Page:Storm Over Paris.pdf/30

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ache or which one aches somewhere else. After all, you women are a very sensitive lot."

"Why especially on Mondays?" This from Jacques, the cutter, who stood at his table near the window. His eyes widened.

"Did I say Monday was to blame?" Masson laughed his artificial laugh.

"What then?"

"Use your brains, genius, and see if you can figure it out. My opinion is that it's Sunday that's to blame."

"You don't say! Sunday's a day like any other day. But Sunday night-that's something different!"

Jacques burst out in a roar of laughter. The whole shop followed suit.

"Hold on! Hold on!" Masson dropped the chalk from his hand. "It's all right for us, a bunch of old sinners, and with a lot of experience. But for a greenhorn, an amateur!"

Anna felt the blood rush to her face.

"Yes, yes, a greenhorn," Masson repeated. "Probably got bounced around a little too much! And then she tells me a cock and bull story about a headache . . . !"

This time no one answered, nor did anyone laugh. Pierre started whistling a tango to relieve the strained atmosphere. One of the girls chimed in, in a high voice. The increased tempo of the motors pierced the air. Anna's heart seemed to stop dead, then suddenly whirred into the rhythm of the motors, becoming one with the dizzy tumult of the shop.

Now her headache was real: her mind, like pieces of broken machinery flew in all directions; a piece of metal took the shape of a bird-the robin she had seen on the green fence, carrying in its beak the twigged promise of spring....