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Rh manner of her kind, in a ringing soprano which penetrated into every corner of the lobby. Archie, waiting while the brigand reluctantly made change for a dollar bill, was privileged to hear every word.

"Right from the start I seen he was in a ugly mood. You know how he gets, dearie! Chewing his upper lip and looking at you as if you were so much dirt beneath his feet! How was I to know he'd lost fifteen dollars fifty-five playing poker, and anyway, I don't see where he gets a licence to work off his grouches on me. And I told him so. I said to him, 'Gus,' I said, 'if you can't be bright and smiling and cheerful when you take me out, why do you come round at all?' Was I wrong or right, dearie?"

The girl behind the counter heartily endorsed her conduct. Once you let a man think he could use you as a door-mat, where were you?"

"What happened then, honey?"

"Well, after that we went to the movies."

Archie started convulsively. The change from his dollar-bill leaped in his hand. Some of it sprang overboard and tinkled across the floor, with the brigand in pursuit. A monstrous suspicion had begun to take root in his mind.

"Well, we got good seats, but—well, you know how it is, once things start going wrong. You know that hat of mine, the one with the daisies and cherries and the feather—I'd taken it off and given it him to hold when we went in, and what do you think that fell'r'd done? Put it on the floor and crammed it under the seat, just to save himself the trouble of holding it on his lap! And,