In a back room of a place just off Broadway sat a good-looking brunette—you will notice all these girls of mine are good looking—and three young fellows of the kind known to the police as “cadets.” There was nothing unusual about this room except that it was better furnished than you would have expected, and it had expensive oil paintings on the walls. Besides, it was carpeted. All this would mean higher-priced drinks if not a better service.
It was a drinking place where women might come with their escorts and feel reasonably safe from intrusion, and midnight was its busiest hour. Just now was the calm which precedes the storm, and there were not enough guests to induce the waiters to cease their gossiping and loafing in the big room outside.
The woman who sat there at the little round table was a common type; you can see her like wherever you go, especially at night. When the sun has gone down and the lights are bright, she flutters out of some cave-like dwelling like a new kind of butterfly, with the instincts of the moth, in that she flutters only at night, and in her veins runs the blood of a hunter, for she is ever on the trail.
This one is pretty in a negative sort of way. Her features are regular, her teeth are white and strong, and her eyes are bright and have expression, but if you
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 will look close you will notice a hard glance there. It is neither merciful nor kind.
She has emotions, but they are hardly worth considering, for they are of the baser sort.
She has nerve, daring, courage and calmness, and because her life has been a constant warfare she fears nothing. She may dread the touch of a policeman’s hand and the command to “Come on,” but she doesn’t fear it. There is a difference, you know, between the words of fear and dread.
It is unfortunate that she was born to be what she is.
Her first adventure in life was when she became infatuated with the glitter of the arena, and with a girl companion of her own age took up with a couple of clowns attached to a circus. But she soon found the difference between the dressing tents and reserved seats and headed for the nearest big city.
“There ain’t a case note among the four of us,” remarks one of the men. “I think we’re a bunch of shines. The first thing you know we’ll have to go out and look for jobs.”
The girl was drumming idly on the table with her fingers.
“You’re the strongest one of the lot, what’s the matter with you making a start?” said another to the one who had just spoken.
“I’d look nice getting up with the milk wagons, wouldn’t I?”
The girl stopped her drumming and glanced up.
“You can leave me out of all this argument,” she remarked, “for I don’t figure. No more Broadway for mine after ten o’clock to-night, and it’s a case of good-by for you, too, Jack.”
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“I suppose that’s another one of your funny jokes,” said Jack, “but I don’t like those kind of stories, so you can cut it out.”
“No funny story about it at all,” she went on, in that even, monotonous way which is particularly aggravating. “I’m tired of this way of living, and I’m tired of being a coaling station, and I know when I got enough.”
“Where are you going?”
She had resumed her drumming and paid no attention.
“Who are you going with?”
“That’s none of your damned business.”
He leaned forward and taking her by the wrist gave her a vicious pull toward him.
“I suppose it’s that guy from the country?”
“Well, what if it is?” she said defiantly, and then, as if she had suddenly made up her mind, she went on, talking rapidly, as a woman will do when she is under a nervous strain:
“He’s going to do what you never thought of doing—he’s going to marry me and make me decent—if it ain’t too late. He’s going to meet me here at ten o’clock and we’re going to jump to the Coast. He’s got the coin, for he’s sold out his farm. He’s going to take me out there, and he says we are going to begin all over again; that I’ll have a good chance, for nobody will know where I came from. What do I get here? Nothing. If I’m sick I can go to the hospital or die in my room like a rat in a garret. I haven’t a friend in the world who would do anything for me on the level and for pure friendship’s sake. If I was to grow old to-morrow, I couldn’t get enough to buy a cup of
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 coffee, and of all the good fellows I know there is only one who would walk across the street to do anything for me just because he liked me. You’re broke now, and you are wondering how you are going to get money, but you know down in your heart that you’re expecting me to get it for you. You’ve got a long wait, for I’ll not get it. I’m through, and that settles it.”
“So you’ve been meeting this fellow on the quiet, have you?” asked the one who was called Jack.
“No, I haven’t seen him for five years.”
“Don’t think you can kid me; how have you been framing things up then if you haven’t been meeting him?”
She gazed at him steadily for a moment as if she were shaping her course, and then she said:
“Well, I’ll just put you right for once. I suppose you’ve heard of the mail. Well, I’ve been getting letters from him, and here,” pulling one from a little handbag she carried, “is the last one.”
With a quick, deft movement he snatched it from her hand and opened it. At the first line he laughed loudly.
“He’s nutty, all right—he must have it bad. Listen to him:”
He began to read.
My Dear Little Girl:—I have just received your letter, and the world looks different to me already. I don’t want you to tell me any more about yourself, for I don’t want to know any more. We have nothing to do with the past now, it is only the future which concerns us and that will be what we make it. I have sold the old farm, so we have $12,000 to start with, and I shall be in New York at the place you suggest and on
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 time to the minute, so you can look for me. Don’t bother about baggage or any of your personal belongings, for all we will want is a minister. After that we can talk things over. I hate to leave the old place, but it makes no difference now that I’m going to have you.
Yours always, Joe.
He handed the letter back to her.
“Little girl, you’re all right after all, ain’t she, fellows? Landed a guy with $12,000 in cold coin, and he’ll have the goods on him, too, I suppose. We won’t do a thing but take that bank roll away and send him back to the farm again.”
Then he turned to the girl.
“How’s the best way to do it? Give him the peter? Maybe it will be best to take him up to the room and wait till he gets asleep. It’............