Page:Nigger Heaven (1926).pdf/142

 aware, was in the nature of a complaint: she desired to upbraid Byron for not calling her earlier. Was he, her succeeding despairing inner voice demanded, going to call her at all?

At noon she was so completely occupied with the irksome requirements of an offensively precise youth—he had brought in a long typewritten list of obscure volumes dealing with tribal magic, and it was almost with shame that Mary had to confess, after considerable searching in the card-catalogue, that the library could not supply a single one of them—that when the bell rang again she did not hear it.

Alice Langley prompted her: Miss Silbert has been calling you for some time. Telephone.

Mary hastily returned the list to the obnoxious youth, gave a vicious stamp to a girl's card on the desk before her, and slipped from her stool. She walked, conscious that Alice's curious eyes were following her, the length of the room. Her brow was molten lava, her hands were ice. In Miss Silbert's room she lifted the receiver to her ear.

Hello!

Is that you, Mary?

Yes.

My adored one, can't you say any more than that?

No, not now.

What's the matter? The voice became more importunate, even a trifle petulant. Don't you feel the same way you did last night?