Mammon and Co.

by E. F. Benson

"Let us go," said Toby gravely; and he gave her his arm back into the ballroom.

Miss Murchison, when she left half an hour later with her mother, was conscious of having enjoyed herself much more than she usually did at such parties. For the most part they seemed to her sad and strange forms of amusement. She danced with a certain number of young men, who admired her pearls or her profile. It is true that both were admirable, especially her profile. But to talk to them was like talking to order through a telephone; it seemed impossible to get beyond the banalités of the day. She was labelled, as she knew, as the heiress of the year; and it was as difficult to forget that as to forget that other people remembered it. No doubt when she got to know people more intimately it would be different; but these first weeks of débutancy could not, she thought, be considered amusing.

But Toby had been a most delightful change. Here was an ordinary human young man, who did not seem to be merely a weary automaton for going from one party to another. He was fairly stupid—an unutterable relief; for if there was one mode of conversation she detested, it was cheap epigram; and he was quite sensible and natural, a relief more unutterable.

Her mother drove home with her in a state of elation. The mystic innermost shrine was going to be unlocked at last.

"Lady Conybeare said that simply no one was coming to-morrow night," she said. "We shall be six or eight only. Lord Comber, I think, is coming, and Lord Evelyn. It will be quite an arcanum. She said she would wear only a tea-gown—I should say a tea-gown only. So chic. We will have a little tea-gown party before the end of the season, dear. You and Lord Evelyn quite hobnailed together. Did you enjoy yourself, Lily?"

"Yes, very much."

"So glad, darling. I saw no pearls so good as yours. Wear them to-morrow, dear. Lady Conybeare said she adored pearls. 'Ah, Margerita!'" And Mrs. Murchison hummed a bar or two of Siebel's song in a variety of keys. "And the evening after we go to see 'Tristram and Isolde,'" she continued. "It is a gala night, and Jean de Risky plays Tristram. How lucky we were to get the box next the royal box! I hope it won't be very hot, for I hear that everybody stops to the end in 'Tristram.' There is a Leitmotif—or is it Liebstod?—at the end, which is quite marvellous, I am told. However, we can go late. I hope it will be in Italian. Italian is the only language for singing. I remember when I was a girl I used to sing 'La donna è nobile.' I forget who wrote it; those Italian names are so alike. And what did you talk to Lord Evelyn about, dear? Was he amusing? We might ask him to our box on Thursday to see 'Tristram.'"

"I don't think he cares about Wagner," said Lily; "indeed, he told me so."

"How very unfashionable! We all like Wagner now. Personally I think it is quite enchanting; but it always sends me fast asleep, though I enjoy it very much until. But there is a great sameness in the operas; they are like those novels I used to read by Mrs. Austen—'Sense and Sensibleness,' and all the rest of them about Bath and other watering-places. I thought them very tedious; but I was told one must read them. Or was it Sir George Eliot who wrote them? Dear me, how stupid of me! Sir George was there to-night, and I never once thought of telling him how much I enjoyed his charming novels!"