“I like the music you have chosen for the play,” said Hector; “what we heard tonight was very pretty.”

“Thank you,” said Cobbler. “Pretty isn’t just the word I would have chosen myself for Purcell’s elegant numbers, but I discern that your heart is in the right place.”

“A pretty girl is like a melody,” hummed Roger.

“Excuse me,” said Cobbler, turning toward him, “but I must contradict you. A pretty girl is nothing of the kind. A melody, if it is any good, has a discernible logic; a pretty girl can exist without the frailest vestige of sense. Do you know that that great cow of a girl they call The Torso—a pretty girl if ever there was one—came to me the other day and told me that she was musical, indeed surpassingly musical, because she often heard melodies in her head. Her proposal was that she should hum these gifts of God to me, and that I should write them down. She then hummed the scrambled fragments of two or three nugacities from last year’s movies. There were two courses open to me: as a musician I could have struck her; as a man I could have dragged her into the shrubbery and worked my wicked will upon her.”

“As a matter of curiosity, which did you do?” asked Solly.

“Curiosity killed the cat,” said Hector, who was a little embarrassed by the turn the conversation had taken; nevertheless, he wanted to show himself a man’s man, and something witty seemed called for.

“I deny that,” said Cobbler; “the cat probably died a happy martyr to research. In this case I was spared the necessity for decision; Mrs Forrester called me away at the critical moment to ask if it would be necessary for the musicians to have any light, or whether they could get along with the few rays which might spill from the stage. When Nellie is in one of her efficient moods all passions are stilled in her presence.”

“She’s a damned efficient woman,” said Roger. There wouldn’t be any show without her.”

“I’d like her better if she hadn’t such an insufferably cosy mind,” said Solly.

“What do you mean by that?” said Roger.

“Oh, you know; she makes everything seem so snug and homey; she wants to be a dear little Wendy-mother to us all. Not being a Peter Pan myself, I don’t like it.”

“Peter Pan, the boy who never grew up,” said Hector, to show that he was following the conversation, and also that he was as keen in his appreciation of a literary reference as anybody.

“Funny, I would have thought that Peter Pan was a pretty good name for you,” said Roger.

“Would you,” said Solly; “and just why would you think that?”

“Take my advice and don’t answer that question,” said Cobbler. “You two are bound to quarrel eventually, but if you take my advice you won’t do it here.”

“And why are we bound to quarrel, may I ask?” said Roger, very much on his dignity.

“Because, as everybody knows, you are both after the Impatient Griselda. It’s the talk of the company. At the moment, Tasset, you are well in the lead, but Solly may leave you behind at any moment. Your fascination—I speak merely as an impartial but keen observer, mind you, and mean nothing personal—is beginning to wane. At any moment Griselda may weary of your second-rate man-of-the-world manner, and turn toward our host’s particular brand of devitalized charm.”

This was sheer mischief-making, but Cobbler liked mischief and had had enough to drink to make him indulgent toward his weakness.

“I had not realized that we were so closely watched,” said Solly. He and Roger were both caught off their guard by Cobbler’s words. But they were not so startled as Hector. So intensely had he concentrated on his own passion that he had not observed anything unusual in the attentions which Roger had been paying to Griselda; nor was he acute enough to have noticed anything significant about the way in which Solly avoided her. And here he was, confronted with two unsuspected rivals, both younger and more attractive than he, whose presence had been unknown to him! He had not drunk much, but his stomach heaved, and he felt cold within. He had no time to consider his plight, however, for Roger turned to him.

“That’s a lie, isn’t it, Mackintosh?” said he.

“What? What’s a lie?” said Hector, startled.

“A lie that everybody is watching Griselda and me. I’ve been giving her a mild buzz, of course. Got to pass the time somehow. But nobody’s been talking about it.”

“I don’t know,” said Hector.

“Of course you don’t know. Nobody’s been talking and nobody cares. You’re lying, Cobbler.”

“Nobody says that with impunity to a Fellow of the Royal College of Organists,” said Humphrey. “Floreat Vox Humana!”

“And exactly what do you intend to do about it?”

“Nothing at present. But I’ll embarrass you some time in public, and make you sorry.”

“I never heard such nonsense in my life,” said Solly. “I couldn’t be less interested in Griselda Webster. I’ve known her, man and boy, for years. She has a heart like an artichoke; one man pulls off a leaf, dips it in melted butter, and consumes it with relish; another does the same. Anybody can have a leaf, but nobody gets them all, and nobody touches the core. I’ve had a leaf or two; why should I grudge Tasset his turn?”

“Perhaps that’s the way you talk about women in the universities,” said Roger. “In the Army we’re a little more particular.”

“In the great shrines of humanism we don’t need arbitrary rules to keep our manners in order,” said Solly, bowing rather drunkenly over his glass.

“Come, come, gentlemen,” said Cobbler. “Don’t go all grand on us. You must admit, whatever you say about Miss Webster’s character, that she is an unusually personable young woman.”

“Handsome is as handsome does,” said Solly owlishly. “Griselda is attractive—damnably attractive. But it’s all on the surface. If I may so express it, she is like a fraudulent bank which advertises a capital of several millions, and has perhaps five hundred dollars in actual cash. She is lovely; I repeat it, lovely. Because I am peculiarly sensitive to beauty I admit to a certain tenderness for her on that account; but her heart is cold and empty.”

“Horse feathers,” said Roger, with heat. “She’s just a kid—a damned nice kid. She has to be taught what life’s all about, and what love is; just because you couldn’t get to first base with her you say her heart is cold and empty. I know better.”

“Ah, I knew that we could rely upon you, Lieutenant,” said Cobbler. “Our host is a man of theory, you, a man of action. From your remarks I deduce that you have already bruised the teats of her virginity?”

This was greeted with a moment of silence. Then—

“What the hell do you mean by that?” demanded Roger.

“Three guesses,” said Humphrey, smiling. “It is a rather delicate phrase from the Prophet Ezekiel—one of the nicer-minded prophets. In my capacity as an organist I hear a lot of Scripture; it’s an education in itself.”

“Listen, Cobbler,” said Roger, “I’ve lived a rough life—a soldier’s life—but I have no use for raw language, particularly when applied to women. Just be careful, will you?”

“But I was careful,” said Humphrey, smiling; “I could have put it plainly, but I chose a Biblical phrase to suit the solemnity of the occasion. And from what I know of your past history, Lieutenant, your objection to raw language has never stood in the way of your fondness for what fussy people might consider raw conduct.”

“I’ve been around,” said Roger; “and I’ve known a lot of girls.”

“It was said of that great and good monarch Henry VIII,” said Cobbler, “that his eye lighted upon few women whom he did not desire, and he desired few whom he did not enjoy. Would you consider that a fair description of yourself?”

“I don’t say that I haven’t taken my pleasure where I found it,” said Roger, “but it was usually a fifty-fifty deal. Girls don’t get laid against their will. But don’t get any wrong ideas about Griselda. She’s different.”