GINEVRA. 'It is always evening dress. And don't be afraid of his Man, dear; they always have a Man.' AMY. 'Oh, Ginevra.' GINEVRA. 'First try fascination. You remember how they fling back their cloak--like this, dear. If that fails, threaten him. You must get back the letters. There are always letters.' AMY. 'If father should suspect and follow? They usually do.' GINEVRA. 'Then you must sacrifice yourself for her. Does my dearest falter?' AMY, pressing Ginevra's hand, 'I will do my duty. Oh, Ginevra, what things there will be to put in my diary to-night.' II Night has fallen, and Amy is probably now in her bedroom, fully arrayed for her dreadful mission. She says good-bye to her diary--perhaps for aye. She steals from the house--to a very different scene, which (if one were sufficiently daring) would represent a Man's Chambers at Midnight. There is no really valid excuse for shirking this scene, which is so popular that every theatre has it stowed away in readiness; it is capable of 'setting' itself should the stage-hands forget to do so. It should be a handsome, sombre room in oak and dark red, with sinister easy chairs and couches, great curtains discreetly drawn, a door to enter by, a door to hide by, a carelessly strewn table on which to write a letter reluctantly to dictation, another table exquisitely decorated for supper for two, champagne in an ice-bucket, many rows of books which on close examination will prove to be painted wood (the stage Lotharios not being really reading men). The lamps shed a diffused light, and one of them is slightly odd in construction, because it is for knocking over presently in order to let the lady escape unobserved. Through this room moves occasionally the man's Man, sleek, imperturbable, announcing the lady, the lady's husband, the woman friend who is to save them; he says little, but is responsible for all the arrangements going right; before the curtain rises he may be conceived trying the lamp and making sure that the lady will not stick in the door. That is how it ought to be, that is how Amy has seen it several times in the past week; and now that we come to the grapple we wish we could give you what you want, for you do want it, you have been used to it, and you will feel that you are looking at a strange middle act without it. But Steve cannot have such a room as this, he has only two hundred