The social secretary

•k~MMwJMfc~JHHk<MMkJMK~MBk..^M~«BBk.4Mk~J^Bk~«B»^aHB~«Mk'«>Bi

THE
SOCIAL

\

DAVID GRAHAM PHILLIPS

LIBRARY

UNIVERSITY OF

CALIFORNIA

SANTA CRUZ

The Social SecretaGS

.

THE SOCIAL
SECRETARY

4*

DAVID GRAHAM PHILLIPS
Author of The Plum Tree
The Cost etcetc.

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
CLARENCE E UNDERWOOD

Decorations by
Ralph Fletcher Seymour

New York

Grosset & Dunlap

Publishers

COPYRIGHT 1905
THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY

OCTOBER

PS

The Social Secretai35

The Social Secretac£

I

NOVEMBER 29. At half-past
one to-day — half- past one ex
actly — I began my "career."
Mrs. Carteret said she would call for
me at five minutes to one. But it was
ten minutes after when she appeared,
away down at the corner of I Street.
Jim was walking up and down the
drawing-room; I was at the window,
watching that corner of I Street.
"There she blows!" I cried, my voice
brave, but my heart like a big lump of
something soggy and sad.

The Social Secreta^

Jim hurried up and stood behind me,
staring glumly over my shoulder. He
has proposed to me in so many words
more than twenty times in the last three
years, and has looked it every time
we've met — we meet almost every day.
I could feel that he was getting ready
to propose again, but I hadn't the slight
est fear that he'd touch me. He's in
the army, and his "pull" has kept him
snug and safe at Washington and has
promoted him steadily until now he's
a Colonel at thirty-five. But he was
brought up in a formal, old-fashioned
way, and he'd think it a deadly insult
to a woman he respected enough to ask
her to be his wife if he should touch
her without her permission. I admire
Jim's self-restraint, but — I couldn't bear
being married to a man who worshiped
me, even if I only liked him. If I

2

The Social Secretaos

loved him, I'd be utterly miserable. I've
been trying hard to love Jim for the
past four months, or ever since I've
really realized how desperate my affairs
are. But I can't. And the most exas
perating part of my obstinacy is that I
can't find a good reason or excuse for it.

As I was saying — or, rather, writing
— Jim stood behind me and said in a
husky sort of voice: "You ain't goin'
to do it, are you, Gus?"

I didn't answer. If I had said any
thing, it would have been a feeble,
miserable "No" — which would have
meant that I was accepting the alter
native — him. All my courage had gone
and I felt contemptibly feminine and
dependent.

I looked at him — I did like the ex
pression of his eyes and the strength
and manliness of him from head to foot.

The Social Secreta^

What a fine sort of man a "pull" and
a private income have spoiled in Jim
Lafollette! He went on: "Surely, I'm
not more repellent to you than — than
what that auto is coming to take you
away to."

"Shame on you, Jim Lafollette?" I
said angrily — most of the anger so tha*
he wouldn't understand and take advan
tage of the tears in my eyes and voice.
"But how like you! How brave!"

He reddened at that — partly because
he felt guilty toward me, partly because
he is ashamed of the laziness that has
made him shirk for thirteen years. "I
don't care a hang whether it's brave or
not, or what it is," he said sullenly. "I
want you. And it seems to me I've got
to do something — use force, if necessary
— to keep you from— from that. You
ain't fit for it, Gus — not in any way.

4

The Social Secreta^

Why, it's worse than being a servant.
And you — brought up as you've been — "

I laughed — a pretty successful effort.
"I've been educating for it all my life,
without knowing it. And it's honest
and independent. If you had the right
sort of ideas of self-respect, you'd be
ashamed of me if you thought I'd be
low enough to marry a man I couldn't
give my heart to — for a living."

"Don't talk rubbish," he retorted.
"Thousands of women do it. Besides,
if I don't mind, why should you? God
knows you've made it plain enough that
you don't love me. Gus, why can't you
marry me and let me save you from this
just as a brother might save a sister?"

"Because I may love somebody some
day, Jim," said I. I wanted to hurt
him — for his own sake, and also because
I didn't want him to tempt me.

5

The Social Secretaos

The auto was at the curb. He didn't
move until I was almost at the drawing-
room door. Then he rushed at me and
his look frightened me a little. He
caught me by the arm. "It's the last
chance, Augusta!" he exclaimed.
"Won't you?"

I drew away and hurried out. "Then
you don't intend to have anything to
do with me after I've crossed the line
and become a toiler?" I called back
over my shoulder. I couldn't resist the
temptation to be thoroughly feminine
and leave the matter open by putting
him in the wrong with my "woman's
last word." I was so low in my mind
that I reasoned that my adventure might
be as appalling as I feared, in which
case it would be well to have an alter
native. I wonder if the awful thoughts
we sometimes have are our real selves
6

The Social Secretacs

or if they just give us the chance to
measure the gap between what we might
be as shown by them and what we are
as shown by our acts. I hope the lat
ter, for surely I can't be as poor a crea
ture as I so often have impulses to make
myself.

Mrs. Carteret was waiting for the
servant to open the door. I hurried her
back toward the auto, being a little
afraid that Jim would be desperate
enough to come out and beg her to
help him — and I knew she would do
it if she were asked. In the first place,
Jessie always does what she's asked to
do — if it helps her to spend time and
breath. In the second place, she'd never
let up on me if she thought I had so
good a chance to marry. For she knows
that Washington is the hardest place in
the world for a woman to find a hus-

The Social SecretaG£

band unless she's got something that
appeals to the ambition of men. Besides,
she thinks, as do many of my friends,
that I am indifferent to men and dis
courage them. As if any woman was
indifferent to men! The only point is
that women's ideas of what constitutes
a man differ, and my six years in this
cosmopolis have made me somewhat
discriminating.

But to return to Jessie, she was full
of apologies for being late. "I've thought
of nothing but you, dear, for two days
and nights. And I thought that for
once in my life I'd be on time. Yet
here I am, fifteen minutes late, unless
that clock's wrong." She was looking
at the beautiful little clock set in the
dashbpard of the auto.

"Only fifteen minutes!" I said. "And
you never before were known to be less

8

The Social Secretae£

than half an hour late. You even kept
the President waiting twenty minutes/'

"Isn't it stupid, this fussing about
being on time?" she replied. "I don't
believe any but dull people and those
who want to get something from one
are ever on time. For those who really
live, life is so full that punctuality is
impossible. But I should have been on
time, if I hadn't been down seeing the
Secretary of War about Willie Catesby
— poor Willie! He has been so handi
capped by nature!"

"Did you get it for him?" I asked.

"I think so — third secretary at St.
Petersburg. The secretary said: 'But
Willie is almost an imbecile, Mrs. Car-
teret. If we don't send him abroad, his
family'll have to put him away/ And
I said: ' That's true, Mr. Secretary. But
if we don't send that sort of people to

9

The Social Secretaeg

foreign courts, how are we to repay the
insults they send us in the form of im
becile attaches?' And then I handed
him six letters from senators— every one
of them a man whose vote he needs for
his fight on that nomination. They were
real letters. So presently he said, 'Very
well, Mrs. Carteret, I'll do what I can
to resent the Czar's last insult by export
ing Willie to him."

I waited a moment, then burst out with
what I was full of. "You think she'll
take me?" I said.

Jessie reproached me with tragedy in
her always intensely serious gray eyes.
"Take your' she exclaimed. "Take a
Talltowers when there's a chance to get
one? Why, as soon as I explained who
you were, she fairly quivered with
eagerness."

"You had to explain who a Talltow-
10

The Social Secreta^

ers is?" I said with mock amazement.
It's delightful to poke fun at Jessie; she
always appreciates a jest by taking it
more seriously than an ordinary state
ment of fact.

"But, dear, you mustn't be offended.
You know Mrs. Burke is very common
and ignorant. She doesn't know the
first thing about the world. She said
to me the other day that she had often
heard there were such things as class
distinctions, but had never believed it
until she came to Washington — she had
thought it was like the fairy stories.
She never was farther east than Chi
cago until this fall. She went there
to the Fair. You must get her to tell
you how she and three other women
who belong to the same Chautauqua
Circle went on together and slept in
the same room and walked from dawn
ii

The Social Secretao*

till dark every day, catalogue in hand,
for eleven days. It's too pathetic. She
said, 'My! but my feet were sore. I
thought I was a cripple for life/ "

"That sounds nice and friendly/' said
I, suspicious that Jessie's quaint sense of
humor had not permitted her to appre
ciate Mrs. Burke. "I'm so dreadfully
afraid I'll fall into the clutches of peo
ple that'll try to — to humiliate me."

Tears sprang to Jessie's eyes. "Please
don't, Gus!" she pleaded. "They'll be
only too deferential. And you must keep
them so. I suspect that Mrs. Burke
chums with her servants."

We were stopping before the house
— the big, splendid Ralston Castle, as
they call it; one of the very finest of the
houses that have been building since rich
men began to buy into the Senate and
Cabinet and aspire for diplomatic places,

12

The Social Secreta^S

and so have attracted other rich fami
lies to Washington. What a changed
Washington it is, and what a fight the
old simplicity is making against the new
ostentation! The sight of the Ralston
Castle in my present circumstances de
pressed me horribly. I went to my sec
ond ball there, and it was given for me
by Mrs. Ralston. And only a little more
than a year ago I danced in the qua
drille of honor with the French Ambas
sador — and the next week the Ralstons
went smash and hurried abroad to hide,
all except the old man who is hanging
round Wall Street, they say, trying to
get on his feet with the aid of his friends.
Friends ! How that word must burn into
him every time he thinks of it. When
he got into a tight place his "friends"
took advantage of their knowledge of
his affairs to grab his best securities, they

13

The Social Secreta^

say. No doubt he was disagreeable in
a way, but still those who turned on him
the most savagely had been intimate with
him and had accepted his hospitality.

"You'll be mistress here," Jessie was
saying. She had put on her prophetic
look and pose — she really believes she
has second sight at certain times. "And
you'll marry the son, if you manage it
right. I counted him in when I was
going over the advantages and disadvan
tages of the place before proposing it to
you. He looks like a mild, nice young
man — though I must say I don't fancy
cowlicks right in the part of the hair.
I saw only his picture."

A tall footman with an insolent face
opened the door and ushered us into the
small drawing-room to the left: "Mrs.
Carteret ! Miss Tall to wers ! " he shouted
— far louder than is customary or cour-

H

The Social

teous. I saw the impudent grin in his eyes
— no proper man-servant ever permits
any one to see his eyes. And he almost
dropped the curtain in our faces, in such
haste was he to get back to his lounging-
place below stairs.

His roar had lifted to her feet an
elderly woman with her hair so badly
dyed that it made her features look hag
gard and harsh and even dissipated. She
made a nervous bow. She was of the
figure called stout by the charitable and
sumptuous by the crude. She was richly-
dressed, over-dressed, dressed-up — shiny
figured satin with a great deal of beads
and lace that added to her width and
subtracted from her height. She stood
miserable, jammed and crammed into a
tight corset. Her hands — very nice
hands, I noticed — were folded upon her
stomach. As soon as I got used to that

15

The Social Secreta^S

revolting hair-dye, I saw that she had
in fact a large-featured, sweet face with
fine brown eyes. Even with the dye she
was the kind of looking woman that it
sounds perfectly natural to hear her hus
band call "mother."

Jessie went up to her as she stood
wretched in her pitiful attempt at youth
and her grandeur of clothes and sur
roundings. Mrs. Burke looked down
kindly, with a sudden quizzical smile
that reminded me of my suspicions as
to the Chicago Fair story. Jessie was
looking up like a plump, pretty, tame
robin, head on one side. "Dear Mrs.
Burke," she said. "This is Miss Tall-
towers, and I'm sure you'll love each
other."

Mrs. Burke looked at me — I thought,
with a determined attempt to be sus
picious and cautious. I'm afraid Jessie's
16

The Social SecretaQS

reputation for tireless effort to do some
thing for everybody has finally "queered"
her recommendations. However, what
ever warning Mrs. Burke had received
went for nothing. She was no match
for Jessie — Jessie from whom his Maj
esty at the White House hides when
he knows she's coming for an impossi
ble favor — she was no match for Jessie
and she knew it. She wiped the sweat
from her face and stammered: "I hope
we'll suit each other, Miss — " In her
embarrassment she had forgotten my
name.

"Talltowers," whispered Jessie with a
side-splitting look of tragic apology to
me. Just then the clock in the corner
struck out the half-hour from its cathedral
bell — the sound echoed and reechoed
through me, for it marked the beginning
of my "career." Jessie went on more

The Social Secretaes

loudly: "And now that our business is
settled, can't we have some lunch, Mrs.
Burke? I'm starved."

Mrs. Burke brightened. "The Sena
tor won't be here to-day," she drawled, in
a tone which always suggests to me that,
after all, life is a smooth, leisurely mat
ter with plenty of time for everything
except work. "As he was leaving for
the Capitol this morning, he says to me,
says he: 'You women had better fight
it out alone.' '

"The dear Senator!" said Jessie.
"He's so clever?"

"Yes, he is mighty clever with those
he likes," replied Mrs. Burke — Jessie
looking at me to make sure I would
note Mrs. Burke's "provincial" way of
using the word clever.

Jessie saved the luncheon — or, at least,
thought she was saving it. Mrs. Burke
18 '

The Social Secret aos

and I had only to listen and eat. I caught
her looking at me several times, and
then I saw shrewdness in her eyes —
good-natured, but none the less pene
trating for that. And I knew I should
like her, and should get on with her.
At last our eyes met and we both smiled.
After that she somehow seemed less
crowded and foreign in her tight, fine
clothes. I saw she was impatient for
Jessie to go the moment luncheon was
over, but it was nearly three o'clock
before we were left alone together.
There fell an embarrassed silence — for
both of us were painfully conscious that
nothing had really been settled.

"When do you wish me to come—
if you do wish it at all?*' I asked, by
way of making a beginning.

"When do you think you could
come?" she inquired nervously.

'9

The Social SecretaQS

"Then you do wish to give me a
trial? I hope you won't feel that Mrs.
Carteret's precipitate way binds you."

She gave me a shrewd, good-natured
look. "I want you to come," she said.
"I wanted it from what I'd heard of
you— I and Mr. Burke. I want it more
than ever, now that F ve seen you. When
can you come?"

"To-morrow — to-morrow morn-
ing?"

"Come as early as you like. The sal
ary is — is satisfactory?"

"Mrs. Carteret said — but I'm sure —
you can judge better — whatever — " I
stuttered, red as fire.

Mrs. Burke laughed. "I can see you
ain't a great hand at business. The sal
ary is two thousand a year, with a three
months' vacation in the time we're not
at Washington. Always have a plain un-

20

The Social Secretaos

derstanding in money matters — it saves
a lot of mean feelings and quarrels."

"Very well — whatever you think. I
don't believe I'm worth much of any
thing until I've had a chance to show
what I can do."

"Well, Tom— Mr. Burke— said two
thousand would be about right at the set-
off," she drawled in her calming tone.
"So we'll consider that settled."

"Yes," I gasped, with a big sigh of
relief. "I suppose you wish me to take
charge of your social matters — relieve
you of the burdensome part of enter
taining?"

"I just wish you could," she said, with
a great deal of humor in her slow voice.
"But I've got to keep that— it's the try
ing to make people have a good time
and not look and act as if they were
wondering why they'd come."

21

The Social Secreta^

"That'll soon wear off/' said I. "Most
of the stiffness is strangeness on both
sides, don't you think?"

"I don't know. As nearly as I can
make out, they never had a real, natural
good time in their lives. They wear the
Sunday, go-to-meeting clothes and man
ners the whole seven days. I'll never
get used to it. I can't talk that kind of
talk. And if I was just plain and natural,
they'd think I was stark crazy."

"Did you ever try?"

She lifted her hands in mock-horror.
"Mercy, no! Tom — Mr. Burke — warned

me.'3

I laughed. "Men don't know much
about that sort of thing," said I. "A
woman might as well let a man tell her
how to dress as how to act."

She colored. "He does," she said, her
eyes twinkling. "He was here two win-

22

The Social

ters — this is my first. I've a kind of feel
ing that he really don't know, but he's
positive and — I've had nobody else to
talk about it with. I'm a stranger here
— not a friend except people who — well,
I can guess pretty close to what they say
behind my back." She laughed — a great
shaking of as much of her as was not
held rigid by that tight corset. "Not
that I care — I like a joke myself, and
I'm a good deal of a joke among these
grand folks. Only, I do want to help
Tom, and not be a drag." She gave me
a sudden, sharp look. "I don't know
why I trust you, I'm sure."

"Because I'm your confidential ad
viser," said I, "and it's always well to
keep nothing from a confidential ad
viser." The longer I looked and lis
tened, the larger possibilities I saw in
her. My enthusiasm was rising.

23

The Social Secreta^

She rose and came to me and kissed
me. There were tears in her eyes. "I've
been so lonesome/' she said. " Even Tom
don't seem natural any more, away off
here in the East. Sometimes I get so
homesick that I just can't eat or any
thing."

