Of course there is a small set who affect not to mingle freely with
newly prosperous people like the Hilbroughs. These are they in whose
estimation wealth and distinction only gain their proper flavor--their
bouquet, so to speak--by resting stagnant for three generations, for
gentility, like game, acquires an admirable highness by the lapse of
time. Descendants of the Lord knows whom, with fortunes made the devil
knows how, fondly imagine that a village storekeeper who has risen to
affluence is somehow inferior to the grandson of a Dutch sailor who
amassed a fortune by illicit trade with the Madagascar pirates, or a
worse trade in rum and blackamoors on the Guinea coast, and that a
quondam bookkeeper who has fairly won position and money by his own
shrewdness is lower down than the lineal descendant of an Indian trader
who waxed great by first treating and then cheating shivering Mohawks.
Which only shows that we are prone to plant ourselves on the sound
traditions of ancestors; for where is the aristocracy which does not
regard wealth won by ancient thievery as better than money modernly
earned in a commonplace way? But among a gentry so numerous and so
democratic, in spite of itself, as that of our American Babel,
exclusiveness works discomfort mainly to the exclusive. The Hilbroughs
are agreeable Americans, their suppers are provided by the best
caterers, their house has been rendered attractive by boughten taste,
and the company one sees there is not more stupid than that in other
miscellaneous assemblies.
People who are Livingstons of the manor on their great-grandmother's
side, and Van Something-or-others on the side of a great-great-uncle by
his second marriage, and who perhaps have never chanced to be asked to
the Hilbroughs' receptions, shrug their shoulders, and tell you that
they do not know them. But Mrs. Hilbrough does not slight such families
because of the colonialness of their ancestry. Her own progenitors came
to America in some capacity long before the disagreement about the Stamp
Act, though they were not brilliant enough to buy small kingdoms from
the Hudson River Indians with jews'-harps and cast-iron hatchets, nor
supple enough to get manor lordships by bribes to royal governors.
I suppose the advent of the Hilbroughs in society might be dated from
the first reception they gave in New York, though, for that matter, the
Hilbroughs do not take pains to date it at all. For it is a rule of good
society that as soon as you arrive you affect to have always been there.
Of other ascents men boast; of social success, rarely. Your millionaire,
for example,--and millionairism is getting so common as to be almost
vulgar,--your millionaire never tires of telling you how he worked the
multiplication table until cents became dimes, and dimes well sown
blossomed presently into dollars, till hundreds swelled to hundreds of
thousands, and the man who had been a blithe youth but twenty years
before became the possessor of an uneasy tumor he calls a fortune. Once
this narrative is begun no matter that you beat your breast with
reluctance to hear out the tedious tale, while loud bassoons perchance
are calling you to wedding feasts. Pray hear the modern Whittington with
patience, good reader! The recital of this story is his main consolation
for the boredom of complicated possession in which his life is
inextricably involved--his recoupment for the irksome vigilance with
which he must defend his hoard against the incessant attacks of cheats
and beggars, subscription papers and poor relations. But the man who has
won his way in that illusive sphere we call society sends to swift
oblivion all his processes. In society no man asks another, "How did you
get here?" or congratulates him on moving among better people than he
did ten years ago. Theoretically society is stationary. Even while
breathless from climbing, the newcomer affects to have been always atop.
Warren Hilbrough's family had risen with his bettered circumstances from
a two-story brick in Degraw street, Brooklyn, by the usual stages to a
brownstone "mansion" above the reservoir in New York. When he came to be
vice-president of the Bank of Manhadoes, Hilbrough had in a measure
reached the goal of his ambition. He felt that he could slacken the
strenuousness of his exertions and let his fortune expand naturally
under prudent management. But Mrs. Hilbrough was ten years younger than
her husband, and her ambition was far from spent. She found herself only
on the threshold of her career. In Brooklyn increasing prosperity had
made her a leader in church fairs and entertainments. The "Church
Social" had often assembled at her house, and she had given a reception
in honor of the minister when he came back from the Holy Land--a party
which the society reporter of the "Brooklyn Daily Eagle" had pronounced
"a brilliant affair." This last stroke had put her at the head of her
little world. But now that Hilbrough was vice-president of the Bank of
Manhadoes, the new business relations brought her invitations from
beyond the little planetary system that revolved around the Reverend Dr.
