What gave the place
its air of vulgarity, a suggestion of being the starting and finishing
point for lewd, drink sodden revels, she couldn't determine. It did
suggest this plainly. But, in the light of what Jimmy Wallace had told
her, she didn't think it likely there'd be any reveling to speak of at
rehearsal.
At the head of the stairway, tilted back in a kitchen chair beneath a
single gas-jet whose light he was trying to make suffice for the perusal
of a green newspaper, sat a man, under orders no doubt, to keep
intruders away.
Rose cast about as she climbed for the sort of phrase that would
convince him she wasn't an intruder. She would ask him, but in the
manner of one who seeks a formal assurance merely, if this was where
they were rehearsing _The Girl Up-stairs_. Three steps from the top, she
changed her tactics, as a result of a glance at his unshaven face. The
thing to do was to go by as if he weren't there at all--as if, for such
as she, watchmen didn't exist. The rhythmic pounding of feet and the
frayed chords from a worn-out piano, convinced her she was in the right
place.
Pages:
397
398
399
400
401
402
403
404
405
406
407
408
409
410
411
412
413
414
415
416
417
418
419
420
421