"We're going to have a lot of fun,"
said I encouragingly — as if she were
twenty-four and I fifty, instead of it be
ing the other way. "You'll soon learn
the ropes."

"I'm so glad you use slang," she
drawled, back in her chair and comfort
ably settled. "My, but Tom'll be scan
dalized. He's made inquiries about you
and has made up his mind that whatever
you say is right. And I almost believed
he knew the trails. I might 'a' known!
He's a man, you see, and always was
stiff with the ladies. You ought to 'a'

24

The Social Secreta^

seen the letter he wrote proposing to me.
You see, I'm kind of fat and always was.
Mother used to tease me because I hadn't
any beaux except Tom, who wouldn't
come to the point. She said: 'Lizzie,
you'll never have a man make real love
to you/ And she was right. When
Tom proposed he wrote very formal-
like — not a sentimental word. And
when we were married and got better
acquainted, I teased him about it, and
tried to get him to make love, real book
kind of love. But not a word! But he's
fond of me — we always have got on
fine, and his being no good at love-talk
is just one of our jokes."

It was fine to hear her drawl it out
— I knew that she was sure to make a
hit, if only I could get her under way,
could convince her that it's nice to be
natural if you're naturally nice.

The Social Secreta^

"Tom" came in from the Senate and
I soon saw that, though she was a
"really" lady, of the only kind that is
real — the kind that's born right, he was
a made gentleman, and not a very suc
cessful job. He was small and thin and
dressed with the same absurd stiff care
with which he had made her dress. He
had a pointed reddish beard and reddish
curls, and he used a kind of scent that
smelt cheap though it probably wasn't.
He was very precise and distant with
me — how "Lizzie's" eyes did twinkle
as she watched him. I saw that she was
"on to" Tom with the quickness with
which a shrewd woman always finds
out, once she gets the clue.

"Have you had Miss Talltowers
shown her rooms, Mrs. Burke?" he soon
inquired.

"Why, no, pa," replied Mrs. Burke.
26

The Social Secretaos

"I forgot it clear." As she said "pa"
he winced and her eyes danced with
fun. She went on to me: "You don't
mind our calling each other pa and ma
before you, do you, Miss Talltowers?
We're so used to doing it that, if you
minded it and we had to stop, we'd feel
as if we had company in the house all
the time."

I didn't dare answer, I was so full of
laughter. For "pa" looked as if he
were about to sink through the floor.
She led me up to my rooms — a beauti
ful suite on the third floor. "We took
the house furnished," she explained as
we went, "and I feel as if I was living
in a hotel — except that the servants
ain't nearly so nice. I do hope you'll
help me with them. Tom wanted me
to take a housekeeper, but those that
applied were such grand ladies that I'd

27

The Social Secretaos

rather V done all my own work than
'a' had any one of them about. Perhaps
we could get one now, and you could
kind of keep her in check/'

"I think it'd be better to have some
one/' I replied. "I've had some experi
ence in managing a house." I couldn't
help saying it unsteadily — not because
I miss our house; no, I'm sure it wasn't
that. But I suddenly saw the old li
brary and my father looking up from his
book to smile lovingly at me as I strug
gled with the household accounts. Any
how, deep down I'm glad he did know
so little about business and so much
about everything that's fine. I'd rather
have my memories of him than any
money he could have left me by being
less of a father and friend and more of
a "practical" man.

Mrs. Burke looked at me sympathet-
28

The Social Secreta^

ically — I could see that she longed to
say something about my changed for
tunes, but refrained through fear of not
saying the right thing. I must teach
her never to be afraid of that — a born
lady with a good heart could never be
really tactless. She went to the front
door with me, opening it for me her
self to the contemptuous amusement of
the tall footman. We shook hands and
kissed — I usually can't bear to have a
woman kiss me, but I'd have felt badly
if "ma" Burke hadn't done it.

When I got back to Rachel's and
burst into the drawing-room with a
radiant face, I heard a grunt like a groan.
It was from Jim in the twilight near
Rachel at the tea-table. "I'm going
out to service to-morrow," said I to
Rachel. "So you're to be rid of your
visitor at last."

29

The Social Secret a^

"Oh, Gus!" exclaimed Rachel be
tween anger and tears. And Jim looked
black and sullen. But I was happy—
and am to-night. Happy for the first
time in two years. I'm going to do
something — and it is something that
interests me. I'm going to launch a fine
stately ship, a full-rigged four-master in
this big-little sea of Washington society.
What a sensation I can make with it
among the pretty holiday boats!

3°

D

II

ECEMBER 6. Last Monday
morning young Mr. Burke —
Cyrus, the son and heir — ar
rived, just from Germany. The first
glimpse I had of him was as he entered
the house between his father and his
mother, who had gone to the station to
meet him. I got myself out of the way
and didn't come down until "ma" Burke
sent for me. I liked the way she was
sitting there beaming — but then, I like
almost everything she does; she's such
a large, natural person. She never stands,

31

The Social Secret a^

except on her way to sit just as soon as
ever she can. "I never was a great
hand for using my feet/' she said to me
on my second day, "and I don't know
but about as much seems to V come to
find me as most people catch up with
by running their legs off?' I liked the
way her son was hovering about her.
And I liked the way "pa" Burke hov
ered round them both, nervous and pull
ing at his whiskers and trying to think
of things to say — if he only wouldn't
use brilliantine, or whatever it is, on his
whiskers !

" Cyrus, this is my friend, Miss Tall-
towers," said Mrs. Burke. I smiled and
he clapped his heels together with a
click and doubled up as if he had a sud
den pain in his middle, just like all the
northern Continental diplomats. When
he straightened back to the normal I

The Social Secreta^

took a good look at him — and he at me.
I don't know — or, rather, didn't then
know — what he thought. But I thought
him — well, "common." He has a great
big body that's strong and well-pro
portioned; but his features are so insig
nificant — a small mouth, a small nose,
small ears, eyes, forehead, small head.
And there, in the very worst place —
just where the part ought to be — was
the cowlick I'd noticed in his photo
graph. When he began to speak I liked
him still less. He's been at Berlin three
years, but still has his Harvard accent.
I wonder why they teach men at Har
vard to use their lips in making words
as a Miss Nancy sort of man uses his
fingers in doing fancy work?

Neither of us said anything memora
ble, and presently he went away to his
room, his mother going up with him.

33

The Social Secret SLIQZ,

His father followed to the foot of the
stairs, then drifted away to his study
where he could lie in wait for Cyrus
on his way down. Pretty soon his
mother came into the "office" they've
given me — it's just off the drawing-room
so that I can be summoned to it the
instant any one comes to see Mrs. Burke.
"I've let his pa have him for a while,"
she explained, as she came in. I saw
that she was full of her boy, so I turned
away from my books. She rambled on
about him for an hour, not knowing
what she was saying, but just pouring
out whatever came into her head. " His
pa has always said I'd spoil him," was
one of the things I remember, "but I
don't think love ever spoiled anybody."
Also she told me that his real name
wasn't Cyrus but Bucyrus, the town his
father originally came from — it's some-

34

The Social Secreta^

where in Ohio, I think she said. "And/*
said she, "whenever I want to cut his
comb I just give him his name. He
tames right down." Also that he has
used all sorts of things on the cowlick
without success. "There it is, still,"
said she, "as cross-grained as ever. I
like it about the best of anything, ex
cept maybe his long legs. I'm a duck-
leg myself, and his pa — well, his legs
*just about reach the ground/ as Lincoln
said, and after that the less said the
sooner forgot. But Cyrus has legs. And
his cowlick matches a cowlick in his
disposition — a kind of gnarly knot that
you can't cut nor saw through nor get
round no way. It's been the saving of
him, he's so good-natured and easy
otherwise." And she went on to tell
how generous he is, "the only generous
small-eared person I've ever known,

35

The Social SecretaG£

though I must say I have my doubts
about ears as a sign. There was Bill
Slayback in our town, with ears like a
jack-rabbit, and whenever he had a poor
man do a job of work about his place
he used to pay him with a ninety-day
note and then shave the note."

I was glad when she hurried away at
the sound of Cyrus in the hall. For a
huge lot of work there'll be for me to do
until I get things in some sort of order.
I've opened a regular set of books to
keep the social accounts in. Of course,
nobody who goes in for society, on the
scale we're going into it, could get along
without social bookkeeping as big as a
bank's. I pity the official women in the
high places who can't afford secretaries;
they must spend hours every night post
ing and fussing with their account-books
when they ought to be in bed asleep.

The Social Secretag£

On my second day here "pa" Burke
explained what his plans were. "We
wish to make our house," said he, "the
most distinguished social center in Wash
ington, next to the White House — and
very democratic. Above all, Miss Tall-
towers, democratic."

"He don't mean that he wants us to
do our own work and send out the wash,"
drawled "ma" Burke, who was sitting
by. "But democratic, with fourteen ser
vants in livery."

"I understand," said I. "You wish
simplicity, and people to feel at ease,
Mr. Burke."

"Exactly," he replied in a dubious
tone. "But I wish to maintain the —
the dignities, as it were."

I saw he was afraid I might get the
idea he wanted something like those
rough-and-tumble public maulings of

37

The-Social Secreta^

the President that they have at the White
House. I hastened to reassure him; then
I explained my plan. I had drawn up a
system somewhat like those the Presi
dent's wife and the Cabinet women and
the other big entertainers have. I'm glad
the Burkes haven't any daughters. If
they had I'd certainly need an assistant.
As it is, I'm afraid I'll worry myself
hollow-eyed over my books.

First, there's the Ledger — a real, big,
thick office ledger with almost four hun
dred accounts in it, each one indexed.
Of course, there aren't any entries as yet.
But there soon will be — what we owe
various people in the way of entertain
ment, what they've paid, and what they
owe us.

Second, there's my Day-Book. It
contains each day's engagements so that
I can find out at a glance just what we've

38

The Social Secreta^

got to do, and can make out each night
before going to bed or early each morn
ing the schedule for Mrs. Burke for the
day, and for Senator Burke and the son,
I suppose, for the late afternoon and the
evening.

Third, there's the Calling-Book.
Already I've got down more than a thou
sand names. The obscurer the women
are — the back-district congressmen's
wives and the like — the greater the
necessity for keeping the calling account
straight. I wonder how many public
men have had their careers injured or
ruined just because their wives didn't
keep the calling account straight. They
say that men forgive slights, and, when
it's to their interest, forget them. But
I know the women never do. They keep
the knife sharp and wait for a chance
to stick it in, for years and years. Of

39

The Social SecretaG£

course, if the Burkes weren't going into
this business in a way that makes me
think the Senator's looking for the nom
ination for president I shouldn't be so
elaborate. We'd pick out our set and
stick to it and ignore the other sets. As
it is, I'm going to do this thing thor
oughly, as it hasn't been done before.

Fourth, there's our Ball-and-Big-
Dinner Book. That's got a list of all
the young men and another of all the
young women. And I'm making notes
against the names of those I don't know
very well or don't know at all— notes
about their personal appearance, eligibil
ity, capacities for dancing, conversation,
and so forth and so on. If you're going
to make an entertainment a success
you've got to know something more or
less definite about the people that are
coming, whom to ask to certain things
40

The Social Secret SL&

and whom not to ask. Take a man like
Phil Harkness, or a girl like Nell Wit-
ton, for example. Either of them would
ruin a dinner, but Phil shines at a ball,
where silence and good steady dancing
are what the girls want. As for Nell,
she's possible at a ball only if you can be
sure John Rush or somebody like him
is coming — somebody to sit with her
and help her blink at the dancers and
be bored. Then there's the Sain Trem-
enger ? )Tt of man — a good talker, but
something ruinous when he turns loose
in a ball-room and begins to batter the
women's toilets to bits. He's a dinner
man, but you can't ask him when poli
tics may be discussed — he gets so violent
that he not only talks all the time, but
makes a deafening clamor and uses swear
words — and we still have quiet people
who get gooseflesh for damn.

41

The Social

Then there's — let mesee,what number
— oh, yes — fifth, there's my Acceptance-
and-Refusal Book. It's most necessary,
both as a direct help and as an indirect
check on other books. Then, too, I
want it to be impossible to send the
Burkes to places they've said they
wouldn't go, or for them to be out
when they've asked people to come here.
Those things usually happen when
you've asked some of those dreadful
people that everybody always forgets,
yet that are sure to be important at
some critical time.

Sixth, there's my Book of Home
Entertainments — a small book but most
necessary, as arranging entertainments
in the packed days of the Washington
season isn't easy.

Seventh, there's the little book with
the list of entertainments other people
42

The Social Secreta^

are going to give. We have to have
that so that we can know how to make
our plans. And in it I'm going to keep
all the information I can get about the
engagements of the people we particu
larly want to ask. If I'm not sharp-eyed
about that I'll fail in one of my principal
duties, which is getting the right sort
of people under this roof often enough
during the season to give us "distinction."
Eighth, there's my Distinguished-
Stranger Book. I'm going to make that
a specialty. I want to try to know
whenever anybody who is anybody is
here on a visit, so that we can get hold
of him if possible. The White House
can get all that sort of information easily
because the distinguished stranger
always gives the President a chance to
get at him. We shall have to make an
effort, b1.:* I think we'll succeed.

43

The Social SecretaG£

Ninth — that's my book for press
notices. It's empty now, but I think
"pa" Burke will be satisfied long before
the season is over.

Quite a library isn't it? How simple
it must be to live in a city like New
York or Boston where one bothers only
with the people of one set and has
practically no bookkeeping beyond a
calling list. And here it's getting worse
and worse each season.

Let me see, how many sets are there?
There's the set that can say must to us —
the White House and the Cabinet and
the embassies. Then there's the set we
can say must to— a huge, big set and,
in a way, important, but there's nobody
really important in it. Then there's the
still wider lower official set — such people
as the under-secretaries of departments,
the attaches of embassies, small con-

44

The Social Secretaes

gressmen and the like. Then there's the
old Washington aristocracy — my par
ticular crowd. It doesn't amount to
"shucks," as Mrs. Burke would say, but
everybody tries to be on good terms
with it, Lord knows why. Finally,
there's the set of unofficial people — the
rich or otherwise distinguished who live
in Washington and must be cultivated.
And we're going to gather in all of
them, so as not to miss a trick.

The first one of the Burkes to whom
I showed my books and explained my
self in full was "ma" Burke. She looked
as if she had been taken with a "misery,"
as she calls it. "Lord! Lord!" she
groaned. "Whatever have I got my
fool self into?"

I laughed and assured her that it was
nothing at all. "I'm only showing you
my work. All you've got to do is to

45

The'Social

carry out each day's work. I'll see to
it that you won't even have to bother
about what clothes to wear, unless you
want to. You'll be perfectly free to
enjoy yourself."

"Enjoy myself?" said she. "Why,
I'll be on the jump from morning till
night."

"From morning till morning again,"
I corrected. "The men sleep in Wash
ington. But the women with social
duties have no time for sleep — only for
naps."

"I reckon it'll hardly be worth while
to undress for bed," she said grimly.
"I'm going to have the bed taken out
of my room. It'd drive me crazy to
look at it. Such a good bed, too. I
always was a great hand for a good bed.
I've often said to pa that you can't put
too much value into a bed — and by bed

The Social SecretaG£

I don't mean headboard and footboard,
nor canopy nor any other fixings. What
do you think of my hair?"

I was a bit startled by her sudden
change of subject. I waited.

"Don't mind me — speak right out,"
she said with her good-natured twinkle.
"You might think it wasn't my hair,
but it is. The color's not, though, as
you may be surprised to hear." The
"surprised" was broadly satirical.

"I prefer natural hair," said I, "and
gray hair is most becoming. It makes a
woman look younger, not older."

"That's sensible," said she. "I never
did care for bottled hair. I think it
looks bad from the set-off, and gets
worse. The widow Pfizer in our town
got so that hers was bright green after
she bottled it for two years, trying to
catch old man Coakley. And after she

47

The Social

caught him she bottled his, and it turned
out green, too, after a while/'

"Why run such a risk?" said I. "I'm
sure your own hair done as your maid
can do it would be far more becoming."

Mrs. Burke was delighted. "I might
have known better," she observed, "but
I found Mr. Burke bottling his beard,
and he wanted me to; and it seemed to
me that somehow bottled hair just fitted
right in with all the rest of this foolish
ness here. How they would rear round
at home if they knew what kind of a
place Washington is ! Why, I hear that
up at the White House, when the Presi
dent leaves the table for a while during
meals, all the ladies — women, I mean
— his wife and all of them, have to rise
and stand till he comes back."

"Yes," I replied. "He's started that
custom. I like ceremony, don't you?"

48

The Social Secreta^

"No, I can't say that I do," she
drawled. "Out home all the drones and
pokes and nobodies are just crazy about
getting out in feathers and red plush
aprons and clanking and pawing round,
trying to make out they're somebody.
And I've always noticed that whenever
anybody that is a somebody hankers after
that sort of thing it's because he's got a
streak of nobody in him. No, I don't
like it in Cal Walters out home, and I
don't like it in the President."

