"More so," says he. "But it"s only seeing you again that brings on the attack. Katie, you"re glorious!"
"Please!" says she, protestin". "I"ve rather outgrown my liking for sentimental speeches. Tell me, why do you hunt me up like this, after so long?"
"Can you ask?" says he. "Look! No--in my eyes, Katie."
And, say, with things gettin" that gummy, I was beginnin" to feel like a cold boiled potato served accidental with the pie.
"Excuse me," says I, "but maybe I"d better wait in the next room."
"Not at all," says Mrs. Steele, real crisp and businesslike. "It will be only for a moment, while Mr. Bolan states very briefly his exact purpose in coming here."
Larry bows. "To see once more the girl he could not forget," says he.
"Humph!" says she, curlin" her upper lip. "Very pretty, I suppose. But let me a.s.sure you that foolish young person ceased to exist several years ago."
"She lives for me--here," says Larry, placin" one hand on his left vest pocket.
Mrs. Steele indulges in a thin little cold-storage laugh that sounds almost as pleasant as tappin" a gas pipe. "What a sudden revival of an old, worn-out affection!" says she. "When did you first hear I was a widow?"
"Less than an hour ago," says Larry.
"Did they say I was rich, or poor?" she goes on sarcastic.
"Katie!" says he gaspy. "Surely you--you can"t think----"
"It"s what I ask them all," says she, "domestic and imported. Naturally I am a little suspicious when they declare pa.s.sionate love at the first or second meeting; for, in spite of what my maids tell me, my mirror insists that I"m not ravishingly beautiful. So I"ve begun to suspect that perhaps my money may be the attraction. And I"m not in the market for a husband, you know."
"Bing-g-g!" says I under my breath.
As for Larry Bolan, it leaves him with his chin down. For, after all, he ain"t one of your walrus-hided gents. As a matter of fact, he"s as sensitive as they come, and she couldn"t have handed it out rougher.
"My dear lady," says he, "you are pleased to be cruel. Perhaps, though, it"s only my due. I admit that I"m only a poor pensioner posing as a gentleman. But within a month I shall be on my way to bury myself on the other side of the world. Meanwhile, I see you pa.s.s. Could I help wanting a few kind words of yours to take with me?"
"If that is really all, Mr. Bolan," says she, "I would advise you to outlive your nonsense, as I"ve outlived mine. Try paying your tailor with kind words."
"Katie," says he, with a sob in his voice, "you--you"ve broken the heart of me. Come, McCabe, we will go."
She stands watchin" us, smilin" cynical, until we"re almost through the door; and then--well, it"s a sigh that comes out explosive. She starts as if she meant to dash after us, and then stops with her arms out.
"Larry!" says she, almost in a whisper.
It pulls him up, and he stares at her a minute over his shoulder. "It"s no use, Katie," says he. "What"s turned you hard and cold I don"t know; but you can"t unsay what"s been said. And it hurt--bitter."
"Oh, I know, I know!" says she. "But you must hear what it was that changed me from the girl you knew. Money, Larry, the money for which I married. As for the man--oh, I suppose he was no worse than the rest; only he taught me to love a dollar more than anything else in earth or heaven. He"d wrung all of his from a grudging world with his bare hands,--starved and slaved and plotted for it, in mean ways, against mean men; then fought to hold it. And he knew to a penny"s worth what every dollar he spent should buy for him. Among other things, he bought me. Sixty-odd he was; I barely twenty. Why call it differently? I was fool enough, too, to think I was a lucky girl. Ah, what a fool! Seven years of fear and hate! It"s an awful thing, Larry, to live so long with hate in you for one at your side. But he--he never knew."
She leaves off, squeezin" one hand in the other until the ends of the fingers went white, her chest heavin", her eyes stary. Larry watches her without a word.
"Tell me," says she after a bit, "why you ran away that time and left me to--to make such a mess of things. Why?"
"For the same reason that I"m going away again now," says he. "I"ve a thousand pounds a year, and not sense enough to keep myself on it, let alone a wife. So it"s good-by, Katie."
Then the weeps came, open eyed; but she didn"t try to hide "em. "Oh, oh!" she moans. "But I was so lonely then, and--and I"m so lonely now!"
Them few drops of brine turned the trick. "Ah, Katie McDevitt!" says he.
"If I could bring back the old Katie! By the soul of me, but I will? You never heard of my old uncle, did you? Come with me to him, and see me make it up; for I can"t leave you this way, Katie, I just can"t!"
"Larry!" says she, and with that they goes to a fond clinch.
"Help!" says I, and slides through the door.
When I gets home Sadie wants to know what I"ve done with Mr. Bolan.
"Towed him up to Hymen"s gate," says I, "and left him bein" yanked through by Mrs. Sam Steele."
"Wha-a-at?" says she. "Of all persons! And when did that start, I"d like to know?"
"Eight years back," says I. "She was Katie the nurse, and this is their second act. Anyway, he ducks Bulgaroo by it."
CHAPTER XVII
BAYARD DUCKS HIS PAST
First place, Swifty Joe should have let the subject drop. Anyway, he needn"t have come paradin" into the front office in his gym suit to show me his nutty theory of how Young Disko landed that knockout on the Australian in the breakaway.
"Turn over!" says I. "You"re on your back! He couldn"t have done anything of the kind."
"Couldn"t, eh?" growls Swifty. "Ahr-r-r-r chee! Couldn"t give him the shoulder on the jaw! Ain"t I seen it done? Say, lemme show you----"
"Show nothing!" says I. "I"m tellin" you it was a right hook the kid put him out with, from chancery. Now see!"
With that I sheds my coat, gets Swifty"s neck in the crook of my left elbow, swings him round for a side hip-lock, and bends his head forward.
"Now, you South Brooklyn kike," I goes on, maybe more realistic than I meant, "I got you right, ain"t I? And all I got to do is push in a half-arm jolt like this, and----"
Well, then I looks up. Neither of us has noticed her come in, hadn"t even heard the k.n.o.b turn; but standin" there in the middle of the room and starin" straight at us is a perfectly good female lady.
That don"t half tell it, either. She"s all lady, from the tips of her double-A pumps to the little gray wing peekin" over the top of her dingy gray bonnet. One of these slim, dainty, graceful built parties, with white, lacy stuff at her wrists and throat, and the rest of her costume all gray: not the puckered-waist, half-masted skirt effects all the women are wearin" now. I can"t say what year"s model it was, or how far back; but it"s a style that seems just fitted to her: maybe one that she"s invented herself. Around thirty-five, I should judge she was, from the little streak of gray runnin" through her front hair.
What got me, though, was the calm, remote, superior look that she"s givin" us. She don"t seem nervous or panicky at all, like most women would, breakin" in on a roughhouse scene like that. She don"t even stare reprovin", but stands there watchin" us as serene as if we wa"n"t anything more"n pictures on a movie sheet. And there we was, holdin" the pose; me with my right all bunched for action, and Swifty with his face to the mat. Seemed minutes we was clinched there, and everything so still you could hear Swifty"s heavy breathin" all over the room.
Course I was waitin" for some remarks from her. You"d most think they was due, wouldn"t you? It"s my private office, remember, and she"s sort of crashed in unannounced. If any explainin" was done, it was up to her to start it. And waitin" for what don"t come is apt to get on your nerves.
"Eh?" I throws over my shoulder at her.
Her straight eyebrows kind of humps in the middle--that"s all.