All the cringing Peons in the big Stockade hated him because he had a Drag. It was up to him to deliver the Merchandise and demonstrate that he was a Human Being rather than a College Graduate.
In the meantime, the Spectators were hoping that he would Skid and go into the Fence.
He began to wear his Frat pin on his undershirt, and he had no time to frivol away on the fluffy Gender, because he expected to be sitting in the Directors' Room in a couple of years, talking it over with Henry C. Frick.
So he waved aside the Square Envelopes and allowed himself to be billed all over the Macaroon Circuit as a Woman-Hater.
Of course he girled in a conservative way, but he merely trailed. He did not buzz, or throw himself at the fallen Handkerchief, or run to get the Wraps, or do any of the Stuff that marks the true and bounden Captive.
When he found himself in the cushioned Lair of a Feline, he would lean back in perfect Security, knowing that even if she exercised her entire repertoire of Wiles, she could not warm the Dead Heart nor stir into life the fallen Rose Leaves of Romance.
All the time she was spilling her familiar line of Chatter, he would look at her with an arid and patronizing Smile, such as the Harvard Man produces when he finds himself in immediate juxtaposition to some human Caterpillar from west of Pittsburgh.
Very often, when the registered Dolly Grays got together for a Bon-Bon
Orgy, some one would say, "Oh, Crickey, ain't he the regular Cynic?"
Another might suggest that he was hiding a great Sorrow, his whole
Existence having been embittered by the faithlessness of some Creature.
Then they would take a Vote and decide that he was a plain Mutt.
The Chauncey who refuses to reciprocate will excite more Conversation than a regular Union Lover, but it is Lucky for him that he does not hear all the Conversation.
Walter at the age of twenty-five thought he was too old and sedate to be a Diner-Out and Dancing Devil.