prompt:
Chapter: Carrie was an apt student of fortune's ways--of fortune's
superficialities. Seeing a thing, she would immediately set to inquiring
how she would look, properly related to it. Be it known that this is not
fine feeling, it is not wisdom. The greatest minds are not so afflicted;
and on the contrary, the lowest order of mind is not so disturbed.
Fine clothes to her were a vast persuasion; they spoke tenderly and
Jesuitically for themselves. When she came within earshot of their
pleading, desire in her bent a willing ear. The voice of the so-called
inanimate! Who shall translate for us the language of the stones?

"My dear," said the lace collar she secured from Partridge's, "I fit you
beautifully; don't give me up."

"Ah, such little feet," said the leather of the soft new shoes; "how
effectively I cover them. What a pity they should ever want my aid."

Once these things were in her hand, on her person, she might dream of
giving them up; the method by which they came might intrude itself so
forcibly that she would ache to be rid of the thought of it, but she
would not give them up. "Put on the old clothes--that torn pair of
shoes," was called to her by her conscience in vain. She could possibly
have conquered the fear of hunger and gone back; the thought of hard
work and a narrow round of suffering would, under the last pressure of
conscience, have yielded, but spoil her appearance?--be old-clothed and
poor-appearing?--never!

Drouet heightened her opinion on this and allied subjects in such a
manner as to weaken her power of resisting their influence. It is so
easy to do this when the thing opined is in the line of what we desire.
In his hearty way, he insisted upon her good looks. He looked at her
admiringly, and she took it at its full value. Under the circumstances,
she did not need to carry herself as pretty women do. She picked that
knowledge up fast enough for herself. Drouet had a habit, characteristic
of his kind, of looking after stylishly dressed or pretty women on the
street and remarking upon them. He had just enough of the feminine love
of dress to be a good judge--not of intellect, but of clothes. He saw
how they set their little feet, how they carried their chins, with what
grace and sinuosity they swung their bodies. A dainty, self-conscious
swaying of the hips by a woman was to him as alluring as the glint of
rare wine to a toper. He would turn and follow the disappearing vision
with his eyes. He would thrill as a child with the unhindered passion
that was in him. He loved the thing that women love in themselves,
grace. At this, their own shrine, he knelt with them, an ardent devotee.

"Did you see that woman who went by just now?" he said to Carrie on the
first day they took a walk together. "Fine stepper, wasn't she?"

Carrie looked, and observed the grace commended.

"Yes, she is," she returned, cheerfully, a little suggestion of possible
defect in herself awakening in her mind. If that was so fine, she must
look at it more closely. Instinctively, she felt a desire to imitate it.
Surely she could do that too.

When one of her mind sees many things emphasized and re-emphasized and
admired, she gathers the logic of it and applies accordingly. Drouet
was not shrewd enough to see that this was not tactful. He could not
see that it would be better to make her feel that she was competing with
herself, not others better than herself. He would not have done it with
an older, wiser woman, but in Carrie he saw only the novice. Less clever
than she, he was naturally unable to comprehend her sensibility. He
went on educating and wounding her, a thing rather foolish in one whose
admiration for his pupil and victim was apt to grow.

Carrie took the instructions affably. She saw what Drouet liked; in a
vague way she saw where he was weak. It lessens a woman's opinion of a
man when she learns that his admiration is so pointedly and generously
distributed. She sees but one object of supreme compliment in this
world, and that is herself. If a man is to succeed with many women, he
must be all in all to each.

In her own apartments Carrie saw things which were lessons in the same
school.

In the same house with her lived an official of one of the theatres, Mr.
Frank A. Hale, manager of the Standard, and his wife, a pleasing-looking
brunette of thirty-five. They were people of a sort very common in
America today, who live respectably from hand to mouth. Hale received
a salary of forty-five dollars a week. His wife, quite attractive,
affected the feeling of youth, and objected to that sort of home life
which means the care of a house and the raising of a family. Like Drouet
and Carrie, they also occupied three rooms on the floor above.

Not long after she arrived Mrs. Hale established social relations with
her, and together they went about. For a long time this was her only
companionship, and the gossip of the manager's wife formed the medium
through which she saw the world. Such trivialities, such praises of
wealth, such conventional expression of morals as sifted through this
passive creature's mind, fell upon Carrie and for the while confused
her.

On the other hand, her own feelings were a corrective influence. The
constant drag to something better was not to be denied. By those things
which address the heart was she steadily recalled. In the apartments
across the hall were a young girl and her mother. They were from
Evansville, Indiana, the wife and daughter of a railroad treasurer. The
daughter was here to study music, the mother to keep her company.

Carrie did not make their acquaintance, but she saw the daughter coming
in and going out. A few times she had seen her at the piano in the
parlour, and not infrequently had heard her play. This young woman was
particularly dressy for her station, and wore a jewelled ring or two
which flashed upon her white fingers as she played.

Now Carrie was affected by music. Her nervous composition responded
to certain strains, much as certain strings of a harp vibrate when a
corresponding key of a piano is struck. She was delicately moulded
in sentiment, and answered with vague ruminations to certain wistful
chords. They awoke longings for those things which she did not have.
They caused her to cling closer to things she possessed. One short song
the young lady played in a most soulful and tender mood. Carrie heard
it through the open door from the parlour below. It was at that hour
between afternoon and night when, for the idle, the wanderer, things are
apt to take on a wistful aspect. The mind wanders forth on far journeys
and returns with sheaves of withered and departed joys. Carrie sat at
her window looking out. Drouet had been away since ten in the morning.
She had amused herself with a walk, a book by Bertha M. Clay which
Drouet had left there, though she did not wholly enjoy the latter, and
by changing her dress for the evening. Now she sat looking out across
the park as wistful and depressed as the nature which craves variety and
life can be under such circumstances. As she contemplated her new state,
the strain from the parlour below stole upward. With it her thoughts
became coloured and enmeshed. She reverted to the things which were best
and saddest within the small limit of her experience. She became for the
moment a repentant.

While she was in this mood Drouet came in, bringing with him an entirely
different atmosphere. It was dusk and Carrie had neglected to light the
lamp. The fire in the grate, too, had burned low.

"Where are you, Cad?" he said, using a pet name he had given her.

"Here," she answered.

There was something delicate and lonely in her voice, but he could not
hear it. He had not the poetry in him that would seek a woman out under
such circumstances and console her for the tragedy of life. Instead, he
struck a match and lighted the gas.

"Hello," he exclaimed, "you've been crying."

Her eyes were still wet with a few vague tears.

"Pshaw," he said, "you don't want to do that."

He took her hand, feeling in his good-natured egotism that it was
probably lack of his presence which had made her lonely.

"Come on, now," he went on; "it's all right. Let's waltz a little to
that music."

He could not have introduced a more incongruous proposition. It made
clear to Carrie that he could not sympathise with her. She could not
have framed thoughts which would have expressed his defect or made clear
the difference between them, but she felt it. It was his first great
mistake.

What Drouet said about the girl's grace, as she tripped out evenings
accompanied by her mother, caused Carrie to perceive the nature and
value of those little modish ways which women adopt when they would
presume to be something. She looked in the mirror and pursed up her
lips, accompanying it with a little toss of the head, as she had seen
the railroad treasurer's daughter do. She caught up her skirts with an
easy swing, for had not Drouet remarked that in her and several others,
and Carrie was naturally imitative. She began to get the hang of those
little things which the pretty woman who has vanity invariably adopts.
In short, her knowledge of grace doubled, and with it her appearance
changed. She became a girl of considerable taste.

Drouet noticed this. He saw the new bow in her hair and the new way of
arranging her locks which she affected one morning.

"You look fine that way, Cad," he said.

"Do I?" she replied, sweetly. It made her try for other effects that
selfsame day.

She used her feet less heavily, a thing that was brought about by her
attempting to imitate the treasurer's daughter's graceful carriage. How
much influence the presence of that young woman in the same house had
upon her it would be difficult to say. But, because of all these things,
when Hurstwood called he had found a young woman who was much more than
the Carrie to whom Drouet had first spoken. The primary defects of dress
and manner had passed. She was pretty, graceful, rich in the timidity
born of uncertainty, and with a something childlike in her large eyes
which captured the fancy of this starched and conventional poser among
men. It was the ancient attraction of the fresh for the stale. If
there was a touch of appreciation left in him for the bloom and
unsophistication which is the charm of youth, it rekindled now. He
looked into her pretty face and felt the subtle waves of young life
radiating therefrom. In that large clear eye he could see nothing that
his blase nature could understand as guile. The little vanity, if he
could have perceived it there, would have touched him as a pleasant
thing.

"I wonder," he said, as he rode away in his cab, "how Drouet came to win
her."

He gave her credit for feelings superior to Drouet at the first glance.

The cab plopped along between the far-receding lines of gas lamps on
either hand. He folded his gloved hands and saw only the lighted chamber
and Carrie's face. He was pondering over the delight of youthful beauty.

"I'll have a bouquet for her," he thought. "Drouet won't mind." He
never for a moment concealed the fact of her attraction for himself.
He troubled himself not at all about Drouet's priority. He was merely
floating those gossamer threads of thought which, like the spider's,
he hoped would lay hold somewhere. He did not know, he could not guess,
what the result would be.

A few weeks later Drouet, in his peregrinations, encountered one of his
well-dressed lady acquaintances in Chicago on his return from a short
trip to Omaha. He had intended to hurry out to Ogden Place and surprise
Carrie, but now he fell into an interesting conversation and soon
modified his original intention.

"Let's go to dinner," he said, little recking any chance meeting which
might trouble his way.

"Certainly," said his companion.

They visited one of the better restaurants for a social chat. It was
five in the afternoon when they met; it was seven-thirty before the last
bone was picked.

Drouet was just finishing a little incident he was relating, and his
face was expanding into a smile, when Hurstwood's eye caught his own.
The latter had come in with several friends, and, seeing Drouet and some
woman, not Carrie, drew his own conclusion.

"Ah, the rascal," he thought, and then, with a touch of righteous
sympathy, "that's pretty hard on the little girl."

Drouet jumped from one easy thought to another as he caught Hurstwood's
eye. He felt but very little misgiving, until he saw that Hurstwood was
cautiously pretending not to see. Then some of the latter's impression
forced itself upon him. He thought of Carrie and their last meeting.
By George, he would have to explain this to Hurstwood. Such a chance
half-hour with an old friend must not have anything more attached to it
than it really warranted.

