“And you really believe in free love?” said the bearded fellow.
“Sure.”
“Wouldn’t you like to get married?”
“No, sirree.”
“She’s a cold fish,” interrupted he of the side-whiskers. “She doesn’t understand matters of affection.”
“Bah. I don’t believe that.”
“The trouble with the poor girl is that she’s very ... brutish,” muttered the old man in a whisky-soaked voice.
“And your wife?” she asked, hitching about in her seat and looking at the old man out of cold, jesting eyes. The girl gave the impression of some wasp or other creature endowed with a sting. Whenever she was about to say something she changed position, stung her interlocutor, and sat back, content and calm for a moment.
The old man mumbled a string of blasphemies. The fellow with the red whiskers continued his interrogatory of the girl: