"Maybe the big man want marry me," she suggested. "Or the black one."
Joe laughed scornfully. At the same time a horrible anxiety attacked him. Those two were old; they couldn't afford to be so particular as he. One of them might——
"Any'ow I not go wit' you now," said Bela. "Plenty time."
"You'd better look out for yourself," Joe burst out, "or you'll get in worse than you are already. You'll be sorry then."
"All right," she returned calmly.
Joe sat fuming. Anger and balked desire made his comely, brutal face look absurd and piteous. It was like a wilful child denied the moon. Joe could never resist his emotions. Whether or not Bela had guessed it, it was bound to come.
"Oh, hell!" he cried. "Look here, if Jack or Shand offer to marry you, I'll match them, see? Is that a go? You'd sooner have me, wouldn't you? I'm young."
Bela neither smiled nor frowned. "I think about it," she said.
"No you don't!" he cried. "You've got to promise now or I'll withdraw it!"
"I tell you somesing," said Bela, concealing the wicked sparkle in her eye. "I not want the big man. Not want the black man either. I tell you, if I marry any of the three, I tak' you."