times!

Ordinary forms of greeting had changed to mutual congratulations on
affluence. Anecdotes of business men were no longer of struggle and
privation, but of record outputs and maximum prices. Theatres, cafes,
cinema palaces, churches, hotels--they had never seen such times.
Success was in the very dampness of the air as thousands of people looked
at it from the cosy interior of limousines, people who had never aspired
higher than an occasional taxi-cab. The times! Dollars multiplied and
begat great families of dollars--and Broadway glittered as never before.

It is difficult to state what trend of thought made conversation between
the friends difficult, but after two or three desultory attempts they
walked on without speaking. As they were entering the majestic portals
of the club, Selwyn was reminded of a question he had intended all day to
ask.

'Edge,' he said, 'have you heard anything of Marjory Shoreham?'

'She sailed two weeks ago for France,' answered the clergyman.

They were directed to an upper floor, where they found a hundred or so
guests who claimed Harvard as their _alma mater_. Although most of his
old acquaintances were quite cordial, Selwyn felt oddly self-conscious.
He caught sight of Gerard Van Derwater with his impassive courtliness
dominating a group of active but less impressive men; and behind them he
saw Douglas Watson of Cambridge surrounded by a dozen guests; but he
pleaded a headache to Forbes, and sought a secluded corner, where he
remained until dinner was announced.

Like all affairs where men are alone and the charming artifices of
femininity are missing, there was a severity and a formality which did
not disappear until the ministrations of wine and food had engendered a
glow which did away with shyness. The table was arranged in the form of
the letter U, with Watson beside the chairman at the head.

Towards the end of the dinner conversation and hilarity were growing
apace. Men were forgetting the scramble of existence in the recollection
of old college days, when their blood was like wine and the world a thing
of adventure. Mellowed by retrospect, they laughed over incidents that
had caused heart-burnings at the time; and as they laughed more than one
felt a swelling of the throat. It was, perhaps, just an odd streak of
sentiment (and the man who is without such is a sorry spectacle); or it
may have been the memory of ideals, aspirations, dreams--left behind the
c