“Marry me, Marylin,” he said, “and you’ll wear diamonds.”

In spite of herself, his bay-rummed nearness was not unpleasant to her.  “Cut it out—­here, Getaway,” she said through a blush.

He hooked her very close to him by the elbow, and together they crossed through the crash of a street bifurcated by elevated tracks.

“You hear, Marylin,” he shouted above the din.  “Marry me and you’ll wear diamonds.”

“Getaway, you’re up to something again!”

“Whadda you mean?”

“Diamonds on your twenty a week!  It can’t be done.”

His gaze lit up with the pointiness.  “I tell you, Marylin, I can promise you headlights!”

“How?”

“Never you bother your little head how; O.K., though.”

“How, Getaway?”

“Oh—­clean—­if that’s what’s worrying you.  Clean-cut.”

“It is worrying me.”

“Saw one on a little Jane yesterday out to Belmont race track.  A fist-load for a little trick like her.  And sparkle!  Say, every time that little Jane daubed some whitewash on her little nosie she gave that grand stand the squints.  That’s what I’m going to do.  Sparkle you up!  With a diamond engagement ring.  Oh boy!  How’s that?  A diamond engagement ring!”

“Oh, Getaway!” she said, with her hand on the flutter of her throat and closing her eyes as if to imprison the vision against her lids.  “A pure white one with lots of fire dancing around it.”  And little Marylin, who didn’t want to want it, actually kissed the bare dot on her left ring finger where she could feel the burn of it, and there in the crowded street, where he knew he was surest of his privacy with her, he stole a kiss off that selfsame finger, too.

“I’ll make their eyes hang out on their cheeks like grapes when they see you coming along, Marylin.”

“I love them because they’re so clear—­and clean!  Mountain water that’s been filtered through pebbles.”

“Pebbles is right!  I’m going to dike you out in one as big as a pebble.  And poils!  Sa-y, they’re what cost the spondulicks.  A guy showed me a string of little ones no bigger than pimples.  Know what?  That little string could knock the three spots out of a thousand-dollar bond—­I mean bill!”

It was then that something flashed out of Marylin’s face.  A shade might have been lowered; a candle blown out.

“Getaway,” she said, with a quick little dig of fingers into his forearm, “you’re up to something!”

“Snuff, I said.”

“What did you mean by that word, ’bond’?”

“Who built a high fence around the word ’bond’?”

“Bonds!  All that stuff in the newspapers about those messengers disappearing out of Wall Street with—­bonds!  Getaway, are you mixed up in that?  Getaway!”

“Well, well!  I like that!  I had you doped out for fair and warmer to-day.  The weather prophet didn’t predict no brainstorm.”