Before they rose from the table, Plimpton approached Vickers to say that Mrs. Raikes had telephoned to ask if Mr. Robert Lee would dine with her the next evening at eight. Vickers replied that Mr. Robert Lee would be graciously minded to do so, and was delighted to see a shade of some sort settle on Nellie’s brow.
The dinner was the first of many—not only with Mrs. Raikes, but with other people. Indeed Vickers had—what is so rare in a large city like New York—a sudden and conspicuous social success. He was good-looking, he was amusing, he did not care very much what he said, or whether he were liked or not, and the result was that he had more invitations than he could accept. It was the first of April, and that short, pleasant spring season that New York social life has lately known, had set in. The winter was over, many people had gone away, but a small group of those left behind drew closer together and felt a rare impulse to be intimate. The Park was turning green, the country clubs were pleasant objects for motor trips,—altogether there was a good deal of an agreeable and informal nature to be done, and all of it Lee was asked to share.
The strange feature of it all was that there was a general understanding that Nellie and her cousin were not upon cordial terms, and that they could not both be asked on the same party. The result was that Nellie spent more time at home alone than she was accustomed to.
Mr. Lee, who had always been absolutely unconscious where or how much Nellie went out, took the keenest interest in his son’s comings and goings, and would often express to Nellie a pride in his popularity which she found rather hard to bear.
Emmons disapproved intensely.
“We have no right to foist a fellow like that on our friends, unless we are sure they know about his past.”
“Every one does know, I think.”
“They can’t, or they would not ask him. Though I must say the sort of irresponsible man he is seems to me to stick out plainly enough.”
“Does it?” said Nellie. “I don’t think so. If I met Bob now for the first time, I think I might be inclined to like him.”
The reply for some reason seemed to irritate Emmons. “Oh, then you approve of letting him loose on society,” he said somewhat illogically.