“He’s just been made assistant general manager,” added Mrs. Olafson.
When they got out on the Drive walking downtown against a tussling wind she cried out: “Darling I’m so happy.... It’s really going to be worth living now.”
“But why did you tell him we lived at the Astor?”
“I couldnt tell him we lived in the Bronx could I? He’d have thought we were Jews and wouldnt have rented us the apartment.”
“But you know I dont like that sort of thing.”
“Well we’ll just move down to the Astor for the rest of the week, if you’re feeling so truthful.... I’ve never in my life stopped in a big downtown hotel.”
“Oh Bertha it’s the principle of the thing.... I don’t like you to be like that.”
She turned and looked at him with twitching nostrils. “You’re so nambypamby, Billy.... I wish to heavens I’d married a man for a husband.”
He took her by the arm. “Let’s go up here,” he said gruffly with his face turned away.
They walked up a cross street between buildinglots. At a corner the rickety half of a weatherboarded farmhouse was still standing. There was half a room with blueflowered paper eaten by brown stains on the walls, a smoked fireplace, a shattered builtin cupboard, and an iron bedstead bent double.