_An Awfully Good Time_
Since her engagement to Plumstone Smith, Jr., was announced, Miss Pearl
Veal is having what in Society is called an awfully good time. This
means that her day ends in the early morning and she awakens about
noon; stands around other people's drawing-rooms at teas for some
hours; hurries home to change her costume for dinner; sits smiling
through a half-dozen courses; is whirled away for a few acts of opera;
hustled off to dance till close to dawn. Society has taken her up.
People are doing things for her. Consequently, I am beginning to
fear that she will lose the color she brought from Kansas City; that
the lines of her face, once so round and soft, will straighten and
harden; that she will give up smiling and take to talking, or become
phonographic, like Miss Marion Speechless.
Mrs. Radigan, of course, is delighted. Mrs. Radigan has cause to be
pleased. She has become a personage. She is being gossiped about in the
most outlandish fashion, much to her own amusement and the indignation
of J. John, who always was slow-witted and not ready to appraise things
at their real value. For instance, Radigan was in a towering rage when
a weekly journal that chronicles the doings of the smart set hinted
broadly that Mrs. Radigan was engaged to marry J. Madison Mudison
as soon as she had cleared away the present matrimonial barriers by
visiting South Dakota. Moreover, it was said that the husband had
already found consolation and was acquiescing in the arrangement, as it
was long known that he had been making eyes at Miss Ethel Bumpschus.
The purest fiction! Radigan and his wife are the most devoted pair
imaginable, and even if it were the smart thing to do, I cannot
conceive their separating, particularly if Radigan's winnings in such
an arrangement were to be Miss Bumpschus. The story was, of course,
promptly denied and put to sleep, but it serves to show the high place
my friends at present fill in the public eye. Radigan was brought to
this view and cooled down, but it required some diplomacy to soothe
the ruffled feelings of Miss Bumpschus. A check for $5,000 for her pet
charity, the Home for Aged Elevated Ticket-choppers, acted as a balm,
and to show that she bore no ill-will against her fellow-sufferers she
gave a dinner-dance in honor of Miss Veal.
And this was but one of about fifteen "things" given for the girl in
the past week. Mrs. Plumstone Smith, Miss Bobbie Williegilt, and Mrs.
Lenox Mint all gave her luncheons; Miss Wherry and J. Madison Mudison
gave her theatre-parties; the Dewberry Lambs a dance. Besides, she has
been kept jumping from house to house every afternoon to meet people
who have been asked to meet her. Then she has been asked to act as
bridesmaid at eleven weddings in the near future, and it will take no
small part of her income for the year, large though it is, to buy gowns
and hats for these joyous affairs, which will vary in shade from pink
to saffron. Poor Miss Veal! My heart goes out to her.
I was favored with an invitation to the dinner preceding the Bumpschus
dance, and had the honor of sitting between Miss Ethel and the Countess
Poglioso Spinnigini, an arrangement which I suspected was effected by
Bertie Bumpschus in revenge for my taking his place at the Radigan
table last week. I talked to the Countess in English, French, German,
and Italian till my head ached, then turned her over to the guileless
J. Madison Mudison at her other side. But Mudison is an old campaigner.
He did not try to entertain the fair Italian at all, but let her talk
to him, occasionally breaking into her flow of jargon with the French
expressions he had picked up at the bridge-table. How I admired him! He
is a man of tact.
Meantime I was in the hands of Miss Bumpschus discussing the needs of
the aged ticket-choppers, and covertly watching Miss Veal down the
table having an awfully good time. She was seated between old Mr.
Bumpschus and Dewberry Lamb, talking out to them a few thoughts that
I had talked into her the day before concerning the great novel of
the week. Mr. Bumpschus showed his deep interest by eying her over
the top of his upraised glass and exclaiming, "Ah! Indeed!" at proper
intervals, and when she had exhausted him she turned to Dewberry Lamb
and said, "I was just telling Mr. Bumpschus," etc. "How intensely
interesting!" exclaimed Mr. Lamb. "Indeed!"
Blessed is the tobacco habit at times like this! When the women had
gone, I had an opportunity to soothe my nerves with a strong cigar and
relieve the pressure of thought upon my brain by discussing stocks and
real-estate with Madison Mudison. He also talked entertainingly about
the invasion of upper Fifth Avenue by tradesmen. It was with regret
that I left him to get down to the business of dancing.
Dancing is the strangest of diversions. It is a curious relic of
barbarity. To glide over a glassy floor, a beautiful girl on your
arm, to the strains of some dreamy waltz, sweeping around and around,
free and fearless, that is one thing, but not the real. To go bumping
and thumping through a maze of a hundred hopping and skipping and
kicking men and women, to have your feet tramped on, to tangle them up
in meshy trains, to have elbows poked into your eye, to strain your
sight hunting for vacant places--is that pleasure? I waited in line a
half-hour for the opportunity to take Miss Veal twice around the room.
My collar was gone, my shirt front caved in, but waiting had given me
rest. When she came staggering up she was on the point of collapse, her
hair was awry, she was panting for air, and seemed to be wobbling on
her legs, but when I handed her a paper parasol she said "Whew!" long
drawn, and away we went. Miss Bumpschus stepped on my heel, Bobbie
Williegilt's toe caught in the lace trimming of Miss Veal's gown and we
had to stop in the most dangerous spot while I gathered up the trailing
yards of it, at the peril of being bowled over at any minute. Miss
Speechless rammed a paper parasol into my ear, and a near-sighted stag
rushing onto the floor for the hand of Miss Mint jumped heavily on my
partner's foot, crushing her diamond buckle. But we got twice around.
She said it was lovely.
"I am almost dead," she gasped. "I've been having such an awfully good
time."
With that she passed into the hands of the next man in that devoted row
awaiting her, and was whirled from sight in the dancing maelstrom.
Yet man prides himself on being a reasoning creature.