"I am, if I have enough money left to hire a model."
Ellis rose, twirled his walking-stick meditatively, glanced at his carefully brushed hat, and placed it gravely on his head.
"Soon," he said cheerfully, "it will be time for straw hats. But where I'm going to get one I don't know. Poverty used to be considered funny in the Quarter; but it's no idle jest in this town. Well—I'll let your best girl alone, Jim, if you feel that way about it."
They laughed and shook hands.
In the corridor Ellis looked hard at the closed door opposite, and his volatile heart gave a tortured thump; he twirled his stick and sauntered out into Stuyvesant Square.
