An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser

Clyde hastened to cover his mistake. “Eight,” he called.

There being no one else on the elevator with them, the

Negro elevator boy in charge of the car saluted him at once.

“You’se new, ain’t you? I ain’t seen you around her befo’.”

“Yes, I just came on,” replied Clyde.

“Well, you won’t hate it here,” commented this youth in the

most friendly way. “No one hates this house, I’ll say. Eight

did you say?” He stopped the car and Clyde stepped out.

He was too nervous to think to ask the direction and now

began looking at room numbers, only to decide after a

moment that he was in the wrong corridor. The soft brown

carpet under his feet; the soft, cream-tinted walls; the snow-

white bowl lights in the ceiling—all seemed to him parts of a

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perfection and a social superiority wich was almost

unbelievable—so remote from all that he had ever known.

And finally, finding 882, he knocked timidly and was

greeted after a moment by a segment of a very stout and

vigorous body in a blue and white striped union suit and a

related segment of a round and florid head in which was set

one eye and some wrinkles to one side of it.

“Here’s a dollar bill, son,” said the eye seemingly—and now

a hand appeared holding a paper dollar. It was fat and red.

“You go out to a haberdasher’s and get me a pair of garters

—Boston Garters—silk—and hurry back.”

“Yes, sir,” replied Clyde, and took the dollar. The door

closed and he found himself hustling along the hall toward

the elevator, wondering what a haberdasher’s was. As old

as he was—seventeen—the name was new to him. He had

never even heard it before, or noticed it at least. If the man

had said a “gents’ furnishing store,” he would have

understood at once, but now here he was told to go to a

haberdasher’s and he did not know what it was. A cold

sweat burst out upon his forehead. His knees trembled. The

devil! What would he do now? Could he ask any one, even

Hegglund, and not seem——

He pushed the elevator button. The car began to descend.

A haberdasher. A haberdasher. Suddenly a sane thought

reached him. Supposing he didn’t know what a

haberdasher was? After all the man wanted a pair of silk

Boston garters. Where did one get silk Boston garters—at a

store, of course, a place where they sold things for men.

Certainly. A gents’ furnishing store. He would run out to a

store. And on the way down, noting another friendly Negro

in charge, he asked: “Do you know if there’s a gents’

furnishing store anywhere around here?”

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“One in the building, captain, right outside the south lobby,”

replied the Negro, and Clyde hurried there, greatly relieved.

Yet he felt odd and strange in his close-fitting uniform and

his peculiar hat. All the time he was troubled by the notion

that his small, round, tight-fitting hat might fall off. And he

kept pressing it furtively and yet firmly down. And bustling

into the haberdasher’s, which was blazing with lights

outside, he exclaimed, “I want to get a pair of Boston silk

garters.”

“All right, son, here you are,” replied a sleek, short man with

bright, bald head, pink face and gold-rimmed glasses. “For

some one in the hotel, I presume? Well, we’ll make that

seventy-five cents, and here’s a dime for you,” he remarked

as he wrapped up the package and dropped the dollar in

the cash register. “I always like to do the right thing by you

boys in there because I know you come to me whenever

you can.”

Clyde took the dime and the package, not knowing quite

what to think. The garters must be seventy-five cents—he

said so. Hence only twenty-five cents need to be returned

to the man. Then the dime was his. And now, maybe—

would the man really give him another tip?

He hurried back into the hotel and up to the elevators. The

strains of a string orchestra somewhere were filling the

lobby with delightful sounds. People were moving here and

there—so well-dressed, so much at ease, so very different

from most of the people in the streets or anywhere, as he

caw it.

An elevator door flew open. Various guests entered. Then

Clyde and another bell-boy who gave him an interested

glance. At the sixth floor the boy departed. At the eighth

Clyde and an old lady stepped forth. He hurried to the door

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of his guest and tapped. The man opened it, somewhat

more fully dressed than before. He had on a pair of trousers

and was shaving.

“Back, eh,” he called.

“Yes, sir,” replied Clyde, handing him the package and

change. “He said it was seventy-five cents.”

“He’s a damned robber, but you can keep the change, just

the same,” he replied, handing him the quarter and closing

the door. Clyde stood there, quite spellbound for the

fraction of a second. “Thirty-five cents”—he thought—“thirty-

five cents.” And for one little short errand. Could that really

be the way things went here? It couldn’t be, really. It wasn’t

possible—not always.

And then, his feet sinking in the soft nap of the carpet, his

hand in one pocket clutching the money, he felt as if he

could squeal or laugh out loud. Why, thirty-five cents—and

for a little service like that. This man had given him a

quarter and the other a dime and he hadn’t done anything

at all.

He hurried from the car at the bottom—the strains of the

orchestra once more fascinated him, the wonder of so well-

dressed a throng thrilling him—and made his way to the

bench from which he had first departed.

And following this he had been called to carry the three

bags and two umbrellas of an aged farmer-like couple, who

had engaged a parlor, bedroom and bath on the fifth floor.

En route they kept looking at him, as he could see, but said

nothing. Yet once in their room, and after he had promptly

turned on the lights near the door, lowered the blinds and

placed the bags upon the bag racks, the middle-aged and

rather awkward husband—a decidedly solemn and

bewhiskered person—studied him and finally observed:

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“Young fella, you seem to be a nice, brisk sort of boy—

rather better than most we’ve seen so far, I must say.”

“I certainly don’t think that hotels are any place for boys,”

chirped up the wife of his bosom—a large and rotund

person, who by this time was busily employed inspecting an

adjoining room. “I certainly wouldn’t want any of my boys to

work in ’em—the way people act.”

“But here, young man,” went on the elder, laying off

hisovercoat and fishing in his trousers pocket. “You go

down and get me three or four evening papers if there are

that many and a pitcher of ice-water, and I’ll give you fifteen

cents when you get back.”

“This hotel’s better’n the one in Omaha, Pa,” added the wife

sententiously. “It’s got nicer carpets and curtains.”

And as green as Clyde was, he could not help smiling

secretly. Openly, however, he preserved a masklike

solemnity, seemingly effacing all facial evidence of thought,

and took the change and went out. And in a few moments

he was back with the ice-water and all the evening papers

and de parted smilingly with his fifteen cents.

But this, in itself, was but a beginning in so far as this

particular evening was concerned, for he was scarcely

seated upon the bench again, before he was called to room

529, only to be sent to the bar for drinks—two ginger ales

and two syphons of soda—and this by a group of smartly-

dressed young men and girls who were laughing and

chattering in the room, one of whom opened the door just

wide enough to instruct him as to what was wanted. But

because of a mirror over the mantel, he could see the party

and one pretty girl in a white suit and cap, sitting on the

edge of a chair in which reclined a young man who had his

arm about her.

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Clyde stared, even while pretending not to. And in his state

of mind, this sight was like looking through the gates of

Paradise. Here were young fellows and girls in this room,

not so much older than himself, laughing and talking and

drinking even—not ice-cream sodas and the like, but such

drinks no doubt as his mother and father were always

speaking against as leading to destruction, and apparently

nothing was thought of it.

He bustled down to the bar, and having secured the drinks

and a charge slip, returned—and was paid—a dollar and a

half for the drinks and a quarter for himself. And once more