THE CHAPLET



A strange stillness hung over the restaurant; it was one of those
rare moments when the orchestra was not discoursing the strains of
the Ice-cream Sailor waltz.

"Did I ever tell you," asked Clovis of his friend, "the tragedy of
music at mealtimes?

"It was a gala evening at the Grand Sybaris Hotel, and a special
dinner was being served in the Amethyst dining-hall. The Amethyst
dining-hall had almost a European reputation, especially with that
section of Europe which is historically identified with the Jordan
Valley. Its cooking was beyond reproach, and its orchestra was
sufficiently highly salaried to be above criticism. Thither came
in shoals the intensely musical and the almost intensely musical,
who are very many, and in still greater numbers the merely
musical, who know how Tchaikowsky's name is pronounced and can
recognize several of Chopin's nocturnes if you give them due
warning; these eat in the nervous, detached manner of roebuck
feeding in the open, and keep anxious ears cocked towards the
orchestra for the first hint of a recognizable melody.

"'Ah, yes, Pagliacci,' they murmur, as the opening strains follow
hot upon the soup, and if no contradiction is forthcoming from any
better-informed quarter they break forth into subdued humming by
way of supplementing the efforts of the musicians. Sometimes the
melody starts on level terms with the soup, in which case the