Page:Stella Dallas, a novel (IA stelladallasnove00prou).pdf/241

Rh it. I'm as contented as a clam, so long as you are happy, Lollie. But you can't go like that, in that wrinkled waist and your hair all mussy."

"Oh, it doesn't matter."

Laurel did not take the elevator downstairs. She walked. The elevator would leave her the whole length of the foyer away from the hotel office. The stairs came down just behind it. Laurel felt fairly sure that none of "the crowd" would be near the office at this time in the evening. She was right. Nobody was near the office. The clerk was alone.

"We're leaving to-morrow," she told him.

"Leaving! I thought your mother—"

"My mother is much better, and something has happened that makes it necessary for us to go home immediately."

"Why, but—"

"Oh, I know we've engaged the room for the season. You'll have to charge us for it, if that is the way you do. We've got to go, anyway." There was something very convincing about Laurel. "We're going on the early train," she said.

"Oh, but the early train isn't necessary. The train that connects with the Boston Pullman at the Junction, sixty miles below here, doesn't leave until evening."

That didn't matter to Laurel. If she and her mother preferred leaving on the early train, they could do so, couldn't they, and pick up the Pullman, when it came through the Junction at night?

"Why, of course—but it would be very foolish—nobody ever does it."

"We're going to," Laurel announced.