hate having my hand kissed."

"I wonder," he observed shrewdly, "whether that's really true, or
whether you just hate having me do it?"

When Nina came in he was drawing a rough sketch of his new power
boat, being built in Florida.

Nina's delay was explained by the appearance, a few minutes later,
of a rather sullen Annie with a tea tray. Afternoon tea was not a
Wheeler institution, but was notoriously a Sayre one. And Nina
believed in putting one's best foot foremost, even when that resulted
in a state of unstable domestic equilibrium.

"Put in a word for me, Nina," Wallie begged. "I intend to ask
Elizabeth to go to the theater this week, and I think she is going
to refuse."

"What's the play?" Nina inquired negligently. She was privately
determining that her mother needed a tea cart and a new tea service.
There were some in old Georgian silver--

"'The Valley.' Not that the play matters. It's Beverly Carlysle."

"I thought she was dead, or something."

"Or something is right. She retired years ago, at the top of her
success. She was a howling beauty, I'm told. I never saw her.
There was some queer story. I've forgotten it. I was a kid then.
How about it, Elizabeth?"