In fact, at that moment they came abreast the street that led to the factories, and the six-o'clock whistle was just dying away in a long reverberation, and the workmen pouring out of the doors and down the stairs. Ellen had moved quickly, for she had an errand at the grocery-store before she went home. She was going to get some oysters for a hot stew for supper, of which her father was very fond. She had a little oyster-can in her hand when she met the two gentlemen. She had grown undeniably thinner since summer, but she was charming. Her short black skirt and her coarse gray jacket fitted her as well as if they had been tailor-made. There was nothing tawdry or slatternly about her. She looked every inch a lady, even with the drawback of an oyster-can, and mittens instead of gloves.
Both Risley and Robert raised their hats, and Ellen bowed. She did not smile, but her face contracted curiously, and her color obviously paled. Risley looked at Robert after they had passed.
“I have called on her twice,” said Robert, as if answering a question. His relations with the older man had become very close, almost like those of father and son, though Risley was hardly old enough for that relation.
“And you haven't been since she went to work?”
“No.”
“But you would have, had she gone to college instead of going to work in a shoe-factory?” Risley's voice had a tone of the gentlest conceivable sarcasm.
Robert colored. “Yes, I suppose so,” he said. Then he turned to Risley with a burst of utter frankness. “Hang it! old fellow,” he said, “you know how I have been brought up; you know how she—you know all about it. What is a fellow to do?”
“Do what he pleases. If it would please me to call on that splendid young thing, I should call if I were the Czar of all the Russias.”
“Well, I will call,” said Robert.