"A little thing would make me tell
...how much I lack of a man."
—Shakespeare.
The palace clock over in Monaco was striking eight as I reached the steps of the Hôtel de Paris. Eight had been the hour appointed. Now, here were both the Hour and the Man: but where was the Boy?
I walked into the gay restaurant, with its window-wall, and the long rank of candle-lit tables ready for dinner. Twenty people, perhaps, were dining; but there was no slim figure in short black jacket, Eton collar, and loose silk tie; no curly chestnut head; no blue-star eyes. Cordially disliking everybody present, I marched down the length of the room, and took a corner table, which was laid for four. On the sparkling snow of the damask cloth burned a bonfire of scarlet geraniums, and two red-shaded wax candles, of the kind which the Boy used to call "candles with nostrils," made wavering rose-lights on the white expanse.
I sat down, and an attentive waiter appeared at my elbow, having apparently shot up from the floor like a pantomime demon.
"Monsieur desires dinner for one?" he deferentially enquired.
"I am expecting one or perhaps two friends," I replied. "I will wait for them half an hour. If they do not come by the end of that time, I will dine alone."
"Will Monsieur please to regard the menu?"
"Yes, thanks."
He put it in my hand with an appetizing bow, which would have been almost as good as an hors d'œuvre had my mood been appreciative of delicacies. But it was not; neither could I fix my mind upon the ordering of a dinner. My eyes would keep jumping to the glass door at the far end of the room. "I want the best dinner the house can serve," I said, meanly shifting responsibility. "Not too long a dinner, but—oh well, you may tell the chef I depend upon his choice."
"I quite understand, Monsieur. A dinner to please a lady, is it not?"