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Rh unexpected this way after the way we were kicked around in every bowling alley in the state, this is all the sweeter."

"Applesauce, dearie," she said. "You've got a partner. Don't you know it?"

"I know it. I'm up to here with thanks for what you've done for me."

"Do you know what you've done for me?" she asked. He shook his head.

"Look in my eyes," she begged.

He studied her eyes searchingly. They were clouded, brown with a faint fleck of hazel. Vainly she tried to pierce his mind, penetrate his thoughts.

"You didn't know it," she said, and her voice softened, "but I've been on a bat since we left San Bernardino in December and this is nearly March."

"You haven't been drinking?"

"No," she said bitterly. "I haven't been drinking."

She stood up, walked to the window. He followed.

"Let's not argue," he pleaded. "We got a night show to do."

"Oh, nuts!" she whirled about, caught him by the arm, clung to him and kissed him. Her voice melted away. "We've got to find some way to be happy."

Night had fallen. The little clock said ten after eight. He must rouse himself, he knew, and bathe and eat and be in the theatre at twenty after nine.

Suddenly he recalled what she had told him. How could she have submitted to those men, those horrible men, not one but many men in many places—Los Angeles, Santa Ana, Santa Barbara, even in Bakersfield the night Feinberg's wire came, informing them of their 'Frisco booking?