Formal, formal, formal. Was that how it must be between them hereafter? Well, it was better so. Miss Meyrick presented her father and her aunt, and that did not tend to lighten the formality. Icicles, both of them, though stocky puffing icicles. Aunt inquired if Mr. Minot was related to the Minots of Detroit, and when he failed to qualify, at once lost all interest in him. Old Spencer Meyrick did not accord him even that much attention. Yet--all was not formal, as it happened. For as Cynthia Meyrick moved away, she whispered: "I must see you after dinner--on important business." And her smile as she said it made Minot's own lonely dinner quite cheery. At seven in the evening the hotel orchestra gathered in the lobby for its nightly concert, and after the way of orchestras, it was almost ready to begin when Minot left the dining-room at eight. Sitting primly in straight backed chairs, an audience gathered for the most part from the more inexpensive hostelries waited patiently. Presumably these people were there for an hour with music, lovely maid. But it was the gowns of more material maids that interested the greater number of them, and many drab little women sat making furtive mental notes that should while away the hours conversationally when they got back to Akron or Terre Haute. Minot sat down in a veranda chair and looked out at the courtyard. In the splendor of its evening colors, it was indeed the setting for romance. In the midst of the green palms and blooming things splashed a fountain which might well have been the one old Ponce de Leon sought. On three sides the lighted towers and turrets of that huge hotel climbed toward the bright, warm southern sky. A dazzling moon shamed Mr. Edison's lamps, the breeze came tepid from the sea, the very latest in waltzes drifted out from the gorgeous lobby. Here romance, Minot thought, must have been born. "Mr. Minot--I've been looking everywhere--" She was beside him now, a slim white figure in the dusk--the one thing lacking in that glittering picture. He leaped to meet her. "Sitting here dreaming, I reckon," she whispered, "of somebody far away." "No." He shook his head. "I leave that to the newly engaged." She made no answer. He gave her his chair, and drew up another for himself. "Mr. Minot," she said, "I was terribly thoughtless this noon. But you must forgive me--I was so excited. Mr. Minot--I owe you--" She hesitated. Minot bit his lip savagely. Must he hear all that again? How much she owed him for his service--for getting her to that luncheon in time--that wonderful luncheon-- "I owe you," finished the girl softly, "the charges on that taxi." It was something of a shock to Minot. Was she making game of him? "Don't," he answered. "Here in the moonlight, with that waltz playing, and the old palms whispering--is this a time to talk of taxi bills?" "But--we must talk of something--oh, I mean--I insist. Won't you please tell me the figure?"