"It was a jolly, joyous sort of thing," he laughed. "Sort of thing to make you feel nothing matters. That was the name of that thing I was humming. No, not 'Nothing Matters,' but 'Don't You Care.' And there were the 'Don't You Care' girls—pink dresses and big black hats. They seemed to mean what they sang. They didn't care, certainly."
It was Wayne who spoke. "Think not?"
Ann came a little way out of the shadow. She had leaned toward Wayne.
"Well you'd never know it if they did," laughed Prescott. He turned to
Wayne. "What's your theory?"
"Oh I have no theory. Just a wondering. Can't see how girls who have their living to earn could sing 'Don't You Care' with complete abandon."
Ann leaned forward, looking at him tensely. Then, as if afraid, she sank back into shadow. Katie could still see her hand gripping the arm of her chair.
"But they're not the caring sort," Prescott was holding.
"Think not?" said Wayne again, in Wayne's queer way.
There was a silence, and then Ann had murmured something and slipped away.
Katie followed her; for hours she sat by her bed, holding her hand, trying to soothe her. It was almost morning before that other girl, that girl they were trying to get away from, would let Ann go to sleep.