ening and stay till Sunday night or
Monday?"

"I shall be very pleased indeed," John replied. "It is very good of you
to ask me. When I come, I'd like, if I may," he went on, "to tell you
about myself, and why I am here, and about Louise."

She sighed, and watched the top of the lift as it came up. Then she
dropped her veil.

"You will find me," she assured him, as she gave him the tips of her
fingers, "a most sympathetic listener."

* * * * *

Louise and Sophy came to dine that evening with John in the grill-room
at the Milan. They arrived a little late and were still in morning
clothes. Louise was looking pale and tired, and her greeting was almost
listless.

"We are dead beat," Sophy exclaimed. "We've been having a secret
rehearsal this afternoon without Graillot, and he came in just as we
were finishing. He was perfectly furious!"

"He was here to tea with me," John remarked, as he led the way to their
table.

"My dear man," Louise exclaimed, "if you could have kept him half an
hour longer you'd have earned our undying gratitude! You see, there are
several little things on which we shall never agree, he and myself and
the rest of the company; so we decided to run over certain passages in
the way we intend to do them, without him. Of course, he saw through it
all when he arrived, tore up his manuscript on the stage, and generally
behaved like a madman."

"I am sorry," John said, as they took their seats and he handed Louise
the menu of the dinner that he had ordered. "Won't the play be produced
to-morrow night, then?"

"Oh, it will be produced all right," Louise told him; "but you don't
know how we've all worn ourselves out, trying to make that old bear see
reason. We've had to give way on one scene, as it is. What a delightful
little dinner, John! You're spoiling us. You know how I love that big
white asparagus. And strawberries, too! Well, I think we've earned it
anyhow, Sophy!"

"You have," the latter declared. "You were the only one who could soothe
Graillot at all."

"I can get my way with most people," Louise remarked languidly; "but it
simply means that the more difficult they are, the more you have to
spend yourself in getting it. John," she went on, after a moment's
pause, "you are coming to-morrow night, I suppose?"

"Of course. Didn't I take my box two months ago?"

"And now that my part after the first act has been cut out, I am coming
with him," Sophy pu