'Met as acquaintances meet,Smiling, tranquil-eyed—Not even the least little beatOf the heart, upon either side!'
'Met as acquaintances meet,Smiling, tranquil-eyed—Not even the least little beatOf the heart, upon either side!'
'Met as acquaintances meet,
Smiling, tranquil-eyed—
Not even the least little beat
Of the heart, upon either side!'
But,—should old acquaintance be forgot?" she hummed. He was still a spoilt boy who had to be coaxed into good humor.
"You know what I mean, Evelyn. I feel a particular interest in having you start right here, now that you've come home to stay. People will be surprised to hear of your taking a part like that; they want to take you seriously. You've been to college—"
"Oh, Warry!" she cried appealingly. "And are you to throw this at me? A few minutes ago you were complaining that people wouldn't take you seriously,but I'm afraid they want to take me much too seriously. I don't like it! In fact, I don't intend to have it!"
"But you don't mean to get down to a level with these girls who've been ground out of boarding schools, and who don't know anything? The kind that play badly on the piano, or sing worse, and come home to mix Fifth Avenue boarding school with Missouri River every-day life!"
"I'm really disappointed in you. I supposed you weren't like the others. A few days ago some estimable women called here to get me to become a candidate for school commissioner. They talked beautifully to me. There was one of them, a Miss Morris—" Raridan extended his arms to Heaven, as if imploring mercy—"who told me that I was a bachelor of arts and that all kinds of things were therefore to be expected of me."
"But I don't mean that! It's just that sort of thing I think you ought to keep free from,—it's this awful publicity; it's making yourself public property! Women must keep out of such things. School commissioner!" His spirits were rising again and he laughed aloud.
"Wouldn't you vote for me?"
He stared. "You're not going to—"
"Decidedly not. I want you to understand, and everybody to find out that I'm a very ordinary being. I hope if I've learned anything in college it's common sense. I don't feel a bit interested in regulating the universe, or in getting more rights for women, or in politics of any kind, any more than every sane woman is interested in such things. About this carnival and the ball, I don't mind telling you that I dislike itparticularly. But I'm going to do it for two reasons, to be much franker with you than you deserve; to please father, for whom I can do very little, and to set at rest this idea about my being a divinely gifted individual who has come home from college to rub up the universe with a witch cloth. And now, Warrick Raridan, we will, if you please, consider the incident closed; and if you are very good you may dance with me at the ball."
"Oh, the noble king will have first place there."
"Well, if you're the king you can't object," she said. "I'm sure I don't know who the king's to be—"
"Well, I do—"
"Then you needn't tell me, please. I want to be surprised."
"But he's likely to be somebody you won't care to know under any circumstances," he persisted. His contempt for the carnival and his rage at the thought of this girl being publicly identified with Wheaton rose in him and he grew morose again. Evelyn, seeing another storm, approaching and wishing to restore his good humor, returned to her expected guests and her plans for entertaining them.
It must be confessed that in her heart Evelyn was one of those who, in Raridan's own phrase, did not take him seriously. She had seen more of him than of any other man. She had a great fondness for him, and she was glad to find that after her absences he always came to the house as if there had been no break, and took up their pleasant comradeship where they had left it. She had speculated not a little as to the violent flirtations which he carried on so openly, and had wondered whether he would sometime grow serious in one of them,and what manner of girl would finally steady him and win him to a real affection. She did not understand the mood that had swayed him, or that seemed about to sway him to-night; but a woman's natural instinct in such matters had warned her that he wanted to change their old attitude toward each other, and she knew that she did not want to change it. She liked his gentleness, his humor and his generous impulses. She had seen enough of the world to know that the qualities which set him apart from most men were rare. His likings in themselves were unusual, and though they were not sincere enough for his own good, they constituted an element of charm in him. His easy susceptibility was amusing; and it was no more marked in flirtations with girls than in dallyings with books or pictures or music. He was certainly a delightful companion, almost as satisfactory to talk to as a bright girl! She felt, though, that there was a real power in him; she could dramatize him in situations where he would be a leader of forlorn hopes on battlefields; but she stopped short of loving him; she had, she told herself, no idea of loving any one now; but neither did she wish to lose a friend who was so entirely agreeable and charming. She resolved as they sat talking of perfectly safe matters, that their old footing must be maintained, and she felt confident that she could manage this.
"Don't you like John Saxton very much?" he asked, and she felt that the day was saved when he would talk of another man. "I like him better all the time."
"Yes; people are saying agreeable things about him. But he's pretty serious, isn't he?"
"Well, that makes him a good companion for me, youknow. Acute gaiety is diagnosed as my chief trouble," he said, a little bitterly. He was trying to feel his way back to the talk of an hour ago, but she had resolved not to have it so.
"It's very nice of you to be kind to him."
"If you mean that I bring him up here, that isn't kindness, it's just ordinary decent humanity."
He was cheerful again, and he went away assuring her that he would be at the station to meet the approaching visitors the following afternoon. He abused himself, as he went down the hill toward the electric lights of the city, for having permitted Evelyn to defeat him in what he had intended to say. He stopped on the long viaduct that spanned the railway tracks and looked moodily down on the lights of the switch targets and the signal lanterns of the trainmen. Then he turned his eyes toward the Porter house which stood darkly against the starlit sky among the trees. As he looked a light flashed suddenly in the tower. He laughed softly to himself as he turned with a quickened step on his way.
"Maybe it's Evelyn, and maybe it's the cook; but any lady in a tower! The thought of it doth please me well."
Raridan was at the station to meet Evelyn's guests, as he had promised. He had established a claim upon their notice on the occasion of one of his visits to Evelyn at college, and he greeted them with an air of possession which would have been intolerable in another man. He pressed Miss Warren for news of the Connecticut nutmeg crop, and hoped that Miss Marshall had not lost her accent in crossing the Missouri, while he begged their baggage checks and waved their minor impedimenta into the hands of the station porters.
Wise men, long ago, abandoned the hope of accounting for college friendships in either sex, and there was nothing proved in Evelyn's case by her choice of these young women as her intimate friends. Annie Warren was as reserved and quiet as Evelyn could be in her soberest moments; Belle Marshall was as frank and friendly as Evelyn became in her lightest moods. Evelyn had been the beauty of her class; her two friends were what is called, by people that wish to be kind, nice looking. Annie Warren had been the best scholar in her class; Belle Marshall had been among the poorest; and Evelyn had maintained a happy medium between the two. And so it fortunately happened that the trio mitigated one another's imperfections.
