46 
hardly finished reading through the advertisement for the second 
time when the train reeled round a corner, the flanged jaws of 
its wheels screeched, and Miss Craig trying desperately to grab 
a strap, dropped her little pink handkerchief. The hankerchief 
fluttered down past Mr. Warburg’s newspaper, spread its wings 
like a butterfly, and landed gently in his unconscious lap. The 
train having taken the curve, and Miss Craig regaining her bal 
ance turned to Miss Williams and said, “Holy Moses 1” Leaving 
a blurred trail of lights and spectral faces the train slewed past 
Eighteenth street. “What?” said Miss Williams. “Look!” 
Miss Craig lowered her eyes. Now if Miss Williams hadn’t 
laughed or if their eyes hadn’t met, it might have turned out all 
right. The handkerchief might have blown off his lap, or it 
might have just slipped onto the floor, or he might have seen it 
lying there and passed it up to her if he was gentleman enough. 
But he probably was 
NOT GENTLEMAN ENOUGH 
Miss Williams began giggling, the motion of the train is giggly 
anyway, doing her mouth up with a lip stick to make off she 
wasn’t laughing, which of course was no use because she lost her 
balance and that set them off all over again. And just then that 
fat nigger woman saw it lying there, so she began rolling her 
eyes trying to hide her big blobber lips with a handkerchief, and 
then the man next to Miss Williams saw it, and the young man 
who’d fallen over, saw it, and pretty soon everybody in the car 
was peeking over their shoulders to take a look at it. Miss Craig 
went white and red by turn not daring to look at Miss Williams 
for fear she’d scream. And then the man himself began to get 
figgety behind his newspaper and the next moment he was star 
ing over it again at Miss Craig. Of course he must have seen 
everyone looking in that direction, for he looked down over his 
paper and saw it. Or probably he must have just glanced at it, 
for he was wearing a baby blue shirt and the handkerchief was 
pink. At any rate the difference in color didn’t seem to mean 
much to him, for he went behind his paper and when a moment 
or two later he coughed and turned to a new page Presto! the 
handkerchief had absolutely disappeared. Naturally Miss Craig 
and Miss Williams didn’t dare move their eyes one way or the 
other, but kept them positively glued to “Nodoreen. Harmless. 
Effective.” until finally the train did stop at Canal Street, and 
out Miss Craig and Miss Williams wriggled as hard as they 
could and then just ran for the exit. As for Mr. Warburg, he 
stayed within the shell of his newspaper, and was carried past 
his usual station all the way to Rector street. But this is not 
extremely unusual in the daily annals of the subway, for occa