When the dizziness had gone, I was called to the business of the hour by Tumbleton Wherry, who dropped in my lap a corn-cob pipe tied with pink ribbon and hurried on. So I gathered my feet together, and by sliding madly across the room, managed to place it in the hands of Miss Veal before the Rollers Club fellow could claim her by the presentation of a gilt paper pin-wheel. Oh, but that girl can glide! Perhaps it was the sudden contrast with the hopping performance of Mrs. Radigan that made my new partner seem immaterial. I seemed to be clasping merely a bust, she moved so easily, and I found myself doubting if she had any feet at all, even going to the extent of kicking, gently, to satisfy myself. There was nothing there, she glided so airily. It is the Chicago way. I cannot say that I like it. It is uncanny. Still, it is, perhaps, preferable to the Boston style, which requires that the young woman stand erect like a soldier and move around as though she had castors on the soles of her shoes. But Miss Veal compensated for her over-gracefulness by not talking, which is a blessing, for nothing is so trying as to have to make remarks about this dance being better than some others when a mesh of pink trimmings is swishing around your feet.
Then she smiled! That smile went to many hearts, and when it was seen that I knew her I was besieged with demands to be presented. Consequently she had what society calls a good time, and when along toward morning the band struck up "Home, Sweet Home," she was hung over with favors till she looked like a Christmas-tree, and, besides I had to carry to the automobile for her a whole grab-bag full of corn-cob pipes and pin-wheels.
I walked home with the other Rollers Club fellow. He was very silent. It seems she danced just once around the room with him and then sailed off and sat in a quiet corner for a whole half-hour with young Plumstone Smith. The future is all clear now. From the Rollers Club fellow to Plumstone Smith, then a Williegilt, who will give place to a title and a real wedding with a riot.
Mrs. Radigan Captures Miss Bumpschus
If Solomon had been living in these days he would have classed the doings of society folk with the ship on the sea, the snake on a rock, and the way of a man with a maid, the things that pass understanding. Why, for instance, should people who have a comfortable home of their own and money to buy their seats in a theatre, or, indeed, the theatre itself, like the Williegilts, wittingly accept an invitation from the Radigans for dinner and the play, and supper at Flurry's afterward? It meant six hours with that remarkable family, or one-quarter of a day, and when we consider that even the Williegilts' days are numbered, we begin to wonder if it can be true that of all the animals, man is the most intelligent. Stranger still, now that the Williegilts have placed on the broad brow of Mrs. Radigan the laurel wreath of social victory, there are in the town a thousand simple, unambitious souls who would give a year of their lives for six hours with a woman so conspicuous as my friend. The Radigans are in. The Radigans are smart. And by smartness we mean that highly intellectual state which requires yachts, horses, automobiles, dancing, and bridge to keep the mind occupied.
I was walking up the avenue the other afternoon when a brougham swerved into the curb, and a familiar voice hailed me and bade me get in, as she wanted to see me. There is no mistaking a Radigan carriage. They are always perfectly turned out, though I have suspected that the mistress would have three men on the box were there room. She makes up for this misfortune, however, by adopting the London wrinkle of having her footman sit with hands clasped and uplifted in an attitude of prayer; and as I had recognized one of my bandy-legged cynics of the Westbury days at his devotions as the equipage approached, I was prepared to be gathered in. Mrs. Radigan simply had to have me to dinner. Young Plumstone Smith had accepted and then backed out, pleading grippe, though she had seen him going to the Grand Central in a hansom. She must have me to fill in, and though I am accustomed to filling in, I doubt that even the astonishing fact that the Williegilts were coming would have enticed me, but then Miss Ethel Bumpschus was to be there, and I surrendered. I had seen the young woman's picture covering the half-page over the society notes in the Sunday paper, showing her with lustrous eyes and a furry thing around her neck, an Oriental beauty reduced to New York; and on the promise that I should take her in, I accepted. When I heard what was on the programme, dinner, the play, and supper, I asked Mrs. Radigan if we should bring trunks, and she said of course not.
But there were times that evening when it seemed to me that we were of one family, the Radigans, the Williegilts, all of us; that we had lived together all our lives and were to spend eternity in company. It began at seven o'clock, very informally, and when I entered the drawing-room the very last, prepared to besiege Miss Bumpschus, I had suddenly impressed on me a profound respect for the art of photography. She seemed to have aged since Sunday, and though she slipped her arm through mine and worked her way with me through a maze of chairs and tables to the dining-room, I felt that, after all, Mrs. Radigan had taken me in.