Evelyn had summoned her guests at this time principally to have their support through the carnival. They made light of the perplexities and difficulties of Evelyn's own participation when she unfolded them; there would be a lot of fun in it, they thought, and they deemed it, too, a recognition of Evelyn's fine qualities. They were fresh from college and they could see nothing in the carnival and the coronation of the carnival's queen that was inconsistent with a girl's dignity; it ranked at least with some of the festivals of girl's colleges. The whole matter presently resolved itself into the question of clothes, and Evelyn's coronation gown was laid before them and duly praised.
"It is worth while," declared Miss Marshall, "to have a chance to wear clothes like that just once in your life."
Evelyn had discussed with her father ways and means of entertaining her guests; he was anxious for her to celebrate her home-coming with a great deal of entertaining. He preferred large functions, perhaps for the reason that he could lose himself better in them than in small gatherings, in which his responsibilities as host could not be dodged. In a large company he could take one or two of his old friends into a corner and enjoy a smoke with them. He wished Evelyn to give a lawn party before the blight of fall came upon his flowers and shrubbery; but she persuaded him to wait until after the carnival. He still felt a little guilty about having asked Evelyn to appear in this public way, but she showed no resentment; she was honestly glad to do anything that would please him. The ball was near at hand and she proposed that they give a small dinner in the interval.
"I'll ask Warry and Mr. Saxton." People were already coupling Saxton's name with Raridan's.
"Oh, yes, that's all right."
"I don't want very many; I'd like to ask the Whipples;" she went on, with the anxious, far-away look that comes into the eyes of a woman who is weighing dinner guests or matching fabrics.
"Can't you ask Wheaton?" ventured Mr. Porter cautiously from behind his paper. Men grow humble in such matters from the long series of rejections to which they are subjected by the women of their households.
"If you say so," Evelyn assented. "He isn't exciting, but Belle Marshall can get on with anybody. I'm out of practice and won't try too many. Mrs. Whipple will help over the hard places."
Finally, however, her party numbered ten, but it seemed to Wheaton a large assemblage. He had never taken a lady in to dinner before, but he had studied a book of etiquette, and the chapter on "Dining Out" had given him a hint of what was expected. It had not, however, supplied him with a fund of talk, but he was glad to find, when he reached the table, that the company was so small that talk could be general, and he was thankful for the shelter made for him by the light banter which followed the settling of chairs. Saxton went in with Evelyn, who wished to make amends for his clumsy reception on the occasion of his first appearance in the house.
"I'm glad you could come to our board once without being snubbed by the maid," she said to John, when they were seated.
"I came under convoy of Mr. Raridan this time. I find that he is pretty hard to lose."
"Oh, he's a splendid guide! He declares that there are just as interesting things to see here in Clarkson as there are in Rome or Venice. He told Miss Warren this afternoon that it would take him a month to show her half the sights."
"He certainly makes things interesting. His local history is delightful."
"Yes; father tells him that he knows nearly everything, but that the pity is it isn't all true. You see, Warry and I have known each other always. The Raridans lived very near us, just over the way."
"He has shown me the place; it's on the clay sugar loaf across the street."
"Isn't it shameful of him not to bring his ancestral home down to the street level?"
"Oh, he says he'd rather burn the money. It seems that he fought the assessment as long as he could and has refused to abide by it. He enjoys fighting it in the courts. It gives him something to do."
"That's like Warry. He can be more steadfast in error than anybody."
Raridan was exchanging chaff with Miss Marshall across the table and Wheaton was stranded for the moment.
"You must tell us about that Chinaman at your bachelors' house, Mr. Wheaton. Mr. Raridan has told me many funny stories about him, but I think he makes up most of them."
"I'd hardly dare repudiate any of Mr. Raridan'sstories; but I'll say that we couldn't get on without the Chinaman. He's a very faithful fellow."
"But Mr. Raridan says he isn't!" exclaimed Evelyn. "He says that you bachelors suffer terribly from his mistakes, and that he can't keep any rice for use at weddings because the Oriental takes it out of his pockets and makes puddings of it."
"That must be one of Mr. Raridan's jokes," said Wheaton. "We have had no rice pudding since I went to live at The Bachelors'." Wheaton was suspicious of Raridan's jokes. He was not always sure that he caught the point of them. He saw that Saxton, who sat opposite him, got on very well with Miss Porter, and he was surprised at this; he had thought Saxton very slow, and yet he seemed to be as much at his ease as Raridan, who was Wheaton's ideal master of social accomplishment. He was somewhat dismayed by the array of silver beside his plate, and he found himself covertly taking his cue from Saxton, who seemed to make his choice without difficulty. It dawned on him presently that the forks and spoons were arranged in order; that it was not necessary to exercise any judgment of selection, and he felt elated to see how easily it was managed. In his relief he engaged Miss Marshall in a talk about Richmond. He knew the names of banks and bankers there, from having looked them up in the bank directories in the course of business. He liked the Southern girl's vivacity, though he thought Evelyn much handsomer and more dignified. She asked him whether he played golf, which had just been introduced into Clarkson, and he was forced to admit that he did not; and he ventured to add that he had heard it calledan old man's game. When she replied that she shouldn't imagine then that it would interest him particularly, he felt foolish and could not think of anything to say in reply. Raridan again claimed Miss Marshall's attention, and Wheaton was drawn into talk with Evelyn and Saxton.
"Mr. Saxton has never seen one of our carnivals," she said, "and neither have I. You know I've missed them by being away so much."
"They expect to have a great entertainment this year," said Wheaton. He was sorry for the secrecy with which the names of the principal participants were guarded; he would have liked to say something to Miss Porter about it, but he did not dare, with Saxton listening. Moreover, he was not sure that she had consented to take part.
"I suppose it's a good deal like amateur theatricals, only on a larger scale," suggested Saxton.
"That's not taking the carnival in the right spirit," said Evelyn. "The word amateur is jarring, I think. We must try to imagine that King Midas really and truly comes floating down the Missouri River on a barge, supported by his men of magic, and that they are met by a delegation of the wise men of Clarkson, all properly clad, and escorted to the local parthenon, or whatever it is called, where the keys of the city are given to him. I'm sure it's all very plausible."
"But I don't see," said Saxton, "why all the western towns that go in for these carnivals have to go back to mythology and medieval customs. Why don't they use something indigenous,—the Indians for instance?"
"They're too recent," Evelyn answered. "The peoplearound here—a good many of them, at least—were here before the savages had all gone. And those whose fathers and mothers were scalped might take it as unpleasantly suggestive if a lot of white men, dressed up as Indians, paraded themselves through the streets."
"What was that about Indians?" demanded Mr. Porter, who had been busy exchanging reminiscences with Mrs. Whipple. "Why, there hasn't been an Indian on the place for twenty years!"
"Oh yes, there has, father," said Evelyn. "It was only five years ago that there were two in this room. Don't you remember, when Warry had his hobby for educating Indian youth? He brought those boys up here for Christmas dinner."