North. It became a question of making her way in the general society of
Brooklyn, which had long drawn its members from the genteel quarters of
the Heights, the Hill, and the remoter South Brooklyn, and, in later
days, also from Prospect Park Slope. But at the houses of the officers
of the bank she had caught somewhat bewildering vistas of those involved
and undefined circles of people that make up in one way and another
metropolitan society on the New York side of East River. Three years
before Hilbrough entered the bank his family had removed into a new
house in South Oxford street, and lately they had contemplated building
a finer dwelling on the Slope. But Mrs. Hilbrough in a moment of
inspiration decided to omit Brooklyn and to persuade her husband to
remove to New York. There would be many advantages in this course. In
New York her smaller social campaigns were unknown, and by removal she
would be able to readjust with less difficulty her relations with old
friends in Dr. North's congregation. When one goes up one must always
leave somebody behind; but crossing the river would give her a clean
slate, and make it easy to be rid of old scores when she pleased. So it
came about that on the first of May following Hilbrough's accession to
the bank the family in a carriage, and all their belongings on trucks,
were trundled over Fulton Ferry to begin life anew, with painted walls,
more expensive carpets, and twice as many servants. A carriage with a
coachman in livery took the place of the top-buggy in which, by twos,
and sometimes by threes, the Hilbroughs had been wont to enjoy Prospect
Park. The Hilbrough children did not relish this part of the change. The
boys could not see the fun of sitting with folded hands on a carriage
seat while they rumbled slowly through Fifth Avenue and Central Park,
even when the Riverside Park was thrown in. An augmentation of family
dignity was small compensation for the loss of the long drive between
the quadruple lines of maples that shade the Ocean Parkway in full view
of the fast trotting horses which made a whirling maze as they flew past
them in either direction.
"There was some fun in a long Saturday's drive to Coney Island, and
round by Fort Hamilton and the Narrows," muttered Jack, as the horses
toiled up a steep in Central Park; "this here is about as amusing as
riding in a black maria would be."
Ah, Jack! You are too young to comprehend the necessity that rests upon
us of swelling our dignity into some proportion to a growing stock
balance. It is irksome this living on stilts, but an unfortunate
inability to match our fortune by increasing our bulk leaves us no
alternative but to augment our belongings so as to preserve the fitness
of things at any cost. There is as yet no Society for the Emancipation
of Princes, and the Association for the Amelioration of the Condition of
the Children of the Rich has no place in the list of New York
philanthropies.
Mrs. Hilbrough prudently spent her first winter on Manhattan Island in
looking about her. She ventured a dinner company two or three times, but
went no further. She received calls from the wives of those who had, and
those who wished to have, business relations with her husband, and she
returned them, making such observations as she could on the domestic
economy, or rather the domestic extravagance, of those she visited. The
first result of this was that she changed her door-boy. The fine-looking
mulatto she had installed in imitation of some of her richer Brooklyn
acquaintances had to be discharged. The Anglomania of the early eighties
cruelly abolished the handsome darky hall-boy, that most artistic living
bronze, with all his suggestion of barbaric magnificence, and all his
Oriental obsequiousness. His one fault was that he was not English.
Fashion forbade the rich to avail themselves of one of the finest
products of the country. The lackey who took his place had the English
superciliousness, and marked the advance of American civilization by
adding a new discomfort and deformity to the life of people of fashion.
The minister of the church in which the Hilbroughs had taken pews sent
his wife to call on Mrs. Hilbrough, and two of the church officers,
knowing the value of such an acquisition to the church, showed their
Christian feeling in the same way. Many of her old Degraw street and
South Oxford street friends called at the new house, their affection
being quickened by a desire "to see what sort of style the Hilbroughs
are putting on now." Some of her Brooklyn calls she returned out of a
positive liking for good old friends, some because the callers were
those who could introduce her to people she desired to know in New York.
