"I wish I had my lunch right now," wailed Mabel, dragging her hat into place and stuffing loose locks under it. "I'm hungry and I'm thirsty and my new shoes hurt my feet. It's awfully noisy here and I don't like being lost. I don't _like_ it--"
"Mabel," warned Henrietta, "if you cry, I'll run away and leave you here and then you'll be a lot more lost than you are now. I'm just as much lost as you are, even if I _have_ been in Chicago before. We'll go along until we see a restaurant with ladies eating in it and _we'll_ go in and eat--"
"But we haven't any money," objected Mabel, dismally.
"If I remember rightly," said Henrietta, after a moment's deep thought, "they don't ask for your money until _after_ you've eaten. I think I know of a way to fix it. Wait a minute until I tidy you up a little. There are three dabs of soot on your face and your hair is all over the place. Of course we want to look as if we _had_ money."
"You always do," said Mabel, "but I don't."
"Still," consoled Henrietta, "you always look as if you'd had meals--as many as four or five a day."
"But," questioned Mabel, "are you _sure_ it's all right?"
"Of course. I told you I knew a way to fix it. Here's a place right here--not very big but the folks look all right. Stand up straight and don't look so scared. There, that's better."
They were inside. The waiter held up two fingers and escorted them to a table. They sat down and Henrietta leisurely removed her gloves. Mabel's had been removed--and lost--for some hours.
"We might as well have a _good_ meal," remarked Henrietta, studying the _menu_. "Of course, if Mr. Black were paying for it I'd leave the choice to him; but as long as he isn't we'll choose what we like. Let's begin with cream of celery soup. Then how would you like chicken _à la king_ and shrimp salad, creamed cauliflower, French fried potatoes--and ice cream for dessert?"
"That's all right for me," agreed Mabel, visibly cheering up, "only I like the looks of the green corn that man is eating over there; and the waiter just went by with a big tray of fluffy things--"
"French pastry. We can have some of that, too."
They enjoyed their meal. Being lost wasn't half bad when the salad was so delicious, the chicken so tender, the rolls so delightfully crisp, the corn so sweet, the service so excellent. Besides her ice cream, Mabel ate two varieties of French pastry and was sorry that Henrietta didn't urge her to try more when there were so many kinds. But Henrietta was putting on her gloves.