“Just,” said Blackie, rising. “Sorry t’ see you drinkin’ Baumbach’s coffee, Doc. It ain’t fair t’ your patients.”
“Quite right,” replied Von Gerhard; and rose with us. “I shall not drink it. I shall walk home with Mrs. Orme instead, if she will allow me. That will be more stimulating than coffee, and twice as dangerous, perhaps, but—”
“You know how I hate that sort of thing,” I said, coldly, as we passed from the warmth of the little front shop where the plump girls were still filling pasteboard boxes with holiday cakes, to the brisk chill of the winter street. The little black-and-gilt sign swung and creaked in the wind. Whimsically, and with the memory of that last cream-filled cake fresh in my mind, I saluted the letters that spelled “Franz Baumbach.”
Blackie chuckled impishly. “Just the same, try a pinch of soda bicarb’nate when you get home, Dawn,” he advised. “Well, I’m off to the factory again. Got t’ make up for time wasted on m’ lady friend. Auf wiedersehen!”
And the little figure in the checked top-coat trotted off.
“But he called you—Dawn,” broke from Von Gerhard.
“Mhum,” I agreed. “My name’s Dawn.”
“Surely not to him. You have known him but a few weeks. I would not have presumed—”
“Blackie never presumes,” I laughed. “Blackie’s just—Blackie. Imagine taking offense at him! He knows every one by their given name, from Jo, the boss of the pressroom, to the Chief, who imports his office coats from London. Besides, Blackie and I are newspaper men. And people don’t scrape and bow in a newspaper office—especially when they’re fond of one another. You wouldn’t understand.”
As I looked at Von Gerhard in the light of the street lamp I saw a tense, drawn look about the little group of muscles which show when the teeth are set hard. When he spoke those muscles had relaxed but little.