however, the more she felt that she did have something to tell Hubert.
When they were alone that night she said to him, "Say, I saw Billy get you in a corner tonight and do a lot of sweet and low gabbing. Was he making a touch?"
"Trying to."
"How much?"
"Twenty reduced from fifty."
"Did you give it to him?"
"Sure."
"You did!" Lillian's astonishment came forth in a sharp exclamation. Who was lying? Billy or Hubert? And for what reason?
Hubert took the high, bewildered pitch of her voice to mean only one thing. She was vexed that he had loaned money to Billy after refusing to aid Mary Jackson.
"Well, to tell the truth, Lil, I didn't."
"What did you say you did for, then?"
"Oh, I don't know. Guess I was thinking of something else. What did you want to holler at me that way just now for?"
"When?" asked Lillian. She knew very well when.
"When? Why, just now when you said, 'You did!' Cripes, it sounded as though I'd just said I'd murdered somebody."
"I don't know. Maybe I was thinking of something else too. So you didn't let Billy have the money, huh? Why not?"
Hubert looked at her with a hurt expression on his
