Mrs. Bannister had half risen--I thought in horror. It was really the butler who had brought my eulogy of Stacy Shunk to a sudden close, for, appearing in half-drawn portieres, he announced: "Mr. Talcott." The mere entrance of Mr. Talcott carried us far from the valley and such rude associates as old Bill Hansen and his kind. I think that even Rufus Blight would have been too discreet to refer to them in his presence--for Penelope's sake, if nothing else. He was a slender young man of medium height, clean-shaven, perfectly groomed, and perfectly mannered. He was as much at ease as I had been ill at ease, and I envied him for it. He declined tea because he had just come from the club, and I envied him this delightful way of avoiding cake and embarrassing crumbs. Mrs. Bannister addressed him as Herbert, and I knew at once that he was Edward Herbert Talcott, whose name I had often seen in my paper-reading task. His claim to distinction was descent from the man whose name he bore, a member of the cabinet of one of our early presidents. A dead statesman in a family is always a valuable asset, and the longer dead the better. Statesmen, like wines, must be hidden away in vaults long years to be properly mellowed for social uses. I think that Mr. Secretary Talcott would have been astonished, indeed, could he have measured his influence after a century by the numbers, collateral and direct, who were proud to use his name. There were Talcott Joneses, and Talcott Robinsons, and Talcott Browns by the score in town, but one and all they acknowledged the primacy of this Edward Herbert Talcott, and never lost an opportunity of speaking of him as their cousin. He had written, I learned afterward, a monograph on his great-grandfather, which had given him a certain literary distinction in his own set, and it was generally understood that, while he might easily have earned a livelihood by his pen, he had been relieved of the necessity of doing it by his ancestors' investments in Harlem real estate. Talcott looked perfectly inoffensive, and yet he had hardly been seated before I conceived a profound aversion to him. Mrs. Bannister's treatment of him did much to arouse it. Here, she seemed to say, is a human being, a sentient creature with ideas in his head, a finished man with an appreciation of the finer things of life. She asked him if he was going to the Martin dance. Mr. Talcott did not know--he might--he hadn't made up his mind. "There will probably be a rather mixed crowd," he said, with his lips twitching into a cynical smile. Rufus Blight, who had moved to a chair by the fire, shook his head in disapproval of mixed crowds, and Mrs. Bannister said that, nevertheless, the Martins were getting along and certainly would get in. "And sometimes, you know, mixed crowds are rather fun," said Talcott; and turning to Penelope: "I suppose you are not going?" "I certainly am," Penelope answered heartily. "I love dancing so."