“Of what are you thinking—the third scene?” he asked.
Doris started, and the natural color forced its way through the powder and rouge. She was not thinking of Romeo and Juliet at all, but of the handsome face that lay in her lap yesterday afternoon, of the young fellow whose name was Cecil Neville.
“I—I don’t know,” she said, faltering a little. “I think I was dreaming, Jeffrey.”
“Then you must wake up,” he retorted firmly, but not unkindly. “I heard the curtain go down on the farce. Will you have a glass of wine?”
She shook her head, and looked at him with smiling surprise.
“And you, who are always preaching against it!” she said.
“I know,” he admitted; “but to-night——”
The manager knocked at the door. He was a keen business man, just and not ungenerous, and he nodded and smiled at the beautiful vision admiringly and encouragingly.
“Beautiful house, Miss Marlowe,” he said, “and in the very best of tempers; a child might play with them to-night.”
“Ah, it is only a child who is going to play to them, Mr. Brown!” said Doris.