For the first time he was troubled. Here was a moral complication of
which he could not possibly get the ends. Hurstwood would laugh at him
for being a fickle boy. He would laugh with Hurstwood. Carrie would
never hear, his present companion at table would never know, and yet he
could not help feeling that he was getting the worst of it--there was
some faint stigma attached, and he was not guilty. He broke up the
dinner by becoming dull, and saw his companion on her car. Then he went
home.

"He hasn't talked to me about any of these later flames," thought
Hurstwood to himself. "He thinks I think he cares for the girl out
there."

"He ought not to think I'm knocking around, since I have just introduced
him out there," thought Drouet.

"I saw you," Hurstwood said, genially, the next time Drouet drifted in
to his polished resort, from which he could not stay away. He raised his
forefinger indicatively, as parents do to children.

"An old acquaintance of mine that I ran into just as I was coming up
from the station," explained Drouet. "She used to be quite a beauty."

"Still attracts a little, eh?" returned the other, affecting to jest.

"Oh, no," said Drouet, "just couldn't escape her this time."

"How long are you here?" asked Hurstwood.

"Only a few days."

"You must bring the girl down and take dinner with me," he said.
"I'm afraid you keep her cooped up out there. I'll get a box for Joe
Jefferson."

"Not me," answered the drummer. "Sure I'll come."

This pleased Hurstwood immensely. He gave Drouet no credit for any
feelings toward Carrie whatever. He envied him, and now, as he looked at
the well-dressed jolly salesman, whom he so much liked, the gleam of
the rival glowed in his eye. He began to "size up" Drouet from the
standpoints of wit and fascination. He began to look to see where he was
weak. There was no disputing that, whatever he might think of him as a
good fellow, he felt a certain amount of contempt for him as a lover. He
could hoodwink him all right. Why, if he would just let Carrie see one
such little incident as that of Thursday, it would settle the matter.
He ran on in thought, almost exulting, the while he laughed and chatted,
and Drouet felt nothing. He had no power of analysing the glance and the
atmosphere of a man like Hurstwood. He stood and smiled and accepted the
invitation while his friend examined him with the eye of a hawk.

The object of this peculiarly involved comedy was not thinking of
either. She was busy adjusting her thoughts and feelings to newer
conditions, and was not in danger of suffering disturbing pangs from
either quarter. One evening Drouet found her dressing herself before the
glass.

"Cad," said he, catching her, "I believe you're getting vain."

"Nothing of the kind," she returned, smiling.

"Well, you're mighty pretty," he went on, slipping his arm around her.
"Put on that navy-blue dress of yours and I'll take you to the show."

"Oh, I've promised Mrs. Hale to go with her to the Exposition to-night,"
she returned, apologetically.

"You did, eh?" he said, studying the situation abstractedly. "I wouldn't
care to go to that myself."

"Well, I don't know," answered Carrie, puzzling, but not offering to
break her promise in his favour.

Just then a knock came at their door and the maidservant handed a letter
in.

"He says there's an answer expected," she explained.

"It's from Hurstwood," said Drouet, noting the superscription as he tore
it open.

"You are to come down and see Joe Jefferson with me to-night," it ran
in part. "It's my turn, as we agreed the other day. All other bets are
off."

"Well, what do you say to this?" asked Drouet, innocently, while
Carrie's mind bubbled with favourable replies.

"You had better decide, Charlie," she said, reservedly.

"I guess we had better go, if you can break that engagement upstairs,"
said Drouet.

"Oh, I can," returned Carrie without thinking.

Drouet selected writing paper while Carrie went to change her dress. She
hardly explained to herself why this latest invitation appealed to her
most.

"Shall I wear my hair as I did yesterday?" she asked, as she came out
with several articles of apparel pending.

"Sure," he returned, pleasantly.

She was relieved to see that he felt nothing. She did not credit her
willingness to go to any fascination Hurstwood held for her. It
seemed that the combination of Hurstwood, Drouet, and herself was
more agreeable than anything else that had been suggested. She arrayed
herself most carefully and they started off, extending excuses upstairs.

"I say," said Hurstwood, as they came up the theatre lobby, "we are
exceedingly charming this evening."

Carrie fluttered under his approving glance.

"Now, then," he said, leading the way up the foyer into the theatre.

If ever there was dressiness it was here. It was the personification of
the old term spick and span.

"Did you ever see Jefferson?" he questioned, as he leaned toward Carrie
in the box.

"I never did," she returned.

"He's delightful, delightful," he went on, giving the commonplace
rendition of approval which such men know. He sent Drouet after a
programme, and then discoursed to Carrie concerning Jefferson as he had
heard of him. The former was pleased beyond expression, and was really
hypnotised by the environment, the trappings of the box, the elegance of
her companion. Several times their eyes accidentally met, and then
there poured into hers such a flood of feeling as she had never before
experienced. She could not for the moment explain it, for in the next
glance or the next move of the hand there was seeming indifference,
mingled only with the kindest attention.

Drouet shared in the conversation, but he was almost dull in comparison.
Hurstwood entertained them both, and now it was driven into Carrie's
mind that here was the superior man. She instinctively felt that he was
stronger and higher, and yet withal so simple. By the end of the third
act she was sure that Drouet was only a kindly soul, but otherwise
defective. He sank every moment in her estimation by the strong
comparison.

"I have had such a nice time," said Carrie, when it was all over and
they were coming out.

"Yes, indeed," added Drouet, who was not in the least aware that a
battle had been fought and his defences weakened. He was like the
Emperor of China, who sat glorying in himself, unaware that his fairest
provinces were being wrested from him.

"Well, you have saved me a dreary evening," returned Hurstwood.
"Good-night."

He took Carrie's little hand, and a current of feeling swept from one to
the other.

"I'm so tired," said Carrie, leaning back in the car when Drouet began
to talk.

"Well, you rest a little while I smoke," he said, rising, and then he
foolishly went to the forward platform of the car and left the game as
it stood.

Mrs. Hurstwood was not aware of any of her husband's moral defections,
though she might readily have suspected his tendencies, which she well
understood. She was a woman upon whose action under provocation you
could never count. Hurstwood, for one, had not the slightest idea of
what she would do under certain circumstances. He had never seen her
thoroughly aroused. In fact, she was not a woman who would fly into a
passion. She had too little faith in mankind not to know that they were
erring. She was too calculating to jeopardize any advantage she might
gain in the way of information by fruitless clamour. Her wrath would
never wreak itself in one fell blow. She would wait and brood, studying
the details and adding to them until her power might be commensurate
with her desire for revenge. At the same time, she would not delay to
inflict any injury, big or little, which would wound the object of her
revenge and still leave him uncertain as to the source of the evil. She
was a cold, self-centred woman, with many a thought of her own which
never found expression, not even by so much as the glint of an eye.

Hurstwood felt some of this in her nature, though he did not actually
perceive it. He dwelt with her in peace and some satisfaction. He did
not fear her in the least--there was no cause for it. She still took a
faint pride in him, which was augmented by her desire to have her social
integrity maintained. She was secretly somewhat pleased by the fact
that much of her husband's property was in her name, a precaution which
Hurstwood had taken when his home interests were somewhat more alluring
than at present. His wife had not the slightest reason to feel that
anything would ever go amiss with their household, and yet the shadows
which run before gave her a thought of the good of it now and then. She
was in a position to become refractory with considerable advantage, and
Hurstwood conducted himself circumspectly because he felt that he could
not be sure of anything once she became dissatisfied.

It so happened that on the night when Hurstwood, Carrie, and Drouet
were in the box at McVickar's, George, Jr., was in the sixth row of the
parquet with the daughter of H. B. Carmichael, the third partner of a
wholesale dry-goods house of that city. Hurstwood did not see his son,
for he sat, as was his wont, as far back as possible, leaving himself
just partially visible, when he bent forward, to those within the
first six rows in question. It was his wont to sit this way in every
theatre--to make his personality as inconspicuous as possible where it
would be no advantage to him to have it otherwise.

He never moved but what, if there was any danger of his conduct being
misconstrued or ill-reported, he looked carefully about him and counted
the cost of every inch of conspicuity.

The next morning at breakfast his son said:

"I saw you, Governor, last night."

"Were you at McVickar's?" said Hurstwood, with the best grace in the
world.

"Yes," said young George.

"Who with?"

"Miss Carmichael."

Mrs. Hurstwood directed an inquiring glance at her husband, but could
not judge from his appearance whether it was any more than a casual look
into the theatre which was referred to.

"How was the play?" she inquired.

"Very good," returned Hurstwood, "only it's the same old thing, 'Rip Van
Winkle.'"

"Whom did you go with?" queried his wife, with assumed indifference.

"Charlie Drouet and his wife. They are friends of Moy's, visiting here."

Owing to the peculiar nature of his position, such a disclosure as this
would ordinarily create no difficulty. His wife took it for granted that
his situation called for certain social movements in which she might not
be included. But of late he had pleaded office duty on several occasions
when his wife asked for his company to any evening entertainment. He
had done so in regard to the very evening in question only the morning
before.

"I thought you were going to be busy," she remarked, very carefully.

"So I was," he exclaimed. "I couldn't help the interruption, but I made
up for it afterward by working until two."

This settled the discussion for the time being, but there was a residue
of opinion which was not satisfactory. There was no time at which the
claims of his wife could have been more unsatisfactorily pushed. For
years he had been steadily modifying his matrimonial devotion, and found
her company dull. Now that a new light shone upon the horizon, this
older luminary paled in the west. He was satisfied to turn his face away
entirely, and any call to look back was irksome.

She, on the contrary, was not at all inclined to accept anything less
than a complete fulfilment of the letter of their relationship, though
the spirit might be wanting.

"We are coming down town this afternoon," she remarked, a few days
later. "I want you to come over to Kinsley's and meet Mr. Phillips and
his wife. They're stopping at the Tremont, and we're going to show them
around a little."

After the occurrence of Wednesday, he could not refuse, though the
Phillips were about as uninteresting as vanity and ignorance could make
them. He agreed, but it was with short grace. He was angry when he left
the house.

