"I always had a mental reservation on Fenton," remarked another. "He was always insisting that his soul was his own, don't you know; and when a man keeps that up I always conclude that he has his private doubts on the subject; or if he hasn't, I have."
"That's about the case with all the musical rowing we've been having for the last year or two; every musician has been in a fever lest he should be thought to be truckling to somebody."
"What rubbish all this concert business is," remarked Tom. "In Boston a concert interests a little clique of people, and another bigger clique pretend to be interested. The nonsense that is talked about music here is nauseating. The public doesn't really care any thing about it. In Boston a concert is given in Music Hall; but in Paris it is given in the whole city. It is an event there, not a trifling incident."
"What do you know about music?" retorted the player, clashing a furious discord with his elbow as he turned towards the speaker. "I'll attend to you presently. Now I want to know about Fenton. What has he done that you are all blackguarding him?"
"I think he's got a creed," said Ainsworth, scowling and smiling together, according to his wont. "I hate to charge a man with any thing so black, but I think Fenton's wife has made him take a creed, and a pretty damned narrow one at that."
"By Jove!" the musician observed, solemnly. "It's too bad. Fenton is a mighty bright fellow, and no end obliging."
"If it's only a creed," swore Bently, "what's all this fuss about?
Every body has a creed, hasn't he? A man's temperament is his creed."
"It isn't his having a creed that I object to," remarked Grant Herman; "it is the question of his sincerity that troubles me. If he has taken up some collection of dogmas merely to please his wife—who seems a very sweet, quiet body—that is of course against him; but if he believes it, I don't see why we should object."
"Believes it!" sniffed Ainsworth, in great contempt. "That is worse than any thing I've said. I don't think Fenton is quite such an idiot as that comes to. The idea of his believing in Puritanism! Oh, good Lord!"
"Puritanism," Bently threw in irrelevantly, and because he liked the sound of it, "Puritanism is the preliminary rottenness of New England. If he is struck with that by all means let him go; the further the better."