"I remember; and they didn't like turkey," added Mr. Porter. "They were hungry for their native bear meat."
"It's too bad," said Raridan sorrowfully, "that a man never can live down his good deeds."
Raridan liked to pretend that Clarkson society had a deep philosophy which he alone understood. He had fallen into his favorite rôle as a social sage for the benefit of the strangers, and Mrs. Whipple was correcting or denying what he said. He had assured the table that the supreme social test was whether people could walk on their own hardwood floors and rugs without taking the long slide into eternity. Philistines could buy hardwood floors, but only the elect could walk on them.
"Society in Clarkson is easily classified," said Raridan readily, as though he had often given thought to this subject. "There are three classes of homes in this town,namely, those in which no servants are kept, those in which two are kept, and those in which the maids wear caps."
"Warry is going from bad to worse," declared Mrs. Whipple. "I'm sure he could give in advance the menu of any dinner he's asked to."
"A tax on the memory and not on the imagination," retorted Warry.
Miss Warren was asking Mr. Porter's opinion of local political conditions which were just then attracting wide-spread attention. Mr. Porter was expressing his distrust of a leader who had leaped into fame by a violent arraignment of the rich.
"It wouldn't be so terribly hard for us all to get rich," said Warry. "I sometimes marvel at the squalor about us. All that a man need do is to concentrate his attention on one thing, and if he is capable of earning a dollar a day he can just as easily earn ten thousand a year. Why"—he continued earnestly, "I knew a fellow in Peoria, who devised a scheme for building duplicates of some of the architectural wonders of the Old World in American cities. His plan was to send out a million postal cards inviting a dollar apiece from a million people. Almost anybody can give away a dollar and not miss it."
"How did the scheme work?" asked Mr. Porter.
"It wasn't tested," answered Warry. "The doctors in the sanitarium wouldn't let him out long enough to mail his postal cards."
General Whipple persuaded Miss Marshall to tell a negro story, which she did delightfully, while the table listened. Southerners are, after all, the most naturaltalkers we have and the only ones who can talk freely of themselves without offense. Her speech was musical, and she told her story with a nice sense of its dramatic quality. At the climax, after the laughter had abated, she asked, with an air of surprise at their pleasure in her tale:
"Didn't you all ever hear that story before?" She was guiltless of final r's, and her drawl was delicious.
"Oh, Miss Marshall! Iknewyou'd say it!" Raridan appealed to the others to be sure of witnesses.
"What are you all laughing at?" demanded the girl, flushing and smiling about her.
"Oh, you did it twice!"
"Ididn'tsay it, Mr. Raridan," she said, with dignity. "I never said that after I went North to school."
"Well, Belle," said Evelyn, "I'm heartily ashamed of you. After all we did in college to break you of it, you are at it again though you've been only a few months away from us."
"It's hopeless, I'm afraid," said Miss Warren. "You know, Evelyn, she said 'I-alls' when she first came to college."
They had their coffee on the veranda, where the lights from within made a pleasant dusk about them. Porter's heart was warm with the joy of Evelyn's home-coming. She had been away from him so much that he was realizing for the first time the common experience of fathers, who find that their daughters have escaped suddenly and inexplicably from girlhood into womanhood; and yet the girl heart in her had not lost its freshness nor its thirst for pleasure. She had carried off her littlecompany charmingly; Porter had enjoyed it himself, and he felt young again in the presence of youth.
General Whipple had attached himself to one of the couples of young people that were strolling here and there in the grounds. Porter and Mrs. Whipple held the veranda alone; both were unconsciously watching Evelyn and Saxton as they walked back and forth in front of the house, talking gaily; and Porter smiled at the eagerness and quickness of her movements. Saxton's deliberateness contrasted oddly with the girl's light step. Such a girl must marry a man worthy of her; there could be no question of that; and for the first time the thought of losing her rose in his heart and numbed it.
Porter's cigar had gone out, a fact to which Mrs. Whipple called his attention.
"I've heard that it's a great compliment for a man to let his cigar go out when he's talking to a woman. But I don't believe my chatter was responsible for it this time." She nodded toward Evelyn, as if she understood what had been in his thought.
"She's very fine. Both handsome and sensible, and at our age we know how rare the combination is."
"I shall have to trust you to keep an eye on her. I want her to know the right people." He spoke between the flashes of the cigar he was relighting.
"Don't worry about her. You may trust her around the world. Evelyn has already manifested an interest in my advice," she added, smiling to herself in the dark,—"and she didn't seem much pleased with it!"
Evelyn and Saxton had met the others, who were coming up from the walks, and there was a redistribution atthe house; it was too beautiful to go in, they said, and the strolling abroad continued. A great flood of moonlight poured over the grounds. A breeze stole up from the valley and made a soothing rustle in the trees. Evelyn rescued Wheaton and Miss Warren from each other; she sent Raridan away to impart, as he said, further western lore to the Yankee. She followed, with Wheaton, the arc which the others were transcribing. A feeling of elation possessed him. The tide of good fortune was bearing him far, but memory played hide and seek with him as he walked there talking to Evelyn Porter; he was struck with the unreality of this new experience. He was afraid of blundering; of failing to meet even the trifling demands of her careless talk. He remembered once, in his train-boy days, having pressed upon a pretty girl one of Miss Braddon's novels; and the girl's scornful rejection of the book and of himself came back and mocked him. Raridan's merry laugh rang out suddenly far across the lawn; he had done more with his life than Raridan would ever do with his; Raridan was a foolish fellow. Saxton passed them with Miss Marshall; Saxton was dull; he had failed in the cattle business. James Wheaton was not a town's jester, and he was not a failure. Evelyn was telling him some of Belle Marshall's pranks at school.
"She was the greatest cut-up. I suppose she'll never change. I don't believe we do change so much as the wiseacres pretend, do you?"
She was aware that she had talked a great deal and threw out this line to him a little desperately; he was proving even more difficult than she had imagined him.He had been thinking of his mother—forgotten these many years—who was old even when he left home. He remembered her only as the dominant figure of the steaming kitchen where she had ministered with rough kindness and severity to her uncouth brood. His sisters—what loutish, brawling girls they were, and how they fought over whatever silly finery they were able to procure for themselves! A faint flower-scent rose from the soft skirts of the tall young woman beside him. He hated himself for his memories.
He felt suddenly alarmed by her question, which seemed to aim at the undercurrent of his own silent thought.
"There are those of us who ought to change," he said.
The others had straggled back toward the veranda and were disappearing indoors.
"They seem to be going in. We can find our way through the sun-porch; I suppose it might be called a moon-porch, too," she said, leading the way.