"I'll put a stop to this," he thought. "I'm not going to be bothered
fooling around with visitors when I have work to do."

Not long after this Mrs. Hurstwood came with a similar proposition, only
it was to a matinee this time.

"My dear," he returned, "I haven't time. I'm too busy."

"You find time to go with other people, though," she replied, with
considerable irritation.

"Nothing of the kind," he answered. "I can't avoid business relations,
and that's all there is to it."

"Well, never mind," she exclaimed. Her lips tightened. The feeling of
mutual antagonism was increased.

On the other hand, his interest in Drouet's little shop-girl grew in an
almost evenly balanced proportion. That young lady, under the stress of
her situation and the tutelage of her new friend, changed effectively.
She had the aptitude of the struggler who seeks emancipation. The
glow of a more showy life was not lost upon her. She did not grow in
knowledge so much as she awakened in the matter of desire. Mrs. Hale's
extended harangues upon the subjects of wealth and position taught her
to distinguish between degrees of wealth. Mrs. Hale loved to drive in
the afternoon in the sun when it was fine, and to satisfy her soul with
a sight of those mansions and lawns which she could not afford. On the
North Side had been erected a number of elegant mansions along what is
now known as the North Shore Drive. The present lake wall of stone and
granitoid was not then in place, but the road had been well laid out,
the intermediate spaces of lawn were lovely to look upon, and the houses
were thoroughly new and imposing. When the winter season had passed and
the first fine days of the early spring appeared, Mrs. Hale secured
a buggy for an afternoon and invited Carrie. They rode first through
Lincoln Park and on far out towards Evanston, turning back at four and
arriving at the north end of the Shore Drive at about five o'clock.
At this time of year the days are still comparatively short, and the
shadows of the evening were beginning to settle down upon the great
city. Lamps were beginning to burn with that mellow radiance which seems
almost watery and translucent to the eye. There was a softness in the
air which speaks with an infinite delicacy of feeling to the flesh
as well as to the soul. Carrie felt that it was a lovely day. She was
ripened by it in spirit for many suggestions. As they drove along the
smooth pavement an occasional carriage passed. She saw one stop and
the footman dismount, opening the door for a gentleman who seemed to
be leisurely returning from some afternoon pleasure. Across the broad
lawns, now first freshening into green, she saw lamps faintly glowing
upon rich interiors. Now it was but a chair, now a table, now an ornate
corner, which met her eye, but it appealed to her as almost nothing else
could. Such childish fancies as she had had of fairy palaces and kingly
quarters now came back. She imagined that across these richly carved
entrance-ways, where the globed and crystalled lamps shone upon panelled
doors set with stained and designed panes of glass, was neither care nor
unsatisfied desire. She was perfectly certain that here was happiness.
If she could but stroll up yon broad walk, cross that rich entrance-way,
which to her was of the beauty of a jewel, and sweep in grace and luxury
to possession and command--oh! how quickly would sadness flee; how, in
an instant, would the heartache end. She gazed and gazed, wondering,
delighting, longing, and all the while the siren voice of the unrestful
was whispering in her ear.

"If we could have such a home as that," said Mrs. Hale sadly, "how
delightful it would be."

"And yet they do say," said Carrie, "that no one is ever happy."

She had heard so much of the canting philosophy of the grapeless fox.

"I notice," said Mrs. Hale, "that they all try mighty hard, though, to
take their misery in a mansion."

When she came to her own rooms, Carrie saw their comparative
insignificance. She was not so dull but that she could perceive
they were but three small rooms in a moderately well-furnished
boarding-house. She was not contrasting it now with what she had had,
but what she had so recently seen. The glow of the palatial doors was
still in her eye, the roll of cushioned carriages still in her ears.
What, after all, was Drouet? What was she? At her window, she thought it
over, rocking to and fro, and gazing out across the lamp-lit park toward
the lamp-lit houses on Warren and Ashland avenues. She was too wrought
up to care to go down to eat, too pensive to do aught but rock and sing.
Some old tunes crept to her lips, and, as she sang them, her heart sank.
She longed and longed and longed. It was now for the old cottage room in
Columbia City, now the mansion upon the Shore Drive, now the fine
dress of some lady, now the elegance of some scene. She was sad beyond
measure, and yet uncertain, wishing, fancying. Finally, it seemed as
if all her state was one of loneliness and forsakenness, and she could
scarce refrain from trembling at the lip. She hummed and hummed as the
moments went by, sitting in the shadow by the window, and was therein as
happy, though she did not perceive it, as she ever would be.

While Carrie was still in this frame of mind, the house-servant brought
up the intelligence that Mr. Hurstwood was in the parlour asking to see
Mr. and Mrs. Drouet.

"I guess he doesn't know that Charlie is out of town," thought Carrie.

She had seen comparatively little of the manager during the winter,
but had been kept constantly in mind of him by one thing and another,
principally by the strong impression he had made. She was quite
disturbed for the moment as to her appearance, but soon satisfied
herself by the aid of the mirror, and went below.

Hurstwood was in his best form, as usual. He hadn't heard that Drouet
was out of town. He was but slightly affected by the intelligence, and
devoted himself to the more general topics which would interest Carrie.
It was surprising--the ease with which he conducted a conversation. He
was like every man who has had the advantage of practice and knows he
has sympathy. He knew that Carrie listened to him pleasurably, and,
without the least effort, he fell into a train of observation which
absorbed her fancy. He drew up his chair and modulated his voice to
such a degree that what he said seemed wholly confidential. He confined
himself almost exclusively to his observation of men and pleasures.
He had been here and there, he had seen this and that. Somehow he made
Carrie wish to see similar things, and all the while kept her aware of
himself. She could not shut out the consciousness of his individuality
and presence for a moment. He would raise his eyes slowly in smiling
emphasis of something, and she was fixed by their magnetism. He would
draw out, with the easiest grace, her approval. Once he touched her hand
for emphasis and she only smiled. He seemed to radiate an atmosphere
which suffused her being. He was never dull for a minute, and seemed to
make her clever. At least, she brightened under his influence until all
her best side was exhibited. She felt that she was more clever with him
than with others. At least, he seemed to find so much in her to applaud.
There was not the slightest touch of patronage. Drouet was full of it.

There had been something so personal, so subtle, in each meeting between
them, both when Drouet was present and when he was absent, that Carrie
could not speak of it without feeling a sense of difficulty. She was
no talker. She could never arrange her thoughts in fluent order. It was
always a matter of feeling with her, strong and deep. Each time there
had been no sentence of importance which she could relate, and as for
the glances and sensations, what woman would reveal them? Such things
had never been between her and Drouet. As a matter of fact, they could
never be. She had been dominated by distress and the enthusiastic forces
of relief which Drouet represented at an opportune moment when she
yielded to him. Now she was persuaded by secret current feelings which
Drouet had never understood. Hurstwood's glance was as effective as
the spoken words of a lover, and more. They called for no immediate
decision, and could not be answered.

People in general attach too much importance to words. They are under
the illusion that talking effects great results. As a matter of fact,
words are, as a rule, the shallowest portion of all the argument. They
but dimly represent the great surging feelings and desires which
lie behind. When the distraction of the tongue is removed, the heart
listens.

In this conversation she heard, instead of his words, the voices of
the things which he represented. How suave was the counsel of his
appearance! How feelingly did his superior state speak for itself! The
growing desire he felt for her lay upon her spirit as a gentle hand. She
did not need to tremble at all, because it was invisible; she did not
need to worry over what other people would say--what she herself
would say--because it had no tangibility. She was being pleaded with,
persuaded, led into denying old rights and assuming new ones, and yet
there were no words to prove it. Such conversation as was indulged in
held the same relationship to the actual mental enactments of the twain
that the low music of the orchestra does to the dramatic incident which
it is used to cover.

"Have you ever seen the houses along the Lake Shore on the North Side?"
asked Hurstwood.

"Why, I was just over there this afternoon--Mrs. Hale and I. Aren't they
beautiful?"

"They're very fine," he answered.

"Oh, me," said Carrie, pensively. "I wish I could live in such a place."

"You're not happy," said Hurstwood, slowly, after a slight pause.

He had raised his eyes solemnly and was looking into her own. He assumed
that he had struck a deep chord. Now was a slight chance to say a word
in his own behalf. He leaned over quietly and continued his steady gaze.
He felt the critical character of the period. She endeavoured to stir,
but it was useless. The whole strength of a man's nature was working. He
had good cause to urge him on. He looked and looked, and the longer the
situation lasted the more difficult it became. The little shop-girl was
getting into deep water. She was letting her few supports float away
from her.

"Oh," she said at last, "you mustn't look at me like that."

"I can't help it," he answered.

She relaxed a little and let the situation endure, giving him strength.

"You are not satisfied with life, are you?"

"No," she answered, weakly.

He saw he was the master of the situation--he felt it. He reached over
and touched her hand.

"You mustn't," she exclaimed, jumping up.

"I didn't intend to," he answered, easily.

She did not run away, as she might have done. She did not terminate the
interview, but he drifted off into a pleasant field of thought with the
readiest grace. Not long after he rose to go, and she felt that he
was in power. "You mustn't feel bad," he said, kindly; "things will
straighten out in the course of time."

She made no answer, because she could think of nothing to say.

"We are good friends, aren't we?" he said, extending his hand.

"Yes," she answered.

"Not a word, then, until I see you again."

He retained a hold on her hand.

"I can't promise," she said, doubtfully.

"You must be more generous than that," he said, in such a simple way
that she was touched.

"Let's not talk about it any more," she returned.

"All right," he said, brightening.

He went down the steps and into his cab. Carrie closed the door and
ascended into her room. She undid her broad lace collar before the
mirror and unfastened her pretty alligator belt which she had recently
bought.

"I'm getting terrible," she said, honestly affected by a feeling of
trouble and shame. "I don't seem to do anything right."

She unloosed her hair after a time, and let it hang in loose brown
waves. Her mind was going over the events of the evening.

"I don't know," she murmured at last, "what I can do."

"Well," said Hurstwood as he rode away, "she likes me all right; that I
know."

The aroused manager whistled merrily for a good four miles to his office
an old melody that he had not recalled for fifteen years.

