im. That was her stepfather upon whom she was turning the
battery of those lovely eyes; those little boys who were, he knew,
jumping up and down in their little Dutch colonial beds, and calling
"Norma--Norma--Norma!" were her half-brothers.

He glanced toward Annie; her beautiful figure wrapped in a sparkling
robe that swept about her like a regal mantle, her fair hair scalloped
like waves of carved gold, her fingers and throat and hair and ears
sparkling with diamonds. Annie had on the famous Murison pearls, too,
to-night; she was twisting them in her fingers as her creditable Italian
delighted the ears of the Italian ambassador. Her own daughter to-night
sat among her guests. Chris liked to think himself above surprise, but
the strangeness of the situation was never absent a second from his
thoughts. He drifted toward his hostess; he was proud of his own
languages, and when Norma came back she came to stand wistfully beside
them, wondering if ever--ever--ever--she would be able to do that!

It was all thrilling--exhilarating--wonderful! Norma's heart thumped
delightfully as the big motor-cars turned into Broadway and took their
place in the slowly moving line. She pressed her radiant face close to
the window; snow was fluttering softly down in the darkness, and men
were pushing it from the sidewalks, and shouting in the night. There
was the usual fringe of onlookers in front of the opera house, and it
required all Norma's self-control to seem quite naturally absorbed in
getting herself safely out of the motor-car, and quite unconscious that
her pretty ankles, and her pretty head, and the great bunched wrap, were
not being generally appraised.

Women were stepping about gingerly in high heels; lights flashed on
quivering aigrettes, on the pressed, intense faces of the watchers, and
on the gently turning and falling snow, against the dark street. Norma
was caught in some man's protecting arm, to push through into the
churning crowd in the foyer; she had a glimpse of uniformed ushers and
programme boys, of furred shoulders, of bared shoulders, of silk hats,
of a sign that said: "Footmen Are Not Allowed in This Lobby."

Then somehow through, criss-crossed currents in the crowd, they reached
the mysterious door of the box, and Norma saw for the first time the
great, dimly lighted circle of the opera house, the enormous rise of
balcony above balcony, the double tiers of boxes, and the rows of seats
downstairs, separated