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financial troubles were in the past and the fearfully expected child
had evolved into an absorbing family. They were always glad to see
old Anson, but they dressed up for him and tried to impress him with
their present importance, and kept their troubles to themselves. They
needed him no longer.
A few weeks before his thirtieth birthday the last of his early
and intimate friends was married. Anson acted in his usual role of
best man, gave his usual silver tea-service, and went down to the
usual Homeric to say good-by. It was a hot Friday afternoon in May,
and as he walked from the pier he realized that Saturday closing had
begun and he was free until Monday morning.
"Go where?" he asked himself.
The Yale Club, of course; bridge until dinner, then four or five
raw cocktails in somebody's room and a pleasant confused evening.
He regretted that this afternoon's groom wouldn't be along – they had
always been able to cram so much into such nights: they knew how to
attach women and how to get rid of them, how much consideration
any girl deserved from their intelligent hedonism. A party was an
adjusted thing – you took certain girls to certain places and spent just
so much on their amusement; you drank a little, not much, more than
you ought to drink, and at a certain time in the morning you stood up
and said you were going home. You avoided college boys, sponges,
future engagements, fights, sentiment, and indiscretions. That was the
way it was done. All the rest was dissipation.
In the morning you were never violently sorry - you made no
resolutions, but if you had overdone it and your heart was slightly out
of order, you went on the wagon for a few days without saying
anything about it, and waited until an accumulation of nervous
boredom projected you into another party.
The lobby of the Yale Club was unpopulated. In the bar three
very young alumni looked up at him, momentarily and without
curiosity.
"Hello, there, Oscar," he said to the bartender. "Mr.. Cahill
been around this afternoon?"
"Mr.. Cahill's gone to New Haven."
"Oh ... that so?"
"Gone to the ball game. Lot of men gone up."
Anson looked once again into the lobby, considered for a
moment, and then walked out and over to Fifth Avenue. From the