smile.

``I wanted to see,'' he explained, catching the look of listless
curiosity in MacWilliams's eye, ``whether there was anything
hotter than my blood. It's racing around like boiling water in a
pot.''

``Listen,'' said Langham, holding up his hand. ``There goes the
call for prayers in the convent, and now it's too late to go to
town. I am glad, rather. I'm too tired to keep awake, and
besides, they don't know how to amuse themselves in a civilized
way--at least not in my way. I wish I could just drop in at home
about now; don't you, MacWilliams? Just about this time up in
God's country all the people are at the theatre, or they've just
finished dinner and are sitting around sipping cool green mint,
trickling through little lumps of ice. What I'd like--'' he
stopped and shut one eye and gazed, with his head on one side, at
the unimaginative MacWilliams--``what I'd like to do now,''
he continued, thoughtfully, ``would be to sit in the front row at
a comic opera, ON THE AISLE. The prima donna must be very,
very beautiful, and sing most of her songs at me, and there must
be three comedians, all good, and a chorus entirely composed of
girls. I never could see why they have men in the chorus,
anyway. No one ever looks at them. Now that's where I'd like to
be. What would you like, MacWilliams?''

MacWilliams was a type with which Clay was intimately familiar,
but to the college-bred Langham he was a revelation and a joy.
He came from some little town in the West, and had learned what
he knew of engineering at the transit's mouth, after he had first