They heard the sound of the piano through the open windows, and a girl's voice broke gaily into song.
"It's Belle. She does sing those coon songs wonderfully. Let us wait here until she finishes this one." The sun-porch opened from the dining-room. They could see beyond it, into the drawing-room; the singer was in plain view, sitting at the piano; Raridan stood facing her, keeping time with an imaginary baton.
A man came unobserved to the glass door of the porch and stood unsteadily peering in. He was very dirty and balanced himself in that abandon with which intoxicated men belie Newton's discovery. He had gained thetop step with difficulty; the light from the window blinded him and for a moment he stood within the inclosure blinking. An ugly grin spread over his face as he made out the two figures by the window, and he began a laborious journey toward them. He tried to tiptoe, and this added further to his embarrassments; but the figures by the window were intent on the song and did not hear him. He drew slowly nearer; one more step and he would have concluded his journey. He poised on his toes before taking it, but the law of gravitation now asserted itself. He lunged forward heavily, casting himself upon Wheaton, and nearly knocking him from his feet.
"Jimmy," he blurted in a drunken voice. "Jim-my!"
Evelyn turned quickly and shrank back with a cry. Wheaton was slowly rallying from the shock of his surprise. He grabbed the man by the arms and began pushing him toward the door.
"Don't be alarmed," he said over his shoulder to Evelyn, who had shrunk back against the wall. "I'll manage him."
This, however, was not so easily done. The tramp, as Evelyn supposed him to be, had been sobered by Wheaton's attack. He clasped his fingers about Wheaton's throat and planted his feet firmly. He clearly intended to stand his ground, and he dug his fingers into Wheaton's neck with the intention of hurting.
"Father!" cried Evelyn once, but the song was growing noisier toward its end and the circle about the piano did not hear. She was about to call again when a heavy step sounded outside on the walk and Bishop Delafield came swiftly into the porch. He had entered thegrounds from the rear and was walking around the house to the front door.
"Quick! that man there,—I'll call the others!" cried Evelyn, still shrinking against the wall. Wheaton had been forced to his knees and his assailant was choking him. But there was no need of other help. The bishop had already seized the tramp about the body with his great hands, tearing him from Wheaton's neck. He strode, with the squirming figure in his grasp, toward an open window at the back of the glass inclosure, and pushed the man out. There was a great snorting and threshing below. The hill dipped abruptly away from this side of the house and the man had fallen several feet, into a flower bed.
"Get away from here," the bishop said, in his deep voice, "and be quick about it." The man rose and ran swiftly down the slope toward the street.
The bishop walked back to the window. The others had now hurried out in response to Evelyn's peremptory calls, and she was telling of the tramp's visit, while Wheaton received their condolences, and readjusted his tie. His collar and shirt-front showed signs of contact with dirt.
"It was a tramp," said Evelyn, as the others plied her with questions, "and he attacked Mr. Wheaton."
"Where's he gone?" demanded Porter, excitedly.
"There he goes," said the bishop, pointing toward the window. "He smelled horribly of whisky, and I dropped him gently out of the window. The shock seems to have inspired his legs."
"I'll have the police—," began Porter.
"Oh, he's gone now, Mr. Porter," said Wheaton coolly, as he restored his tie. "Bishop Delafield disposed of him so vigorously that he'll hardly come back."
"Yes, let him go," said the bishop, wiping his hands on his handkerchief. "I'm only afraid, Porter, that I've spoiled your best canna bed."
There were two separate and distinct sides to the annual carnival of the Knights of Midas. The main object to which the many committees on arrangements addressed themselves was the assembling in Clarkson of as many people as could be collected by assiduous advertising and the granting of special privileges by the railroads. The streets must be filled, and to fill them and keep them filled it was necessary to entertain the masses; and this was done by providing what the committee on publicity and promotion proclaimed to be a monster Pageant of Industry. The spectacle was not tawdry nor ugly. It did not lack touches of real beauty. The gaily decked floats, borne over the street car tracks by trolleys, were like barges from a pageant of the Old World in the long ago, impelled by mysterious forces. From many floats fireworks summoned the heavens to behold the splendor and bravery of the parade. The procession was led by the Knights of Midas, arrayed in yellow robes and wearing helmets which shone with all the effulgence of bright tin. There was a series of floats on which Commerce, Agriculture, Transportation and Manufacturing were embodied and deified in the persons of sundry young women, posed in appropriate attitudes and lifted high on uncertain pedestals for the admiration ofthe multitude. On other cars men followed strenuously their callings; coopers hammered hoops upon their barrels; a blacksmith, with an infant forge at his command, made the sparks fly from his anvil as his float rumbled by. An enormous steer was held in check by ropes, and surrounded by murderous giants from the abattoirs; Gambrinus smiled down from a proud height of kegs on men that bottled beer below. Many brass bands, including a famous cowboy band from Lone Prairie, and an Indian boy band from a Wyoming reservation, played the newest and most dashing marches of the day. Thus were the thrift, the enterprise, the audacity, and the generosity of the people of Clarkson exemplified.
Such was the first night's entertainment. The crowd which was brought to town to spend its money certainly was not defrauded. The second night it was treated to band concerts, a horse-show and other entertainments, while the Knights of Midas closed the door of their wooden temple upon all but their chosen guests. These were, of course, expected to pay a certain sum for their tickets, and the sum was not small. The Knights of Midas ball was not, it should be said, a cheap affair. Raridan and Saxton had taken a balcony box for the ball and they asked Evelyn's guests to share it with them. Raridan still growled to Saxton over what he called Evelyn's debasement, but he had said nothing more to Evelyn about it.
"Here's to the deification of Jim Wheaton," he sighed, as he and Saxton waited for the young ladies in the Porter drawing-room.
Saxton grinned at him unsympathetically.
"Stop sighing like an air-brake. You will be dancing yourself to death in an hour."
When the two young women came in, Raridan's spirits brightened. Evelyn was, Miss Marshall declared, "perfectly adorable" in her gown; but the young men did not see her. She was to go later with her father.
They were early at the hall, whose bareness had been relieved by a gay show of bunting and flags.
"I will now give you a succinct running account of the first families of this community as they assemble," Raridan announced, when they had settled in their chairs. There were no seats on the main floor, as the ceremonial part of the entertainment was brief, and the greater number of the spectators stood until it was over. An aisle was kept down the middle of the hall and on each side the crowd gossiped, while a band high above played popular airs.
