"But maybe you'll lend it
to me, if I need it in a week or so?"
"Sure," said the puzzled saloon man--liquor store man, he
preferred to be called, or politician. "Any amount you want."
As she went away he looked after her, saying to his barkeeper:
"What do you think of that, Terry? I offered her a twenty and
she sidestepped."
Terry's brother had got drunk a few days before, had killed a
woman and was on his way to the chair. Terry scowled at the
boss and said:
"She's got a right to, ain't she? Don't she earn her money
honest, without harmin' anybody but herself? There ain't many
that can say that--not any that runs factories and stores and
holds their noses up as if they smelt their own sins, damn 'em!"
"She's a nice girl," said Rafferty, sauntering away. He was a
broad, tolerant and good-humored man; he made allowances for an
employee whose brother was in for murder.
Susan had little time to spend at the hospital. She must now
earn fifty dollars a week--nearly double the amount she had
been averaging. She must pay the twenty-five dollars for
Spenser, the ten dollars for her lodgings. Then there was the
seven dollars which must be handed to the police captain's
"wardman" in the darkness of some entry every Thursday night.
She had been paying the patrolman three dollars a week to keep
him in a good humor, and two dollars to the janitor's wife; she
might risk cutting out these items for the time, as both
janitor's wife and policeman were sympathetic.
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