"We've got to do as the other capi
tals do," said I. "Naturally, as we get
more and more ambassadors, and a big
ger army, and the President more power
ful, we become like the European
courts. And the President is simply
making a change abruptly that'd have
to come gradually anyhow."

Her eyes began to twinkle. "First

49

The Social Secretao;

thing you know, the country'll turn loose
a herd of steers from the prairies in this
town, and — But, long as it's here, I
suppose I've got to abide by it. So I'll
do whatever you say. It'll be a poor do,
without my trying to find fault."

And she's being as good as her word.
She makes me tell her exactly what to
do. She is so beautifully simple and
ladylike in her frank confessions of her
ignorance — just as the Queen of Eng
land would be if she were to land on
the planet Mars and have to learn the
ways — the surface ways, I mean. I've
no doubt that outside of a few frills
which silly people make a great fuss
about, a lady is a lady from one end of
the universe to the other.

I'm making the rounds of my friends
with Mrs. Burke in this period of wait
ing for the season to begin. And she

5°

The Social Secreta^

sits mum and keeps her eyes moving.
She's rapidly picking up the right way
to say things — that is, the self-assurance
to say things in her own way. I took
her among my friends first because I
wanted her to realize that I was abso
lutely right in urging her to naturalness.
There are so many in the different sets
she'll be brought into contact with who
are ludicrously self-conscious. Certainly,
there's much truth in what she says
about the new order. We Americans
don't do the European sort of thing
well, and, while the old way wasn't
pretty to look at it, it was — it was our
own. However, I'm merely a social
secretary, dealing with what is, and not
bothering my head about what ought
to be. And as for the Burkes, they're
here to take advantage of what is, not
to revolutionize things.

51

The Social Secreta^

Mr. Burke himself was the next mem
ber of the family at whom I got a chance
with my great plans. When he had got
it all out of me he began to pace up and
down the floor, pulling at his whiskers,
and evidently thinking. Finally he
looked at me in a kindly, sharp way,
and, in a voice I recognized at once as
the voice of the Thomas Burke who
had been able to pile up a fortune and
buy into the Senate, said:

"I double your salary, Miss Tall-
towers. And I hope you understand
that expense isn't to be considered in
carrying out your program. I want you
to act just as if this were all for your
self. And if we succeed I think you'll
find I'm not ungenerous." And before
I could try to thank him he was gone.

The last member was "Bucyrus."
As I knew his parents wished to be alone

52

The^Social

with him at first I kept out of the way,
breakfasting in my rooms, lunching and
dining out a great deal. What little I
saw of him I didn't like. He ignored
me most of the time — and I, for ona
woman, don't like to be ignored by any
man. When he did speak to me it was
as they speak to the governess in fami
lies where they haven't been used to
very much for very long. Perhaps this
piqued me a little, but it certainly
amused me, and I spoke to him in an
humble, deferential way that seemed
somehow to make him uneasy.

It was day before yesterday that he
came into my office about an hour after
luncheon. He tried to look very digni
fied and superior.

"Miss Talltowers," he said, "I must
request you to refrain from calling mo
sir whenever you address me."

53

The;Social Secreta^

"I beg your pardon, sir," I replied
meekly, "but I have never addressed
you. I hope I know my place and my
duty better than that. Oh, no, sir, I
have always waited to be spoken to."

He blazed a furious red. "I must
request you," he said, with his speech
at its most fancy-work like, "not to
continue your present manner toward
me. Why, the very servants are laugh
ing at me."

"Oh, sir," I said earnestly, "I'm sure
that's not my fault." And I didn't spoil
it by putting accent on the "that" and
the "my."

He got as pale as he had been red.
"Are you trying to make it impossible
for us to remain under the same roof?"
he demanded. What a spoiled stupid!

"I'm sure, sir," said I, and I think
my eyes must have shown what an un-

54

The Social Secreta^

pleasant mood his hinted threat had put
me in, "that I'm not even succeeding
in making it impossible for us to remain
in my private office at the same time.
Do you understand me, or do you wish
me to make my meaning — "

He had given a sort of snort and had
rushed from the room.

I suppose I ought to be more chari
table toward him. A small person,
brought up to regard himself as a sort
of god, and able to buy flattery, and per
mitted to act precisely as his humors
might suggest — what is to be expected
of such a man? No, not a man but boy,
for he's only twenty-six. Only twenty-
six! One would think I was forty to
hear me talking in that way of twenty-
six. But women always seem older than
men who are even many years older
than they. And how having to earn

55

The Social

my own bread has aged me inside! I
think Jessie was right when she said in
that solemn way of hers, "And although,
dear Augusta, they may think you
haven't brains enough, I assure you
you'll develop them." Poor, dear Jessie!
How she would amuse herself if she
could be as she is, and also have a sense
of humor !

At any rate, Mr. Bucyrus came strid
ing back after half an hour, and, rather
surlily but with a certain grudging man
liness, said: "I beg your pardon, Miss
Talltowers, for what I said. I am
ashamed of my having forgotten myself
and made that tyrannical speech to you/'

"Thank you, sir," said I, without
raising my eyes. "You are most gra
cious."

"And I hope," he went on, "that you
will try to treat me as an equal."

56

The Social SecretaQ5

"It'll be very hard to do that, sir,"
said I. And I lifted my eyes and let
him see that I was laughing at him.

He shifted uneasily, red and white by
turns. "I think you understand me,"
he muttered.

"Perfectly," said I.

He waved his arm impatiently.
"Please don't!" he exclaimed rather
imperiously. "I could have got my
mother to — "

"I hope you won't complain of me
to your mother," I pleaded.

He flushed and snorted, like a horse
that is being teased by a fly it can reach
with neither teeth, hoofs nor tail. "You
know I didn't mean that. I'm not an
utter cad — now, don't say, 'Aren't you,
sir?' "

"I had no intention of doing so,"
said I. "In fact I've been trying to

57

The Social

make allowances for you — for your
mother's sake. I appreciate that you've
been away from civilization for a long
time. And I'm sure we shall get on
comfortably, once you've got your bear
ings again."

He was silent, stood biting his lips
and looking out of the window. Pres
ently, when I had resumed my work,
he said in an endurable tone and man
ner: "I hope you will be kind enough
to include me in that admirable social
scheme of yours. Are those your
books?"

I explained them to him as briefly
as I could. I had no intention of mak
ing myself obnoxious, but on the other
hand I did not, and do not purpose to
go out of my way to be courteous to
this silly of an overgrown, spoiled baby.
He tried to be nice in praise of my

58

The Social Secretaos

system, but I got rid of him as soon as
I had explained all that my obligations
as social secretary to the family required.
He thanked me as he was leaving and
said, in his most gracious tone, "I shall
see that my father raises your salary."

I fairly gasped at the impudence of
this, but before I could collect myself
properly to deal with him he was gone.
Perhaps it was just as well. I must be
careful not to be "sensitive" — that
would make me as ridiculous as he is.

And that's the man Jim Lafollette is
fairly smoking with jealousy of! He
was dining at Rachel's last night, and
Rachel put him next me. He couldn't
keep off the subject of "that young
Burke." Jessie overheard him after a
while and leaned round and said to me,
"How do you and young Mr. Burke
get on?" in her "strictly private" man-

59

The Social

ner — Jessie's strictly private manner is
about as private as the Monument.

"Not badly," I replied, to punish Jim.
"We're gradually getting acquainted."

Jim sneered under his mustache. "It's
the most shameful scheme two women
ever put up," he said, as if he were
joking.

"Oh, has Jessie told you?" I ex
claimed, pretending to be concealing
my vexation.

"It's the talk of the town," he
answered, showing his teeth in a grin
that was all fury and no fun.

There may be women idiots enough
to marry a man who warns them in
advance that he's rabidly jealous, but
I'm not one of them. Better a crust
in quietness.

60

Ill

DECEMBER 27. Three weeks
simply boiling with business
since I wrote here — and it seems
not more than so many days. And all
by way of preparation, for the actual
season is still five days away.

I can hardly realize that Mrs. Burke
is the same person I looked at so dubi
ously two days less than a month ago.
Truly, the right sort of us Americans
are wonderful people. To begin with
her appearance: her hair isn't "bottled,"
as she called it, any more. It's beauti-
61

The Social Secretaos

ful iron-gray, and softens her features
and permits all the placid kindliness and
humor of her face to show. Then there's
her dress — gracious, how tight-looking
she was! A thin woman can, and should,
wear close things. But no woman who
wishes to look like a lady must ever
wear anything tight. To be tight in one's
clothes is to be tight in one's talk, man
ner, thought — and that means — well,
common. What an expressive word
"common" is, yet I'm sure I couldn't
define it.

For a fat woman to be tight is —
revolting! My idea of misery is a fat
woman in a tight waist and tight shoes.
Yet fat women have a mania for wear
ing tight things, just as gaunt women
yearn for stripes and short women for
flounces. My first move in getting Mrs.
Burke into shape — after doing away
62

The Social SecretaG5

with that dreadful "bottled" hair — was
to put her into comfortable clothes.
The first time I got her into an evening
dress of the right sort I was rewarded
for all my trouble by her expression.
She kissed me with tears in her eyes.
"My dear," said she, "never before did
I have a best dress that I wasn't afraid
to breathe in for fear I'd bust out, back
or front." Then I made her sit down
before her long glass and look at her
self carefully. She had the prettiest kind
of color in her cheeks as she smiled at
me and said: "If I'd 'a' looked like this
when I was young I reckon Mr. Burke
wouldn't 'a' been so easy in his mind
when he went away from home, nor
'a' stayed so long. I always did sympa
thize with pretty women when they
capered round, but now I wonder they
ever do sober down. If I weighed a hun-

The Social SecretaQS

dred pounds or so less I do believe I'd
try to frisk yet."

And I do believe she could; for she's
really a handsome woman. Why is it
that the women who have the most to
them don't give it a chance to show
through, but get themselves up so that
anybody who glances at them tries
never to look again?

It is the change in her appearance
even more than all she's learned that
has given her self-confidence. She feels
at ease — and that puts her at ease, and
puts everybody else at ease, too. It has
reacted upon Mr. Burke. He has
dropped brilliantine — perhaps "ma"
gave him a quiet hint— and he has taken
some lessons in dress from "Cyrus," who
really gets himself up very well, con
sidering that he has lived in Germany
for three years. I should have hopes

The Social SecretaQS

that "pa" would blossom out into some
thing very attractive socially if he
hadn't a deep-seated notion that he is
a great joker. A naturally serious man
who tries to be funny is about the most
painful object in civilization. Still,
Washington is full of statesmen and
scholars who try to unbend and be
"light," especially with "the ladies."
Nothing makes me — or any other
woman, I suppose — so angry as for a
man to show that he takes me for a fool
by making a grinning galoot of himself
whenever he talks to me. Bucyrus is
much that kind of ass. He alternates
between solemnity and silliness.

I said rather pointedly to him the
other night: "You men with your great,
deep minds make a mistake in chang
ing your manner when you talk with
the women and the children. Nothing

65

The Social Secreta^

pleases us so much as to be taken seri
ously." But it didn't touch him. How
ever, he's hardly to blame. He's spent
a great many years round institutions of
learning, and in those places, I've no
ticed, every one has a musty, fusty sense
of humor. Probably it comes from
cackling at classical jokes that have
laughed themselves as dry as a mummy.
We've been giving a few entertain
ments — informal and not large, but
highly important. I had two objects in
mind: In the first place, to get Mr. and
Mrs. Burke accustomed to the style of
hospitality they've got to give if they're
going to win out. In the second place,
to get certain of the kind of people who
are necessary to us in the habit of com
ing to this house — and those people are
not so very hard to get hold of now;
later they'll be engaged day and night.
66

The Social Secreta^

For two weeks now I've had my two
especial features going. One of them
is for the men, the other for the women.
And I can see already that they alone
would carry us through triumphantly;
for they've caught on.

My men's feature is a breakfast. I
engaged a particularly good cook — the
best old-fashioned Southern cook in
Washington. Rachel had her, and I
persuaded Mr. Derby to consent to giv
ing her up to us, just for this season.
Cleopatra — that's her name — has noth
ing to do but get together every morn
ing by nine o'clock the grandest kind
of an old-fashioned American breakfast.
And I explained to Senator Burke that
he was to invite some of his colleagues,
as many as he liked, and tell them to
come any morning, or every morning
if they wished, and bring their friends.

The Social Secreta:©^

I consult with Cleopatra every day
as to what she's to have the next morn
ing; and I think dear old father taught
me what kind of breakfast men like. I
don't give them too much, or they'd
be afraid to come and risk indigestion
a second time. I see to it that every
thing is perfectly cooked — and it's pretty
hard for any man to get indigestion,
even from corned beef hash and hot
cornbread and buckwheat cakes with
maple syrup, if it's perfectly cooked and
is eaten in a cheerful frame of mind.
No women are permitted at these break
fasts — just men, with everything free
and easy, plenty to smoke, separate tables,
but each large enough so that there's
always room at any one of them for one
more who might otherwise be uncom
fortable. Even now we have from
fifteen to twenty men — among them

68

The Social Secretaos

the very best in Washington. In the
season we'll have thirty and forty, and
our house will be a regular club from
nine to eleven for just the right men.

My other big feature is an informal
dance every Wednesday night. It's
already as great a success in its way as
the breakfasts are in theirs. I've been
rather careful about whom I let Mrs.
Burke invite to come in on Wednesdays
whenever they like. The result is that
everybody is pleased; the affairs seem to
be "exclusive," yet are not. I know it
will do the Burkes a world of good
politically, because a certain kind of
people who are important politically
but have had no chance socially are
coming to us on Wednesdays, and that's
just the kind of people who are frantic
ally flattered by the idea that they are
"in the push."

69

The Social Secretaos

Speaking of being "in the push,"
there are two ways of getting there if
one isn't there. One is to worm your
way in; the other is to make yourself
the head and front of "the push."
That's the way for those who have
money and know how. And that's the
way the Burkes are getting in — getting
in at the front instead of at the rear.

It's most gratifying to see how Mr.
Burke treats me. He always has been
deferential, but he now shows that he
thinks I have real brains. And since his
breakfasts have become the talk of the
town and are "patronized" by the men
he's so eager to get hold of, he is even
consulting me about his business. I am
criticizing for him now a speech he's
going to make on the canal question
next month — a dreadfully dull speech,
and I don't feel competent to tell him

The Social Secretae£

what to do with it. I think I'll advise
him not to make it, tell him his forte
is diplomacy — winning men round by
personal dealing with them — which is
the truth.

Young Mr. Burke — after a period of
unbending — is now shyer than ever. I
wondered why, until it happened to oc
cur to me one day as I was talking with
Jessie. I suddenly said to her: "Jessie,
did you ever tell Nadeshda that you had
planned to marry me to Cyrus Burke?"

She hopped about in her chair a bit,
as uneasy as a bird on a swaying perch.
Then she confessed that she "might have
suggested before Nadeshda what a de
lightfully satisfactory thing it would be."

I laughed to relieve her mind — also
because it amused me to see through
Nadeshda.

Of course, one of the women I needed

71

The Social Secretaos

most in this Burke campaign was Na-
deshda. And I happened to know that
she is bent on marrying a rich Ameri
can — indeed, that's the only reason why
the wilds of America are favored with
the presence of the beautiful, joy-loving,
courted and adored Baroness Nadeshda
Daragane. The yarn about her sister,
the ambassadress, being an invalid and
shrinking from the heavy social respon
sibilities of the embassy is just so much
trash. So, as soon as "Cyrus" came I
went over to see her, and, as diplomat
ically as I knew how, displayed before
her dazzled eyes the substantial advan
tages of the sole heir of the great West
ern multi-millionaire.

As I went on to tell how generous
the Senator is, and how certain he would
be to lavish wealth upon his daughter-
in-law, I could see her mind at work.

72

The Social Secreta^

A fascinating, naughty, treacherous lit
tle mind it is — like a small Swiss watch
of the rarest workmanship and full of
wheels within wheels. And she's a
beautiful little creature, as warm as a
tropical sun to look at, and about as
cold as the Arctic regions to deal with.
No, I haven't begun to describe her.
I'd not be surprised to hear that she had
eloped with her brother-in-law's coach
man; nor should I be surprised to hear
that she had married the most hideous,
revolting man in the world for his money,
and was suspected of being engaged in
trying to hasten him off to the grave.
She's of the queer sort that would kiss
or kill with equal enthusiasm, capable
of almost any virtue or vice — on impulse.
If there's any part of her beneath the
impulsive part it's solid ice in a frame
of steel. But— is there? She's talked

73

The Social Secretaos

about a good deal — not a tenth enough
to satisfy her craving for notoriety, and,
I may add, not a tenth part so much as
she deserves to be, and would be if we
studied character on this side of the
water instead of being too busy with
ourselves to look beyond anybody else's
surface.

Well, the Baroness Nadeshda has been
wild about the Burkes ever since we had
our talk. And she has Mr. Cyrus thor
oughly tangled in her nets, and the Sen
ator, too. And, naturally, she lost no
time in trying to "do" me. She has
told Bucyrus what a designing creature
I am— no doubt has warned him that if
I seem distant to him I'm at my dead
liest, and to look out for mines. He
certainly is looking out for them, for,
whenever I speak to him, he acts as if
he were stepping round on a volcano.

