Maud had been reflecting while Susan was casting about, as she had many a time before, for her real opinion of her master who was in turn the slave of Finnegan, who was in his turn the slave of somebody higher up, she didn't exactly know who—or why—or the why of any of it—or the why of the grotesque savage purposeless doings of destiny in general. Maud now burst out:
"I don't care. I'm going to put you wise if I die for it."
"Don't," said Susan. "I don't want to know."
"But I've got to tell you. Do you know what Freddie's going to do?"
Susan smiled disdainfully. "I don't care. You mustn't tell me—when you've been drinking this way——"
"Finnegan's police judge is a man named Bennett. As soon as Bennett comes back to Jefferson Market Police Court, Freddie's going to have you sent up for three months."
Susan's glass was on the way to her lips. She set it down again. The drunken old wreck of an entertainer at the piano in the corner was bellowing out his favorite song—"I Am the King of the Vikings." Susan began to hum the air.
"It's gospel," cried Maud, thinking Susan did not believe her. "He's a queer one, is Freddie. They're all afraid of him. You'd think he was a coward, the way he bullies women and that. But somehow he ain't—not a bit. He'll be a big man in the organization some day, they all say. He never lets up till he gets square. And he thinks you're not square—after all he's done for you."
"Perhaps not—as he looks at it," said Susan.
"And Jim says he's crazy in love with you, and that he wants to put you where other men can't see you and where maybe he can get over caring about you. That's the real reason. He's a queer devil. But then all men are though none quite like Freddie."