Joan Thursday

resembling a thin layer of decayed rubber, had once been bright linoleum. There was no light other than a dejecte

for purposes of ventilation and publicity. It was a question which was the louder, the clatter of tongues or the c

me, the clatter and squalling came from below, a familiar and not unpleasant blend of dissonances. And within the smel

," "alcove," and "parlour." They were all, however, sleeping-rooms. The nearest was occupied by Joan's brother; the next, the alcove, contained a double-bed dedicated to

with the assistance of her fifteen-year-old daughter

ent over a ragged note-book and a well-thumbed

cause, of her misfortune, and abandon herself to the luxury of self-pity soothed by sympathy. But she had also meant to have it understood that nobod

n't better confess and have it out with him first as last. The only thing, indeed, that made her pause was the knowledge that there would be no living w

asked herself if the bitterness in her heart for her father were in truth hatred or mere premonit

beard, and lined and seamed with the imprint of that consuming passion whose sign was also set in his grey, passionate, haunted eyes. Shabbily dressed in a soiled madras shirt and shoddy trousers, he wore neither tie nor collar: his unkempt chin hung in folds u

king selections for tomorrow's races. This pursuit, with its concomitants, its attendant tides of ho

he muttered

chen. Annoyed by the interruption, he s

ated gaze a face of calm

. "How the h-how lo

es, pa," the girl

standing there-sta

thing: I was just

with senseless anger-"cut alo

s

hat, unlike her browbeaten mother and timid sister and her sleek, loaferish brother, she could give as good as he could send. He bent again, grumbling, over his dop

, it reeked with the smell of human flesh and cheap perfume. She noted resentfully the fact that her sister had neglected to make up th

he sat for a time on the edge

a gate of escape stood ajar to her, with a mundane para

possessed of their mean lodgings; and there was no longer any excuse for hope that he would ever shake off the bondage of his infatuation. As it was, he gave little enough toward the support of his family, and grudged that lit

on and a delicatessen shop, in the shadow of the Third Avenue Elevated Railway. In her understanding it was chiefly remarkable as the one place where one could be certain of n

heedle a dollar or two out of the Old Man. Wages he neither received nor expected, being well content with a nominal employment which served to cover many an hour of unlicensed liberty; and he seemed to have access to some mysterious if occasionally scanty fund, for he was never without some little money in pocket. A

in sallow cheeks-his mouth set in a perpetually sardonic curve. He dressed neatly, whatever the straits and necessities of the family (to the mitigation of which he contributed nothing whatever) and had a failing for narrow red neckties and flashy waistcoats. His hard, thin lips were generally tight upon a cigarette; they were forever tight up

wary, reserved; a perpetual subject of cov

she came upon newspaper headlines advertising some fresh hooliganism on the part of the gang-a policeman "beaten up," a sober citizen "held

most unrecognized by either. Joan's nearest approach to acknowledgment of it resided in infrequent adm

ic, flat-chested, pretty in an appealing way: fit only for one of two things, tuberculosis or reconstruction in the country. As it was, in the busy seasons she f

ffacing herself, seemed more a woman that had been than a woman who was. The four boundary walls of the flat comprehended her existence; she seldom left the house; she never changed her dress save for bed. It might have been thought that she would thus dominat

lay dormant, her subjective will to live alone kept this woman going her sempiternal rounds of monotony. Capacity for affection she appa

ot: she accepted her as a convention in which

he smouldering evening, sombre eyes staring steadfastly at the thr

every fibre of her being, every instinct of her forlorn soul, was in vital mutiny against such servitude. In fact, doubt no long

called her fretfully: "Joan!

ce. Her mind was now made up: she would tell them aft

eft fingers while she stared curiously at the face

e back, she lifted her shoulders, at one and the same time smoothi

here had been any one to hear, "I g