"What? About our social position? Ours is as good as theirs, I fancy."
"Oh yes, Wilbur. She acknowledges that herself. She admires us both and she thinks it fine that we don't care for that sort of thing. What she said was chiefly in connection with herself, but she intimated that neither they, nor we, are the—er—equals of the people who live on Fifth Avenue and thereabouts. She's a cousin of the Morton Prices, whoever they may be, and she declared perfectly frankly that they were better than she. Wasn't it funny?"
"You seem to have made considerable progress for one visit."
"I like that, you know, Wilbur. I prefer people who are willing to tell me their real feelings at once."
"Morton Price is one of the big bugs. His great grandfather was among the wise, shrewd pioneers in the commercial progress of the city. The present generation are eminently respectable, very dignified, mildly philanthropic, somewhat self-indulgent, reasonably harmless, decidedly ornamental and rather dull."
"But Mrs. Williams says that she will never be happy until her relations and the people of that set are obliged to take notice of her, and that she and her husband are going to cut a dash to attract attention. It's her secret."
"The cat which she let out of the bag is a familiar one. She must be amusing, provided she is not vulgar."
"I don't think she's vulgar, Wilbur. She wears gorgeous clothes, but they're extremely pretty. She said that she called on me because she thought that we were literary, and that she desired an antidote to the banker's business, which shows she isn't altogether worldly. She wishes us to dine with them soon."
"That's neighborly."
"Why was it, Wilbur, that you didn't buy our house instead of hiring it?"