“It was a slip,” she said. “I didn’t mean it.”
“It’s a good thing for you that you didn’t,” he answered, surlily.
From Berlin they went to the Casino, in Paris, and if the trick that was pulled off there had never happened I wouldn’t be writing this story.
Paris to him was like a bone to a hungry dog and he was a hot sport from the night they hit the town, while she was a joke because she wouldn’t mix with the bunch and play the game of love on her own hook.
But all the time she was getting ready for the stunt that was to give her revenge and freedom together.
At last it came.
When he stumbled into the dressing room one night he had the beginnings of a good-sized jag. He had been putting away his share of absinthe and he began to abuse her.
“You’re a dead one,” he said, “and I don’t know what I ever saw in you. Here I’ve put you on your feet and give you the chance of your life to make good, but you don’t connect. Get in with the crowd and be a live one before it’s too late, for you’re getting to be a shine.”
“What do you expect me to do when you are mixed up with a bunch of cheap soubrettes, and drunk half the time?”
“Why, do the same as I do, of course. There’s that guy that came in last night and wanted to meet you. He’s got all kinds of coin, and——”