the box was overheard to say:
"I wish somebody would invent a silencer for box-parties."
Again there were almost audible stares of reproach from the audience, and quietude settled down once more like a pall. At the end of this act again Forbes rose to go, but Ten Eyck checked him again.
"What you doing after the play?"
"Nothing."
"Come turkey-trotting with us."
"Turkey-trotting!" Forbes gasped. "Do nice people—"
"We're not nice people," said Persis, "but we do."
"It's all we do do," said the lady of the embonpoint, whose first name by now he had gleaned as Winifred.
Forbes was surprised to hear himself speaking as if to old acquaintance. "When I was in San Francisco, six years or so ago, slumming parties were taking it up along the 'Barbary Coast.' And on my way East just now I read an editorial about its rage in New York, but I didn't believe it."
"It's awful," said the little man. "People have gone stark mad over it. The mayor ought to stop it."
"Oh, Willie, don't be a prude," said Persis. "You know it's healthier than playing bridge all day and all night."
"And much less expensive," said the white-haired one.
"It's sickening," Willie insisted. "It's unfit for a decent woman."
"Thanks!" said Persis, with a tone of zinc.
The little man made haste with an apology. "I don't mean you, my dear, of course; you dance it harmlessly enough; but—well, I don't like to see you at it, that's all."
"Your own mother is learning it," said Winifred.
"Oh, mother!" Willie gasped. "I gave her up long ago."
Ten Eyck intervened. Forbes remembered now that he was always intervening between extremists in the club quarrels in Manila.
"What difference does it make?" he said. "All dancing is impure to some people. The waltz and polka used to be considered bad enough to get you kicked out of the churches. The turkey-trot is only vulgar when vulgar people dance it, and they'd be vulgar anyway, anywhere. The trot has set people to jigging again. That's one good, wholesome thing. For several years you couldn't get people to dance at all. Now they're at it morning, noon, and night."
"The police ought to stop it, I tell you," Willie insisted, with a peevishness that was like a dash of vinegar. "I hate to see it."
"Then don't come along, my dear," Persis answered, with a glint of temper.
Forbes did not like that "my dear." It might mean nothing, but it might mean everything.
CHAPTER VI
WHEN the final curtain came down like a guillotine on the play there was a general uprising, a sort of slow panic to escape from this finished place and move on to the next event—by street-car to a welsh rabbit in a kitchenette, or by motor to a restaurant of pretense.
Everybody being in haste, everybody went slowly. Forbes retrieved his hat and overcoat after a ferocious struggle. In the lazy ooze-out of the crowd he was gradually shunted to the side of Persis, and willing enough to be there, proud to be there. He walked a little more militarily than he usually did in civilian's.
He heard people whispering with a shrillness that Persis had evidently grown accustomed to, for she could not have helped hearing, yet showed no sign. And now Forbes recaptured her last name, and it was familiar to him, little as he knew of social chronicles.
"Look! That's Persis Cabot," said one. "There's the Cabot girl you read so much about," said another. "She's got a sister who's a Countess or Marquise, or something." Then Forbes learned by roundabout the last name of Willie, and learned it with alarm from two of the sharpest whisperers:
"That's Willie Enslee with her, I suppose."
"I guess so."
"Don't see why they call that big fellow Little Willie."
"Just a joke, I guess."
"They say he's worth twenty million dollars."
"He looks it."
At any other time it would have amused Forbes immensely to be called so far out of his name and to receive twenty million dollars by acclamation.
But now he could only busy himself with deductions: why did they assume that any man who was with Persis Cabot was sure to be Willie Enslee? Could it mean—what else could it mean?
He glanced around to take another look at Willie Enslee. Now that he knew him for what he was, the situation was intolerable. Marry this dream of beauty to that cartoon, that grotesque who came hardly to her shoulder!
His glance had showed him that the men and women they had passed were looking up and down Persis' back like appraising dry-goods merchants or plagiarizing dressmakers. When he turned his head forward he saw that the women in front were inspecting her with even more brazen curiosity. It astounded Forbes to see such well-dressed people behaving so peasantly. But Persis seemed as oblivious of their study as if they were painted heads on a fresco. Forbes, however, flushed when their eyes turned to him, because he felt that they were saying, "That must be Willie Enslee," and "Why do they call that big thing Little Willie?"
Meanwhile Little Willie himself was handing the attendant at the switchboard a punctured carriage check, with which to flash the number on the sign outside.
There was a long wait for their own car, while motor after motor slid up and slid away as soon as its number had been bawled and its cargo had detached itself from the waiting huddle.
After the close, warm theater Forbes flinched at the edged night wind coming from the river. With the caution of an athlete he turned up his collar and buttoned his overcoat over his chest. But Persis stood with throat and bosom naked to the wind, and to all those staring eyes, and never thought to gather about her even the flimsy aureole of chiffon that took the place of a scarf. And equally unafraid and unashamed stood Winifred and Mrs. Neff. (He had collected her name, too, during the conversation that flourished throughout the last act.)
At length the footman, who had howled out other people's numbers, held up a timid finger and murmured, awesomely, "Mr. Enslee?"
The limousine, whose door he opened, was by no means the handsomest of the line. Enslee was evidently rich enough to afford a shabby car. The three women bent their heads and entered with difficulty, their tight skirts sliding to their knees as they clambered in.
There was a great ado over the problem of room. Every man offered to walk or take a taxi. Ten Eyck made sure that Forbes should not be omitted. Ignoring his protests, he bundled him into one of the little extra seats and crawled in after him. The huge third man (still anonymous and taciturn) next inserted his bulk—a large cork in a small bottle.
Willie put his head in to ask:
"Where d'you want to go, Persis?"
"Trotting, of course," came from the crowded depths.
"But I don't think—"
"Then take me home and go to the devil."
"We'll trot," sighed Willie. He spoke to the chauffeur dolefully, then appeared at the door to wail helplessly:
"There seems to be no room for me."
"You're only the host," said Winifred. "Hop on behind."
"You can sit on my lap," said Ten Eyck.
And as that was the only vacant space, the big man lifted him up and set him there. The footman, reassured by the tip in his hand, grinned at the spectacle and laughed, as he closed