Carrie obeyed.

" Say, that fits like a T, don’t it?” he remarked, feeling the set of it at the waist and eyeing it from a few paces with real pleasure. " What you need now is a new shirt.  Let’s go to breakfast.”

Carrie put on her hat.

" Where are the gloves?” he inquired.

" Here,” she said, taking them out of the bureau drawer.

" Now, come on,” he said.

Thus the first hour of misgiving was swept away.

It went this way on every occasion.  Drouet did not leave her much alone.  She had time for some lone wanderings, but mostly he filled her hours with skirt and shirt waist.  With his money she purchased the little necessaries of toilet, until at last she looked quite another maiden.  The mirror convinced her of a few things which she had long believed.  She was pretty, yes, indeed!  How nice her had set, and weren’t her eyes pretty.  She caught her little red lip with her teeth and felt her first thrill of power Drouet was so good.

They went to see " The Mikado” one evening, an open which was hilariously popular at that time.  Before going they made off for the Windsor dinning-room, which was in Dearborn Street, a considerable distance from Carrie’s room.  It was blowing up cold, and out of her window.  Carrie could see the western sky, still pink with the fading light, but steely blue at the top where it met the darkness.  A long, thin cloud of pink hung in midair, shape like some island in a far-off sea.  Somehow the swaying of some dead branches of trees across the way brought back the picture with which she was familiar when she looked from their front window in December days a home.

She paused and wrung her little hands.

" What’s the matter?” said Drouet.

" Oh, I don’t know,” she said, her lip trembling.

He sensed something, and slipped his arm over her shoulder, patting her arm.

" Come on,” he said gently, " you’re all right.”

She turned to slip on her jacket.

" Better wear that boa about throat to-night.”

They walked north on Wabash to Adams Street and then west.  The lights in the stores were already shinning out in gushes of golden hue.  The are lights were sputtering overhead, and high up were the lighted window of the tall office buildings.  The chill wind whipped in and out in gusty breaths.  Homeward bound, the six o’clock throng bumped and jostled.  Light overcoats were turned up about the ears, hats were pulled down.  Little shop girls went fluttering by in pairs and fours, chattering, laughing.  It was a spectacle of warm-blooded humanity.

Suddenly a pair of eye met Carrie’s in recognition.  They were looking out from a group of poorly dressed girls.  Their clothes were faded and loose-hanging, their jackets old, their general make-up shabby.

Carrie recognized the glance and the girl.  She was one of those who worked at the machines in the shoe factory.  The latter looked, Carrie felt as if some great tide had rolled between them.  The old dress and the old machine came back.  She actually started.  Drouet didn’t notice