t would take a long time for a letter
to elicit information from Berlin.

Incontinently he wrote and despatched a long, extravagant cablegram to
Mrs. Pettit in care of the American Embassy, little doubting that she
would immediately answer.

Then he set whole-heartedly about the business of making himself
presentable for the evening.

When eventually he strode into the white room, Max was already
established at the famous little table in the southeast corner. Whitaker
was conscious of turning heads and guarded comment as he took his place
opposite the little fat man.

"Make you famous in a night," Max assured him importantly. "Don't happen
to need any notoriety, do you?"

"No, thanks."

"Dine with me here three nights hand-running and they'll let you into
the Syndicate by the back door without even asking your name. P.T.A.'s
one grand little motto, my boy."

"P.T.A.?"

"Pays to advertise. Paste that in your hat, keep your head small enough
to wear it, and don't givadam if folks do think you're an addle-pated
village cut-up, and you'll have this town at heel like a good dog as
long as--well," Max wound up with a short laugh, "as long as your luck
lasts."

"Yours seems to be pretty healthy--no signs of going into a premature
decline."

"Ah!" said Max gloomily. "Seems!"

With a morose manner he devoted himself to his soup.

"Look me over," he requested abruptly, leaning back. "I guess I'm some
giddy young buck, what?"

Whitaker reviewed the striking effect Max had created by encasing his
brief neck and double chin in an old-fashioned high collar and black
silk stock, beneath which his important chest was protected by an
elaborately frilled shirt decorated with black pearl studs. His waist
was strapped in by a pique waistcoat edged with black, and there was a
distinctly perceptible "invisible" stripe in the material of his evening
coat and trousers.

"Dressed up like a fool," Max summed up the ensemble before his guest
could speak. "Would you believe that despair could gnaw at the vitals of
any one as wonderfully arrayed?"

"I would not," Whitaker asserted.

"Nobody would," said Max mournfully. "And yet, 'tis true."

"Meaning--?"

"Oh, I'm just down in the mouth because this is Sara's last appearance."
Max motioned the waiter to remove the debris of a course. "I'm as
superstitious as any trouper in the profession. I've got it in my knob
that she's my mascot. If she leaves me, my luck goes with her.