Page:Stella Dallas, a novel (IA stelladallasnove00prou).pdf/289

Rh "Nope."

"I do, Ma. He's over at Liz Halloran's. She was tellin' me 'bout him."

Eagerly Stella turned toward the younger woman. "Say, take me there. Take me there now. I got to see him."

But she didn't see him. Not that day. Liz Halloran, a thin haggard old woman with no front teeth had told Stella, standing in her miserable black hole of a doorway (like the opening into the cavity of a decayed tooth, it was), that he wa'n't fit to be seen to-day. "He's just layin' there like dead to-day."

"How often does he get this way?" Stella inquired.

"Oh, off and on, I don't know! I don't keep track. Couldn't get no hooch. That's what done it."

"When do you think I could see him?"

"Oh, he'll be rousin' up to-morrow or the day after. He'll be real bright for a spell, too."

"I'll come day after to-morrow," said Stella.

hour later, as Stella sat gazing out of the window of an electric car that was bearing her back to the apartment and Laurel, she kept saying to herself, grimly, doggedly, "I can stand it. I wasn't brought up in a pink-and-white nursery, thank God! I shan't mind it after awhile. I'm tough as tripe. Anyhow, it's better than jumping off the Harvard Bridge."