"Well, how was the show?" Conry demanded of his wife. "Did you sing good,—make a hit with the swells? She thinks she wants to sing," he explained with a wink to Vickers, "but I tell her she's after sassiety,—that's what the women want; ain't it so?"
"Mrs. Conry sang very well indeed," Vickers remarked in default of better, and rose to leave.
"Don't go,—what's your hurry? Have something to drink? I got some in there you don't see every day in the week, young man. A racing friend of mine from Kentuck sends it to me. What's yours, Stacy?" …
When the young man departed, Stacia Conry stared at the door through which he had disappeared, with a dead expression that had something disagreeable in it. Conry, who had had his drink, came back to the parlor and began to talk.
"I went to a show myself to-night, seeing you were amusing yourself….
There was a girl there who danced and sang,—you'd oughter seen her….
Well, what are you sittin' staring at? Ain't you coming to bed?"
His wife rose from her seat, exclaiming harshly, "Let me alone!" And Conry, with a half-sober scrutiny of the woman, who had flung herself face down on the lounge, mumbled:—
"Singing don't seem to agree with you. Well, I kept my word; gave you the money to educate yourself." …
"And I have paid you!" the wife flashed. "God, I have paid!"
The man stumbled off to bed.
* * * * *