“Don’t talk any more about it—not now,” she said. “Look! The sky’s getting light. It’s morning.”
“And I’m due on board at ten o’clock,” he said. “I’ll come back to you, Pem.[Pg 143] Pem, you won’t forget me? You won’t—you couldn’t, could you, Pem?”
“I don’t think so,” she answered.
The taxi had stopped before the apartment house, where Nickie and the two other boys, just arrived, were waiting for them in the street. A pallid light was spreading in the sky, and a strange quiet lay over the city. Trucks rumbled far away, but there wasn’t a voice or a footstep. The street lamps still burned wanly.
“It’s time for breakfast,” suggested one of the boys. “Let’s go to a beanery and have something to eat.”
“No!” said Pem sharply. “We’ve had enough. Good-by! Come on, Nickie!”
For she had seen on Nickie’s face something that hurt her—something that she had often seen in the mirror, reflected in her own eyes.
IV
Nickie was lying on the bed, flat on her back, without a pillow, her eyes resolutely closed, in a stern effort to rest. That morning, just as she was saying good-by—very willingly—to the cantankerous old lady with a broken arm whom she had been attending for three weeks, Dr. Lucas had telephoned and told her that he wanted her for night duty on a pneumonia case. It was a bad case, and she had a bad night ahead of her. She must rest now; but she couldn’t. This wasn’t rest.
She heard the key turned in the latch, and the front door opened quietly.