Page:The Mating of the Blades.djvu/109

 including Gwendolyn de Vere—hopped about in bathing suits; interpolated specialties giving imitations of famous imitators; a whole-hearted Irish self-made man, who had founded the Bermuda Onion Trust and whose daughter was being wooed by a Russian Grand-duke who spoke with a Franco-Hebrew accent; and wheezes, the repetition of which would be considered suicidal on any sunny Broadway corner between Thirty-Fourth and Forty-Seventh Streets.

Even the tuning of the bass-viol was stolen.

But the play was a success.

“Yes, old dear,” said Gwendolyn de Vere to The Honorable Tollemache Wade, reclining on a couch in her bedroom of the Adelphi Apartments, which was typical of her mind and taste—a hectic rubbish and flummery of make-believe art. “They're turning them away night after night.”

“Corkin', what?”

“Corkin'—rather! But not for me! I haven't even a speakin' bit. And the show has positively made Nell Grosvenor. You know yourself she can't dance, and she can't sing, and—her figure—my word! But there you are, Tollie old chap. She is—made! Why—up at Robinson & Smyth's they named a new brassiere after her!”

“Yes?”

Tollemache Wade looked up, a little worried. He was the sort who, never looking ahead of the passing hour when it was a question of staying his own cravings, had not the heart to look beyond the passing hour's pity where those whom he loved were concerned—