Breen laughed his ever-ready, self-satisfied laugh, and Nielsen, and even Carstairs, joined him. Presently, the studio slept the sleep of the unperturbed. Carefully, Breen filled his pipe and began a deliberate puffing, while Nielsen introduced some new anecdote in his droll, even-tempered way. Carstairs, on the other hand, was meditating gloomily: in an hour or so he would be due at that damnable hole, the Phoenix Music Hall—where he earned his bread playing accompaniments. A second thought cheered him not a little. He would still have time to eat his supper at Landsmann’s.
II
“Erna! What is the matter with you? Another cup of coffee for Mr. Nolan!”
“I know it. I ordered it an hour ago.”
The stocky, middle-aged, stolid-faced German stared at the handsome sensual girl of twenty, muttered something, as she returned his critical stare with a defiant one, and passed out of the kitchen into the store.
“What is the matter with Erna to-day?” he demanded of his stocky, middle-aged, stolid-faced wife, who stood behind the counter waiting on customers.
“Why?”
“This is the third time she has been schnautzing me.”
“Oh, she has something on her mind,” was the woman’s unconcerned reply.
The storekeeper was not satisfied. “That fellow must be to blame,” he said.