in getting money for
necessaries, for what the compulsion of custom and habit has
made necessaries to them--airily to judge them for their doings
in such dire straits is like sitting calmly on shore and
criticizing the conduct of passengers and sailors in a
storm-beset sinking ship. It is one of the favorite pastimes of
the comfortable classes; it makes an excellent impression as to
one's virtue upon one's audience; it gives us a pleasing sense
of superior delicacy and humor. But it is none the less mean
and ridiculous. Instead of condemnation, the world needs to
bestir itself to remove the stupid and cruel creatures that
make evil conduct necessary; for can anyone, not a prig, say
that the small part of the human race that does well does so
because it is naturally better than the large part that does ill?

Spring was slow in opening. Susan's one dress was in a
deplorable state. The lining hung in rags. The never good
material was stretched out of shape, was frayed and worn gray
in spots, was beyond being made up as presentable by the most
careful pressing and cleaning. She had been forced to buy a
hat, shoes, underclothes. She had only three dollars and a few
cents left, and she simply did not dare lay it all out in dress
materials. Yet, less than all would not be enough; all would
not be enough.

Lange had from time to time more than hinted at the
opportunities she was having as a public singer in his hall.
But Susan, for all her experience, had remained one of those
upon whom such opportunities must be thrust if they are to be
accepted.

So long as she had food and shelter, she could not make
advances; she could not even go so far as passive acquiescence.
She knew she was again violating the fundamental canon of
success; whatever one's business, do it thoroughly if at all.
But she could not overcome her temperament which had at this
feeble and false opportunity at once resented itself. She knew
perfectly that therein was the whole cause of her failure to
make the success she ought to have made when she came up from
the tenements, and again when she fell into the clutches of
Freddie Palmer. But it is one thing to know; it is another
thing to do. Susan ignored the attempts of the men; she
pretended not to understand Lange when they set him on to
intercede with her for them. She saw that she was once more
drifting to disaster--and that she had not long to drift. She
was exasperated against herself