Sister Carrie: Chapters 16–25

They were at their little table in the room which might have been used for a kitchen, where Carrie occasionally served a meal. To-night the fancy had caught her, and the little table was spread with a pleasing repast.

Of late, seeing the airy grace of the ingenue in several well-constructed plays, she had been moved to secretly imitate it, and many were the little movements and expressions of the body in which she indulged from time to time in the privacy of her chamber.

Her mind delighted itself with scenes of luxury and refinement, situations in which she was the cynosure of all eyes, the arbiter of all fates.

He had been afraid that he was about to precipitate another conversation upon the marriage question.

As delineated by Mr. Daly, it was true to the most sacred traditions of melodrama as he found it when he began his career.

There is nothing so inspiring in life as the sight of a legitimate ambition, no matter how incipient.

John L. Sullivan, the pugilist, was at one end of the glittering bar, surrounded by a company of loudly dressed sports, who were holding a most animated conversation.

“She’s clever, though,” said Drouet, casting off any imputation against Carrie’s ability.

“One night,” resumed Mrs. Morgan, whose lines came next, “father and mother were going to the opera. When they were crossing Broadway, the usual crowd of children accosted them for alms—”

The rendition ran on in this wise until it came to where Carrie, as Laura, comes into the room to explain to Ray, who, after hearing Pearl’s statement about her birth, had written the letter repudiating her, which, however, he did not deliver.

“Well, she’s got more gumption than any one I’ve seen here so far—seems to take an interest in what she’s doing.”

Carrie disliked his appearance, but she was too much the actress not to swallow his qualities with complaisance, seeing that she must suffer his fictitious love for the evening.

Look at him any time within the half hour before the curtain was up, he was a member of an eminent group—a rounded company of five or more whose stout figures, large white bosoms, and shining pins bespoke the character of their success.

She presented her part with some felicity, though nothing like the intensity which had aroused the feeling at the end of the long first act.

She was gazing now sadly out upon the open sea, her arm resting listlessly upon the polished door-post.

He was charmed by the pale face, the lissome figure, draped in pearl grey, with a coiled string of pearls at the throat.

“Let the woman you look upon be wise or vain,” said Carrie, her eyes bent sadly upon the lover, who had sunk into a seat, “beautiful or homely, rich or poor, she has but one thing she can really give or refuse—her heart.”

The two men were in the most harrowed state of affection.

There is none of the tendency to sing outside of my lady’s window—to languish and repine in the face of difficulties.

There is none of the tendency to sing outside of my lady’s window—to languish and repine in the face of difficulties.

In the night he was long getting to sleep because of too much thinking, and in the morning he was early awake, seizing with alacrity upon the same dear subject and pursuing it with vigour.

On this account the silence was irritably broken by a reproof. “I’ve told you about this before, Maggie,” said Mrs. Hurstwood.

Accordingly, Mrs. Hurstwood decided to broach the subject.

She had listened to Drouet’s enthusiastic maunderings with much regard for that part which concerned herself, with very little for that which affected his own gain.

She was now experiencing the first shades of feeling of that subtle change which removes one out of the ranks of the suppliants into the lines of the dispensers of charity.

There was a lilt in her voice which was new.

He wanted to plunge in and expostulate with her, and yet he found himself fishing for words and feeling for a way.

The manager looked at his lovely prize, so beautiful, so winsome, so difficult to be won, and made strange resolutions.

There had been so much enthusiasm engendered that she was believing herself deeply in love.

She could see from the scrupulous care which he exercised in the matter of his personal appearance that his interest in life had abated not a jot.

An inkling of untoward deeds on the part of Hurstwood had come.

As a consequence, she recalled, with rising feeling, how often he had refused to go to places with her, to share in little visits, or, indeed, take part in any of the social amenities which furnished the diversion of her existence.

She thought how she should like to tell him—what stress and emphasis she would lend her assertions, how she should drive over this whole affair until satisfaction should be rendered her.

Mrs. Hurstwood kept on arranging her hair, not so much as deigning a glance.

In an instant his persuasive, conciliatory manner fled. He was on the defensive at a wink and puzzled for a word to reply.

Her little brain had been surging with contradictory feelings—shame at exposure, shame at Hurstwood’s perfidy, anger at Drouet’s deception, the mockery he had made at her.

She hardly knew how to answer this, and yet her wrath was not placated.

Mercy, how he turned at the man’s shameless duplicity.

She could hardly believe her senses—so good-natured and tractable had he invariably been.

Later, however, his old discretion asserted itself. Something had to be done.