Noble lit another Orduma.  He would follow the line of conduct he had marked out for himself:  he would not take his place by Julia for the supper interval—­perhaps that breach of etiquette would “show” her.  He could see her no longer—­she had moved out of range—­but he imagined her, asking everywhere:  “Hasn’t any one seen Mr. Dill?” And he thought of her as biting her lip nervously, perhaps, and replying absently to sallies and quips—­perhaps even having to run upstairs to her own room to dash something sparkling from her eyes, and, maybe, to look angrily in her glass for an instant and exclaim, “Fool!” For Julia was proud, and not used to be treated in this way.

He felt the least bit soothed, and, lightly flicking the ash from his Orduma with his little finger, an act indicating some measure of restored composure, he strolled to the other side of the house and brought other fields of vision into view through other windows.  Abruptly his stroll came to an end.

There sat Julia, flushed and joyous, finishing her supper in company with old Baldy Clairdyce, Newland Sanders, George Plum, seven or eight other young gentlemen, and some inconsidered adhering girls—­the horrible barytone sitting closest of all to Julia.  Moreover, upon that very moment the orchestra, in the hall beyond, thought fit to pay the recent vocalist a sickening compliment, and began to play “The Sunshine of Your Smile.”

Thereupon, with Julia herself first taking up the air in a dulcet soprano, all of the party, including the people in the other rooms, sang the dreadful song in chorus, the beaming Clairdyce exerting such demoniac power as to be heard tremendously over all other voices.  He had risen for this effort, and to Noble, below the window, everything in his mouth was visible.

The lone listener had a bitter thought, though it was a longing, rather than a thought.  For the first time in his life he wished that he had adopted the profession of dentistry.

    “Geev a-mee the righ to luv va-yew ALL the wile,
      My worrrlda for AIV-vorr,
    The sunshigh NUV vyewr-ra-smile!”

The musicians swung into dance music; old Baldy closed the exhibition with an operatic gesture (for which alone, if for nothing else, at least one watcher thought the showy gentleman deserved hanging), and this odious gesture concluded with a seizure of Julia’s hand.  She sprang up eagerly; he whirled her away, and the whole place fluctuated in the dance once more.

“Well, now,” said Noble, between his teeth—­“now, I am goin’ to do something!”

He turned his back upon that painful house, walked out to the front gate, opened it, passed through, and looked southward.  Not quite two blocks away there shone the lights of a corner drug store, still open to custom though the hour was nearing midnight.  He walked straight to the door of this place, which stood ajar, but paused before entering, and looked long and nervously at the middle-aged proprietor who was unconscious of his regard, and lounged in a chair, drowsily stroking a cat upon his lap.  Noble walked in.