But he drew her by the hand toward the open door to his front room. The brighter light from there streamed out into the dim hall.
“My hands are sticky from the paste. I’ll come back. I’d rather come back.”
“It’s about that—about your hands, Pidge. I’ve waited as long as I can.”
... Somebody’s shoulder. She wasn’t safe to be trusted right now, yet she couldn’t pull away. If she ever got upstairs—even for a minute in her own little place, before the mirror that waved, she would see it all clearly, but here and now she didn’t want to see clearly. She wanted to give up and rest. She wanted what he wanted—wanted to give him what he wanted, which was the tiredest, most hopeless girl in New York to-night. She was dying of all its strains and failures and rigidities and fightings, and he wanted to take the load.
They were standing under the hanging lamp in his room. The light was white; his face was white. It was leaner than ever before, more of a man in it, more of a boy in it. His will was working furiously to make him speak.
He held her right hand up between them.
“It’s about your hands, Pidge, about the factory. Listen, you make me feel like a tout or a sot—as if you were out killing yourself to support me. I’ve been home two hours and you just coming in.”
“There’s half a million girls in New York—just coming in.”
“I know. We’ll get to them later, but now there’s only one—only one Pidge. I want her home to stay. I want to make a home for her. Why, Pidge, I’ll let you alone, if you just let me do that——”
“I believe you would.”