That evening a famous Hungarian Fiddler, accompanied by a warbling Guinea Hen and backed up by sixty Symphonic Heineys wearing Spectacles, was giving a Recital for the True Lovers in a Mammoth Cave devoted to Art.
Loretta had a sneaking preference for the May Irwin School of Expression, but she had to go through with the Saint-Saens Stuff now and then to maintain a Club Standing.
Accordingly she and Mother and poor old dying Father, with no Heart in the Enterprise, were planted well down in Section B, where they could watch Mrs. Leroy Geblotz, who once entertained Nordica, and say "Bravo" at the Psychological Moment.
On Saturday Morning, after she had penned 14 Epistles, using the tall cuneiform Hieroglyphics, she didn't have a blessed thing to do before her 1 o'clock Engagement except drop in at a Flower Show and a Cat Show and have her Palm read by a perfectly fascinating Serpent with a Goatee who had been telling all the Gells the most wonderful things about themselves.
A merry little Group went slumming Saturday afternoon. They attended a Ball Game. Loretta had her Chin over the Railing and evinced a keen Interest, her only Difficulty being that she never knew which Side was at bat.
At dusk she began hanging on the Family Jewels. It was a formal Dinner Party with a list made up by Dun and Bradstreet.
Loretta found herself between an extinct Volcano of Political World and a sappy Fledgling whose Grandfather laid the cornerstone of Brooklyn.
The Dinner was one of those corpseless Funerals, stage-managed by a respectable Lady with a granite Front who had Mayflower Corpuscles moving majestically through her Arterial System.
Loretta was marooned so far from the Live Ones that she couldn't wig- wag for Help. Her C. Q. D. brought no Relief.
She threw about three throes of Anguish before they escaped to the private Gambling Hell.
Here she tucked back her Valenciennes and proceeded to cop a little Pin-Money at the soul-destroying game known as Bridge.
At 11.30 she led a highly connected volunteer Wine Pusher out into the Conservatory and told him she did not think it advisable to marry him until she had learned his First Name.
Shortly after Midnight she blew, arriving at headquarters just in time to participate in a Chafing-Dish Jubilee promoted by only Brother, just back from the Varsity.
She approached the Porcelain in a chastened mood that Sabbath morning.
She was thinking of the Night Before and of playing cards for Money.
She remembered the glare of Light for overhead and the tense, eager Faces peering above the Paste-Boards.
Then she recalled, with a sharp catch of the Breath and a little tug of Pain at the Heart, that she had balled herself up at one Stage and got dummied out of a Grand Slam.
"It would have meant a long pair of the Silk Kind," thought she, as she sighed deeply and turned the cold Faucet.
After Breakfast, she took a long Walk up the Avenue as a Bracer.
After which to the Kirk, for she taught a class of Little Girls in the Sunday School, and she had to fake up an Explanation of how Joshua made the Sun stand still, thereby putting herself in the Scratch Division of Explainers, believe us.
She listened to a dainty Boston Sermon, trimmed with Ruching, singing lustily before and after.
Then back home with the solemn Parade to sit among the condemned waiting for that superlative Gorge known as the Sunday Dinner.
While she was waiting, a male Friend dropped in. His costume was a compromise between an English Actor and a hired Mourner.
On Week Days he sat at a Desk dictating Letters and saying that the Matter had been referred to the proper Department.
He looked at Loretta, so calm and cool and collected in her pious Raiment, and the Smile that he summoned was benevolent and almost patronizing.
"I was wondering," said he. "I was wondering if a Girl like you ever gets tired of sitting around and doing nothing."
Loretta did not cackle. She had read in a Book by a Yale Professor that Woman is not supposed to possess the Sense of Humor.
MORAL: The Settlement Campaign is not getting to the real Workers.
THE NEW FABLE OF THE INTERMITTENT FUSSER
Once a grammar-school Rabbit, struggling from long Trousers toward his first brier-wood Pipe, had Growing Pains which he diagnosed as the pangs of True Love.
The Target was a dry-seasoned Fannie old enough to be his Godmother. She was a Post-Graduate who was keeping herself on Earth by running to the Drug-Store every few minutes.
The Eye-Brows were neatly blocked out by some Process unknown to the writer, and she had a Shape that could be revised ad lib.
An Expert would have Made her at a glance, but the Cub fell for the Scenery and Mechanical Effects.
He had sketched a little synopsis of the Future. After waiting 8 years, until she had unpetaled into the perfect bloom of Womanhood and he was wearing a Full Beard, he would take her by the Long Glove and lead her off into Dreamland.
Just to show how one of those pinfeather Passions may be shunted onto a Siding and left among the Dog-Fennel, when the Subject of this Sketch was aetat 22, he was picking them out of the Air in the Left Garden at the State University. Fannie (she of the purchased Pallor) was thoroughly married to a Veterinary with the Drug Habit.
Soon after recovering from the Pip, known in Medical Parlance as the Spooney Infantum, he began to glory in the friendship of an incipient Amazon who wore a Blazer and walked like a Policeman.
She did not hamper her fibrous Physique with any excess Harness that might pinch when she essayed a full St. Andrew's Swipe with a wooden Club. And she had one lower octave of Pipes, like a Brakeman on the Erie.
There comes a brief Period in the Veal Epoch of every Sentimental Tommy when the only real Cutie is one who can propel a Canoe and throw Overhand.
So Walter, such being the baptismal Handicap, often thought it would be Sweet Billiards to keep house with the she-Acrobat for 30 or 40 years, because when they were tired of sitting in the House they could go into the Front Yard and play Ketch.
He was just at the rickety Age when the Gams refuse to co-ordinate.
Every time he sauntered carelessly across the porch at a Summer Hotel, he gave a correct Imitation of a troop of Cavalry going over a Wooden Bridge at full Gallop.
He had a way of backing into Potted Plants.
Each Morning was clouded by the task of picking out a Cravat that would be of the same Radio-Activity as his Socks. And all through the waking hours he carried with him a faint and sickly Realization that his Parents did not understand him.
One day he stood before a kind-faced Registrar and matriculated. Branded as a regular Freshman, he went back to his little Den and put a news-stand Photo of Lillian Russell between two Pennants.
The whalebone Divinity in the Home Town passed out of his Life. He told himself that he would be true to Miss Russell and all the other Members of her sprightly Profession.
The emotional side of his unfolding Nature began to nourish itself on Song Hits, and he slept each night with his Banjo folded tightly to his Bosom.
He became acquainted with a Sophomore who once sat near Trixie Friganza in a Parlor Car. One night Alice Nielsen looked directly at the Box in which he was seated with the other Fraters of the Ippy Ki Yi. In fact, his Life became crowded with tingling Experiences.
The collection of Cigarette Pictures made him acquainted with many Celebrities. His intimacy with them grew apace as he developed a bookish appetite for Sunday Newspapers.
He danced with the local Chickadees, but all the time his Heart was far away, in the Dramatic Column.
Suddenly