“We’ll carry this between us,” I said, “and I’ll walk with you to the place.”
Without a word of demur she took firm hold of the stout twine with which the parcel was tied, and thus linked we set off together down Randolph Street to La Salle. Conversation was nearly impossible, for we were edging our way for the most part along crowded pavements.
When we stood for a few moments at a crossing, waiting for a check in the tide of traffic, she confided to me that she had come to Chicago from “——ville” to see a lawyer.
“You are often in the city,” I suggested, delighted to talk on the pleasant, easy terms which were springing up between us.
“Oh, no! I ain’t,” she said, and then she was innocently superior to the compliment implied in my feigned surprise, and she began to question me about myself.
“What do you do for a living, young man?”
“I am out of work, and I am looking for a job,” I said, evasively.
“What is your line of work?” she continued; for the bucolic mind was bent on a sure footing from which to launch out into further inquiry.
“I shall be glad of any work that I can get,” I said. “Any work at all,” I reiterated, thinking that she might put me in the way of a job.
“Where do you live when you’re to home?” and the question indicated a new tack in the quest for certitude.