“I thought you would be disgusted with our search before it was half finished,” he said, looking admiringly into her soft brown eyes that had given him one of those startled glances which half bewitched him.
“It has been heaven!” she said, with a sigh of rapture. “I love the bright lights, and the well-dressed, happy people, and the busy, silent waiters, and the white linen and the fine dishes. Oh, I think people who can take their dinners out all the time must be very, very happy.”
“You would not think so if you were a poor, forlorn man,” he said, smiling at her enthusiasm, “and had to dine out three hundred and sixty-five times a year, not counting breakfast and luncheon. I’ve started out evenings and I’ve stopped on Broadway and wondered where on earth I should eat. Delmonico’s, St. James, Hoffman, all are old stories, clear down the list. Here I had luncheon, there probably I had breakfast, the other place I dined last night or the night before, and at last I turn down some cross street, and go into a cheap place where a fellow can’t get a mouthful that it doesn’t gag him, so I’ll have an appetite to-morrow. I hate the sight of a bill of fare and I get so that I’ll fool around for half an hour until some man near me orders, and then I order the same thing. I tell you it’s dreadful not to know where to eat.”
“I suppose that is the reason some men marry?” she asked, brightly.
“Well, not exactly,” he said, flushing slightly.
“Do the people you see in the restaurants never interest you?” Dido asked, seeing he had become silent.
“No, I never notice them unless it is some one with loud dress or manners, and then I watch them as I watch a lot of monkeys in a cage.”
“Every place I go I see some one interesting,” Dido said, slowly. “Look at that fat woman over there, in the cherry-red dress and hat. See how proud that little dark man looks of having such a woman with him. I have heard her tell him of her former great triumphs as an actress, and I can imagine a story of her life. See that slender, pretty, dark-eyed girl, with very white brow, and very red cheeks, and very dark shadows about her eyes, and very, very golden hair. See her smile and talk to that insipid-looking man, with an enormous nose and bald head and eye-glasses, whose ‘villain’s mustache,’ carries a sample of everything he had for dinner. Now can’t you picture that pretty girl is some ballet girl ambitious to rise. He, a man of means and influence, and she forgets his looks and that he talks through his nose, and tries to impress him with her ability.”
“Hum!” said Richard, giving Dido a strange smile. “I’m afraid my imagination is not as great or as charitable as yours. Tell me what you think of the party to our left.”
“That poor little man without legs?” asked Dido, quick tears coming to her eyes. “He has a bright, happy face though, and he has diamonds—many of them, on his fingers. I think that large woman who sits beside him and looks into his eyes so affectionately, loves him very much because of his affliction. I’m sure I would. And that man and woman opposite, though I don’t like their looks, seem to heed every word he says and to be very fond of him.”