"I'll see you through," he repeated. "Don't you worry about anything.
Just lie low."
"See me through? How?"
"I can give you money; that's the least I can do. Until you are able to
work again." And as she drew away, "We'll call it a loan, if that makes
you feel better. You haven't anything, have you?"
"He has everything I've earned.. I've never had a penny except carfare."
"Poor little girl!" he said again.
She was still weak, he saw, and he led her into the deserted cafe.
He took a highball himself, not because he wanted it, but because she
refused to drink, at first. He had never before had a drink in the
morning, and he felt a warm and reckless glow to his very finger-tips.
Bending toward her, while the waiter's back was turned, he kissed her
marred and swollen cheek.
"To think I have brought you all this trouble!"
"You mustn't blame yourself."
"I do. But I'll make it up to you, Anna. You don't hate me for it, do
you?"
"Hate you! You know better than that."
"I'll come round to take you out now and then, in the evenings. I don't
want you to sit alone in that forsaken boarding-house and mope." He
drew out a bill-fold, and extracted some notes. "Don't be silly,"
he protested, as she drew back. "It's the only way I can get back my
self-respect. You owe it to me to let me do it."
She was not hard to persuade. Anything was better than going back to the
cottage on the hill, and to that heavy brooding figure, and the strap on
the wall. But the taking of the money marked a new epoch in the girl's
infatuation. It bought her. She did not know it, nor did he. But
hitherto she had been her own, earning her own livelihood. What she gave
of love, of small caresses and intimacies, had been free gifts.
From that time she was his creature. In her creed, which was the creed
of the girls on the hill, one did not receive without giving. She would
pay him back, but all that she had to give was herself.
"You'll come to see me, too. Won't you?"
The tingling was very noticeable now. He felt warm, and young, and very,
very strong.
"Of course I'll come to see you," he said, recklessly. "You take a
little time off--you've worked hard--and we'll play round together."