Her beauty returned to his senses like a familiar thing; he had admired the way her hair grew from her temples, and to-night it was dressed to show the unusual charm; her ankles had always been wonderfully slim, and to-night they looked finer than ever atop of twinkly little Court shoes in a vivid green hue; her eyes had that deep, still look which expressed her inanity, while having the result of concealing it. During the first interval he scribbled a note to her, and sent it round with an imperative request for an answer. The note asked: "My dear Roselle, come out to supper? And shall I wait for you at the stage door?--O.K." And her reply, in her big, silly back-hand writing, said laconically: "Right. I'll be out at eleven.--R.D." Eleven found him waiting by the stage-door entrance, and she did not keep him long. Soon she came, big and brilliant, out from the gloomy gully, in the inevitable fur-coat which he remembered so well, but which had begun now to look battered, and the velvet hat shoved on cheekily, like a man's wideawake. Her eyes and her teeth acclaimed him in a kindred smile, for which he felt the warmer. "Hallo, dear old thing!" she greeted him. "I thought you were lost." He held her hand, smiling. "This is fine!" he said. "Where shall we go?" "Romano's." "Romano's let it be. I've a cab here, waiting." He handed her in, jumped in after her, and slammed the door, with a feeling that for an hour at least he had left his troubles outside. "How are you?" he asked. "What have you been doing since I saw you last? And didn't you ever expect to see me again?" Her eyes, in the dimness, looked very deep. "I knew I should," she answered murmurously. The inimitable atmosphere of Romano's loosened his tongue. After she had ordered supper, with every whit of the appetite and extravagance which he remembered as her chief characteristic, next to her beauty, and after each had been stimulated by a cocktail, he was conscious that he wanted to confide in her, not so much because she was Roselle, but because she was a woman, would look soft and listen prettily. He wanted stroking gently, patting on the back, and reassuring about himself. The slight moodiness of his expression set her suggesting confidences. "You've got a pretty bad hump," she said caressingly. "What is it? Has the car slumped? Won't they have it? Or is it indigestion? You're not what you were when--" She gave a quick sigh and smile, very inviting. "When we were touring about Canada and the States together," he finished. "Well, you see; when a man has come back to all he left behind him--" "Did you leave much behind you?" "Why do you ask?" "You never told _me_ anything," she pouted. "But I'm not _asking_. I've no curiosity. The knots men tie themselves into--" "You can laugh." "You make me. Aren't men silly? Tell me about--to whom you came back." "What does it matter?"