"How jolly!" he exclaimed. "Something to do with aviation, isn't it? I'm expecting to take it up soon."
"How silly you are, Freddy," the young woman reproved him, "it's an awfully scientific thing."
"Oh! Well, then, that lets me out," acknowledged Freddy, conscientiously, "but I think a lot of the fellows who work out those affairs. Knew a chap who was drowned at Montauk last summer, who was keen on bees and bugs. Queer Johnnie!"
Our scientific and literary symposium ceased abruptly. The accompanist came in and sat at the piano, being immediately followed by a young lady I remembered seeing in Richetti's rooms. My little neighbor applauded, frantically, as did most of the audience.
"Her father's worth two millions," she informed me, "and she thinks her voice is the biggest ever. Her hair doesn't naturally wave that way and she's got too much rouge on. Richetti didn't want her to go on yet, but she made her father insist."
My own knowledge of the divine art of singing, as I have confessed a thousand times, amounts to little or nothing, but I found something pleasurable in listening to the plutocratic contralto. She was by no means embarrassed and began the "Angelic Voice" from Gioconda in a most business-like fashion, finishing amid a salvo of applause.
"There! I've gone and split my glove," said the young lady beside me, "but I just had to do it. I'm going to their house-party next week and the place is perfectly gorgeous."
Next, as an encore, came "He shall feed His flocks" from the Messiah, which received similar encomiums and the singer retired, smothered in flowers and followed by uproarious approval.
"Funny she should have selected that," came the voice near me, "seeing that her father made all his money in wool."
In rapid succession came several other singers, all of whom appeared to impress the audience favorably. My heart was beginning to thump again in my breast, for the moment was approaching and I suffered from a vicarious stage-fright that could have been no greater had I myself been sentenced to appear upon the stage. It may be that the hall was overheated; at any rate I had to pass my handkerchief a number of times over my forehead, and my high collar began to choke me. I was grasping Porter's arm, convulsively, when, all of a sudden, before I could realize that the moment had come, she stood before the footlights, bowing before the moderate clapping of hands, and Richetti himself sat at the piano.