They ain't
hard. Look! Porcelain-lined sink. It's got Twenty-third Street beat
some, 'ain't it?"
"Yes, Jerry."
"Fix us a beefsteak supper, Cloonan, and lemme weigh up them groceries I
sent out and lemme see your books afterward. Come, Peachy, here, up
these stairs. This is the second floor. Pretty neat, ain't it? Her and
her mother shopped three more weeks on this oak bed-set. Some little
move out here from Twenty-third Street for a little rooming-house queen
like you, eh? Neat little bedroom, eh, Peachy? Eh?"
His face was close to her and claret red with an expression she did not
dare to face.
"And what's this next room here, Jerry? Ain't it sweet and
quiet-looking! Spare room? Ain't it pretty with them little white
curtains? Quit, quit, Jerry! You mustn't--you mustn't."
She broke from his embrace, confusion muddling her movements.
"Is this the--the spare room?"
"It is, now. It used to be the old woman's till I laid down on the
mother-in-law game and squealed. Yeh, I used to have a little
mother-in-law in our house that was some mother-in-law. Believe me, she
makes that old devil of yourn look like a prize angel."
"I--This'll be just the room for Dee Dee, Jerry, where she can feel the
morning sun and hear the street-cars over there when she gets lonesome.
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