Page:Keeban (IA keeban00balm).pdf/304

 not being certain that others would so judge, I kept to myself what I knew. And I kept her to myself, too.

I had her in a cab; and this was no stray taxi, you may be sure. This was certain to go where I ordered it; and the number I gave was that of my friend on the Avenue.

"We can both go there and stay," I said. "That's one use for friends."

"No," said Doris. "Not for me."

"Oh, yes," I said; and, being alone with her in the back of that taxi, I firmly and forcibly held her. Also I kissed her, several times.

"Don't!" She fought with me; and furiously, too.

"I love you," I repeated to her. "And you love me. God knows why, but you kissed me in that closet; and you"

She told me then and there that none of that counted. She had thought we were going to be killed, you see, or she never would have shown any interest in me. Now we weren't killed, she said; and certainly that was true. We'd have to go back to our own lines, me to the bean business and she to "shoving the queer."

"You can't do that," I told her.

"Why not?" she came back at me.