dinner,
really, Fred. I am hungry again, I'm ashamed to say,--and I forgot to
order anything at my hotel."

Fred put his hand on the door. "Where to? You must have food."

"Do you know any quiet place, where I won't be stared at? I've still got
make-up on."

"I do. Nice English chop-house on Forty-fourth Street. Nobody there at
night but theater people after the show, and a few bachelors." He opened
the door and spoke to the driver.

As the car turned, Thea reached across to the front seat and drew Dr.
Archie's handkerchief out of his breast pocket.

"This comes to me naturally," she said, rubbing her cheeks and eyebrows.
"When I was little I always loved your handkerchiefs because they were
silk and smelled of Cologne water. I think they must have been the only
really clean handkerchiefs in Moonstone. You were always wiping my face
with them, when you met me out in the dust, I remember. Did I never have
any?"

"I think you'd nearly always used yours up on your baby brother."

Thea sighed. "Yes, Thor had such a way of getting messy. You say he's a
good chauffeur?" She closed her eyes for a moment as if they were tired.
Suddenly she looked up. "Isn't it funny, how we travel in circles? Here
you are, still getting me clean, and Fred is still feeding me. I would
have died of starvation at that boarding-house on Indiana Avenue if he
hadn't taken me out to the Buckingham and filled me up once in a while.
What a cavern I was to fill, too. The waiters used to look astonished.
I'm still singing on that food."

Fred alighted and gave Thea his arm as they crossed the icy sidewalk.
They were taken upstairs in an antiquated lift and found the cheerful
chop-room half full of supper parties. An English company playing at the
Empire had just come in. The waiters, in red waistcoats, were hurrying
about. Fred got a table at the back of the room, in a corner, and urged
his waiter to get the oysters on at once.

"Takes a few minutes to open them, sir," the man expostulated.

"Yes, but make it as few as possible, and bring the lady's first. Then
grilled chops with kidneys, and salad."

Thea began eating celery stalks at once, from the base to the foliage.
"Necker said something nice to me tonight. You might have thought the
management would say something, but not they." She looked at Fred from
under her blackened lashes. "It WAS a stunt, to jump in and sing that
second act without rehearsal. It doesn't sing itself."

Ottenbu