in any event. Trash littered the dirt space between the two rows of houses, blowing up against the unpainted walls and catching on wooden steps. Here and there someone had made an attempt at cheerfulness by planting geraniums in tin cans and setting them on the steps, but the spot of brightness only served to make the surroundings more dismal in comparison.
Boys played a rough and tumble game of kick-the-can in the middle of the street, and Daniel placed himself between Georgina and the game and skirted around them skillfully. One of the boys shouted a word of greeting, and he lifted his hand in acknowledgement, but he didn't stop to talk any more than the boy stopped his game. Sociability wasn't a priority on this side of town.
"It smells," Georgina muttered as they stopped in front of the narrow one-story shotgun house that was their destination.
"There's no sanitation. No indoor toilets, no yards for privies. I won't tell you what they use." Daniel lifted his knuckles to knock at the weathered door without looking at the expression of wide-eyed horror on his companion's face. He didn't have to see it to know it was there.
The door burst open before he could lower his fist against the wood. A small figure darted from the interior, colliding with Daniel's legs before skittering around him and out into the street, shouting "Douglas!" at the top of her lungs and in a tone of terror.
Daniel staggered, momentarily unbalanced as the collision shifted his weight to his weak leg, but the cries from within forced him forward. Leaving the woman on his arm outside, he stepped into the dim interior.
Clutching her fingers over her mouth to stifle a scream, Georgina glanced after the young girl running and yelling down the street in the direction of the older boys, then back to Mr. Martin, who had just disappeared into the shadows of the interior. She could hear a woman's screams and a man's thundering voice, and she was paralyzed. She had never been in such an unpleasant situation before, and she didn't have experience or etiquette to rely on.
So she relied on instinct. Stepping into the tiny front room, she watched a big ruffian in a derby hat and shapeless sack coat raise his hand to the pretty woman she recognized from her father's factory. The woman cringed, and a younger girl beside her screamed in fury and terror.
Before Georgina could react, Mr. Martin grabbed the bully's collar and jerked him backward. The newspaperman was considerably more slender than his opponent but his action caused the bully's fist to miss its connection. Georgina bit her hand in horror as the bigger man turned in a fury to whip his powerful arm in Mr. Martin's direction.
Daniel dodged, kicked upward in a vicious blow to the man's privates, and bent the bigger man over in a bellow of pain. Using the camera case for leverage, he slammed it against the bully's neck, flattening him to the wooden floor.
By this time the gang of boys from the street careened inside screeching. Georgina retreated to the wall, out of their way. Without regard to her, the newspaperman she had considered mild-mannered and amusing pointed at the ruffian he had single-handedly brought down.
"The gentleman had a little accident, Douglas. Why don't you and the boys haul him out where he can get some fresh air?"
With whoops of triumph the boys grabbed every available limb and piece of fabric and unceremoniously hauled the huge man out into the open cesspool that they called a street.
"Who in hell was that?" Daniel demanded as soon as the boys were gone, turning back to the two women clinging to each other.
Now that her eyes had adjusted to the darkness, Georgina could see that there was already a growing bruise on the face of the woman she knew as Janice. The younger woman, who looked enough like her to be her sister, was sobbing brokenly. Janice lifted her chin in a defiant tilt as she glanced to Georgina then back to the man who had saved her.
"That's the rent collector. It's the first of the month, and we didn't have all the rent."
Her sister gulped back a sob long enough to offer the explanation Janice had proudly refused to give. "Betsy was sick and we had to use some of the rent money for medicine. We told him we would have it next week, but Egan's a brute."
Douglas returned, brushing his hands off on his