Our first word from Susan was a day letter, telephoned to me from the telegraph office, though I at once demanded the delivery of a verbatim copy by messenger. Here it is:
"_At grand central safe so far new york lies roaring just beyond sister and togo tarry with the stuff near cab stand while I send. Love Mrs. Arthur snooped in vain now for it courage Susan whos afraid dont you be alonsen fan._"
Phil, the scholar, interpreted the last two verbatim symbols: "_Allons, enfants!_"
"Sister and I are at the nice old mid-Victorian Brevoort House for three or four days. Sister is calmly and courageously hunting rooms for us--or, if not rooms, a room. She hopes for the plural. We like this quarter of town. It's near enough publishers and things for walking, and it's not quite so New Yorky as some others. What Sister is trying to avoid for us is slavery to the Subway, which is awful! But we may have to fly up beyond Columbia, or even to the Bronx, before we're through. The hotel objected to Togo, but I descended to hitherto untried depths of feminine wheedle--and justified them by getting my way. Sister blushed for me--and herself--but has since felt more confident about my chances for success in this wickedly opportunist world.
"Better skip this part if you read extracts to Phil; he'll brood. But perhaps you'd better begin disillusioning him at once, for I'm discovering dreadful possibilities in my nature--now the Hillhouse inhibitions seem remote. New York, one sees overnight, is no place for a romantic idealist--Maltby's phrase, not mine, bless Phil's heart!--but luckily I've never been one. Birch Street is going to stand me in good stead down here. New York _is_ Birch Street on a slightly exaggerated scale; Hillhouse Avenue is something entirely different. Finer too, perhaps; but the world's future has its roots in New Birch Street. I began to feel that yesterday during my first hunt for a paying job.
"I've plunged on shop equipment, since Jimmy says, other things being equal, the factory with the best tools wins--that is, I've bought a reliable typewriter, and I tackled my first two-finger exercises last night. The results were dire--mostly interior capitals and extraneous asterisks. I shan't have patience to take proper five-finger lessons. Sister vows she's going to master the wretched thing too, so she can help with copying now and then. There's a gleam in her eye, dear--wonderful! This is to be her great adventure as well as mine. 'Susan, Sister & Co., Unlicensed Hacks--Piffle While You Wait!' Oh, we shall get on--you'll see. Still, I can't truthfully report much progress yesterday or to-day, though a shade more to-day than yesterday. I've been counting callously on Maltby, as Phil disapprovingly knows, and I brought three short manufactured-in-advance articles for the Garden Ex. down with me. So my first step was to stifle my last maidenly scruple and take them straight to Maltby; I hoped they would pay at least for the typewriter. It was a clear ice-bath of a morning, and the walk up Fifth Avenue braced me for anything. I stared at everybody and a good many unattached males stared back; sometimes I rather liked it, and sometimes not. It all depends.