ELDRIDGE WALCOTT paused in front of the great building; he looked up and hesitated and went in. He crossed the marble lobby and passed through the silent, swinging doors on the opposite side and stepped into a softly lighted café. He had never been in Merwin’s before, though he had often heard of it, and he was curious as to what it would be like. There was a sound of music somewhere and low voices and the tinkle of silver and glass behind the little green curtains. He entered an alcove at the left and sat down. The restfulness of the place soothed him, and he sat listening to the distant music and looking out between the parted curtains of the alcove to the room with its little tables filling the space beyond the green-curtained alcoves on either side and the people seated at the tables. They were laughing and eating and talking and drinking from delicate cups or turning slender-stemmed glasses in their fingers as they talked. Beyond the tables rose a small platform; a woman had just mounted it and was bowing to the scattered tables. The sound of voices ceased an instant and hands clapped faintly here and there. The woman on the platform bowed again and looked at the accompanist, who struck the opening bars. It was a light, trivial song with more personality than art in the singing of it, and the audience applauded perfunctorily, hardly breaking off its talk to acknowledge that it was done. The woman stepped down from the platform and joined a group at a table near by, and waiters moved among the tables, refilling cups and glasses and taking orders.
A waiter paused by the alcove where Eldridge Walcott was sitting and pushed back the little curtain and looked in and waited. Eldridge took up the card on the table before him; he fingered it a little awkwardly and laid it down: “Bring me cigars,” he said.
The waiter scribbled on a card and passed on. When he had completed the alcoves on the left he turned and went back along the right, pausing before each one and bending forward to listen and take the order on his card. As he approached the third alcove he pushed back the curtain that half concealed it at the back and bent forward. When he passed on the curtain did not fall into place; it remained caught on the back of the seat. From where Eldridge sat he could see the woman seated in the alcove. She was alone, her back to him, her head a little bent as if in thought.
He glanced at her carelessly and along the row of green curtains to the tables beyond. It was all much as he had imagined it—a place where one could spend time and money without too much exertion. It was the money part of it that interested Eldridge. His client had asked him to look into it for him as an investment, and he had decided on this informal way of appraising it. To-morrow he was to go over the books and accounts. The owners wanted a stiff price for the goodwill. It was probably worth what they were asking he decided as he watched the careless, happy crowd. People who came here were not thinking how much they could save.... It was not the sort of place he should care to come to often himself. Life to Eldridge was a serious, drab affair compared with Merwin’s. He liked to think how much he could save; and when he had saved it he liked to invest it where it would breed more.... He might take a few shares of the capital stock himself—his client had suggested it.
The waiter brought the cigars and Eldridge lighted one and leaned back, smoking and enjoying the relaxed air of the place. He could understand dimly how people liked this sort of thing and would come day after day for music and talk and the purposelessness of it all; it was a kind of huge, informal club with a self-elected membership.
As a prospective investor the charm of it pleased him. They ought to be able to make a good thing of it. He fell to making little calculations; it was part of his power as a successful man of business that he understood detail and the value of small things.
He was not a financier, but he handled small interests well and he had built up a comfortable fortune. From being in debt before he married, he had advanced slowly until now his investments made a good showing. He could probably live on the income to-morrow if he chose.... He blew a little ring of smoke.... His investments and what they were mounting to was a kind of epic poem to Eldridge’s slow-moving mind.... Yes—he would take a few shares of the café stock. He looked thoughtfully at his cigar and calculated how many, and what they would be worth.... The music had taken the form of a young boy with a violin who stood absorbed in his playing, a kind of quick fervor in his face and figure. The voices had ceased and only now and then a cup clicked.
Eldridge lifted his eyes from the cigar. The woman in the alcove had moved nearer the end of the seat and was watching the boy, her lips parted on a half smile.
The cigar dropped from Eldridge’s fingers. He stared at the woman—stared—and stirred vaguely.
She turned a little and Eldridge reached out his hand and drew a quick curtain between them.