Los Angeles herald., 1905-07-23
AAAA44A44A4 A4a.s44 444ss4 4s44@4 4444ss444ss
. EARL was too corpulent of figure
by As pounds to qualify as

hasher, hence she had been
"counter woman" for term of years.
There were several reasons for call
ing her something else than Pearl
and none that justified the name she
actually bore. She was neither of great
price-she represented something like
eight dollars and seventy-eight cents
as she stood in her clothes and work
ing capacity of six dollars per week.
nor was she soft, save in texture; on the
contrary, she might more discriminat-
ingly have been called "Ruby"-her col
oring was brilliant. Some said it was
because she loved Him, while, as
matter of fact, it was because she
drank. which amounted to the same
thing, perhaps. She drank because
she loved Him.
Pearl was AZ years months and s
cays old. and her thirst had gained no
headway since her thirty-hfth year.
which had marked the occasion of His
desertion of her. Atthat time she had
taken to drink and to striking her
father, so to speak, and had pursued
a persistentIy unsteady course ever
since. She never had been too drunk
in public, and certainly she never had
been sober. Possibly in secret she had
known moments of sobriety-moments
which enabled her the better to appre-
ciate her habitual state and to long for
it. Doubtless in those notable moments
she resolved never to become sober
again, because at those times she en-
joyed her misery less.
She was a Hasher's necessity. There
was no emotional crisis Of which the
flasher was capable that Pearl had not
experienced so poignantly as to be able
to sympathize with it in a sublime de-
gree.
No one noticed Pearl much unless one
needed her to listen to some tale of a
lovers perfidy or of the injustice of
Hasher's relations to an inappreciative
world which gave no tips. No happy
flasher ever spoke to Pearl of her joys,
because while Pearl would have sym
pathized she would have done so ac-
cording to a system Of contrariety, ex-
clusively her own, as:
"AyeI 1 remember tn time" while
she shook her head and discriminat-
ingly dropped tears into the hash.
where they could by no means be de-
tected. "I sympathize wit ye. Yell
know tn sorrer Of yer joy soon, me
girl; m she's tellin' ye as knows"
Pearl was useful, but not beloved. To
Murphy, Pearl was not at all useful,
and while she was not beloved, yet she
was judiciously pitied with that beau
tiful impartiality and sense of justice
that was Murphys. Before Mag, No.
10, had gone away she and Murphy had
frequently sat at night-Murphy on the
gas stove and No. 10 engaged in brush
ing her lusterless iron black hair-and
they had spoken comprehendingly Of
Pearl. OF all the Hashers, No. 10 and
Murphy, being the only philosophers
and deep sea thinkers, were able prop
erly to round up Pearls excellencies
and eccentricities. After multiplication
and subtraction and division of the
sheep from the goats the result had
been: "She's monument of sufferin',
acordin' to her deserts" conclusion
none the less kindly arrived at because
quite impartially and clearly thought.
After Mag had gone away Murphy
lived for a time like clock without a
pendulum, and the buses lodged till
they were like to become crosseyed.
Twelve-Twenty had come at twenty
minutes after 12 and had gone at a.
quarter of 1 o'clock, and after that there
was no more day for Murphy till night,
when she went to care for Twelve
Twenty's beautiful bachelor quarters;
while he, the object of her gentlest
thoughts and endeavors, sat beneath
his shaded lamp, the circle of light upon
his extreme forehead (Which No. 10 had
once libelously described as stopping
only at the back of his neck), and read
absorbedly until the bitter end of Muir
phys ministrations. Before she went
away Murphy never failed to remind
him that he was at home; lest in his
abstraction he should arise after her
departure and go lose himself in seek
ing that which was not and would not
be again before the morrow-that chaos
from which Murphy redeemed the
apartment each night Twelve-Twenty
was not orderly, excepting vicariously
She always came and stood beside the
table. with a smile upon her face,
brilliant CLEAN in her Irish eye and
characteristic turn Of her sleek head,
and upon these occasions Twelve
Twenty never failed to put aside his
book for brief moment and to remind
Murphy that he considered her essen
tial to his piece Of mind and general
we'll being, and that II she should ever
marry or do anything else that might
naturally deprive him of her services
he was likely 10 be excavated from the
ruin of his rooms soon after and lodged
in some more orderly place reserved
for the insane.
Upon these nightly occasions Murphy
never failed earnestly TO assure him
that she should never marry, and
Twelve-Twenty never failed character
lstieally 10 respond:
rs 1t possiblel" while looking imper-
bonally at her fine. intelligent face, her