Theodore Dreiser Jennie Gerhardt; a novel

 
 

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CHAPTER XXXII 
The following spring the show-rooms and warehouse were completed, and 
Lester removed his office to the new building. Heretofore, he had been 
transacting all his business affairs at the Grand Pacific and the club. From 
now on he felt himself to be firmly established in Chicago—as if that was to 
be his future home. A large number of details were thrown upon him—the 
control of a considerable office force, and the handling of various important 
transactions. It took away from him the need of traveling, that duty going to 
Amy's husband, under the direction of Robert. The latter was doing his best 
to push his personal interests, not only through the influence he was 
bringing to bear upon his sisters, but through his reorganization of the 
factory. Several men whom Lester was personally fond of were in danger of 
elimination. But Lester did not hear of this, and Kane senior was inclined to 
give Robert a free hand. Age was telling on him. He was glad to see some one 
with a strong policy come up and take charge. Lester did not seem to mind. 
Apparently he and Robert were on better terms than ever before. 
Matters might have gone on smoothly enough were it not for the fact that 
Lester's private life with Jennie was not a matter which could be 
permanently kept under cover. At times he was seen driving with her by 
people who knew him in a social and commercial way. He was for brazening 
it out on the ground that he was a single man, and at liberty to associate 
with anybody he pleased. Jennie might be any young woman of good family 
in whom he was interested. He did not propose to introduce her to anybody 
if he could help it, and he always made it a point to be a fast traveler in 
driving, in order that others might not attempt to detain and talk to him. At 
the theater, as has been said, she was simply "Miss Gerhardt." 
The trouble was that many of his friends were also keen observers of life. 
They had no quarrel to pick with Lester's conduct. Only he had been seen in 
other cities, in times past, with this same woman. She must be some one 
whom he was maintaining irregularly. Well, what of it? Wealth and youthful 
spirits must have their fling. Rumors came to Robert, who, however, kept 
his own counsel. If Lester wanted to do this sort of thing, well and good. But 
there must come a time when there would be a show-down. 
This came about in one form about a year and a half after Lester and Jennie 
had been living in the north side apartment. It so happened that, during a 
stretch of inclement weather in the fall, Lester was seized with a mild form 
of grip. When he felt the first symptoms he thought that his indisposition 
would be a matter of short duration, and tried to overcome it by taking a hot 
bath and a liberal dose of quinine. But the infection was stronger than he 
counted on; by morning he was flat on his back, with a severe fever and a 
splitting headache. 

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His long period of association with Jennie had made him incautious. Policy 
would have dictated that he should betake himself to his hotel and endure 
his sickness alone. As a matter of fact, he was very glad to be in the house 
with her. He had to call up the office to say that he was indisposed and 
would not be down for a day or so; then he yielded himself comfortably to 
her patient ministrations. 
Jennie, of course, was delighted to have Lester with her, sick or well. She 
persuaded him to see a doctor and have him prescribe. She brought him 
potions of hot lemonade, and bathed his face and hands in cold water over 
and over. Later, when he was recovering, she made him appetizing cups of 
beef-tea or gruel. 
It was during this illness that the first real contretemps occurred. Lester's 
sister Louise, who had been visiting friends in St. Paul, and who had written 
him that she might stop off to see him on her way, decided upon an earlier 
return than she had originally planned. While Lester was sick at his 
apartment she arrived in Chicago. Calling up the office, and finding that he 
was not there and would not be down for several days, she asked where he 
could be reached. 
"I think he is at his rooms in the Grand Pacific," said an incautious 
secretary. "He's not feeling well." Louise, a little disturbed, telephoned to the 
Grand Pacific, and was told that Mr. Kane had not been there for several 
days—did not, as a matter of fact, occupy his rooms more than one or two 
days a week. Piqued by this, she telephoned his club. 
It so happened that at the club there was a telephone boy who had called up 
the apartment a number of times for Lester himself. He had not been 
cautioned not to give its number—as a matter of fact, it had never been 
asked for by any one else. When Louise stated that she was Lester's sister, 
and was anxious to find him, the boy replied, "I think he lives at 19 Schiller 
Place." 
"Whose address is that you're giving?" inquired a passing clerk. 
"Mr. Kane's." 
"Well, don't be giving out addresses. Don't you know that yet?" 
The boy apologized, but Louise had hung up the receiver and was gone. 
About an hour later, curious as to this third residence of her brother, Louise 
arrived at Schiller Place. Ascending the steps—it was a two-apartment 
house—she saw the name of Kane on the door leading to the second floor. 
Ringing the bell, she was opened to by Jennie, who was surprised to see so 
fashionably attired a young woman. 

