Mr. Hawkins proved himself worthy of his wife's faith in hiscapacity. He learned from Ann Eliza as much as she could tell himabout Mrs. Hochmuller and returned the next evening with a scrap ofpaper bearing her address, beneath which Johnny (the family scribe)had written in a large round hand the names of the streets that ledthere from the ferry.
Ann Eliza lay awake all that night, repeating over and overagain the directions Mr. Hawkins had given her. He was a kind man,and she knew he would willingly have gone with her to Hoboken;indeed she read in his timid eye the half-formed intention ofoffering to accompany her--but on such an errand she preferred togo alone.
The next Sunday, accordingly, she set out early, and withoutmuch trouble found her way to the ferry. Nearly a year had passedsince her previous visit to Mrs. Hochmuller, and a chilly Aprilbreeze smote her face as she stepped on the boat. Most of thepassengers were huddled together in the cabin, and Ann Eliza shrankinto its obscurest corner, shivering under the thin black mantlewhich had seemed so hot in July. She began to feel a littlebewildered as she stepped ashore, but a paternal policeman put herinto the right car, and as in a dream she found herself retracingthe way to Mrs. Hochmuller's door. She had told the conductor thename of the street at which she wished to get out, and presentlyshe stood in the biting wind at the corner near the beer-saloon,where the sun had once beat down on her so fiercely. At length anempty car appeared, its yellow flank emblazoned with the name ofMrs. Hochmuller's suburb, and Ann Eliza was presently jolting pastthe narrow brick houses islanded between vacant lots like giantpiles in a desolate lagoon. When the car reached the end of itsjourney she got out and stood for some time trying to rememberwhich turn Mr. Ramy had taken. She had just made up her mind toask the car-driver when he shook the reins on the backs of his leanhorses, and the car, still empty, jogged away toward Hoboken.
Ann Eliza, left alone by the roadside, began to movecautiously forward, looking about for a small red house with agable overhung by an elm-tree; but everything about her seemedunfamiliar and forbidding. One or two surly looking men slouchedpast with inquisitive glances, and she could not make up her mindto stop and speak to them.
At length a tow-headed boy came out of a swinging doorsuggestive of illicit conviviality, and to him Ann Eliza venturedto confide her difficulty. The offer of five cents fired him withan instant willingness to lead her to Mrs. Hochmuller, and he wassoon trotting past the stone-cutter's yard with Ann Eliza in his wake.
Another turn in the road brought them to the little red house,and having rewarded her guide Ann Eliza unlatched the gate andwalked up to the door. Her heart was beating violently, and shehad to lean against the door-post to compose her twitching lips:
she had not known till that moment how much it was going to hurther to speak of Evelina to Mrs. Hochmuller. As her agitationsubsided she began to notice how much the appearance of the househad changed. It was not only that winter had stripped the elm, andblackened the flower-borders: the house itself had a debased anddeserted air. The window-panes were cracked and dirty, and one ortwo shutters swung dismally on loosened hinges.
She rang several times before the door was opened. At lengthan Irish woman with a shawl over her head and a baby in her armsappeared on the threshold, and glancing past her into the narrowpassage Ann Eliza saw that Mrs. Hochmuller's neat abode haddeteriorated as much within as without.
At the mention of the name the woman stared. "Mrs. who, didye say?""Mrs. Hochmuller. This is surely her house?""No, it ain't neither," said the woman turning away.
"Oh, but wait, please," Ann Eliza entreated. "I can't bemistaken. I mean the Mrs. Hochmuller who takes in washing. I cameout to see her last June.""Oh, the Dutch washerwoman is it--her that used to live here?
She's been gone two months and more. It's Mike McNulty lives herenow. Whisht!" to the baby, who had squared his mouth for a howl.
Ann Eliza's knees grew weak. "Mrs. Hochmuller gone? Butwhere has she gone? She must be somewhere round here. Can't youtell me?""Sure an' I can't," said the woman. "She wint away beforeiver we come.""Dalia Geoghegan, will ye bring the choild in out av thecowld?" cried an irate voice from within.