It was not quite two days after the scene between Carrie and Hurstwood
in the Ogden Place parlour before he again put in his appearance. He had
been thinking almost uninterruptedly of her. Her leniency had, in a way,
inflamed his regard. He felt that he must succeed with her, and that
speedily.

The reason for his interest, not to say fascination, was deeper than
mere desire. It was a flowering out of feelings which had been withering
in dry and almost barren soil for many years. It is probable that Carrie
represented a better order of woman than had ever attracted him before.
He had had no love affair since that which culminated in his marriage,
and since then time and the world had taught him how raw and erroneous
was his original judgment. Whenever he thought of it, he told himself
that, if he had it to do over again, he would never marry such a woman.
At the same time, his experience with women in general had lessened his
respect for the sex. He maintained a cynical attitude, well grounded
on numerous experiences. Such women as he had known were of nearly
one type, selfish, ignorant, flashy. The wives of his friends were not
inspiring to look upon. His own wife had developed a cold, commonplace
nature which to him was anything but pleasing. What he knew of that
under-world where grovel the beat-men of society (and he knew a
great deal) had hardened his nature. He looked upon most women with
suspicion--a single eye to the utility of beauty and dress. He followed
them with a keen, suggestive glance. At the same time, he was not so
dull but that a good woman commanded his respect. Personally, he did not
attempt to analyse the marvel of a saintly woman. He would take off
his hat, and would silence the light-tongued and the vicious in her
presence--much as the Irish keeper of a Bowery hall will humble himself
before a Sister of Mercy, and pay toll to charity with a willing and
reverent hand. But he would not think much upon the question of why he
did so.

A man in his situation who comes, after a long round of worthless or
hardening experiences, upon a young, unsophisticated, innocent soul, is
apt either to hold aloof, out of a sense of his own remoteness, or to
draw near and become fascinated and elated by his discovery. It is only
by a roundabout process that such men ever do draw near such a girl.
They have no method, no understanding of how to ingratiate themselves
in youthful favour, save when they find virtue in the toils. If,
unfortunately, the fly has got caught in the net, the spider can come
forth and talk business upon its own terms. So when maidenhood has
wandered into the moil of the city, when it is brought within the circle
of the "rounder" and the roue, even though it be at the outermost rim,
they can come forth and use their alluring arts.

Hurstwood had gone, at Drouet's invitation, to meet a new baggage of
fine clothes and pretty features. He entered, expecting to indulge in
an evening of lightsome frolic, and then lose track of the newcomer
forever. Instead he found a woman whose youth and beauty attracted him.
In the mild light of Carrie's eye was nothing of the calculation of
the mistress. In the diffident manner was nothing of the art of the
courtesan. He saw at once that a mistake had been made, that some
difficult conditions had pushed this troubled creature into his
presence, and his interest was enlisted. Here sympathy sprang to the
rescue, but it was not unmixed with selfishness. He wanted to win Carrie
because he thought her fate mingled with his was better than if it were
united with Drouet's. He envied the drummer his conquest as he had never
envied any man in all the course of his experience.

Carrie was certainly better than this man, as she was superior,
mentally, to Drouet. She came fresh from the air of the village, the
light of the country still in her eye. Here was neither guile nor
rapacity. There were slight inherited traits of both in her, but they
were rudimentary. She was too full of wonder and desire to be greedy.
She still looked about her upon the great maze of the city without
understanding. Hurstwood felt the bloom and the youth. He picked her as
he would the fresh fruit of a tree. He felt as fresh in her presence as
one who is taken out of the flash of summer to the first cool breath of
spring.

Carrie, left alone since the scene in question, and having no one
with whom to counsel, had at first wandered from one strange mental
conclusion to another, until at last, tired out, she gave it up.
She owed something to Drouet, she thought. It did not seem more than
yesterday that he had aided her when she was worried and distressed. She
had the kindliest feelings for him in every way. She gave him credit
for his good looks, his generous feelings, and even, in fact, failed
to recollect his egotism when he was absent; but she could not feel any
binding influence keeping her for him as against all others. In fact,
such a thought had never had any grounding, even in Drouet's desires.

The truth is, that this goodly drummer carried the doom of all enduring
relationships in his own lightsome manner and unstable fancy. He went
merrily on, assured that he was alluring all, that affection followed
tenderly in his wake, that things would endure unchangingly for his
pleasure. When he missed some old face, or found some door finally shut
to him, it did not grieve him deeply. He was too young, too successful.
He would remain thus young in spirit until he was dead.

As for Hurstwood, he was alive with thoughts and feelings concerning
Carrie. He had no definite plans regarding her, but he was determined to
make her confess an affection for him. He thought he saw in her drooping
eye, her unstable glance, her wavering manner, the symptoms of a budding
passion. He wanted to stand near her and make her lay her hand in
his--he wanted to find out what her next step would be--what the next
sign of feeling for him would be. Such anxiety and enthusiasm had not
affected him for years. He was a youth again in feeling--a cavalier in
action.

In his position opportunity for taking his evenings out was excellent.
He was a most faithful worker in general, and a man who commanded the
confidence of his employers in so far as the distribution of his time
was concerned. He could take such hours off as he chose, for it was well
known that he fulfilled his managerial duties successfully, whatever
time he might take. His grace, tact, and ornate appearance gave the
place an air which was most essential, while at the same time his long
experience made him a most excellent judge of its stock necessities.
Bartenders and assistants might come and go, singly or in groups, but,
so long as he was present, the host of old-time customers would barely
notice the change. He gave the place the atmosphere to which they were
used. Consequently, he arranged his hours very much to suit himself,
taking now an afternoon, now an evening, but invariably returning
between eleven and twelve to witness the last hour or two of the day's
business and look after the closing details.

"You see that things are safe and all the employees are out when you go
home, George," Moy had once remarked to him, and he never once, in all
the period of his long service, neglected to do this. Neither of the
owners had for years been in the resort after five in the afternoon, and
yet their manager as faithfully fulfilled this request as if they had
been there regularly to observe.

On this Friday afternoon, scarcely two days after his previous visit, he
made up his mind to see Carrie. He could not stay away longer.

"Evans," he said, addressing the head barkeeper, "if any one calls, I
will be back between four and five."

He hurried to Madison Street and boarded a horse-car, which carried him
to Ogden Place in half an hour.

Carrie had thought of going for a walk, and had put on a light grey
woollen dress with a jaunty double-breasted jacket. She had out her hat
and gloves, and was fastening a white lace tie about her throat when the
housemaid brought up the information that Mr. Hurstwood wished to see
her.

She started slightly at the announcement, but told the girl to say that
she would come down in a moment, and proceeded to hasten her dressing.

Carrie could not have told herself at this moment whether she was glad
or sorry that the impressive manager was awaiting her presence. She
was slightly flurried and tingling in the cheeks, but it was more
nervousness than either fear or favour. She did not try to conjecture
what the drift of the conversation would be. She only felt that she must
be careful, and that Hurstwood had an indefinable fascination for her.
Then she gave her tie its last touch with her fingers and went below.

The deep-feeling manager was himself a little strained in the nerves by
the thorough consciousness of his mission. He felt that he must make
a strong play on this occasion, but now that the hour was come, and
he heard Carrie's feet upon the stair, his nerve failed him. He sank
a little in determination, for he was not so sure, after all, what her
opinion might be.

When she entered the room, however, her appearance gave him courage. She
looked simple and charming enough to strengthen the daring of any lover.
Her apparent nervousness dispelled his own.

"How are you?" he said, easily. "I could not resist the temptation to
come out this afternoon, it was so pleasant."

"Yes," said Carrie, halting before him, "I was just preparing to go for
a walk myself."

"Oh, were you?" he said. "Supposing, then, you get your hat and we both
go?"

They crossed the park and went west along Washington Boulevard,
beautiful with its broad macadamised road, and large frame houses
set back from the sidewalks. It was a street where many of the more
prosperous residents of the West Side lived, and Hurstwood could not
help feeling nervous over the publicity of it. They had gone but a few
blocks when a livery stable sign in one of the side streets solved the
difficulty for him. He would take her to drive along the new Boulevard.

The Boulevard at that time was little more than a country road. The part
he intended showing her was much farther out on this same West Side,
where there was scarcely a house. It connected Douglas Park with
Washington or South Park, and was nothing more than a neatly MADE road,
running due south for some five miles over an open, grassy prairie, and
then due east over the same kind of prairie for the same distance. There
was not a house to be encountered anywhere along the larger part of the
route, and any conversation would be pleasantly free of interruption.

At the stable he picked a gentle horse, and they were soon out of range
of either public observation or hearing.

"Can you drive?" he said, after a time.

"I never tried," said Carrie.

He put the reins in her hand, and folded his arms.

"You see there's nothing to it much," he said, smilingly.

"Not when you have a gentle horse," said Carrie.

"You can handle a horse as well as any one, after a little practice," he
added, encouragingly.

He had been looking for some time for a break in the conversation when
he could give it a serious turn. Once or twice he had held his peace,
hoping that in silence her thoughts would take the colour of his own,
but she had lightly continued the subject. Presently, however, his
silence controlled the situation. The drift of his thoughts began to
tell. He gazed fixedly at nothing in particular, as if he were thinking
of something which concerned her not at all. His thoughts, however,
spoke for themselves. She was very much aware that a climax was pending.

"Do you know," he said, "I have spent the happiest evenings in years
since I have known you?"

"Have you?" she said, with assumed airiness, but still excited by the
conviction which the tone of his voice carried.

"I was going to tell you the other evening," he added, "but somehow the
opportunity slipped away."

Carrie was listening without attempting to reply. She could think of
nothing worth while to say. Despite all the ideas concerning right
which had troubled her vaguely since she had last seen him, she was now
influenced again strongly in his favour.

"I came out here to-day," he went on, solemnly, "to tell you just how I
feel--to see if you wouldn't listen to me."

Hurstwood was something of a romanticist after his kind. He was capable
of strong feelings--often poetic ones--and under a stress of desire,
such as the present, he waxed eloquent. That is, his feelings and his
voice were coloured with that seeming repression and pathos which is the
essence of eloquence.

"You know," he said, putting his hand on her arm, and keeping a strange
silence while he formulated words, "that I love you?" Carrie did not
stir at the words. She was bound up completely in the man's atmosphere.
He would have churchlike silence in order to express his feelings, and
she kept it. She did not move her eyes from the flat, open scene before
her. Hurstwood waited for a few moments, and then repeated the words.

