Part 34 (1/2)
[Ill.u.s.tration: ”Doris continued to haunt agencies and theatrical offices.”]
Doris always went out more or less; and what troubled Athalie was not that the girl had opportunities for the decent nourishment she needed, but that her reticence concerning the people she dined with was steadily increasing.
”Oh, shut up! I can look out for myself,” she always repeated sullenly. ”Anyway, Athalie, _you_ are not the one to bully me. n.o.body ever presented me with a cosy flat and--”
”Doris!”
”Didn't your young man give you this flat?”
”Don't speak of him or of me in that manner,” said Athalie, flus.h.i.+ng scarlet.
”Why are you so particular? It's the truth. He's given you about everything a man can offer a girl, hasn't he?--jewellery, furniture, clothing--cats--”
”Will you please not say anything more!”
But Doris was still smarting under recent admonition, and she meant to make an end of Athalie's daily interference: ”I will say what I like when it's the truth,” she retorted. ”You are very free with your unsolicited advice. And I'll say this, and it's true, that not one girl in a thousand who accepts what you have accepted from Clive Bailey, is straight!”
Athalie's tightening lips quivered: ”Do you intimate that I am not straight?”
”I didn't say that.”
”You implied it.”
There was a silence; Catharine lounged on the sofa, watching and listening with interest. After a moment Doris shrugged her young shoulders.
”Does it matter so much, anyway?” she said with a short, unpleasant laugh.
”Does _what_ matter--you little ninny!”
”Whether a girl _is_ straight.”
”Is that the philosophy you learn in your theatrical agencies?”
demanded Athalie fiercely. ”What nauseating rot you do talk, Doris!”
”Very well. It may be nauseating. But what is a girl to do in a world run entirely by men?”
”You know well enough what a girl is _not_ to do, don't you? All right then,--leave that undone and do what's left.”
”What _is_ left?” demanded Doris with a mirthless laugh. ”There's scarcely a job that a girl can hold unless she squares some man to keep it--and keep--her!”
”Shame on you! I held mine for over five years,” said Athalie with hot contempt.
”Yes, and then along came the junior partner. You wouldn't square him: you lost your job! There's always a junior partner in every business--when there isn't a senior. There's nothing to it if you stand in with the firm. If you don't--good night!”
”You managed to remain at the Egyptian Garden during the entire season.”
”But the fights I had, my dear, and the tricks I employed and the lies I told and the promises I made! Oh, it's sickening--sickening! But--”
she shrugged--”what are you to do? Thousands of girls go queer because they're forced to by starvation--”