Within the Law [37]
out of the window.
"Perhaps it wasn't a bluff, Aggie," he suggested.
"Well, what have we done, I'd like to know?" the girl demanded, confidently. She took a cigarette and a match from the tabouret beside her, and stretched her feet comfortably, if very inelegantly, on a chair opposite.
Garson answered with a note of weariness that was unlike him.
"It ain't what you have done," he said, quietly. "It's what they can make a jury think you've done. And, once they set out to get you--God, how they can frame things! If they ever start out after Mary----" He did not finish the sentence, but sank down into his chair with a groan that was almost of despair.
The girl replied with a burst of careless laughter.
"Joe," she said gaily, "you're one grand little forger, all right, all right. But Mary's got the brains. Pooh, I'll string along with her as far as she wants to go. She's educated, she is. She ain't like you and me, Joe. She talks like a lady, and, what's a damned sight harder, she acts like a lady. I guess I know. Wake me up any old night and ask me--just ask me, that's all. She's been tryin' to make a lady out of me!"
The vivaciousness of the girl distracted the man for the moment from the gloom of his thoughts, and he turned to survey the speaker with a cynical amusement.
"Swell chance!" he commented, drily.
"Oh, I'm not so worse! Just you watch out." The lively girl sprang up, discarded the cigarette, adjusted an imaginary train, and spoke lispingly in a society manner much more moderate and convincing than that with which she had favored the retiring Cassidy. Voice, pose and gesture proclaimed at least the excellent mimic.
"How do you do, Mrs. Jones! So good of you to call!... My dear Miss Smith, this is indeed a pleasure." She seated herself again, quite primly now, and moved her hands over the tabouret appropriately to her words. "One lump, or two?... Yes, I just love bridge. No, I don't play," she continued, simpering; "but, just the same, I love it." With this absurd ending, Aggie again arranged her feet according to her liking on the opposite chair. "That's the kind of stuff she's had me doing," she rattled on in her coarser voice, "and believe me, Joe, it's damned near killing me. But all the same," she hurried on, with a swift revulsion of mood to the former serious topic, "I'm for Mary strong! You stick to her, Joe, and you'll wear diamon's.... And that reminds me! I wish she'd let me wear mine, but she won't. She says they're vulgar for an innocent country girl like her cousin, Agnes Lynch. Ain't that fierce?... How can anything be vulgar that's worth a hundred and fifty a carat?"
CHAPTER IX. A LEGAL DOCUMENT.
Mary Turner spent less than an hour in that mysteriously important engagement with Dick Gilder, of which she had spoken to Aggie. After separating from the young man, she went alone down Broadway, walking the few blocks of distance to Sigismund Harris's office. On a corner, her attention was caught by the forlorn face of a girl crossing into the side street. A closer glance showed that the privation of the gaunt features was emphasized by the scant garments, almost in tatters. Instantly, Mary's quick sympathies were aroused, the more particularly since the wretched child seemed of about the age she herself had been when her great suffering had befallen. So, turning aside, she soon caught up with the girl and spoke an inquiry.
It was the familiar story, a father out of work, a sick mother, a brood of hungry children. Some confused words of distress revealed the fact that the wobegone girl was even then fighting the final battle of purity against starvation. That she still fought on in such case proved enough as to her decency of nature, wholesome despite squalid surroundings. Mary's heart was deeply moved, and her words of comfort came with a simple sincerity that was like new life to the sorely beset waif. She promised to interest herself in securing employment for the father, such care as the mother and children might need, along with
"Perhaps it wasn't a bluff, Aggie," he suggested.
"Well, what have we done, I'd like to know?" the girl demanded, confidently. She took a cigarette and a match from the tabouret beside her, and stretched her feet comfortably, if very inelegantly, on a chair opposite.
Garson answered with a note of weariness that was unlike him.
"It ain't what you have done," he said, quietly. "It's what they can make a jury think you've done. And, once they set out to get you--God, how they can frame things! If they ever start out after Mary----" He did not finish the sentence, but sank down into his chair with a groan that was almost of despair.
The girl replied with a burst of careless laughter.
"Joe," she said gaily, "you're one grand little forger, all right, all right. But Mary's got the brains. Pooh, I'll string along with her as far as she wants to go. She's educated, she is. She ain't like you and me, Joe. She talks like a lady, and, what's a damned sight harder, she acts like a lady. I guess I know. Wake me up any old night and ask me--just ask me, that's all. She's been tryin' to make a lady out of me!"
The vivaciousness of the girl distracted the man for the moment from the gloom of his thoughts, and he turned to survey the speaker with a cynical amusement.
"Swell chance!" he commented, drily.
"Oh, I'm not so worse! Just you watch out." The lively girl sprang up, discarded the cigarette, adjusted an imaginary train, and spoke lispingly in a society manner much more moderate and convincing than that with which she had favored the retiring Cassidy. Voice, pose and gesture proclaimed at least the excellent mimic.
"How do you do, Mrs. Jones! So good of you to call!... My dear Miss Smith, this is indeed a pleasure." She seated herself again, quite primly now, and moved her hands over the tabouret appropriately to her words. "One lump, or two?... Yes, I just love bridge. No, I don't play," she continued, simpering; "but, just the same, I love it." With this absurd ending, Aggie again arranged her feet according to her liking on the opposite chair. "That's the kind of stuff she's had me doing," she rattled on in her coarser voice, "and believe me, Joe, it's damned near killing me. But all the same," she hurried on, with a swift revulsion of mood to the former serious topic, "I'm for Mary strong! You stick to her, Joe, and you'll wear diamon's.... And that reminds me! I wish she'd let me wear mine, but she won't. She says they're vulgar for an innocent country girl like her cousin, Agnes Lynch. Ain't that fierce?... How can anything be vulgar that's worth a hundred and fifty a carat?"
CHAPTER IX. A LEGAL DOCUMENT.
Mary Turner spent less than an hour in that mysteriously important engagement with Dick Gilder, of which she had spoken to Aggie. After separating from the young man, she went alone down Broadway, walking the few blocks of distance to Sigismund Harris's office. On a corner, her attention was caught by the forlorn face of a girl crossing into the side street. A closer glance showed that the privation of the gaunt features was emphasized by the scant garments, almost in tatters. Instantly, Mary's quick sympathies were aroused, the more particularly since the wretched child seemed of about the age she herself had been when her great suffering had befallen. So, turning aside, she soon caught up with the girl and spoke an inquiry.
It was the familiar story, a father out of work, a sick mother, a brood of hungry children. Some confused words of distress revealed the fact that the wobegone girl was even then fighting the final battle of purity against starvation. That she still fought on in such case proved enough as to her decency of nature, wholesome despite squalid surroundings. Mary's heart was deeply moved, and her words of comfort came with a simple sincerity that was like new life to the sorely beset waif. She promised to interest herself in securing employment for the father, such care as the mother and children might need, along with