74

The Social Secreta^

I'm having a good deal of fun with
him. I wish I had the time; I'd try to
teach him a very valuable lesson. Really,
it's a shame to let a man go through life
imagining that he's an all-conqueror,
when in reality the woman who marries
him will feel that she's swallowing about
as bitter a dose as Fate ever presented
to feminine lips in a gold spoon.

Dear old "ma" Burke hasn't yet
yielded to Nadeshda's blandishments.
We went to the embassy to call yester
day afternoon at tea-time, and I saw her
watching Nadeshda in that smiling,
simple way of hers that conceals about
as keen a brain as I shouldn't care to
have tearing me to pieces for inspection.

The embassy at tea-time is always
wild. For then Sophie comes in with
her monkey and Nadeshda's seven dogs
are racing about. And the Count always

75

The Social SecretaQj

laughs loudly, usually at nothing at all.
And each time he laughs the dogs bark
until the monkey in a great fright dashes
up the curtains or flings himself at Sophie
and almost strangles her with his paws
or arms, or whatever they are, round
her neck. I don't think I've ever been
there that something hasn't been spilt
for a huge mess; often the whole tea-
table topples over. Mrs. Burke loves to
go, for afterward she laughs a dozen
times a day until her sides ache.

As we came away yesterday I said to
her: "What a fascinating, beautiful
creature Nadeshda is!"

Mrs. Burke smiled. "When I was a
girl," she said, "I had a catamount for
a pet — a cub, and they had cut his
claws. He was beautiful and mighty
fascinating — you never did know when
he was going to fawn on you and when

The Social SecretaG£

he was going to fasten his teeth in you.
The baroness puts me in mind of my
old pet, and how I didn't know which
was harder — to keep him or to give
him up."

"She certainly has a strange nature,"
said I.

After a pause Mrs. Burke went on:
"She's the queerest animal in this me
nagerie here, so far as I've seen. And I
don't think I'm wrong in suspecting
she's sitting up to Cyrus."

"I don't wonder he finds her inter
esting," said I.

"Cyrus is just like his pa," said she,
"a mighty poor judge of women. It
was lucky for his pa that he married
and settled down before he had much
glitter to catch the eyes of the women.
Otherwise, he'd 'a' made a ridiculous
fool of himself. But I like a man the

77

The Social Secretaes

women can fool easy. That shows he's
honest. These fellows who are so sharp
at getting on to the tricks of the women
ain't, as a rule, good for much else. But
Cyrus has got me to look after him/'

"He might do much worse than
marry Nadeshda," said I.

"That's what his pa says," she replied.
"But I ain't got round to these new-
fashioned notions of marriage. I want
to see my Cyrus married to the sort of
woman his ma'd like and be proud to
have for the mother of her grand-chil
dren. And I ain't altogether sure we
need the kind of tone in our blood that
a catamount'd bring. Though I must
say a year or so of living with a cata
mount might do Cyrus a world of good."

Which shows that even love can't
altogether blind "ma" Burke.

January 3. I had to do a little schem-

The Social Secreta^

ing to get Mrs. Burke an invitation to
assist at the New Year's reception. It's
always the first event of the season, and,
though it would have been no great
matter if I hadn't been able to get her
in among those who stand near the
President's wife and the Cabinet women,
still I felt that I couldn't get my "pulls"
into working order any too soon. Ever
since the second week in my "job" I've
realized that nothing could be easier than
to put the Burkes well to the front, but
my ambition to make them first calls for
the exertion of every energy.

So, in the third week of December I
set Rachel at Mrs. Senator Lumley and
Mrs. Admiral Bixby — two women who
can get almost anything in reason out
of the President's wife. Rachel is about
the most important woman in the old
Washington aristocracy, and the Lum-

79

The Social Secretaos

leys and the Bixbys are in the nature of
fixtures here, not at all like an evanes
cent President or Cabinet person. So
Rachel's request set the two women to
work. And although the President's
wife said she'd asked all she intended to
ask, far too many, and didn't see why
on earth she should be beset for a new
comer who had been reported to her
as fat and impossible, still she finally
yielded.

I hadn't hoped to get an invitation
for them for the Cabinet dinner, and I
was astounded when it came. We had
arranged to give a rather large informal
dinner that night and had to call it off,
as an invitation from the White House,
even from the obscurest member of the
President's family for any old function
whatever, is a command that may not
be disobeyed. Well, as I was saying, the
80

The Social Secretaos

invitation to the Cabinet dinner came
unsought. It seems that the Burke
breakfasts are making a great stir polit
ically; so great a stir that they have
made the President a little uneasy. Of
course, the best way to get rid of an
opponent is to conciliate him. Hence
the royal command to Senator and Mrs.
Burke to appear at his Majesty's dinner
to his Majesty's ministers.

Mrs. Burke is tremendously proud of
her first two communications from the
White House. As for the Senator, he
looks at them half a dozen times a day.

I went down to the New Year's re
ception to see how "ma" was getting
on. As I had expected, she didn't stand
very long. She cast about for a chair,
and, seeing one, planted herself. Soon
the Baroness joined her, and young
Prince Krepousky joined Nadeshda, and

81

The Social Secretaos

then General Martin, who loves Mrs.
Burke for the feeds she gives. The
group grew, and Mrs. Burke began to
talk in her drawling, humorous way,
and Nadeshda laughed, which made the
others laugh — for it's impossible to
resist Nadeshda. When I arrived Mrs.
Burke was "right in it."

And after a while the President came
and said: "Is this your reception, madam,
or is it mine?" At which there was
more laughing, he raising a great guffaw
and slapping his hip with his powerful
hand. Then they all went up to have
something to eat, and the President spent
most of the time with her.

She doesn't need any more coaching0
Of course, she's flattered by her success.
But instead of having her head turned,
as most women do who get the least bit
of especial attention from the conspicu-

82

The Social

ous men here, she takes it all very plac
idly. "They don't care shucks for me,"
she says, "and I know it. We're all in
business together, and I'm mighty glad
it can be carried on so cheerful-like."
At the Cabinet dinner, to-morrow night,
she'll have to sit well down toward the
foot of the table. But she won't mind
that. Indeed, if I hadn't been giving
her lessons in precedence she wouldn't
have an idea that everything here is
arranged by rank.

Jessie — so she tells me — had a half-
hour's session with "Cyrus" the other
day and gave him a very exalted idea of
my social position and influence. No
doubt, what she said confirmed his sus
picion that I and my friends are con
spiring against him; but I observe a
distinct change in his manner toward
me. He's even humble. I suppose he

83

The Social SecretaG£

thought I was some miserable creature
whom his mother had taken on, half
out of charity. I'm afraid I have a sort
of family pride that's a little ridiculous
— but I can't help it. Still, I am Amer
ican enough to despise people who are
courteous or otherwise, according as they
look up to or look down on the particular
person's family and position. I guess
young Mr. Burke is his father in an ag
gravated form. Yet Jessie, and Rachel,
too, pretend to like him. And probably
they really do — it's not hard to like any
one who is not asking favors and is in
a position to grant them, and isn't so
near to one that his quills stick into one.
The Countess of Wend came in to
see me this afternoon and told me all
about the row over at the legation. It
seems that the new minister is a plebeian,
and in their country people of his sort

84

The Social

aren't noticed by the upper classes un
less an upper-class man happens to need
something to wipe his boots on and one
of them is convenient for use. Well,
every attache* is in a fury, and none of
them will speak to the minister except
in the most formal way and only when
it's absolutely necessary. As for the
minister's wife, the other women —
but what's the use of describing it; we
all know how nasty women can be about
matters of rank. The Count is talking
seriously of .resigning. I'd be dread
fully sorry, as Eugenie is a dear, more
like an American than a foreigner; and
I believe she really likes us, where most
of them privately despise us as a lot of
low-born upstarts. I know they laugh
all day long at the President's queer
manners and mannerisms — but then, so
do we, for that matter. And it's quite

85

The Social Secret 3i&

unusual for Washington, where each
President is bowed down to and praised
everywhere and flattered till he thinks
he's a sort of god — and forgotten as
soon as his term is ended. I suppose
there's nothing deader on this earth
than an ex-President, with no offices to
distribute and no hopes for a further
political career.

January 9. We had a beautiful din
ner here last night — very brilliant too,
as we all were going to a ball at the
Russian embassy afterward. All the
diplomats and army men were in uni
form — and one or two of the army men
were really brilliant. But none of the
diplomats. They say that no nation
sends us its best or even its second best.
It seems that diplomats don't amount
to much in this day of cables. Those
who have any intelligence naturally go
86

The Social Secretaos

to courts, where the atmosphere is con
genial and where there are chances for
decorations. So we get only the stiffs
and stuffs — with a few exceptions. If it
weren't for their women —

But, to return to our dinner — Mrs.
Burke went in with the German am
bassador, and I saw that they were get
ting on famously. He is a very clever
man in a small way, and has almost an
American sense of humor. As soon as
he saw that she intended what she said
to be laughed at he gave himself up to
it. "Your Mrs. Burke is charming,
Miss Talltowers," said he to me after
dinner. "She ranks with Bret Harte
and Mark Twain. It's only in Amer
ica that you find old women who make
you forget to wish you were with young
and pretty women."

Jim Lafollette took me in— the first

The Social Secretac£

time I've had him here. I must say he
behaved very well and was the hand
somest man in the room. But he never
has much to say that is worth hearing.
Though conversation at Washington in
society isn't on any too high a plane,
as a rule — how could conversation in a
mixed society anywhere be very high?
— still it isn't the wishy-washy chatter
and gossip that Jim Lafollette delights
in. Of course, army officers almost
always go in for gossip — that comes
from sitting round with their women
at lonely posts where nothing occurs.
And they, as a rule, either gossip or
simply drivel when they talk to women,
because all the women that ever liked
them liked them for their brass buttons,
and all the women they ever liked they
liked for their pretty faces and empty
heads. So, usually, to get an army of-

The Social Secretag£

ficer at dinner is to sit with a bowl of
soft taffy held to your lips and a huge
spoonful of it thrust into your mouth
every time you stop talking. That's
true of many of the statesmen, too, es
pecially the heavyweights. I suppose
I'm wrong, but I can't help suspecting
a man without a sense of humor of be
ing a solemn fraud.

You'd think American women, at the
capital, at least, would be interested in
politics. But they're not. They say it's
the vulgarity of the intriguing and of
most of the best intriguers that makes
them dislike politics, even here. I suspect
there's another reason. We women are
so petted by the men that we don't have
to know anything to make ourselves
agreeable. If we're pretty and listen
well that's all that's necessary. So, why
get headaches learning things ?

The Social Secreta^

Of course, there are exceptions. Take
Maggie Shotwell. Her husband is a
wag-eared ass. Yet in eleven years she
has advanced him from second secretary
to minister to a second-class power just
by showing up here at intervals and
playing the game intelligently. And
there are scores of army women who do
as well in a smaller way, and a few of
the diplomats' wives are most adroit,
intriguing well both here and at their
homes in a nice, clean way, as intrigue
goes.

But most of the women are like
"ma" Burke, who'd as soon think of
entering for a foot-race as of interfering
in her husband's political affairs in any
way, beyond giving him some sound
advice about the men that can be trusted
and the men that can't. I suppose if
there were real careers in public life in
90

The Social Secreta^

this country, not dependent upon elec
tions, the Washington women wouldn't
be so lazy and indifferent, but would
wake up and intrigue their brothers and
sons and other male relatives into all
sorts of things. Then, too, a man has
to vote with his "party" on everything
that's important, and his "party" is a
small group of old men who are beyond
social blandishments and go to bed early
every night and associate only with men
in the daytime.

No, we women don't amount to much
directly at Washington. If Jim Lafol-
lette had kept away from the women
and society he might have amounted
to something. It's become a proverb
that whenever a young man comes here
and goes in for the social end of it he
is doomed soon to disappear and be
heard of no more. The President is try-

91

The Social Secreta££

ing to make society amount to some
thing, but he won't succeed. Whatever
benefit there may be in it will go, not
to him, but to men like Senator Burke.
He doesn't go any more than he can
help, except to his own breakfasts. But
he sends his wife, and so, without wast
ing any of his time, he makes himself
prominent in a very short space of time
and gets all the big social indirect in
fluence — the influence of the women on
their husbands.

Mrs. Burke's younger brother, Robert
Gunton, arrived last night. He reminds
me of her, but he's slender and very act
ive — a shabby sort of person, clean but
careless, and he looks as if he had so
many other things to think about that
he hadn't time to think about himself.
He looks younger and talks older than
his years. He's here to get some sort
92

The Social Secretaos

of patent through; he won't permit his
brother-in-law to assist him; he refuses
to go anywhere — in society, I mean.
We rode up to the Capitol together in a
street-car this morning, and I liked him.

"Why do you ride in a street-car ?"
he asked.

"Because it's not considered good
form to use carriages too much," I re
plied. "It might rouse the envy of
those who can't afford carriages."

"Then it isn't because you don't want
to, but because you don't dare to?"

"Yes," said I. " But things are chang
ing rapidly. The rich people who live
here but care nothing for politics are
gradually introducing class distinctions."

"You mean, poor people who like to
fawn upon and hate the rich are intro
ducing class distinctions," he corrected.

He is thirty-two years old; he treats

93

The Social Secretag£

a woman as if she were a man, and
he treats a man as if he himself were
one. It isn't possible not to like that
sort of human being.

Invitations are beginning to come in
floods — invitations for the big, formal
things for which people are asked weeks
in advance. And we are getting a splen
did percentage of acceptances for our big
affairs, thanks to my taking the trouble
to find out the freest dates in the sea
son. If all goes well, before another
month, as soon as it gets round that we
are going to give something big in a
short time, lots of pretty good people will
be holding off from accepting other
things in the hope that they're on our
list.

Certainly, there's a good deal in go
ing about anything in a systematic way
— even a social launching.

94

IV

JANUARY 1 2. We are all sleeping
so badly. Even the Senator,, whom
nothing has ever before kept from
his "proper rest," is complaining of
wakefulness. Suppers every night either
here or elsewhere, the house never quiet
until two or three in the morning, all
of us up at eight — Cyrus often at seven
because he rides a good deal, and the
early morning is the only time when
any one in Washington in the season
can find time to ride. "It's worse than
the Wilderness campaign," said Mr.

95

The Social Secreta^

Burke, who was a lieutenant in flie war.
"For now and then, between battles and
skirmishes, we did get plenty of sleep.
This is a continuous battle day and night,
week in and week out, with no let-up
for Sundays." And Mrs. Burke — poor
"ma!" How hollow-eyed and sagged-
cheeked she is getting with the real sea
son less than two weeks old! She says:
"I wouldn't treat a dog as I treat my
self. I no sooner get to sleep than they
wake me. I think the servants just de
light to wake me, and I don't blame
them, for they're worse off than we are,
though I do try to be as easy on them
as possible." She doesn't know how
many long naps they take while she's
dragging herself from place to place.

On our way to the White House to
a musicale she fell asleep. As we rolled
up to the entrance I had to wake her.

The Social SecretaQS

She came to with a sort of groan and
gave a ludicrously pitiful glance at the
attendant who was impatiently waiting.
"Oh, Lord!" she muttered. "I was
dreaming I was in bed, and it ain't so.
Instead, I've got to enjoy myself." And
then she gave a dreary laugh.

"Ma" Burke dozed through the mu-
sicale with a pleasant smile on her large
face and her head keeping time to the
music. When we spoke to the Presi
dent and he said he hoped she'd "en
joyed herself," she drawled: "I did that,
Mr. President! I only wish it had been
longer — I'm 'way behind on sleep." He
laughed uproariously. It's the fashion
to laugh at everything "ma" says now,
because the German ambassador tells
every one what a wit she is. And who'd
fail to laugh at wit admired by an am
bassador?

97

^ Social SecretaG£

Writing about sleep has driven off
my fit of wakefulness. I'll only add
that Lu Frayne's in town, working day
and night to get her husband transferred
from San Francisco to the War Depart
ment here. I think she'll win out, as
she's got two Senators who've been
frightening the President by acting
queerly lately. It's too funny! When
the new Administration came every one
was scared because the rumor got round
that he was going to give us a repeti
tion of the Cleveland nightmare. But
there was nothing in it; the only "pulls"
that have failed to work are those that
were strong with the last Administra
tion, and there's a whole crop of new
pulls. Well, at least, the right sort of
people, those who have family and posi
tion, are getting their rights to prefer
ence as they never did before. We've

98

The Social SecretaG£

not had many Presidents who knew the
right sort of people even when they've
been willing to please them, if they
could pick them out.

What a changed Washington it is:
so many formalities; so many rich peo
ple; so many rich men, and men of
family and position in office; so many
big, fine houses and English and French
servants. "Such a stylishness!"

