There was tennis in the afternoon and in the evening visitors began
to drop in--chiefly young married people of the Freemans’ circle.
Some of these were of well-to-do families and others, Henderson
explained to Bruce, were not rich but “right.” The talk was lively and
pitched in that chaffing key which is possible only among people who
are intimately acquainted. This was Dale Freeman’s salon, Henderson
explained. Any Saturday or Sunday evening you were likely to meet
people who had something worth while to offer.
He drew Bruce from one group to another, praising or abusing him with
equal extravagance. He assured everyone that it was a great honor to
meet a man destined, as he declared Bruce to be, to cut a big figure
in the future of the town. He never backed a dead one, he reminded
them. Bruce was the dearest friend he had in the world, and, he would
ruefully add, probably the only one. It was for this reason that he had
urged the young architect to establish himself in the city--a city that
sorely needed men of Bruce’s splendid character and lofty ideals.
A number of the guests had gone when late in the evening the depleted
company was reinforced by the arrival of Shepherd Mills and his wife.
“Shep and the Shepherdess!” Henderson cheerfully announced as he
ushered them in.
Mrs. Mills extended her hand with a gracious smile as Bruce was
presented. She was tall and fair and moved with a lazy sort of grace.
She spoke in a low, murmurous tone little broken by inflections. Bruce
noted that she was dressed rather more smartly than the other women
present. It seemed to him that the atmosphere of the room changed
perceptibly on her appearance; or it might have been merely that
everyone paused a minute to inspect her or to hear what she had to say.
Bruce surmised from the self-conscious look in her handsome gray eyes
as she crossed the room that she enjoyed being the center of attention.
“Shep just would spend the day motoring to some queer place,” she was
saying, “where a lot of people were killed by the Indians ages ago.
Most depressing! Ruined the day for me! He’s going to set up a monument
or something to mark the painful affair.”
Shepherd Mills greeted Bruce in the quick, eager fashion of a diffident
person anxious to appear cordial but not sure that his good intentions
will be understood, and suggested that they sit down. He was not so
tall as his wife; his face was long and rather delicate. His slight
reddish mustache seemed out of place on his lip; it did not quite
succeed in giving him a masculine air. His speech was marked by odd,
abrupt pauses, as though he were trying to hide a stammer; or it might
have been that he was merely waiting to note the effect of what he
was saying upon the hearer. He drew out a case and offered Bruce a
cigarette, lighted one himself, smoking as though it were part of a
required social routine to which he conformed perforce but did not
relish particularly.
There was to be a tennis tournament at the country club the coming week
and he mentioned this tentatively and was embarrassed to find that
Bruce knew nothing about it.
“Oh, I’m always forgetting that everyone doesn’t live here!” he laughed
apologetically. “A little weakness of the provincial mind! I suppose
we’re horribly provincial out here. Do we strike you that way, Mr.
Storrs?”
One might have surmised from his tone that he was used to having his
serious questions ignored or answered flippantly, but hoped that the
stranger would meet him on his own ground.
“Oh, there isn’t any such thing as provincialism any more, is there?”
asked Bruce amiably. “I haven’t sniffed anything of the sort in your
city: you seem very metropolitan. The fact is, I’m a good deal of a
hick myself!”
Mills laughed with more fervor than the remark justified. Evidently
satisfied of the intelligence and good nature of the Freemans’ guest,
he began to discuss the effect upon industry of a pending coal strike.
His hand went frequently to his mustache as he talked and the leg
that he swung over his knee waggled nervously. He plunged into a
discussion of labor, mentioning foreign market conditions and citing
figures from trade journals showing the losses to both capital and
labor caused by the frequent disturbances in the industrial world. He
expressed opinions tentatively, a little apologetically, and withdrew
them quickly when they were questioned. Bruce, having tramped through
one of the coal fields where a strike was in progress, described the
conditions as he had observed them. Mills expressed the greatest
interest; the frown deepened on his face as he listened.
“That’s bad; things shouldn’t be that way,” he said. “The truth of
the matter is that we haven’t mastered the handling of business.
It’s stupendous; we’ve outgrown the old methods. We forget the vast
territory we have to handle and the numbers of men it’s necessary to
keep in touch with. When my Grandfather Mills set up as a manufacturer
here he had fifty men working for him, and he knew them all--knew their
families, circumstances, everything. Now I have six hundred in my
battery plant and don’t know fifty of them! But I’d like to know them
all; I feel that it’s my duty to know them.”
He shrugged his shoulders impatiently when Henderson’s sharp little
laugh at the other end of the room broke in discordantly upon Bruce’s
sympathetic reply to this.
“Bud, how silly you are!” they heard Mrs. Mills saying. “But I don’t
know what we’d do without you. You do cheer things up a bit now and
then!”
Mrs. Freeman effected a redistribution of the guests that brought Mrs.
Mills and Bruce together.
“Shep, you mustn’t monopolize Mr. Storrs. Give Connie a chance. Mr.
