"Not to-night!" she pleaded. "You know, I cannot seem to believe it myself except when I am with you and we are alone. It seems too wonderful after all these years. Do you know, John, that I am nearly thirty?"
He laughed.
"How pathetic! All the more reason, I should say, why we should let people know about it as soon as possible."
"There is no particular hurry," she said, a little nervously. "Let me get used to it myself. I don't think you will have to wait long. Everything I have been used to doing and thinking seems to be crumbling up around me. Last night I even hated my work, or at least part of it."
His eyes lit up with genuine pleasure.
"I can't tell you how glad I am to hear you say that," he declared. "I don't hate your work—I've got over that. I don't think I am narrow about it. I admire Graillot, and his play is wonderful. But I think, and I always shall think, that the dénouement in that third act is damnable!"
She nodded understandingly.
"I am beginning to realize how you must feel," she confessed. "We won't talk about it any more now. Drive me to the theater, will you? I want to be there early to-night, just to get everything ready for changing afterward."
The telephone-bell rang as they were leaving the room. John put the receiver to his ear and a moment later held it away.
"It is Sophy," he announced. "Shall I tell them to send her up?"