She hurried home and changed it, and hurried forth again to keep an appointment with Hubert Fowey. They dined at a pretentious hotel, in an "Orange Garden" whose false moonlight and tinkling, artificial fountain manufactured an alluring simulacrum of romantic night, despite the incessant activities of a ragtime-bitten orchestra and the inability of the ventilating system to infuse a hint of coolness into the heavy, superheated air. Joan had little appetite--the day had been too over-poweringly hot--but she was very thirsty; and Fowey provided a brand of champagne less sweet and heady than she would have chosen, and consequently more insinuative. During the meal Billy Salute appeared at a table across the room and invisible to Fowey, whose back was toward it, but still not far enough removed to prevent Joan from recognizing that look in the dancer's eyes which she resented so angrily. She didn't once look at the man; but she never quite lost sight of him, and was well aware that he was ridiculing Fowey to his companion--an actor, by many an indication, but a stranger to Joan. Provoked, she demonstrated her contempt of Salute by flirting outrageously with Fowey. Unconscious of her motive, that aspiring little dramatic author lost his head to some extent. Now and again his voice trembled when he spoke to her, and once he mumbled something about marriage, but checked at discretion, and let his words trail off inarticulately. Joan was not to be denied. "What did you say?" she demanded, with her most distracting smile. "Oh, nothing of any importance," muttered Fowey, his face reddening. "But you did say something. I only caught part of it. Hubert, I want to know!" It was the first time she had used his given name. "I--I only wondered if you were married," he stammered. "You talk so cursed little about yourself!" "Does it matter?" she parried, surrender in her eyes. He choked and gulped on his champagne. "But you're not, are you?" he persisted. "What's that to you?" He hesitated and changed the subject, fearful lest his tongue compromise him. "What shall we do now? Don't say a roof garden. Let's get out of this infernal smother. I vote for a taxi ride to Manhattan Beach." Joan assented. Leaving, they passed Salute's table. Joan gave the dancer a distant and chilling greeting, and swept haughtily past, ignoring his offer to rise. The insolent irony of his eyes was incredibly offensive to her. They said: "I am waiting, I am patient, I make no effort, I am inevitable." She swore in her soul that she would prove them wrong. In the taxicab Fowey made some slighting reference to the dancer. "He's the devil!" Joan declared with profound conviction. But she wouldn't explain her reasons for so naming him.