“My father was a lawyer, too. Rather well known in his day. One time ambassador to Vienna.”
Ambassador to Vienna! She didn’t know where Vienna was or the nature of an ambassador, but she did know that it sounded grand, so she looked 36 at him attentively. It was either more gold brick or else....
Then something struck her—“smote her” would be perhaps the more accurately descriptive word, since the effect was on her heart. This man was sick. He was suffering. She had often seen women suffer, but men rarely, and this was one of the rare instances. Something in her was touched. She couldn’t imagine why he talked to her or what he wanted of her, but a pity which had never yet been called upon was astir among her emotions.
As for the minute he said no more, her next words came out only because she supposed them to betray the kindly interest of which he was in need.
“Then I suppose he left you a big fat wad.”
“Yes; but it doesn’t do me any good. I mean, it doesn’t make me happy—when I’m not.”
“I guess it’d make you a good deal less happy if you didn’t have it.”
“Perhaps so; I don’t think about it either way.” He added, after tense compression of the lips; “I’m all alone in the world—like you.”
She was sure now that something was coming, though of what nature lay beyond her speculative power. She wondered if he could have fallen in love with her at first sight, realizing a favorite dream she often had in the subway. Hundreds of times she had beguiled the minutes by selecting one or another of the wealthy lawyers and bankers, whom she supposed to be her fellow-travelers there, seeing him smitten by a glance at her, following her when she got out, and laying his heart and coronet at her feet before she had 37 run up the steps. If this man were not a shyster lawyer or a gold brick nut, he might possibly be doing that.
“It’s about a girl,” he burst out suddenly. “Half an hour ago she kicked me out.”