Page:Frank Owen - Woman Without Love (1949 reprint).djvu/125

 "For that matter," said she, "a girl isn't so keen on being told by a chap that he doesn't want her. By the way, what do you want, Jimmy?"

"If I had another dime," he sighed, "we could each have another cup of coffee."

"Would you consider yourself a gigolo," she asked, "if I financed the transaction?"

"Oh," said he, "it takes more than a cup of coffee to make a gigolo. Waiter," he ordered, "fill 'em up again."

"We're out and out spendthrifts today," said she.

"We're celebrating my getting you back," he said sheepishly.

"I didn't know you had lost me," she commented, "though I'm beginning to suspect that you've been trying to mighty hard."

The establishment of Madame Leota was in darkness save for a single light that gleamed forth from the library window of the apartment at the top of the house. Madame sat beside the table wearing one of the elaborate ruffled dressing gowns that she loved so well. Opposite her at the table was Ivan Alter. They were alone in the entire house except for Terese.

"This place," Louella said, "is unused to quiet. How sad the halls must feel not to hear the laughter of Minetta and Belle. If houses have souls, and I believe they do, they must grow melancholy when the old order changeth, giving place to the new, the old order of which they have grown fond."

Terese brought a pot of tea. Madame poured a cup and sipped it languidly. That day she had bade goodbye to her servants and her girls. She had given each servant a check for five hundred dollars and every girl had been rewarded with a thousand. There were tears in everybody's eyes at the parting.

"I'll give each of you my New York address," she told them, "so that if you are ever in need of funds, you can write to me."