re not in evening dress.

As like attracts like,--on the same principle that laborers in a car
foregather with other laborers,--so Skinner began to foregather with
the dress-suit contingent. Their clothes attracted his clothes. He
felt that he belonged with them. Furthermore, he had a painful
consciousness of being conspicuous among the underdressed men. He
also wished to escape a certain envy which he sensed in a few of his
fellow clerks, because of his dress suit. While this was a novel
sensation to Skinner--the walk-in-the-slush, sit-in-the-corner,
watch-the-other-fellow-dance, male-wallflower proposition--he did n't
like it, for he was a kind-hearted man, always considerate of the
feelings of others. And for the moment it threatened to check the
pleasure he was beginning to take in his new clothes.

As Skinner aligned himself with the dress-suit contingent, he realized
that many of these were clerks who had risen in the world and owned
their own machines, while the under-dressed men still belonged to the
bicycle club.

Many of the newly rich men were old acquaintances of Skinner's who had
passed him, left him behind, as it were, years before. To these, his
dress suit was a kind of new introduction. They seemed pleased to see
him. They clapped him on the shoulder. It struck his sense of humor
that they were like old friends who had preceded him to heaven and were
waiting to welcome him to their new sphere.

He thrust his hands into his pockets--as he saw the others do--and
strode, not walked or glided pussy-footedly, as became a "cage man."
And he began to feel a commiseration for the men who were not in dress
suits.

Skinner found himself taking a sudden interest in the social chatter
about him. It did not bore him now. Why had he always hated it so, he
asked himself? Probably because he had never taken the trouble to
understand it--but he was a rank outsider then. He began to wonder if
social life were really so potent of good cheer, physical and mental
refreshment. He began to realize that he had permitted himself to
dislike a great institution because of a few butterflies whose chatter
had offended him.

But he now saw that important business men were social butterflies, at
times. Surely, they must see something in it. And if these clever and
able men saw something in it, then he, Skinner, must have been
something of an ass to deny himself these things.

When McLaughlin came up and greet