Page 150 of If Looks Could Kill
After a week at the Woodward home, Pearl decided she felt ready to faceher mother. She let me give her a Christmas gift of a train ticket to take her to Edinboro, Pennsylvania, her farming town near Erie.
“Will you tell her?” I asked her on one of our walks around the shops of Troy, all decorated for Christmas.
“What choice do I have?” Pearl said. “I’m all she has, and she’s all I have. We’re going to have to figure this out.”
“Maybe she’ll surprise you,” I told her.
“People tend to.”
My father and I drove her to the train station. I hated to see her go.
Neither one of us had talked about what came next in our lives. But we both knew that this was, for us, a probable goodbye. Not that, perhaps, we couldn’t visit each other at some future point. Not that we couldn’t send letters. I vowed I would. But we both knew a door was closing. For myself, all I saw was a long corridor stretching before me, with no doors in it at all.
I received a letter from Freyda Gorbady. Inside it were two clippings of articles in theNew York World:UNDERCOVER REPORTER GIRL PENETRATES NOTORIOUS FIVE POINTS BROTHEL, SUFFERS OUTRAGES TO EXPOSE THE TRUTH. BY FIONA GREAVES.
The second appeared in the paper a few days later:INFAMOUS FIVE POINTS MADAM AND KIDNAPPER, ROSE HERTZFELD, ARRESTED. YOUNG WOMEN RESTORED TO THEIR FAMILIES.
I read them both. I wondered about Delilah, née Sarah. What family was she restored to? Even so, I wept and thanked God.
I wrote out copies of the articles longhand and mailed the originals to Pearl.
I received a letter from Emma Bown with some very interesting pieces of information.
Purse Laurier had left the Salvation Army a few days after we did. He’dgone home to his parents and had made his peace with them. He would return to university in January.
Mrs. Jessop had asked to be transferred to a different unit within the Army. She felt that the sudden exodus of so many of the young people in her division was a failure on her part, especially since she had not known so many of us were struggling, as evidently we must have been. I was sorry to hear it. Our struggles were no reflection on her.
As a postscript, Emma added that our departures—Pearl’s, Purse’s, and mine—had left Paddy Campbell as the youngest member of the Bowery corps and that he’d been rather mopey and blue of late. He needed, Emma theorized, some new friends. Poor fellow.
I copied this letter out longhand as well and sent the original to Pearl.
I received a Christmas card showing pictures of Saint Nicholas and pink-cheeked children. No note; only signedMike.
I did not send this to Pearl.
Closer to Christmas, I received a letter from none other than Commander Maud Ballington Booth.
Dear Miss Woodward,
I was grieved to hear that you and Pearl Davenport had left us. You’re both such intelligent, resolute girls. I thought so from the moment I met you. It was why I assigned you to room together.
I have come to realize that when some people leave a program like ours, perhaps they weren’t ready to do the work or to weather its hardships. That isn’t you. So I suspect something distressing happened. I would be glad to do whatever might lie in my power to help you.
I am grateful for how you both embraced so enthusiastically the “Soup, Soap, and Salvation” initiative. We’ve seen a wonderful harvest already from the seeds you’ve sown.
Which brings me to my reason for writing.
The more I hear from our fellow soldiers about the needs they see, the more convinced I am that we need to allocate more of our energy and resources to alleviating the conditions that keep families trapped in cycles of poverty, vice, and misery. These conditions are the root cause of so much of the unhappiness we see. The answer is not to clear the slums and send wretched souls somewhere else. Nor is it simply to preach to them, though we will continue to put the good word of God to use. If we, who have been blessed with more means, more learning, more family care, and better spiritual guidance, do not put our gifts to work in the service of the poor, then I am not sure what kind of reception we can hope for when we look our Maker in the eye.
So I propose a new ministry. Just as before, when we switched from our tavern ministry to our soup and soap efforts, I want us once again to roll up our sleeves and work closer to the root of the problem.
When I served in the Salvation Army in Britain, before traveling to the United States to accept my current post with the Army upon my marriage, I helped organize an effort we called the Slum Sisters. These were young women who went tenement by tenement and door by door, asking families how they could be of service. They were angels on earth. They held crying babies, helped carry coal or prepare supper, wash dishes, scrub floors, clean up, and so on. They relieved the anguish of poor mothers whose funds and patience were both stretched to the bone. The Slum Sisters were not there to find converts, but to serve. If someone wanted to learn more about the Christian faith, they extended an invitation to a meeting. Beyond that, they confined themselves to relieving suffering in the home.
I would like to roll out the Slum Sisters initiative in New York City. Emma Bown, whom I know you know, has agreed to help lead this project in New York. Her worthy companion, Carrie Joy Lovett, will spearhead a parallel effort designed to more aggressively enter saloons and save girls there in danger of being lured into prostitution. I understand that cause matters to you as well. How can we look away as these girls, so terribly young, become trapped in a hell they had no way to understand, and from which most are powerless to escape?
I realize you may be quite done with us, and if so, please know you will always have my hearty good wishes. But if either of these initiatives holds any appeal for you, and if you would have an interest in working with us again, nothing could make me happier.
Wishing you and yours a happy holiday season, I remain,
