Wearied by the events of the day, Joy went early to bed after giving Madame Durant a sketch of the main events of the rain. Sleep came reluctantly; she was thinking over Packy’s words. “No matter what the women of to-day are making of themselves—they’re all we’ve got.” “Bye and bye the world’ll get straightened out—it takes time—and costs a lot on the way.” How Packy had changed from the casual, flippant, “jazz-hound” of only last fall. To think about things so——She had made an error common among girls—Because men of his type had never talked seriously to her, she had supposed that they never thought seriously.
It was true; these days were, must be, but transitional. Excitement-Eaters, dancers in the dark—all were part of the wheel of progress that seems to go back at times before it turns forward again. But “it takes time, and costs a lot on the way.”
It costs a lot, it costs a lot. Had she been asleep? She was still repeating those words in the quiescent darkness of the room. What had awakened her? The call of the telephone bell, a long shriek in the black space of the night, answered her question. Still half dazed, she stumbled to the door and into the hall. The telephone was on a little table outside the kitchen. She made her way sat down. “Hello.”
“Hello. Is this Brighton 7560?”
It was a man’s voice speaking, speaking hurriedly, as if something fearful was knocking behind every word, anxious to come out.
“Yes,” Joy steadied her voice. “Joy Nelson speaking.”
“Oh, Miss Nelson, is that you—Miss Nelson—I—we’ve had—this is Hal Jennings speaking, Miss Nelson—I’m at the River Hill hospital—we’ve had a—bad accident.”
The darkness swayed around Joy as blackness sways when one’s eyes are closed and one presses one’s eyeballs. “Félicie—what of Félicie!” she cried into the mouthpiece.
“She—she’s horribly hurt, Miss Nelson. We—we just brought her here. I thought you’d be able to know—to notify——”
“Not—not seriously hurt?” Joy gasped, pressing the receiver close to her ear against the frenzy to throw it and its horror far from her.