Every one of us cleaners was obliged to go to the Turkish bath and have our clothing brushed and fumigated before we could go to our own homes.
On Saturday evening I told Mr. Wheeler and Mr. Gordon that besides the good men and women who had helped us for the cause for five days, we had spent twenty-five dollars. Never will I forget the dismay of those two good men. “What! Twenty-five dollars! Where do you think we will get that?” I answered, “Fortunately I belong to a church that lives and works by faith, and to-morrow, being Sunday, I shall tell the Sunday school of the Luther Memorial Church, and we'll see about that twenty-five dollars.”
The next morning I went to the pastor, Rev. J. G. Butler, D.D., and he secured permission from the superintendent of the Sunday school for me to speak three minutes. The superintendent hated innovations, but I can say a lot in three minutes, especially when I state the needs of the lost men of the community. After the school was dismissed nearly every teacher and grown student gave me something, and in less than five minutes I had twenty-seven dollars.
Sunday night I told what the Lord had done for us, and I began to ask all persons present to contribute sheets and pillow-cases. I did this so much and so often that season that a little four-year-old girl of Mrs. Claude Myers upset the gravity of an entire meeting by saying out loud one Sunday evening, “There comes Mrs. Sheets and Pillow-cases again.” Well, before winter was over we had about fifty clean, well-equipped beds for which, when they had it, men gladly paid ten cents per night. If they did not have it, the beds were given as long as they lasted; but, after the beds were filled, often fifty men slept on the floor with only the boards under them and no covers.
We had no heat in the dormitories, but one day Mrs. Richard Butler, a wealthy woman of the city, was ordered by the Spirit to visit the Mission. She came by Mr. Gordon's office in her carriage and he took her through our building. She saw our first need was heat. She sent immediately to a hardware store and ordered a large stove for the third floor with a drum for the fourth story, and through her kindness the men were given heat, but not until after two deaths, caused by cold, hunger and wet clothing, had about broken our hearts.