Part 31 (1/2)
She was drying her eyes, and looking a little happily foolish.
”I knew better than to give them a chance to snub me,” she told him.
”Now I'm respectable.”
But at this Sherwood reared his crest.
”Respectable!” he snorted, ”What do you mean? Haven't you always been respectable? I'd like to see anybody who would hint--”
”You're a dear, but you're a man,” she broke in more calmly. ”Don't you know that a gambler's wife isn't respectable--in their sense of the word?”
”But every mother's son of them gambles!” cried Sherwood. ”It's a perfectly legal and legitimate occupation!”
”The men do; we'd always get along if it was only a question of the men. But the women make distinctions--”
”Look here!” he broke out wrathfully. ”There's d.i.c.k Blatchford mixed up in dirty work for dirty money I wouldn't lay my fingers on; and Terry, or Brannan, or McGowan, or all the rest of the boodling, land-grabbing, pettifogging crew! Why, if I made my living or spare cash the way that gang of pirates and cutthroats do I'd carry a pair of handcuffs for myself. Honest! Respectable! I've got no kick on their methods; it's none of my business. But their wives are all right. I don't see it!”
”It's all names, I acknowledge,” she soothed, ”just names, I attach no more weight to them than you do. Don't you suppose I'd have said something if I had thought you were doing anything wrong? But that's the way they play the game, and it is their game. If we play it we've got to accept their rules. Don't you see?”
”Well, it's a mighty poor game,” grumbled Sherwood, ”and they strike me as an exceptionally stupid lot of women. They'd drive me to drink. I don't see what you want to bother with them for.”
”They are,” she agreed. ”They won't amuse me much--you couldn't understand--it's just the _idea_ of it--But I won't be looked down on, even by my inferiors! Tell me, Jack, when we sell the business are we going to be wealthy, will we have plenty of money?”
A hurt look came into his fine, straightforward eyes.
”Haven't you always had all you wanted, Patsy?” he inquired.
”Of course I have, you old goose! But I want to know what our resources are before I plan my campaign.”
”Going in up to your neck, are you?” he commented ruefully.
She nodded. Her eyes were bright, and a spot of colour glowed in either cheek.
”Course I am. What can I spend?”
”You can have whatever you want.”
”That's too vague, too indefinite. How rich--or poor--are we going to be?”
”We'll be rich enough.”
”Very?”
”Well--yes, very. The business has paid, investments have panned out. I got a good cash purchase price.”
”How much can I spend a year?” she persisted. ”It doesn't matter whether it's much or little, but I want to know.”
”What a mercenary little creature!” he cried facetiously, then sobered as he saw by the expression of her face that this, apparently trivial thing meant a great deal to her. ”Oh, fifty thousand or so won't cripple us.”