Storrs is an ideal subject for you, Connie. Take him out on the terrace
and put him through all your degrees.” And then to Bruce: “Mrs. Mills
is not only our leading vamp but a terrible highbrow--reads all the
queer stuff!”
Shepherd Mills was not wholly successful in concealing his displeasure
in thus being deprived of Bruce’s company. And noting this, Bruce put
out his hand, saying:
“That’s a deep subject; we shall have to tackle it again. Please don’t
forget that we’ve left it in the air and give me another chance.”
“My husband really wants so much to save the human race,” remarked Mrs.
Mills as she stepped out on the tiled flooring of a broad terrace where
there were rugs and comfortable places to sit. There was moonlight and
the great phalanx of stars marched across the clear heavens; below
flowed the river. She seated herself on a couch, suffered him to adjust
a pillow at her back and indicated that he was to sit beside her.
“I’m really done up by our all-day motor trip, but my husband insisted
on dropping in here. The Freemans are a great resource to all of us.
You’re always likely to find someone new and interesting here. Dale
Freeman has a genius for picking up just the right sort of people and
she’s generous about letting her friends know them. Are you and the
Freemans old friends?”
“Oh, not at all! Bud Henderson’s my only friend here. He vouched for me
to the Freemans.”
“Oh, Bud! He’s such a delightful rascal. You don’t mind my calling
him that? I shouldn’t if I weren’t so fond of him. He’s absolutely
necessary to our social existence. We’d stagnate without him.”
“Bud was always a master hand at stirring things up. His methods are a
little peculiar at times, but he does get results.”
“There’s no question but that he’s a warm admirer of yours.”
“That’s because he’s forgotten about me! He hadn’t seen me for five
years.”
“I think possibly I can understand that one wouldn’t exactly forget
you, Mr. Storrs.”
She let the words fall carelessly, as though to minimize their daring
in case they were not wholly acceptable to her auditor. The point was
not lost upon him. He was not without his experience in the gentle art
of flirtation, and her technic was familiar. There was always, however,
the possibility of variations in the ancient game, and he hoped that
Mrs. Shepherd Mills was blessed with originality.
“There’s a good deal of me to forget; I’m six feet two!”
“Well, of course I wasn’t referring altogether to your size,” she said
with her murmurous little laugh. “I adore big men, and I suppose that’s
why I married a small one. Isn’t’ it deliciously funny how contrary we
are when it comes to the important affairs of our lives! I suppose it’s
just because we’re poor, weak humans. We haven’t the courage of our
prejudices.”
“I’d never thought of that,” Bruce replied. “But it is an interesting
idea. I suppose we’re none of us free agents. It’s not in the great
design of things that we shall walk a chalk line. If we all did, it
would probably be a very stupid world.”
“I’m glad you feel that way about it. For a long time half the world
tried to make conformists of the other half; nowadays not more than a
third are trying to keep the rest on the chalk line--and that third’s
skidding! People think me dreadfully heretical about everything.
But--I’m not, really! Tell me you don’t think me terribly wild and
untamed.”
“I think,” said Bruce, feeling that here was a cue he mustn’t miss, “I
think you are very charming. If it’s your ideas that make you so, I
certainly refuse to quarrel with them.”
“How beautifully you came up on that! Something tells me that I’m not
going to be disappointed in you. I have a vague sort of idea that we’re
going to understand each other.”
“You do me great honor! It will be a grief to me if we don’t.”
“It’s odd how instantly we recognize the signals when someone really
worth while swims into our ken,” she said pensively. “Dear old Nature
looks after that! Bud intimated that you’re to be one of us; throw
in your lot with those of us who struggle along in this rather nice,
comfortable town. If you enjoy grandeur in social things, you’ll not
find much here to interest you; but if just nice little companies and a
few friends are enough, you can probably keep amused.”
“If the Freemans’ friends are specimens and there’s much of this sort
of thing”--he waved his hand toward the company within--“I certainly
shall have nothing to complain of.”
“We must see you at our house. I haven’t quite Dale’s knack
of attracting people”--she paused a moment upon this note of
humility--“but I try to bring a few worth while people together. I’ve
educated a few men to drop in for tea on Thursdays with usually a few
of my pals among the young matrons and a girl or two. If you feel
moved----”
“I hope you’re not trifling with me,” said Bruce, “for I shall
certainly come.”
“Then that’s all settled. Don’t pay any attention to what Bud says
about me. To hear him talk you might think me a man-eater. My husband’s
the dearest thing! He doesn’t mind at all my having men in for tea.
He comes himself now and then when his business doesn’t interfere.
Dear Shep! He’s a slave to business, and he’s always at work on some
philanthropic scheme. I just talk about helping the world; but he, poor
dear, really tries to do something.”
Henderson appeared presently with a dark hint that Shepherd was peeved
by their long absence and that the company was breaking up.
“Connie never plays all her cards the first time, Bruce; you must give
her another chance.”
“Oh, Mr. Storrs has promised me a thousand chances!” said Mrs. Mills.