made sensuous by the night and by the hot smell of damp powder
puffs, tucked in the fronts of low dresses and distilling a thousand
rich scents, to float out through the open door. The music itself,
blurred by a loud trombone, became hot and shadowy, a languorous
overtone to the scraping of many shoes and slippers.

Suddenly the square of yellow light that fell through the door was
obscured by a dark figure. A girl had come out of the dressing-room
and was standing on the porch not more than ten feet away. Jim heard a
low-breathed "doggone" and then she turned and saw him. It was Nancy
Lamar.

Jim rose to his feet.

"Howdy?"

"Hello--" she paused, hesitated and then approached. "Oh, it's--Jim
Powell."

He bowed slightly, tried to think of a casual remark.

"Do you suppose," she began quickly, "I mean--do you know anything
about gum?"

"What?" "I've got gum on my shoe. Some utter ass left his or her gum
on the floor and of course I stepped in it."

Jim blushed, inappropriately.

"Do you know how to get it off?" she demanded petulantly. "I've tried
a knife. I've tried every damn thing in the dressing-room. I've tried
soap and water--and even perfume and I've ruined my powder-puff trying
to make it stick to that."

Jim considered the question in some agitation.

"Why--I think maybe gasolene--"

The words had scarcely left his lips when she grasped his hand and
pulled him at a run off the low veranda, over a flower bed and at a
gallop toward a group of cars parked in the moonlight by the first
hole of the golf course.

"Turn on the gasolene," she commanded breathlessly.

"What?"

"For the gum of course. I've got to get it off. I can't dance with gum
on."

Obediently Jim turned to the cars and began inspecting them with a
view to obtaining the desired solvent. Had she demanded a cylinder he
would have done his best to wrench one out.

"Here," he said after a moment's search. "'Here's one that's easy. Got
a handkerchief?"

"It's up-stairs wet. I used it for the soap and water."

Jim laboriously explored his pockets.

"Don't believe I got one either."

"Doggone it! Well, we can turn it on and let it run on the ground."

He turned the spout; a dripping began.

"More!"

He turned it on fuller. The dripping became a flow and formed an oily
pool that glistened brightly, reflecting a dozen tremulous moons on
its quivering bosom.

"Ah," she sighed contentedly, "let it all out. The only thing to do