"Yes," she replied, with energy. "That's what all these fine people have done, and that's the way they know each other so well. All the Americans are intimate in Paris, and then when they come back they are all friends together."
Mr. Fairchild listened and pondered. He was as tired as his wife with nothing to do; and moreover deeply mortified, though he said less about it, at not being admitted among those with whom he had no tastes or associations in common, and he consented.
The house was shut up and the Fairchilds were off.
"Who are those Fairchilds," asked somebody in Paris, "that one sees every where, where money can gain admittance?"
"Oh, I don't know," replied Miss Rutherford. "They traveled down the Rhine with us last summer, and were our perfect torment. We could not shake them off."
"What sort of people are they?" was the next question.
"Ignorant past belief: but that would not so much matter if she were not such a spiteful little creature. I declare I heard more gossip and ill-natured stories from her about Americans in Paris than I ever heard in all the rest of my life put together."
"And rich?"
"Yes, I suppose so—for they spent absurdly. They are just those ignorant, vulgar people that one only meets in traveling, and that make us blush for our country and countrymen. Such people should not have passports."