he
restaurant, and stood staring into it as at a blurred picture. The band
crashed a popular two-step above the mingled voices and laughter. He sat
down at a vacant table near the door, and presently became aware that a
waiter had been for some time at his elbow.

"What will you have, sir?"

Then he remembered that he had not eaten, discovered that he was hungry,
and ordered some sandwiches and beer. Still staring, the figures began
to differentiate themselves, although they all appeared, somehow, in
perpetual motion; hurrying, though seated. It was like gazing at a
quivering cinematograph. Here and there ribbons of smoke curled upward,
adding volume to the blue cloud that hung over the tables, which in turn
was dissipated in spots by the industrious electric fans. Everywhere
he looked he met the glances of women; even at the table next him, they
were not so absorbed in their escorts as to be able to resist flinging
him covert stares between the shrieks of laughter in which they
intermittently indulged. The cumulative effect of all these faces was
intoxicating, and for a long time he was unable to examine closely any
one group. What he saw was a composite woman with flushed cheeks
and soliciting eyes, becomingly gowned and hatted--to the masculine
judgment. On the walls, heavily frescoed in the German style, he read,
in Gothic letters:

"Wer liebt nicht Wein, Weib, and Gesang,
Er bleibt ein Narr sein Leben lang."

The waiter brought the sandwiches and beer, yet he did not eat. In the
middle distance certain figures began insistently to stand out,--figures
of women sitting alone wherever he looked he met a provoking gaze. One
woman, a little farther away than the rest, seemed determinedly bent
on getting a nod of recognition, and it was gradually borne in upon
Hodder's consciousness that her features were familiar. In avoiding her
eyes he studied the men at the next table,--or rather one of them, who
loudly ordered the waiters about, who told brief anecdotes that were
uproariously applauded; whose pudgy, bejewelled fingers were continually
feeling for the bottle in the ice beside his chair, or nudging his
companions with easy familiarity; whose little eyes, set in a heavy
face, lighted now and again with a certain expression.....

Suddenly Hodder pushed back his chair and got to his feet, overcome by a
choking sensation like that of being, asphyxiated by foul gases. He
must get out at once, or f