How they ever surmounted the various walls and crossed the various yards they encountered Sylvia could never understand. All she remembered was being lifted on packing-cases and dust-bins, of slipping once and crashing into a hen-coop, of tearing her dress on some broken glass, of riding astride walls and pricking her face against plants, and of repeating to herself all the time, “When lilacs last in the dooryard bloomed.” When at last they extricated themselves from the maze of dooryards they wandered for a long time through a maze of narrow streets. Sylvia had managed to stuff all her jewelry out of sight into her corsage, where it scratched her most uncomfortably, but any discomfort was preferable to the covetous eyes of the half-breeds that watched her from the shadows.
“I guess you enjoyed yourself,” said Morera, in a satisfied voice, when at last they found a carriage and leaned back to breathe the gentle night air.
“I enjoyed myself thoroughly,” said Sylvia.
“Dat’s the way to see a bit of life,” he declared. “What’s the good of sitting in a bum theater all the night? Dat don’t amuse me any. I plugged him in the leg,” he added, in a tone of almost tender reminiscence.
Sylvia expressed surprise at his knowing where he had hit him, and Morera was very indignant at the idea of her supposing that he should shoot a man without knowing exactly at what part of him he was aiming and where he should hit him.
“Why, I might have killed him dead,” he added. “I didn’t want to kill a man dead just for a bit of fun. I started them guys off, see. They thought they’d got a slob. Dat’s where I was laughing. I guess I’ll sleep good to-night.”
Sylvia spent a month seeing life with Carlos Morera; though she never had another experience so exciting as the first, she passed a good deal of her time upon the verge of melodramatic adventure. She grew fond of this child-like creature with his spendthrift ostentation and bravado. He never showed the least sign of wanting to make love to her, and demanded nothing from Sylvia but overdressing and admiration of his exploits. At the end of the month he told Sylvia that business called him to New York and invited her to come with him. He let her understand, however, that now he wanted her as his mistress. Even if she could have tolerated the idea, Sylvia was sure that from the moment she accepted such a position he would begin to despise her. She had heard too many of his contemptuous references to the women he had bought. She refused to accompany him, on the plea of wanting to go back to Europe. Morera looked sullen, and she had a feeling that he was regretting the amount he had spent upon her. Her pride found such a sensation insupportable and she made haste to return him all his jewels.
“Say, what sort of a guy do you think I am?” He threw the jewels at her feet and left her like a spoiled child.
An hour or two later he came back with a necklace that must have cost five thousand dollars.
“Dat’s the sort of guy I am,” he said, and would take no refusal from her to accept it.