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Show l.ll:cea mirror 11111:> llose ani:> Stl"er remembered something else that happened to be useful. "Look," she said, indicating a man in the front seat who had fallen asleep. "He's taking his pleasure sadly." "Perhaps he's happier to be asleep. He may not care for the play." "Somebody once said," she went on hastily, seeing that she was making a good impression, "that life would be very endurable were it not for its pleasures." Allison laughed. He had the sense of discovering a bright star that had been temporarily overshadowed by surrounding planets. " I did n't know you could talk so well," he observed, with evident admiration. Isabel flushed with pleasure-not guilt. She had no thought of sailing under false colours, but reflected the life about her as innocently as a mirror might, if conveniently placed. Repeated curtain calls for the leading woman, at the end of the third act, delayed the final curtain by the few minutes that would have enabled them to catch the earlier of the two theatre trains. Allison was not wholly displeased, though he feared that Aunt Francesca and Rose might be unduly anxious about Isabel. As they had more than an hour and a half to wait, before the last train, he suggested going to a popular restaurant. Thrilled with pleasure and excitement, she eagerly consented. Fortunately, she did not have to talk much, for the chatter of the gay crowd, and the hard-working orchestra made conversation difficult, if not impossible. "I 've never been in a place like this before," she ventured. "So late, I mean." "But you enjoy it, don't you?" "Oh, yes! So much!" The dark eyes that turned to his were full of happy eagerness, like a child's. Allison's pulses quickened, with man's insatiable love of Youth. "We 'II do it again," he said, "if you '11 come with me." "I will, if Aunt Francesca will let me." "She's willing to trust you with me, I think. She's known me ever since I was born and she helped father bring me up. Aunt Francesca has been like a mother to me." "She says she doesn't care for the theatre," resumed Isabel, who did not care to talk about Aunt Francesca, "but I love it. I believe I could go every night." "Don't make the mistake of going too often to see what pleases you, for you might tire of it. Perhaps plays 'keep best in a cool, dry atmosphere,' as you say men do." "You're laughing at me," she said, reproachfully. " Indeed I 'm not. I knew a man once who fell desperately in love with a woman, and, as 139 " llllle'l( mo1t 1\galn" |