January 14. Our first big dance last
night— I mean, formal dance to show our
strength. Everybody was here, and the
dinner beforehand and the supper after
ward and all the mechanical arrange
ments, so to speak, were perfect. The
ball-room was a sight— even "ma' ' Burke,
tired to death, perked up. Almost all
the diplomats, except those nobody
asks, were here. And I don't think
more than thirty people we hadn't in-

99

The Social Secretac£

vited ventured to come. We were all
so excited that, after the last people had
gone, we sat round for nearly an hour.
"Ma" Burke took me in her arms and
kissed me. "It was your ball/' said she.
"But then, everything we get credit for
is all yours; ain't it, pa?"

"Miss Talltowers has certainly done
wonderfully," said "pa" in his cautious,
judicial way. Then he seemed ashamed
of himself, as if he had been ungenerous,
and shook hands with me and added:
"Thank you, thank you, Miss Augusta —
if you'll permit me the liberty of call
ing you so."

"I never expected to see as pretty a
girl as you bothering to have brains,"
Mrs. Burke went on to say. And for
the first time in weeks and weeks it oc
curred to me that I did have a personal
existence apart from my work — the
100

The Social Secreta©5

books and bookkeeping, the servants and
the housekeeper, who is only one more
to fuss with, the tradespeople, and mu
sicians, and singers, and florists, and —
it makes my head whirl to try to recall
the awful list.

"She won't be pretty very long," said
Cyrus — he's taking lessons of his mother
and is dropping his fancy-work speech
and his "made-in-Germany" manners —
"if she don't stop working day and
night."

"Oh, I'm amusing myself," replied
I; but I was reminded how weary I
felt, and went away to bed. I neglected
to close my sitting-room door, and as I
was getting ready for bed in my dress
ing-room I couldn't help overhearing
a scrap of talk between Cyrus and Mr.
Gunton as thev went along the hall on
the way to their apartments.
101

The Social Secretaos

"The Tevises were disgusting — they
showed their envy so plainly/' Cyrus
said. The Tevises are trying hard to do
what we're doing in a social way, and
though they must have even more
money than the Burkes, they're failing
at it.

"They'll never get anywhere," Mr.
Gunton replied. "You can't collect
much of a crowd of nice people just to
watch you spend money. You've got
to give them a real show. There's where
Miss Talltowers comes in."

"She has wonderful taste and origi
nality," said Cyrus. Cyrus!

Mr. Gunton sat out most of the even
ing with Nadeshda. I suppose she was
trying to make Cyrus jealous and also
to create trouble between him and his
uncle. I've not seen a franker flirtation
even in Washington. Whenever I
102

The Social SecretaG£

chanced to look at them, Mr. Gunton
was talking earnestly, and she seemed
to be hanging to his words like a thirsty
bird to a water-pan. And her queer,
subtle face was — well, it was beautiful,
and gave me that sence of the wild and
fierce and uncanny which makes her
both fascinating and terrible. I think
Mr. Gunton was infatuated — indeed, I
know it. For when I spoke of her to
him this morning his eyes seemed to
blaze. He drew a long breath. "A
wonder-woman!" he said. "I never
saw anything like her — in the flesh."
Then he looked a little sheepish, and
added: "I mean it, but I laugh at my
self, too. There are fools that don't
know they're fools; then, there are fools
that do know it and laugh at them
selves as they plan fresh follies— it takes
a pretty clever man, Miss Talltowers,
103

The Social Secreta££

to make a grand, supreme, rip-roaring
ass of himself, doesn't it? At least, I
hope so." And with that somewhat
mysterious observation he left me ab
ruptly.

When I saw hLn and Nadeshda to
gether so much at the ball I looked
out for Cyrus. He seemed bored, and
devoted himself to wallflowers, but on
the whole was surprisingly unconcerned,
apparently. I had him in sight almost
the whole evening. Jim Lafollette,
who stuck to my train like a Japanese
poodle — I told him so, but he didn't
take the hint — said that "the gawk,"
meaning Cyrus, was hanging round me.
"He's moon-struck," said Jim. "So
your little put-up job with Jessie seems
to be doing nicely, thank you." I won
der why a man assumes that the fact
that he loves a woman gives him the
104

The Social Secretag£

right to insult her and makes it his duty
to do it. And I wonder why we women
assent to that sort of impudence. There's
another conventionality that ought to be
stamped out.

I find I was hasty in my judgment of
Cyrus. He's a lot more of a man than
he led me to suppose at first. I think
he might be licked into shape. He ought
to hunt up some widow or married
woman older than himself and go to
school for a few seasons. But perhaps
Nadeshda will do as well.

January 17. There were thirty-two
at Senator Burke's "little informal break
fast" yesterday morning, including four
of the leading Senators, two members
of the Cabinet, an ambassador and three
ministers, several generals, half a dozen
distinguished strangers, four or five big
financial men from New York who are

The Social SecretaQS

here on "private business" with Con
gress, and not a man who doesn't count
for something except that wretched
little Framstern, who never misses any
thing free. And our regular weekly in
formal dance was an equal success in its
way. Senator Ritchie told me it was
amazing how Burke had forged to the
front in influence and in popularity.
"And now that the newspapers have be
gun to take him up he'll soon be stand
ing out before the whole country." So
my little suggestion about the wives and
families of correspondents of the big pa
pers, which the Burkes adopted, is bear
ing fruit. And Mrs. Burke is so genuinely
friendly and hospitable that really I've
only to suggest her being nice to some
body to set her to work. If she were
the least bit of a fraud I'd not dare —
she'd only get into trouble.
106

The Social Secret a&

January 1 8. I was breakfasting alone
in my sitting-room this morning — I
always do an hour or so of work before
I touch anything to eat — when Mr. Gun-
ton sent, asking if he might join me. I
was glad to have him. His direct way
is attractive, and he never talks without
saying at least a few things I haven't
heard time and again. He was in riding
clothes, and as soon as I looked at him
I saw he had something on his mind.

"Good ride?" I asked.

He made an impatient gesture — when
ever he has anything to say and doesn't
know how to begin, the way to start
him off is to make some common
place remark. It acts like a blow that
knocks in the head of a full barrel. "I
was out with the Baroness Daragane,"
he said, "with Nadeshda."

"And Cyrus?" said I.
107

The Social Secreta^S

He looked at me in astonishment,
then laughed queer ly. "Oh, bother!"
he exclaimed. "Cyrus doesn't disturb
himself about /ier, or she about him —
and you know it. Miss Talltowers, I
love her — and she loves me."

His tone was convincing. But, after
ihe first shock, I couldn't believe any
thing so preposterous. And I felt sorry
for him — an honest, straight man, in
experienced with women, a fine mix
ture of gentleness and roughness, at once
too much and too little of a gentleman
for Nadeshda. If I had dared I should
have tried to undeceive him. But
I'm not so stupid as ever to try to make
a person in love see the truth about the
person he or she's in love with. So I
simply said: "She is a most fascinating

woman.'

"You think I'm a fool," he went on,

108

The Social SecretaQS

/

as if I hadn't spoken, "and I am a —
a blankety -blank fool. Did you see her
night before last in that dress of silver
spangles like the wonderful skin of some
amazing serpent? Did you see her eyes
— her hair — the way her arms looked —
as if they could wind themselves round
a man's neck and choke him to death
while her eyes were fooling him into
thinking that such a death was greater
happiness than to live?" He rolled this
all out, then burst into a queer, crazy
laugh. "You see, I'm a lunatic!" he
said.

"Yes, I see it," I replied cheerfully.
"But why do you rave to me?"

"Because I — we — have got to tell
somebody, and you're the only person
in Washington that I know that's both
sensible and experienced, wise enough
to understand, beautiful enough to sym-
109

The Social Secretaos

pathize, and young enough to encour-
age."

That was rather good for a man who
had had less than a month's real experi
ence with women, wasn't it? I recognized
Nadeshda's handiwork, and admired.

"Miss Tall towers," he went on, "I
am going to make a fool of myself, and
she's going to help me."

"In what particular sort of folly are
you about to embark?" said I.

"We're going to marry," he replied.
"We've got to marry. I'm afraid of her
and she's afraid of me, and we'll either
have Heaven or the other place when
we do marry — perhaps big doses of
each alternately. But we've got to do it."

"You know it's impossible," said I.
"Under the laws of her country she
mayn't marry without the consent of
her parents. And they'd never consent."

no

The Social Secreta^

"Certainly they won't," said he, "un
less you can suggest some way of getting
the ambassador and his wife round. We
want to give her people a chance." This
with perfect coolness. I began to believe
that there must be something in it.

"Does Nadeshda know you aren't
rich?" I asked.

"She knows I have practically noth
ing. In fact I told her I had less than
I have."

"And you're sure she wishes to marry
you?"

"Ask her."

He was quiet a while, then raved
about her for ten minutes, begged me
to do my best thinking, and left me.
I felt dazed. I simply couldn't believe
it. And the longer I thought, the more
certain I was that she was making some
sort of grand play in coquetry, which
in

The Social Secretacs

seemed ridiculous enough when I con
sidered what small game Mr. Gunton is
from the standpoint of a woman like
Nadeshda.

In the afternoon I was in a flower
store in Pennsylvania Avenue, and Na
deshda joined me. Her surface was, if
anything, cooler and subtler and more
cynical than usual. "Send away your
cab," said she, "and let me take you in
my auto — wherever you wish."

As I was full of curiosity, I accepted
instantly. When we were under way
she gave me a strange smile — a slow
parting of the lips, a slow half-closing
and elongation of those Eastern eyes
which she inherits from a Russian grand
mother, I believe.

"Well, Gus," she said, "has that wild
man told you?"

"Yes, and you ought to be ashamed

I 12

The Social Secreta^

of yourself/' said I, a little indignantly.
"It ain't fair to coax an innocent into
your sort of game and fleece him of
his little all."

She laughed — beautiful white teeth,
cruel like her red lips. "It's all true —
all he told you," she replied. "All true,
on my honor."

Every season Washington's strange
mixture of classes and conditions and
nations furnishes at least one sensation
of some kind or other. But, used as I
am to surprises until they have ceased
to surprise, this took me quite aback.
"Do you love him, Nadeshda — really?"

She quite closed her eyes and said in
a strange, slow undertone: "He's my
master. The blood in my veins flowed
straight from the savage wilderness. And
he comes from there, and I don't dare
disobey him. I'd do anything he said.

The Social

And when we're married I'll never
glance at another man — if he saw me
he'd kill me. Ah, you don't understand
— you're too — too civilized. Now, I
think I should love him better if he'd
beat me."

I laughed — it was too ridiculous,
especially as she was plainly in earnest.
She laughed, too, and added: "I think
some day I'll try to make him do it.
He's afraid of me, too. And he may
well be, for I — well, he belongs to me,
you see, and I will have what's mine!"

Yes, she would — I believe her abso
lutely. And I must say I like her at
last, for all her extremely uncanny way
of loving and of liking to be loved. I sup
pose she's only a primeval woman —
I believe the primeval woman fancied
the lover who lay in wait and brought
her down with a club. I begin to un-
114

The Social Secretaos

derstand Robert Gunton, too — that is,
the side of his nature she's roused.

"Do you believe us?" she asked.

"Yes, I do/' said I, "and I apolo^
gize to you. I've been thinking of you
all along as — fascinating, of course, but
— mercenary."

"Ah, but so I am!" she exclaimed.
" It breaks my heart to marry this poor
man — and of such a vulgar family —
even among you funny Americans. But"
— she threw up her arms and her shoul
ders and let them drop in a gesture of
tragicomic helplessness — "I must have
him; I must be his slave."

I can't imagine how it's going to
end, as her people will never let her
marry him. Possibly, if "ma" Burke
were to persuade the Senator to settle a
large sum on her — but that's wild, even
if Gunton would consent. I can imag-

"5

The Social Secreta^

ine what a roar he'd give if such a thing
were proposed. He'll insist on having
her on his own terms. As if his insist
ing would do any good!

The last thing she said to me was:
"Do you know when we became en
gaged? Listen! It was the first time
we met — after three hours. After one
hour he made me insult the men who
came up to claim dances. After two
hours he made me say, <I love you.'
After three hours — it was on the way
down to my carriage — he asked me to
come into the little reception-room by
the entrance. And he closed the door
and caught me in his arms and kissed
me. 'That makes you my wife/ he
said in a dreadful voice — oh, it was —
magntfique! — and he said, ' Do you under
stand?' And" — she smiled ravishingly
and nodded her head — "I understood."
116

The Social SecretaQS

I shan't sleep a wink to-night.

January 20. I wish they hadn't told
me. If ever a man loves me and wants
to win me he must be — well, perhaps
not exactly that, but certainly not tame.
I'm not K bit like Nadeshda, but I do
hate the tame sort. I know what's the
matter with me now. Yes, I wish they
hadn't tc Id me.

Janua y 21. Robert and Nadeshda
have told "ma" Burke. She is — de
lighted! "I never heard of the like," she
said to me all in a quiver. "I wish I'd
known there were such things. I reckon
I'd 'a' made my Tom cut a few capers
before he got me." And then she laughed
until she cried. It certainly was droll
to picture "pa" capering in the Robert-
Nadeshda fashion.

She went to the embassy and told
Nadeshda's sister, Madame I'Ambassa-

"7

The Social Secreta:^

drice. "She let on as if she was just
tickled to death," she reported to me a
few minutes after she returned. "And
when I told her that we — Tom and I
— would do handsomely by Nadeshda
as soon as they were married she had
tears in her eyes. But I don't trust her
— nor any other foreigner/'

"Not even Nadeshda?"

"Ma" nodded knowingly. "I reckon
Bob'll keep her on the chalk," she re
plied. "He's started right, and in mar
riage, as in everything else, it's all in
the start."

January 22. Nadeshda asked Mrs.
Burke to give a big costume ball, but
I sat on it hard. "I don't think you
want to do that, Mrs. Burke," said I,
when she proposed it to me. "If this
were New York it wouldn't matter so
much, though I don't think really nice
118

The Social Secreta^

people with means do that sort of thing
there. Here I'm afraid it'd make you
very unpopular."

"Do you think so?" said she. "Now,
I'd 'a' said it was just the sort of fool
ishness these people'd like."

"Those who have money would," I
replied. "But how about those who
haven't? Don't you think that people
of large means ought to make it a rule
never to cause any expense whatever to
those of their friends and acquaintances
who haven't means?"

"Don't say another word!" she ex
claimed, seeing my point instantly.
"Why, it'd be the worst thing in the
world. Out home I've always been care
ful about those kind of things, but on
here I don't know the people and am
liable to forget how they're circum
stanced. They all seem so prosperous
119

The Social Secretacg

on the surface. I reckon there's a lot
of miserable pinching and squinching
when the blinds are down."

Cyrus happened to come in just then,
and she told him all about it. He looked
at me and grew red and evidently tried
to say something — probably something
that would have shown how poorly he
thought of my cheating them all out
of the fun. But he restrained himself
and said nothing.

Presently he went out and must have
gone straight to his father — probably
to remonstrate, though I may wrong
him — for, after a few minutes, the
Senator came.

"My son has just been telling me,"
he said to me, "and I agree with you
entirely. It would be ruinous politically.
As it is, if it hadn't been for you we'd
never have been able to keep both the

120

The Social SecretaQS

official and the fashionable sets in a good
humor with us." I never saw him so
"flustered" before.

"What are you talking about, pa?"
inquired Mrs. Burke.

"About the costume ball you were
thinking of giving."

Mrs. Burke smiled. "You'd better
go back to your cage," said she. "That's
settled and done for long ago."

"Pa" looked more uneasy than his
good-natured tone seemed to justify —
but, no doubt, he knows when he has
put his foot into it. He "faded" from
the room. When she heard his study
door close "ma" said to me in a com
placent voice: "There's nothing like
keeping a man always to his side of the
fence. When 'pa' began to get rich I
saw trouble ahead, for he was showing
signs that he was thinking himself right

121

The Social SecretaQ$

smart better than the common run, and
that he was including his wife in the
common run. I took Mr. Smartie Burke
right in hand. And so, with him it's
never been 'I* in this family, but 'we.'
And keeping it that way has made Tom
lots happier than he would 'a' been
lording it over me and having no con
trol on his foolishness anywhere."

What a dear, sensible woman she is!
He's got good brains, but if he had as
good brains as she has he'd get what
he's after and doesn't stand a show for.

January 24. The whole town is in
a tumult over Robert and Nadeshda.
People think she's crazy. When Cyrus
said this to me I said: "And I think
they are — at least, delirious."

"A divine delirium, though," he re
plied, much to my astonishment. For
he's never shown before that he had so
122

The Social Secreta^

much as a spot of that sort of thing in
him. But then, I'm beginning to revise
my judgment of him in some ways. He
is much nearer what his mother said
he was than what I thought him. But
he's young and crude. I find that he
likes — and really appreciates — the same
composers and poets and novelists that
I do. I can forgive much to any one
who realizes what a poet Browning was
—when he did write poetry, not when
he wrote the stuff for the Browning
clubs to fuddle with.