She excused herself from calling on the most of her trans-East-River
acquaintances by urging that it is so much farther from New York to
Brooklyn than it is from Brooklyn to New York, you know. She attended
several large evening receptions in New York, and drank five o'clock tea
at six in the evening at a good many places. She thus made
acquaintances, while with a clever woman's tact she kept her wits about
her and began to "get the hang of the thing," as she expressed it to one
of her confidential friends. Meantime she was as constant in her
attendance at the opera as she had been at the prayer-meeting in former
days.
It was at the beginning of her second winter in New York that she served
notice on Hilbrough that she meant to give a reception; or, as she put
it, "We must give a reception." The children had gone to school, the
butler was otherwise engaged, and there was nobody but a waitress
present.
Hilbrough's face was of that sunny, sanguine sort which always seems to
indicate that things are booming, to borrow a phrase from our modern
argot. His plump, cheery countenance, and the buoyant spontaneity of his
laugh, inspired a confidence which had floated his craft over more than
one financial shoal. But when Mrs. Hilbrough proposed a reception, just
as he finished his coffee, he became meditative, leaned his two large
arms on the table, and made a careful inspection of the china cup: his
wife--Brooklyn woman that she was--had lately made a journey across the
new bridge to buy the set at Ovington's.
"You don't mean one of those stupid crushes," he began, "where all the
people outside are trying to butt their way in, and all those inside are
wishing to heaven that they were well out again--like so many June bugs
and millers on a summer night bumping against both sides of a window
with a candle in it?" Hilbrough finished with a humorous little chuckle
at his own comparison.
"Well," rejoined Mrs. Hilbrough, firmly, "a reception is the thing to
give. We owe it to our social position."
"Social position be hanged!" said Hilbrough, half in vexation, but still
laughing, while his wife tried by frowning to remind him that the use of
such words in the presence of a servant was very improper.
"It seems as though I never could get square with that thing you call
social position. I pay all my other debts and take receipts in full, but
the more money we have the more we owe to social position. I have a
great mind to suspend payment for a while and let social position go to
smash. I detest a reception. I don't mind a nice little gathering of
good friendly folks such as we used to have in Degraw street at the
church socials--"
"Church socials!"
His wife's interruption took Hilbrough's breath. She muttered rather
than spoke these few words, but with a contemptuousness of inflection
that was most expressive. Hilbrough was left in some doubt as to whether
all the contempt was intended for the church socials in Degraw street,
or whether a part of it might not be meant for a husband whose mind had
not kept pace with his fortune.
"I am sure there was real enjoyment in a church social," he said, with a
deprecating laugh, "to say nothing of the money raised to recarpet the
church aisles. And I confess I rather enjoyed the party you gave in
Oxford street when Dr. North got back from the Holy Land."
While Hilbrough was making this speech his wife had, by dumb show,
ordered the waitress to take something down-stairs, in order that there
might be no listener to Hilbrough's autobiographical reminiscences but
herself.
"Well, my dear," she said, taking a conciliatory tone, "our walk in life
has changed, and we must adapt ourselves to our surroundings. You know
you always said that we ought to do our share toward promoting
sociability."
"Sociability!" It was Hilbrough's turn now. His laugh had a note of
derision in it. "W'y, my dear, there is rather more sociability in a
cue of depositors at the teller's window of an afternoon than there was
at Mrs. Master's reception last winter."
"Well, don't let's argue. I hate arguments of all things."
"Most people do, when they get the worst of them," rejoined Hilbrough,
merrily.
"You are positively rude," pouted Mrs. Hilbrough, rising from the table.
If she hated arguments, her husband hated tiffs, and her look of
reproach accomplished what her arguments could not. Hilbrough knew that
at the game of injured innocence he was no match for his wife. The
question in his mind now was to find a line of retreat.
"You ought to have more consideration for my feelings, Warren," she went
on. "Besides, you know you said that whatever widened our acquaintance
was likely to do the bank good. You know you did."
"So I did, my dear; so I did," he answered, soothingly, as he rose from
the table and looked at his watch. "There's one comfort, anyhow. You
don't know a great many people on this side of the river yet, and so I
guess I sha'n't have to put hoops on the house this time, unless you
fetch all Brooklyn across the new bridge."
