Tucker. "I had a good schooling. Besides, sermons
is highly educating."
"Well," said Susan, "if I had a choice of living under Nero or
of living under that God you and Mrs. Reardon talk about, I'd
take Nero and be thankful and happy."
Mrs. Tucker would have fled if she could have afforded it. As
it was all she ventured was a sigh and lips moving in prayer.
On a Friday in late October, at the lunch hour, Susan was
walking up and down the sunny side of Broadway. It was the
first distinctly cool day of the autumn; there had been a heavy
downpour of rain all morning, but the New York sun that is ever
struggling to shine and is successful on all but an occasional
day was tearing up and scattering the clouds with the aid of a
sharp north wind blowing down the deep canyon. She was wearing
her summer dress still--old and dingy but clean. That look of
neatness about the feet--that charm of a well-shaped foot and
a well-turned ankle properly set off--had disappeared--with her
the surest sign of the extreme of desperate poverty. Her shoes
were much scuffed, were even slightly down at the heel; her
sailor hat would have looked only the worse had it had a fresh
ribbon on its crown. This first hint of winter had stung her
fast numbing faculties into unusual activity. She was
remembering the misery of the cold in Cincinnati--the misery
that had driven her into prostitution as a drunken driver's
lash makes the frenzied horse rush he cares not where in his
desire to escape.
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