Page:Levenson - Butterfly Man.djvu/117

Rh "Next Monday. We leave for the big town from Los Angeles on Thursday."

Ken shrugged his shoulders. "I can't make it," he said. "But how about a date four weeks from next Monday." "At eleven o'clock?" laughed Shaw.

"Make it ten-thirty. I'll be anxious," Ken laughed back. "I like your nerve," Norah said. "Will you work out with me for half an hour this morning?"

"Where?" asked Ken.

"We'll use the hotel ballroom.

They were homey folks, the Nasmuths. They surrounded Ken with an atmosphere of wholesome sympathy.

"I'm surprised that you even talked to a dancer in a joint like Frank and Jack's," Ken remarked to Norah.

"You're not just a dancer, my dear. When Leon Shaw watched you dance he said: 'There's another Clifton Webb, if he only knew it.'"

"Who's Clifton Webb?"

"A Broadway star who studied in Europe and who is sophistication to the finger tips."

"I suppose I'm a little hickish to you New Yorkers."

"No. You're a natural dancer and a born gentleman."

The morning passed as they danced for each other in the ballroom. Mrs. Nasmuth played for them.

Afterwards, at lunch, she told Ken she hoped to meet him again in the East.

"We're just show people," she laughed. "My daughter is quite a star in New York. Norah has really been on the stage since she was a baby, you see. I was Laura Lorimer of the old Casino days.

"Norah was a child actress ten years ago. I've held her