ctor,
but they have a vague idea in their nice heads that Pat isn't happy and
may have to be rescued when the time comes, but they must have felt that
nothing so violent could happen in a place as "exclusive" as Tuxedo
Park. By the way, don't you hate the expression "exclusive" in
connection with society? I do think it quite naively snobbish, not to
say un-Christian! How much more heart-warming to speak of an _in_clusive
place or entertainment! However, we humans haven't mounted to that
height yet; and "exclusive" being not only the word but the feeling at
Tuxedo, the Boys felt themselves and the Hippopotamus unsuited to the
occasion. Consequently they broke down outside the sacred precincts, and
we glided past the gray-stone, red-gabled portals while they grouped
round a tire to hide the fact that it was flat.

We spent the morning with Larry's friend for our guide, seeing one grand
private place after another. His own is almost the grandest of all, and
is on a lake fringed with feathery trees which weave a gold-green
network across the blue. The golf course is perfectly beautiful, and
made me for the first time want to learn. I never have, because it seems
to me a middle-aged, pottering game; and I've always so hated staying
at country houses with golf lovers who talk of nothing else. Anyhow, I
don't want to have a golf complexion until I'm _forced_ to be over
twenty-six.

[Illustration: map]*

The gardens of the Tuxedo Park dwellers are really bits of Eden,
although you would have to bite a bit out of the apple before you could
be sophisticated enough to make them grow like that. We lunched with
Larry's friend, and should have enjoyed the feast immensely if Ed
Caspian hadn't put on multimillionaire airs, and snubbed Peter Storm at
the table. Pat turned crimson, and I hoped that good might come out of
evil--that she might break off with the rude wretch as a punishment.
Peter behaved so well that he deserved such a reward. Jack and I were
proud of him! But the engagement survived the earthquake, as an ugly
house of "reinforced" cement will stand when medieval castles fall. I
found out afterward why, and I'll tell you presently. As for Mrs.
Shuster, I was rather sorry for her. She sat opposite Larry and beside
her incarnate Peace Tract, Larry being at his hostess's left hand with
Idonia Goodrich on his other side. The hostess is a beauty, so is
Idonia, so you may well imagine that Larry would have forgotten Lily's
e