"If Sid should marry a homely girl, I should hate her," she said, one day. "Is he not splendid?" she would ask, when her son chanced to dwarf physically his associates.
And Sidney's exterior was admirable. He dressed perfectly, and there was about him the freshness of perpetual bathing. To Mariposilla he was the ideal type of masculine American elegance.
She scorned each day in her secret soul the careless, unconventional dress of the remaining Spanish men of her acquaintance, feasting her eyes with childish delight upon every detail of her lover's faultless attire.
Yet, withal, Sidney was not a fop. He was too blasé, and at times too sullen, to represent the gibbering class to which his immaculate and ultra-fashionable clothes might have otherwise attached him. But his unbounded reticence was his greatest protection; while it gave him, with some, a reputation for depth. Many believed that, although not brilliant in conversation, he sympathized silently with culture, and was shrewd in business affairs. In truth, Sidney had never taken an active part in his mother's financial transactions; but that her son was a dummy she carefully concealed. There was a laudable spirit in the woman's attitude. Her affectionate subserviency to her boy in the eyes of their friends was admirable.
I had so often seen wealthy mothers humiliate and belittle their sons, that, although I believed Mrs. Sanderson to be the business brains of the family, I was glad that she abstained from flaunting the fact.
I think I understood the elements of Mrs. Sanderson's character at that time quite well, with one exception. Unfortunately, I stopped too soon in my analysis. I innocently took it for granted that she possessed a moral side to her worldly and perhaps frivolous nature. Here was my fatal mistake. I did not understand that the woman would unflinchingly sacrifice any one for selfish, momentary enjoyment.
In all cases her own pleasure was suggested by the inclinations of her son. To keep him contented and passably respectable, she would have ruined her dearest friend.
Ethel Walton was arranging an entertainment to take place shortly after Easter. The girl was an enthusiast. Everything that she did called for her heart's best efforts.
Her present schemes were charitable. The Episcopal church needed an organ, and Ethel had determined that the necessary money should be raised. Her artistic and really poetic nature had found an outlet in the existing emergencies of her church, and she boldly originated a grand rose pageant. Each day she grew more enthusiastic over her prospects of success.
All the youth and beauty of Pasadena had been pressed into the carnival. The opera-house had been generously donated by the owner; while the papers each day keyed to the highest pitch the expectations of the public, by promising the most ravishing display of beauty and flowers ever gathered upon the celebrated Pacific Coast.