I'll fix it
up with you."
"Now, Clara, don't you go bothering with extras for me. This is
certainly fine. Sorry you never asked me before."
"You know why I never asked you before."
"Why, you never saw the like how pleased ma was. She was the first one
to fall in with the idea of my coming to-night."
She dipped into a shallow plate of amber soup. "I know," she said, "all
about that."
"Ma's a good sport about being left at home alone."
"How do you know? You never tried it until to-night. I'll bet it's the
first time since that night you first met me, five years ago, at Jerome
Fertig's, and it wouldn't have been then if she hadn't had the neuralgia
and it was your own clerk's wedding."
He laid down his spoon, settling back a bit from the table, pulling the
napkin across his knees out into a string.
"I thought we'd gone all over that, Clara."
"Yes; but where did it get us? That's why we're here to-night, Sam--to
get somewheres."
He crumbed his bread. "What do you mean, Clara?"
She forced his slow gaze to hers calmly, her hands outstretched on the
table between them. "I've made up my mind, Sam. Things can't go on this
way no longer between us.
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