An American Tragedy. Theodore Dreiser
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contra, not to obligate herself to those whom she could not like.
In Clyde’s case, liking him but a little, she still could not resist the desire to use him. She liked his willingness to buy her any little thing in which she appeared interested—a bag, a scarf, a purse, a pair of gloves—anything that she could reasonably ask or take without obligating herself too much. And yet from the first, in her smart, tricky way, she realized that unless she could bring herself to yield to him—at some time or other offer him the definite reward which she knew he craved—she could not hold him indefinitely.
One thought that stirred her more than anything else was that the way Clyde appeared to be willing to spend his money on her she might easily get some quite expensive things from him—a pretty and rather expensive dress, perhaps, or a hat, or even a fur coat such as was then being shown and worn in the city, to say nothing of gold earrings, or a wrist watch, all of which she was constantly and enviously eyeing in the different shop windows.
One day not so long after Clyde’s discovery of his sister Esta, Hortense, walking along Baltimore Street near its junction with Fifteenth—the smartest portion of the shopping section of the city—at the noon hour—with Doris Trine, another shop girl in her department store, saw in the window of one of the smaller and less exclusive fur stores of the city, a fur jacket of beaver that to her, viewed from the eye-point of her own particular build, coloring and temperament, was exactly what she needed to strengthen mightily her very limited personal wardrobe. It was not such an expensive coat, worth possibly a hundred dollars—but fashioned in such an individual way as to cause her to imagine that, once invested with it, her own physical charm would register more than it ever had.
Moved by this thought, she paused and exclaimed: “Oh, isn’t that just the classiest, darlingest little coat you ever saw! Oh, do look at those sleeves, Doris.” She clutched her companion violently by the arm. “Lookit the collar. And the lining! And those pockets! Oh, dear!” She fairly vibrated with the intensity of her approval and delight. “Oh, isn’t that just too sweet for words? And the very kind of coat I’ve been thinking of since I don’t know when. Oh, you pity sing!” she exclaimed, affectedly, thinking all at once as much of her own pose before the window and its effect on the passer-by as of the coat before her. “Oh, if I could only have ’oo.”
She clapped her hands admiringly, while Isadore Rubenstein, the elderly son of the proprietor, who was standing somewhat out of the range of her gaze at the moment, noted the gesture and her enthusiasm and decided forthwith that the coat must be worth at least twenty-five or fifty dollars more to her, anyhow, in case she inquired for it. The firm had been offering it at one hundred. “Oh, ha!” he grunted. But being of a sensual and somewhat romantic turn, he also speculated to himself rather definitely as to the probable trading value, affectionally speaking, of such a coat. What, say, would the poverty and vanity of such a pretty girl as this cause her to yield for such a coat?
In the meantime, however, Hortense, having gloated as long as her noontime hour would permit, had gone away, still dreaming and satiating her flaming vanity by thinking of how devastating she would look in such a coat. But she had not stopped to ask the price. Hence, the next day, feeling that she must look at it once more, she returned, only this time alone, and yet with no idea of being able to purchase it herself. On the contrary, she was only vaguely revolving the problem of how, assuming that the coat was sufficiently low in price, she could get it. At the moment she could think of no one. But seeing the coat once more, and also seeing Mr. Rubenstein, Jr., inside eyeing her in a most propitiatory and genial manner, she finally ventured in.
“You like the coat, eh?” was Rubenstein’s ingratiating comment as she opened the door. “Well, that shows you have good taste, I’ll say. That’s one of the nobbiest little coats we’ve ever had to show in this store yet. A real beauty, that. And how it would look on such a beautiful girl as you!” He took it out of the window and held it up. “I seen you when you was looking at it yesterday.” A gleam of greedy admiration was in his eye.
And noting this, and feeling that a remote and yet not wholly unfriendly air would win her more consideration and courtesy than a more intimate one, Hortense merely said, “Yes?”
“Yes, indeed. And I said right away, there’s a girl that knows a really swell coat when she sees it.”
The flattering unction soothed, in spite of herself.
“Look at that! Look at that!” went on Mr. Rubinstein, turning the coat about and holding it before her. “Where in Kansas City will you find anything to equal that today? Look at this silk lining here—genuine Mallinson silk—and these slant pockets. And the buttons. You think those things don’t make a different-looking coat? There ain’t another one like it in Kansas City today—not one. And there won’t be. We designed it ourselves and we never repeat our models. We protect our customers. But come back here.” (He led the way to a triple mirror at the back.) “It takes the right person to wear a coat like this—to get the best effect out of it. Let me try it on you.”
And by the artificial light Hortense was now privileged to see how really fetching she did look in it. She cocked her head and twisted and turned and buried one small ear in the fur, while Mr. Rubenstein stood by, eyeing her with not a little admiration and almost rubbing his hands.
“There now,” he continued. “Look at that. What do you say to that, eh? Didn’t I tell you it was the very thing for you? A find for you. A pick-up. You’ll never get another coat like that in this city. If you do, I’ll make you a present of this one.” He came very near, extending his plump hands, palms up.
“Well, I must say it does look smart on me,” commented Hortense, her vainglorious soul yearning for it. “I can wear anything like this, though.” She twisted and turned the more, forgetting him entirely and the effect her interest would have on his cost price. Then she added: “How much is it?”
“Well, it’s really a two-hundred-dollar coat,” began Mr. Rubenstein artfully. Then noting a shadow of relinquishment pass swiftly over Hortense’s face, he added quickly: “That sounds like a lot of money, but of course we don’t ask so much for it down here. One hundred and fifty is our price. But if that coat was at Jarek’s, that’s what you’d pay for it and more. We haven’t got the location here and we don’t have to pay the high rents. But it’s worth every cent of two hundred.”
“Why, I think that’s a terrible price to ask for it, just awful,” exclaimed Hortense sadly, beginning to remove the coat. She was feeling as though life were depriving her of nearly all that was worth while. “Why, at Biggs and Beck’s they have lots of three-quarter mink and beaver coats for that much, and classy styles, too.”
“Maybe, maybe. But not that coat,” insisted Mr. Rubenstein stubbornly. “Just look at it again. Look at the collar. You mean to say you can find a coat like that up there? If you can, I’ll buy the coat for you and sell it to you again for a hundred dollars. Actually, this is a special coat. It’s copied from one of the smartest coats that was in New York last summer before the season opened. It has class. You won’t find no coat like this coat.”
“Oh, well, just the same, a hundred and fifty dollars is more than I can pay,” commented Hortense dolefully, at the same time slipping on her old broadcloth jacket with the fur collar and cuffs, and edging toward the door.
“Wait! You like the coat?” wisely observed Mr. Rubenstein, after deciding that even a hundred dollars was too much for her purse, unless it could be supplemented by some man’s. “It’s really a two-hundred-dollar coat. I’m telling you that straight. Our regular price is one hundred and fifty. But if you could bring me a hundred and twenty-five dollars, since you want it so much, well, I’ll let you have it for that. And that’s like finding it. A stunning-looking girl like you oughtn’t to have no trouble in finding a dozen fellows who would be glad to buy that coat and give it to you. I know I would, if I thought you would be nice to me.”
He beamed ingratiatingly up at her, and Hortense, sensing the nature of the overture and resenting it—from him—drew back slightly. At the same time she was not wholly displeased by the compliment involved. But she was not coarse enough, as yet, to feel that