In the afternoon he went over to the North Side, and along a modest street he walked, looking at the houses as if hunting for a number. He went up a short flight of wooden steps and rang the bell of the second flat. The hall door was open, and a moment later he saw Miss Drury at the head of the stairs.
"Why, is that you, Mr. Witherspoon?"
"Yes; may I come up?"
"What a question! Of course you may, especially as I am as lonesome as I can be."
He was shown into a neat sitting-room, where a canary bird "fluttered" his hanging cage up and down. A rose was pinned on one of the white curtains. The room was warmed by a stove, and through the isinglass the playful flame could be seen. She brought a "tidied" rocking-chair, and smiling in her welcome, said that as this was his first visit, she must make him comfortable. "Don't you see," she added, "that you constantly make me forget that I am working for you?"
"And don't you know," he answered, "that you are most pleasing when you do forget it? But I am to infer that you wouldn't give me the rocking-chair if you didn't forget that you were working for me?"
"You must infer nothing," she said. "But am I most pleasing when I forget? Then I will not remember again. It is a woman's duty to be pleasing; and her advantage, too, for when she ceases to please she loses many of her privileges."
DeGolyer went to the window, took the rose, brought it to her and said: "Put this in your hair."
She looked up as she took the rose; their eyes met and for a moment they lived in the promise of a delirious bliss. She looked down as she was putting the flower in her hair. He spoke an idle word that meant more than old Wisdom's speech, and she answered with a laugh that was nearly a sob. He thirsted to take her in his arms, to tell her of his love, but his time was not yet come—he was still Henry Witherspoon.
"How have you spent the day?" she asked.