"Upon my word, I don't know that that's at all a bad idea!"
CHAPTER V
"Mrs. Salisbury," said Justine, when her mistress came into the kitchen one December morning, "I've had a note from Mrs. Sargent—"
"From Mrs. Sargent?" Mrs. Salisbury repeated, astonished. And to herself she said: "She's trying to get Justine away from me!"
"She writes as Chairman of the Department of Civics of the Forum Club," pursued Justine, referring to the letter she held in her hand, "to ask me if I will address the club some Thursday on the subject of the College of Domestic Science. I know that you expect to give a card party some Thursday, and I thought I would make sure just which one you meant."
Mrs. Salisbury, taken entirely unaware, was actually speechless for a moment. The Forum was, of all her clubs, the one in which membership was most prized by the women of River Falls. It was not a large club, and she had longed for many years somehow to place her name among the eighty on its roll. The richest and most exclusive women of River Falls belonged to the Forum Club; its few rooms, situated in the business part of town, and handsomely but plainly furnished, were full of subtle reminders that here was no mere social center; here responsible members of the recently enfranchised sex met to discuss civic betterment, schools and municipal budgets, commercialized vice and child labor, library appropriations, liquor laws and sewer systems. Local politicians were beginning to respect the Forum, local newspapers reported its conventions, printed its communications.
Mrs. Salisbury was really a little bit out of place among the clever, serious young doctors, the architects, lawyers, philanthropists and writers who belonged to the club. But her membership therein was one of the things in which she felt an unalloyed satisfaction. If the discussions ever secretly bored or puzzled her, she was quite clever enough to conceal it. She sat, her handsome face, under its handsome hat, turned toward the speaker, her bright eyes immovable as she listened to reports and expositions. And, after the motion to adjourn had been duly made, she had her reward. Rich women, brilliant women, famous women chatted with her cordially as the Forum Club streamed downstairs. She was asked to luncheons, to teas; she was whirled home in the limousines of her fellow-members. No other one thing in her life seemed to Mrs. Salisbury as definite a social triumph as was her membership in the Forum.
Her election had come about simply enough, after years of secret longing to become a member. Sandy, who was about twelve at the time, during a call from Mrs. Sargent, had said innocently:
"Why haven't you ever joined the Forum, Mother?"