At this moment a mighty tray, covered with such inducements to appetite as anchovies, sliced tomatoes, sardines, radishes, chopped celery, Strasburg sausage, _et hoc genus omne_--all equally superfluous in the case of a schoolboy up in town on an _exeat_--was laid before him with a stately flourish. Then the waiter came stiffly and grimly to attention, and stood obviously expectant. _Hors d'oeuvres_ are rather puzzling things. Here was a chance for the tyros before him to show their mettle. They showed it. "One gets tired of these everlasting things," mused Nicky wearily. "I'll just peck at one or two. You can fetch the soup, waiter: we shall be ready for it immediately." "Thick or clear soup, madam?" "We'll have thick to begin with, please: then clear," replied Nicky calmly. "Stiffy, I will take an anchovy." The waiter was not more than two minutes absent, but ere he returned a lightning transformation scene had been enacted. Certainly the Briton, with all his faults, surpasses the foreigner in the control of the emotions. What a Gaul or a Teuton would have done on witnessing the sight which met the eyes of the imperturbable Ganymede of the Restaurant International when he returned with the thick soup, it is difficult to say. The first would probably have wept, the second have sent for a policeman. For lo! the richly dight _hors d'oeuvres_ tray had become a solitude--the component parts thereof were duly discovered by the charwoman next morning amid the foliage of an adjacent palm--and the tail of the last radish was disappearing into Stiffy's mouth. Stiffy, once roused, made an excellent accomplice, though he had no initiative of his own. The waiter's face twitched ever so slightly, and there was an undulating movement in the region of his scarlet waistcoat. But he recovered himself in time, and having served the thick soup, departed unbidden in search of the clear. "Nicky," said Stiffy in a concerned voice, "are we really going to have everything on the _menu_?" "You are, my son," replied Nicky. "I, being a lady, will make use of this palm-tub." The waiter brought the clear soup, and asked for instructions with regard to the fish. "What sort of fish have you?" The man proffered the card. "_Sole: Sauce Tartare._ That means sole with tartar sauce," Nicky translated glibly for the benefit of her untutored relative. "We had better not have that. Tartar sauce always makes him sick," she explained to the waiter, indicating the fermenting Stiffy. "What else is there? Let me see--ah! _Blanchailles!_--er--_Blanchailles!_ A very delicate fish! Quite so. You may bring us"--her brain worked desperately behind a smiling face, but fruitlessly--"a _blanchaille_, waiter." There was an ominous silence. Then the waiter asked, in a voice tinged with polite incredulity-- "A _whole_ one each, madam?" "Certainly," said madam in freezing tones. The waiter bowed deferentially, and departed.