Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1913-12-04
The I)kUG >F;R OF;
DAVID KE RR s1e
BY Harry King 'Eoofle
Illustrations y T4/ U1T=@s %

went down the scale her acquaintance
ship grew slighteT and her understand
ing more vague. The poor creatures
whom as q class Little Ella now rep
resented to her were almost as foreign
and as misunderstood as would be a
lama of Thibet. Having no knowledge,
she could have no real pity.
Gloria had never dreamed. even
when she tried to put the worst pos
sible construction on what few things
she knew. that the world could be so
cruel Never for an instant had she
thought that it was possible for men
whom she regarded as upright and
honorable to be engaged directly or in
directly In exploiting vice and igno-
rance. 1t had never occurred to her
that men whom she might know, some
OF them owned dreary blocks of novels
and tenements from which high rents
were secured only because the people
who lived in them were not respect
able. Poor and honest tenants could
have paid but poor and precarious
rents
As little Ella told her story of the
system" at Gloria's request, her voice
grew shriller and shriller as the in
dictment grew grayer. She talked
rapidly, sometimes turning aside from
the direct channel of her revelation,
to explore some little eddy of a spe-
cific instance which made her account
reality. Gloria could have credited
OF hino n h,I ?
been that just at the moment she
thought the girl was beginning to
draw on her Imagination some Incl
dent would be introduced suddenly to
make the whole thing CHASTITY real.
For the first time the daughter of
David Kerr learned Of the peddlers of
snowy dresses, the vendors Of cheap
perfumeTy, the stealthy disseminators
of cocaine, and the many other Ieeches
that f2tten on the unfortunate of the
underworld, She learned that all the
misery was but monument to human
greed. Nothing was exploited in
which there was not a profit Of three.
or four hundred per cent Nothing
was exploited which did not tend to
kill the finer feelings, reducing the
poor victims in time to the level of
brutes.
And the men down here" Little
Ella cried, the memory Of the good,
wholesome men whom she had known
in her earlier life coming back to
smite her. poor ignorant excuses fer
men, most of email they're good fer
is to steal an lie an live off us wom-
en-, an vote the way the boss tells 'em
on lection day An who's RESPONSE
BILE fer that? Say?" Gloria could
make no reply. and Ella, whose pause
had been rhetorical, uncOuth as she
was, made answer herself 81 know.
The fine gentlemen what buys the
votes. An when they needs more
money fer more votes they send the
p'lice round, an US poor girls has to
pay, always pay"
Il never dreamed of such a thing"
Il toll you you didn't know Why,
oncet I was good like you, too An
now" she began to now-I'm
down-an' 1 can't git up. I can't git
up. It's too late"
suddenly Gloria remembered the
power to which she would appeal.
Where a minute before had been dark
ness and uncertainty was now the
c1earness of a summer day.
It's never too late,' size insisted
Remember. I'm not alone. My father
will help me. He's brave and good and
strong, with heart of gold. I can't
change the worlds ways, maybe, but /
can do something to make Belmont
better with my fathers help-and
yours"
Gloria was a doughty Crusader, and