Jimmie started. “Willie told you that! ”
“We have no secrets. He told me also you threatened the—the”—she was mocking—“extreme penalty to shut her up. Very chivalrous. Never had the male of my species offer to kill for me, before. I was positively touched. And greatly relieved, believe me!”
“I was out of my head with rage—”
“—and acted very—what we call ‘British,’ no doubt. I recall Sarah’s Harry. A merry-eyed, curly-haired youth with a fine figure, if a girl may say so, and a talent for staying violently alive all night long. What did Sarah have to say on the angle that he was part Jewish? News, incidentally, to me.”
“Sarah didn’t have anything to say. Never mentioned it. Mother told me.”
Audrey nodded again. “I remember, too, your mother, in the period when she was pouring ice water on that romance. Buckets of it. I thought, then, that she was going to unscrupulous lengths. She practically locked Sarah in the house, and she tore around Muskogewan grafting little abscesses on the reputation of the boy. At the time I presumed the tales were true. Musicians have a way of getting around—too much. Maybe they weren’t, though. He didn’t have that roving look. Or the sultry one, like Biff. Just—gay. I—” She broke off.
“You what?” Her manner changed, stepped up its intensity.
“Jimmie! Do you suppose it’s possible that—that Sarah never knew her passion was part non-Aryan? I mean to say—”
“Good God!” Jimmie studied the idea. “ He’d tell her.”
The girl shrugged. “Maybe not. Maybe he thought she knew. After all, in New York, where he lives, it’s no secret. His middle name’s Jewish, and the family he’s related to helped finance the Revolutionary War. I remember reading that in a publicity story about the band he plays in. Suppose your mother got hold of the fact—”