"Then there's Carminetti's," Clytie recalled, now. "That's modern enough, and typical of San Francisco, isn't it? I mean not so much what's done there, as the way they do it. I've always wanted to go down there some Saturday night and see just what it's like."
"I wouldn't want you to be seen there, Cly, it wouldn't do." Cayley shook his head decidedly.
"Why wouldn't it do?"
"It's a little too lively a crowd. You'd be disgusted, if they happened to hit things up a bit, as they often do."
"I don't see why I shouldn't be privileged to see what is going on. It's a part of my education, isn't it? It's all innocent enough, from what you say; it's at worst nothing but vulgar. I think I am proof against that."
"People would get an altogether wrong opinion of you. They'd think you were fast."
"I fast?" Clytie smiled. "I think I can risk that. I shouldn't probably want to go more than once, it's true. You don't know me, that's all. You don't believe that I can go from one world of convention to another and accept the new rules of life when it's necessary. It's just for that reason that I do wish to go—as, when I went to London, I wanted to see if I could accept all their slow, poky methods of business and transportation and everything and find out the reason of it all for myself, before I thought of criticizing it. I want to understand Carminetti's, if I can, and if you won't take me, I'll find some one who will."
"Granthope, perhaps?" Cayley suggested with irony.
"I have no doubt he'd understand my motives better than you do!"
"Well, it might be an interesting experiment. Miss Payson at Carminetti's—there's a San Francisco contrast for you!"