FIVE WOMEN.
Reading edition
ONE afternoon five women went out on South Hill in a street car. One of them was a fat woman in a black dress, with a cameo pin as large as a stucco ornament. She breathed at a high pressure, about 103 to the minute. A woman with a thin, long neck, and sad eyes, and a Paisley shawl, sitting on the other side of the car, said, in a feeble voice:
“Good afternoon, Mrs. Waughop.”
“Oh, (puff) Mrs. Dresseldorff, (puff, puff,) how do (puff) you do?” (Puff, puff.)
“Oh, I ain’t feeling well at all. I’ve had so much trouble with my lungs, and nothing seems to do them any good. I’ve tried onion gargle, and three kinds of expectorant, and Wine of Tar, and two of Doctor Bolus’s prescriptions, and one of Dr. Bleadem’s, and a new kind of ointment, but nothing seems to have any effect on them. How do you feel to-day?”
“Oh,” groaned Mrs. Waughop, “I’m not getting on at all. My asthma is worse every day (puff, puff), and I can’t sleep at night, and I’m afraid I’ll have to give up entirely (puff, puff). I could hardly get out to-day (puff, puff, puff). I went to Greenbaum and Schroder’s and around to Guest’s and down to Carpenter’s (puff, puff), and into Parsons’ and up to Mrs. Voorhees’ (puff, puff), and down to Wyman’s and up to Wesley Jones’ and into Gus Dodge’s and (puff, puff, puff) down to the express office, and then by the time I had made a couple of calls out on North Hill and went to the doctor’s, I was as tired as though I had walked a mile (puff, puff, puff). I don’t know what’s going to become of me, I’m sure. How are you, this afternoon, Mrs. Dinkleman?” she continued, turning to the next woman, a lonesome looking female with a wart on her chin, who smiled dismally on being addressed and paused in the midst of a search for a street car nickel in the bottom of a black reticule as big as a hair trunk.
“I’m about half down with the chills,” she said, with a prolonged sigh; “I have such a fever every night, I don’t get two hours’ sleep out of the twenty-four, and I’m afraid I’ll be down sick before I get through with it. My eyesight is failing, too, and I have a constant headache that worries me nearly to death. I am glad, Mrs. Mulligan,” said Mrs. Dinkleman, turning to the fourth woman, “to see you able to be out.”
Mrs. Mulligan bowed feebly to the rest of the ladies. “Indeed I oughtn’t to be out,” she groaned, “I ought to be in bed this minute. I haven’t had this flannel off my throat for three weeks, and I’m afraid I’ll lose my voice entirely. I’ve had a misery across my back since I don’t know when, and I had to have three teeth pulled this blessed afternoon. I was that bad with the rheumatiz all last week I didn’t dare stir out of the house, and I’ve got a felon coming on my finger just as sure as I’m a living woman. What appears to be the matter with your face, Mrs. Gallagher?” she asked the last woman in the car.
“Neuralagy of the eyes,” the last woman, who wore black glasses and green goggles, remarked, in such lugubrious tones that they cast a gloom over the entire community, and the masculine occupants of the car wondered if there was a well woman in America.
GOBLIN GATE. See page 148.
