It was about eight o’clock in the evening, and Flora Utterbourne sat by a lamp in her little apartment. She was wearing the same gown she wore the day she met Mr. Curry on the way to Crawl Hill. A book lay in her lap. She was expecting some people who were to drop in and look the apartment over with an eye to subletting from her. She read a little and cut a few pages with her tiny Swiss paper knife. A small clock was ticking somewhere in shadow. It was very quiet: no sounds but the ticking of the clock and the rustle of pages. After a bit she closed the book upon a long first finger and let her head drop back against the Egyptian shawl which so beautifully disguised and enriched a very plain little second hand arm chair. She closed her eyes and sat musing.
Presently there was a ring at the door. Ah, she thought, the people to look at the apartment. And she glanced lovingly about as she went to admit them to her sanctum. The rooms were somehow so entirely hers. One would suppose she had lived here always. Everything delighted and refreshed the eye. Here one encountered the most harmonious sort of colour combination. The little drawing room illustrated the fine compatibility of cream white, Burgundy rose, quiet apple green and plum and there were delicate touches here and there of red and indigo, and even warm, bright orange. Over the little white wood mantle was an antique-looking reproduction of Burne-Jones’ familiar panel of angels on a winding stair; in a dimmer spot was a madonna of Raphael’s. Flora took it all in as she crossed, with just a tremor of wistful hesitation.
But lo! no sooner had she opened the door than she uttered an incredulous cry. Then she held out her hand, and a moment later a man had her right in his arms—a big man in a Palm Beach suit, wearing gay rings and a beautiful new shiny toupee. Curry had paused for only one thing after landing. A new toupee. He couldn’t call the way he was—it might have proved positively fatal!
Well, as one may imagine, the first quarter of an hour or so was simply indescribable. No, it is useless even to attempt it. Both talked at once nearly the whole of the time, and laughed. After that things began to quiet down a little, though there were still intermittent outbursts. How could they help themselves?
It developed that the impulsive impresario, who was behaving just exactly like a kid, hadn’t had a mouthful of dinner. There was talk of slipping out together for something; but then Flora remembered she had promised to be at home all evening on account of the people who were coming to look at the apartment. And Curry wouldn’t go out alone. He said he’d starve first. So Flora said: “Let’s go and see what there is in the ‘ice box,’ though I’m dreadfully afraid there isn’t enough to satisfy such a big hungry man!”
But behold! there was! Oh, yes—there was a really sumptuous dinner in the ice box! Flora evolved a fine crisp salad, and produced a little platter of cold chicken. She made a pot of coffee, while, under her cordial and excited directions, the impresario spread a cloth on their gate-legged table and brought out the requisite silver and china. In ever so short a time they were seated with their table between them. And Flora said that of course she couldn’t really eat a thing, but that she would just nibble a little to keep him “company.”
Her face took on a look of exaggerated, grave, and high concern as he told her more about the wreck of the Skipping Goone than it had been possible to squeeze into a cable. His eyes brimmed for a moment with the unhappy memory. But then her face lighted, for he was reminding her that, after all, here he was, safe and sound—“alive to tell the tale, though Good Lord! when the bolt struck us I never expected to be!”
Her voice was rich with happiness. “And Africa,” she laughed, “—I was ‘reading up’ on it so diligently. I thought I’d even try to go down there, since my agent says he hears there are delightful ‘apartments’ in Johannesburg!”
But Mr. Curry shook his head slowly, and his eyes looked suspiciously moist again. He was thinking of his songbirds. When he spoke there was a tone of deep sadness in his voice. “We’ve come to the end of our world tour that was going to mark such an epoch in the history of opera—” He sighed a little.
“But,” she told him warmly, “I think it has, anyhow!”