“Good gracious! Don’t you see? They’re women!”
He still stared at her, while his incredulous expression slowly changed to one of troubled perplexity. But he said nothing at all, and after a moment more, turned away and went to his room, where he remained until dinner-time. When he appeared at the table, he made no reference to his mistake, but reverted to the topic of which they had been speaking that afternoon before his attention wandered to the horsewomen at the porte cochère.
“Prohibition must have altered a great many people’s lives quite violently,” he said. “I suppose it was quite a shock for people who’d always had wine or Scotch at dinner—giving it up so suddenly.”
“I suppose so—I don’t know——” A little colour showed below Mrs. Troup’s eyes. “Of course, quite a number of people had supplies on hand when the day came.”
“But most of that must be gone by this time.”
“Quite a good deal of it is gone, yes; you don’t see wine very often any more. People who have any left are getting very piggish about it, I believe.”
“It must be odd,” he said contemplatively, “the whole country’s being absolutely sober and dry, like this.”
“Well——” she began; then, after a pause, went on: “It isn’t like that—exactly. You see——”
“Oh, of course there would be a few moonshine stills and low dives,” he interrupted. “But people of our circle——”
“Aren’t exactly ‘dry,’ Charles.”