, THE 
 
 BOARDMAN 
 FAMILY 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 NEW YORK BOSTON - CHICAGO DALLAS 
 ATLANTA SAN FRANCISCO 
 
 MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED 
 
 LONDON BOMBAY CALCUTTA 
 MELBOURNE 
 
 THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Lm 
 
 TORONTO 
 
THE 
 BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 BY 
 
 MARY S. WATTS 
 
 Author of "Nathan Burke," "The Rise 
 of Jennie Gushing," etc. 
 
 fork 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 1918 
 
 A.U rights reserved 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1938 
 BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 Set up and electrotyped. Published, April, 1918 
 
PAET I 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 AND SOME OTHERS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 ONE Tuesday evening towards the Christmas holi 
 days in an early year of the earliest decade of this 
 century, there was an awning tunnel erected across the 
 sidewalk and a strip of jute carpeting laid down the steps 
 in front of Mr. Matson s, Number Two, Pine Street, the 
 North Hill ; and a good many private conveyances more 
 carriages than automobiles in those remote days were 
 rumbling up and halting and presently rumbling off after 
 exhilarating noises of doors slammed and numbers shouted. 
 Mr. Matson had a dancing-school. It long ago ceased to 
 be in good taste to call him Professor or his establishment 
 an Academy, as was the fashion once upon a time in other 
 parts of the world besides ours. Likewise the midwinter 
 entertainment and the one he gave at Easter were not 
 " Soirees " perish the thought ! They were unpretend 
 ing Exhibitions of Dancing by the pupils of Mr. Norman 
 R. Matson s School in the Classical, Ballet and Ball-Room 
 Departments, from half -past eight to ten ; general dancing 
 after the exhibition. The pupils who exhibited were 
 mainly young girls with a rare boy or so ; at this date So 
 ciety at large had not yet begun to take a vivid interest in 
 the art, and a dancing-school was still eminently a place of 
 juvenile education. 
 
 The carriages rolled up gloriously, and Mr. Matson s 
 coloured man with white cotton gloves on, opened the doors 
 
 3 
 
BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 and dispensed the little numbered tickets, and there de 
 scended a great array of shiny satin slippers and foaming 
 tulle skirts, beaded, glittering and glancing (the Fairy 
 Ballet), of laced sandals, fillets, cheesecloth draperies (the 
 Urn-Dance of the Priestesses of Minerva) of crinoline, 
 flowered cretonne and cottony-looking wigs the Colonial 
 Minuet. There was a kind of environing haze of par 
 ents, of course, but nobody need notice them; and always a 
 set of gawky high-school lads gathered about the halls and 
 boys dressing-rooms for the general dancing promised 
 later on. They could all dance ; doubtless many of them 
 were capable of as good dancing as any that would be seen 
 that evening; but nothing on earth would have induced 
 these young gentlemen to " exhibit." Get up in front of 
 all that crowd? Never! Although getting up in front 
 of all that crowd was precisely what they did when the 
 exhibiting was over ! Let some wiser mind explain the 
 mystery; and let him also take note of another curious 
 fact, namely : that although Papa and Mama, even Grand 
 papa and Grandmamma and Uncle Joe and Aunt Sarah 
 invariably turned out in force, big brother who was in 
 Judge Whoppingfee s office, who smoked cigars and had a 
 nightkey and belonged to the Harvard Club, and wore 
 evening-clothes in the evening unlike Dad who slouched 
 around in the same old business-suit he had had on all day 
 big brother never went to the Exhibition ! And older 
 sister who came out last winter and got three hundred and 
 ten bouquets at her party, and was a member of the Debu 
 tantes Cotillion and appeared at the Eiding Club Ama 
 teur Circus nobody ever saw her at the Exhibition ! 
 
