England -- Social life and customs -- 20th century -- Fiction; Social classes -- England -- Fiction
"For Dolly's out and about again,
She doesn't give a damn for a shower of rain.
Here's Dolly with her collie!
And London, dear old London,
London is itself again."
This outburst was followed by a silence which was presently broken by a
sound of torn paper.
"What are you tearing up, Tony?"
"Oh, nothing," he called back, in accents of elaborate indifference.
"Only an old program."
In the morning Dorothy looked in the paper-basket, the bottom of which
was lightly powdered by the fragments of a letter. She stooped to pick
up the pieces; then she stopped.
"What does it matter who it was for? It was never sent. But I was only
just in time."
On October 15th a party of eight visited "The Belle of Belgravia" at the
Vanity. Besides Tony and Dorothy, there were Arthur Lonsdale, who had
long forgotten all about Queenie Molyneux and could now watch a musical
comedy as coldly as a dramatic critic whose paper did not depend on the
theatrical advertisements. He brought his partner, Adrian Lee, whose
pretty little wife, all cheeks and hair, looked much more like an
actress than Dorothy, though she was really the daughter of a bishop.
People used to wonder how a bishop came to have such a daughter; they
forgot that while he was a vicar he had written a commentary on the Song
of Solomon, with foot-notes as luscious as the plums that sink to the
bottom of a cake. Harry Tufton came, and a Mrs. Foster-ffrench who went
everywhere except where she most wanted to go and was always a little
resentful that even with her two "f's" she could not hook herself up to
some altitudes. However, that was Mrs. Foster-ffrench's private sorrow,
and she did not let it mar a jolly evening. The other guests were Capt.
Archibald Keith, late of the 16th Hussars, who had abandoned the cavalry
in order to write the librettos of musical comedies, and a Mrs.
Mainwaring, who kept a fashionable hat-shop in Bruton Street and was the
widow of poor Dick Mainwaring, a brother of Lord Hughenden. Everybody
always spoke about him as poor Dick Mainwaring, but whether because he
had been killed at Paardeburg or because he had married Rita Daubeny was
uncertain; it probably varied with the point of view of the speaker. The
friends of Mrs. Mainwaring put down any oddness in her behavior to
French creole blood and a childhood in Martinique; to the former was
also attributable her chic in hats; to the latter the dryness and pallor
of her complexion; French blood or French brandy, Martinique or Martell,
the Hon. Mrs. Richard Mainwaring certainly did stimulate conversation
just as paprika stimulates the appetite. But however jocund her life,
her hats were chaste, and however sharp her play, her name was
honorable. Moreover, so many people owed her money that they had to be
pleasant to her. Mrs. Foster-ffrench, in spite of her name, had no
French blood to excuse her odd behavior; in fact, she had nothing except
a hyphen and those two "f's." Mr.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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