Only
the Signorina was left to him, and Bobby hesitated just a moment as it
occurred to him that, perhaps, a more personal entertainment was
expected by this eminent songstress. Biff Bates, however, relieved him
of his dilemma.

"While you're gone down to see the boys at the Idlers' Club," said
Biff, "I'm going to take Miss Carry--Miss--Miss--"

"Caravaggio," interrupted the Signorina with a repetition of a laugh
which had convinced Bobby that, after all, she might be a singer,
though her speaking voice gave no trace of it.

"Carrie for mine," insisted Biff with a confident grin. "I'm going to
take Miss Carrie out to lunch some place where they don't serve
prunes. I guess the Hotel Spender will do for us."

Bobby surveyed Biff with an indulgent smile.

"Thanks," said he. "That will give me time to see what I can do."

"You take my advice, Mr. Burnit," earnestly interposed the Signorina.
"Don't bother with your friends. Go and see the manager of the Orpheum
and ask him about that open date. Ask him if he thinks it wouldn't be
a good investment for you to back us."

Biff, the conservative; Biff, whose vote was invariably for the
negative on any proposition involving an investment of Bobby's funds,
unexpectedly added his weight for the affirmative.

"It's a good stunt, Bobby. Go to it," he counseled, and the Caravaggio
smiled down at him.

Again Bobby laughed.

"All right, Biff," said he. "I'll hunt up the manager of the Orpheum
right away."

In his machine he conveyed Biff and the prima donna to the Hotel
Spender, and then drove to the Orpheum.

CHAPTER XIX

WITH THE RELUCTANT CONSENT OF AGNES, BOBBY BECOMES A PATRON OF MUSIC

The manager of the Orpheum was a strange evolution. He was a man who
had spent a lifetime in the show business, running first a concert
hall that "broke into the papers" every Sunday morning with an account
of from two to seven fights the night before, then an equally
disreputable "burlesque" house, the broad attractions of which
appealed to men and boys only. To this, as he made money, he added the
cheapest and most blood-curdling melodrama theater in town, then a
"regular" house of the second grade. In his career he had endured two
divorce cases of the most unattractive sort, and, among quiet and
conventional citizens, was supposed to have horns and a barbed tail
that snapped sparks where it struck on the pavement. When he first
purchased the Orpheum Theater, the most ex