Nadeshda is in the depths — except
when Robert is by to hypnotize her.
"I was so strong," she said pathetically
to me to-day, "or I thought I was.
And now I'm all weakness." She went
on to tell me how horribly they are
talking to her at the embassy — for they
are determined she shan't marry
123

The Social SecretaQS

nobody with nothing." I always knew
her brother-in-law was a snob of the
cheapest and narrowest kind — the well
born, well-bred kind. But I had no idea
he was a coward. He threatens to have
the Emperor make her come home and
go into a convent if she doesn't break
off the engagement within a week.

We are tremendously popular. Ev
erybody is cultivating us, hoping to find
out the real inside of this incredible en
gagement. And the ambassador has to
pretend publicly that he's personally
wild with delight and hopes Nadeshda's
parents will consent. He knows how
unpopular it would make him and his
country with America if his opposition
and his reason for it were to be known.

January 30. Nadeshda has disap
peared. They give out at the embassy
that she has left for home to consult
124

The Social Secreta^

with her parents. Robert looks like a
man who had gone stark mad and was
fighting to keep himself from showing it.
We were all at the ball at the French
embassy, Mr. and Mrs. Burke dining
there. I dined at the White House — a
literary affair. The conversation was
what you might expect when a lot of
people get together to show one an
other how brilliant they are. The Presi
dent talked a great deal. He has very
positive opinions on literature in all its
branches. I was the only person at the
table who wasn't familiar with his books.
Fortunately, I wasn't cornered. Cyrus
came to the ball from Mrs. Dorringer's,
where he took in the Duchess d'Emarre.
"She has a beautiful face in repose," he
said to me as he paused for a moment,
"and it's not at all pretty when she talks.
So she listened well."
125

The Social Secreta^

I was too tired to dance, as were the
others. We went home together, all
depressed. "It's too ridiculous, this kind
of life," said "ma" Burke, "and the most
ridiculous part of it is that, now we're
hauled into it and set a-going, we'll
never get out and be sensible again. It
just shows you can get used to anything
in this world — except doing as you
please. I don't believe anybody was ever
satisfied to do that. Did you ever wear a
Mother Hubbard? There s comfort!"

I can think of nothing but Robert
and Nadeshda. Have they some sort of
understanding? No — I'm afraid not.

I forgot to put down that Robert
made the Senator go to the Secretary
of State about Nadeshda's disappearance.
The Secretary was sympathetic, but he
refused to interfere in any way. What
else could he do?

126

FEBRUARY i . Last night Robert
started for Europe. He is going
to see Nadeshda's father and
mother. I begin to suspect that Na-
deshda has really gone abroad and that
she has let him know. He is certainly
in a very different frame of mind from
what he was at first. But he says noth
ing, hints nothing. Rachel, who has a
huge sentimental streak in her, has given
Robert a letter to her sister Ellen — she's
married to one of the biggest nobles in
the empire, Prince Gliickstein. Also,
127

The Social

she has written Ellen a long, long letter,
telling her all about Robert, and what
a great catch he is. And he is a great
catch now, for Senator Burke has organ
ized a company to take over his patents
and pay him a big sum for them — it'll
sound fabulously big to such people as
the Daraganes. For even where these
foreigners are very rich and have miles
on miles of land and large incomes from
it, they're not used to the kind of for
tunes we have — the sums in cash, or in
property that's easily sold. And the
Daraganes have only rank; their estates
are quite insignificant, Von Slovatsky
says.

"They might as well consent first as
last," said Mrs. Burke to me just after
Robert left; "for Bob always gets what
he wants. He never lets go. Cyrus is
the same way — he spent eleven months
128

The Social Secreta^

in the mountains once, and like to 'a'
starved and froze and died of fever, just
because he'd made up his mind not to
come back without a grizzly. That's
why the President took to him."

And then she told me that it was
Cyrus who thought out the scheme for
making Robert financially eligible and
put it in such form that Robert con
sented. That convicted me of injustice
again, for I had been suspecting him
of being secretly pleased at Robert's set
back — he certainly hasn't looked in the
least sorry for him. But it may be that
Robert has told him more than he's told
us. He certainly couldn't have found a
closer-mouthed person. As his mother
says, "The grave's a blabmouth beside
him when it comes to keeping secrets.
And most men are such gossips."

Mrs. Fortescue came in to tea this
129

The Social Secreta^

afternoon. Mrs. Burke was out calling,
and I received her — or, rather, she
caught me, for I detest her. Just as she
was going Cyrus popped in, and she
nailed him before he could pop out.
She thought it was a good chance to
put in a few strong strokes for her
daughter. "Of course, it's very pretty
and romantic about Nadeshda," she said,
"and in this case I'm sure no one with
a spark of heart could object. Still, the
principle is bad. I don't think young
girls who are properly brought up are
so impulsive and imprudent. I often
say to my husband that I think it's per
fectly frightful the way girls — young
girls — go about in Washington. They're
out before they should be even think
ing of leaving the nursery, and go round
practically unchaperoned. It's so de
moralizing."

130

The Social Secretaes

"But how are they to compete with
the young married women if they
don't ?" said Cyrus, because he was evi
dently expected to say something.

"I don't think a man— a sensible man
— looking for a wife for his home and
a mother for his children would want
a girl who'd been 'competing' in Wash
ington society," she answered. "I don't
at all approve the way American girls
are brought up, anyway — it's entirely
too free and destructive of the innocence
that is a woman's chief charm. And
as for turning the young girls loose in
Washington!" Mrs. Fortescue threw
up her hands. "It's simply madness.
Most of the men are foreigners, accus
tomed to meet only married women in
society. They don't know how to take a
young girl, and they don't understand this
American freedom. The wonder to me

The Social Secreta^

is that we don't have a regular cataclysm
every season. Now, I never permit
Mildred to go anywhere without me or
some other real chaperon. And I know
that her mind is like a fresh rose-leaf."

Cyrus and I exchanged a covert glance
of amusement. Mildred Fortescue is a
very nice, sweet girl, but — well, she does
fool her mother scandalously.

"I should think a man would posi
tively be afraid to marry the ordinary
Washington society girl who knows
everything that she shouldn't and noth
ing that she should/'

"Perhaps that's what makes them so
irresistible," said Cyrus.

" Irresistible to flirt with and tojtaner
about with," said Mrs. Fortescue re
proachfully. "But I'm sure you wouldn't
marry one of them, Mr. Burke."

"Oh, I don't know," he answered.
132

The Social SecretaG£

"No doubt it does spoil a good many,
being so free and associating with ex
perienced men who've been brought up
in a very different way. But "7— he hesi
tated and blushed uncomfortably — "it
seems to me that those who do come
through all right are about the best any
where. If a girl has any really bad qual
ities anywhere in her they come out
here. And if a Washington girl does
marry a man — for himself— and I rather
think they make marriages of the heart
more than most girls in the same sort
of society in other cities — don't you,
Miss Talltowers?"

"It may be so," I replied. "But prob
ably they're much like girls — and men
— everywhere. They make marriages
of the heart if they get the chance. And
if nobody happens along in the marry
ing mood who is able to appeal to their

133

The Social SecretaG£

hearts, they select the most eligible
among the agreeable ones they can get.
I think many a girl has been branded
as mercenary when in reality the rich
man she chose was neither more nor
less agreeable than the poor man she
rejected, and she only had choice among
men she didn't especially care about."
Mrs. Fortescue looked disgusted.
Cyrus showed that he agreed with me.
"What I was going to say/' he went on,
"was, that if a Washington girl does
choose a man, after she has known lots
of men and has come to prefer him,
she's not likely — at least, not so likely
— to repent her bargain. And," he said,
getting quite warmed up by his subject,
"if a man looks forward to his wife's
going about in society, as he must if he
lives in a certain way, I think he's wise
to select some one who has learned

134

The Social SecretaQS

something of the world — how to con
duct herself, how to control herself,
how to fill the role Fate has assigned
her."

"Oh, of course, a girl should be well-
bred," said Mrs. Fortescue, as sourly as
her sort of woman can speak to a bach
elor with prospects.

Cyrus said no more, and soon she was
off. He stood at the window watching
her carriage drive away. He turned
abruptly — I was at the little desk, writ
ing a note.

"You can't imagine," he said with
quick energy, "how I loathe the aver
age girl brought up in conventional,
exclusive society in America."

"Really?" said I, not stopping my
writing — though I don't mind confess
ing that I was more interested in his
views than I cared to let him see,

135

The Social Secreta^

"Yes, really," he replied ironically.
Then he went on in his former tone:
"Poor things, they can't help having
silly mothers with the idea of aping the
European upper classes, and with hardly
a notion of those upper classes beyond
— well, such notions as are got in novels
written by snobs for snobs. And these
unfortunate girls are afraid of a genuine
; emotion — by Jove, I doubt if they even
have the germs of genuine emotion.
All that sort of thing has been weeded
out of them. Little dry minds, little
'dry hearts — so 'proper/ so — vulgar!"

"Not in Washington," said I.

"No, not so many in Washington;
though more and more all the time.
Miss Talltowers, will you marry me?"

It was just like that — no warning,
not a touch of sentiment toward me.
I almost dropped my pen. But I man-

The Social

aged to hide myself pretty well. I sim
ply went on with my note, finished it,
sealed and addressed it, and rang for a
servant. Then I went and stood by the
fire. The servant came; I gave him
the note and went into my office. I
had been in there perhaps ten minutes
when he came, looking shy and sheep
ish. He stumbled over a low chair and
had a ridiculous time saving himself
from falling. When he finally had him
self straightened up and shaken together
he stood with his hands behind him,
and his face red, and his eyes down,
and with his mouth fixed in that foolish
little way as if he were about to speak
with his fancy-work way of handling
his words.

"Do you wish something?" I asked.

"Only — only my answer," said he
humbly.

137

The Social Secreta^

Would you believe it, I actually hesi
tated.

"I want a woman that doesn't like
me for my money, and that at the same
time would know how to act and would
be — be sensible. I've had you in mind
ever since you explained your system
for — for" — he smiled faintly — "exploit
ing mother and father. And mother
has been talking in the same way of
late. She says we can't afford to let you
get out of the family. That's all, I guess
— all you'd have patience to hear."

"Then you were making me a seri
ous business proposition?" said I.

"Well, you might call it that," he ad
mitted, as if he weren't altogether satis
fied with my way of summing it up.

"I'm much obliged, but it doesn't
attract me," I said.

He gave a kind of hopeless gesture.

138

The Social Secreta^

"I've put it all wrong/' said he. "I
always say things wrong. But— I — I
believe I do things better." And he gave
me a look that I liked. It was such a
quaint mingling of such a nice man
with such a nice boy.

"I understand perfectly/' said I, and
I can't tell how much I hated to hurt
him — he did so remind me of dear old
"ma" Burke. "But— please don't dis
cuss it. I couldn't consider the matter
— possibly."

"You won't leave!" he exclaimed.
"I assure you I'll not annoy you. You
must admit, Miss Talltowers, that I
haven' t tried to thrust myself on you in the
past. And — really, mother and father
couldn't get on at all without you."

"Certainly, I shan't leave — why
should I?" said I. "I'm very well satis
fied with my position."

139

The Social Secreta©5

"Thank you," he said with an awk
ward bow, and he left me alone.

Of course, I couldn't possibly marry
him. But I suppose a woman's vanity
compels her to take a more favorable
view of any man after she's found out
that he wishes to marry her. Anyhow,
I find I don't dislike him at all as I
thought I did. I couldn't help being
amused at myself the next day. I was
driving with Jessie, and she was giving
me her usual sermon on the advantages
of the Burke alliance — if I could by
chance scheme it through. "You're
very pretty, Gus," she said. "In fact
you're beautiful at times. Men do like
height when it goes with your sort of
a — a willowy figure. Your eyes alone
— if you would only use them — would
catch him. And the Burkes would be
— well, they might object a little at first
140

The Social

because you've given them a position
that has no doubt swollen their heads
— but they'd yield gracefully. And
although you are very attractive and are
always having men in love with you,
you've simply got to make up your
mind soon. Look how many such nice,
good-looking girls have been crowded
aside by the young ones. Men are crazy
about freshness, no matter what they
pretend. Yes, you must decide, dear.
And — I couldn't endure poor Carter et
when I married him."

Carteret is a miserable specimen, and
Jessie's ways keep him in a dazed state
— like an old hen sitting on a limb and
turning her head round and round to
keep watch on a fox that's racing in a
circle underneath. Fox doesn't seem
exactly to fit Jessie, but sometimes I
suspect — however —
141

The Social Secreta^

"But," Jessie was going on, "I knew
mama was my best friend. And when
she said, 'Six months after marriage
you'll be quite used to him and won't
in the least mind, and you'll be so glad
you married somebody who was quiet
and good/ I married him. And I love
him dearly, Gus, and we make each
other so happy!"

I laughed — Jessie doesn't mind; she
don't understand what laughter means
in most people. I was thinking of what
Rachel told me the other day. She said
to Carteret, "It must be great fun
wondering what Jessie will do next."
And he looked at her in his dumb way
and said: "What she'll do next? Lord,
I ain't caught up with that. I'm just
about six weeks behind on her record
all the time."

But to go back to Jessie's talk to me,
142

The SocialSecretaGS

she went on: "And Mr. Burke's not
so dreadfully unattractive, dear. Of
course, he's far from handsome, and —
well, he's the son of Mr. and Mrs. Burke
— but though they're quite common and
all that—"

I found myself furiously angry. "I
don't think he's at all bad-looking," I
said, pretending to be judicial. "He's
big and strong and sensible; and what
more does a woman usually ask for?
And I don't at all agree with you about
his father and mother, either — especially
his mother. No, Jessie, dear, my ob
jections aren't yours at all. I'm sure you
wouldn't understand them, so let's not
talk about it."

February 3. Yesterday Mrs. Tevis
sent for me. That was a good deal of
an impertinence, but I'm getting very
sensible about impertinences. She lives

143

The Social

in grand style in a big, new house in
K Street — it, like everything about her,
is "regardless of expense." The Tevises
have been making the most desperate
efforts to "break in" last season and
this, and as Washington is, up to a cer
tain point, very easy for strangers with
money, they've gone pretty far. I sup
pose Washington's like every other cap
ital — the people are so used to all sorts
of queer strangers and everything is so
restless and changeful that no one minds
adding to his list of acquaintances any
person who offers entertainment and
isn't too appalling. And the Tevises
have been spending money like water.
It's queer how people can go every
where that anybody goes and can seem
to be "right in it," yet not be in it at
all. That's the way it is with the Tev
ises. They are at every big affair in town
144

The SocialSecretae£

— White House, embassies, private
houses. But they're never invited to the
smaller, more or less informal things.
And when they do appear at a ball or
anywhere they're treated with formal
politeness. They know there's some
thing wrong, but they can't for the life
of them see what it is. And that's not
strange, for who can see the line that's
instinctively drawn between social sheep
and social goats in the flock that's
apparently all mixed up? Everybody
knows the sheep on sight; everybody
knows the goats. And all act accord
ingly without anything being said.

Well, Mr. and Mrs. Tevis are goats.
Why? Anybody could see it after talk
ing to either of them for five minutes;
yet who could say why? It isn't because
they're snobs — lots of sheep are nauseat
ing snobs. It isn't because they're very

H5

The Social Secreta^

badly self-made — I defy anybody to pro
duce a goat that can touch Willie
Catesby or Rennie Tucker, yet each of
them has ancestors by the score. It isn't
because they're new — the Burkes are
new, yet Mrs. Burke has at least a dozen
intimate acquaintances of the right sort.
It isn't because they're ostentatious and
boastful about wealth and prices — there
are scores of sheep who make the same
sort of absurd exhibition of vulgarity.
I can't place it. They're just goats, and
they know it, and they feel it; and when
you go to their house they suggest a
restaurant keeper welcoming his cus
tomers; and when they come to your
house they suggest Cook's tourists roam
ing in the private apartments of a palace,
smiling apologetically at every one and
wondering whether they're not about
to be told to "step lively."
146

The Social SecretaG£

Mrs. Tevis received me very grandly
and graciously, though dreadfully nerv
ous withal, lest I should be seeing that
she was "throwing a bluff" and should
put her in her place.

"I've requested you to come, my dear
Miss Talltowers," she began, after she
had bunglingly served tea from the new
est and costliest and most elaborate tea-set
I ever saw, "because I had a little mat
ter of business to talk over with you
and felt that we could talk more freely
here."

"I must be back at half-past five,"
said I, by way of urging her on to the
point.

"That will be quite time enough,"
said she. "We can have our little con
versation quite nicely, and you will be
in ample time for your duties."

I wonder what sort of dialect she

147

The Social Secreta££

thinks in. It certainly can't be more
irritating than the one she translates her
thoughts into before speaking them.
The dialect she inflicts on people sounds
as if it were from a Complete Conver
sationalist, got up by an old maid who
had been teaching school for forty
years.

"I hare decided to take a secretary
for next season/' she went on. "Not
that I need any such direction as the
Burkes. Fortunately, Mr. Tevis and I
have had a large social experience on
both sides of the Atlantic and have al
ways moved with the best pebple. But
just a secretary — to attend to my oner
ous correspondence and arrangements
for entertaining. The duties would be
light, but we should be willing to pay
a larger salary than the position would
really justify— that is, we should be will-

The Social Secretaj35

ing to pay it, you know, to a lady such
as you are/'

I bowed.

