There was a time (time out of mind) in the sempiternal progress of the divadienst, at that suspensory pause in its career just prior to the advent of what was to be known as "Mawrdolatory", when the cult of Morgana Neri flourished in the hot house ambience of the Crossroads Cafe, in the shadow of the old Times building, across Broadway from the very hotel (a ghostly renovated ruin) where Caruso had sojourned in the great days, whose palmy lobby, once ormolu and velvet, had been transformed into a vast drugstore, and in Caruso's suite a podiatrist had been installed.