"As for you, Miss Green," I said, "you're up against it, aren't you? The manager's broke. You don't know when you've touched any salary. There's been no balm in your benefit. What are you going to do?"
This time she looked me over before she spoke.
"I don't have to ask," said I, blushing red, "if you're a good girl. It's just naturally obvious. I guess that's what put me up to butting in. I want to help. Will you answer three questions?"
"Where," said I, "will you get breakfast to-morrow?--lunch to-morrow?--and dinner to-morrow?"
"We disband to-night," she said, "and I don't know."
"I suppose you know," said I, "what happens to most white girls who get stranded in Indian cities?"
"I know," she said, "that people get up against it so hard that they oughtn't to be blamed for anything they do."
"They aren't," I said, "by--Christians; but it's ugly just the same. Now----"
"And you," she said, flaring up, "think that, as long as it's got to be, it might as well be you! Is that your song and dance, Mr. Smarty?"
"Don't be a little goat!" I said; and that seemed to make her take to me and trust me.
"I'll tell you," I said; and I found that it wasn't easy. "First place," I said, "I've got some money saved up. That will keep you on Easy Street till I get back from Sydney. If by that time nothing's turned up that you want of your own free heart and will, I'll ask you to pay me back by--by changing your name."
"That," said I, "gives you a chance to look around--gives you one small chance in a million to light on some man you can care for and who'll care for you and take care of you. Failing that, it would be fair enough for you to take me, failing a better. See?"
"You mean," she said, "that if things don't straighten out, it would be better for me to become Mrs. Bower than walk the streets? Is that it?"
"But I don't see your point of view," she cried. "Just because you're sorry for a girl don't mean you want to make her your wife."
"It isn't sorrowing," I said. "It's wanting. It's the right kind of wanting. It's the wanting that would rather wait than hurt you; that would rather do without you than hurt you."
"And you'll trust me with all your savings and go away to Australia--and if I find some other man that I like better you'll let me off from marrying you? Is that it?"