"We should treat you with all deli
cacy and appreciation of the fact that
your misfortunes have compelled you to
take a — a — position — which — which — "

"You are very kind, Mrs. Tevis,"
said I.

"And we realized that in all proba
bility the Burkes would have no further
use for your services at the end of this
season, as you have been most success
ful with them."

I winced. For the first time the
"practical" view of what I've been
doing for the Burkes stared me in the
face— that is, the view which such people
as the Tevises, perhaps many of my
friends, took of it. So I was being re
garded, spoken of, discussed, as a person
149

The Social SecretaQj

who had been bought by the Burkes to
get them in with certain people. And
it was assumed that, having got what
they wanted, they would dismiss me and
so cut off a superfluous expense! I was
somewhat astonished at myself for not
having seen my position in this light
before.

And I suddenly realized why I hadn't
— because the Burkes were really nice peo
ple, because I hadn't been their employee
but their friend. What if I had started
my career as a dependent of Mrs. TevisM
I shivered. And when the Burkes should
need me no longer — why, the probabili
ties were that I should have to seek em
ployment from just such dreadful people
as these — upstarts eager to jam them
selves in, vulgarians whom icy manners
and forbidding looks only influence to
fiercer efforts to associate with those
150

The Social Secretae£

who don't wish to associate with them.

Mrs. Tevis interrupted my dismal
thoughts with a cough, intended to be
polite. "What — what — compensation
would you expect, may I ask?"

"What do such positions pay?" I said,
and my voice sounded harsh to me. I
wished to know what value was usually
put upon such services.

"Would — say — twenty-five dollars a
week be— meet with your views?" she
asked, and her tone was that of a per
son performing an act of astounding
generosity.

"Oh, dear me, no," said I, with the
kind of sweetness that coats a pill of
gall. "I couldn't think of trying to get
you in for any such sum as that."

I saw that the gall had bit through
the sugar-coat.

"Would you object to giving me some

The Social SecretaQ5

idea of what the Burkes pay?" she asked,
with the taste puckering her mouth.

"I should/' I replied, rising. "Any
how, I don't care to undertake the job.
Thank you so much for your generosity
and kindness, Mrs. Tevis." I nodded
— I'm afraid it was a nod intended to
"put her in her place." "Good-by."
And I smiled and got myself out of the
room before she recovered.

I 'wish I hadn't seen her. I hate the
truth — it's always unpleasant.

February 5. Mrs. Burke had thirty-
one invitations to-day, eleven of them
for her and Mr. Burke. Seven were in
vitations to little affairs which Mrs.
Tevis would give — well, perhaps five
dollars apiece — to get to. How ridic
ulous for her to economize in the one
way in which liberality is most neces
sary. Here they are spending probably
152

The Social Secret aG£

a hundred thousand dollars a season in
hopeless attempts to do that which they
would hesitate to pay me six hundred
dollars for doing. And this when they
think I could accomplish it. But could
I? I guess not. To win out as I have
with the Burkes you've got to have the
right sort of material to work on, and
it must be workable. Vulgar people
would be ashamed to put themselves in
any one's hands as completely as Mrs.
Burke put herself in my hands.

Oh, I'm sick — sick, sick of it! I'm
ashamed to look "ma" Burke in the
face, because I think such mean things
about them all when I'm in bed and blue.

February 6. I decline all the invita
tions that come for me personally. I sit
in my "office" and pretend to be fussing
with my books — they give me the hor
rors ! And I was so proud of them and

153

The Social Secreta^

of my plans to make my little enter
prise a success.

February 7. Mrs. Burke came in
this afternoon and came round my desk
and kissed me. "What is it, dear?
What's the matter?" she said. "Won't
you tell me? Why, I feel as if you
were my daughter. I did have a daugh
ter. She came first. Tom was so dis
appointed. But I was glad. A son
belongs to both his parents, and, when
he's grown up, to his wife. But a
daughter — she would 'a' belonged to me
always. And she had to up and die just
when she was about to make up her
mind to talk."

I put my face down in my arms on
the desk.

"Tired, dear?" said "ma"— she's a
born "ma." "Of course, that's it. You're
clean pegged out, working and worry-

The Social Secreta^

ing. You must put it all away and rest."
And she sat down by me.

All of a sudden — I couldn't help it
— I put my head on her great, big bosom
and burst out crying. "Oh, I'm so bad!"
I said. "And you're so good!"

She patted me and kissed me on top
of my head. "What pretty, soft hair
you have, dear," she said, "and what a
lot of it! My! My! I don't see how
anybody that looks like you do could ever
be unhappy a minute. You don't know
what it means to be born homely and
fat and to have to work hard just to
make people not object to having you
about." And she went on talking in
that way until I was presently laugh
ing, still against that great, big bosom
with the great, big heart beating under
it. When I felt that it would be a down
right imposition to stay there any longer

155

The Social Secreta^

I straightened up. I felt quite cheerful.

"Was there something worrying
you?" she asked.

I blushed and hung my head. "Yes,
but I can't tell you/' said I. And I
couldn't — could I ? Besides, there some
how doesn't seem to be much of any
thing in all my brooding. What a nasty
beast that Mrs. Tevis is!

February 12. Mrs. Burke and I went
to a reception at the Secretary of State's
this afternoon. We saw Nadeshda's sis
ter in the distance — that's where we've
always seen her and the ambassador and
the whole embassy staff ever since the
"bust-up," except funny little De Pleyev.
He, being of a mediatized family, does
not need to disturb himself about am
bassadorial frowns or smiles. It's curi
ous what a strong resemblance there is
between a foreigner of royal blood and

The Social Secreta^

a straightaway American gentleman.
But, as I was about to write, this after
noon the distance between us and Ma
dame P Ambassadrice slowly lessened, and
when she was quite close to us she gave
us a dazzling smile apiece and said to
Mrs. Burke: "My dear Madame Burke,
you are looking most charming. You
must come to us to tea. To-morrow?
Do say yes — we've missed you so. My
poor back — it almost shuts me out of
the world/' And she passed on — prob
ably didn't wish to risk the chance that
"ma's" puzzled look might give place
to an expression of some kind of anger
and that she might make one of those
frank speeches she's famous for.

"Well, did you ever!" exclaimed
"ma" when the Countess was out of
earshot.

I said warningly: "Everybody's seen

'57

The Social Secreta^

it and is watching you." And it was
true. The whole crowd in those per
fume-steeped rooms was gaping, and the
news had spread so quickly that a throng
was pushing in from the tea-room, some
of them still chewing.

Afterward we discussed it, and could
come to but one conclusion — that the
Robert-Nadeshda crisis had passed. But
— do the Daraganes think that Nadeshda
is safe from Robert, or have they decided
to take him in? Certainly, something
decisive has happened. And if Robert
had anything to do with it it must have
been stirring enough to make the Dara
ganes use the cable — how else could
Nadeshda's sister have got her cue so
soon ?

February 15. No news whatever of
Robert and Nadeshda. Yesterday the
ambassadress came here to tea and said

158

The Social Secreta^

to Mrs. Burke that she had had a letter
from Nadeshda in which she sent us
all her love — "especially your dear,
splendid, big Monsieur Cyrus." Mr. and
Mrs. Burke are to dine at the embassy
five weeks from to-night — the ambas
sadress insisted on Mrs. Burke's giving
her first free evening to her, and that
was it.

"I reckon we'll have to go," said
"ma" after her departure, and while the
odor of her frightfully-powerful helio
trope scent was still heavy in the room,
"though I doubt if I'll be alive by then.
Sometimes it seems to me I've just got
to knock off and take a clean week in
bed. I thought I'd never think of drugs
to keep me going, as so many women
advise. But I see I'm getting round to
it. And I'm getting that fat in the body
and that lean in the face! Did you ever

159

The SocialSecretaGS

see the like? I must V lost three pounds
off my face. And the skin's hanging
there waiting for it to come back, in
stead of shrinking. I'm glad my Tom
never looks at me. I know to a certainty
he ain't looked at me in twenty years.
Husbands and wives don't waste much
time looking at each other, and I guess
it's a good, safe plan."

Mrs. Burke does look badly. I must
take better care of her. Cyrus looks
badly, too. I haven't seen him to talk
to since he made his "strictly business"
proposition. I suppose he wants me to
realize that he isn't one of the pestering
kind. I'm sorry he takes it that way,
as I'd have liked to be friends with him.
He quarreled so beautifully when we
didn't agree. It's a great satisfaction to
have some one at hand who both agrees
and quarrels in a satisfactory way. But
160

The Social Secreta^S

I don't dare make any advances to him.
He might misunderstand.

I've just been laughing — at his cow
lick. It is such an obstinate little swirl.
And when he looks serious it looks so
funnily frisky, and when he smiles it
looks so fiercely serious and disapprov
ing. Yesterday I hurried suddenly into
the little room just off the ball-room,
thinking it was empty. But Cyrus and
his mother were there, and he was tick
ling her, and he looked so fond of her,
and she looked so delighted. I slipped
away without their seeing me.

February 16. We gave our second
big ball last night with a dinner for sixty
before. It was just half-past five this
morning when the last couple came
sneaking out from the alcove off the lit
tle room beyond the conservatory and,
we pretending not to see them, scuttled
161

The Social Secreta^

away without saying good night.
Major-General Cutler danced with Mrs.
Burke in the opening quadrille, and
Mr. Burke danced with the British am
bassadress — the ambassador is ill. I had
Jim on my hands most of the evening
— though I was flirting desperately with
little D'Estourelle, he hung to me with
a maddening husbandish air of propri
etorship. I don't see how I ever en
dured him, much less thought of marry
ing him. Cyrus Burke is a king beside
him. Excuse me from men who think
the fact that they've done a woman the
honor of loving her gives them a prop
erty right to her. Mrs. Burke was the
belle of the ball. She had a crowd of
men round her chair all evening, laugh
ing at everything she said.

February 17. A cable from Robert
Guhton at Hamburg this morning —

162

The Social Secr

just "Arrive Washington about March
3." That was all — worse than nothing.
It is Lent, but there's no let up for us.
We only get rid of the kind of enter
tainments that cost us the least trouble
to plan and give, and we have to arrange
more of the kind that have to be done
carefully. Anybody can give a dance,
but it takes skill to give a successful
dinner.

February 19. Nadeshda's sister said
to-day, quite casually, to Jessie: "Desh-
da's coming back, and we're so glad.
The trip has done her so much good —
in every way." Now, whatever did that
mean?

163

VI

FEBRUARY 26. No news of
Robert and Nadeshda. Have
been glancing through this diary.
How conceited I am, taking credit to
myself for everything. I wonder if I
am vainer than most people, or does
everybody make the same ridiculous dis
covery about himself when he takes
himself off his guard? What an imper
fect record this is of our launching. But
then, if I had made it perfect I should
have had to go into so many wearisome
details, not to speak of my having so
164

The Social Secret aQ5

little time. Still, it would have been
interesting to read some day, when I
shall have forgotten the little steps — for
although we've had in all only a month
before the season and five weeks between
New Year's and Ash Wednesday, so
much has been crowded into that time.
It's amazing what one can accomplish
if one uses every moment to a single
purpose. And I've not only used my
own time, but Robert's and Jessie's and
the time of their and my friends, and
that of Nadeshda and a dozen other peo
ple. They and I all worked together
to make my enterprise a success — and
Jim and the Senator, and "ma" Burke
was a great help after the first few
weeks. Yes, and I mustn't forget Cyrus.
He has made himself astonishingly pop
ular. I see now that he showed a bet
ter side to every one than he did to me.

165

The Social Secreta©5

Perhaps I can guess why. I wonder if
he really cares or did care — for me, or
was it just "ma" trying to get me into
the family, and he willing to do any
thing she asked of him?

But to go back to my vanity — I see
that Jessie, Rachel and Cyrus were the
real cause of my success. Jessie and
Rachel alone could make anybody, who
wasn't positively awful, a go. Then
Nadeshda, bent on marrying Cyrus at
first, was a big help — and every mama
with a marriageable daughter was hot
on Cyrus* trail. So it's easy to make
an infallible recipe for getting into so
ciety: First, wealth; second, willingness
to act on competent advice; third, get
a "secretary" who knows society and
has intimate friends in its most exclu
sive set, and who also knows how to
arrange entertainments; fourth, have a
166

The Social Secretaos

marriageable son, if possible, or, failing
that, a daughter, or, failing that, a near
relative who will be well dowered; fifth,
organize the campaign thoroughly and
pay particular attention to getting your
self liked by the few people who really
count. You can't bribe them; you can't
drive them; you must amuse them. The
more leisure people have the harder it
is to amuse them.

Looking back, I can see that "ma"
Burke passed her social crisis when, on
January 5, Mrs. Gaether asked her to
assist at her reception. For Mrs.
Gaether was the first social power who
took "ma" up simply and solely because
she liked her.

We have spent a great deal of money,
but not half what the Tevises have spent.
But our money counted because it was
incidental. Mere money won't carry any

'

, The Social

one very far in Washington — I don't
believe it will anywhere, except, per
haps, in New York.

I ought to have kept some sort of
record of what we've done from day to
day — I mean, more detailed than my
books. However, I'll just put in our
last full day before Lent, as far as I can
recall it. No, I'll only write out what
Mrs. Burke alone did that day:

7:30 to 10. She and I, in her room,
went over the arrangements for the ball
we were giving in the evening.

10 to 12:30. She went to see half a
dozen people about various social matters,
besides doing a great deal of shopping.

12:30 to 1:45. More worrying con
sultation with me, then dressing for
luncheon.

1:45 to 3:4S' A l°ng an(i tiresome
luncheon at one of the embassies.

168

The Social Secreta^s

3:45 to 6:30. More than twenty calls
and teas — a succession of exhausting
rushes and struggles.

6:30 to 7:15. In the drawing-room
here, with a lot of people coming and
going.

7:15 to 8. Dressing for dinner — a
frightful rush.

8 to 8:30. Receiving the dinner
guests.

8:30 to 10:45. The dinner.

10:45 to midnight. Receiving the
guests for the dance — on her feet all the
time.

Midnight to 6 in the morning. Sit
ting, but incessantly busy.

6 to 9. In bed.

9. A new and crowded day.

This has been a short season, but I
don't think it was the shortness, crowd
ing much into a few days, that made
169

The Social Secreta££

the pressure so great. It's simply that
year by year Washington becomes so
cially worse and worse. As I looked
round at that last ball of ours I pitied
the people who were nerving themselves
up to trying to enjoy themselves.

Almost every one was, and looked,
worn out. Here and there the un
natural brightness of eyes or cheeks
showed that somebody — usually a young
person — had been driven to some sort of
stimulant to enable him or her to hold
the pace. Quick to laugh; quick to
frown and bite the lips in almost uncon
trollable anger. Nerves on edge, flesh
quivering.

Yet, what is one to do? To be "in
it" one must go all the time; not to go
all the time, not to accept all the prin
cipal invitations, is to make enemies
right and left. Besides, who that gets
170

The Social

into the hysterical state which the
Washington season induces can be con
tent to sit quietly at home when on
every side there are alluring opportuni
ties to enjoy?

No wonder we see less and less of the
jien of importance. No wonder the
"sons of somebodies" and the young
men of the embassies and legations and
departments, most of them amiable
enough, but all just about as near nothing
as you would naturally expect, are the
best the women can get to their houses.

It is foolish; it is frightful. But it is
somehow fascinating, and it gives us
women the chance to go the same reck
less American gait that the men go in
their business and professions.

I am utterly worn out. I might be
asleep at this moment. Yet I'm sitting
here alone, too feverish for hope of rest.
171

The Social Secreta^

And I can see lights in Cyrus' apart
ment and in Senator Burke's sitting-
room, and I don't doubt poor "ma" is
tossing miserably in a vain attempt to
get the sleep that used to come unasked
and stay until it was fought off.

It is Lent, and the season is supposed
to be over. But the rush is still on, and
other things which crowd and jam in
more than fill up the vacant space left by
big, formal parties. It seems to me that
there is even as much dancing as there was
two weeks ago. The only difference is
that it isn't formally arranged for be
forehand.

I'd like to "shut off steam" — indeed,
it seems to me that I must if "ma"
Burke is not to be sacrificed. But how
can we? People expect us to entertain,
and we must go out to their affairs also.
The only escape would be to fly, and
172

The Social Secretaj35

we can't do that so long as Congress
is sitting.

February 27. Robert and Nadeshda
are both in town, he with us, she at the
embassy. They are to be married the
twelfth of April. The engagement is to
be announced to-morrow. I've never seen
any one more demure than Nadeshda, or
happier. I suspect she's going to settle
down into the most domestic of women.
Indeed, I know it — for, as she says, she's
afraid of him, obeys him as a dog its mas
ter, and the domestic side of her is the
only one he'll tolerate. I've always heard
that her sort of woman is the tamest,
once it's under control. She has will
but no continuity. He has a stronger
will and his purposes are unalterable.
So he'll continue to dominate her.

