"A glass of stout, I think, and--"
"And a bun," he interposed, smiling in recollection of their first
interview.
But Cuckoo did not smile or seem to recognize the allusion.
"Please, I'll have a sandwich," she said.
Julian ordered it, the stout, a cup of coffee and a liqueur brandy for
himself. While the waiter was getting the things he noticed Cuckoo's
extreme and active gravity, a gravity which seemed oddly to give her
quite a formidable appearance under her feathers. Despite the obvious
weariness written on her face, there was somehow a look of energy about
her, the aspect of a person full of intention and purpose.
"Why, Cuckoo," he said, "you look like a young judge about to deliver a
sentence on somebody."
And indeed that was just how her expression and pose behind the
marble-topped table affected him. Just then the waiter brought the
stout and the other things. Cuckoo removed her cheap kid gloves, took
the tumbler in her thin fingers and sipped at it. After a sip or two
she put the glass down, and said to Julian:
"I say."
"Well?"
"What are you about to-night?"
The question came from her painted lips very sternly. It seemed
addressed by one who had a right to condemn, and who was going to
exercise that right.
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