ing down the same
old job at the factory. I know plenty of boys who turn over easy money.
Too easy--"

"Then marry me, Marylin, and you'll wear diamonds. In a couple of days,
when this goes through, this deal with the fellows--oh, _honest_ deal,
if that's what you're opening your mouth to ask--I can stand up beside
you with money in my pockets. Twenty bucks to the pastor, just like
that! Then you can pick out another job and I'll hold it down for you.
Bet your life I will--Oh--here, Marylin--this way--quick!"

"Getaway, why did you turn down this street so all of a sudden? This
isn't my way home."

"It's only a block out of the way. Come on! Don't stand gassing."

"You-thought-that-fellow-on-the-corner-of-Dock-Street-might-be-a-plain
-clothes-man!"

"What if I did? Want me to go up and kiss him?"

"Why-should-you-care, Getaway?"

"Don't."

"But--"

"Don't believe in hugging the law, though. It's enough when it hugs
you."

"I want to go home, Getaway."

"Come on. I'll buy some supper. Steak and French frieds and some French
pastry with a cherry on top for your little sweet tooth. That's the kind
of a regular guy I am."

"No. I want to go home."

"All right, all right! I'm taking you there, ain't I?"

"Straight."

"Oh, you'll go straight, if you can't go that way anywhere but home."

They trotted the little detour in silence, the corners of her mouth
wilting, he would have declared, had he the words, like a field flower
in the hands of a picnicker. Marylin could droop that way, so suddenly
and so whitely that almost a second could blight her.

"Now you're mad, ain't you?" he said, ashamed to be so quickly
conciliatory and trying to make his voice grate.

"No, Getaway--not mad--only I guess--sad."

She stopped before her rooming house. It was as long and as lean and
as brown as a witch, and, to the more fanciful, something even of the
riding of a broom in the straddle of the doorway, with an empty flagpole
jutting from it. And then there was the cat, too--not a black one with
gold eyes, just one of the city's myriad of mackerel ones, with chewed
ear and a skillful crouch for the leap from ash to garbage can.

"I'm going in now, Getaway."

"Gowann! Get into your blue dress and I'll blow you to supper."

"Not to-night."

"Mad?"

"No. I said only--"

"Sad?"

"No--tired--I guess."

"Please, Marylin."

"No. Some other time."

"When? To-morrow? It's Saturday! Coney?"

"Oh!"

He thoug