"Fine, daughter; I never had such a good time in my life."
"Cousin James! You—dancing! You are surely jesting—you—you—a man of your age!"
"Oh, I'm not so awfully old, Cousin Park! There were men on the floor ten years older than I am—bank presidents, eminent surgeons, and several judges, all dancing the new dances with the utmost abandon."
"Well, where on earth did you learn the new dances, Cousin James?"
"Well, I never saw them danced before, so it must have been by a correspondence course." And Father winked at me.
The sepulchral butler came in to announce dinner just at this crucial moment when his irate mistress looked as though she would burst her tight black satin basque in which she had been so compactly hooked. He quavered in a sad voice: "Dinner is served," but his tone reminded me of Jeremiah, Chapter IX, first verse: "Oh, that my head were waters and mine eyes a fountain of tears that I might weep day and night!"
The dining room was one degree more cheerful than the parlor, as instead of the portraits there were Audubon prints and the Marriage of Pocahontas. A heavy walnut sideboard laden with massive silver almost filled one side of the room. The table was precisely set and the food may have been good, but everything was so ponderous, including the hostess, that when we got through with the long tiresome courses I felt like the old wolf that Mammy Susan used to tell about. He swallowed seven little kids whole and then, while he slept by the water's edge, the Widow Goat came and ripped him open, took out the dear little kids and put in their place seven huge stones. The old wolf was naturally thirsty after this surgical operation, and so was I when I had packed in and hammered down roast chicken, boiled hominy, mashed potatoes, baked rice, macaroni and I don't know what besides, except that we topped off with a plum pudding that was the last straw.
Dum looked at me aghast. "Page, you here, and Dee!"—Page 271.
I longed for sleep with an intensity that was truly painful, and I could see that poor dear Father was desperate. The conversation at the table was as heavy and starchy as the food. Father and I could not help comparing it to the gay little dinner we had enjoyed the night before at the Country Club.