David took the magazine indifferently from the obedient Nancy and dropped it at once.
"Who's looking after them?" he inquired, leaping, in his deadly rigid way, over much debatable ground.
"They're looking after themselves, David." Doris metaphorically got into position for a severe bout.
"You don't mean," Martin came close and glowered over Doris, "you cannot possibly mean that Joan is going in for that loose, smudgy stunt that some girls are doing down in that part of town known as Every Man's Land?"
Nancy ran to the window and bent over her loom. She was always frightened when David Martin looked as if he were going to perform an operation.
"Certainly not," Doris replied; "the girls have a place uptown in a perfectly respectable quarter. Joan shares the expense. This is very real and fine, David. And you are not going to blame me for permitting Joan to do this—it was the only thing to be done. The girl has a right to her life and the use of her talents; this was an opening that we could not ignore. Sylvia Reed is older than Joan."
"How much?" David's voice was like steel.
"Four years." In spite of her anxiety, Doris had to laugh.
"Is this a joke, Doris?" Martin was confused.
"Why, no, David, it isn't."