Cast Adrift | Page 2

and because we heed it not we vainly imagine that no
responsibility lies at our door; and yet there is no man or woman who is
not, according to the measure of his or her influence, responsible for
the human debasement and suffering I have portrayed.
The task I set for myself has not been a pleasant one. It has hurt my
sensibilities and sickened my heart many times as I stood face to face
with the sad and awful degradation that exists in certain regions of our
larger cities; and now that my work is done, I take a deep breath of
relief. The result is in your hands, good citizen, Christian reader,
earnest philanthropist! If it stirs your heart in the reading as it stirred
mine in the writing, it will not die fruitless.
THE AUTHOR.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.
The unwelcome babe--The defrauded young mother--The struggle
between life and death--"Your baby is in heaven"--A brief
retrospect--A marriage for social position--An ambitious wife and a
disappointed husband--The young daughter--The matrimonial
market--The Circassian slaves of modern society--The highest
bidder--Disappearance--The old sad story--Secret marriage--The
letters--Disappointed ambition--Interview between the parents--The
mother's purpose--"Baffled, but not defeated"--The father's
surprise--The returned daughter--Forgiven--"I am not going away again,
father dear"--Insecurity and distrust

CHAPTER II.
The hatred of a bad woman--Mrs. Dinneford's plans for the destruction
of Granger--Starting in business--Plots of Mrs. Dinneford and
Freeling--The discounted notes--The trap--Granger's suspicions
aroused--Forgery--Mrs. Dinneford relentless--The arrest--Fresh
evidence of crime upon Granger's person--The shock to Edith--"That

night her baby was born"

CHAPTER III.
"It is a splendid boy"--A convenient, non-interfering family
doctor--Cast adrift--Into the world in a basket, unnamed and
disowned--Edith's second struggle back to life--Her mind a
blank--Granger convicted of forgery--Seeks to gain knowledge of his
child--The doctor's evasion and ignorance--An insane asylum instead of
State's prison--Edith's slow return to intelligence--"There's something I
can't understand, mother"--"Where is my baby?"--"What of
George?"--No longer a child, but a broken hearted woman--The divorce

CHAPTER IV.
Sympathy between father and daughter--Interest in public charities--A
dreadful sight--A sick babe in the arms of a half-drunken woman--"Is
there no law to meet such cases?"---"The poor baby has no
vote!"--Edith seeks for the grave of her child, but cannot find it--She
questions her mother, who baffles her curiosity--Mrs. Bray's
visit--Interview between Mrs. Dinneford and Mrs. Bray--"The baby
isn't living?"--"Yes; I saw it day before yesterday in the arms of a
beggar-woman"--Edith's suspicions aroused--Determined to discover
the fate of her child--Visits the doctor--"Your baby is in
heaven"--"Would to God it were so, for I saw a baby in hell not long
ago!"

CHAPTER V.
Mrs. Dinneford visits Mrs. Bray--"The woman to whom you gave that
baby was here yesterday"--The woman must be put out of the
way--Exit Mrs. Dinneford, enter Pinky Swett--"You know your
fate--New Orleans and the yellow fever"--"All I want of you is to keep
track of the baby"--Division of the spoils--Lucky dreams--Consultation
of the dream-book for lucky figures--Sam McFaddon and his backer,
who "drives in the Park and wears a two thousand dollar diamond
pin"--The fate of a baby begged with--The baby must not die--The

lottery-policies

CHAPTER VI.
Rottenness at the heart of a great city--Pinky Swett's attempted rescue
of a child from cruel beating--The fight--Pinky's arrest--Appearance of
the "queen"--Pinky's release at her command--The queen's home--The
screams of children being beaten--The rescue of "Flanagan's
Nell"--Death the great rescuer--"They don't look after things in here as
they do outside--Everybody's got the screws on, and things must break
sometimes, but it isn't called murder--The coroner understands it all"

CHAPTER VII.
Pinky Swett at the mercy of the crowd in the street--Taken to the
nearest station-house--Mrs. Dinneford visits Mrs. Bray again--Fresh
alarms--"She's got you in her power"---"Money is of no account"--The
knock at the door--Mrs. Dinneford in hiding--The visitor gone--Mrs.
Bray reports the woman insatiable in her demands--Must have two
hundred dollars by sundown--No way of escape except through police
interference--"People who deal with the devil generally have the devil
to pay"--Suspicion--A mistake--Sound of feet upon the stairs--Mrs.
Dinneford again in hiding--Enter Pinky Swett--Pinky disposed of--Mrs.
Dinneford again released--Mrs. Bray's strategy--"Let us be friends still,
Mrs. Bray"--Mrs. Dinneford's deprecation and humiliation--Mrs. Bray's
triumph

CHAPTER VIII.
Mrs. Bray receives a package containing two hundred dollars--"Poor
baby! I must see better to its comfort"--Pinky meets a young girl from
the country--The "Ladies' Restaurant"--Fried oysters and sangaree--The
"bindery" girl--"My head feels strangely"--Through the back alley--The
ten-cent lodging house--Robbery--A second robbery--A veil drawn--A
wild prolonged cry of a woman--The policeman listens only for a
moment, and then passes on--Foul play--"In all our large cities are
savages more cruel and brutal in their instincts than the

Comanches"--Who is responsible?

CHAPTER IX.
Valuation of the spoils--The receiver--The "policy-shop" and its
customers--A victim of the lottery mania

CHAPTER X.
"Policy-drunkards"--A newly-appointed policeman's blunder--The end
of a "policy-drunkard"--Pinky