Flossy shrugged her shoulders. "I have never thought whether I approve of it or not. I am only telling you what exists. I don't deny that money counts for a great deal, for, as Gregory says, money is the measure of success. But money isn't everything. Brains count and refinement, and nice honorable ways of looking at things. Of course, I'm only telling you what my ambition is. People have different kinds of bees in their bonnets. Some men have the presidential bee; I have the social bee. I should like to be recognized as a prominent member of the charmed circle on my own merits and show my cousins that I am really worthy of their attention. There are a few who are able to be superior to that sort of thing, who go on living their own lives attractively and finely, without thinking of society, and who suddenly wake up some day to find themselves socially famous--to find that they have been taken up. That's the best way, but one requires to be the right sort of person and to have a lot of moral courage. I can imagine it happening to you and your husband. But it would never happen to Gregory and me. We shall have to make money and cut a dash in order to attract attention, and by-and-by, if we are persistent and clever enough, we may be recognized as somebodies, provided there is something original or interesting about us. There! I have told you my secret and shocked you into the bargain. I really must be going. But I'll tell you another secret first: It'll be a pleasure to me to see you, if I may, because you look at things differently and haven't a social bee. I wish I were like that--really like it. But then, as Gregory would say, I shouldn't be myself, and not to be one's self is worse than anything else after all, isn't it? You and your husband must come and dine with us soon." After Mrs. Williams had gone, Selma fell into a brown study. She had listened to sentiments of which she thoroughly disapproved, and which were at variance with all her theories and conceptions. What her friendly, frivolous visitor had told her with engaging frankness offended her conscience and patriotism. She did not choose to admit the existence of these class-distinctions, and she knew that even if they did exist, they could not possibly concern Wilbur and herself. Even Mrs. Williams had appreciated that Wilbur and her literary superiority put them above and beyond the application of any snobbish, artificial, social measuring-tape. And yet Selma's brow was clouded. Her thought reverted to the row of stately houses on either side of Fifth Avenue, into none of which she had the right of free access, in spite of the fact that she was leading her life attractively and finely, without regard to society. She thought instinctively of Sodom and Gomorrah, and she saw righteously with her mind's eye for a moment an angel with a flaming sword consigning to destruction these offending mansions and their owners as symbols of mammon and contraband to God.