The moments passed--stilled, leaden moments. The silence had become intolerable. Our host jiggled on his feet. Some of the quicker-minded guests made a pretence of little conversational flurries: “That second movement--oh, exquisitely rendered!... No one has ever read Chopin so divinely.... How his family must idolize him!... They say.... That exquisite concerto!... Hasn’t he the most stunning hair.... Those staccato passages left me actually limp--I’m starting Myrtle in Tuesday to take of Professor Gluckstein. She wants to take stenography, but I tell her.... Did you think the preludes were just the tiniest bit idealized.... I always say if one has one’s music, and one’s books, of course--He must be very, _very_ fond of music!” Such were the hushed, tentative fragments I caught. The moments passed. Belknap-Jackson went to the telephone. “What? But they’re not here! Very strange! They should have been here half an hour ago. Send some one--yes, at once.” In the ensuing silence he repaired to the buffet and drank a glass of vodka. Quite distraught he was. The moments passed. Again several guests exchanged seats with other guests. It seemed to be a device for relieving the strain. Once more there were scattering efforts at normal talk. “Myrtle is a strange girl--a creature of moods, I call her. She wanted to act in the moving pictures until papa bought the car. And she knows every one of the new tango steps, but I tell her a few lessons in cooking wouldn’t--Beryl Mae is just the same puzzling child; one thing one day, and another thing the next; a mere bundle of nerves, and so sensitive if you say the least little thing to her ... If we could only get Ling Wong back--this Jap boy is always threatening to leave if the men don’t get up to breakfast on time, or if Gertie makes fudge in his kitchen of an afternoon ... Our boy sends all his wages to his uncle in China, but I simply can’t get him to say, ‘Dinner is served.’ He just slides in and says, ‘All right, you come!’ It’s very annoying, but I always tell the family, ‘Remember what a time we had with the Swede----’”