The dressmaker on the street floor of the rabbit warren had gone out of business.Failed probably, poor thing.Tootles had once said that the only people she ever saw in the shop were pressing creditors.Acolored woman of bulbous proportions and stertorous breathing was giving a catlick to the dirty stairway.A smell of garlic and onions met Martin on his way to the rooms of Tootles' friend, and on the first landing he drew back to let two men pass down who looked like movie actors.They wore violet ties and tight-fitting jackets with trench belts and short trousers that should have been worn by their younger brothers.The actor on the next floor, unshaven and obviously just out of bed, was cooking breakfast in his cubby-hole.
He wore the upper part of his pajamas and a pair of incredibly dirty flannel trousers.The marks of last night's grease paint were on his temples and eyebrows.He hummed a little song to the accompaniment of sizzling bacon.
When Martin knocked on the door of the apartment of the girl to whom he had never spoken except over the telephone and whose name he remembered to be Irene Stanton, a high-pitched, nasal voice cried out.
"Come right in." He went right in and was charged at by a half-bred Chow whose bark was like a gunman's laugh, and a tiny pink beast which worked itself into a state of hysterical rage.But when a high-heeled shoe was flung at them from the bedroom, followed by a volley of fruit-carrier words of the latest brand, they retired, awed and horror-stricken, to cover.
Martin found himself in a small, square living room with two windows looking over the intimate backs of other similar houses.Under the best of conditions it was not a room of very comfortable possibilities.In the hands of its present occupant, it was, to Martin's eyes, the most depressing and chaotic place he had ever seen.The cheap furniture and the cheaper wall paper went well with a long-unwhite-washed ceiling and smudged white paint.A line of empty beer bottles which stood on a mantelpiece littered with unframed photographs and dog-eared Christmas cards struck a note so blase that it might almost have been committed for a reason.On the square mission table in the center there was a lamp with a belaced pink shade at a cock-eyed angle which resembled the bonnet of a streetwalker in the early hours of the morning.An electric iron stood coldly beneath it with its wire attached to a fixture in the wall.Various garments littered the chairs and sofa, and jagged pieces of newspaper which had been worried by the dogs covered the floor.
But the young woman who shortly made her appearance was very different from the room.Her frock was neat and clean, her face most carefully made up, her shoes smart.She had a wide and winning grin, teeth that should have advertised a toothpaste, and a pair of dimples which ought to have been a valuable asset to any chorus.
"Why, but you HAVE done a hustle," she said."I haven't even had time to tidy up a bit." She cleared a chair and shook a finger at the dogs, who, sneaking out from under the sofa, were eyeing her with apprehensive affection.The Chow's mother had evidently lost her heart to a bulldog."Excuse the look of this back attic," she added."I've got to move, and I'm in the middle of packing.""Of course," said Martin, eager to know why he had been sent for.
"It's about Tootles, you said."
"Very much so." She sat on the edge of the table, crossed her arms, and deliberately looked Martin over with expert eyes.Knowing as much about men as a mechanic of a main-road motor-repairing shop knows about engines, her examination was acute and thorough.
Martin waited quietly, amused at her coolness, but impatient to come to cues.She was a good sort, he knew.Tootles had told him so, and he was certain that she had asked to see him out of friendship for the girl upstairs.
Her first question was almost as disconcerting and abrupt as a Zeppelin bomb."What did you do to Tootles?"Martin held her examining gaze."Nothing, except give her a bit of a holiday," he said.
"I saw you go off with her that morning." She smiled and her eyes became a little more friendly."She wrote me a letter from your place and said she'd found out what song writers meant by the word heaven.""Did she?" said Martin."I'm glad."
It came to her in a flash that her little pal had fallen in love with this boy and instantly she understood the mystery of Tootles'
change of method and point of view--her moping, her relaxed grip on life.She meant almost nothing to the boy and knew it.
"But don't you think you might have been to see her since you brought her back?" she asked.
"I've been very worried," said Martin simply.
"Is that so?" and then, after another pause, this girl said a second astonishing thing."I wish I didn't see in you a man who tells the truth.I wish you were just one of the ordinary sort that comes our way.I should know how to deal with you better.""Tell me what you mean," said Martin.