“Hoped she might be permitted to improve the acquaintance thus opportunely begun, by calling on Mrs. Smithson.”
Letty graciously gave the required permission, expressing all that courtesy demanded on the occasion, but carefully abstaining from appearing overwhelmed with the compliment, as many a weaker minded and less skillful tactician would have done. She knew that her cue was to meet advances half-way, but not to pass the line one hair’s breadth, if she wished any new acquaintance to be made to feel, than in seeking her, the obligation was mutual.
On the next day but one Mrs. Rodgers was ushered into Letty’s drawing-room. That lady did not detain her long before she made her appearance, but still dallied sufficiently to allow the other to take in at a rapid glance the completeness of her establishment. Her experience, however, was for once at fault, for she determined hastily that the woman who could arrange her rooms with such taste, must have been surrounded by like refinements and elegancies all her life. Her reception of Letty, therefore, when she arrived, was most cordial and impressive. The season was far advanced. Her last “Evening” was on that of the succeeding day, “and it was to secure Mrs. Smithson’s appearance as well as further to cultivate so pleasant an acquaintance thus agreeably begun, that she had called this morning, etc.”
Mrs. Smithson, on her part, would be very happy to make one at this exclusive assemblage, and a very unfashionably long visit for a morning call followed. Mrs. Rodgers was anxious to find out all about Letty, who she was, where she came from, etc.; but was foiled in all her skillful questions, by answers equally skillful. When at length she took her leave, she could not help pondering on this to herself. She admitted her curiosity about it, but wound up by saying to herself, be she who she may, she is certainly a most agreeable personage, and I think I have made a most decided hit in introducing her into our set.
As for Letty, she was all exultation on the departure of her visitor. She saw herself achieving at once the distinctions she panted after. Not only were the doors of the drawing-room of dame Fashion opened to her, but as she passed through them with firm step and head erect amid the ill-concealed envy of the crowd which filled them, she saw the curtains of the boudoir drawn aside at her approach, and she was admitted into the inmost presence-chamber of the goddess. Not so fast, Letty. You certainly have mounted the first rung of the ladder; and my readers and myself know you now too well to fear for a moment that you will go backward; but there is many a step yet to climb before you reach that giddy height on which you aspire to stand.
The next evening soon came, and after almost all the guests had assembled, Mr. and Mrs. Smithson arrived. She was arrayed in a dress of the richest kind, and with her usual faultless taste. Her ornaments were few, but elegant; the best of them being that bright, fresh face and elastic form, which the dissipation of city life had not yet impaired. She had a severe and scathing ordeal to pass. It was felt by several, with the keen intuition which women alone have, that she might prove a formidable rival. Mrs. Rodgers’ reception and treatment of her were most kind. She introduced several most desirable acquaintances to her, and the gentlemen in especial were delighted with her. Letty’s earliest allies, it may be remembered, were of the male sex; but the gallant Colonel Lumley, and that exquisite of exquisites, Mr. Tom Harrowby, were of a different stamp from Phil Dubbs and even Harry Edmonds, though the latter, in after days, achieved renown both at the bar and in the senate-chamber. The evening passed but too delightfully and too rapidly for Letty. She felt that she was at last among kindred minds, and on arriving at home, when she reviewed what had transpired as she was preparing for her night’s repose, she was satisfied that her debut had been eminently successful, and that she had made a decided hit. With visions of much future greatness before her, she fell asleep.
PÈRE-LA-CHAISE.
Engraved by J. A. Rolph.