IX
As Easter rode to the door, another car drove down Lexington Avenue. Dora didn't see her visitor, but Ulick did, and he whispered into the ear of his chauffeur. The machine flew. Easter not wasting a moment didn't leave her car. She saw the couple, and she bade her driver follow. A long stern chase ensued. The two cars kept equal distance all the way down-town. Policemen whistled. People stared. Timid ladies expostulated. Furiously Easter's car pursued the other. At Eighteenth street Ulick told his man to turn west-ward, to Fourth Avenue, thence to the old Everett House on Union Square. There was no sight of Easter. At Gramercy Park Ulick had outmanoeuvred Easter, taking the short cut into Irving Place, while Easter seeing her prey escape had no doubt directed her car to Fourth Avenue by way of Twentieth Street. Ulick inwardly exulted. He had dodged Easter, and he was sure that she was jealous of him, else how account for this wild, whirling chase! Oblivious, Dora wondered at the speed and the growing excitement of her beau—so she called him. He's a sport, after all, she said. The car stopped in front of the hotel, but, alas, as it did, Easter's motor came into view around the corner of the Avenue. So timed was the arrest of the two cars that the chauffeurs grinned, believing the meeting had been arranged.
Ulick bundled Dora into the hotel, calling to the man to go to Broadway ferry, east Fourteenth street; then he fairly pushed Dora through the lobbies, the café, through the Fourth Avenue door, and, the girl scared by his determined face, didn't question him. When they reached Eighteenth street he hurried her along to Third Avenue and there he relaxed. "They were after us Dora." "Who was?" "The police." "My Gawd, the police!" "Plain-clothes men," he sententiously explained, and the frightened girl almost collapsed. The police! The House of Correction, or some horrible Magdalen Home? Ulick seeing that she was suffering cooked up a lie. He had been sued—or was it contempt of court?—at any rate, he had detectives on his trail. No necessity to be troubled over the incident. He, alone, was involved. Reassured, she clung to his arm. They arrived at Fourteenth Street. There they took an east-bound car. At the ferry house the motor was awaiting them. Ulick drew the chauffeur aside, gave him a tip and asked what had become of the other car. It still stood before the hotel, he supposed. The big lady in it had leaped out before it stopped and made a dash after them. But as luck would have it a young gentleman detained her and she was as mad as hops. But he wouldn't let go her wrists. "What sort of looking young gentleman was it?" Ulick asked. Oh, clean-shaved like you, sir, and he wore loud checks in his clothes. He laughed a lot, too, especially when he saw that the lady was getting madder and madder. Phew! She had a temper, that beauty! Ulick told him to drive to Manhattan Beach. It must have been Paul, he fancied.
After midnight they returned. The sea-air had refreshed them. The dinner at Jack's had been excellent, and the roof-garden prime-chop. Dora was drowsy. Dora was affectionate. Her beloved Jewel was beside her once more and she didn't care if she did attract attention by almost sitting in his lap. Some of her "lady-friends", those sweet girl-graduates from the University of Sin, "whose feet took hold on hell," had aroused in her a half drunken quarrelsome spirit when they flirted with her "fellow" at the show. But she had him now, he couldn't be taken from her by any woman alive. She opened the door after some preliminary fumbling with the key. They entered. Her French poodle, which usually barked with joy whenever she came home, did not lift up its voice. Dora was frightened. Dodo was ill, perhaps stolen—and O my Gawd! there's a light in the living-room. Burglars, Jewel, let's go for the police. But Ulick thought otherwise. Burglars don't smoke cigarettes when cracking a crib. It must be Paul. He made a wry face. He called, "Paulchen, is that you?" "No, it's Istarchen," came the answer, in a resonant voice. By all the infernal gods—Easter!
"Well," screamed Dora, "this is a surprise. Where did you blow in from? And how in the world did you break in? Them hall-boys hasn't keys." She was drunk enough to be familiar. She knew Easter only by sight, but whisky bridged the gulf; in her sober senses she would have been too cowed by Easter's magnificent presence to have addressed her thus. Easter, smoking a cigarette, lay outstretched on a divan. She smiled in a friendly manner at Dora, and pulled her down beside her. To Ulick she addressed no word. She gazed at him, and sneered. Dora was in the seventh heaven of pride. She, poor little prostitute, one of the despised and rejected, living on the lusts of men, was treated not only as a human but as a social equal by the greatest living lady opera-singer! She embraced her, and besought her to drink. Easter thanked her, adding "I've already helped myself." She again challenged Ulick with her hard glance. He fell into a chair and held his peace. The two women drank a toast to "happy days and better acquaintance" and Dora, now half-seas over, supplemented it with the classic toast of "professional ladies" and kept-women. Easter laughed uproariously. Her descent into this moral sewer pleased her. Ulick was disgusted. Emboldened by her success Dora persuaded Easter to go with her into the dressing-room, from which, much later, they emerged wearing night draperies. A queer go, this sudden intimacy, ruminated the young man.
The women were in high spirits, and high-balls were absorbed. Ulick saw that Dora was hopeless. The problem was how to get rid of Easter. Her car had been dismissed; no doubt about that. Curiously he asked: "But Easter, how did you get in here?" She turned to Dora, now on the divan, her drunken eyes admiringly blinking at the singer. "Dora, dear, where there's a will there's a way. After I lost you this afternoon at the Everett House"—"Lost me at the Everett?" gasped Dora. "It's a new one on me." She turned to Ulick and fairly snarled. "So that was your game, was it, to go hell-splitting through the town and get rid of my darling friend?" She wept. "You nearly broke my neck, d'ye know it, you herring-gut! Oh! I ain't got any use for a young chap who doesn't drink or smoke. He's sure to be up to something worse. He'll bear watching, so he will!" Easter triumphantly soothed the hysterical girl. They went into the kitchen. Soon a Welsh rabbit was on the table. Easter also possessed culinary technique. Impassioned by her superior prowess, Dora watched her with ravished vision. They drank again. The younger girl became frolicksome. She pulled Ulick's hair. She tickled him. She kissed and hugged Easter as if she were carried away by her friendship. Easter enjoyed the sport. They dragged the unresisting Ulick into the bedroom and assaulted him with pillows. They rolled him on the bed. Dora unbuttoned his vest. Then they tumbled over him, tantalizing him with their pranks. He saw that they were nude beneath their house-wrappers. Abandoning themselves the half-crazy pair would stretch on the sheets and then draw up their legs in unison, while the harrassed Ulick viewed with longing their beautiful figures; Dora, slender blonde, resilient; Easter, brunette, massive, but supple as a snake. He suffered. With shrieks they teased, tempted, evaded him.
Tiring, the trio returned to the dining-room. More whisky. Quite overcome, Dora lolled on the couch. She held Easter closely clutched. Ulick hinted that she had better go to bed. That aroused her. "Yes, but not with you ... my boy." And she returned to Easter. "Go on about your business," she suddenly shrieked. "I hate you. I hate all men. You only want to use me." And then she fell to sobbing. Easter motioned toward the door with her head. "I think you had better go," she calmly counselled. "Dora is overwrought, hysterical, and doesn't know what she is saying or doing." He fetched his hat. "That's true," he answered. "Dora doesn't know what she is doing, but you do, Easter." She gave him a nasty look, in which were mingled amusement and contempt. Too polite to pelt her with the invectives he felt she deserved, he contented himself with saying as he opened the door: "Yes, Easter, I think I had better go; go back to Paris. It can't be any viler there than here." Jeering laughter followed him to the lift.
X
"You look blue about the gills, Ulick," said Milt in his heartiest manner. "You're not well these days, are you? What's the trouble?"