e different
rooms. As the lamentations seemed to approach nearer, the visitors'
doors were successively shut, swift footsteps hurried along the hall;
past my open door came a momentary vision of a heated nursemaid
carrying a tumultuous chaos of frilled skirts, flying sash, rebellious
slippers, and tossing curls; there was a moment's rallying struggle
before the room nearly opposite mine, and then a door opened and shut
upon the vision. It was Sarah Walker!

Everybody knew her; few had ever seen more of her than this passing
vision. In the great hall, in the dining-room, in the vast parlors, in
the garden, in the avenue, on the beach, a sound of lamentation had
always been followed by this same brief apparition. Was there a sudden
pause among the dancers and a subjugation of the loudest bassoons in
the early evening "hop," the explanation was given in the words "Sarah
Walker." Was there a wild confusion among the morning bathers on the
sands, people whispered "Sarah Walker." A panic among the waiters at
dinner, an interruption in the Sunday sacred concert, a disorganization
of the after-dinner promenade on the veranda, was instantly referred to
Sarah Walker. Nor were her efforts confined entirely to public life.
In cozy corners and darkened recesses, bearded lips withheld the
amorous declaration to mutter "Sarah Walker" between their clenched
teeth; coy and bashful tongues found speech at last in the rapid
formulation of "Sarah Walker." Nobody ever thought of abbreviating her
full name. The two people in the hotel, otherwise individualized, but
known only as "Sarah Walker's father" and "Sarah Walker's mother," and
never as Mr. and Mrs. Walker, addressed her only as "Sarah Walker"; two
animals that were occasionally a part of this passing pageant were
known as "Sarah Walker's dog" and "Sarah Walker's cat," and later it
was my proud privilege to sink my own individuality under the title of
"that friend of Sarah Walker's."

It must not be supposed that she had attained this baleful eminence
without some active criticism. Every parent in the Greyport Hotel had
held his or her theory of the particular defects of Sarah Walker's
education; every virgin and bachelor had openly expressed views of the
peculiar discipline that was necessary to her subjugation. It may be
roughly estimated that she would have spent the entire nine years of
her active life in a dark cupboard on an exclusive diet of bread and
water, had this