“Aw, hell, I’m not as pretty as you, Miss!” I replied, taking in her high heel buttoned shoes and her hat with flowers and ribbons on it. “And you smell good, too.” That vision of loveliness was bathed in cheap perfume, but to me it was divine compared to the stink of the rotten copra being hauled out of the hold.
I had no way of judging women except from the conversation among the sailors that I had caught. I thought every woman’s character was measured by her ankles and her hips, for often I had heard the sailors say: “a good pair of hips and little ankles is worth nine months’ pay.” So, using their standard of perfection of womanhood, I measured the woman who stood before me. She was perfect.
“Got any glad rags, Kid?” she asked.
“No, but I’ve got some tapa cloth and two tortoise-shell bracelets with pearl in them,” I answered, hoping to impress her.
“I mean, haven’t you got any pretties to go around with gents? I bet all the sailors aboard here are nuts about you.”
“No, they ain’t,” I answered hastily. “If I ever lay down on the job of pulling on ropes when I’m needed, or get in their way when they unload a cargo, they kick my pants for me.”
She became very much interested in me.
“Say, what do you stick on this bloody barge for? You ought to be down with me and the girls where you’d be appreciated.”
“You mean leave the ship?”
“Sure, I’ll get you a swell job with me and the girls down at the Union Hotel.”