The novelist looked into the faces that were nearest to him and thought he could discern the various grades of which his friend spoke—the new, the older, the ones whose turn to give way to others would soon come. All of them were drinking. Most had on the stage dresses they had just worn or were about to wear in the performance. Some had finished their parts and were enveloped in street clothes, ready to take their departure with the first male who asked them. And they were drinking, drinking, either in little sips or in feverish gulps, as they would at a later day, when the five-dollar wine would be replaced by five cent beer or perhaps the drainings of a keg on the sidewalk.
Mr. Walker Boggs soon came into the wine-room and joined the pair at Mr. Weil's table. He called for a whiskey straight, pushing the champagne aside with an impatient movement.
"I won't punish my stomach with such stuff, even if it has gone back on me," he exclaimed. "That will knock out any man who drinks it between meals."
Mr. Weil assented to this proposition, and to show his full belief in it filled his own glass again and tossed its contents down his throat.
"What brings you here?" he asked, quizzically.
"Those creatures," replied Boggs, with a motion of his hand toward the members of the ballet. "They're all that's left me now. They don't mind the size of my waist. My hold on them is as strong as ever. But you ought not to be here," he broke in, turning to Roseleaf. "It will be years before you get to this stage, I hope."
Mr. Weil hastened to explain.
"Shirley is merely observing," said he. "He came at my request. We are going next to Isaac Leveson's."
Mr. Boggs grew interested.