrie sensed the root of the opposition at once.
“I have some money,” she said. “You go with me.” Minnie shook her head.
“He could go along,” said Carrie.
“No,” returned Minnie softly, and rattling the dishes to drown the conversation. “He wouldn’t.”
It had been several years since Minnie had seen Carrie, and in that time the latter’s character had developed a few shades. Naturally timid in all things that related to her own advancement, and especially so when without power or resource, her craving for pleasure was so strong that it was the one stay of her nature. She would speak for that when silent on all else.
“Ask him,” she pleaded softly.
Minnie was thinking of the resource which Carrie’s board would add. It would pay the rent and would make the subject of expenditure a little less difficult to talk about with her husband. But if Carrie was going to think of running around in the beginning there would be a hitch somewhere. Unless Carrie submitted to a solemn round of industry and saw the need of hard work without longing for play, how was her coming to the city to profit them? These thoughts were not those of a cold, hard nature at all. They were the serious reflections of a mind which invariably adjusted itself, without much complaining, to such surroundings as its industry could make for it.
At last she yielded enough to ask Hanson. It was a half-hearted procedure without a shade of desire on her part.
“Carrie wants us to go to the theatre,” she said, looking in upon her husband. Hanson looked up from his paper, and they exchanged a mild look, which said as plainly as anything: “This isn’t what we expected.”
“I don’t care to go,” he returned. “What does she want to see?”
“H. R. Jacob’s,” said Minnie.
He looked down at his paper and shook his head negatively.
When Carrie saw how they looked upon her proposition, she gained a still clearer feeling of their way of life. It weighed on her, but took no definite form of opposition.
“I think I’ll go down and stand at the foot of the stairs,” she said, after a time.
Minnie made no objection to this, and Carrie put on her hat and went below.
“Where has Carrie gone?” asked Hanson, coming back into the dining-room when he heard the door close.
“She said she was going down to the foot of the stairs,” answered Minnie. “I guess she just wants to look out a while.”
“She oughtn’t to be thinking about spending her money on theatres already, do you think?” he said.
“She just feels a little curious, I guess,” ventured Minnie. “Everything is so new.”
“I don’t know,” said Hanson, and went over to the baby, his forehead slightly wrinkled.
He was thinking of a full career of vanity and wastefulness which a young
