Scanning column after column, occasionally she poked a
toothpick through the page, and once tore out a little segment, dropping
it into her hand bag. It read:
Neatly Furnished Room near Columbia University and Kroeg School of
Music. Three dollars and a half a week and breakfasts if desired. Ideal
for refined young lady. Inquire at 9000 Amsterdam Avenue.
She paid her check, inquired direction of the cashier, and, hurrying
out, boarded a north-bound Amsterdam Avenue car, riding for half an hour
through streets lined in petty shops and presenting the peculiar swept
look of Sunday.
She had cooled to apathy, a drowsiness descending that made her
reluctant to leave the car; could have ridden on and on in this eased
and half-narcotized state, but people had a habit of remembering her. A
truckman had followed her only the day before through half a block of
snarled traffic to see that she turned properly to the right. New York,
mad as a March hare, was eager to direct her. The conductor now walked
up the aisle of car to tap her on the shoulder.
"Your corner, miss."
Nine thousand Amsterdam Avenue was a drug store sidled in between a
bakeshop that six days a week poured forth sweet hot breath, and an
undertaking establishment with a white-satin infant's coffin _de luxe_
tilted in the window.
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