By a strange insidiousness the evil rhythms had infected the general public. The oligarchy was infatuated to the point of finding any place a fit place. The aged were hobbling about. The very children were capering and refusing the more hallowed dances.
Forbes was not ready to see how quickly such things lose their wickedness as they lose their novelty and rarity. "The devil has had those tunes long enough," said John Wesley, as he turned the ribald street ballads into hymns.
But with Forbes, as with everybody, vice lost her hideous mien when her face became familiar. Like everybody else, he first endured, then pitied, then embraced. Later he would talk as Persis did and Ten Eyck; he would proclaim the turkey-trot a harmless romp, and the tango a simple walk around. Later still he would turn from them all in disgust, not because he repented, but because they were tiresome. But for the present he was smitten with revulsion. The very quality of the company had served as a proof of the evil motive.
Even though he told Willie Enslee he saw nothing wrong, he sat gasping as at a turbulent pool of iniquity.
Motherly dowagers in ball costumes bumped and caromed from the ample forms of procuresses. Young women of high degree in the arms of the scions of great houses jostled and drifted with walkers of the better streets, chorus-girls who "saved their salary," sirens from behind the counters.
As the dance swirled round and round among the gilded pillars, the same couples reeled again and again into view and out, like passengers on a merry-go-round.
Forbes watched with the eager eyes of a fisher the reappearance of Persis. It pleased him to see in her manner, and in Ten Eyck's, an entire absence of grossness; but it hurt him surprisingly to see her in such a crew and responding to the music of songs whose words, unsung but easily remembered or imagined, were all concerned with "teasing," "squeezing," "tantalizing," "hypnotizing," "honey babe," "hold me tight," "keep on a-playin'," "don't stop till I drop," and all the amorous animality of the slums.
He found himself indignant at Ten Eyck's intimacy with the wonderful girl. They clung together as closely as they could and breathe. Now they sidled, now they trotted, now twirled madly as on a pivot. Their feet seemed to be manacled together except when they dipped a knee almost to the ground and thrust the other foot far back.
Then gradually, in spite of him, the music began to invade his own feet. He felt a yearning in his ankles. The tune took on a kind of care-free swagger, a flip boastfulness. He wanted to get up and brag, too. His feeling for Ten Eyck was not of reproof, but of envy. He longed to take his place.
When at length the music ended he felt as if he had missed an opportunity that he must not miss again. He had witnessed a display of knowledge which he must make his own.