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Updated: June 12, 2025
The next day Quin's suit-case, containing all his worldly possessions, was transferred from the small stuffy room over the Martels' kitchen to the large luxurious one over the Bartletts' dining-room.
Phipps had met with disfavor, and he sighed as he thought of the hold the older man still had on Eleanor. During the next difficult weeks Quin devoted all his spare time to the grateful occupation of diverting the Martels' woe-begone little guest.
Then he discovered that he was trying to shake hands and hold his cap with the same hand, and in his confusion he slipped on the hard-wood floor, and achieved an exit that was scarcely more dignified than his entrance a half-hour before. The news that Quin had broken through the Bartlett barrage afforded great amusement to the Martels at breakfast next morning.
Financial affairs were evidently going worse than usual with the Martels these days. Cass, adamant in his resolve to pay off the numerous debts contracted by the family during his absence abroad, refused to contribute more than the barest living expenses. Rose had given up the dancing classes and taken a position in one of the big department-stores.
On the night of the Bartlett party, Quin stood before the small mirror of his old room over the Martels' kitchen and surveyed himself in sections. The first view, obtained by standing on a chair, was the least satisfactory; for, in spite of the most correct of wing-toed dancing-shoes, there was a space between them and the cuffs of his trousers that no amount of adjustment could diminish.
"You see, I'm living with some friends out on Sixth Street. They are sort of kin-folks of yours, I believe the Martels." A carefully aimed hand grenade could have produced no more violent or immediate result. Madam damned the Martels, individually and collectively, and furiously disclaimed any relationship. "They are a trifling, worthless lot!" she stormed. "I wish I'd never heard of them.
Not the stagnation of the Bartlett household, certainly not the slipshod poverty of the Martels. She searched her heart for the answer. And as she knelt there with her head on the window-sill, looking miserably out to sea, a strange thing happened to her.
Lying in royal state in a huge four-poster bed was Madam Bartlett, resplendent in a purple robe, with her hair dressed in its usual elaborate style, and in her ears pearls that, Quin afterward assured the Martels, looked like moth-balls. "You go on out of here and stay until I ring for you," she snapped at the nurse; then she squinted her eyes and looked at Quin.
He had been skating on thin ice in discussing the Martels, for any moment might have brought up a question concerning Eleanor. "I used to have a corporal that was an ex-burglar," he said, plunging into the new subject with alacrity. "First-rate fellow, too. Last I heard of him, he had a position as chauffeur with a rich old lady who lived alone up in Detroit.
Martel, protesting and accepting at the same time, sank into his large chair and bade Quin pull up a rocker. In the Martels' living-room all the chairs were rockers; so, in fact, were the table and the sofa, owing to missing castors. "I am going to talk to you quite confidentially," began Mr. Martel, giving himself up to the enjoyment of the hour.
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