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"This is Mr. Kane's apartment, I believe," began Louise, condescendingly, as 
she looked in at the open door behind Jennie. She was a little surprised to 
meet a young woman, but her suspicions were as yet only vaguely aroused. 
"Yes," replied Jennie. 
"He's sick, I believe. I'm his sister. May I come in?" 
Jennie, had she had time to collect her thoughts, would have tried to make 
some excuse, but Louise, with the audacity of her birth and station, swept 
past before Jennie could say a word. Once inside Louise looked about her 
inquiringly. She found herself in the sitting-room, which gave into the 
bedroom where Lester was lying. Vesta happened to be playing in one corner 
of the room, and stood up to eye the new-comer. The open bedroom showed 
Lester quite plainly lying in bed, a window to the left of him, his eyes closed. 
"Oh, there you are, old fellow!" exclaimed Louise. "What's ailing you?" she 
hurried on. 
Lester, who at the sound of her voice had opened his eyes, realized in an 
instant how things were. He pulled himself up on one elbow, but words 
failed him. 
"Why, hello, Louise," he finally forced himself to say. "Where did you come 
from?" 
"St. Paul. I came back sooner than I thought," she answered lamely, a sense 
of something wrong irritating her. "I had a hard time finding you, too. Who's 
your—" she was about to say "pretty housekeeper," but turned to find 
Jennie dazedly gathering up certain articles in the adjoining room and 
looking dreadfully distraught. 
Lester cleared his throat hopelessly. 
His sister swept the place with an observing eye. It took in the home 
atmosphere, which was both pleasing and suggestive. There was a dress of 
Jennie's lying across a chair, in a familiar way, which caused Miss Kane to 
draw herself up warily. She looked at her brother, who had a rather curious 
expression in his eyes—he seemed slightly nonplussed, but cool and defiant. 
"You shouldn't have come out here," said Lester finally, before Louise could 
give vent to the rising question in her mind. 
"Why shouldn't I?" she exclaimed, angered at the brazen confession. "You're 
my brother, aren't you? Why should you have any place that I couldn't 
come. Well, I like that—and from you to me." 
"Listen, Louise," went on Lester, drawing himself up further on one elbow. 
"You know as much about life as I do. There is no need of our getting into an 

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argument. I didn't know you were coming, or I would have made other 
arrangements." 
"Other arrangements, indeed," she sneered. "I should think as much. The 
idea!" 
She was greatly irritated to think that she had fallen into this trap; it was 
really disgraceful of Lester. 
"I wouldn't be so haughty about it," he declared, his color rising. "I'm not 
apologizing to you for my conduct. I'm saying I would have made other 
arrangements, which is a very different thing from begging your pardon. If 
you don't want to be civil, you needn't." 
"Why, Lester Kane!" she exclaimed, her cheeks flaming. "I thought better of 
you, honestly I did. I should think you would be ashamed of yourself living 
here in open—" she paused without using the word—"and our friends 
scattered all over the city. It's terrible! I thought you had more sense of 
decency and consideration." 
"Decency nothing," he flared. "I tell you I'm not apologizing to you. If you 
don't like this you know what you can do." 
"Oh!" she exclaimed. "This from my own brother! And for the sake of that 
creature! Whose child is that?" she demanded, savagely and yet curiously. 
"Never mind, it's not mine. If it were it wouldn't make any difference. I wish 
you wouldn't busy yourself about my affairs." 
Jennie, who had been moving about the dining-room beyond the sitting-
room, heard the cutting references to herself. She winced with pain. 
"Don't flatter yourself. I won't any more," retorted Louise. "I should think, 
though, that you, of all men, would be above anything like this—and that 
with a woman so obviously beneath you. Why, I thought she was—" she was 
again going to add "your housekeeper," but she was interrupted by Lester, 
who was angry to the point of brutality. 
"Never mind what you thought she was," he growled. "She's better than 
some who do the so-called superior thinking. I know what you think. It's 
neither here nor there, I tell you. I'm doing this, and I don't care what you 
think. I have to take the blame. Don't bother about me." 
"Well, I won't, I assure you," she flung back. "It's quite plain that your family 
means nothing to you. But if you had any sense of decency, Lester Kane, 
you would never let your sister be trapped into coming into a place like this. 
I'm disgusted, that's all, and so will the others be when they hear of it." 
She turned on her heel and walked scornfully out, a withering look being 
reserved for Jennie, who had unfortunately stepped near the door of the 

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dining-room. Vesta had disappeared. Jennie came in a little while later and 
closed the door. She knew of nothing to say. Lester, his thick hair pushed 
back from his vigorous face, leaned back moodily on his pillow. "What a 
devilish trick of fortune," he thought. Now she would go home and tell it to 
the family. His father would know, and his mother. Robert, Imogene, Amy all 
would hear. He would have no explanation to make—she had seen. He 
stared at the wall meditatively. 
Meanwhile Jennie, moving about her duties, also found food for reflection. 
So this was her real position in another woman's eyes. Now she could see 
what the world thought. This family was as aloof from her as if it lived on 
another planet. To his sisters and brothers, his father and mother, she was 
a bad woman, a creature far beneath him socially, far beneath him mentally 
and morally, a creature of the streets. And she had hoped somehow to 
rehabilitate herself in the eyes of the world. It cut her as nothing before had 
ever done. The thought tore a great, gaping wound in her sensibilities. She 
was really low and vile in her—Louise's—eyes, in the world's eyes, basically 
so in Lester's eyes. How could it be otherwise? She went about numb and 
still, but the ache of defeat and disgrace was under it all. Oh, if she could 
only see some way to make herself right with the world, to live honorably, to 
be decent. How could that possibly be brought about? It ought to be—she 
knew that. But how?