"You never can tell. People were looking wise about it last night," said Captain Wheelock, who was a purveyor of gossip.
"Don't trouble yourself," volunteered Caldwell, who read the society items thoroughly every morning and created a social fabric out of them. "I guess Warry will have something to say to that."
At the bank Wheaton found that the men who came in to transact business had a knowing nod for him, that implied a common knowledge of matters which it was not necessary to discuss. A good many who came to his desk asked him if he was tired. They referred to the carnival ball as a "push" and said it was "great" with all the emphasis that slang has imparted to these words.
Porter came down early and enveloped himself in a cloud of smoke. This in the bank was the outward and visible sign of a "grouch." When he pressed the button to call one of the messengers, he pushed it long and hard, so that the boys remarked to one another that the boss had been out late last night and wasn't feeling good.
Porter did not mention the ball to Wheaton in any way, except when he threw over to him a memorandum of the bank's subscription to the fund, remarking: "Send them a check. That's all of that for one year."
Wheaton made no reply, but did as Porter bade him. It was his business to accommodate himself to the president's moods, and he was very successful in doing so. A few of the bank's customers made use of him as a kind of human barometer, telephoning sometimes to ask how the old man was feeling, and whether it was a good time to approach him. He attributed the president's reticence this morning to late hours, and was very careful to answer promptly when Porter spoke to him. He knew that there would be no recognition by Porter of the fact that he had participated in a public function the night before; he would have to gather the glory of it elsewhere. He thought of Evelyn in moments when his work was not pressing, and wondered whether he could safely ask her father how she stood the night's gaiety. It occurred to him to pay his compliments by telephone; Raridan was always telephoning to girls; but he could not quite put himself in Raridan's place. Warry presumed a good deal, and was younger; he did many things which Wheaton considered undignified, though he envied the younger man's ease in carrying them off.
One of Porter's callers asked how Miss Porter had "stood the racket," as he phrased it.
"Don't ask me," growled Porter. "Didn't show up for breakfast."
William Porter did not often eat salad at midnight, but when he did it punished him.
As Wheaton was opening the afternoon mail he was called to the telephone-box to speak to Mrs. Jordan, a lady whom he had met at the ball. She was inviting a few friends for dinner the next evening to meet some guests who were with her for the carnival. She begged that Mr. Wheaton would pardon the informality of the invitation and come. He answered that he should be very glad to come; but when he got back to his desk he realized that he had probably made a mistake; the Jordans were socially anomalous, and there was nothing to be gained by cultivating them. However, he consoled himself with the recollection of one of Raridan's social dicta—that a dinner invitation should never be declined unless smallpox existed in the house of the hostess. He swayed between the disposition to consider the Jordans patronizingly and an honest feeling of gratitude for their invitation, as he bent over his desk signing drafts.