"Will you have him called?"
The clerk hesitated. Stranded "actresses" weren't in the habit of
talking like that. They always wanted to see the proprietor, they were
always on the point of receiving an ample remittance from some generally
distant place. They were often very queenly, incredibly outraged that
their solvency should be questioned. But their voices never had the cool
confident ring that this girl's voice had, nor the look in their eyes,
the purposeful thrust.
He hesitated uncomfortably. Then his difficulty was solved for him.
"There he goes now," he said. "You can talk to him if you like."
The proprietor was sixty years old, perhaps; gray, stooped, stringy of
neck. He had a short-cropped mustache, one corner of which he was always
caressing with a protruding under-lip. He had a good shrewd pair of
eyes, not altogether unkindly. Rose had seen him before, but hadn't
known who he was.
He was making, just now, for a little office he had, that opened into
the railed-off space behind the desk, and, by another door, into the
corridor.
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