"And what kind of people, pray, live in such places as that?" demanded the Bibliomaniac. "Very nice people," said the Idiot. "People, for the most part, who spend their winters at Palm Beach, their springs in London, their summers at Newport or on the Continent, and their autumns in the Berkshires." "I don't see why they need a home at all if that's the way they do," said Mrs. Pedagog. "It's very simple," said the Idiot. "You've got to have an address to get your name in the _Social Register_." "Four thousand dollars is pretty steep for an address," commented the Bibliomaniac. "It would be for me," said the Idiot. "But it is cheap for them. Moreover, in the case of the Redmere it's the swellest address in town. Three of the most important divorces of the last social season took place at the Redmere. Social position comes high, Mr. Bib, but there are people who must have it. It is to them what baked beans are to the Bostonian's Sunday breakfast--a _sine qua non_." "May I ask whatever induced you to look for a four-thousand-dollar apartment?" asked Mr. Pedagog. "You have frequently stated that your income barely equalled twenty-four hundred dollars a year." "Why shouldn't I?" asked the Idiot. "It doesn't cost any more to look for a four-thousand-dollar apartment than it does to go chasing after a two-dollar-a-week hall-bedroom, and it impresses the cab-driver with a sense of responsibility. But bagging these gorgeous apartments does not constitute the real joy of flat-hunting. For solid satisfaction and real sport the chase for a fifteen-hundred-dollar apartment in a decent neighborhood bears away the palm. You can get plenty of roomy suites in the neighborhood of a boiler-factory, or next door to a distillery, or back of a fire-engine house, at reasonable rents, and along the elevated railway lines much that is impressive is to be found by those who can sleep with trains running alongside of their pillows all night; but when you get away from these, the real thing at that figure is elusive. Over by the Park you can get two pigeon-holes and a bath, with a southern exposure, for nineteen hundred dollars a year; if you are willing to dispense with the southern exposure you can get three Black Holes of Calcutta and a butler's pantry, in the same neighborhood, for sixteen hundred dollars, but you have to provide your own air. Farther down-town you will occasionally find the thing you want with a few extras in the shape of cornet-players, pianola-bangers, and peroxide sopranos on either side of you, and an osteopathic veterinary surgeon on the ground floor thrown in. Then there are paper flats that can be had for twelve hundred dollars, but you can't have any pictures in them, because the walls won't stand the weight, and any nail of reasonable length would stick through into the next apartment. A friend of mine lived in one of these affairs once, and when he inadvertently leaned against the wall