"Votes for Women?" he suggested in all respect.
Joan dimpled, thinking suddenly of Mrs. Rossiter. "Well, something like that. Elbows for women, anyway!" she murmured nonsensically.
Again the conversation languished, being confined on Archie's part entirely to Yea, yea and Nay, nay.
Joan was both amused and bored. It had been for some time quite evident to her that this simple soul was not indifferent to her charms; but there was something so boyish about his devotion, so grateful and unobtrusive, that it did not trouble her in the least. Rather the contrary. It reminded her of "cases" the younger girls at the Convent got up on older girls, who were in turn expected to act toward their satellites as guide, philosopher, and friend. Joan had always been very nice to her satellites. This one should come to no harm through her. Indeed, she intended that he should come ultimately to much good, for she really liked him. But this first tongue-tied stage of his admiration was a little trying to both, and she was relieved when the Darcy house came into view.
Not until then, with their parting imminent, did he summon up sufficient ease to tell her of his recent stroke of fortune. She received it pleasantly, as a teacher listens to tales of prowess on the part of a pupil.
"Sales-manager!—isn't that nice, Mr. Blair? I must get my step-mother to try some of that polish of yours. She loves things to glisten. And you'll have a lot more money, won't you? Splendid! So now," she suggested, as Ellen had suggested, "you'll probably be moving somewhere else."
She had her eye on him, though, for it may be remembered that Joan had a theory of her own as to why this up-and-coming young man continued to live in an attic in the slums.
He shook his head. "I'll stay in the old place. Even if I hadn't lived there ever since I can remember, I think I'd stay anyway."
"Why?" asked Joan, walking more slowly.
"Well, there's something sort of homey about it. I've got a fireplace in my room, you see, and I like the little panes in the windows, and the big sills—they're just as good as tables—And that funny old twisty staircase. Sometimes at night when everybody in the house is asleep you can hear the steps creaking, as if people were coming up and down. I like that. And the old tree outside taps on the roof as if it were saying, 'Here I am, kid. Go on to sleep!'"—He broke off apologetically. "You'll think me a nut, Miss Darcy, talking like this! But you see everything that's ever happened to me happened in that room, and I feel as if—well, as if I weren't exactly alone in it."