"Not a moment."
"Why, Mr. Van Berg, what was the matter with you? It will never do for me to come here and waste your forenoons if you try to make up so unmercifully after I'm gone."
"You were indeed altogether to blame. Some things, like fine music or a great painting or—it happened to be yourself yesterday—often cause what I call my working moods, when I feel able to do the best things of which I'm capable. Not that they are wonderful or ever will be—they are simply my best efforts—and I assure you I'm not foolish enough to waste such moments in the prosaic task of eating."
"I'm only a matter-of-fact person. Plain food at regular intervals is very essential to me."
He looked up at her quickly and said: "Now you are mentally laughing at me again. I assure you I ate like an ostrich after my work was over. I even upset the dignity of an urbane Delmonico waiter."
Ida bit her lip as she recalled certain resemblances on her own part to that suggestive bird, but she said sympathetically: "It must be rather stupid to dine alone at a restaurant."
"I found it insufferably stupid, and I'm more grateful to your father for his invitation than you would believe."
Ida could scarcely disguise her pleasure, and with mirthful eyes she said:
"Really, Mr. Van Berg, you place me in quite a dilemma. I find that in one mood you do not wish to eat at all, and again you say you have the rather peculiar appetite of the bird you named. Now I'm housekeeper at present, and scarcely know how to provide. What kind of viands are best adapted to artists and poets, and—-"
"And idiots in general, you might conclude," said Van Berg, laughing. "After sitting so near me at the table all summer you must have noticed that nothing but ambrosia and nectar will serve my purpose."