m with, withering briefness. "A little training wouldn't
ruin your figure."

She had never objected to Orville's _embonpoint_. But then, Orville was
a different sort of fat man; pink-cheeked, springy, immaculate.

At four o'clock, as she was in the chorus of "Isn't There Another Joan
of Arc?" a melting masculine voice from the other side of the counter
said, "Pardon me. What's that you're playing?"

Terry told him. She did not look up.

"I wouldn't have known it. Played like that--a second Marseillaise. If
the words--what are the words? Let me see a--"

"Show the gentleman a 'Joan'," Terry commanded briefly, over her
shoulder. The fat man laughed a wheezy laugh. Terry glanced around,
still playing, and encountered the gaze of two melting masculine eyes
that matched the melting masculine voice. The songster waved a hand
uniting Terry and the eyes in informal introduction.

"Mr. Leon Sammett, the gentleman who sings the Gottschalk songs wherever
songs are heard. And Mrs.--that is--and Mrs. Sammett--"

Terry turned. A sleek, swarthy world-old young man with the fashionable
concave torso, and alarmingly convex bone-rimmed glasses. Through them
his darkly luminous gaze glowed upon Terry. To escape their warmth she
sent her own gaze past him to encounter the arctic stare of the large
blonde person who had been included so lamely in the introduction. And
at that the frigidity of that stare softened, melted, dissolved.

"Why Terry Sheehan! What in the world!"

Terry's eyes bored beneath the layers of flabby fat. "It's--why, it's
Ruby Watson, isn't it? Eccentric Song and Dance--"

She glanced at the concave young man and faltered. He was not Jim, of
the Bijou days. From him her eyes leaped back to the fur-bedecked
splendour of the woman. The plump face went so painfully red that the
makeup stood out on it, a distinct layer, like thin ice covering flowing
water. As she surveyed that bulk Terry realised that while Ruby might
still claim eccentricity, her song and dance days were over. "That's
ancient history, m'dear. I haven't been working for three years. What're
you doing in this joint? I'd heard you'd done well for yourself. That
you were married."

"I am. That is I--well, I am. I--"

At that the dark young man leaned over and patted Terry's hand that lay
on the counter. He smiled. His own hand was incredibly slender, long,
and tapering.

"That's all right," he assured her, and smiled. "You two girls can have
a