“Oh, Joe, here’s a picture that always makes me think of the old days; see, that one with the lake,” and as Joe looked the other man deftly poured the dose into the waiting glass. She saw it done and nodded her approval, and then, while they were still talking about the picture, she asked Jack to get her a pencil so she could write a note. In little affairs of this kind strict obedience to an order is absolutely necessary, so he did not question her, but went at once.
When he returned they were sitting at the table again.
“Now for our last drink together,” she remarked gayly, “and here’s that we may all be happy,” and she looked at Jack.
And so they drank, and then Jack set himself to watching furtively out of the corner of his eye this man with the money. He fell to wondering just where it was, and turned cold at the thought that it might have been left at some place for safe keeping. Once his eyes closed and he opened them with an effort. The girl said something, and it took him some little time before his brain could figure out what he ought to say in reply, and longer still for his lips to form the words. She was talking rapidly, but her voice seemed a great distance away.
“Come on, Joe,” he heard that all right. “Come on, it’s time we were going. We must hurry.”
It didn’t seem at all strange to him that they should want to hurry; in fact, it seemed quite natural.
“If he’s a friend of yours we ought not to leave him here like that.” That was the man’s voice, he could swear to that.
“Come on,” she said again, and for hours afterward it was as if the world was filled with women shouting “come on, come on,” to tall, athletic young fellows with blue eyes and brown faces, and the incessant murmur of it all made his head ache.
Then he was being violently handled by someone who appeared to be intent upon annoying him and causing his head to hurt still worse.
He was slapped and walked, and a strange, queer liquid was being forced between his teeth.