"Well," he announced, judiciously, "you shall not have to reproach me
with anything of that kind. Your day shall be a success if I can make
it so."

His manner was more than gentle. His mood was one of gratitude and
pleasant expectation. He was getting to know her and was sorry for
her--possibly because she trusted him and was sorry for him. She was
not the companion he would have chosen for a day's outing, and it was
doubtful if she would be any too cheerful; but he would serve her
loyally, wherever this queer adventure led, and he was young enough to
appreciate its possibilities. Inwardly she was amused by his little
affectation of experience, of ripe age addressing youth, but it was so
unconsciously done, so unconquerably youthful, that it added to the
interest he had aroused in her. She liked, too, his freshness and
boyish beauty, and his habit of asserting his sense of honor above
everything. Above all things, she liked his ignorance of her. To him,
she was merely a woman like other women; there was a satisfaction to
her in that thought as deep as it was indescribable. The only other
occupants of the car were a messenger-boy, lost to his surroundings in
a paper-covered novel, and a commercial traveller whose brow was
corrugated by mental strain over a notebook.

"There are some things I would like to do in New York," she confided.
"We will do them now--lunch at Delmonico's, go sight-seeing all the
afternoon, dine at Sherry's, and go to the theatre this evening. Which
is the best play in town?"

"Well--er--that, you know, depends on what you like," hazarded the
boy, sagely. "Do you prefer comedy, tragedy, or melodrama?"