In the months that followed the meeting in the church, King saw Billee
frequently. She came to him at places below Twenty-third Street
usually, and he could not help but notice that she was at times a
little nervous. She developed a fancy for downtown picture shows, and
he began to be concerned for her. Her dress was not always what it
should have been, her gloves alternated between holes and darns. Once,
admitting that she was hungry, she had let him take her into one of the
white restaurants scattered throughout the city and served by girls.
She enjoyed it all unaffectedly, the only drawback being that her
beauty made her conspicuous. Their presence in the lunch-house raised
a little storm of excitement among the girls, which King noticed with
uneasiness. He arrived at the conclusion, unwillingly, that he was
dressed too well for the girl he was escorting.
And once, face to face with her, a gentleman paused and half raised
his hat. He blocked the way. Billee’s little chin went into the air
ignoring him, but King roughly shoved the fellow into the gutter.
“Shall I go back and beat him up?” he asked, overtaking Billee, who was
hurrying away.
“No,” she said a little hysterically, and laughing, “come, he probably
took me for someone else.” But King thought otherwise.
One evening they wandered from a picture play and found a seat in
Washington Square.
“See here, Billee,” he said, “I don’t know what your secret is, but we
have about reached the limit in some things. I am going to be blunt,
even rude, you will think; but last week you borrowed a carfare of me
and your gloves are frightful. And your dress!--come, it’s all wrong.
You won’t marry me, won’t talk about it even; let’s switch off and
you be just a trusting little friend in all things until your affairs
straighten out. You need things. The fact keeps me unhappy. I have
plenty of money; let me be banker and provide everything. And if your
job isn’t pleasant or profitable, drop it. There is no need for you to
do menial work or be at the beck and call of exacting old ladies. I can
take care of you until you find a congenial occupation.”
But her face was something more than a study when he looked into it
after the offer, which had embarrassed him not a little. Her mouth
trembled and her eyes turned from him.
“You mean--you want to--want me to take a flat somewhere and--let
you--pay the rent?”
“Good God, no!” She watched him as though fascinated by a vision.
“King, it would be wonderful--just to see you coming and going every
day!”
“Billee!” She laughed and suddenly hid her face.
“What a boy it is, still!” She looked up shyly. “No, King, when you
are your own man and successful and other men speak your name with
admiration and you are so secure in your field you can marry whom you
please, even a girl who has done menial work--if you want me then,
I will come to you, and the flat, if you want a flat. Till then,
it’s--just sweethearts.”
“Wait, then, until my office building is up,” he said, trying to
disguise by affected gayety how he was touched. “Art glass was only my
struggle for a foothold. I am by education an architect.”
“_Your_ office building! Who is it for?”
“John Throckmorton. But he doesn’t know it yet.”
“John Throckmorton, the banker?” Billee gurgled and gasped. Then she
suppressed a little scream and stared wildly.
“Yes, the plans are all ready.”
“Has he seen them?”
“No; there’s the hitch. He has only talked about a thirty-five story
building out in Chicago, a trust fund investment. So far it has been
impossible to break through the guard around him. Harvard couldn’t do
it.”
She was silent a long moment, with parted lips, still staring at him.
“Listen, King. Do you believe in premonitions?”
“Hunches? Yes. Terence, my office boy, has one every time there is a
big game on up at the park, and he needs somebody to finance him. They
never fail.”
“I have one now. Try again--for my sake, won’t you?”
“For your sake, I’ll camp on Throckmorton’s trail like a poor relation.
What time has your premonition selected?”
“To-morrow at twelve o’clock.”
“Sounds more like lunch than hunch.”
“Send your card in at twelve. Will you?”
“I’ll gamble on you once, Billee. At twelve my card goes in--for your
sake. At twelve one I come out, for my own,” he laughed.
“You promise? King, I am really very superstitious.”
“So am I--about you.”
At twelve o’clock next day King handed his card to the red-headed outer
guard at Banker Throckmorton’s office. To his everlasting astonishment,
the boy smiled genially.
“Come in, Mr. Dubignon,” he said. And by the inner guard and the
extreme inner guard and the secretary entanglements, King marched
straight into the august Presence. All roads led to Rome. Ten minutes
later he came out, his head in the clouds. His cherished plans for a
thirty-five story office building were behind him. Billee’s eyes danced
when he told her the story.
But he went no more. The banker had promised to send for him when he
got a report on the plans from older architects. He did not send, and
Billee was away in Boston with that restless old woman. What the devil
did she want to be prancing around the country for at her age? Meaning
the old woman, of course.
Hope began to shrivel. The office building grew smaller. It lost a
story a day for thirty-five days. Nothing but the cellar, a hole in the
ground, was left. He laid himself down in that and pulled the hole in.
And the green grass grew all around.
Then Billee came back with a rush, and things began to move. Fate had
completed her gambit. She pushed a queen. The queen was Billee, of
course.
A wonderful day was at hand, for King.