wed Elinor into the larger room where a feeble daylight,
filtering in through heavily grated basement windows, struggled with
the flaring gas jets, and the odor of cocoa and bread and butter
mingled with sachet and the fumes of turpentine and paint.

Elinor made her way over the mottled stone floor with as easy a grace
as though it were a flowery turf, but Patricia, not so well schooled in
concealing her feelings, made a wry mouth.

"If this is where the celebrities eat, I don't wonder they're smudgy,"
she said in an undertone, as they seated themselves at the last vacant
table and spread their purchases on its discolored surface. "This
doesn't strike me as being very appetizing."

"It's clean, anyway, Miss Pat," said Elinor, whose practiced eyes had
been busy. "It looks soiled because the table-tops are old marble and
the floor is mottled cement, but it is really clean, though I can't
honestly say it is attractive on first sight."

"One gets used to anything in time," said Patricia airily. "You
remember how Sally Lukes missed the doing of those five weekly washes
after Johnny got prosperous enough to keep her in comfort. I reckon
we'll be just like that after a while--can't eat without smudges on the
table and paint-splotches on the dining-room walls."

Her eyes strayed about, resting on one group after another till they
lighted with sudden interest.

"There she is," she said ardently. "You can't deny, Elinor, that she's
terribly good to look at. Why, the very way she manipulates that
frilly napkin reconciles me to my food. I declare I'm twice as hungry
as I was before."

The girl certainly did make a charming and refreshing picture in her
pretty gown, and with a dainty lunch covering the objectionable table.
Opposite to her sat the drab young woman, silently eating while she
read hurriedly from a technical magazine. The contrast between the two
was so great that it made Elinor wonder.

"She must be unselfish and agreeable," she said, forgetting her
momentary prejudice, "particularly when the other doesn't seem to
appreciate her society very highly. I fancy that one isn't very
diverting. I wonder why they are such chums."

"Relatives, perhaps," hazarded Patricia, reveling in Elinor's
conversion. "I hope we get to know her soon, don't you, Norn? She
must be awfully popular. See how they all turn when she passes. I'm
sorry she's going, though, for I could simply feast my eyes on her for
hours."