ness in a fat blonde.

Sammett whipped out a watch. "Just three quarters of an hour. Come on,
girlie."

His conversation had been conducted in an urgent undertone, with side
glances at the fat man with the megaphone. Terry approached him now.

"I'm leaving now," she said.

"Oh, no, you're not. Six o'clock is your quitting time."

In which he touched the Irish in Terry. "Any time I quit is my
quitting time. She went in quest of hat and coat much as the girl had
done whose place she had taken early in the day. The fat man followed
her, protesting. Terry, putting on her hat, tried to ignore him. But
he laid one plump hand on her arm and kept it there, though she tried
to shake him off.

"Now, listen to me. That boy wouldn't mind grinding his heel on your
face if he thought it would bring him up a step. I know'm. See that
walking stick he's carrying? Well, compared to the yellow stripe
that's in him, that cane is a Lead pencil. He's a song tout, that's
all he is." Then, more feverishly, as Terry tried to pull away: "Wait
a minute. You're a decent girl. I want to--Why, he can't even sing a
note without you give it to him first. He can put a song over, yes.
But how? By flashing that toothy grin of his and talking every word of
it. Don't you----"

But Terry freed herself with a final jerk and whipped around the
counter. The two, who had been talking together in an undertone,
turned to welcome her. "We've got a half-hour. Come on. It's just
over to Clark and up a block or so."

The University Inn, that gloriously intercollegiate institution which
welcomes any graduate of any school of experience, was situated in the
basement, down a flight of stairs. Into the unwonted quiet that reigns
during the hour of low potentiality, between five and six, the three
went, and seated themselves at a table in an obscure corner. A waiter
brought them things in little glasses, though no order had been given.
The woman who had been Ruby Watson was so silent as to be almost
wordless. But the man talked rapidly. He talked well, too. The same
quality that enabled him, voiceless though he was, to boost a song to
success was making his plea sound plausible in Terry's ears now.

"I've got to go and make up in a few minutes. So get this. I'm not
going to stick down in this basement eating house forever. I've got too
much talent. If I only had a voice--I mean a singing voice. But I
haven't. But then, neither