"We're all here," said Raridan, when the band rested. "The butcher, the baker and the candlestick-maker; also probably some of our cooks. We are the spectators at one of Nero's matinees; the goodly knights are ready for combat, and those who have had practice in the adjacent packing houses have the best chance of winning the victory. There comes Tim Margrave, one of the merriest of them all, full of Arthurian valor and as gentle a knight as ever held lance or bought a city council. And there is the master of our largest and goriest abattoir. That is not a star on his chest, but a diamond pig, rampant on a field of dress-shirt. He used to wear it on his watch-chain, but it was too inconspicuous there—
'On his breast a five-point starPoints the way that his kingdoms are.'"
'On his breast a five-point starPoints the way that his kingdoms are.'"
'On his breast a five-point star
Points the way that his kingdoms are.'"
Miss Marshall was scrutinizing the man indicated through her opera glasses.
"Why, itisa pig!" she declared.
"Of course it is," said Warry, with an aggrieved air. "I hope you don't think I'd fib about it. Now, the girl over there by the window, with the young man with the pompadour hair, is Mabel Margrave, whose father you saw a minute ago. She is looking this way with her lorgnette; but don't flinch; there's only the plain window glass of our rude western commerce in it; she handles it awfully well, though."
"And the man coming in who looks like a statesman?" asked Miss Marshall.
"That's Wilkins, the boy orator of the Range. He palpitates with Ciceronian speech. He's our greatest authority on the demonetization of wampum. The young man who's talking to him is telling him what hot stuff he is, and that the speech he made at Tin Cup, Texas, last week on the 'Inequalities of Taxation' is the warmest little speech that has been made in this country since Patrick Henry died. He's a good thing,—Wilkins. The Indians back on the reservation, where he goes to raise the wolf's mournful howl when white people won't listen to him, call him Young-man-not-afraid-of-his-voice. Our Chinaman calls him Yung Lung. Quite a character, Wilkins."
"And," Miss Warren inquired, "the grave, handsome man, who must be an eminent jurist?"
"He does one's laundry," Raridan replied, "and," looking at his cuffs critically, "he does it rather decently."
"There's another side to this," said Saxton to MissWarren, while Raridan babbled on to the pretty Virginian. "These people have had a terribly hard time of it. They've been through a panic that would have killed an ordinary community; a good many of the nicest of them have had to begin over again; and it's uphill work. It isn't so funny when we consider that these older people have tried their level best to make the wilderness blossom as the rose, and after they'd made a fine beginning the desert repossessed it. There's something splendid in their courage."
"Yes, it's hard for us who live on the outside to appreciate it. And they seem such nice people, too."
"Don't they! They're big-hearted and plucky and generous! Eastern people don't begin to appreciate the people who do their rough work for them."
The other boxes and the gallery had filled, and the main floor was crowded, save where the broad aisle had been maintained down the center from the front door to the stage. A buzz of talk floated over the hall. The band was silent while its leader peered down upon the floor waiting his signal. He turned suddenly and the trumpets broke forth into the notes of a dignified march. All eyes turned to the front of the hall, where the knights, in their robes, preceded by the grand seneschal, bearing his staff of office, were emerging slowly from the outer door into the aisle. When the stage was reached, the procession formed in long lines, facing inward on the steps, making a path through which the governors, who were distinguished by scarlet robes, came attending the person of the king.
"All hail the king!" A crowd of knights in eveningdress, who were honorary members of the organization and had no parts in costume, sent up the shout.
"Hail to Midas!"
"Isn't he noble and grand?" shouted Raridan in Miss Marshall's ear. A murmur ran through the hall as Wheaton was recognized; his name was passed to those who did not know him, and everybody applauded. He was really imposing in the robes of his kingship. He walked with a fitting deliberation among his escort. He was conscious of the lights, the applause, the music, and of the fact that he was the center of it all. The cheers were subsiding as the party neared the throne.
"I'll wager he's badly frightened," said Raridan to Saxton.
"Don't you think it," declared Saxton, "he looks as cool as a cucumber."
"Oh, he's cool enough," grumbled Raridan.
"You see what envy will do for a man," remarked Saxton to Miss Marshall. "Mr. Raridan's simply perishing because he isn't there himself. But what's this?"
The king had reached his throne and faced the audience. All the knights bowed low; the king returned the salutation while the audience cheered.
"It's like a comic opera," said Miss Marshall.
The supreme knight advanced and handed Wheaton the scepter and there was renewed applause and cheering.
"Only funnier," said Raridan. "Yell, Saxton, yell!" He rose to his feet and led his end of the house in cheering. "It makes me think of old times at football," he declared, sinking back into his chair with an air of exhaustion, and wiping his face.
The king had seated himself, and expectancy again possessed the hall. The band struck up another air, and a line of girls in filmy, trailing gowns was filing in.
"There are the foolish virgins who didn't fill their lamps," said Raridan; "that's why they have brought bouquets."
"But they ought to have got their gowns at the same place," said Miss Marshall, who was abetting Raridan in his comments. Miss Warren and Saxton, on the other side of her, were taking it all more seriously.
"It's really very pretty and impressive," Miss Warren declared, "and not at all silly as I feared it might be."
"Well,thatis very pretty," replied Saxton.
The queen, following her ladies in waiting, had appeared at the door. There was a pause, a murmur, and then a great burst of applause as those who were in the secret identified the queen, and those who were not learned it as Evelyn's name passed from lip to lip. Whatever there was of absurdity in the scene was dispelled by Evelyn's loveliness and dignity. Her white gown intensified her fairness, and her long court train added an illusion of height. She carried her head high, with a serene air that was habitual. The charm that set her apart from other girls was in no wise lost in the mock splendor of this ceremony.
"She's as lovely as a bride," murmured Belle Marshall, so low that only Raridan heard her. Something caught in his throat and he looked steadily down upon the approaching queen and said nothing. The supreme knight descended to escort the queen to the dais. The king came down to meet her and led her to a place beside him, where they turned and faced the applauding crowd.
The grand chamberlain now stepped forward and read the proclamation of the Knights of Midas, announcing that the king had reached their city, and urging upon all subjects the duty of showing strict obedience. He read a formula to which Evelyn and Wheaton made responses. A page stood beside the queen holding a crown, which glittered with false brilliants upon a richly embroidered pillow, and when the king knelt before her, she placed it upon his head. At this there was more cheering and handclapping. Saxton glanced toward Raridan as he beat his own hands together, expecting one of Raridan's gibes at the chamberlain's bombast; but there was a fierce light in Raridan's eyes that Saxton had never seen there before. He was staring before him at Evelyn Porter, as she now sat beside Wheaton on the tawdry throne; his face was white and his lips were set. Saxton was struck with sorrow for him.
There was a stir throughout the hall. The king and queen were descending; the floor manager was already manifesting his authority.
"Let's stay here until the grand march is over," said Raridan. He had partly regained his spirits, and was again pointing out people of interest on the floor below.
