They laugh heartily enough and often enough down in the Village, but they never laugh at the Village itself,--not because they take it so reverentially, but because they know how to make believe altogether too well.
Let me whisper here that the most fascinating hour in the "Mouse Trap" is in the late afternoon, when no one is there, and the ebony hand-maiden in the big back kitchen is taking the fat, delicious-smelling cakes from the oven.

Drop in some afternoon and sniff the fragrance that suggests your childhood and "sponge-cake day." You will feel that it is a trap no sane mouse would ever think of leaving! On a table beside you is a slate with, obviously, the day's specials: "Spice cakes.
Chocolate cake.
Strawberry tarts with whipped cream." And still as you peep through the door at the back you see more and still more goodies coming hot and fresh and enticing from the oven.
White cakes, golden cakes, delicately browned pies,--if you are dieting by any chance you flee temptation and leave the "Mouse Trap" behind you.
It would be impossible to give even an approximately complete inventory of the representative places of the Village.

I have had to content myself with some dozen or so examples,--recorded almost haphazard, for the most part, but as I believe, more or less typical, take them all in all, of the Village eating place in its varied and rather curious manifestations.
Then there is a charming shop presided over by a pretty girl with the inevitable smock and braided hair, where tea is served in order to entice you to buy carved and painted trifles.
And then there is, or was, the place kept by Polly's brother, which was heartlessly raided by the police, and much maligned, not to say libelled, by the newspapers.
And then there was and is the "Hell Hole." Its ancient distinction used to be that it was one of the first cheap Bohemian places where women could smoke, and that it was always open.

When all the other resorts closed for the night you repaired to the "Hell Hole." As to the smoking, it has taken a good while for New York to allow its Bohemian women this privilege, though society leaders have enjoyed it for ages.

We all know that though most fashionable hotels permitted their feminine guests to smoke, the Haymarket of dubious memory always tabooed the custom to the bitter end! The "Hell Hole" has always stoutly approved of cigarettes, so all honour to it! And many a happy small-hours party has brought up there to top off the night in peace without having to keep an eye on the clock.
There is a little story told about one of these restaurants of which I have been writing--never mind which.