oston, or have friends living
there; probably she had never heard of his engagement. Somehow this
seemed to simplify matters for Dan. She did not ask specifically after
the Pasmers; but that might have been because of the sort of break in
her friendship with Alice after that night at the Trevors'; she did not
ask specifically after Mrs. Brinkley or any of the others.

At Mrs. Secretary Miller's door there was a rapid arrival and departure
of carriages, of coupes, of hansoms, and of herdics, all managed by a
man in plain livery, who opened and shut the doors, and sent the
drivers off without the intervention of a policeman; it is the genius of
Washington, which distinguishes it from every other capital, from every
other city, to make no show of formality, of any manner of constraint
anywhere. People were swarming in and out; coming and going on foot
as well as by carriage. The blandest of coloured uncles received
their cards in the hall and put them into a vast tray heaped up with
pasteboard, smiling affectionately upon them as if they had done him a
favour.

"Don't you like them?" asked Dan of Miss Anderson; he meant the Southern
negroes.

"I adoye them," she responded, with equal fervour. "You must study some
new types here for next summer," she added.

Dan laughed and winced too. "Yes!" Then he said solemnly, "I am not
going to Campobello next summer."

They felt into a stream of people tending toward an archway between the
drawing-rooms, where Mrs. Secretary Miller stood with two lady friends
who were helping her receive. They smiled wearily but kindly upon
the crowd, for whom the Secretary's wife had a look of impartial
hospitality. She could not have known more than one in fifty; and
she met them all with this look at first, breaking into incredulous
recognition when she found a friend. "Don't go away yet," she said
cordially, to Miss Van Hook and her niece, and she held their hands for
a moment with a gentle look of relief and appeal which included Dan.
"Let me introduce you to Mrs. Tolliver and to Miss Dixon."

These ladies said that it was not necessary in regard to Miss Anderson
and Miss Van Hook; and as the crowd pushed them on, Dan felt that they
had been received with distinction.

The crowd expressed the national variety of rich and poor, plain and
fashionable, urbane and rustic; they elbowed and shouldered each other
upon a perfect equality in a place where all were as free to come as to
the White