He was putting on his coat and waistcoat. He took from the waistcoat pocket a dollar bill. "You're a peach," said he. "I'll come again, next time my old lady goes off guard." He made the bill into a pellet, dropped it on her breast. "A little present for you. Put it in your stocking and don't let the madam grab it."
With a groan Susan lifted herself to a sitting position, drew the spread about her—a gesture of instinct rather than of conscious modesty. "They drugged me and brought me here," said she. "I want you to help me get out."
"Good Lord!" cried the man, instantly all a-quiver with nervousness. "I'm a married man. I don't want to get mixed up in this." And out of the room he bolted, closing the door behind him.
Susan smiled at herself satirically. After all her experience, to make this silly appeal—she who knew men! "I must be getting feeble-minded," thought she. Then——
Her clothes! With a glance she swept the little room. No closet! Her own clothes gone! On the chair beside the bed a fast-house parlor dress of pink cotton silk, and a kind of abbreviated chemise. The stockings on her legs were not her own, but were of pink cotton, silk finished. A pair of pink satin slippers stood on the floor beside the two galvanized iron wash basins.
The door opened and a burly man, dressed in cheap ready-made clothes but with an air of authority and prosperity, was smiling at her. "The madam told me to walk right in and make myself at home," said he. "Yes, you're up to her account of you. Only she said you were dead drunk and would probably be asleep. Now, honey, you treat me right and I'll treat you right."
"Get out of here!" cried Susan. "I'm going to leave this house. They drugged me and brought me here."
"Oh, come now. I've got nothing to do with your quarrels with the landlady. Cut those fairy tales out. You treat me right and——"
A few minutes later in came the madam. Susan, exhausted, sick, lay inert in the middle of the bed. She fixed her gaze upon the eyes looking through the hideous mask of paint and powder partially concealing the madam's face.
"Well, are you going to be a good girl now?" said the madam.