When Mr. Alphonse Michelson unlocked the door of his second-floor
five-room apartment, a lamp softly burning through a yellow silk
lamp-shade met him with the soft radiance of home. Beside the door he
divested himself of his rain-spotted mackintosh, inserted his dripping
umbrella in a tall china stand, shook a little rivulet from his hat and
hung it on a pair of wall antlers.

"That you, Phonzie?"

"Yes, hon, it's me."

'"Sh-h-h-h!"

He tiptoed down the aisle of hallway and into the soft-lighted front
room. From a mound of pillows and sleepy from their luxury Millie Moores
rose to his approach, her forefinger placed across her lips and a pale
mist of chiffon falling backward from her arms.

What a masseuse is Love! The lines had faded from Millie's face and in
their place the grace of tenderness and a roundness where the chin had
softened. Years had folded back like petals, revealing the heart and the
unwithered bosom of her.

He kissed her, pressing the finger of warning closer against her lips,
and she patted a place for him on the Mexican afghan beside her.

"Phonzie!"

"How you feelin', hon?"