Howard Eliot guided his charges through the mazes of the city to a restaurant. Moses with the perennial appetite of fourteen ate silently and steadily, not omitting one item on the menu. He gorged.
Mrs. Wopp’s bonnet with its imitation osprey looked as though adorned with fragments of barbed-wire. Her jet earrings seemed entirely superfluous as the lobes of her generous ears glowed like rubies.
Howard sat back in his chair and thought of the possibilities of seeing Nell. He reflected that they were as good as engaged. Mrs. Wopp had given her diagnosis of the case enigmatically, perhaps, but with a degree of accuracy denoting keen observation on the evening of his last visit at the Wopp household. For fully a fraction of a minute Nell had let him hold her hand, and then her face all dimpling had turned to say good-night. He was rehearsing what he should say next time she dimpled so irresistibly and he breathed anathemas on his asinine conduct in being so shy and tardy. He was brought to the immediate present by Moses who was regarding an ice-cream soda with suspicion.
“This froth looks like soapsuds,” he complained.
“Soapsuds is Moses’ strong weakness,” commented Mrs. Wopp, laughing till her fat shoulders quaked perilously.
To stay the cloud that began to gather over Moses’ brow, Howard suggested going to see a vaudeville show.
“Oh Mar,” asked Moses as they passed a brilliantly colored and illuminated poster, “Is them the actor people?”
“Them’s thum,” was the sophisticated answer.
Fate led the trio to the theatre where Mr. Zalhambra was playing. Howard took his friends to a box and no sooner were they seated than he espied Nell and Betty.
The orchestra were tuning up, that delightful tilting at the notes that precedes the overture. To Moses were revealed such vistaed glimpses of trees and mountains and rivers as his young eyes had never seen. He saw nothing but the gorgeous scenery and the blaze of lights, and heard nothing but the booming of the drum in the overture. Then becoming more used to the glare and clamor, he cocked one eye aloft and saw youths of his own age eating peanuts in the gallery. It made his mouth water. He surveyed the obnoxious offenders however with the nonchalance of one who has already dined sumptuously. Outwardly Moses was an overgrown, freckle-faced, well-fed boy of commonplace propensities; inwardly he was a battery fully charged.