Page:That Royle Girl (Balmer).pdf/341

 "Oh! I meant, how's your shoulder?"

"It is no trouble. The matter of the ditch—that is, the investigation of it will be arranged without requiring you, at least for to-day."

She felt Ket's hand under her arm, and Ket asked, genially enough but not speaking directly to Mr. Clarke, "What's on his chest now?"

Calvin turned to the elevator, which had just risen empty, and he said to the operator, "Take these people down by themselves."

Peering through the elevator grating, as the car descended, Joan got a glimpse of Mr. Clarke and Mr. Ellison on the stairs, and she heard Mr. Ellison say, "Zenn will try—"

The car descended swiftly, and with Ket and his mother and Herman Elmen and Weigal, she went out to the street.

"God!" exulted Ket, looking up and filling his lungs deep with the fresh air. He jerked Jo and his mother closer to him, pushing his way to the curb, where Weigal was holding a taxi. "Much obliged," Ket accepted it, grandly, and thrust Jo in, pushed his mother after her and, blocking off Weigal, who tried to enter, he jumped in and slammed the door.

"Beat it!" he commanded.

"Where to?" the driver asked.

"Beat it!" yelled Ket, more loudly, when Lola Nesson came to the curb and spoke to the driver. "Beat it! Then I'll tell you where."

Joan Daisy drew into her corner as he plumped himself between her and his mother; he settled back with an arm around each as the cab started. "Just don't you turn by that  jail!" he called, and Joan remembered him in it and gave no resistance to his arm.