Page:So Big (1924).djvu/191

 “Here. Get the kid a decent roost for the night. You and the kid, see.”

Selina stared at the shining round dollar; at Mabel’s face. The quick sting of tears came to her eyes. She shook her head, smiled. “We don’t mind sleeping out here. Thank you just the same—Mabel.”

The girl put her dollar plumply back into her purse. “Well, takes all kinds, I always say. I thought I had a bum deal but, say, alongside of what you got I ain’t got it so worse. Place to sleep in, anyways, even if it is—well, good-night. Listen to that Elsie, hollering for me. I’m comin’! Shut up!”

You heard the two on their way up the street, arm in arm, laughing.

“Come Dirk.”

“Are we going to sleep here!” He was delighted.

“Right here, all snug in the hay, like campers.”

The boy lay down, wriggling, laughing. “Like gypsies. Ain’t it, Mom?”

“‘Isn’t it,’ Dirk—not “ain’t it’.” The school teacher.

She lay down beside him. The boy seemed terribly wide awake. “I liked the Mabel one best, didn’t you? She was the nicest, h’m?”

“Oh, much the nicest,” said Selina, and put one arm around him and drew him to her, close. And suddenly he was asleep, deeply. The street became quieter. The talking and laughter ceased. The lights were dim at Chris Spanknoebel’s. Now and then the clatter of wheels and horses’ hoofs proclaimed a late comer seeking a place, but the sound was not near by,