My uncle’s chauffeur met me, and he did not seem very sociable (I had not learned that you mustn’t talk to them, at that time), and after I asked him how he was and whether my aunt and uncle were well and whether they had had summer colds or hay fever, which is the way we start acquaintance in Queensburg, I stopped talking and looked. And I never saw so much to see before. It is wonderful. It took all my dreams of fairyland and made them look like a miffed ball. I looked up, and began to see why they picture the Reuben type with their mouths ajar. It is natural to let your chin droop from surprise.
“Are we almost there?” I asked, after we’d gone about a million blocks.
Jackson replied, “Not yet, miss,” and stared straight ahead.
And I said: “Well, isn’t this a long way!”
And he said: “Yes, miss.”
After that I did some more looking. . . . The dusk had fallen, and it made a lovely haze around the tops of the buildings, and looking down the side streets one could see only millions of motor head-lights, and nothing but those. And the women were so beautifully dressed! Some of them, in the passing motors, leaned way back and looked tired, but beautifully so. . . . Not as the women do around Queensburg. When they are tired they wear calico wrappers, and their backs get stooped, and usually there is a baby clinging to their skirts. . . . But here it is different. I can’t say why. The women’s eyes are narrowed as if they wanted to look tired. And they are so pretty. “Jackson,” I said, “I never saw such beautiful complexions”--no, I said, “Mr. Jackson,” then. And he said: “Yes, miss.”
Well, after a great way of this we reached a quieter section, and here, in front of a very tall, brownstone building, Jackson alighted, and I followed. A girl, whom I knew to be Evelyn, came out of a doorway, and said, “Why, what made you ride up with Jackson?” and then she turned her cheek for my kiss. And I can’t yet understand what there was about that which made me feel so hollow and cold inside.
Then she said: “Come in, and we’ll go up. I don’t think mother’s in, but she will be soon. . . . I hope your trip was pleasant?”
I replied that it was. But I don’t think she heard what I said, for we had stepped in an elevator and she was busy smiling at a man who leaned on a heavy cane.
“Charming day, Mr. Kempwood,” she said. “You’ve been motoring?”