"Please wait--oh, please wait," Ann Eliza insisted. "You seeI must find Mrs. Hochmuller.""Why don't ye go and look for her thin?" the woman returned,slamming the door in her face.
She stood motionless on the door-step, dazed by the immensityof her disappointment, till a burst of loud voices inside the housedrove her down the path and out of the gate.
Even then she could not grasp what had happened, and pausingin the road she looked back at the house, half hoping that Mrs.
Hochmuller's once detested face might appear at one of the grimywindows.
She was roused by an icy wind that seemed to spring upsuddenly from the desolate scene, piercing her thin dress likegauze; and turning away she began to retrace her steps. Shethought of enquiring for Mrs. Hochmuller at some of theneighbouring houses, but their look was so unfriendly that shewalked on without making up her mind at which door to ring. Whenshe reached the horse-car terminus a car was just moving off towardHoboken, and for nearly an hour she had to wait on the corner inthe bitter wind. Her hands and feet were stiff with cold when thecar at length loomed into sight again, and she thought of stoppingsomewhere on the way to the ferry for a cup of tea; but before theregion of lunch-rooms was reached she had grown so sick and dizzythat the thought of food was repulsive. At length she foundherself on the ferry-boat, in the soothing stuffiness of thecrowded cabin; then came another interval of shivering on astreet-corner, another long jolting journey in a "cross-town" car thatsmelt of damp straw and tobacco; and lastly, in the cold spring dusk,she unlocked her door and groped her way through the shop to herfireless bedroom.
The next morning Mrs. Hawkins, dropping in to hear the resultof the trip, found Ann Eliza sitting behind the counter wrapped inan old shawl.
"Why, Miss Bunner, you're sick! You must have fever--yourface is just as red!""It's nothing. I guess I caught cold yesterday on the ferry-boat," Ann Eliza acknowledged.
"And it's jest like a vault in here!" Mrs. Hawkins rebukedher. "Let me feel your hand--it's burning. Now, Miss Bunner,you've got to go right to bed this very minute.""Oh, but I can't, Mrs. Hawkins." Ann Eliza attempted a wansmile. "You forget there ain't nobody but me to tend the store.""I guess you won't tend it long neither, if you ain'tcareful," Mrs. Hawkins grimly rejoined. Beneath her placidexterior she cherished a morbid passion for disease and death, andthe sight of Ann Eliza's suffering had roused her from her habitualindifference. "There ain't so many folks comes to the storeanyhow," she went on with unconscious cruelty, "and I'll go rightup and see if Miss Mellins can't spare one of her girls."Ann Eliza, too weary to resist, allowed Mrs. Hawkins to puther to bed and make a cup of tea over the stove, while MissMellins, always good-naturedly responsive to any appeal for help,sent down the weak-eyed little girl to deal with hypotheticalcustomers.
Ann Eliza, having so far abdicated her independence, sank intosudden apathy. As far as she could remember, it was the first timein her life that she had been taken care of instead of taking care,and there was a momentary relief in the surrender. She swallowedthe tea like an obedient child, allowed a poultice to be applied toher aching chest and uttered no protest when a fire was kindled inthe rarely used grate; but as Mrs. Hawkins bent over to "settle"her pillows she raised herself on her elbow to whisper: "Oh, Mrs.
Hawkins, Mrs. Hochmuller warn't there." The tears rolled down hercheeks.
"She warn't there? Has she moved?""Over two months ago--and they don't know where she's gone.
Oh what'll I do, Mrs. Hawkins?""There, there, Miss Bunner. You lay still and don't fret.
I'll ask Mr. Hawkins soon as ever he comes home."Ann Eliza murmured her gratitude, and Mrs. Hawkins, bendingdown, kissed her on the forehead. "Don't you fret," she repeated,in the v............