"It's very comfortable. I always thought there were nothing but business places all about here. I should rather like to live in the very middle of the town, like this."
"Should you? That's just what I like. Oh, how I enjoy the noise and the crowds! I should be ill if I had to live in one of those long, dismal streets, where the houses are all the same shape, and costermongers go bawling about all day long. I suppose you live in a place like that?"
"Very much the same."
In taking his handkerchief out, Waymark just happened to feel a book in his overcoat-pocket. He drew it forth to see what it was, having forgotten entirely that he had been carrying the volume about with him since morning.
"What's that?" asked the girl. "Will you let me look? Is it a tale? Lend it me; will you?"
"Do you read books?"
"Oh yes; why not? Let me keep this till you come again. Is this your name written here—Osmond Waymark?"
"Yes. And what is your name?"
"Ida Starr."
"Ida? That's a beautiful name. I was almost afraid to ask you, for fear it should be something common."