Mrs. Hilbrough did not care to contradict her husband now that he had
relented. But as for crowding the house she felt sure there was a way to
do it, if she could only find it, and she was resolved not to have fewer
people than Mrs. Masters, and that without depleting Brooklyn.
What she needed was an adviser. She went over the bead-roll of her
acquaintance and found nobody eligible. Those who could have pointed out
to her what were the proper steps to take in such a case were just the
people to whom she was not willing to expose herself in her unfledged
condition. At last she felt obliged to ask Mr. Hilbrough about it.
"Don't you know somebody, my dear, who knows New York better than I do,
who could give me advice about our reception?" This was her opening of
the matter as she sat crocheting by the glowing grate of anthracite in
the large front room on the second floor, while her husband smoked, and
read his evening paper.
"I? How should I know?" he said, laying down the paper. "I don't know
many New York ladies."
"Not a woman! I mean some man. You can't speak to a woman about such
things so well as you can to a man;" and she spread her fancy-work out
over her knee and turned her head on one side to get a good view of its
general effect.
"I should think you would rather confide in a woman." Hilbrough looked
puzzled and curious as he said this.
"You don't understand," she said. "A woman doesn't like to give herself
away to another woman. Women always think you ridiculous if you don't
understand everything, and they remember and talk about it. But a man
likes to give information to a woman. I suppose men like to have a woman
look up to them." Mrs. Hilbrough laughed at the explanation, which was
not quite satisfactory to herself.
"Well," said Hilbrough, after a minute's amused meditation, "the men I
know are all like me. They are business men, and are rather dragged into
society, I suppose, by their wives, and by"--he chuckled merrily at this
point--"by the debts they owe to social position, you know. I don't
believe there's a man in the bank that wouldn't be as likely to ask me
about what coat he ought to wear on any occasion as to give me any
information on the subject. Yes, there is one man. That's young
_Mil_lard, or Mil_lard_, as he calls it. He's a sort of a dude, and I
never could stand dudes. I asked Mr. Masters the other day whether the
assistant cashier was worth so large a salary as five thousand dollars,
and he said that that man had the entry--the _ontray_, as he called
it--to the best houses in New York. He's cheek by jowl with a dozen of
the richest men, he's invited everywhere, and is considered a great
authority on all matters of that kind. He brings some business to the
bank, and he's one of the best judges in New York of a man's character
and responsibility. He knows all about pretty nearly every man whose
note is presented for discount, and, if he does not know at once, he can
generally find out in an hour. I believe he could tell us the name of
the grandmother of almost every prominent depositor if we wished to
know, and how every man got his money."
"Is he rich?"
"Well, nobody seems to know for certain. He has a large slice of the
bank's stock, and he's known to have good investments outside. He's well
enough off to live without his salary if he wanted to. But I am pretty
sure he isn't rich. Belongs to some old family, I suppose."
"I should be afraid of him," said Mrs. Hilbrough, ruefully.
"You needn't be. He's a good enough sort of fellow if he only wouldn't
part his hair in the middle. I can't abide that in a man. But it's no
use being afraid of him. He probably knows all about you and me already.
He first came to see me about coming into the bank, and I don't know but
it was his move to get me."
"Would he come up to dinner some evening?"
"He'd rather like to oblige me. I'll have to get him when he's
disengaged. What shall I tell him?"
"Tell him that Mrs. Hilbrough wishes his advice, and would be glad if he
would come to dinner with us some evening."
"Why do I need to say anything about your wanting advice? I don't just
like to ask a favor of such a dude. I'll ask him to dinner, and you can
ask his advice as though by accident."
"No; that won't do. That kind of man would see through it all. Tell him
that I wish his advice. That will show him that I recognize his position
as an authority. He'll like that better."
Warren Hilbrough suddenly discovered that his wife was cleverer--or, as
he would have said, "smarter"--than he had thought her.
"You are a good hand, Jenny," he said. "You'll win your game." And after
he had resumed the reading of his paper he looked over the top of it
once or twice in furtive admiration of her as she sat between him and
the dark portiere, which set her form in relief against the rich
background and made her seem a picture to the fond eyes of her husband.
He reflected that perhaps after all managing church fairs and running
sewing societies was no bad training for a larger social activity.