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All changed but you, Isabelle!" "But I have changed a lot!" she protested. "I have grown better looking, Vickie, and my mind has developed, hasn't it, Tom? One's family never sees any change but the wrinkles!"... Vickers, turning back to the terrace where Fosdick and Gossom were smoking, had a depressed feeling that of all the changes his was the greatest.
Besides Gossom and Cairy and the Silvers and others of their kind there were Lane's business friends, officers of the railroad, and men that Lane brought out to golf with or ride with. "We don't go in for society," Isabelle explained, affecting a stronger indifference than she really felt for "merely smart people."
"And if you hadn't heard it line by line from Tommy, you'd know it." "No," Isabelle protested; "it's lots cleverer than most things." "I do not know how it may be with the theatre," Gossom put in at this point, "but more literature is produced in America to-day than at any other time in the world's history!" "Oh!"
He left this personal side of life to Isabelle, content to be a passive spectator of the little game she was playing; while, as Vickers judged from what Gossom and other men said, Lane himself had a more absorbing, more exacting game in the city, which he was playing with eminent success. "He's getting close to the king row," Isabelle remarked to Vickers.
After visiting his small charge, who was lonely this first night in the strange house, Vickers had gone to his room and sat down by the window. Below him on the terrace Fosdick and Gossom were discussing Socialism, the Russian revolution, and the War of Classes. New topics, or rather new forms of old themes, they seemed to Vickers.
Gossom, ignoring the gibe, continued: "We publish every month real literature, the kind that comes from the heart, the stuff of real human lives. I am tired of this silly whine about the lack of opportunities for genius in our country." "It's hard on Tommy, all the same," Isabelle concluded irrelevantly.
It was all about the progress of the socialist parties abroad, their aims and accomplishments, showing first-hand observation and knowledge; also a vivaciously critical spirit, in short what Gossom would call "a smart article." ... There was another "serious" article on the problem of housing the poor, amply illustrated.
Having discharged the duties of her day, her mind returned to Cairy, to his work for Gossom, to his appealing self, and her lips relaxed in a gentle smile. Hers was a simple nature, the cue once caught. She had come of rather plain people, who knew the worth of a dollar, and had spent their lives saving or investing money. The energy of the proletariat had been handed to her undiminished.
But after he had left the room she called him back. "You didn't kiss me," she said sweetly. "You may if you like, just once.... There!" she raised her head and smiled at Cairy, with that satisfaction which emotional moments brought to her. "You had better get to work, too. You can't have been of much use to Gossom lately." And she settled herself at her desk with the telephone book.
With full purses and never sated appetites they rushed to the tables, all running, out of breath, scenting opportunities, avid to know, to feel, to experience! "We are passing through another renaissance," as Gossom had pompously phrased it. But with what a difference!
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