"You must not say that," she said, weakly.

Her words were not convincing at all. They were the result of a feeble
thought that something ought to be said. He paid no attention to them
whatever.

"Carrie," he said, using her first name with sympathetic familiarity, "I
want you to love me. You don't know how much I need some one to waste a
little affection on me. I am practically alone. There is nothing in my
life that is pleasant or delightful. It's all work and worry with people
who are nothing to me."

As he said this, Hurstwood really imagined that his state was
pitiful. He had the ability to get off at a distance and view himself
objectively--of seeing what he wanted to see in the things which made up
his existence. Now, as he spoke, his voice trembled with that peculiar
vibration which is the result of tensity. It went ringing home to his
companion's heart.

"Why, I should think," she said, turning upon him large eyes which were
full of sympathy and feeling, "that you would be very happy. You know so
much of the world."

"That is it," he said, his voice dropping to a soft minor, "I know too
much of the world."

It was an important thing to her to hear one so well-positioned and
powerful speaking in this manner. She could not help feeling the
strangeness of her situation. How was it that, in so little a while,
the narrow life of the country had fallen from her as a garment, and
the city, with all its mystery, taken its place? Here was this greatest
mystery, the man of money and affairs sitting beside her, appealing
to her. Behold, he had ease and comfort, his strength was great, his
position high, his clothing rich, and yet he was appealing to her. She
could formulate no thought which would be just and right. She troubled
herself no more upon the matter. She only basked in the warmth of his
feeling, which was as a grateful blaze to one who is cold. Hurstwood
glowed with his own intensity, and the heat of his passion was already
melting the wax of his companion's scruples.

"You think," he said, "I am happy; that I ought not to complain? If you
were to meet all day with people who care absolutely nothing about you,
if you went day after day to a place where there was nothing but show
and indifference, if there was not one person in all those you knew to
whom you could appeal for sympathy or talk to with pleasure, perhaps you
would be unhappy too."

He was striking a chord now which found sympathetic response in her
own situation. She knew what it was to meet with people who were
indifferent, to walk alone amid so many who cared absolutely nothing
about you. Had not she? Was not she at this very moment quite alone? Who
was there among all whom she knew to whom she could appeal for sympathy?
Not one. She was left to herself to brood and wonder.

"I could be content," went on Hurstwood, "if I had you to love me. If
I had you to go to; you for a companion. As it is, I simply move about
from place to place without any satisfaction. Time hangs heavily on my
hands. Before you came I did nothing but idle and drift into anything
that offered itself. Since you came--well, I've had you to think about."

The old illusion that here was some one who needed her aid began to grow
in Carrie's mind. She truly pitied this sad, lonely figure. To think
that all his fine state should be so barren for want of her; that he
needed to make such an appeal when she herself was lonely and without
anchor. Surely, this was too bad.

"I am not very bad," he said, apologetically, as if he owed it to her to
explain on this score. "You think, probably, that I roam around, and get
into all sorts of evil? I have been rather reckless, but I could easily
come out of that. I need you to draw me back, if my life ever amounts to
anything."

Carrie looked at him with the tenderness which virtue ever feels in
its hope of reclaiming vice. How could such a man need reclaiming? His
errors, what were they, that she could correct? Small they must be,
where all was so fine. At worst, they were gilded affairs, and with what
leniency are gilded errors viewed. He put himself in such a lonely light
that she was deeply moved.

"Is it that way?" she mused.

He slipped his arm about her waist, and she could not find the heart to
draw away. With his free hand he seized upon her fingers. A breath of
soft spring wind went bounding over the road, rolling some brown
twigs of the previous autumn before it. The horse paced leisurely on,
unguided.

"Tell me," he said, softly, "that you love me."

Her eyes fell consciously.

"Own to it, dear," he said, feelingly; "you do, don't you?"

She made no answer, but he felt his victory.

"Tell me," he said, richly, drawing her so close that their lips were
near together. He pressed her hand warmly, and then released it to touch
her cheek.

"You do?" he said, pressing his lips to her own.

For answer, her lips replied.

"Now," he said, joyously, his fine eyes ablaze, "you're my own girl,
aren't you?"

By way of further conclusion, her head lay softly upon his shoulder.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: Carrie continues to grow more graceful and charming as the days pass. Drouet seeks to help along her change by making tactless and stupidly cruel comparisons with other women; he has no awareness of Carrie's extreme sensitivity. One evening as she sits alone listening to a piano being played in the next apartment she is moved to tears by the combination of its wistful sadness and her own mood. She is crying when Drouet arrives; he makes the absurd suggestion that they waltz to the music. "It was his first great mistake." Returning from a business trip one evening, Drouet meets an old female acquaintance and invites her to dinner. To the chagrin of Drouet, Hurstwood enters the same restaurant and sees the two together. Drouet feels embarrassed and guilty, thinking correctly that Hurstwood will interpret this as a sign that Drouet is already growing tired of Carrie. A few days later the couple receives an invitation from Hurstwood to join him at the theater. Carrie is concerned that Drouet might notice her readiness to break an engagement for Hurstwood that she was reluctant to break for him. His egotism is so strong, however, that the detail escapes his notice. Carrie recognizes not only that Hurstwood is the superior man, but also that he looks upon her with more than companionable affection. Drouet is losing Carrie's heart as quickly as Hurstwood gains it, but he is too sure of himself ever to suspect this. In the meantime, Mrs. Hurstwood suspects her husband's tendencies, although she is not yet aware of his "moral defection." It is her nature to wait and brood upon revenge. Because much of his property is in her name Hurstwood behaves very carefully, since he could not be sure what she might do if she became dissatisfied. Realizing that all love between them has been lost over the years, Hurstwood is inclined to turn his back on the relationship, but Mrs. Hurstwood expects complete adherence to the forms of marriage, even though the spirit has waned. Nevertheless, Hurstwood begins to excuse himself more and more from family and social matters. His interest in "Drouet's little shop girl" grows in proportion to his marital discontent. As for Carrie herself, she begins to acquire a sense of taste and wealth which guides her desire. Her neighbor, Mrs. Hale, with whom she walks and rides frequently, awakens the "siren voice of the unrestful" whispering in Carrie's ear. Sadly, Carrie longs for the power of affluence, which she is certain dispels all care and bestows every felicity. One afternoon after a drive with Mrs. Hale, Carrie sits at home in her rocking chair by the window, feeling lonely and forsaken. Although she has seen little of Hurstwood through the long winter, she has kept him in mind by the strong impression their few meetings together had made on her. The manager arrives at that moment, and his presence and graceful manner and warmth cause Carrie to brighten until "all her best side is exhibited." Hurstwood's glances and light touches of the hand are as effective upon Carrie as the spoken words of a lover. They require no immediate decision or answer, only a warm response. Eventually, Hurstwood forces Carrie to admit that she is unhappy and dissatisfied with her life as it is. She becomes distressed by her own frankness and when Hurstwood departs, troubled and ashamed, she looks into the mirror, saying aloud, "I'm getting terrible... I don't seem to do anything right." Hurstwood feels that a liaison with Carrie would provide him with a new opportunity for real life. Carrie's youth, naivete, and vitality seem to compensate for all the deceit experience has led him to find in women. He wants to win Carrie and sincerely believes that "her fate mingled with his" would be far "better than if it were united with Drouet's." Carrie compares the two men in her mind and sees that Drouet is the type who carries the "doom of all enduring relationships in his own lightsome manner and unstable fancy." He is too youthful to grieve long over a departed lover. She does realize, however, that Hurstwood has not yet formulated any plans except to accelerate the progress of their affection for each other. Two days after their previous meeting, Hurstwood returns once again and he and Carrie go for a walk. Because he feels that he might be seen by someone who should not see him, Hurstwood suggests that they take a drive on the Boulevard, a country road where houses are just beginning to appear. Hurstwood turns on his full passionate charm, confessing to Carrie that he loves her. This produces no visible effect, so he turns next to an appeal to her pity. Carrie can form no words or even thoughts; but she sees that Hurstwood's complaint of having no one to sympathize with him or show more than indifference is her complaint as well. "Tell me that you love me," says Hurstwood. "Own to it." Carrie makes no answer but simply responds to Hurstwood's kiss. He asks then if she is now his "own girl." In response, she lays her head upon his shoulder.


prompt:
Chapter: Carrie in her rooms that evening was in a fine glow, physically and
mentally. She was deeply rejoicing in her affection for Hurstwood and
his love, and looked forward with fine fancy to their next meeting
Sunday night. They had agreed, without any feeling of enforced secrecy,
that she should come down town and meet him, though, after all, the need
of it was the cause.

Mrs. Hale, from her upper window, saw her come in.

"Um," she thought to herself, "she goes riding with another man when her
husband is out of the city. He had better keep an eye on her."

The truth is that Mrs. Hale was not the only one who had a thought on
this score. The housemaid who had welcomed Hurstwood had her opinion
also. She had no particular regard for Carrie, whom she took to be cold
and disagreeable. At the same time, she had a fancy for the merry and
easy-mannered Drouet, who threw her a pleasant remark now and then, and
in other ways extended her the evidence of that regard which he had for
all members of the sex. Hurstwood was more reserved and critical in
his manner. He did not appeal to this bodiced functionary in the same
pleasant way. She wondered that he came so frequently, that Mrs. Drouet
should go out with him this afternoon when Mr. Drouet was absent.
She gave vent to her opinions in the kitchen where the cook was. As a
result, a hum of gossip was set going which moved about the house in
that secret manner common to gossip.

Carrie, now that she had yielded sufficiently to Hurstwood to confess
her affection, no longer troubled about her attitude towards him.
Temporarily she gave little thought to Drouet, thinking only of the
dignity and grace of her lover and of his consuming affection for her.
On the first evening, she did little but go over the details of the
afternoon. It was the first time her sympathies had ever been thoroughly
aroused, and they threw a new light on her character. She had some
power of initiative, latent before, which now began to exert itself. She
looked more practically upon her state and began to see glimmerings of
a way out. Hurstwood seemed a drag in the direction of honour. Her
feelings were exceedingly creditable, in that they constructed out
of these recent developments something which conquered freedom from
dishonour. She had no idea what Hurstwood's next word would be. She
only took his affection to be a fine thing, and appended better, more
generous results accordingly.

