"Ah--many times! It depends on one's own mood and health, because, of course, the circumstances are always the same. There are mornings when one looks round a big class-room and sees all the girls' faces looking upwards, and it gives one quite a thrilling sense of power and opportunity. That is what the heaven-born teacher must feel every time.--`Here is the fresh virgin soil, and mine is the joy of planting the right seed! Here are the women of the future, the mothers of the race. For this hour they are mine. What I say, they must hear. They will listen with an attention which even their parents cannot gain. The words which I speak this morning may bear fruit in many lives.' That's the ideal attitude, but the ordinary human woman has other mornings when all she feels is--`Oh, dear me, six hours of this! And what's the use? Everything I batter in to-day will be forgotten by to-morrow. What's the ideal anyway in teaching French verbs? I want to go to bed.'" They laughed together, but Captain Fanshawe sobered quickly, and his brow showed furrows of distress. Claire looked at him and said quickly-- "Do you mind if we don't talk school? I am Cinderella to-night, wearing fine clothes and supping in state. I'd so much rather talk Cinderella to match." "Certainly, certainly. Just as you wish." Lolling back in his chair, Captain Fanshawe adopted an air of _blase_ indifference, and drawled slowly, "Quite a good winter, isn't it? Lots going on. Have you been to the Opera lately?" "Oh dear!" thought Claire with a gush, "how refreshing to meet a grown- up man who can pretend like a child!" She simpered, and replied artificially, "Oh, yes--quite often. The dear Duchess is _so_ kind; her box is open to me whenever I choose to go. Wonderful scene, isn't it? All those tiers rising one above another. Do you ever look up at the galleries? Such funny people sit there--men in tweed suits; girls in white blouses. Who _are_ they, should you think? Clerks and typists and school-mistresses, and people of that persuasion?" "Possibly, I dare say. One never knows. They look quite respectable and quiet, don't you know!" The twinkle was alight in Captain Fanshawe's eyes. It shone more brightly still as he added, "Everybody turns up sooner or later in the Duchess's box. Have you happened to meet--the Prince!" For a moment Claire groped for the connection, then dimpled merrily. "Not yet. No! but I am hoping--" The waiter approached with plates of chicken in aspic, and more rolls of crisp browned bread. Claire sent a thought to Cecil finishing a box of sardines, with her book propped up against the cocoa jug. The Cinderella _role_ was forgotten while her eyes roved around, studying the silver dishes on the various tables. "When you were a small boy, Captain Fanshawe, did you go out to parties?"