"God did that. . . . No but look, I'm awfully hungry. I walked up."
"What time is it?"
"It's after one."
"Oh Jimmy I dont know what to do about time. . . . Like this hat? . . . Oh I forgot to tell you. I went to see Al Harrison yesterday. It was simply dreadful. . . . If I hadnt got to the phone in time and threatened to call the police. . . ."
"Look at that funny woman opposite. She's got a face exactly like a llama."
"It's on account of her I have to keep my shades drawn all the time . . ."
"Why?"
"Oh you're much too young to know. You'd be shocked Jimmy." Ruth was leaning close to the mirror running a stick of rouge between her lips.
"So many things shock me, I dont see that it matters much. . . . But come along let's get out of here. The sun's shining outside and people are coming out of church and going home to overeat and read at their Sunday papers among the rubberplants . . ."
"Oh Jimmy you're a shriek . . . Just one minute. Look out you're hooked onto my best shimmy."
A girl with short black hair in a yellow jumper was folding the sheets off the cot in the hall. For a second under the ambercolored powder and the rouge Jimmy did not recognize the face he had seen through the crack in the door.
"Hello Cassie, this is . . . Beg pardon, Miss Wilkins this is Mr. Herf. You tell him about the lady across the air-shaft, you know Sappo the Monk."
Cassandra Wilkins lisped and pouted, "Isn't she dweadful Mr. Herf. . . . She says the dweadfullest things."
"She merely does it to annoy."
"Oh Mr. Herf I'm so pleased to meet you at last, Ruth does nothing but talk about you. . . . Oh I'm afwaid I was indiscweet to say that. . . . I'm dweadfully indiscweet."
