Page:The Star in the Window.pdf/209

Rh "I'm sorry. I'm home already. I live here," she told him.

"Live here!" he repeated, gazing at her critically. "In this place!" He was still in doubt. She was dressed rather expensively—wore to-night a silk sweater (Chadwick Booth knew silk sweaters when he saw them, and their prices too). Reba's was a blue and gold changeable affair. "Live here! You! Exotic young lady!" he said, shaking his head. Then, "Well," he resumed with a sigh, "if you insist upon it—and won't come joy-riding with me—" he left the sentence unfinished for several seconds, but she simply kept on knitting rather exasperatingly. "If you won't accept my invitation—" he gave her still a second opportunity, but she didn't take it, "then, good-night," he finished.

"Good-night," said Reba, glancing up once again from under her lashes, and, this time, daring to let her gaze linger a second or two.

"Pretty eyes she has. Brownish," thought Chadwick Booth three minutes later as he stepped into his car.

And as he sped away Reba, left behind in the deserted Red Cross rooms, two stories up in the Alliance building, was gravely brushing the pile of cigarette ashes Dr. Booth had left behind on a corner of his desk, into the palm of her hand and depositing them in the waste-basket.

Afterward, in her room, she cooped up her palm over her nose and drew in a deep breath of the faint fragrance.

"I wonder what 'exotic' means," she said.