She hadn't seen the night clerk before. He was a sallow-faced boy, scarcely twenty years old, attired in a very striking suit of clothes and wearing a gorgeous jewelled scarf-pin in his cravat. As he read, he smoked a cigarette.
"Hello," said this brilliant individual, as Josie leaned over the counter and regarded him with a faint smile. "You're No. 43, I guess, and it's lucky old Boyle ain't here to read you a lecture—or to turn you out. He won't stand for unmarried lady guests bein' out till this hour, an' you may as well know it first as last."
"He's quite right," was Josie's calm reply. "I'll not do it again. My key, please!"
He rose reluctantly and gave her the key.
"Do you sit up all night?" she asked sweetly.
"I'm s'posed to," he answered in a tone less gruff, "but towards mornin' I snooze a little. Only way to pass the time, with noth'n' to do an' nobody to talk to. It's a beastly job, at the best, an' I'm goin' to quit it."
"Why don't you start a hotel of your own?" she suggested.
"You think you're kiddin' me, don't you? But I might even do that, if I wanted to," he asserted, glaring at her as if he challenged contradiction. "It ain't money that stops me, but hotel keepin' is a dog's life. I've made a bid for a cigar-store down the street, an' if they take me up, somebody can have this job."
"I see you're ambitious," said Josie. "Well, I hope you get the cigar-store. Good night, Mr.—"
"My name's Tom Linnet. I won't tell the ol' boy you was out so late. So long."