Vassar waited with impatience for her answer the next day. If the mails were properly handled his letter should have reached her by noon. An immediate answer posted in Babylon at one o’clock might be delivered at Stuyvesant Square by six. He started at every call of the postman’s whistle in vain. He was sure an answer would come in the morning. Nothing came. He put his hand on the telephone once to call her and decided against the possibility of a second bungling of his cause. Instead he called the post-office and learned that a congestion of mail, owing to the disorganization of the service by the Jubilee, had caused a delay of twenty-four hours in the delivery to points on Long Island. He waited in vain another day. He walked alone through the crowded streets that night studying the curious contagion of hysteria which had swept the entire city from its moorings of an orderly sane life. The din of horns and the shouts of boys and girls, crowding and jostling on the densely packed pavements, surpassed the orgies of any New Year’s riot he had ever witnessed. Every dance hall in Greater New York was thronged with merrymakers. The committee in charge of the Jubilee, supplied with unlimited money, had hired every foot of floor space that could be used for dancing and placed it at the disposal of the social organizations of the city. Wine was flowing like water. The police winked at folly. A world’s holiday was on for a week. Vassar visited Jack’s, Maxim’s, Bustanoby’s, Rector’s, and Churchill’s to watch the orgie at its height. Every seat was filled and surging crowds were waiting their turn at the tables. Hundreds of pretty girls, flushed with wine, were throwing confetti and thrusting feathers into the faces of passing men. The bolder of them were seated on the laps of their sweethearts, shouting the joys of peaceful conquest. Professional dancers led the revelry with excesses of suggestive step and pose that brought wild rounds of approval from the more reckless observers. Vassar left the last place at 12:30 with a sense of sickening anger. The fun had only begun. It would not reach the climax before two o’clock. At three the girls who were throwing confetti would be too drunk to sit in their chairs. He drew a deep breath of fresh air and started up Broadway for a turn in the park. He paused in front of a vacant cab. The chauffeur tipped his cap. “Cab, sir? Free for two hours. Take you anywhere you want to go for a song. All mine on the side. Engaged here for the night. They won’t be out till morning. They’ve just set down.” A sudden impulse seized him to drive past Waldron’s castle and see its illumination. No doubt the place would be a blaze of dazzling electric lights.