e the other guests impressed him still more.
They wore gloves when they arrived. They showed neither forwardness nor
timidity, but greeted each other and their host with grown-up dignity
and formality. They seemed to know what to do at every moment, and how
to do it. Keith was accustomed to decent manners. Social intercourse in
the parental circle was not without grace, but this was something
different. At the time he was utterly incapable of telling where the
difference lay, and years afterward he realized what subtle shadings it
depended on. The main thing at the time was that something in himself
responded instinctively to the higher degree of polish and
self-assurance which he now for the first time was able to observe at
close quarters.

The principal entertainment of the evening was a monster battle with tin
soldiers on the cleared floor of the huge dining-room. The battle was at
its height and supper was not yet in sight, when Keith learned that the
girl was waiting for him. There was nothing to do but to obey, but the
hostess could not think of letting him go without having eaten. A
special service was prepared for him in the kindest way possible, and
Keith enjoyed very much the many dainties offered him. Nevertheless he
felt the situation as humiliating and was actually glad when he got away
at last. But the gladness was only a surface gloss on a burning core of
regrets and dissatisfaction.

In a way that evening, which was never repeated, proved a new starting
point in his life. He had had his first close contact with life on a
higher social level, and he could not forget it. New standards had been
furnished him, and unconsciously he was applying them all the time to
all sorts of things--his parents included. Until then he had blindly
accepted them and their ways and their environment as representing the
best this world had to offer. Now the basis had been laid for doubts
that gradually developed into positive criticism.

The immediate result seemed quite irrelevant. He developed a sudden
objection to running errands for his mother, and especially to doing
anything that involved the carrying of bags or bottles or baskets
through the streets. Packages looking as if they might contain books
remained unobjectional. There was a time when being sent to the grocery
store was a privilege and a distinction. Later it became an opportunity
for clandestine meetings with Johan. Even during his first year at Old
Mary he