is Latz, who was too short, slightly too stout, and too shy
of likely length of swimming arm ever to have figured in any woman's
inevitable visualization of her ultimate Leander, liked, fascinatedly,
to watch Mrs. Samstag's nicely manicured fingers at work. He liked them
passive, too. Best of all, he would have preferred to feel them between
his own, but that had never been.

Nevertheless, that desire was capable of catching him unawares. That
very morning as he had stood, in his sumptuous bachelor's apartment,
strumming on one of the windows that overlooked an expansive
tree-and-lake vista of Central Park, he had wanted very suddenly and
very badly to feel those fingers in his and to kiss down on them.

Even in his busy broker's office, this desire could cut him like a swift
lance.

He liked their taper and their rosy pointedness, those fingers, and the
dry, neat way they had of stepping in between the threads.

Mr. Latz's nails were manicured, too, not quite so pointedly, but just
as correctly as Mrs. Samstag's. But his fingers were stubby and short.
Sometimes he pulled at them until they cracked.

Secretly he yearned for length of limb, of torso, even of finger.

On this, one of a hundred such typical evenings in the Bon Ton lobby,
Mr. Latz, sighing out a satisfaction of his inner man, sat himself down
on a red-velvet chair opposite Mrs. Samstag. His knees, widespread,
taxed his knife-pressed gray trousers to their very last capacity, but
he sat back in none the less evident comfort, building his fingers up
into a little chapel.

"Well, how's Mr. Latz this evening?" asked Mrs. Samstag, her smile
encompassing the question.

"If I was any better I couldn't stand it," relishing her smile and his
reply.

The Bon Ton had just dined, too well, from fruit flip _a la_ Bon Ton,
mulligatawny soup, filet of sole _saute_, choice of or both _poulette
emince_ and spring lamb _grignon_, and on through to fresh strawberry
ice cream in fluted paper boxes, _petits fours_, and _demi-tasse_.
Groups of carefully corseted women stood now beside the invitational
plush divans and peacock chairs, paying twenty minutes' after-dinner
standing penance. Men with Wall Street eyes and blood pressure slid
surreptitious celluloid toothpicks and gathered around the cigar stand.
Orchestra music flickered. Young girls, the traditions of demure sixteen
hanging by one-inch shoulder straps, and who could not walk across a
hardwood floor without