The girl in question did indeed appear very unhappy. She was fifteen or sixteen years old, but of a slight, fragile build that made her seem younger. Her hair, a mass of dark curls, was tied back simply at the nape of her neck. But her lovely face was marred by a pouting, sullen mouth, and her big dark eyes gazed about her with an expression that struck Patricia as one half-frightened, half-rebellious. She did not often look about her, however, but kept her gaze in the main riveted on her plate. Her companion chatted with her almost continuously, but she answered only in monosyllables or not at all.
They were a strange pair. Patricia could not understand them at all, nor could she, for the remainder of the meal, keep her eyes long from turning toward their table. The older woman fascinated her, not only by her handsome appearance and vague resemblance to her aunt, but also because of some subtle attraction in her vivacious manner. Once she looked up suddenly, caught Patricia's gaze fixed on her, and smiled in so winning a manner that Patricia was impelled to smile back in response. The girl puzzled her by her strange, inexplicable conduct toward one who was so evidently interested and absorbed in her. Patricia found herself wondering more and more what could be the relationship between the two.
But their own meal now delightfully finished with French ice cream and tiny cups of black coffee, Patricia and her father rose to leave the dining-room. Their way led directly past the table that had so deeply interested Patricia. As she approached it, she noticed that a dainty handkerchief belonging to the older woman had fallen unheeded to the floor at her side. Stooping to pick it up, Patricia restored it, and was rewarded by another charming smile and a "Thank you, dear!" But in the same instant her eye caught that of the young girl, and was held by it for a long, tense moment. Patricia was no practiced reader of expression, but it seemed to her that in this moment, fear, hope, dread and longing were all mirrored successively in the beautiful dark eyes raised to her face. Then the lids were dropped and the girl went on eating in apparent unconcern.
Patricia and her father passed on. They had almost reached the door of the big dining-room when Captain Meade stopped suddenly to grasp the hand of an elderly lady seated at a table near the door.
"Mrs. Quale! by all things unexpected! How do you happen to be here? Let me present my daughter, Patricia." Patricia made her best curtsey to one of the quaintest little elderly ladies she thought she had ever seen.
"Delighted to know Patricia," began Mrs. Quale. "I'm here by virtue of having my house burn down, not exactly over my head, but while I was away in New Haven. Carelessness of old Juno, my colored cook. She would keep too hot a range fire and overheated the chimney. At any rate, here I am till the thing is rebuilt, and a precious long job they're making of it, with all these war-time restrictions. So this is Patricia! I saw her once before when she was a tiny baby. Are you staying here, Captain Meade?"
The Captain sketched briefly for her, the reason of their presence in the big hotel,—his wife's breakdown and departure to a sanatorium; the closing-up of their home and his coming with Patricia for a combination of holiday for her and lecture-program for him to this distant city, of their disappointment about Aunt Evelyn, and their consequent predicament.
"Well, don't worry your head another moment about Patricia," laughed Mrs. Quale. "Fate seems to have arranged things very nicely, that I should be here to act as her chaperon whenever necessary, and general adviser at all times. My suite is 720, ninth floor. Be sure you call on me soon, Patricia, and we'll get really acquainted in short order. Your father played in my back yard as a child (his house was right next door to ours) and so I feel quite like a grandmother to you!"
"I like Mrs. Quale, Daddy," Patricia confided to her father, as they were ascending to their rooms in the elevator. "I like the way her hair is fixed in those queer, old-fashioned scallops, and her dear, round, soft face, and her jolly manner. But how is it, I've never heard you speak of her before?"
"She is an old friend of my boyhood days," replied her father, "and, as she said, we used to live next door to her. I don't know why I didn't think of her right away, when your aunt's telegram came. I shouldn't have hesitated to take you straight to her and put you in her care. However, if her house is out of commission and she's staying here, it answers the purpose even better. You must be sure to call on her in her rooms to-morrow. Now, I'm afraid you're in for a lonely evening, Patricia, for I have an important business matter to attend to, and may be detained rather late. Telephone down to the office for anything you need or any attention you want, but don't leave these rooms on any consideration—short of a fire! Tomorrow we'll do the town and go out somewhere in the evening, so I hope you won't be lonely to-night,—eh, honey?"