" Yes, Miss Black," he
answered, " I am one of the students."
She did not seem to quite know how to formulate her next
speech. " Er-I suppose you're going to Athens at once " You
must be glad after your horrid experiences."
" I believe they are going to start for Athens today," said
Coke.
Nora was all attention. "'They ?'" she repeated.
"Aren't you going with them? "
" Well," he said, " * * Well---"
She saw of course that there had been some kind of trouble.
She laughed. " You look as if somebody had kicked you down
stairs," she said, candidly. She at once assumed an intimate
manner toward him which was like a temporary motherhood. "
Come, walk with me and tell me all about it." There was in her
tone a most artistic suggestion that whatever had happened
she was on his side. He was not loath. The street was full of
soldiers whose tongues clattered so loudly that the two
foreigners might have been wandering in a great cave of the
winds. " Well, what was the row about ? " asked Nora. " And
who was in it? "
It would have been no solace to Coke to pour out
his tale even if it had been a story that he could have told Nora.
He was not stopped by the fact that he had gotten himself in
the quarrel because he had insulted the name of the girt at his
side. He did not think of it at that time. The whole thing was
now extremely vague in outline to him and he only had a dull
feeling of misery and loneliness.
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