Azalea had expected a negative answer, so she was not disappointed. But Marjorie added,
“I’m sure I shan’t forget any of my friends.”
“Doubtless! The difficulty will lie in remembering all your active enemies!”
“Oh, Miss Deane—I mean Azalea—what shocking things you say! Surely, I don’t have to ask people who have—that is, who haven’t—who aren’t exactly what you might call friendly with me?”
“Positively!”
“Oh, but that doesn’t seem right!” protested Marjorie, in dismay. “It’s deceitful! There’s no use liking people if you treat the ones you don’t like just as well!”
“Sound logic, my dear, but impractical from a social standpoint. You see, it’s something like this—” Azalea slipped a thin gold bracelet from her arm, pouring within and about it, a quantity of pen nibs. “Society is like this bangle, and these nibs are the people who compose it. I’ll jostle the desk and then see what happens to those who are not safe within its golden boundary. They fall off and go down to oblivion. The others, though disturbed, are in a sense secure, so you can see, my dear, that the paramount business of life in the Capital is to get inside. Of course, there are circles within circles, and you must learn about them, later. But for the moment, concentrate upon getting within the shining rim. Once there, you can stick, and prick, and jab, and stab to your heart’s content, and you need not treat your friends and enemies alike. But until you do get there—well, you really won’t matter, one way or the other. Your friendship will be prized scarcely more than your enmity will be deplored.”
“But,” objected Marjorie. “I never heard of dividing people into lots, unless—” a sudden thought occurred to her “—unless you mean that all the nice people are inside and the other kind are not. Is that it?”
“Indubitably,” laughed Azalea. “And you must affirm your belief that this is so, on each and every occasion.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”