"Good night, dear blessed. I know."

CHAPTER x.x.xVI

There were, as Ruth had remarked, families.

When Carl was formally invited to dine at the Winslows', on a night late in April, his only anxiety was as to the condition of his dinner-coat. He arrived in a state of easy briskness, planning apt and sensible remarks about the business situation for Mason and Mr.

Winslow. As the maid opened the door Carl was wondering if he would be able to touch Ruth's hand under the table. He had an antic.i.p.atory fondness for all of the small friendly family group which was about to receive him.

And he was cast into a den of strangers, most of them comprised in the one electric person of Aunt Emma Truegate Winslow.

Aunt Emma Truegate Winslow was the general-commanding in whatsoever group she was placed by Providence (with which she had strong influence). At a White House reception she would pleasantly but firmly have sent the President about his business, and have taken his place in the receiving line. Just now she sat in a pre-historic S chair, near the center of the drawing-room, pumping out of Phil Dunleavy most of the facts about his chiefs' private lives.

Aunt Emma had the soul of a six-foot dowager d.u.c.h.ess, and should have had an eagle nose and a white pompadour. Actually, she was of medium height, with a not unduly maternal bosom, a broad, commonplace face, hair the color of faded gra.s.s, a blunt nose with slightly enlarged pores, and thin lips that seemed to be a straight line when seen from in front, but, seen in profile, puffed out like a fish's. She had a habit of nodding intelligently even when she was not listening, and another habit of rubbing her left knuckles with the fingers of her right hand. Not imposing in appearance was Aunt Emma Truegate Winslow, but she was born to discipline a court.

An impeccable widow was she, speaking with a broad A, and dressed exquisitely in a black satin evening gown.

By such simple-hearted traits as being always right about unimportant matters and idealistically wrong about important matters, politely intruding into everything, being earnest about the morality of the poor and auction bridge and the chaperonage of nice girls, possessing a working knowledge of Wagner and Rodin, wearing fifteen-dollar corsets, and believing on her bended knees that the Truegates and Winslows were the n.o.blest families in the Social Register, Aunt Emma Truegate Winslow had persuaded the whole world, including even her near-English butler, that she was a superior woman. Family tradition said that she had only to raise a finger to get into really smart society. Upon the death of Ruth's mother, Aunt Emma had taken it as one of her duties, along with symphony concerts and committees, to rear Ruth properly. She had been neglecting this duty so far as to permit the invasion of a barbarian named Ericson only because she had been in California with her young son, Arthur. Just now, while her house was being opened, she was staying at the Winslows', with Arthur and a peculiarly beastly j.a.panese spaniel named Taka-San.

She was introduced at Carl, she glanced him over, and pa.s.sed him on to Olive Dunleavy, all in forty-five seconds. When Carl had recovered from a sensation of being a kitten drowned in a sack, he said agreeable things to Olive, and observed the situation in the drawing-room.

Phil was marked out for Aunt Emma's favors; Mr. Winslow sat in a corner, apparently crushed, with restorative conversation administered by Ruth; Mason Winslow was haltingly attentive to a plain, well-dressed, amiable girl named Florence Crewden, who had prematurely gray hair, the week-end habit, and a weakness for baby talk. Ruth's medical-student brother, Bobby Winslow, was not there.

The more he saw of Bobby's kind Aunt Emma, the more Carl could find it in his heart to excuse Bobby for having escaped the family dinner.

Carl had an uncomfortable moment when Aunt Emma and Mr. Winslow asked him questions about the development of the Touricar. But before he could determine whether he was being deliberately inspected by the family the ordeal was over.

As they went in to dinner, Mr. Winslow taking in Aunt Emma like a small boy accompanying the school princ.i.p.al, Ruth had the chance to whisper: "My Hawk, be good. Please believe I'm not responsible. It's all Aunt Emma's doing, this dreadfully stately family dinner. Don't let her bully you. I'm frightened to death and----Yes, Phil, I'm coming."

The warning did not seem justified in view of the attractive table--candles, cut gla.s.s, a mound of flowers on a beveled mirror, silvery linen, and grape-fruit with champagne. Carl was at one side of Aunt Emma, but she seemed more interested in Mr. Winslow, at the end of the table; and on his other side Carl had a safe companion in Olive Dunleavy. Across from him were Florence Crewden, Phil, and Ruth--Ruth shimmering in a gown of yellow satin, which broke the curves of her fine, flushed shoulders only by a narrow band.

The conversation played with people. Florence Crewden told, to applause and laughter, of an exploratory visit to the College of the City of New York, and her discovery of a strange race, young Jews mostly, who went to college to study, and had no sense of the n.o.bility of "making" fraternities.

"Such outsiders!" she said. "Can't you imagine the sort of a party they'd have--they'd all stand around and discuss psychology and dissecting puppies and Greek roots! Phil, I think it would be a lovely punishment for you to have to join them--to work in a laboratory all day and wear a celluloid collar."

"Oh, I know their sort; 'greasy grinds' we used to call them; there were plenty of them in Yale," condescended Phil.

"Maybe they wear celluloid collars--if they do--because they're poor,"

protested Ruth.

"My dear child," sniffed Aunt Emma, "with collars only twenty-five cents apiece? Don't be silly!"

