The Custom of the Country | Page 7

than his brilliant friend. She
remembered thinking him rather shy, less accustomed to society; and
though in his quiet deprecating way he had said one or two droll things
he lacked Mr. Popple's masterly manner, his domineering yet caressing

address. When Mr. Popple had fixed his black eyes on Undine, and
murmured something "artistic" about the colour of her hair, she had
thrilled to the depths of her being. Even now it seemed incredible that
he should not turn out to be more distinguished than young Marvell: he
seemed so much more in the key of the world she read about in the
Sunday papers--the dazzling auriferous world of the Van Degens, the
Driscolls and their peers.
She was roused by the sound in the hall of her mother's last words to
Mrs. Heeny. Undine waited till their adieux were over; then, opening
her door, she seized the astonished masseuse and dragged her into the
room. Mrs. Heeny gazed in admiration at the luminous apparition in
whose hold she found herself.
"Mercy, Undine--you do look stunning! Are you trying on your dress
for Mrs. Fairford's?"
"Yes--no--this is only an old thing." The girl's eyes glittered under their
black brows. "Mrs. Heeny, you've got to tell me the truth--ARE they as
swell as you said?"
"Who? The Fairfords and Marvells? If they ain't swell enough for you.
Undine Spragg, you'd better go right over to the court of England!"
Undine straightened herself. "I want the best. Are they as swell as the
Driscolls and Van Degens?"
Mrs. Heeny sounded a scornful laugh. "Look at here, now, you
unbelieving girl! As sure as I'm standing here before you, I've seen Mrs.
Harmon B. Driscoll of Fifth Avenue laying in her pink velvet bed with
Honiton lace sheets on it, and crying her eyes out because she couldn't
get asked to one of Mrs. Paul Marvell's musicals. She'd never 'a dreamt
of being asked to a dinner there! Not all of her money couldn't 'a
bought her that--and she knows it!"
Undine stood for a moment with bright cheeks and parted lips; then she
flung her soft arms about the masseuse. "Oh Mrs. Heeny--you're lovely
to me!" she breathed, her lips on Mrs. Heeny's rusty veil; while the
latter, freeing herself with a good-natured laugh, said as she turned
away: "Go steady. Undine, and you'll get anywheres."
GO STEADY, UNDINE! Yes, that was the advice she needed.
Sometimes, in her dark moods, she blamed her parents for not having
given it to her. She was so young... and they had told her so little! As
she looked back she shuddered at some of her escapes. Even since they

had come to New York she had been on the verge of one or two
perilous adventures, and there had been a moment during their first
winter when she had actually engaged herself to the handsome Austrian
riding-master who accompanied her in the Park. He had carelessly
shown her a card-case with a coronet, and had confided in her that he
had been forced to resign from a crack cavalry regiment for fighting a
duel about a Countess; and as a result of these confidences she had
pledged herself to him, and bestowed on him her pink pearl ring in
exchange for one of twisted silver, which he said the Countess had
given him on her deathbed with the request that he should never take it
off till he met a woman more beautiful than herself.
Soon afterward, luckily. Undine had run across Mabel Lipscomb,
whom she had known at a middle western boarding-school as Mabel
Blitch. Miss Blitch occupied a position of distinction as the only New
York girl at the school, and for a time there had been sharp rivalry for
her favour between Undine and Indiana Frusk, whose parents had
somehow contrived--for one term--to obtain her admission to the same
establishment. In spite of Indiana's unscrupulous methods, and of a
certain violent way she had of capturing attention, the victory remained
with Undine, whom Mabel pronounced more refined; and the
discomfited Indiana, denouncing her schoolmates as a "bunch of
mushes," had disappeared forever from the scene of her defeat.
Since then Mabel had returned to New York and married a stock-broker;
and Undine's first steps in social enlightenment dated from the day
when she had met Mrs. Harry Lipscomb, and been again taken under
her wing.
Harry Lipscomb had insisted on investigating the riding-master's record,
and had found that his real name was Aaronson, and that he had left
Cracow under a charge of swindling servant-girls out of their savings;
in the light of which discoveries Undine noticed for the first time that
his lips were too red and that his hair was pommaded. That was one of
the episodes that sickened her as