h the intuitive glance of one who has
learned to tread warily amid dangerous surroundings. Apparently her
preliminary examination was satisfactory. She put us into the
non-poisonous class. Keats had flattened the palm of his right hand
against his breast and was offering the last rose to her with the other.
His manner was of the stage but not offensively so.

"At last I have found you," repeated my curious acquaintance. "For all
your laughter you are unhappy. You are consumed with yearning, even as I
am. Pray accept a rose."

With a murmured repetition of his formula he gave he his last flower.

His manner was earnest and the girl had immediately rejected the
assumption that we were mocking her.

"This is a mistake," she explained, hesitating about the rose. "I don't
think you know who I am."

"A lady of high degree, I am sure," responded Keats gallantly. There was
a peculiar quaintness about his English, which like his name, took me
back to the early nineteenth century. The coincidence of his name did
not strike me as unusual, because the telephone directory is full of
such parallels.

"No high degree about me," laughed the girl. "I'm a saleslady at
Marmelstein's, that's all. What you said about being unhappy is true
sometimes. When you came up I was just thinking."

Her voice with its overtone of sadness sounded in the semi-darkness like
the faint tremolo of mandolins serenading in the distance.

"But there need be no unhappiness," contended Keats. "We must shut out
from our sight everything but beauty, pure beauty. At this moment I am
supremely happy."

He looked at her. There was an unreality about him for which I could not
account. Like a mirage of the park he seemed. In a twinkle of the
incandescents, I thought, he might vanish. The girl from Marmelstein's
looked at him as if fascinated. Romance had come and touched her heart
with a magic wand. She sniffed at the rose pensively.

"I couldn't just tell you why I was feeling queer. Marmelstein's is a
nice place, honest. You see all sorts of people during the day and it's
interesting to work there. But there's something missing--I don't know
what."

"Beauty, my lady, beauty," declared Keats.

Out of the shadows a fourth form had materialized, a thickset man who
approached us with a firm stride. He patted my friend gently on the
shoulder.

"You're a bad boy, John," he reproached, "giving me the slip that way. I
had the time of my life looking for you.