Mr. Winslow declared, with portly timidity, "Why, Em, my collars don't cost me but fifteen----"

"Mason dear, let's not discuss it at dinner.... Tell me, all of you, the scandal I've missed by going to California. Which reminds me; did I tell you I saw that miserable Amy Baslin, you remember, that married the porter or the superintendent or something in her father's factory?

I saw her and her husband at Pasadena, and they seemed to be happy. Of course Amy would put the best face she could on it, but they must have been miserably unhappy--such a sad affair, and she could have married quite decently."

"What do you mean by 'decently'?" Ruth demanded.

Carl was startled. He had once asked Ruth the same question about the same phrase.

Aunt Emma revolved like a gun-turret getting Ruth's range, and remarked, calmly: "My dear child, you know quite well what I mean.

Don't, I beg of you, bring any socialistic problems to dinner till you have really learned something about them.... Now I want to hear all the nice scandals I have missed."

There were not many she had missed; but she kept the conversation sternly to discussions of people whose names Carl had never heard.

Again he was obviously an Outsider. Still ignoring Carl, Aunt Emma demanded of Ruth and Phil, sitting together opposite her:

"Tell me about the good times you children have been having, Ruthie.

I am so glad that Phil and you finally went to the William Truegates'.

And your letter about the Beaux Arts festival was charming, Ruthie. I quite envied you and Phil."

The dragon continued talking to Ruth, while Carl listened, in the interstices of his chatter to Olive:

"I hope you haven't been giving all your time and beauty-sleep doing too much of that settlement work, Ruthie--and Heaven only knows what germs you will get there--of course I should be the first to praise any work for the poor, ungrateful and shiftless though they are--what with my committees and the Truegate Temperance Home for Young Working Girls--it's all very well to be sympathetic with them, but when it comes to a settlement-house, and Heaven knows I have given them all the counsel and suggestions I could, though some of the professional settlement workers are as pert as they can be, and I really do believe some of them think they are trying to end poverty entirely, just as though the Lord would have sent poverty into the world if He didn't have a very good reason for it--you will remember the Bible says, 'The poor you always have with you,' and as Florence Barclay says in her novels, which may seem a little sentimental, but they are of such a good moral effect, you can't supersede the Scriptures even in the most charming social circles. To say nothing of the blessings of poverty, I'm sure they're much happier than we are, with our onerous duties, I'm sure that if any of these ragam.u.f.fin anarchists and socialists and anti-militarists want to take over my committees they are welcome, if they'll take over the miserable headaches and worried hours they give me, trying to do something for the poor, they won't even be clean but even in model tenements they will put coal in the bath-tubs. And so I do hope you haven't just been wearing yourself to a bone working for ungrateful dirty little children, Ruthie."

"No, auntie dear, I've been quite as discreet as any Winslow should be. You see, I'm selfish, too. Aren't I, Carl?"

"Oh, very."

Aunt Emma seemed to remember, then, that some sort of a man, whose species she didn't quite know, sat next to her. She glanced at Carl, again gave him up as an error in social judgment, and went on:

"No, Ruthie, not selfish so much as thoughtless about the duties of a family like ours--and I was always the first to say that the Winslows are as fine a stock as the Truegates. And I am going to see that you go out more the rest of this year, Ruthie. I want you and Phil to plan right now to attend the Charity League dances next season. You must learn to concentrate your attention----"

"Auntie dear, please leave my wickedness till the next time we----"

"My dear child, now that I have the chance to get all of us together--I'm sure Mr. Ericson will pardon the rest of us our little family discussions--I want to take you and Master Phil to task together. You are both of you negligent of social duties--duties they are, Ruthie, for man was not born to serve alone--though Phil is far better than you, with your queer habits, and Heaven only knows where you got them, neither your father nor your dear sainted mother was slack or selfish----"

"Dear auntie, let's admit that I'm a black sheep with a little black muzzle and a habit of b.u.t.ting all sorts of ash-cans; and let Phil go on his social way rejoicing."

Ruth was jaunty, but her voice was strained, and she bit her lip with staccato nervousness when she was not speaking. Carl ventured to face the dragon.

"Mrs. Winslow, I'm sure Ruth has been better than you think; she has been learning all these fiendishly complicated new dances. You know a poor business man like myself finds them----"

"Yes," said Aunt Emma, "I am sure she will always remember that she is a Winslow, and must carry on the family traditions, but sometimes I am afraid she gets under bad influences, because of her good nature."

She said it loudly. She looked Carl in the eye.

The whole table stopped talking. Carl felt like a tramp who has kicked a chained bulldog and discovers that the chain is broken.

He wanted to be good; not make a scene. He noticed with intense indignation that Phil was grinning. He planned to get Phil off in a corner, not necessarily a dark corner, and beat him. He wanted to telegraph Ruth; dared not. He realized, in a quarter-second, that he must have been discussed by the Family, and did not like it.

Every one seemed to be waiting for him to speak. Awkwardly he said, wondering all the while if she meant what her tone said she meant, by "bad influences":

"Yes, but----Just going to say----I believe settlement work is a good influence----"

"Please don't discuss----" Ruth was groaning, when Aunt Emma sternly interrupted: