“He’s an interesting outgrowth of our unique social system, eh?”
“We must follow Emerson and treat them all as we do pictures, look at them in the best light,” murmured Carmen.
“Aye, hang them in the best light!” returned Haynerd. “But make sure they’re well hung! There goes the pseudo-princess, member of the royal house of England. She carries the royal taint, too. I tell you, under the splash and glitter you can see the feet of clay, eh?”
“Yes,” smiled Carmen, “resting upon the high heel.”
“Huh!” muttered Haynerd, with a gesture of disgust. “The women of fashion seem to feel that the Creator didn’t do a good job when He designed the feminine sex––that He should have put a hump where the heel is, so’s to slant the foot and make comfortable walking impossible, as well as to insure a plentiful crop of foot-troubles and deformities. The Chinese women used to manifest a similarly insane thought. Good heavens! High heel, low brain! The human mind is a cave of black ignorance!”
Carmen did not reply, but bent her attention again to the throng below.
“Look there,” said Haynerd, indicating a stout, full-toiletted woman, resplendent with diamonds. “That’s our 47 eminent French guest, Madam Carot. She severed herself from her tiresome consort last year by means of a bichloride tablet deftly immersed in his coffee, and then, leaving a sigh of regret hovering over his unhandsome remains, hastened to our friendly shores, to grace the beau monde with her gowns and jewels.”
Carmen turned to him with a remonstrance of incredulity.
“Fact,” he stubbornly insisted. “The Social Era got the whole spicy story. And there beside her is our indispensable Mrs. T. Oliver Pennymon. See, she’s drifted up to young Watson! Coquetting for a husband still, the old buzzard!”
“Mr. Haynerd!”