As yet, Hurstwood had only a thought of pleasure without responsibility.
He did not feel that he was doing anything to complicate his life. His
position was secure, his home-life, if not satisfactory, was at least
undisturbed, his personal liberty rather untrammelled. Carrie's love
represented only so much added pleasure. He would enjoy this new gift
over and above his ordinary allowance of pleasure. He would be happy
with her and his own affairs would go on as they had, undisturbed.

On Sunday evening Carrie dined with him at a place he had selected in
East Adams Street, and thereafter they took a cab to what was then a
pleasant evening resort out on Cottage Grove Avenue near 39th Street.
In the process of his declaration he soon realised that Carrie took
his love upon a higher basis than he had anticipated. She kept him at
a distance in a rather earnest way, and submitted only to those tender
tokens of affection which better become the inexperienced lover.
Hurstwood saw that she was not to be possessed for the asking, and
deferred pressing his suit too warmly.

Since he feigned to believe in her married state he found that he had to
carry out the part. His triumph, he saw, was still at a little distance.
How far he could not guess.

They were returning to Ogden Place in the cab, when he asked:

"When will I see you again?"

"I don't know," she answered, wondering herself.

"Why not come down to The Fair," he suggested, "next Tuesday?"

She shook her head.

"Not so soon," she answered.

"I'll tell you what I'll do," he added. "I'll write you, care of this
West Side Post-office. Could you call next Tuesday?"

Carrie assented.

The cab stopped one door out of the way according to his call.

"Good-night," he whispered, as the cab rolled away.

Unfortunately for the smooth progression of this affair, Drouet
returned. Hurstwood was sitting in his imposing little office the next
afternoon when he saw Drouet enter.

"Why, hello, Charles," he called affably; "back again?"

"Yes," smiled Drouet, approaching and looking in at the door.

Hurstwood arose.

"Well," he said, looking the drummer over, "rosy as ever, eh?"

They began talking of the people they knew and things that had happened.

"Been home yet?" finally asked Hurstwood.

"No, I am going, though," said Drouet.

"I remembered the little girl out there," said Hurstwood, "and called
once. Thought you wouldn't want her left quite alone."

"Right you are," agreed Drouet. "How is she?"

"Very well," said Hurstwood. "Rather anxious about you though. You'd
better go out now and cheer her up."

"I will," said Drouet, smilingly.

"Like to have you both come down and go to the show with me Wednesday,"
concluded Hurstwood at parting.

"Thanks, old man," said his friend, "I'll see what the girl says and let
you know."

They separated in the most cordial manner.

"There's a nice fellow," Drouet thought to himself as he turned the
corner towards Madison.

"Drouet is a good fellow," Hurstwood thought to himself as he went back
into his office, "but he's no man for Carrie."

The thought of the latter turned his mind into a most pleasant vein, and
he wandered how he would get ahead of the drummer.

When Drouet entered Carrie's presence, he caught her in his arms as
usual, but she responded to his kiss with a tremour of opposition.

"Well," he said, "I had a great trip."

"Did you? How did you come out with that La Crosse man you were telling
me about?"

"Oh, fine; sold him a complete line. There was another fellow there,
representing Burnstein, a regular hook-nosed sheeny, but he wasn't in
it. I made him look like nothing at all."

As he undid his collar and unfastened his studs, preparatory to washing
his face and changing his clothes, he dilated upon his trip. Carrie
could not help listening with amusement to his animated descriptions.

"I tell you," he said, "I surprised the people at the office. I've sold
more goods this last quarter than any other man of our house on the
road. I sold three thousand dollars' worth in La Crosse."

He plunged his face in a basin of water, and puffed and blew as he
rubbed his neck and ears with his hands, while Carrie gazed upon him
with mingled thoughts of recollection and present judgment. He was still
wiping his face, when he continued:

"I'm going to strike for a raise in June. They can afford to pay it, as
much business as I turn in. I'll get it too, don't you forget."

"I hope you do," said Carrie.

"And then if that little real estate deal I've got on goes through,
we'll get married," he said with a great show of earnestness, the while
he took his place before the mirror and began brushing his hair.

"I don't believe you ever intend to marry me, Charlie," Carrie said
ruefully. The recent protestations of Hurstwood had given her courage to
say this.

"Oh, yes I do--course I do--what put that into your head?"

He had stopped his trifling before the mirror now and crossed over to
her. For the first time Carrie felt as if she must move away from him.

"But you've been saying that so long," she said, looking with her pretty
face upturned into his.

"Well, and I mean it too, but it takes money to live as I want to.
Now, when I get this increase, I can come pretty near fixing things all
right, and I'll do it. Now, don't you worry, girlie."

He patted her reassuringly upon the shoulder, but Carrie felt how really
futile had been her hopes. She could clearly see that this easy-going
soul intended no move in her behalf. He was simply letting things drift
because he preferred the free round of his present state to any legal
trammellings.

In contrast, Hurstwood appeared strong and sincere. He had no easy
manner of putting her off. He sympathised with her and showed her what
her true value was. He needed her, while Drouet did not care.

"Oh, no," she said remorsefully, her tone reflecting some of her own
success and more of her helplessness, "you never will."

"Well, you wait a little while and see," he concluded. "I'll marry you
all right."

Carrie looked at him and felt justified. She was looking for something
which would calm her conscience, and here it was, a light, airy
disregard of her claims upon his justice. He had faithfully promised to
marry her, and this was the way he fulfilled his promise.

"Say," he said, after he had, as he thought, pleasantly disposed of the
marriage question, "I saw Hurstwood to-day, and he wants us to go to the
theatre with him."

Carrie started at the name, but recovered quickly enough to avoid
notice.

"When?" she asked, with assumed indifference.

"Wednesday. We'll go, won't we?"

"If you think so," she answered, her manner being so enforcedly reserved
as to almost excite suspicion. Drouet noticed something but he thought
it was due to her feelings concerning their talk about marriage. "He
called once, he said."

"Yes," said Carrie, "he was out here Sunday evening."

"Was he?" said Drouet. "I thought from what he said that he had called a
week or so ago."

"So he did," answered Carrie, who was wholly unaware of what
conversation her lovers might have held. She was all at sea mentally,
and fearful of some entanglement which might ensue from what she would
answer.

"Oh, then he called twice?" said Drouet, the first shade of
misunderstanding showing in his face.

"Yes," said Carrie innocently, feeling now that Hurstwood must have
mentioned but one call.

Drouet imagined that he must have misunderstood his friend. He did not
attach particular importance to the information, after all.

"What did he have to say?" he queried, with slightly increased
curiosity.

"He said he came because he thought I might be lonely. You hadn't been
in there so long he wondered what had become of you."

"George is a fine fellow," said Drouet, rather gratified by his
conception of the manager's interest. "Come on and we'll go out to
dinner."

When Hurstwood saw that Drouet was back he wrote at once to Carrie,
saying:

"I told him I called on you, dearest, when he was away. I did not say
how often, but he probably thought once. Let me know of anything you may
have said. Answer by special messenger when you get this, and, darling,
I must see you. Let me know if you can't meet me at Jackson and Throop
Streets Wednesday afternoon at two o'clock. I want to speak with you
before we meet at the theatre."

Carrie received this Tuesday morning when she called at the West Side
branch of the post-office, and answered at once.

"I said you called twice," she wrote. "He didn't seem to mind. I will
try and be at Throop Street if nothing interferes. I seem to be getting
very bad. It's wrong to act as I do, I know."

Hurstwood, when he met her as agreed, reassured her on this score.

"You mustn't worry, sweetheart," he said. "Just as soon as he goes on
the road again we will arrange something. We'll fix it so that you won't
have to deceive any one."

Carrie imagined that he would marry her at once, though he had not
directly said so, and her spirits rose. She proposed to make the best of
the situation until Drouet left again.

"Don't show any more interest in me than you ever have," Hurstwood
counselled concerning the evening at the theatre.

"You mustn't look at me steadily then," she answered, mindful of the
power of his eyes.

"I won't," he said, squeezing her hand at parting and giving the glance
she had just cautioned against.

"There," she said playfully, pointing a finger at him.

"The show hasn't begun yet," he returned.

He watched her walk from him with tender solicitation. Such youth and
prettiness reacted upon him more subtly than wine.

At the theatre things passed as they had in Hurstwood's favour. If he
had been pleasing to Carrie before, how much more so was he now. His
grace was more permeating because it found a readier medium. Carrie
watched his every movement with pleasure. She almost forgot poor Drouet,
who babbled on as if he were the host.

Hurstwood was too clever to give the slightest indication of a change.
He paid, if anything, more attention to his old friend than usual,
and yet in no way held him up to that subtle ridicule which a lover in
favour may so secretly practise before the mistress of his heart. If
anything, he felt the injustice of the game as it stood, and was not
cheap enough to add to it the slightest mental taunt.

Only the play produced an ironical situation, and this was due to Drouet
alone.

The scene was one in "The Covenant," in which the wife listened to the
seductive voice of a lover in the absence of her husband.

"Served him right," said Drouet afterward, even in view of her keen
expiation of her error. "I haven't any pity for a man who would be such
a chump as that."

"Well, you never can tell," returned Hurstwood gently. "He probably
thought he was right."

"Well, a man ought to be more attentive than that to his wife if he
wants to keep her."

They had come out of the lobby and made their way through the showy
crush about the entrance way.

"Say, mister," said a voice at Hurstwood's side, "would you mind giving
me the price of a bed?"

Hurstwood was interestedly remarking to Carrie.

"Honest to God, mister, I'm without a place to sleep."

The plea was that of a gaunt-faced man of about thirty, who looked the
picture of privation and wretchedness. Drouet was the first to see.
He handed over a dime with an upwelling feeling of pity in his heart.
Hurstwood scarcely noticed the incident. Carrie quickly forgot.

The complete ignoring by Hurstwood of his own home came with the growth
of his affection for Carrie. His actions, in all that related to his
family, were of the most perfunctory kind. He sat at breakfast with
his wife and children, absorbed in his own fancies, which reached far
without the realm of their interests. He read his paper, which was
heightened in interest by the shallowness of the themes discussed by
his son and daughter. Between himself and his wife ran a river of
indifference.

