"I've got to wait and go hungry--and maybe get sick again--while they carry on their disgusting love-making." He turned about on the instant, and striding over to the electric bell, rang it again with all his might.
"When that feemale gets up here," he declared, "I'll just find out why I've got to wait like this.

I'll take her down, to the Queen's taste.
I'm lenient enough, Lord knows, but I don't propose to be imposed upon ALL the time." A few moments later, while Annixter was pretending to read the county newspaper by the window in the dining-room, Hilma came in to set the table.

At the time Annixter had his feet cocked on the window ledge and was smoking a cigar, but as soon as she entered the room he--without premeditation--brought his feet down to the floor and crushed out the lighted tip of his cigar under the window ledge.

Over the top of the paper he glanced at her covertly from time to time.
Though Hilma was only nineteen years old, she was a large girl with all the development of a much older woman.

There was a certain generous amplitude to the full, round curves of her hips and shoulders that suggested the precocious maturity of a healthy, vigorous animal life passed under the hot southern sun of a half-tropical country.