“Then why not marry me, Sadie?” The boy came closer, while the nurse hovered about impatiently. “You can’t come back, you know. However good they patch you up, you’re done with the game.”
“Marry you, after what I said about looking for a rich guy? I’m bad and selfish, and I want so much. And I’m older than you think—nearly nineteen. I only wore my hair that way for a stall. Would you really marry me now, when I’m all cut up and no one else would look at me?”
“Call me and see,” suggested Teddy, quietly.
“I’ll let you know later, Teddy. It depends—”
“But I’m going to Dayton to-night to race, and then I go South again. How am I to know?”
Sadie considered for a moment with eyes closed. When she opened them again, her face was very grave.
“Come past here on your way to the depot,” she said, “and look at this window above the bed. It’s the fourth from the end. If the blind’s up, you can bring along your parson.”
“And if it’s down?”
“If it’s down, it will mean that you’d better forget all about me.”
“Then leave it up, Sadie,” he whispered as the nurse bustled up suggestively. “I’m only two thousand short of buying a garage in Florida, where I used to work. You’d love to be down there—all sunshine, pelicans, palms, and sugar-cane, and butterflies as big as your hand soaring about. You’d get well and strong down there, Sadie, and I’d be so good to you! Don’t let them pull it down!”