Now that Carrie had come, he was in a fair way to be blissful again.
There was delight in going down town evenings. When he walked forth
in the short days, the street lamps had a merry twinkle. He began to
experience the almost forgotten feeling which hastens the lover's feet.
When he looked at his fine clothes, he saw them with her eyes--and her
eyes were young.

When in the flush of such feelings he heard his wife's voice, when
the insistent demands of matrimony recalled him from dreams to a stale
practice, how it grated. He then knew that this was a chain which bound
his feet.

"George," said Mrs. Hurstwood, in that tone of voice which had long
since come to be associated in his mind with demands, "we want you to
get us a season ticket to the races."

"Do you want to go to all of them?" he said with a rising inflection.

"Yes," she answered.

The races in question were soon to open at Washington Park, on the South
Side, and were considered quite society affairs among those who did not
affect religious rectitude and conservatism. Mrs. Hurstwood had
never asked for a whole season ticket before, but this year certain
considerations decided her to get a box. For one thing, one of her
neighbours, a certain Mr. and Mrs. Ramsey, who were possessors of money,
made out of the coal business, had done so. In the next place, her
favourite physician, Dr. Beale, a gentleman inclined to horses and
betting, had talked with her concerning his intention to enter a
two-year-old in the Derby. In the third place, she wished to exhibit
Jessica, who was gaining in maturity and beauty, and whom she hoped to
marry to a man of means. Her own desire to be about in such things
and parade among her acquaintances and common throng was as much an
incentive as anything.

Hurstwood thought over the proposition a few moments without answering.
They were in the sitting room on the second floor, waiting for supper.
It was the evening of his engagement with Carrie and Drouet to see "The
Covenant," which had brought him home to make some alterations in his
dress.

"You're sure separate tickets wouldn't do as well?" he asked, hesitating
to say anything more rugged.

"No," she replied impatiently.

"Well," he said, taking offence at her manner, "you needn't get mad
about it. I'm just asking you."

"I'm not mad," she snapped. "I'm merely asking you for a season ticket."

"And I'm telling you," he returned, fixing a clear, steady eye on her,
"that it's no easy thing to get. I'm not sure whether the manager will
give it to me."

He had been thinking all the time of his "pull" with the race-track
magnates.

"We can buy it then," she exclaimed sharply.

"You talk easy," he said. "A season family ticket costs one hundred and
fifty dollars."

"I'll not argue with you," she replied with determination. "I want the
ticket and that's all there is to it."

She had risen, and now walked angrily out of the room.

"Well, you get it then," he said grimly, though in a modified tone of
voice.

As usual, the table was one short that evening.

The next morning he had cooled down considerably, and later the ticket
was duly secured, though it did not heal matters. He did not mind giving
his family a fair share of all that he earned, but he did not like to be
forced to provide against his will.

"Did you know, mother," said Jessica another day, "the Spencers are
getting ready to go away?"

"No. Where, I wonder?"

"Europe," said Jessica. "I met Georgine yesterday and she told me. She
just put on more airs about it."

"Did she say when?"

"Monday, I think. They'll get a notice in the papers again--they always
do."

"Never mind," said Mrs. Hurstwood consolingly, "we'll go one of these
days."

Hurstwood moved his eyes over the paper slowly, but said nothing.

"'We sail for Liverpool from New York,'" Jessica exclaimed, mocking her
acquaintance. "'Expect to spend most of the "summah" in France,'--vain
thing. As If it was anything to go to Europe."

"It must be if you envy her so much," put in Hurstwood.

It grated upon him to see the feeling his daughter displayed.

"Don't worry over them, my dear," said Mrs. Hurstwood.

"Did George get off?" asked Jessica of her mother another day, thus
revealing something that Hurstwood had heard nothing about.

"Where has he gone?" he asked, looking up. He had never before been kept
in ignorance concerning departures.

"He was going to Wheaton," said Jessica, not noticing the slight put
upon her father.

"What's out there?" he asked, secretly irritated and chagrined to think
that he should be made to pump for information in this manner.

"A tennis match," said Jessica.

"He didn't say anything to me," Hurstwood concluded, finding it
difficult to refrain from a bitter tone.

"I guess he must have forgotten," exclaimed his wife blandly. In the
past he had always commanded a certain amount of respect, which was a
compound of appreciation and awe. The familiarity which in part still
existed between himself and his daughter he had courted. As it was, it
did not go beyond the light assumption of words. The TONE was always
modest. Whatever had been, however, had lacked affection, and now he saw
that he was losing track of their doings. His knowledge was no longer
intimate. He sometimes saw them at table, and sometimes did not. He
heard of their doings occasionally, more often not. Some days he found
that he was all at sea as to what they were talking about--things they
had arranged to do or that they had done in his absence. More affecting
was the feeling that there were little things going on of which he no
longer heard. Jessica was beginning to feel that her affairs were her
own. George, Jr., flourished about as if he were a man entirely and must
needs have private matters. All this Hurstwood could see, and it left a
trace of feeling, for he was used to being considered--in his official
position, at least--and felt that his importance should not begin
to wane here. To darken it all, he saw the same indifference and
independence growing in his wife, while he looked on and paid the bills.

He consoled himself with the thought, however, that, after all, he was
not without affection. Things might go as they would at his house, but
he had Carrie outside of it. With his mind's eye he looked into her
comfortable room in Ogden Place, where he had spent several such
delightful evenings, and thought how charming it would be when Drouet
was disposed of entirely and she was waiting evenings in cosey little
quarters for him. That no cause would come up whereby Drouet would be
led to inform Carrie concerning his married state, he felt hopeful.
Things were going so smoothly that he believed they would not change.
Shortly now he would persuade Carrie and all would be satisfactory.

The day after their theatre visit he began writing her regularly--a
letter every morning, and begging her to do as much for him. He was
not literary by any means, but experience of the world and his growing
affection gave him somewhat of a style. This he exercised at his
office desk with perfect deliberation. He purchased a box of delicately
coloured and scented writing paper in monogram, which he kept locked
in one of the drawers. His friends now wondered at the cleric and very
official-looking nature of his position. The five bartenders viewed with
respect the duties which could call a man to do so much desk-work and
penmanship.

Hurstwood surprised himself with his fluency. By the natural law which
governs all effort, what he wrote reacted upon him. He began to feel
those subtleties which he could find words to express. With every
expression came increased conception. Those inmost breathings which
there found words took hold upon him. He thought Carrie worthy of all
the affection he could there express.

Carrie was indeed worth loving if ever youth and grace are to command
that token of acknowledgment from life in their bloom. Experience had
not yet taken away that freshness of the spirit which is the charm of
the body. Her soft eyes contained in their liquid lustre no suggestion
of the knowledge of disappointment. She had been troubled in a way by
doubt and longing, but these had made no deeper impression than could be
traced in a certain open wistfulness of glance and speech. The mouth had
the expression at times, in talking and in repose, of one who might be
upon the verge of tears. It was not that grief was thus ever present.
The pronunciation of certain syllables gave to her lips this peculiarity
of formation--a formation as suggestive and moving as pathos itself.

There was nothing bold in her manner. Life had not taught her
domination--superciliousness of grace, which is the lordly power of some
women. Her longing for consideration was not sufficiently powerful to
move her to demand it. Even now she lacked self-assurance, but there was
that in what she had already experienced which left her a little less
than timid. She wanted pleasure, she wanted position, and yet she was
confused as to what these things might be. Every hour the kaleidoscope
of human affairs threw a new lustre upon something, and therewith it
became for her the desired--the all. Another shift of the box, and some
other had become the beautiful, the perfect.

On her spiritual side, also, she was rich in feeling, as such a nature
well might be. Sorrow in her was aroused by many a spectacle--an
uncritical upwelling of grief for the weak and the helpless. She was
constantly pained by the sight of the white-faced, ragged men who
slopped desperately by her in a sort of wretched mental stupor. The
poorly clad girls who went blowing by her window evenings, hurrying home
from some of the shops of the West Side, she pitied from the depths of
her heart. She would stand and bite her lips as they passed, shaking her
little head and wondering. They had so little, she thought. It was so
sad to be ragged and poor. The hang of faded clothes pained her eyes.

"And they have to work so hard!" was her only comment.

On the street sometimes she would see men working--Irishmen with picks,
coal-heavers with great loads to shovel, Americans busy about some work
which was a mere matter of strength--and they touched her fancy. Toil,
now that she was free of it, seemed even a more desolate thing than when
she was part of it. She saw it through a mist of fancy--a pale, sombre
half-light, which was the essence of poetic feeling. Her old father,
in his flour-dusted miller's suit, sometimes returned to her in memory,
revived by a face in a window. A shoemaker pegging at his last, a
blastman seen through a narrow window in some basement where iron was
being melted, a bench-worker seen high aloft in some window, his coat
off, his sleeves rolled up; these took her back in fancy to the details
of the mill. She felt, though she seldom expressed them, sad thoughts
upon this score. Her sympathies were ever with that under-world of toil
from which she had so recently sprung, and which she best understood.

Though Hurstwood did not know it, he was dealing with one whose feelings
were as tender and as delicate as this. He did not know, but it was this
in her, after all, which attracted him. He never attempted to analyse
the nature of his affection. It was sufficient that there was tenderness
in her eye, weakness in her manner, good nature and hope in her
thoughts. He drew near this lily, which had sucked its waxen beauty and
perfume from below a depth of waters which he had never penetrated,
and out of ooze and mould which he could not understand. He drew near
because it was waxen and fresh. It lightened his feelings for him. It
made the morning worth while.

In a material way, she was considerably improved. Her awkwardness had
all but passed, leaving, if anything, a quaint residue which was as
pleasing as perfect grace. Her little shoes now fitted her smartly
and had high heels. She had learned much about laces and those little
neckpieces which add so much to a woman's appearance. Her form had
filled out until it was admirably plump and well-rounded.

Hurstwood wrote her one morning, asking her to meet him in Jefferson
Park, Monroe Street. He did not consider it policy to call any more,
even when Drouet was at home.

