"We
don't want drinks and a gush of loose talk, and I saw at a
glance that was all those chappies were good for."
They returned home at half-past nine without adventure. Toward
midnight one of Ida's regulars called and Susan was free to go
to bed. She slept hardly at all. Ever before her mind hovered
a nameless, shapeless horror. And when she slept she dreamed
of her wedding night, woke herself screaming, "Please, Mr.
Ferguson--please!"
Ida had three chief sources of revenue.
The best was five men--her "regular gentleman friends"--who
called by appointment from time to time. These paid her ten
dollars apiece, and occasionally gave her presents of money or
jewelry--nothing that amounted to much. From them she averaged
about thirty-five dollars a week. Her second source was a Mrs.
Thurston who kept in West Fifty-sixth Street near Ninth Avenue
a furnished-room house of the sort that is on the official--and
also the "revenue"--lists of the police and the anti-vice
societies. This lady had a list of girls and married women
upon whom she could call. Gentlemen using her house for
rendezvous were sometimes disappointed by the ladies with whom
they were intriguing. Again a gentleman grew a little weary of
his perhaps too respectable or too sincerely loving ladylove
and appealed to Mrs. Thurston. She kept her list of availables
most select and passed them off as women of good position
willing to supplement a small income, or to punish stingy
husbands or fathers and at the same time get the money they
needed for dress and bridge, for matinees and lunches.
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