"Now wasn't it magnificent?" he demanded.
"Wasn't Evelyn lovely?" exclaimed the girls in a breath.
"We didn't need this circus to prove it, did we?" asked Raridan cynically.
"Aren't there any more exercises—is it all over?" cried Miss Marshall.
"Bless us, no!" replied Raridan.
The evolutions of the grand march were now in progress and they stood watching it.
"They didn't get enough rehearsals for this," said Raridan. "Look at that mix up!" One of the knights had tripped and stumbled over the skirt of his robe. "They ought to behead him for that."
"Mr. Raridan's terribly severe," said Saxton. The king and queen, leading the march, were passing under the box.
"The king really looks scared," remarked Miss Warren.
"Yes; he's rather conscious of his clothes," said Raridan. "His train rattles him." Evelyn glanced up at them and laughed and nodded.
Before the march broke up into dancing they went down from the gallery. On the floor, the older people were resolving themselves into lay figures against the wall. They found Mr. Porter leaning against one of the rude supports of the gallery, wondering whether he might now escape to the retirement of the cloak-room to get his hat and cigar. The young people burst upon him with congratulations.
"You must he dying of pride," exclaimed Miss Marshall.
"Evelyn never looked better," declared Miss Warren. "It was splendid!"
"We are proud to know you, sir," said Raridan, shaking hands.
"I surely came to Clarkson in the right year," said Saxton.
Porter regarded them with the patronizing smile which he kept for those who praised Evelyn to his face.
"The only thing now," he said, "is to get that girl home before daylight."
"Oh, the queen gives her own orders," said Raridan. "You'll never be boss at the Hill any more!" He was bringing up all the unattached men he knew to present them to the visitors. He never forgot any one, and not merely the débutantes of other years, but girls that were voted slow in the brutal court of social opinion, were always sure of rescue at his hands. Evelyn and Wheaton were bearing down upon them; Evelyn, flushed and happy, and Wheaton in a glow from the exercise of the march and a dance with her. There was a fusillade of interjections as many crowded about with praise of the leading actors. It was all breathless and incoherent. The crowd was uncomfortably large, and the hall was hot. Porter found General Whipple and escaped with him to the smoking room. Young men were everywhere writing their names on elaborate dance cards.
"Save a few for us," Raridan pleaded airily as the men he had introduced hovered about Evelyn's guests. He made no effort to speak to Evelyn, who was besieged by a throng that wished to congratulate her or to dance with her. She gave Saxton her fingers through a rift in the crowd and he turned again to find himself deserted. Raridan was dancing with Belle Marshall and Annie Warren nodded to him over the shoulder of a youth who had waltzed her away. While Saxton waited for the quadrilles to which his dancing limitations restricted him, he made a circuit of the room. Mrs. Whipple was holding forth to a group of dowagers but turned from them to him.
"I'm hardly sure of you without Warry, and this isthe first time I've seen you alone. Of course, you were looking for me!"
"That's what I came for."
"Please say something more like that. I saw you come in, young man; they are very nice girls, too."
She was trying to remember who had told her that Saxton was stupid.
"How did you like it? This was your first, I think."
"Beautiful! charming! An enchanting entertainment!"
"Is that for you and Warry, too? He always has to approve everything here."
"Oh, I can't speak for him," John answered; "we don't necessarily always agree."
"I'll have to find out later, from him. You and Warry appear to be fast friends, and he talks a great deal. What has he told you about me?"
"He said you were kind to strange young men; but that wasn't information."
"You'll do, I think. Here comes Warry now."
Raridan came along looking for a country girl whose brother he knew, and with whom he had engaged the dance which was now in progress.
"I think she's hiding from me," he complained to Mrs. Whipple, "but the gods are kind; I can talk to you. The general is a generous man." He regarded critically a great bunch of red roses which she held in her lap. "That's why the florist didn't have any for me."
"Oh, these are Evelyn's," explained Mrs. Whipple. "She asked me to keep them for her—the king's gift, you know. I feel highly honored."
"By the king? Impossible! I'll give you something nice to let me drop them into the alley."
"Is it as bad as that? Well, good luck to you!"
He stood with his hands in his pockets looking musingly out over the heads of the dancers. Mrs. Whipple eyed him attentively.
"You know you always tell me all of them," she persisted; but he was following a fair head and a pair of graceful shoulders and ever and anon a laughing face that flashed into sight and then out of range. His rural friend's sister loomed before him, in an attitude of dejection against the wall, and he hastened to her with contrition, and made paradise fly under her feet.
Saxton was doing his best with the square dances, and had finished a quadrille with Evelyn, who had thereafter asked him to sit out a round dance with her; still Raridan did not come near them. He was busy with Evelyn's guests or immolating himself for the benefit of the country wallflowers. Supper was served at midnight in an annex of the hall.
"Here's where we forget to be polite," Raridan announced. "If we die in the struggle I hope you fair young charges will treasure our memories."
The king and queen and the high powers of the knights enjoyed the distinction of sitting at a table where they were served by waiters, while the multitude fought for their food.
"If you lose our seats while we're gone," Raridan warned Miss Marshall and Miss Warren, "you shall have only six olives apiece." He led Saxton in a descent upon an array of long tables at which men were harpooning sandwiches and dipping salad. The successfulraiders were rewarded by the waiters with cups of coffee to add to their perils as they bore their plates away. There was a great clatter and buzz in the room. On the platform where the distinguished personages of the carnival sat there was now much laughing.
"Margrave's pretty noisy to-night," observed Raridan, biting into his sandwich, and sweeping the platform with a comprehensive glance.
"You mustn't forget that this is a carnival," replied Saxton. He had followed his friend's eyes and knew that it was not the horse-laugh of Margrave that troubled him, but the vista which disclosed both Wheaton and Evelyn Porter.
"Mr. Raridan's really not so funny as Evelyn said he was," remarked Belle Marshall.
"The truth is," Raridan answered, rallying, "that I'm getting old. Miss Porter remembers only my light-hearted youth."
"Well, let's revive our youth in another food rush," suggested Saxton. They repeated their tactics of a few minutes before, returning with ice-cream, which the waiters were cutting from bricks for supplicants who stood before them in Oliver Twist's favorite attitude.
"Mr. Saxton's a terrible tenderfoot," lamented Raridan, when they returned from the charge. "He was giving your ice-cream, Miss Warren, to an old gentleman, who stood horror-struck in the midst of the carnage."
"You'd think we rehearsed our talk," Saxton objected. "He wants me to tell you that he got the poor old gentleman not only food for all his relations, but took away other people's chairs for him, as well."
"Lying isn't a lost art, after all," said Raridan.
As they returned to the hall they met a crowd of the nobility who were descending from their high seats.
