Page:Bad Girl (1929).pdf/57

 a cyclone. He was half-way downstairs before she could call him.

"Eddie."

"Oh, gee, Dot," he said and came up the stairs again.

"I was worried about you," she said. "I thought maybe— But say, you got a deuce of a nerve letting me stand in the rain while you play your set."

"They stuck me with it, Dot; at the last minute the boss wanted me to fix it. I brought it home. I can work better here. I thought you'd know I'd get there. I figured you'd sit in Loft's till I come."

"Well, I couldn't. How'd I know you'd come?"

"Well, Gosh, I never gave you a stand-up, did I? You seen just now how I was breaking my neck to get to you, didn't you?"

"Yeh," admitted Dot slowly.

"Gee, that set was a pipe to fix"—Eddie smiled reminiscently as he spoke—"once I found out what was wrong." He was silent for a time, thinking in terms of condensers and grid leaks. Dot watched him sulkily. He had enjoyed working on the set. He hadn't cared at all that that half hour could have been spent with her. "Want to see it?" he asked, brightly.

Dot followed him into his room. She knew it wasn't considered "nice" to go into a man's room, but with Eddie so enthusiastic over his mechanical skill she thought it would be placing a high value on her charm to object. She could fancy him saying, "Don't worry, Kid, I'm so interested in that set you don't look like anything to me!"

He closed the door and turned on the lights. Dot looked about and gathered an impression of a tiny room, a narrow white bed, a chiffonier, and radio parts that trailed their disks, coils, and plates over every visible flat surface. The window sill, the top of the chiffonier, the single chair, the floor, and the table that stood at the