“They hev to, I reckon,” he said with a fine semblance of cheerfulness. “If they didn’t maybe everybody’d be so sure he’d win that they wouldn’t even bother to go to see it.” And then, very carelessly, as though it was of little importance: “Don’t know’s I would hev thought of goin’ myself if it hadn’t been for that. It’s advertisin’ I reckon––just advertisin’!”
Her fists came down from her chin; her whole body relaxed. It was that bewildering change of mood which he could never hope to follow. She even started toward him.
“Wouldn’t have thought of it!” she repeated. “Why––why, you don’t mean that you aren’t going?”
It was quite as though she had never considered 273 the possibility of such a contingency. Old Jerry’s mouth dropped open while he stared at her.
“Go,” he stammered, “me go! Why, it’s goin’ to happen tomorrow night!”
She nodded her head in apparent unconsciousness of his astonishment.
“You’ll have to leave on the early train,” she agreed, “and––and so I won’t see you again.”
She turned her back upon him for a moment. He realized that she was fumbling inside the throat of the little, too-tight blouse. When she faced him again there was something in the palm of her outstretched hand.
“I’ve been waiting for you to come tonight,” she went on, “and it was hard waiting. That’s why I tore the paper up, I think. And now, will you––will you give him this for me––give it to him when he has won? You won’t have to say anything.” She hesitated. “I––I think he’ll understand!”
Old Jerry reached out and took it from her––a bit of a red silk bow, dotted with silver spangles. He gazed at it a moment before he tucked it away in an inside pocket, and in that moment of respite his brain raced madly.