t. Andrew followed, fascinated. The young man in
attendance walked after the manner of his kind, and Andrew,
unconsciously imitating him, ascended the steps, seated himself with
an air of elaborate indifference opposite the party in the narrow
semicircle, and composed his face into an expression of blank
abstraction. His trouble was wasted: they did not see him. They had an
air of seeing no one in the world but their kind. One of the girls, to
Andrew's horror, crossed her knees and swung her foot airily. The young
man sank into a slouching position. Another girl joined the group, but
he did not rise when introduced, nor offer to get her a chair. She was
obliged to perform that office, at some difficulty, for herself.

The band began to play. Andrew leaned forward, gazing at the floor,
intent upon hearing these people actually converse. But their talk only
came to him in snatches between the rise and fall of the music. Like
many other New-Yorkers, he had a deaf ear.

"My things disappear so"--(from the yellow girl) ... "I suspect my maid
wears them.... Don't really know what I have.... Don't dare say
anything." This was said with a languid drawl which Andrew thought
delicious.

All laughed.

"Shall you go to Paris this year?"

"I don't know ... till time comes.... Then we keep four servants up all
night packing.... Must have some new gowns.... You know how you have to
talk to Ducet and Paquin yourself."

The young man went to sleep. The girls put their heads together and
whispered. After a time they arose with a little capricious air, which
completed Andrew's subjugation, and strolled away.

VI

That evening, as he sat with Chapman over the coffee in the stately
little dining-room of the victim of cordage, the journalist remarked
suddenly:

"I say, old fellow, you don't seem to be in it. Don't you know anybody
here at all?"

Andrew shook his head gloomily.

"Well, you'll have a stupid time, I'm afraid. There are only three
classes of people that come to Newport--the swells, the people who want
to see the swells, and the correspondents whose unhappy fate it is to
report the doings of the swells. Now, what on earth did you come here
for?"

Andrew had not a confiding nature, but he could not repress a dark
flush. The astute little journalist understood it.

"It's too bad you didn't bring a letter or two. One would have made it
easy work. You look as well as any of them, and you've got the boodle.
Where