No,” she said to herself, “he can’t come here.”  She asked Minnie for ink and paper, which were upon the mantel in the dining-room, and when the latter had gone to bed at ten, got out Drouet’s card and wrote him.

" I cannot have you call on me here.  You will have to wait until you hear from me again.  My sister’s place is so small.”

She troubled herself over what else to put in the letter She wanted to make some reference to their relations upon the train, but was too timid.  She concluded by thanking him for his kindness in a cruded way, then puzzled over the formality of signing her name, and finally decided upon the severe, winding up with a “Very truly,” which she subsequently changed to “Sincerely.”  She sealed and addressed the letter, and going in the front room, the alcove of which contained her bed, drew the one small rocking-chair up to the open window, and sat looking out upon the night and streets in silent wonder.  Finally, wearied by her own reflections, she began to grow dull in her chair, and feeling the need of sleep, arranged her clothing for the night and went to bed.

When she awoke at eight the next morning, Hanson had gone.  Her sister was busy in the dining-room, which was also the sitting-room, sewing.  She worked, after dressing, to arrange a little breakfast for herself, and then advised with Minnie as to which way to look.  The latter had changed considerably since Carrie had seen her.  She was now a thin, though rugged, women of twenty-seven, with ideas of life colored by her husband’s and fast hardening into narrower conceptions of pleasure and duty than had ever been hers in a thoroughly circumscribed youth. `She had invited Carrie, not because she longed for her presence, but because the latter was dissatisfied at home, and could probably get work and pay her board here.  She was plead to see her in a way but reflected her husband’s point of view in the matter of work.  Anything was good enough so long as it paid say, five dollars a week to begin with.  A shop girl was the destiny prefigured for the newcomer.  She would get in one of the great shops and do well enough until something happened.  Neither of them knew exactly what.  They did not figure on promotion.  They did not exactly count on marriage.  Things would go on, though, in a dim kind of way until the better thing would eventuate, and Carrie would rewarded for coming and toiling in the city.  It was under such auspicious circumstances that she started out this morning to look for work.

Before following her in her round of seeking, let us look at the sphere in which her future was to lie.  In 1889 Chicago had the peculiar qualifications of growth which of young girls plausible.  Its many and growing commercial opportunities gave it widespread fame, which made of it a giant magnet, drawing to itself, from all quarters, the hopeful and the hapless those who had their fortune yet to make and those