The next afternoon he was in the pretty little park by one, and had
found a rustic bench beneath the green leaves of a lilac bush which
bordered one of the paths. It was at that season of the year when the
fulness of spring had not yet worn quite away. At a little pond near by
some cleanly dressed children were sailing white canvas boats. In the
shade of a green pagoda a bebuttoned officer of the law was resting, his
arms folded, his club at rest in his belt. An old gardener was upon the
lawn, with a pair of pruning shears, looking after some bushes. High
overhead was the clean blue sky of the new summer, and in the thickness
of the shiny green leaves of the trees hopped and twittered the busy
sparrows.

Hurstwood had come out of his own home that morning feeling much of the
same old annoyance. At his store he had idled, there being no need to
write. He had come away to this place with the lightness of heart which
characterises those who put weariness behind. Now, in the shade of this
cool, green bush, he looked about him with the fancy of the lover. He
heard the carts go lumbering by upon the neighbouring streets, but they
were far off, and only buzzed upon his ear. The hum of the surrounding
city was faint, the clang of an occasional bell was as music. He looked
and dreamed a new dream of pleasure which concerned his present fixed
condition not at all. He got back in fancy to the old Hurstwood, who was
neither married nor fixed in a solid position for life. He remembered
the light spirit in which he once looked after the girls--how he had
danced, escorted them home, hung over their gates. He almost wished he
was back there again--here in this pleasant scene he felt as if he were
wholly free.

At two Carrie came tripping along the walk toward him, rosy and clean.
She had just recently donned a sailor hat for the season with a band of
pretty white-dotted blue silk. Her skirt was of a rich blue material,
and her shirt waist matched it, with a thin-stripe of blue upon a
snow-white ground--stripes that were as fine as hairs. Her brown shoes
peeped occasionally from beneath her skirt. She carried her gloves in
her hand.

Hurstwood looked up at her with delight.

"You came, dearest," he said eagerly, standing to meet her and taking
her hand.

"Of course," she said, smiling; "did you think I wouldn't?"

"I didn't know," he replied.

He looked at her forehead, which was moist from her brisk walk. Then he
took out one of his own soft, scented silk handkerchiefs and touched her
face here and there.

"Now," he said affectionately, "you're all right."

They were happy in being near one another--in looking into each other's
eyes. Finally, when the long flush of delight had sub sided, he said:

"When is Charlie going away again?"

"I don't know," she answered. "He says he has some things to do for the
house here now."

Hurstwood grew serious, and he lapsed into quiet thought. He looked up
after a time to say:

"Come away and leave him."

He turned his eyes to the boys with the boats, as if the request were of
little importance.

"Where would we go?" she asked in much the same manner, rolling her
gloves, and looking into a neighbouring tree.

"Where do you want to go?" he enquired.

There was something in the tone in which he said this which made her
feel as if she must record her feelings against any local habitation.

"We can't stay in Chicago," she replied.

He had no thought that this was in her mind--that any removal would be
suggested.

"Why not?" he asked softly.

"Oh, because," she said, "I wouldn't want to."

He listened to this with but dull perception of what it meant. It had no
serious ring to it. The question was not up for immediate decision.

"I would have to give up my position," he said.

The tone he used made it seem as if the matter deserved only slight
consideration. Carrie thought a little, the while enjoying the pretty
scene.

"I wouldn't like to live in Chicago and him here," she said, thinking of
Drouet.

"It's a big town, dearest," Hurstwood answered. "It would be as good as
moving to another part of the country to move to the South Side."

He had fixed upon that region as an objective point.

"Anyhow," said Carrie, "I shouldn't want to get married as long as he is
here. I wouldn't want to run away."

The suggestion of marriage struck Hurstwood forcibly. He saw clearly
that this was her idea--he felt that it was not to be gotten over
easily. Bigamy lightened the horizon of his shadowy thoughts for a
moment. He wondered for the life of him how it would all come out. He
could not see that he was making any progress save in her regard. When
he looked at her now, he thought her beautiful. What a thing it was to
have her love him, even if it be entangling! She increased in value in
his eyes because of her objection. She was something to struggle for,
and that was everything. How different from the women who yielded
willingly! He swept the thought of them from his mind.

"And you don't know when he'll go away?" asked Hurstwood, quietly.

She shook her head.

He sighed.

"You're a determined little miss, aren't you?" he said, after a few
moments, looking up into her eyes.

She felt a wave of feeling sweep over her at this. It was pride at
what seemed his admiration--affection for the man who could feel this
concerning her.

"No," she said coyly, "but what can I do?"

Again he folded his hands and looked away over the lawn into the street.

"I wish," he said pathetically, "you would come to me. I don't like to
be away from you this way. What good is there in waiting? You're not any
happier, are you?"

"Happier!" she exclaimed softly, "you know better than that."

"Here we are then," he went on in the same tone, "wasting our days. If
you are not happy, do you think I am? I sit and write to you the biggest
part of the time. I'll tell you what, Carrie," he exclaimed, throwing
sudden force of expression into his voice and fixing her with his eyes,
"I can't live without you, and that's all there is to it. Now," he
concluded, showing the palm of one of his white hands in a sort of
at-an-end, helpless expression, "what shall I do?"

This shifting of the burden to her appealed to Carrie. The semblance of
the load without the weight touched the woman's heart.

"Can't you wait a little while yet?" she said tenderly. "I'll try and
find out when he's going."

"What good will it do?" he asked, holding the same strain of feeling.

"Well, perhaps we can arrange to go somewhere."

She really did not see anything clearer than before, but she was getting
into that frame of mind where, out of sympathy, a woman yields.

Hurstwood did not understand. He was wondering how she was to be
persuaded--what appeal would move her to forsake Drouet. He began to
wonder how far her affection for him would carry her. He was thinking of
some question which would make her tell.

Finally he hit upon one of those problematical propositions which often
disguise our own desires while leading us to an understanding of the
difficulties which others make for us, and so discover for us a way. It
had not the slightest connection with anything intended on his part, and
was spoken at random before he had given it a moment's serious thought.

"Carrie," he said, looking into her face and assuming a serious look
which he did not feel, "suppose I were to come to you next week, or this
week for that matter--to-night say--and tell you I had to go away--that
I couldn't stay another minute and wasn't coming back any more--would
you come with me?" His sweetheart viewed him with the most affectionate
glance, her answer ready before the words were out of his mouth.

"Yes," she said.

"You wouldn't stop to argue or arrange?"

"Not if you couldn't wait."

He smiled when he saw that she took him seriously, and he thought what a
chance it would afford for a possible junket of a week or two. He had
a notion to tell her that he was joking and so brush away her sweet
seriousness, but the effect of it was too delightful. He let it stand.

"Suppose we didn't have time to get married here?" he added, an
afterthought striking him.

"If we got married as soon as we got to the other end of the journey it
would be all right."

"I meant that," he said.

"Yes."

The morning seemed peculiarly bright to him now. He wondered whatever
could have put such a thought into his head. Impossible as it was, he
could not help smiling at its cleverness. It showed how she loved him.
There was no doubt in his mind now, and he would find a way to win her.

"Well," he said, jokingly, "I'll come and get you one of these
evenings," and then he laughed.

"I wouldn't stay with you, though, if you didn't marry me," Carrie added
reflectively.

"I don't want you to," he said tenderly, taking her hand.

She was extremely happy now that she understood. She loved him the
more for thinking that he would rescue her so. As for him, the marriage
clause did not dwell in his mind. He was thinking that with such
affection there could be no bar to his eventual happiness.

"Let's stroll about," he said gayly, rising and surveying all the lovely
park.

"All right," said Carrie.

They passed the young Irishman, who looked after them with envious eyes.

"'Tis a foine couple," he observed to himself. "They must be rich."

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: Even as her neighbor Mrs. Hale is spreading gossip about the rooming house, Carrie reflects on her situation with Drouet and begins to see hope of a way out, mistakenly perceiving in Hurstwood an advance toward honor and self-respect. Hurstwood, however, thinks only of "pleasure without responsibility." He wishes to do nothing that would "complicate his life." During their next meeting Hurstwood realizes that Carrie takes their love "on a much higher basis" than he believed. She holds him off, granting only "tokens of affection." Hurstwood sees that Carrie will be no easy conquest and so resolves to control his ardor. Hurstwood pretends to believe that Carrie is actually married to Drouet, and hopes that Drouet will not tell Carrie that he has a wife and family. When Drouet returns home from his business trip, Carrie once again poses the question of marriage. Of course Drouet does not plan to marry her, even in the distant future. Carrie therefore feels justified in her affair with Hurstwood, believing that it will lead to the secure and honorable state of matrimony. Drouet and Carrie accept an invitation from Hurstwood to attend the theater. A secret letter to Carrie from Hurstwood asks her to meet him in the afternoon before the performance. At that time the lovers agree not to show any interest in each other when Drouet is present. That evening, Hurstwood is particularly attentive to his old friend Drouet and strives to avoid "that subtle ridicule which a lover in favor may so secretly practice before the mistress of his heart." It is difficult, because in the play "The Covenant," a young wife listens willingly to her seductive lover while her husband is away. "Served him right," remarks Drouet, speaking of the husband, "I haven't any pity for a man who would be such a chump as that." Hurstwood answers gently that "you can never tell"; perhaps the man thought he was right. Emerging from the theater Hurstwood is approached by a panhandler but, blinded by the presence of Carrie, he does not even see the fellow. The good-natured Drouet quickly responds to the man's plight "with an upwelling feeling of pity in his heart." The occurrence is scarcely noticed by the lovers. At home, the details of Hurstwood's marriage show that it is going into a crisis. He is continually more put off by his wife's self-centered demands and his children's shallow behavior. Hurstwood begins writing daily letters to Carrie from his office. Each new sentence allows him to feel the subtleties that he tries to express. He loves Carrie for her youth, beauty, and her good nature. She is sympathetic and kind to him and full of pity for all who suffer. All these qualities make Carrie a "waxen lily" in Hurstwood's eyes. He begins to feel youthful himself. The lovers meet in the park to discuss the future. Carrie says that she is willing to leave Drouet anytime if Hurstwood consents to marry her. Her refusal merely to become his mistress causes Hurstwood to be even more in love with her. To test her affection for him, Hurstwood asks with unconscious irony if she would leave Chicago with him without notice. Of course she will, if he will marry her, is the reply. Hurstwood did not mean the question to be taken so seriously. He replies jokingly, "I'll come and get you one of these evenings," and then laughs.