LITMIR.BIZ

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after a few more moments’ scowling cogitation he went out and down the stairs, with the vague idea of inviting some brother painter – any one of the regular irregulars who inhabited Dragon Court.

      Dulcie sat behind the little desk near the door, head bowed, her thin hands clasped over the closed ledger, and in her pallid face the expressionless dullness of a child forgotten.

      “Hello, Sweetness!” he said cheerfully.

      She looked up; a slight colour tinted her cheeks, and she smiled.

      “What’s the matter, Dulcie?”

      “Nothing.”

      “Nothing? That’s a very dreary malady – nothing. You look lonely. Are you?”

      “I don’t know.”

      “You don’t know whether you are lonely or not?” he demanded.

      “I suppose I am,” she ventured, with a shy smile.

      “Where is your father?”

      “He went out.”

      “Any letters for me – or messages?”

      “A man – he had one eye – came. He asked who you are.”

      “What?”

      “I think he was German. He had only one eye. He asked your name.”

      “What did you say?”

      “I told him. Then he went away.”

      Barres shrugged:

      “Somebody who wants to sell artists’ materials,” he concluded. Then he looked at the girl: “So you’re lonely, are you? Where are your three cats? Aren’t they company for you?”

      “Yes…”

      “Well, then,” he said gaily, “why not give a party for them? That ought to amuse you, Dulcie.”

      The child still smiled; Barres walked on past her a pace or two, halted, turned irresolutely, arrived at some swift decision, and came back, suddenly understanding that he need seek no further – that he had discovered his guest of the evening at his very elbow.

      “Did you and your father have your supper, Dulcie?”

      “My father went out to eat at Grogan’s.”

      “How about you?”

      “I can find something.”

      “Why not dine with me?” he suggested.

      The child stared, bewildered, then went a little pale.

      “Shall we have a dinner party for two – you and I, Dulcie? What do you say?”

      She said nothing, but her big grey eyes were fixed on him in a passion of inquiry.

      “A real party,” he repeated. “Let the people get their own mail and packages until your father returns. Nobody’s going to sneak in, anyway. Or, if that won’t do, I’ll call up Grogan’s and tell your father to come back because you are going to dine in my studio with me. Do you know the telephone number? Very well; get Grogan’s for me. I’ll speak to your father.”

      Dulcie’s hand trembled on the receiver as she called up Grogan’s; Barres bent over the transmitter:

      “Soane, Dulcie is going to take dinner in my studio with me. You’ll have to come back on duty, when you’ve eaten.” He hung up, looked at Dulcie and laughed.

      “I wanted company as much as you did,” he confessed. “Now, go and put on your prettiest frock, and we’ll be very grand and magnificent. And afterward we’ll talk and look at books and pretty things – and maybe we’ll turn on the Victrola and I’ll teach you to dance – ” He had already begun to ascend the stairs:

      “In half an hour, Dulcie!” he called back; “ – and you may bring the Prophet if you like… Shall I ask Mr. Westmore to join us?”

      “I’d rather be all alone with you,” she said shyly.

      He laughed and ran on up the stairs.

      In half an hour the electric bell rang very timidly. Aristocrates, having been instructed and rehearsed, and, loftily condescending to his rôle in a kindly comedy to be played seriously, announced: “Miss Soane!” in his most courtly manner.

      Barres threw aside the evening paper and came forward, taking both hands of the white and slightly frightened child.

      “Aristocrates ought to have announced the Prophet, too,” he said gaily, breaking the ice and swinging Dulcie around to face the open door again.

      The Prophet entered, perfectly at ease, his eyes of living jade shining, his tail urbanely hoisted.

      Dulcie ventured to smile; Barres laughed outright; Aristocrates surveyed the Prophet with toleration mingled with a certain respect. For a black cat is never without occult significance to a gentleman of colour.

      With Dulcie’s hand still in his, Barres led her into the living-room, where, presently, Aristocrates brought a silver tray upon which was a glass of iced orange juice for Dulcie, and a “Bronnix,” as Aristocrates called it, for the master.

      “To your health and good fortune in life, Dulcie,” he said politely.

      The child gazed mutely at him over her glass, then, blushing, ventured to taste her orange juice.

      When she finished, Barres drew her frail arm through his and took her out, seating her. Ceremonies began in silence, and the master of the place was not quite sure whether the flush on Dulcie’s face indicated unhappy embarrassment or pleasure.

      He need not have worried: the child adored it all. The Prophet came in and gravely seated himself on a neighbouring chair, whence he could survey the table and seriously inspect each course.

      “Dulcie,” he said, “how grown-up you look with your bobbed hair put up, and your fluffy gown.”

      She lifted her enchanted eyes to him:

      “It is my first communion dress… I’ve had to make it longer for a graduation dress.”

      “Oh, that’s so; you’re graduating this summer!”

      “Yes.”

      “And what then?”

      “Nothing.” She sighed unconsciously and sat very still with folded hands, while Aristocrates refilled her glass of water.

      She no longer felt embarrassed; her gravity matched Aristocrates’s; she seriously accepted whatever was offered or set before her, but Barres noticed that she ate it all, merely leaving on her plate, with inculcated and mathematical precision, a small portion as concession to good manners.

      They had, toward the banquet’s end, water ices, bon-bons, French pastry, and ice cream. And presently a slight and blissful sigh of repletion escaped the child’s red lips. The symptoms were satisfactory but unmistakable; Dulcie was perfectly feminine; her capacity had proven it.

      The Prophet’s stately self-control in the fragrant vicinity of nourishment was now to be rewarded: Barres conducted Dulcie to the studio and installed her among cushions upon a huge sofa. Then, lighting a cigarette, he dropped down beside her and crossed one knee over the other.

      “Dulcie,” he said in his lazy, humorous way, “it’s a funny old world any way you view it.”

      “Do you think it is always funny?” inquired the child, her deep, grey eyes on his face.

      He smiled:

      “Yes, I do; but sometimes the joke in on one’s self. And then, although it is still a funny world, from the world’s point of view, you, of course, fail to see the humour of it… I don’t suppose you understand.”

      “I do,” nodded the child, with the ghost of a smile.

      “Really? Well, I was afraid I’d been talking nonsense, but if you understand, it’s all right.”

      They both laughed.

      “Do you want

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