for entertainment," the man said. "We hayseeds
find the city a pretty lively place. I went to see a show just last
night called _The Girl Up-stairs_. I suppose you've seen it."

"No," said Rodney, "I haven't."

"Well, the title's pretty raw, of course, but the show's all right.
Nothing objectionable about it, and it was downright funny. I haven't
laughed so hard in a year. Pretty tunes, too. I tried to-day to get some
records of it but they didn't have any yet. If you want a real good
time, you go to see it."

The client was working his way to the door all the while and Rodney
followed him, so that the last part of this conversation took place in
the outer office. Rodney saw the man off with a final hand-shake, closed
the door after him and strolled irresolutely back toward Miss Beach's
desk.

It was true, as he had told his client, that he had been spending most
of his evenings lately in his office, and it was also true that he had
an immense amount of work to do; he'd been taking it on rather
recklessly during the last two months. But they'd been pretty sterile,
those long solitary evening hours. He'd worked fitfully, grinding away
by brute strength for a while, without interest, without imagination,
and then, in a frenzy of impatience, thrusting the legal rubbish out of
the way and letting the enigma of his great failure usurp, once more,
his mind and his memories.

It had occurred to him to wonder, as he stood listening to his client's
enthusiastic description of the show at the Globe, whether it would be
possible, in any surroundings, for him, for an hour or two, to laugh and
be jolly--and forget. It might be an experiment worth trying!

"Telephone over to the University Club," he said suddenly to Miss Beach,
"and see if you can get me a seat for _The Girl Up-stairs_."

The office boy was out on an errand and in his absence the switchboard
was Miss Beach's care.

"The--_The Girl Up-stairs_?" she repeated.

"That's what he said, isn't it?"

"Yes," she assented. "That's--the name of it."

He might have been expected, after giving an order like that, to go
striding back into his private office and slam the door after him. It
wasn't at all his way to keep a lingering hand on a task after he'd
delegated it to some one else. But he didn't on this occasion act as
she'd expected him to; remained abstractedly where he was while
something turned itself over in his mind.

There was nothing urgent about his orde