"Yes, I do—if you think it is all right." She added in a low voice: "I want to do what will please you, Louis."
"I don't know whether it's the best thing to do, but—you may have to." He laid his cigarette in a saucer, watched the smoke curling ceilingward, and said as though to himself:
"I should like to be certain that you can support yourself—within a reasonable time from now—say a year. That is all, Dolly."
"I can do it now if you wish it—" The expression of his face checked her.
"I don't mean a variety career devoted to 'mother' songs," he said with a sneer. "There's a middle course between diamonds and 'sinkers.' You'll get there if you don't kick over the traces.... Have you made any more friends?"
"Yes."
"Are they respectable?"
"Yes," she said, colouring.
"Has anybody been impertinent?"
"Mr. Williams."