Chorus girls are merely shop-girls with a taste for caviare and peaches. They are no more sinful than their sisters in the same social strata and the only difference between them is that, whilst they are exposed to similar temptations, the chorus girl has a larger field to pick from and the candidates are much more presentable. A shop-girl accepts the hospitality of a tea-shop, the chorus-girl goes to the Ritz. Both have one consuming passion, a desire for good food, for which they do not have to pay. Reggie Boltover, who, to do him justice, knew everybody, entertained the girl for half-an-hour by pointing out the various celebrities in the room and Vera Flemming was interested without being enthusiastically so. “I would rather you talked about yourself,” she said, “you are ever so much more interesting than these people.” “Oh, no,” said Reggie, with a little giggle; “oh, no!” “You are, indeed, you are,” she said earnestly. “Oh, come,” said Reggie; “oh, come! no! I am not interesting; oh, dear no!” His life he admitted frankly was very ordinary. All that he did was to sign a few cheques, liquidate a few debts, see a few “fellows” about “things” and “there you are,” said Reggie. “It must be wonderful to be in a position of power,” said the girl musingly. “Of course, I come from a very poor family. We only think in shillings where you think in thousands of pounds. And it is awfully hard to realize what it feels like to order people to do things instead of being ordered.” Reggie Boltover, who had never ordered anybody to do anything in his life and would not have dared to dispute the judgment of the innumerable managers and directors whom his sainted father had appointed in his life-time, wondered himself what it felt like. He had often meditated, with a shudder, upon the necessity which might one day arise, for his taking the initiative in the conduct of his business. He dimly realized that, in time, all his managers and directors would die and he had dimly speculated upon the question as to who would replace them. He had a feeling that perhaps one might go to Whiteleys and order some new ones, but it had never occurred to him that at his autocratic word managers and people of that description could be made out of mud, or that an order affecting the business which he was supposed to control would be acted upon if he were to give that order. “Well, you know,” he said, “I never really tell people to do anything. You see, I never see them except very occasionally. Of course, they make reports and all that sort of thing and I have a man who reads them so everything is all right and I just sign cheques and see a few fellows and there you are.”