Our first conversation had been over the telephone, when I had called up Clotilde's to ask if Miss Blair had returned from Boston.
"Miss Blair at the 'phone," was the reply. "Who's this?"
Somewhat timidly I said I was Mr. Harrowby, repeating the name twice before she recognized it as mine. Having invited her to dine with me and go to the theater I got a quavering, "Sure!" which lacked her usual spontaneity.
"You don't seem pleased," I said.
"Oh, I'm pleased enough. I'm only wondering if—if you are."
"Why shouldn't I be, when I've asked you?"
"Well, I put my foot in it for fair, didn't I?"
"You mean in Boston? Oh, that was all right. I know you meant to do me a good turn; and perhaps you've done it."
"Oh, I meant to; but I sure did get a lesson. My mother used to tell me to keep my fingers out of other people's pies; and I'm going to from this time on."
In the evening, seated opposite me at the little table at Josephine's, with the din of a hundred diners giving us a sort of privacy, she told me more about it.