"Does he drink at all, or is he forced to be a teetotaller?"
"Not a bit of it. He drinks at table as others do; no more, no less."
"Then he is cured," said Mrs. Bascom contentedly. "Well, I for one am glad that it's all right. Still, if he had fallen in love with me he would have remained an eminent citizen—without a hideous interval he hardly can care to recall—and become the greatest editor in California. Have they any social position in New York?"
"Probably. I did not ask. They hardly looked like outcasts. You must remember their story is wholly unknown in fashionable New York. Scarcely any one here knows any one in New York Society; or has time for it when passing through…. But I don't fancy they care particularly for Society. In Berlin, whenever it was possible, they went off by themselves. But of course it was necessary for both to go in Society there, and she must have been able to help him a good deal."
"European Society! I suppose she'll be presented to the Queen of England next!—But no! Thank heaven she can't be. Good Queen Victoria is as rigid about divorce as we are. Nor shall she ever cross my threshold if she returns here." And Mrs. Abbott scalded herself with her third cup of tea and emitted terrible sounds.
Mrs. Yorba, a tall, spare, severe-looking woman, who had taught school in New England in her youth, and never even powdered her nose, spoke for the first time. Her tones were slow and portentious, as became one who, owing to her unfortunate nativity, had sailed slowly into this castellated harbor, albeit on her husband's golden ship.
"We may no longer have it in our power to punish Mrs. Langdon Masters," she said. "But at least we shall punish others who violate our code, even as we have done in the past. San Francisco Society shall always be a model for the rest of the world."
"I hope so!" cried Mrs. McLane. "But the world has a queer fashion of changing and moving."
Mrs. Ballinger rose. "I have no misgivings for the future of our Society, Antoinette McLane. Our grandchildren will uphold the traditions we have created, for our children will pass on to them our own immutable laws. Shall we go into the front parlor? I do so want to show it to you. I have a new set of blue satin damask and a crystal chandelier."