"So sorry to have deserted you all evening," said Evelyn to her girl friends as they came together in a crush at the door; "but the worst is over." She looked up curiously at Raridan, who seemed purposely to have turned away to talk to Captain Wheelock, and was commenting ironically on the management that made such a mob possible. There was only a moment for any interchange, but she was sure now that Raridan was avoiding her and it touched her pride.
"I hope you won't forget our dance, Mr. Saxton," she said, struggling to follow a young man who had come to claim her. Raridan turned again, but hung protectingly over Miss Marshall, whom the noisy Margrave seemed bent on crushing. Raridan had not asked Evelyn to dance, though she had been importuned by every other man she knew, and by a great many others whom she did not know. As the gay music of a waltz carried her down the hall with a proud youngster who had been waiting for her, the lightness of her heart was gone for the moment. She remembered Raridan's curious mood on the night before her friends came, and his unfriendliness to the idea of her taking part in the carnival. She was piqued that he had studiously avoided her to-night. The others must have noticed it. Warry needed discipline; he had been spoilt and she meant to visit punishment upon him. She did not care, she told herself; whether Warry Raridan liked what she did or not.
But something of the glory of the evening haddeparted. She was really growing tired, and several of the youths who came for dances were told that they must sit them out, and she welcomed their chatter, throwing in her yes and no occasionally merely to impel them on. Wheaton had grown a little afraid of her after the glow of his royal honors had begun to fade. It is often so with players in amateur theatricals, who think they are growing wonderfully well acquainted during rehearsals; but after the performance is concluded, they are surprised to find how easily they slip back to the old footing of casual acquaintance. There was a flutter about Evelyn at the last, when her father made bold to ask her when she would be ready to go.
"The girls have already gone," he said, replying to her question. When they were in the carriage together and were rolling homeward, she gave a sigh of relief.
"Are you glad it's over?" asked her father.
"Yes, I believe I am."
"Well, they all said fine things about you, girl. I guess I've got to be proud of you." This was his way of saying that he was both proud and grateful.
As they reached the entrance to the Hill they passed another carriage just leaving the grounds. Saxton put his head out of the window and called a cheery good night, and Evelyn waved a hand to him.
"It was Warry and Saxton," said Mr. Porter. "I thought they'd stop to talk it over."
Evelyn had thought so too, but she did not say so.
Wheaton ran away from the livelier spirits of the Knights of Midas, who urged him to join in a celebration at the club after the ball broke up. He pleaded the necessity of early rising and went home and to bed, where, however, he slept little, but lay dreaming over the incidents of the night, particularly those in which he had figured. Many people had congratulated him, and while there was an irony in much of this, as if the whole proceeding were a joke, he had taken it all in the spirit, in which it had been offered. He felt a trifle anxious as to his reception at the breakfast table as he dressed, but his mirror gave him confidence. The night had been an important one for him, and he could afford to bear with his fellows, who would, he knew, spare him no more than they spared any one else in their chaff.
They flaunted at him the morning papers with portraits of the king and queen of the ball bracketed together in double column. He took the papers from them as he replied to their ironies, and casually inspected them while the Chinaman brought in his breakfast.
"Didn't expect to see you this morning," said Caldwell, the Transcontinental agent, stirring his coffee andwinking at Brown, the smelter manager. "You society men are usually shy at breakfast."
Wheaton put down his paper carelessly, and spread his napkin.
"Oh, a king has to eat," said Brown.
"Well," said Wheaton, with an air of relief, "it's worth something to be alive the morning after."
But they had no sympathy for him.
"Listen to him," said Caldwell derisively, "just as if he didn't wish he could do it all over again to-night."
"Not for a million dollars," declared Wheaton, shaking his head dolefully.
"Yes," said Captain Wheelock, "I suppose that show last night bored you nearly to death."
"I'm always glad to see these fellows sacrifice themselves for the public good," said Brown. "Wheaton's a martyr now, with a nice pink halo."
"Well, it doesn't go here," said the army officer severely. "We've got to take him down a peg if he gets too gay."
"Why, we've already got one sassiety man in the house," said Caldwell, "and that's hard enough to bear." He referred to Raridan, who was breakfasting in his room.
They were addressing one another, rather than Wheaton, whose presence they affected to ignore.
"I suppose there'll be no holding him now," said Caldwell. "It's like the taste for strong drink, this society business. They never get over it. It's ruined Raridan; he'd be a good fellow if it wasn't for that."
"Humph! you fellows are envious," said Wheaton, with an effort at swagger.
"Oh, I don't know!" said Brown, with rising inflection. "I suppose any of us could do it if we'd put up the money."
"Well," said Wheaton, "if they let you off as cheaply as they did me, you may call it a bargain."
"Oh, he jewed 'em down," persisted Caldwell, explaining to the others, "and he has the cheek to boast of it. I'll see that Margrave hears that."
"Yes, you do that," Wheaton retorted. "Everybody knows that Margrave's an easy mark." This counted as a palpable hit with Brown and Wheelock. Margrave was notorious for his hard bargains. Wheaton gathered up his papers and went out.
"He takes it pretty well," said Caldwell as they heard the door close after Wheaton. "He ought to make a pretty good fellow in time if he doesn't get stuck on himself."
"Well, I guess Billy Porter'll take him down if he gets too gay," exclaimed Brown.
"Porter may leave it to his daughter to do that," said Caldwell, shaking out the match with which he had lighted his cigar, and dropping it into his coffee cup.
"It'll never come to that," returned Brown.
"You never can tell. People were looking wise about it last night," said Captain Wheelock, who was a purveyor of gossip.
"Don't trouble yourself," volunteered Caldwell, who read the society items thoroughly every morning and created a social fabric out of them. "I guess Warry will have something to say to that."
At the bank Wheaton found that the men who camein to transact business had a knowing nod for him, that implied a common knowledge of matters which it was not necessary to discuss. A good many who came to his desk asked him if he was tired. They referred to the carnival ball as a "push" and said it was "great" with all the emphasis that slang has imparted to these words.
Porter came down early and enveloped himself in a cloud of smoke. This in the bank was the outward and visible sign of a "grouch." When he pressed the button to call one of the messengers, he pushed it long and hard, so that the boys remarked to one another that the boss had been out late last night and wasn't feeling good.
Porter did not mention the ball to Wheaton in any way, except when he threw over to him a memorandum of the bank's subscription to the fund, remarking: "Send them a check. That's all of that for one year."
