"Don't be afraid," I told her, "we have only been away from the
washerlady for fifty minutes. See yourself, there is no deception."

"I am absolutely certain that he is sleeping yet," Frieda assured her,
and turned to the perspiring waiter, ordering three Nesselrodes and
coffees.

Now, when I treat myself to a _table d'hote_ dinner, I love to linger
over my repast, to study the people about me, or at least pretend to.
Also, I sip my coffee very slowly and enjoy a Chartreuse, in tiny gulps.
Frieda, if anything, is more dilatory than myself. But the dear old girl
positively hurried over the little block of ice-cream, and I suspect
that she scalded her mouth a trifle with her coffee. A few minutes later
we were out in the street again, hurrying towards Madame Boivin's, and
I wondered whether such unseemly haste could be compatible with proper
digestion. We reached the tenement in a very short time.

"Frances is going upstairs with me," announced Frieda. "You had better
not wait for us, for we might be detained a little. I'll bring her home,
and we shall be perfectly safe. You go right back and smoke your old
pipe till we return."

"Don't hurry," I told her. "I might as well wait here as anywhere else.
It is an interesting street. If I get tired of waiting, I'll stroll
home; take your time."

So they went up the stairs, Frieda panting behind, and I leaned against
a decrepit iron railing. A few steps away some colored men were
assembled about a lamppost, their laughter coming explosively, in
repeated peals. Opposite me, within an exiguous front yard, a very fat
man sat on a rickety chair, the back resting against the wall, and gave
me an uncomfortable sense of impending collapse of the spindly legs.
Boys, playing ball in the middle of the street, stopped suddenly and
assumed an air of profound detachment from things terrestrial as a
policeman went by, majestic and leisurely, swinging his club. Somewhere
west of me an accordion was whining variations on Annie Laurie, but,
suddenly, its grievous voice was drowned by a curtain lecture addressed
to a deep bass by an exasperated soprano. To the whole world his sins
were proclaimed with a wealth of detail and an imagery of expression
that excited my admiration. Then the clamor ceased abruptly and a man's
head appeared at the window. I speculated whether he was contemplating
self-destruction, but he vanished, to appear a moment later in the
street, garmented in trousers, car