“Why, no. I’d rather lunch with you at Delmonico’s and talk houses.” And, a little amused at this young man’s transparent guile, she added: “I think it would be very agreeable for us to lunch together.”
She came from the dressing-room fresh and flushed as a slightly chilled rose, rejoining him in the lobby, and presently they were seated in the palm room with a discreet and hidden orchestra playing, “Oh! How I Hate To Get Up in the Morning,” and rather busy with a golden Casaba melon between them.
“Isn’t this jolly!” he said, expanding easily, as do all young men in the warmth of the informal.
“Very. What an agreeable business yours seems to be, Mr. Shotwell.”
“In what way?” he asked innocently.
“Why, part of it is lunching with feminine clients, isn’t it?”
His close-set ears burned. She glanced up with mischief brilliant in her brown eyes. But he was busy with his melon. And, not looking at her:
“Don’t you want to know me?” he asked so clumsily that she hesitated to snub so defenceless a male.