Page:The Plutocrat (1927).pdf/115



ME. MOMORO was neither surprised nor in any manner resentful of the intrusion. On the contrary, she smiled charmingly up at the dazed playwright and his brazen companion. "Will you sit with me?" she said in her lovely voice and with the hint of mispronunciation that almost yet not quite made "seet" of "sit." She moved her long black-gloved hand toward the vacant chairs beside her. "I am tiring myself to read a stupid little book. When I saw you coming, I hoped you would stop and chat with me." Then with her fine eyes upon the broad surfaces of Tinker's massaged and powdered cheeks, she inquired so gravely that a shrewd compatriot of hers might have suspected a latent drollery, "Your health to-day, it is excellent?"

"Fine!" he said. "Fine!" However, realizing that his extreme hoarseness seemed to contradict him, "All except my throat," he added. "I ate a silver basketful of Saratoga chips last night—awful salty. Affects my larynx."