"You must not hide from me. I have called up the Bulletin and they say you are not there. When I ask for the number of your house they tell me it is the rule that they must not tell. Is it, Peter, that so many ladies call you up? The next time I am more smart. I say that your father is very sick and that I am the nurse and must know where you are. But I should have known. It is twenty years and the flat it is the same. You are like that Peter. You do not change. I thought not to see you and Pat until next year in Paris but from Buenos Aires I decided suddenly I will go to New York. Here I am. My hotel it is the Ritz. You and Pat you will come tonight at eight and have supper with me—Maria."
"I didn't want to go to Westport much anyway," said Pat.
He was more nervous than Peter when they came to the door of Maria's suite. She kissed Peter but Pat only held out his hand. Maria laughed. "He does not know me. I know him. He is like the picture."
Pat was almost silent during supper. He spoke up only once. Maria was ordering. "We will have some vegetable," she said. "What is the name? I do not know the English. Les épinards."
"That's spinach," said Peter and added slyly. "Pat doesn't like spinach. He won't want that."
"Yes, I do," said Pat promptly.
Peter smiled but he had the joke all to himself. Pat had forgotten.
After dinner they talked sparsely with Peter doing most of the work. Suddenly Maria said, "It is necessary that somebody he ask me."
Peter was puzzled, but Pat understood. "I've waited for five years to hear you sing. Won't you?"
"It is nice, but it is the twenty years I have waited. First you must sing."