Here Virginia and I narrowly escaped detection, for the Literary Lady strode across the room, knocking down other people’s umbrellas in passing, brushing one lady’s velvet stole from the back of a chair, and kicking over a tray that had been put down in, apparently, the most out-of-the-way spot in the room. Clutching the arm of the waitress who belonged to our table and had no dealings with the other end of the room, she demanded immediate service. Instinctively Virginia and I bent our heads forward as low as possible over our plates, and fortunately the wide brims of our hats helped to conceal our features. But we only breathed freely when she returned to her seat to report to her friend— “That waitress says the other girl will be back in a minute; but I doubt it. There; now _she’s_ gone off too! Ah, here’s ours—at last! Now, dear, you said sausage, didn’t you? Or did we decide on oysters? . . . You’re right; it was salmon. I always think that salmon—— . . . . What did you say? . . . Why, of _course_ we want bread! We couldn’t eat it without, could we? . . . Oh, I see, you mean bread or roll? She says will you have bread or roll, dear? . . . Yes, rolls would be nice, but—— Waitress! Not crusty ones! . . . Well, perhaps bread _would_ be softer for you under the circumstances. Stale bread, waitress! Those rolls are usually as hard as—— . . . . Yes, perhaps we _had_ better decide on what we will have to drink. I’m going to have lime-juice. You’d better have some too. It goes so well with salmon. . . . Of course they have coffee, if you really prefer it; but I do think that lime-juice—— Well, if that girl hasn’t gone off again! They do nothing but run about from pillar to post. Oh, she is bringing the other things! _That_ isn’t brown bread, waitress! I said _brown_ bread surely? I _must_ have said brown bread, because I positively cannot touch anything else. Don’t you remember I called you back and said, ‘_Brown_ bread, waitress?’ Well, if you can change it, that’s all right. Wait a minute, though; after all, I think I’ll have white. . . . Yes, you can leave it; but all the same, I can’t think why people never listen to what one says.” Here half the room broke out into an unconcealed smile; _i.e._, the half that had found it impossible to raise their voices above hers, and so had finally given it up as hopeless, and now devoted themselves to listening. But all oblivious of everything but herself, she continued—