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The three men were working sturdily, and it would have been difficult to recognize in them, with their grimy faces and soiled duck uniforms, a doctor, a bank cashier, and a man-about-town well known in New York City. Near the forward hatch, industriously swabbing the deck, was a black-haired youth whose father helps to control some of the largest moves on 'Change.
Sydney, the hired wit, the broken-down man-about-town; his health gone, his future gone, with no family, no friends, no faith in a hereafter and no joy in the present; and the day preceding, at dinner, he had eaten a vol-au-vent which had disagreed with him. Next Mr. Sydney came the Duchess, the gaunt and dignified lady who awed even Jawkins to repose.
But now, in the person of Joseph, he saw that there were human or half-human beings born to self-abasement, and that, if their destiny was to be fulfilled, valetry was a necessary institution. He had no pity for Joseph, no shame in employing him. He scorned Joseph; and yet his desire, as a man-about-town, to keep Joseph's esteem, was in no way diminished!
He looked and was the exquisitely turned-out man-about-town. Only his eyes told of other things, and they, as the organs welled to the sounds of the wedding march lighted up with something that spoke of the man within rather than the man without.
"Shut up, Carminow," said Ishmael; "we've not had our drinks yet if you have." He was rather proud of this, which sounded to him to have quite a man-about-town twang, and he knew it must have been successful when he saw his companions pass it without ribald comment. "Let's all have dinner," said Killigrew exuberantly, "and then go on to see the new ballet. What d'you say, Carminow?"
Here he could find his way blindfold; and freed from the strain of geographical uncertainty, his mind returned to Bosinney's trouble. Down the long avenue of his man-about-town experience, bursting, as it were, through a smirch of doubtful amours, there stalked to him a memory of his youth.
He seems too languid even for the profession of man-about-town, but his clothes are such that one would think their irreproachability could only be maintained by a life of dedication to them. Did he ever exist? Du Maurier is very subtle here.
He enjoyed the friendship of men of such different types as Carlyle, Chalmers, Dean Stanley, and Prévost Paradol. His Letters were ed. by Dr. Dramatist, was at Camb., travelled, read a little law, became a man-about-town, the companion of Sedley, Rochester, and their set.
"How?" "To be worth teasing." Here they moved slightly away, turning their backs toward me and unfortunately I could hear no more. And so I sat listening to the group around Marcia, who was again enthroned at the tea-table. I had not met the men, but they were of the usual man-about-town type, "Marcia's ex-es" somebody, I think the mannish Carew girl, amusingly called them.
Moreover, Saturday was never one of its brilliant days of the week. In the twilight of a subsidiary lounge, illuminated by one early electric spark, a waiter stood alone amid great basket-chairs and wicker-tables. Louis knew the waiter, as did every man-about-town; but Louis imagined that he knew him better than most; the waiter gave a similar impression to all impressionable young men.
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