“Of course. Well, Bonnie May, I think I’ll have to take you home.”
“Whose home—yours?” she asked.
“Good gracious, no! To your own!”
She peered into the lobby searchingly, the light slowly fading from her eyes.
“But I haven’t any home,” she said.
CHAPTER II
A MOMENTOUS DECISION
It was all very well for a young man of an almost painfully circumspect type to rescue a youthful female from danger. It was a different matter, however, when he found himself walking along a crowded thoroughfare, leading a waif in a fantastic and almost shabby dress, and bringing upon himself the curious, if not the suspicious, glances of passers-by.
This fact struck Baron forcibly and unpleasantly.
“Come, let’s get inside somewhere,” he said to his companion. He spoke almost abjectly, as if he had been a soldier seeking a hiding-place behind a wall. “This place will do!” He had espied a haven in the form of a restaurant, deserted by all save two or three young women wearing waitresses’ aprons and caps.
Bonnie May looked at him inquiringly, almost piteously. This movement was a mere strategy, she realized. It was not a time for eating. But the ready speech of half an hour ago had deserted her, and she entered the restaurant, when Baron opened the door for her, without saying a word. Indeed she stood so forlornly and dependently that her companion realized anew that he had somehow committed an enormous blunder.