"Now look here," she said, "you can't have any supper because you have n't reached the stage of magnificent hunger to make a meal palatable to you. You 've got so used to being nearly starved that a meal don't taste good to you under any other circumstances. You 're in on the drinks, though. Your thirst is always available.--Jack," she called down the long room to the bartender, "make it three.--Lean over here, I want to talk to you. See that woman over there by the wall? No, not that one,--the big light woman with Griggs. Well, she 's come here with a story trying to throw Joe down, and I want you to help me do her."
"Oh, that 's the one that upset our young friend, is it?" said Sadness, turning his mournful eyes upon Minty.
"That 's her. So you know about it, do you?"
"Yes, and I 'll help do her. She must n't touch one of the fraternity, you know." He kept his eyes fixed upon the outsider until she squirmed. She could not at all understand this serious conversation directed at her. She wondered if she had gone too far and if they contemplated putting her out. It made her uneasy.
Now, this same Miss Sterling had the faculty of attracting a good deal of attention when she wished to. She brought it into play to-night, and in ten minutes, aided by Sadness, she had a crowd of jolly people about her table. When, as she would have expressed it, "everything was going fat," she suddenly paused and, turning her eyes full upon Minty, said in a voice loud enough for all to hear,--
"Say, boys, you 've heard that story about Joe, have n't you?"
They had.
"Well, that 's the one that told it; she 's come here to try to throw him and me down. Is she going to do it?"
"Well, I guess not!" was the rousing reply, and every face turned towards the now frightened Minty. She rose hastily and, getting her skirts together, fled from the room, followed more leisurely by the crestfallen Griggs. Hattie's laugh and "Thank you, fellows," followed her out.
Matters were less easy for Joe's mother and sister than they were for him. A week or more after this, Kitty found him and told him that Minty's story had reached their employers and that they were out of work.