lding! It loomed up like the giant prow of an unimaginable
ship. Brentano's. The Holland House. Madison Square. Why there never was
anything so terrifying, and beautiful, and palpitating, and exquisite
as this Fifth avenue in the late winter afternoon, with the sky ahead a
rosy mist, and the golden lights just beginning to spangle the gray. At
Madison Square she decided to walk. She negotiated the 'bus steps with
surprising skill for a novice, and scurried along the perilous crossing
to the opposite side. She entered Madison Square. But why hadn't O.
Henry emphasized its beauty, instead of its squalor? It lay, a purple
pool of shadow, surrounded by the great, gleaming, many-windowed office
buildings, like an amethyst sunk in a circle of diamonds. "It's a
fairyland!" Fanny told herself. "Who'd have thought a city could be so
beautiful!"

And then, at her elbow, a voice said, "Oh, lady, for the lova God!"
She turned with a jerk and looked up into the unshaven face of a great,
blue-eyed giant who pulled off his cap and stood twisting it in his
swollen blue fingers. "Lady, I'm cold. I'm hungry. I been sittin' here
hours."

Fanny clutched her bag a little fearfully. She looked at his huge frame.
"Why don't you work?"

"Work!" He laughed. "There ain't any. Looka this!" He turned up his
foot, and you saw the bare sole, blackened and horrible, and fringed,
comically, by the tattered leather upper.

"Oh--my dear!" said Fanny. And at that the man began to cry, weakly,
sickeningly, like a little boy.

"Don't do that! Don't! Here." She was emptying her purse, and something
inside her was saying, "You fool, he's only a professional beggar."

And then the man wiped his face with his cap, and swallowed hard, and
said, "I don't want all you got. I ain't holdin' you up. Just gimme
that. I been sittin' here, on that bench, lookin' at that sign across
the street. Over there. It says, `EAT.' It goes off an' on. Seemed like
it was drivin' me crazy."

Fanny thrust a crumpled five-dollar bill into his hand. And was off. She
fairly flew along, so that it was not until she had reached Thirty-third
street that she said aloud, as was her way when moved, "I don't care.
Don't blame me. It was that miserable little beast of a dog in the white
sweater that did it."

It was almost seven when she reached her room. A maid, in neat black and
white, was just coming out with an armful of towels.

"I just brought you a couple of extra towels. We