"I—oh, Hal—I—I just never was so—so sad and so—so glad!"
The door opened to a slit enclosing her. In his imitation uniform, hand on empty carriage belt, Mr. Hal Sanderson stood there a moment, his face whitening, tightening.
In Ramy's glorified basement, situated in one of the Forties which flow like tributaries into the heady waters of Broadway, one may dine from soup to nuts, raisins and regrest for one hour and sixty cents. In Ramy's, courses may come and courses may go, but the initiated one holds on to his fork forever. Here red wine flows like water, being ninety-nine per cent., just that.
Across a water tumbler of ruby contents, Miss Blossom De Voe, the turbulent curls all piled up beneath a slightly dusty but highly effective amethyst velvet hat, regarded Mr. Sanderson, her perfect lips trembling as it were, against an actual nausea of the spirit which seemed to pull at them.
"Whadda you putting things up to me for, Hal? You're old enough to know your own business."
Blue shaved, too correct in one of Broadway's black and white checked Campus Suits, his face as cleanly chiseled and thrust forward as a Discobolus, Mr. Sanderson patted an open letter spread out on the table cloth between them, his voice rising carefully above the din of diners.
"There's fellows claiming exemption every hour of the day that ain't got this much to show, Bloss. I was just wise enough to see these things and get ready for 'em."
"You ain't your mother's sole support. What about them snapshots of the two farms of hers out in Ohio you gave me?"
"But I got to be in this country to take charge of her affairs for her—my mother's old, honey—ain't I the one to manager for her? Only child and all that. Honest, Bloss, you need a brick house."
"Well, that old lawyer that wrote that letter has been doing it all the time, why all of a sudden should you—"