"Ma" Burke asked him, "How did
you make out with her folks?"

173

The'Social Secreta^

He smiled, then laughed.

"I don't know — exactly/' he said.
"They couldn't talk my language nor
I theirs. So it was all done through an
interpreter. And he was Mrs. Dean's
brother-in-law, Prince Gluckstein,
and a regular trump. He saw them
half a dozen times before I did.
When I saw them everything was
lovely. They left me alone with her
after twenty minutes. Finally it was
agreed that we should come back on
the same steamer, her brother accom
panying her."

"But why on earth didn't you cable
us?" she demanded.

"I did," he replied.

"But you didn't tell us anything,"
she returned.

"I told you all there was to tell," he
replied.

174

The Social Secreta^s

"You only said you were coming/3
she objected.

"Well," he answered, looking
somewhat surprised, "I knew you'd
know I wouldn't come without her."

I'm glad he didn't get it into his
head to "take after" me. A woman
stands no more chance with a man like
that than a rabbit with a greyhound.

February 29. "Ma" Burke is dread
fully ill — has been for two days. The
doctors have got several large Latin
names for it, but the plain truth is that
she has broken down under the strain
she seemed to be bearing so placidly.
She didn't give up until she was abso
lutely unable to lift herself out of bed.
"I knew it was coming/' she said, "but
I thought I had spirit enough to put
it off till I had more time."

It wasn't until she did give up that

175

The Social Secreta^

ter face really showed how badly off
she was. I was sitting by her bed when
"pa" Burke and Cyrus came in. I
couldn't bear to look at them, yet I
couldn't keep my eyes off their faces.
Both got deadly white at sight of her,
and "pa" rushed from the room after a
moment or two. The doctor had cau
tioned him against alarming her by
showing any signs of grief. But "pa"
couldn't stand it. He went to his study,
and the housekeeper told me he cried
like a baby. Cyrus stayed, and I couldn't
help admiring the way he put on cheer
fulness.

"I'll be all right in a few days," said
"ma." "It wasn't what I did; it was
what I et. I'm such a fool that I can't
let things that look good go by. And
I went from house to house, munching
away, cake here, candy there, choco-

The Social SecretaQS

late yonder, besides lunches and dinners
and suppers. I et in and I et out. Now,
I reckon I've got to settle the bill.
Thank the Lord I don't have to do it
standing up."

Cyrus and I went away from her
room together. "If she wasn't so good,"
said he, more to himself than to me,
"I'd not be so — so uncertain."

"I feel that I'm to blame," said I
bitterly. "It was I that gave her all
those things to do."

He was silent, and his silence fright
ened me. I had felt that I was partly
to blame. His silence made me feel
that I was wholly to blame, and that
he thought so.

"If I could only undo it," I said, in
what little voice I could muster.

"If you only could," he muttered.

I was utterly crushed. Every bit of

The Social Secretaos

my courage fled, and — but what's the
use of trying to describe it ? It was as
if I had tried to murder her and had
come to my senses and was realizing
what I'd done.

I suppose I must have shown what
was in my mind, for, all of a sudden,
with a sort of sob or groan, he put his
arms round me — such a strong yet such
a gentle clasp! "Don't look like that,
dear!" he pleaded. "Forgive me —
it was cowardly, what I said — and not
true. We're all to blame — you the least.
Haven't I seen, day after day, how you've
done everything you could to spare her
— how you've worn yourself out?"

He let me go as suddenly as he had
seized me.

"I'm not fit to be called a man!" he
exclaimed. "Just because I loved you,
and was always thinking of you, and

The Social Secretacg

watching you, and worrying about you,
I neglected to think of mother. If I'd
given her a single thought I'd have
known long ago that she was ill."

Just then Mrs. Burke's maid called
me — she was only a few yards away,
and must have seen everything. I hur
ried back to the room we had quitted
a few minutes before. "You must cheer
up those two big, foolish men, child,"
she said. "You all think I'm going to
pass over, but I'm not. You won't get
rid of me for many a year. And I rely
on you to prevent them from going all
to pieces."

She paused and looked at me wist
fully, as if she longed to say something
but was afraid she had no right to. I
said: "What is it — ma?"

Her face brightened. "Come, kiss
me," she murmured. "Thank you for
179

The Social Secretae£

saying that. We're very different in lots
of ways, being raised so different. But
hearts have a way of finding each other,
haven't they?"

I nodded.

"What I wanted to say was about —
Cyrus," she went on. "My Cyrus told
me that he don't see how he could get
along without you, no way, and I ad
vised him to talk to you about it, be
cause I knew it'd relieve his mind and
because it'd set you to looking at him in
a different way. Anyhow, it's always
a good plan to ask for what you want.
And he did — and he told me you wouldn't
hear to him. Don't think I'm trying to
persuade you. All I meant to say is
that—"

She stopped and smiled, a bright
shadow of that old, broad, beaming smile
of hers.

180

The Social SecretaG£

<*Fd do anything for you!" I ex
claimed, on impulse.

"I'm afraid that wouldn't suit Cyrus/'
she drawled, good humoredly. "He'd
be mad as the Old Scratch if he knew
what I was up to now. Well — do the
best you can. But don't do anything
unless it's for his sake. Only — just look
him over again. There's a lot to Cyrus
besides his cowlick. And he's been so
dead in love with you ever since he first
saw you that he's been making a perfect
fool of himself every time he looked at
you or spoke to you. Sometimes, when
I've seen the way he's acted up, like a
farmhand waltzing in cowhides, I've felt
like taking him over my knees and lay
ing it on good and hard."

I was laughing so that I couldn't
answer — the reaction from the fear that
she might be very, very ill had made me
181

The Social Secreta^S

hysterical. I could still see that she was
sick, extremely sick, but I realized that
our love for her had just put us into a

" Do the best you can, dear/' she ended.
"And everything — all the entertaining
here and the going out — must be kept
up just the same as if I was being
dragged about down stairs j istead of lying
up here resting."

She insisted on this, and would not be
content until she had my promise. " And
don't forget to cheer pa and Cyrus up.
I never was sick before— not a day.
That's why they take on so."

I think I have been succeeding in
cheering them up. And everything is
going forward as before — except, of
course, that we've cut out every engage
ment we possibly could.

It's amazing how many friends "ma"

182

The Social Secreta^

Burke has made in such a short time.
Ever since the news of her illness got
out, the front door has been opening and
shutting all day long. And those of the
callers that I've seen have shown a real
interest. This has made me have a bet
ter opinion of human nature than I had
thought I could have. I suppose half
the seeming heartlessness in this world
is suspicion and a sort of miserly dread
lest one should give kindly feeling with
out getting any of it in return. But
"ma" Burke, who never bothers her
head for an instant about whether peo
ple like her, and gets all her pleasure
out of liking them, makes friends by the j
score.

I'm in a queer state of mind about
Cyrus.

March 3. "Ma" Burke was brought
down to the drawing-room for tea

The Social Secreta^

to-day. She held a regular levee. Those
that came early spread it round, and by
six o'clock they were pouring in. She
looked extremely well, and gloriously
happy. All she had needed was com
plete rest and sleep — and less to eat.
"After this/' she said, "I'm not going
to eat more than four or five meals a
day. At my age a woman can't stand
the strain often and twelve — my record
was sixteen — counting two teas as one
meal." For an hour there was hilarious
chattering in English, French, German,
Italian, Russian, and mixtures of all five.
I think the thing that most fascinates
Mrs. Burke about Washington is the
many languages spoken. She looks at
me in an awed way when I trot out my
three in quick succession. And she re
gards the women as superhuman who
speak so many languages so fluently that
184

The Social Secreta^S

they drift from one to the other with
out being quite sure what they're speak
ing. There certainly were enough going
on at once to-day, and a good many of
the women smoked.

But to return to Mrs. Burke. When
only a few of those we know best were
left this afternoon, and Nadeshda was
smoking, Jessie, who is always so tact
ful, said to Robert: "I'm glad to see
that you don't object to Nadeshda's
smoking."

Mrs. Burke laughed. "Why should
he?" said she. "Why, when we were
children ma and pa used to sit on oppo
site sides of the chimney, smoking their
pipes. And ma dipped, too, when it wasn't
convenient for her to have her pipe."

"Do you smoke, Mrs. Burke?" asked
Jessie, with wide, serious eyes. "I never
saw you."

185

The Social Secreta^

"No, I don't," she confessed. "Tom
used to hate the smell of it, so I never
got into the habit."

Nadeshda was tremendously amused
by what Mrs. Burke had said about
pipes. "I didn't know it was consid
ered nice for a lady to smoke in Amer
ica until recently," said she. "And
pipes! How eccentric! Mama smokes
cigars — one after dinner, but I never
heard of a lady smoking a pipe."

"Ma wasn't a lady — what you ' d call
a lady," replied Mrs. Burke. "She was
just a plain woman. She didn't smoke
because she thought it was fashionable,
but because she thought it was comfort
able. As soon as we children got a little
older we used to be terribly ashamed of
it — but she kept right on. And now it's
come in style."

"Not pipes" said Jessie.

1 86

The-Social Secreta^

"Not yet" said "ma," with a smile.

When I thought they had all gone,
and I was writing in my "office" for a
few minutes before going up to dress,
Nadeshda came in to me. "Ma" Burke
used often to say that Nadeshda's eyes
were "full of the Old Scratch," but cer
tainly they were not at that moment.
She was giving me a glimpse of that
side which, as Browning, I think, says,
even the meanest creature has and shows
only to the person he or she loves.
Not that Nadeshda loves me, but she
has that side turned outermost nowa
days whenever she hasn't the veil drawn
completely over her real self.

"My dear," she said in French, "what
is it? Why these little smiles all after
noon whenever you forgot where you
were?"

I couldn't help blushing. "I don't

The Social Secreta^s

quite know, myself/' I replied — and it
was so.

"Oh, you cold, cold, cold Americans !"f
— then she paused and gave me one of
her strange smiles, with her eyes elon
gated and her lips just parted — "I mean,j
you American women."

"Cold, because we don't set ourselves
on fire?" I inquired.

"But yes," she answered, "yourselves,
and the men, too. Never mind. I shall
not peep into your little secret." She
laughed. "It always chills me to grope
round in one of your cold American
women's hearts."

"I wish you could tell me what my
secret is — and that's the plain truth,"
said I.

She laughed again, shrugged her
shoulders, pinched my cheek, nodded
her head until her big plumed hat was
188

The Social SecretaGS

all in £ quiver and was shaking out vol
umes of the strong, heavy perfume she
uses. And without saying anything
more she went away.

March 4. Cyrus and I sat next each
other at dinner at the Secretary of War's
to-night. It has happened several times
this winter, as the precedence is often
very difficult to arrange at small din
ners. Old Alex Bartlett took me in, and
as he's stone deaf and a monstrous eater
I was free.

Cyrus had taken in a silent little girl
who has just come out. She had ex
hausted her little line of prearranged
conversation before the fish was taken
away. So Cyrus talked to me.

"She's grateful for my letting her

alone," said he when I tried to turn

him back to his duty. "Besides, if I

didn't meet you out once in a while

189

The Social SecretaG£

you'd forget me entirely. And I don't
want that, if I can avoid it."

"Thank you/' said I, for lack of any
thing else to say, and with not the re
motest intention of irritating him. But
he flushed scarlet, and frowned.

"You always and deliberately miscon
strue everything I say," said he bitterly.
"I know I'm unfortunate in trying to
express myself to you, but why do you
never attribute to me anything but the
worst intentions?"

"And why should you assume that
every careless reply I make is a care
fully thought out attack on you?" I re
torted. "Don't you think your vanity
makes you morbid?"

"You know perfectly well that it
isn't vanity that makes me think you
especially dislike me," said he.

"But I don't," I answered. "I con-
190

The Social Secretaos

fess I did at first, but not since I've come
to know you better."

"Why did you dislike me at first ?"
he asked. "You began on me with al
most the first moment of our acquaint

ance.'3

"That's true— I did," I admitted. "I
had a reason for it — didn't Nadeshda tell
you what it was?"

He looked frightened.

"Be frank, if you want me to be
frank," said I.

"I never for an instant believed what
she said," he replied abjectly. Then
after a warning look from me, he added
— "Really believed it, I mean."

"And what was it that you didn't
really believe?" I demanded.

He looked at me boldly. "Nadeshda
and one or two others told me that you
and your friends had arranged it for me
191

The Social Secreta^

to marry you. But, of course, I knew it
wasn't so."

"But it was so," I replied. "You
were one of the considerations that de
termined my friends in trying to get
me my .place."

"Well — and why didn't you take me
when I finally fell into the trap?"

I let him see I was laughing at him.

He scowled — his cowlick did look
so funny that I longed to pull it. "Simply
couldn't stand me — not even for the
sake of what I brought," he said. And
then he gave me a straight, searching
look. "I wonder why I don't hate you,"
he went on. "I wonder why I am such
an ass as to care for you. Yes — even if
I knew you didn't care for me, still I'd
want you. Can a man make a more de
grading confession than that?"

"But why?" said I, very careful not
192

The SocialSecretacs

to let him see how eagerly I longed to
hear him say the words again. "Why
should you want — me?"

He gave a very unpleasant laugh. "If
you think I'm going to sit here and ex
hibit my feelings for your amusement
you're going to be disappointed. It's
none of your business why. Certainly
not because I find anything sweet or
amiable or even kind in you."

"That's rude," said I.

"It was intended to be," said he.

"Please — let's not quarrel now," said
I coldly. "It gives me the headache
to quarrel during dinner."

And he answered between his set
teeth, "To quarrel with you — anywhere
— gives me — the heartache, Gus."

I had no answer for that, nor should
I have had the voice to utter it if I
had had it. And then Mr. Bartlett be-

The Social SecretaG£

gan prosing to me about the Greeley-
Grant campaign. And when the men
came to join the women after dinner
Cyrus went away almost immediately.

I am so happy to-night.

March 5. Cyrus came to me in my
office to-day — as I had expected. But
instead of looking woebegone and abject,
he was radiant. He shut the door be
hind him. " Tou — guilty of cowardice/'
he began. "It isn't strange that I never
suspected it."

"What do you mean?" I asked, not
putting down my pen.

He came over and took it out of my
fingers, then he took my fingers and
kissed them, one by one. I was so
astounded — and something else — that I
made not the slightest resistance. "It's
useless for you to cry out," he said, "for
I've got the outer door well guarded."
194

The Social SecretaGS

I started up aflame with indignation.
"Who — whom — " I began.

"Ma," he replied.

"Oh!" I exclaimed, looking round
with a wild idea of making a dart for
liberty.

" Ma," he repeated, "and it's not of the
slightest use for you to try to side-step.
You're cornered." He had both my
hands now ~nd was looking at me at
arm's length. "So you are afraid to
marry me for fear people — your friends
— will say that — I walked right into
the trap?"

I hung my head and couldn't keep
from trembling, I was so ashamed.

"And if it wasn't for that you'd ac
cept my 'proposition' — now — wouldn't
you?" '

"I would not," I replied, wrenching
myself away with an effort that put my

195

The Social Secretac£

hair topsy-turvy — it always does try to
come down if I make a sudden move
ment, and I washed it only yesterday.

"What gorgeous hair you have!" he
said. "Sometimes I've caught a glimpse
of it just as I was entering a room —
and I've had to retreat and compose
myself to make a fresh try."

"You've been talking to your moth
er!" I exclaimed — I'd been casting about
for an explanation of all this sudden
shrewdness of his in ways feminine.

"I have," said he. "It's as important
to her as to me that you don't escape."

"And she told you that I was in love
with you!" I tried to put a little — not
too much — scorn into the "you."

"She did," he answered. "Do you
deny that it's true?"

" I have told you I would never accept
your * proposition,' " was my answer.
196

The Social Secret aes

"So you did," said he. "Then you
mean that you're going to sacrifice my
mother's happiness and mine, simply
because you're afraid of being accused
of mercenary motives?"

"I shall never accept your * proposi
tion,'" I repeated, with a faint smile
that was a plain hint.

He came very close to me and looked
down into my face. "What do you
mean by that?" he demanded. And
then he must have remembered what his
proposition was — a strictly business ar
rangement on both sides. For, with a
sort of gasp of relief, he took me in his
arms. I do love the combination of
strength and tenderness in a man. He
had looked and talked and been so
strong up to that instant. Then he was
so tender — I could hardly keep back the
tears.

197

The^Social Secret aos

"Wouldn't you like me to tell moth
er?" he asked. "She's just in the next
room — and — "

I nodded and said, "I never should
have caught you if it hadn't been for
her."

"Nor I you," said he. And he put
me in a chair and opened the door. I
somehow couldn't look up, though I
knew she was there.

"I don't know whether to laugh or
cry," said "ma" Burke. "So I guess
I'll just do both." And then she seated
herself and was as good as her word.

STORED AT MR'J

THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SANTA CRUZ

This book is due on the last DATE stamped below.

I till*1

50m-l,'69(J5643s8)2373— 3A.1

-

:

3 2106 00213 7187