第37章

"Oh," she said, "to get away from all this for a bit--to shake Broadway and grease paint and slang and electric light, if only for a week.I'm fed up, boy.I'm all out, like an empty gasoline tin.Iwant to see something clean and sweet."

Martin had made up his mind.Look at that poor little bruised soul, as much in need of water as those sad flowers in the milk bottle.

"Tootles," he said, "pack up your troubles in your old kit-bag, and be ready for me in the morning.""What d'yer mean, boy?"

"What I say.At eleven o'clock to-morrow--to-day, I'll have a car here and drive you away to woods and birds and all clean things.

I'll give you a holiday in a big cathedral, and you shall lie and listen to God's own choir.""Go on--ye're pullin' me leg!"

She waved her hand to stop him.It was all too good to joke about.

"No, I'm not.I've got a house away in the country.It was my father's.We shall both be proud to welcome you there, Tootles."She sprang up, put her hands on his face and tilted it back and looked into his eyes.It was true! It was true! She saw it there.

And she kissed him and gave a great sobbing sigh and went into her bedroom and began to undress.Was there anything like life, after all?

Martin cleared the table and drew the curtains over the domestic arrangements.He didn't like domestic arrangements.Then he sat down and lighted a cigarette.His head was all blurred with sleep.

And presently a tired voice, called "Boy!" and he went in.The all-too-golden head was deep into the pillow and long lashes made fans on that powdered face.

"Where did you pinch the magic carpet?" she asked, and smiled, and fell into sleep as a stone disappears into water.

As Martin drew the clothes over her thinly clad shoulder, something touched him.It was like a tap on the heart.Before he knew what he was doing, he had turned out the light, gone into the sitting room, the passage, down the stairs and into the silent street.At top speed he ran into Sixth Avenue, yelled to a cab that was slipping along the trolley lines and told the driver to go to East Sixty-seventh Street for all that he was worth.

Joan wanted him.

Joan!

Joan heard the cab drive up and stop, heard Martin sing out "That's all right," open and shut the front door and mount the stairs; heard him go quickly to her room and knock.

She went out and called "Marty, Marty," and stood on the threshold of his dressing room, smiling a welcome.She was glad, beyond words glad, and surprised.There had seemed to be no chance of seeing him that morning.

Martin came along the passage with his characteristic light tread and drew up short.He looked anxious.

"You wanted me?" he said.

And Joan held out her hand."I did and do, Marty.But how did you guess?""I didn't guess; I knew." And he held her hand nervously.

She looked younger and sweeter than ever in her blue silk dressing gown and shorter in her heelless slippers.What a kid she was, after all, he thought.

"How amazing!" she said."I wonder how?"

He shook his head."I dunno--just as I did the first time, when Itore through the woods and found you on the hill.""Isn't that wonderful! Do you suppose I shall always be able to get you when I want you very much?""Yes, always."

"Why?"

She had gone back into the dressing room.The light was on her face.