“Give me a cigarette,” she demanded, her penetrating voice dissatisfied.
“You know I don't want you to smoke anywhere you can be seen,” he answered. “Since we've come here to live we have to mind the customs. The women'll never take to you smoking cigarettes.”
“Ah, hell, what do I care! We came here, but it ain't living. It makes me sick, and you make me sick I Can't you sing and pray in the city as well as among these hicks?”
“I'm afraid of it,” he said, brief and somber. “And I don't want Flavilla brought up with any of the gang we knew. Where is she?”
“I sent her to bed. She fussed round till she got me nervous.”
“Did she feel good?”
“If she didn't a smack would have cured her.”
He passed Bella, rocking sharply, into the dank interior.
On the right was the bare room where he had his dilapidated barber's chair and shelf with a few mugs, brushes and other scant necessities. There had been no customers to-day nor yesterday; still, it was the middle of the week and what trade there was generally concentrated on Saturday. Beyond he went upstairs to Flavilla's bed. She was awake, twisting about in a fragmentary nightgown, dark against the disordered sheet.
“It's dreadful hot,” she complained shortly; “my head's hot too. The window won't go up.”