ened with absorbed
interest and murmured at the close:

"Who would have thought it? You look so pure and gentle and refined that
a man must have been a brute to treat you like that. But you are happy
now, thank goodness. You have a husband worthy of you."

Each had a host of things still unsaid when Littleton and Williams
joined them.

"Well, my dear," said Wilbur as they left the house, "that was a sort of
Arabian Nights entertainment for us, wasn't it? A little barbaric, but
handsome and well intentioned. I hope it didn't shock you too much."

"It struck me as very pleasant, Wilbur. I think I am beginning to
understand New York a little better. Every thing costs so much here that
it seems necessary to make money, doesn't it? I don't see exactly how
poor people get along. Do you know, Mr. Williams wished to bet me a pair
of gloves that you buy stocks sometimes."

"He would have lost his bet."

"So I told him at once. But he didn't seem to believe me. I was sure you
never did. He appears to be very successful; but I let him see that I
knew it was gambling. You consider it gambling, don't you?"

"Not quite so bad as that. Some stock-brokers are gamblers; but the
occupation of buying and selling stocks for a commission is a well
recognized and fashionable business."

"Mr. Williams thinks that a great many Americans make money in
stocks--that we are gamblers as a nation."

"I am, in my heart, of the same opinion."

"Oh, Wilbur. I find you are not so good a patriot as I supposed."

"I hate bunkum."

"What is that?"

"Saying things for effect, and professing virtue which we do not
possess."

Selma was silent a moment. "What does champagne cost a bottle?"

"About three dollars and a half."

"Do you really think their house barbaric?"

"It certainly suggests to me heterogeneous barbaric splendor. They
bought their upholstery as they did their pictures, with free-handed
self-confidence. Occasionally they made a brilliant shot, but oftener
they never hit the target at all."

"I think I like brighter colors than you do, Wilbur," mused Selma. "I
used to consider things like that as wrong; but I suppose that was
because our fathers wished Europe to understand that we disapproved of
the luxury of courts and the empty lives of the nobility. But if people
here with purpose have money, it would seem sensible to furnish their
houses prettily."

"Subject always to the crucifying canons of art," laughed Littleton.