"Nothing," she answered.
Flint ordered a cognac.
"Old friend Condor tells me that you insulted her last night. I'm glad of it. I'm sick of her. I'm sick of everything. Cheer up! Have one with me, won't you?... I say, but you are a nice little tombstone to be ornamenting a place like this. What's the matter, don't you like me?"
Claire continued to stare dumbly at him. He had been drinking, she could see that plainly, and she felt a remnant of the mixed fascination and fear that she had experienced during that memorable hour at his dinner-table.
"No, you don't like me," he mused audibly, with an air of drunken melancholy, as if the thought had just struck him. "That's why I'm running around with the old girl ... just out of spite.... Say, but this is a hell of a place for you to be in! On the square it is ... nothing but dirty, drunken Greeks and painted females! Bah! this isn't any place for you! What I wanted to say is this—any time you want your job back you can have it. It's there waiting for you. And there ain't any strings on it, either.... I played you a mean trick and I acknowledge it. Now I ask you, on the level, ain't that fair enough?... I ain't the man to go crawling on all-fours, begging people's pardon. But you've been pretty game and I take my hat off to you! I take my hat off to anybody that's game, see? Anybody at all ... anybody that's game.... Well, what you staring at? I know I'm losing my hair, but I don't have to have you tell me that.... Is it a go? Your job back and everything nice and comfortable again?"
Suddenly Claire felt sorry for him. She was beginning to feel sorry for any one stripped of his illusions. And she had a conviction that this man before her had treasured illusions that were no less poignant merely because they were vulgar. He seemed sincere in spite of his befuddled state. Somehow, somewhere, it had come upon him that he had done her a grave injustice and he was offering her such reparation as his lights allowed. Her job back and everything nice and comfortable again! How simple and naïve and masculine! Everything—all the bitter, soul-stirring experiences of the past months to be swept aside by the simple formula of restoring her to her old berth! It was absurd enough for laughter, but tears trembled very near the surface of such a revelation. Yes, it took a man to have the courage of any faith so direct and artless!
"I'm afraid," she said, looking at him clearly, "that it wouldn't be possible ... to have the slate wiped clean again. And besides.... I have to earn my living now at night, Mr. Flint. I have my mother to look after in the daytime, you know."
She spoke so gently that she surprised even herself. And it came upon her that she had no reason to feel any rancor against the man before her. It was he that had given her the first opportunity to cross swords with life. And it struck her with added force that she would not recall one moment of the last six months even if she could.
He did not receive her reply with much grace. His fist came down upon the table as he said:
"You always were damn full of excuses.... You worked in the daytime for Ned Stillman.... But you can't get rid of me as quickly as you once did. This is a public place and I'll come here and sit every night and order up drinks until you change your mind."