Wheaton made no reply, but did as Porter bade him. It was his business to accommodate himself to the president's moods, and he was very successful in doing so. A few of the bank's customers made use of him as a kind of human barometer, telephoning sometimes to ask how the old man was feeling, and whether it was a good time to approach him. He attributed the president's reticence this morning to late hours, and was very careful to answer promptly when Porter spoke to him. He knew that there would be no recognition by Porter of the fact that he had participated in a public function the night before; he would have to gather the glory of it elsewhere. He thought of Evelyn in moments when his work was not pressing, andwondered whether he could safely ask her father how she stood the night's gaiety. It occurred to him to pay his compliments by telephone; Raridan was always telephoning to girls; but he could not quite put himself in Raridan's place. Warry presumed a good deal, and was younger; he did many things which Wheaton considered undignified, though he envied the younger man's ease in carrying them off.
One of Porter's callers asked how Miss Porter had "stood the racket," as he phrased it.
"Don't ask me," growled Porter. "Didn't show up for breakfast."
William Porter did not often eat salad at midnight, but when he did it punished him.
As Wheaton was opening the afternoon mail he was called to the telephone-box to speak to Mrs. Jordan, a lady whom he had met at the ball. She was inviting a few friends for dinner the next evening to meet some guests who were with her for the carnival. She begged that Mr. Wheaton would pardon the informality of the invitation and come. He answered that he should be very glad to come; but when he got back to his desk he realized that he had probably made a mistake; the Jordans were socially anomalous, and there was nothing to be gained by cultivating them. However, he consoled himself with the recollection of one of Raridan's social dicta—that a dinner invitation should never be declined unless smallpox existed in the house of the hostess. He swayed between the disposition to consider the Jordans patronizingly and an honest feeling of gratitude for their invitation, as he bent over his desk signing drafts.
He found the Jordans very cordial. He was their star, and they made much of him; he was pleased that they showed him a real deference; when he spoke at the table, the others paused to listen. He knew the other young men slightly; one was a clerk in a railway office, and the other was the assistant manager of the city's largest dry goods house. The guests were young women from Mrs. Jordan's old home, in Piqua, Ohio. (Mrs. Jordan always gave the name of the state.) Wheaton realized that these young women were much easier to get on with than Miss Porter and other young women he had known latterly; they were more pointedly interested in pleasing him.
After a few days the carnival seemed to be forgotten; Wheaton's fellows at The Bachelors' stopped joking him about it. Raridan had never referred to it at all. On Sunday the newspapers printed a résumé of the social features of the carnival, and Wheaton read the familiar story, and all the other social news in the paper, in bed. He noticed with a twinge an item stating that Mrs. J. Elihu Jordan had entertained at dinner on Thursday evening for the Misses Sweetser, of Piqua, but was relieved to find that neither paper printed the names of the guests. The bachelors were very lazy on Sunday morning, excepting Raridan, who attended what he called "early church." This practice his fellow-lodgers accepted in silence as one of his vagaries. That a man should go to church at seven o'clock and then again at eleven, signified mere eccentricity to Raridan's fellow-boarders, who were not instructed in catholic practices, but divided their own Sundaymornings much more rationally between the barber shop, the post-office and their places of business.
It was a bright morning; the week just ended had been, in a sense, epochal, and Wheaton resolved to go to church. It had been his habit to attend services occasionally, on Sunday evenings, at the People's Church, whose minister frequently found occasion to preach on topics of the day or on literary subjects. Doctor Morningstar was the most popular preacher in Clarkson; the People's Church was filled at all services; on Sunday evenings it was crowded. Doctor Morningstar's series of lectures on the Italian Renaissance, illustrated by the stereopticon, and his even more popular course of lectures on the Victorian novelists, had appealed to Wheaton and to many; but the People's Church was not fashionable; he decided to go this morning to St. Paul's, the Episcopal Cathedral. It was the oldest church in town, and many of the first families attended there. All fashionable weddings in Clarkson were held in the cathedral, not because it was popularly supposed to confer a spiritual benefit upon those who were blessed from its altar, but for the more excellent reason that the main aisle of this Gothic edifice gave ample space for the free sweep of bridal trains, and the chancel lent itself charmingly to the decorative purposes of the florist.
Wheaton found Raridan breakfasting alone, the others of the mess not having appeared. Raridan's good morning was not very cordial; he had worn a gloomy air for several days. Whenever Raridan seemed out of sorts, Caldwell always declared solemnly that Warry had been writing poetry.
"Going to church as usual?" Wheaton asked amiably.
Every Sunday morning some one asked Raridan this question; he supposed Wheaton was attempting to be facetious.
"Yes," he answered patiently; and added, as usual, "better go along."
"Don't care if I do," Wheaton replied, carelessly.
Raridan eyed him in surprise.
"Oh! glad to have you."
They walked toward the cathedral together, Wheaton satisfied that his own hat was as shiny and his frock coat as proper as Raridan's; their gloves were almost of the same shade. There was a stir in the vestibule of the cathedral, which many people in their Sunday finery were entering. Wheaton had never been in an Episcopal church before; it all seemed very strange to him—the rambling music of the voluntary, the unfamiliar scenes depicted on the stained glass windows, the soft light through which he saw well-dressed people coming to their places, and the scent of flowers and the faint breath of orris from the skirts of women. The boy choir came in singing a stirring processional that was both challenge and inspiration. It was like witnessing a little drama: the procession, the singing, the flutter of surplices as the choir found their stalls in the dim chancel. Raridan bowed when the processional cross passed him. Wheaton observed that no one else did so.
A young clergyman began reading the service, and Wheaton followed it in the prayer book which Raridan handed him with the places marked. He felt ashamed that the people about him should see that theplaces had to be found for him; he wished to have the appearance of being very much at home. He suddenly caught sight of Evelyn Porter's profile far across the church, and presently her father and their guests were disclosed. He soon discovered others that he knew, with surprise that so many men of unimpeachable position in town were there. Here, then, was a stage of development that he had not reckoned with; surely it was a very respectable thing to go to church,—to this church, at least,—on Sunday mornings. The bewilderment of reading and chanting continued, and he wondered whether there would be a sermon; at Doctor Morningstar's the sermon was the main thing. He remembered Captain Wheelock's joke with Raridan, that "the Episcopal Church had neither politics nor religion;" but it was at least very aristocratic.
He stood and seated himself many times, bowing his head on the seat in front of him when the others knelt, and now the great figure of Bishop Delafield came from somewhere in the depths of the chancel and rose in the pulpit. The presence of the bishop reminded him unpleasantly of the Porters' sun-porch and of the disgraceful encounter there. The congregation resettled themselves in their places with a rustle of skirts and a rattling of books into the racks. It was not often that the bishop appeared in his cathedral; he was rarely in his see city on Sundays; but whenever he preached men listened to him. Wheaton was relieved to find that there was to be a cessation of the standing up and sitting down which seemed so complicated.