The man was much embarrassed."Oh, I'm sorry," he said feelingly."That's right--keep your virtue.Go home to your parents." He was at ease now; his voice was greasy and his words sleek with the unction of an elder."I thought you were a soiled dove.I'm glad you spoke out--glad for my sake as well as your own.I've got a daughter about your age.Go home, my dear, and stay a good girl.I know it's hard sometimes; but never give up your purity--never!" And he lifted his square-topped hard hat and turned away.
Suddenly Etta felt again the fury of the winter night and icy wind.As that wind flapped her thin skirt and tortured her flesh, she cried, "Wait--please.I was just--just fooling."The man had halted, but he was looking at her uncertainly.Etta put her hand on his arm and smiled pertly up at him--smiled as she had seen other street girls smile in the days when she despised them."I'll go--if you'll give me three.""I--I don't think I care to go now.You sort of put me out of the humor.""Well--two, then." She gave a reckless laugh."God, how cold it is! Anybody'd go to hell to get warm a night like this.""You are a very pretty girl," said the man.He was warmly dressed; his was not the thin blood of poverty.He could not have appreciated what she was feeling."You're sure you want to go? You're sure it's your--your business?""Yes.I'm strange in this part of town.Do you know a place?"An hour later Etta went into the appointed restaurant.Her eyes searched anxiously for Susan, but did not find her.She inquired at the counter.No one had asked there for a young lady.This both relieved her and increased her nervousness; Susan had not come and gone--but would she come? Etta was so hungry that she could hold out no longer.She sat at a table near the door and took up the large sheet on which was printed the bill of fare.
She was almost alone in the place, as it was between dinner and supper.She read the bill thoroughly, then ordered black bean soup, a sirloin steak and German fried potatoes.This, she had calculated, would cost altogether a dollar; undoubtedly an extravagance, but everything at that restaurant seemed dear in comparison with the prices to which she had been used, and she felt horribly empty.She ordered the soup, to stay her while the steak was broiling.
As soon as the waiter set down bread and butter she began upon it greedily.As the soup came, in walked Susan--calm and self-possessed, Etta saw at first glance."I've been so frightened.You'll have a plate of soup?" asked Etta, trying to look and speak in unconcerned fashion.
"No, thank you," replied Susan, seating herself opposite.
"There's a steak coming--a good-sized one, the waiter said it'd be.""Very well."
Susan spoke indifferently.
"Aren't you hungry?"
"I don't know.I'll see." Susan was gazing straight ahead.Her eyes were distinctly gray--gray and as hard as Susan Lenox's eyes could be.
"What're you thinking about?"
"I don't know," she laughed queerly.
"Was--it--dreadful?"
A pause, then: "Nothing is going to be dreadful to me any more.
It's all in the game, as Mr.Burlingham used to say.""Burlingham--who's he?" It was Etta's first faint clew toward that mysterious past of Susan's into which she longed to peer.
"Oh--a man I knew.He's dead."
A long pause, Etta watching Susan's unreadable face.At last she said:
"You don't seem a bit excited."
Susan came back to the present."Don't I? Your soup's getting cold."Etta ate several spoonfuls, then said with an embarrassed attempt at a laugh, "I--I went, too."Susan slowly turned upon Etta her gaze--the gaze of eyes softening, becoming violet.Etta's eyes dropped and the color flooded into her fair skin."He was an old man--forty or maybe fifty," she explained nervously."He gave me two dollars.Inearly didn't get him.I lost my nerve and told him I was good and was only starting because I needed money.""Never whine," said Susan."It's no use.Take what comes, and wait for a winning hand."Etta looked at her in a puzzled way."How queer you talk! Not a bit like yourself.You sound so much older....And your eyes--they don't look natural at all."Indeed they looked supernatural.The last trace of gray was gone.They were of the purest, deepest violet, luminous, mysterious, with that awe-inspiring expression of utter aloneness.But as Etta spoke the expression changed.The gray came back and with it a glance of irony.Said she:
"Oh--nonsense! I'm all right."
"I didn't mind nearly as much as I thought I would.Yes, I'll get used to it.""You mustn't," said Susan.
"But I've got to."
"We've got to do it, but we haven't got to get used to it,"replied Susan.
Etta was still puzzling at this when the dinner now came--a fine, thick broiled steak, the best steak Susan had ever seen, and the best food Etta had ever seen.
They had happened upon one of those famous Cincinnati chop houses where in plain surroundings the highest quality of plain food is served."You _are_ hungry, aren't you, Lorna?" said Etta.
"Yes--I'm hungry," declared Susan."Cut it--quick.""Draught beer or bottled?" asked the waiter.
"Bring us draught beer," said Etta."I haven't tasted beer since our restaurant burned.""I never tasted it," said Susan."But I'll try it tonight."Etta cut two thick slices from the steak, put them on Susan's plate with some of the beautifully browned fried potatoes.
"Gracious, they have good things to eat here!" she exclaimed.
Then she cut two thick slices for herself, and filled her mouth.
Her eyes glistened, the color came into her pale cheeks."Isn't it _grand_!" she cried, when there was room for words to pass out.
"Grand," agreed Susan, a marvelous change of expression in her face also.
The beer came.Etta drank a quarter of the tall glass at once.
Susan tasted, rather liked the fresh bitter-sweet odor and flavor."Is it--very intoxicating?" she inquired.
"If you drink enough," said Etta."But not one glass."Susan took quite a drink."I feel a lot less tired already,"declared she.
