Part 57 (1/2)
”Why? Because I think he owes _you_ something. And that's a grudge. It isn't my business, but if I were you, Rickets, I'd pay him orf and have done with him.”
”Oh, that's all right. I'm safe enough.”
”You? It's just you who isn't. d.i.c.ky's not a bad sort, in his way. All the same, he'd sell you up as soon as look at you. Unless--” (for a moment her bright eyes clouded, charged with the melancholy meanings of the world) ”Unless you happened to be an orf'ly pretty woman.” She laid her right leg across her left knee and struck a vesta on the heel of her shoe.
”Then, of course, he'd sooner look at me.”
Poppy puffed at her cigarette and threw the vesta into the grate with a dexterous jerk of her white forearm. ”Look at you first. Sell you up--after.” Then Poppy burst into song--
”Oh, he is such a nice little boy, When there's nothing you do to annoy; But he's apt to stand aloof If you arsk him for the oof, And it's then that he looks coy.
Oh, he'll show the cloven hoof, If you put him to the proof.
When you want him to hand you the boodle He's _not_ such a nice little boy.
”Yes, d.i.c.kee, _I_ see you!”
The canary, persuaded by Poppy's song that it was broad daylight, was awake and splas.h.i.+ng in his bath. Again in Poppy's mind (how unnecessarily) he stood for the respectabilities and proprieties; he was an understudy for Tiny of the dirty tea-gown.
”Going?”
”Yes. I must go.”
”Wait.” She rose and held him by the collar of his coat, a lapel in each small hand. He grasped her wrists by an instinctive movement of self-preservation, and gently slackened her hold. She gave his coat a little shake. ”What's the matter with you, Rickets? You're such a howling swell.”
Her eyes twinkled in the old way, and he smiled in spite of himself.
”Say, I'm a little nuisance, Rickets, _say_ I'm a little nuisance.”
”You are a little nuisance.
”A d----d little nuisance.”
”A d----d little nuisance.”
”Ah, now you feel better, don't you? Poor Ricky-ticky, don't you be afraid. It's only a _little_ nuisance. It'll never be a big one. It's done growing. That is, I won't rag you any more, if you'll tell me one thing--oh, what a whopper of a sigh!--Promise me you'll pay d.i.c.ky off.”
”All right. I'll pay him.”
”To-morrow?”
”To-morrow, then. Don't, Poppy. I--I've got a sore throat.” For Poppy, standing on tip-toe, had made an effort to embrace him.
”I sy, if you blush like that, Rickets, you'll have a fit. Poor dear!
_Did_ I crumple his nice little stylish collar!”
He endured while she smoothed out an imaginary wrinkle, her head very much on one side. ”You see, Razors, we've been such chums. Whatever happens, I want to be all right and straight with you.”
”What should happen?”
”Oh, anything.” Again there was that troubling of the bright shallows of her eyes. ”You remember larst time you were here?” (his shudder told her that he remembered well). ”I _did_ try to send you away, didn't I?”