“He insisted on coming back with me, to preserve appearances. He is terrified of the gossip. He is going all the way home, and then leave me.”
“Sylvia! What does it mean?” I whispered.
“I can’t tell you here. I want to come and see you. Are you living at the same place?”
I answered in the affirmative.
“It’s a long story,” she added. “I must apologise for asking you to come here, where we can’t talk. But I did it for an important reason. I can’t make my husband really believe that I mean what I say; and you are my Declaration of Independence!” And she laughed, but a trifle wildly, and looking at her suddenly, I realized that she was keyed almost to the breaking point.
“You poor dear!” I murmured.
“I wanted to show him that I meant what I said. I wanted him to see us meet. You see, he’s going home, thinking that with the help of my people he can make me change my mind.”
“But why do you go home? Why not stay here with me? There’s an apartment vacant next to mine.”
“And with a baby?”
“There are lots of babies in our tenement,” I said. But to tell the truth, I had almost forgotten the baby in the excitement of the moment. “How is she,” I asked.