"Oh, I'll fix it. I'll go to the people who bought the boxes you want,
and--I don't know what I'll say to them, exactly--but I'll fix up such
a yarn that they'll beg me to take the boxes off their hands."

"Oh, will you, really?" and the dazzling smile she gave me would have
repaid a much greater Herculean task than I had undertaken. And, of
course, I hadn't meant it, but when she thought I did, I couldn't go
back on my word.

"I'll do my best, Miss Van Allen," I said, seriously, "and if I can't
possibly turn the trick, I'll--well, I'll buy the Metropolitan Opera
House, and put on a show of my own."

"No," she laughed, "you needn't do that. But if you try and fail--why,
we'll just have a little party here, a sort of consolation party,
and--oh, let's have some private theatricals. Wouldn't that be fun!"

"More fun than the original program?" I asked quickly, hoping to be
let off my promise.

"No, sir!" she cried, "decidedly not! I want especially to have that
theatre party and supper afterward at the Britz. Now you do all you
can, won't you?"

I promised to do all I could, and I had a partial hope I could get
what she wanted by hook or crook, and then, as she heard a specially
favorite fox-trot being dashed off on the piano downstairs, she sprang
from her seat, and kicking the satin cushion aside, asked me to dance.
In a moment we were whirling around the music room to the zipping
music, and Mrs. Reeve and Garrison followed in our steps.