“Well, something like this: The rancher who’s been the secret head of the smugglers, he’s a decent fellow at heart, see? Only got into it to pay the mortgage on the old home. Well, now, why not a bit of sentiment between you and him at the end? Nothing splashy, just a nice refined church and a kiss.” When he saw Tish’s face he went on, speaking very fast. “Not more than a four-foot kiss, if that. We’ve got to do it, Miss Carberry. I’ve been wiring our houses all over the country, and they’re unanimous.”
At Tish’s firm refusal he grew almost tearful, saying he dared not fly in the face of tradition, and that he couldn’t even book the picture if he did. But Tish merely rose majestically and opened the door.
“I warned you, Mr. Stein, I would have no sex stuff in this picture.”
“Sex stuff!” he cried. “Good Lord, you don’t call that sex stuff, do you?”
“I dare say you call it platonic friendship here,” Tish said in her coldest tone. “But my agreement stands. Good afternoon.”
He went out, muttering.
VII
Just what happened within a day or two to determine Tish’s later course, I cannot say. We know that she had a long talk with Mr. Macmanus himself, and that he maintained that his intentions were of the most honorable—namely, to earn a small salary—and that his idea was that the final embrace could be limited to his kissing her hand.
“I have ventured so to suggest, madam,” Hannah reported him as saying, “but they care nothing for art here. Nothing. They reduce everything to its physical plane, absolutely.”
That our dear Tish was in a trap evidently became increasingly clear to her as the next few days passed. Nothing else would have forced her to the immediate course she pursued, and which resulted in such ignominious failure.