ting-list is already interminable, and that, if
you hoped to break into New York society, the clever thing to do was to
lay siege to it by way of the suburbs and the country clubs. If you went
direct to New York knowing no one, you would at once expose that fact,
and the result would be disastrous.

She told them of a couple like themselves, young and rich and from the
West, who, at the first dance to which they were invited, asked, "Who is
the old lady in the wig?" and that question argued them so unknown that
it set them back two years. It was a terrible story, and it filled the
Keeps with misgivings. They agreed with the lady correspondent that it
was far better to advance leisurely; first firmly to intrench themselves
in the suburbs, and then to enter New York, not as the Keeps from
Keepsburg, which meant nothing, but as the Fred Keeps of Long Island, or
Westchester, or Bordentown.

"In all of those places," explained the widow lady, "our smartest people
have country homes, and at the country club you may get to know them.
Then, when winter comes, you follow them on to the city."

The point from which the Keeps elected to launch their attack was
Scarboro-on-the-Hudson. They selected Scarboro because both of them
could play golf, and they planned that their first skirmish should be
fought and won upon the golf-links of the Sleepy Hollow Country Club.
But the attack did not succeed. Something went wrong. They began to fear
that the lady correspondent had given them the wrong dope. For, although
three months had passed, and they had played golf together until they
were as loath to clasp a golf club as a red-hot poker, they knew no one,
and no one knew them. That is, they did not know the Van Wardens; and
if you lived at Scarboro and were not recognized by the Van Wardens, you
were not to be found on any map.

Since the days of Hendrik Hudson the country-seat of the Van Wardens
had looked down upon the river that bears his name, and ever since those
days the Van Wardens had looked down upon everybody else. They were so
proud that at all their gates they had placed signs reading, "No horses
allowed. Take the other road." The other road was an earth road used by
tradespeople from Ossining; the road reserved for the Van Wardens, and
automobiles, was of bluestone. It helped greatly to give the Van Warden
estate the appearance of a well kept cemetery. And those Van Wardens who
occupied the country-place were as cold and u