“Why not?” asked Eden. “Women and children always confide in me. I’ve got such a fatherly face. By the way, this coffee is terrible.”
“Yes, isn’t it?” she agreed. “What will you have for dessert? There are two kinds of pie—Apple, and the other’s out. Make your selection.”
“I’ve made it,” he replied. “I’m taking the one that’s out.” He demanded his check. “Now, if you’ll let me pay for your dinner—”
“Nothing of the sort,” she protested.
“But after the way my steak attacked you.”
“Forget it. I’ve an expense account, you know. If you say any more, I’ll pay your check.”
Ignoring the jar of toothpicks hospitably offered by a friendly cashier, Bob Eden followed her to the street. Night had fallen; the sidewalk was deserted. On the false front of a long low building with sides of corrugated tin, a sad little string of electric lights proclaimed that gaiety was afoot.
“Whither away?” Bob Eden said. “The movies?”
“Heavens, no. I remember that one. It took ten years off my young life. Tell me, what are you doing here? People confide in me, too. Stranger, you don’t belong.”
“No, I’m afraid I don’t,” Eden admitted. “It’s a complicated story but I’ll inflict it on you anyhow, some day. Just at present I’m looking for the editor of the Eldorado Times. I’ve got a letter to him in my pocket.”
“Will Holley?”
“Yes. You know him?”
“Everybody knows him. Come with me. He ought to be in his office now.”
