But I kept on
teaching until I'd saved five hundred dollars. Every other school
ma'am in the world teaches until she has saved five hundred
dollars, and then she packs two suit-cases, and goes to Europe from
June until September. But I saved my five hundred for New York.
I've been here six months now, and the five hundred has shrunk to
almost nothing, and if I don't break into the magazines pretty
soon----"
"Then?"
"Then," said Mary Louise, with a quaver in her voice, "I'll
have to go back and teach thirty-seven young devils that six times
five is thirty, put down the naught and carry six, and that the
French are a gay people, fond of dancing and light wines. But I'll
scrimp on everything from hairpins to shoes, and back again,
including pretty collars, and gloves, and hats, until I've saved up
another five hundred, and then I'll try it all over again, because
I--can--write."
From the depths of one capacious pocket the inquiring man took
a small black pipe, from another a bag of tobacco, from another a
match. The long, deft fingers made a brief task of it.
"I didn't ask you," he said, after the first puff, "because I
could see that you weren't the fool kind that objects." Then, with
amazing suddenness, "Know any of the editors?"
"Know them!" cried Mary Louise.
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