"And she my husband."
"Well, she's an agreeable woman, and I must go out sometimes. My acquaintance with agreeable women in New York is not very large."
"Why don't you ask your wife to go with you? I'm fond of agreeable women too."
"You are not fond of her, and I'm afraid she suspects it."
"I should think she would. Women who are glad to receive alone the calls of married men, always do suspect their wives of disliking them."
"Well, it certainly isn't her fault that men go to see her without their wives. Don't be unfair now, my dear."
"I don't think I am," responded Mrs. Belcher. "I notice that women never like other women who are great favorites with men; and there must be some good reason for it. Women like Mrs. Dillingham, who abound in physical fascinations for men, have no liking for the society of their own sex. I have never heard a woman speak well of her, and I have never heard her speak well of any other woman."
"I have, and, more than that, I have heard her speak well of you. I think she is shamefully belied. Indeed, I do not think that either of us has a better friend than she, and I have a proposition to present to you which proves it. She is willing to come to us on New Year's Day, and receive with you—to bring all her acquaintances into your house, and make them yours and mine."
"Is it possible?"
"Yes; and I think we should be most ungrateful and discourteous to her, as well as impolitic with relation to ourselves and to our social future, not to accept the proposition."