“My best,” he said proudly. “Can’t I share it?” she pleaded. “No more than I can my heart,” he said firmly. “It is to be named after you.” Heroically she gulped it down. “Oh, how sweet it is,” she exclaimed. “I know,” he admitted. “But as it isn’t sugar you needn’t mind. I use saccharin which is about a thousand times as sweet. And the beauty of saccharin,” he confided to the others, “is that it stays with you. When I first discovered this Crême d’Alicia as I call it, I tasted it for days.” “It’s a perfectly divine color,” Nora remarked enthusiastically. “I’ve always dreamed of a dress exactly that shade. How did you do it?” “Experimenting with the coal tar dyes,” he said proudly. “I’m getting rather an expert on coal tar compounds. That color was Perkins’ mauve.” “That was more than mauve,” Nora insisted. “I’ve plenty of mauve things.” He raised his hand. “No you don’t, Nora! You don’t get the result of my years of close study like that. I’ll make you each a present of a bottle before you go. We’ll have it with coffee every night. Mauve was the foundation upon which I built.” “It’s a little rich for me, Mikey dear,” his wife said anxiously. “I think it will make a far better winter cordial. I’m going upstairs to see Ethel now.” He watched her disappear and then turned to Nora and Monty with a twinkle in his eye. “I think after my labors I need a little cocktail. In France they call this the _heure de l’aperitif_, as Monty probably knows, and I have a private bar of my own. Don’t give me away, children.” Nora looked at her companion with a frown. She had been looking for his coming, and now when he was here, he had nothing to say. “What’s the matter with you?” she demanded suddenly. “I’m wondering where Steven is,” he returned anxiously. “A blow-out oughtn’t to keep him all this time.” “But what makes you jump so?” she insisted. “You never used to be like this. Is it St. Vitus’s dance?” He turned to her with an assumption of freedom from care. “I am a bit nervous, Nora,” he admitted. “You see, Steven and I are in a big deal together, and, er, the markets go up and down like the temperature and it keeps me sorts of anxious.” “You don’t mean to say you’ve gone into business?” she said. “Not exactly,” he prevaricated, “and yet I have in a way. It’s something secret.” “Well,” said Nora, with sound common sense, “if it frightens you so, why go in for it?” “Well, everything was kind of tepid in Paris,” he explained. “Tepid in Paris?” she cried. “Why, yes,” he told her. “Paris can’t always live up to her reputation. I’d been there studying French banking systems so long that I wanted some excitement and joined Steve in his scheme.” “Oh, Monty,” she said interested, and sitting on the couch at his side, “if it’s really exciting, tell me everything. Are you being pursued?” He looked at her aggrieved. “Now what do you suggest that for?” he demanded. “But what is it?” she insisted.