Dined last night with Philippe Erlanger at the Elysée Club, a sort of superior Sardi's with a ground floor catering to after-theatre supperers, and a private membership sous-sol for solvent artists, mostly theatrical. As we began our turbot à la reine, who should be ushered to the next table but Noël Coward, alone, who proceeded to order an incongruous meal of snails and hot chocolate. While Philippe ever so properly continued his ceaseless chatter (suddenly more discreet), Coward and I intensely examined each other and calculated our separate advantages. I lit a cigaret [sic], he hummed the opening bars of "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes," I nodded bonjour, he spoke: "But haven't I seen you before?" "No," I replied. "I'd have remembered."...