“Why?”
Breen wanted to poke into the argument, but Nielsen raised his hand again.
“She’s not a waitress or a—or a working woman—or a table or a chair,” Carstairs said with obvious difficulty.
Nielsen understood. He squeezed his neighbor’s arm and declared with his most soothing tone: “She’s a woman, of course—as we concluded last night. Breen and I know that. You feel that we do, don’t you?”
Carstairs, who was in his most sentimental mood, seemed on the verge of tears. “Yes,” he managed to agree.
Nielsen broke off the subject at once. “Well, we’ll talk over the whole business some other time. You’re not feeling well this morning. It must be your work at that confounded moving picture hole.”
“Yes,” Carstairs said doubtfully.
“Cheer up!” Breen succeeded in interpolating. “Forget your troubles in the music world and listen to that concert over there. That duet recital, I should say.”
Carstairs smiled.
“Tristan and Isolde are being undone,” Nielsen added, catching Breen’s cue. “Or Salome and Jokannan, eh? Away with Wagner and Strauss: Richard the First and Second—what do you say, John?”