“I know,” said Ratcliffe, “that’s a problem that must often occur to you, I should think.”
“You’ve seen the sort of crowd Havana’s made of,” went on Satan. “It’s hard to tell which is worse, the Yanks or the Spaniards, and there’s not a seaport that’s not the same, and when I think of me lyin’ dead and her driftin’ loose, it gets my goat. It’d be different if she was a boy.”
“Besides that,” said the other, “she can’t go on always as she is now.”
“How’d you mean?”
“Well, dressed as she is now. She’ll grow up.”
“Sure,” said Satan.
“She’ll have to dress differently some day.”
“Meanin’ skirts?”
“Yes.”
Satan laughed a hollow laugh. The idea seemed so futile that he did not dwell upon it, or seemed not to.