It was not what he said--she had been brought up on that kind of talk--it was the way he said it, and the inflection in his voice.
"I have been literally starving for somebody like you to talk to," he continued, drawing up a stool and settling himself determinedly beside her.
"For me! Why, Mr.Breen, I'm not a piece of bread--" she laughed.

"I'm just girl." He had begun to interest her--this brown-eyed young fellow who wore his heart on his sleeve, spoke her dialect and treated her as if she were a duchess.
"You are life-giving bread to me, Miss MacFarlane," answered Jack with a smile.

"I have only been here six months; I am from the South, too." And then the boy poured out his heart, telling her, as he had told Peter, how lonely he got sometimes for some of his own kind; and how the young girl in the lace hat and feathers, who had come in with Garry, was his aunt's daughter; and how he himself was in the Street, signing checks all day--at which she laughed, saying in reply that nothing would give her greater pleasure than a big book with plenty of blank checks--she had never had enough, and her dear father had never had enough, either.
But he omitted all mention of the faro bank and of the gamblers--such things not being proper for her ears, especially such little pink shells of ears, nestling and half hidden in her beautiful hair.
There was no knowing how long this absorbing conversation might have continued (it had already attracted the attention of Miss Felicia) had not a great stir taken place at the door of the outside hall.

Somebody was coming upstairs; or had come upstairs; somebody that Peter was laughing with--great, hearty laughs, which showed his delight; somebody that made Miss Felicia raise her head and listen, a light breaking over her face.

Then Peter's head was thrust in the door: "Here he is, Felicia.