“Here you go, Polly!” as one man after another cast toward her something folded. And Polly, grave and a trifle white now, leaving her associate bowing on the stage, passed down the aisle, met the heaped plate on its way, stopped here and stopped there, laughing and talking, chattering like some innocent child, picking up money—money—more money than David Joslin had thought there was in all the world. He alone gave nothing, for he had naught to give—only the happiness and peace of a human soul.
There was so much tribute that Polly made great show of thrusting part of it beneath her garter, till she could hold no more in that fashion. Some she thrust into her bosom, and then, turning, carried the rest of it to her partner, who happily was provided with a reticule.
Everybody laughed—everybody was pleased. It had cost them very little—perhaps a few hundred dollars—to make these two girls feel that they had made a hit. The wine was excellent. Everything had been splendid in every way. The cost? Why, what Jimmy Haddon had done for them in bringing this geezer here to tell them about their property would bring them more than ten thousand times the cost of the banquet, or the cost of the whole investment.
And so, after a time, the banquet ended, very late—ended, indeed, when Polly Pendleton and her friend, laughing and kissing their hands—Polly with her violin tucked under her arm and her cloak over all—turned once more to the door of the crystal and gold room of the Williston banquet suite. Men rose and waved serviettes at them, shouted good-by, asked them to come again. Haddon himself walked with Polly Pendleton to the door, kissed her hand, bowed goodnight.
As he turned back he saw standing, staring at him fixedly, the tall, white-faced figure of the mountaineer, whom he had utterly forgotten. The eyes of David Joslin were like coals.
“Some girl, eh—what?” said Haddon admiringly to his uncouth friend.
But Joslin made him no reply. What he had seen, what he had felt that night, was epochal, abysmal for him. He had looked into her eyes. He had seen her face framed in her dark hair—had caught the very fragrance of her hair itself. He was mad.
A motor car stood below, waiting for the popular team of Pendleton and Stanton. It whirled them now far uptown, to the little buffet flat which made their home. Nina, matter-of-fact as usual, busied herself about her preparations for the close of the day’s work. But, singularly enough, Polly, usually riante and active to the very last moment of the day, sat, cigarette in hand, silent, somewhat triste.
“What’s the matter, Polly?—Why don’t you get ready?—I’m sleepy as an owl. What are you wolfing about?”