 After a while there came a livery-stable equipage 
 whence alighted first a tall and slender figure with a three- 
 cornered hat topping off an accurately dressed peruke, and 
 a prodigious, long, dramatic black cloak wrapped in folds 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 5 
 
 and held well up about the eyes ; it made one think of cer 
 tain novels of Mr. Weyman and Mr. Anthony Hope which 
 were new then and classics by now; and it caused the 
 porter to look twice for that matter anybody would have 
 looked twice and exclaim : " Well, sir, Mr. Everett, I 
 didn t know you for a minute ! " Whereat the other 
 laughed affably, with a flash of white teeth in the shadow 
 of his mantle. He had a hand on the open carriage-door, 
 but did not abandon his graceful pose being, it would 
 seem, very deliberate in all his movements until the 
 three ladies within had all bundled out unassisted, a cir 
 cumstance which in spite of his little shocked exclamation 
 and gesture as he finally turned his attention to them, 
 appeared not to surprise or disturb any one of them in the 
 least. All three managed excellently without his help 
 the girl in the mantilla and the short red skirt, the plump 
 lady, the tall, bony older one ; and they all sprang up the 
 steps with an almost equal sprightliness of motion, not 
 withstanding the visible difference in their ages, and 
 slipped out of sight behind the dressing-room doors while 
 Mr. Everett was still giving orders to the hackman. 
 
 He gave them with a perfectly unaffected grand air, 
 like a young prince, and went on up into the vestibule 
 where amongst the gawky youths, a particularly gawky 
 long, lank one addressed him, with an up-and-down glance. 
 
 " Lo, Ev ! " 
 
 " Lo, Sam ! " said Everett, making for the dressing- 
 room. The other followed him. Within, some of the boys 
 were smoking cigarettes, a few of the youngest ones in 
 dulged in very mild and subdued skylarking, but mostly 
 they wore the dispirited air peculiar to the youthful male 
 on festive occasions, the group who were to take part with 
 Everett looking not nearly so cheerful as the average col 
 lection of pall-bearers. They sat hunched on the tables, 
 
6 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 or leaned against the walls, and gave him a depressed 
 greeting. 
 
 " Some costume ! " one of them remarked as Everett 
 de-rolled the majestic cloak without either envy or deri 
 sion, however. He stated it as a plain fact, and the rest 
 accepted it in the same manner. This was the more no 
 ticeable because Everett s millinery, worn by any of the 
 others, would have subjected the unlucky lad to pitiless 
 mocking comment. It was a confection of black satin 
 coat and knee-breeches, a waistcoat brocaded in opalescent 
 hues, abundant lace ruffles, buckled shoes of an unmanly 
 shape and size, a cane and eyeglass in short, the full 
 and carefully studied get-up of an eighteenth-century beau. 
 The members of Everett s seventeen-year-old circle, one 
 and all, would have cringed away in agonies of self-con 
 sciousness, they would have looked, acted, felt, like mor 
 tally clumsy young clowns, they would have been " guyed " 
 to extinction by their fellows had they dared to come out 
 in such an array. But nobody poked either fun or satire 
 at Everett ; and indeed he wore the clothes with a conquer 
 ing indifference as if he had had them on every day of 
 his life, and somehow invested their romance with con 
 viction and dignity. His half-dozen companions in the 
 Minuet surveyed him and anon privately reviewed their 
 own makeshifts retired coats and trousers trimmed and 
 faced by maternal hands, vests which were an ingenious 
 falsework fashioned from scraps of curtain-stuff, Susie s 
 last season hat tell it not in Gath ! pinned into shape 
 and its identity further obscured by some ghastly parody 
 of a cockade they eyed it all with fresh misgivings, 
 fresh resentment for having been driven into this thing. 
 Even so, they did not seek solace by taking a fling at 
 Everett; perhaps they admired him, or were impressed 
 by him, or really liked him too much. 
 
THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 7 
 
 " Hire yours ? " they inquired wistfully. 
 
 " No. I wouldn t like to wear anything that all kinds 
 of people had had on before. If it were some fellow s 
 clothes that I knew, of course I wouldn t mind that. 
 But these costume places ! Not for me ! " Everett 
 wagged his head and laughed, and the rest laughed with 
 him, appreciatively, though not one of them shared his 
 feeling, or would have owned to it, at any rate ; it seemed 
 natural and not unworthy for Everett to be thus fastid 
 ious. " I had it made. Might as well and be done with 
 it. Then there ll be something ready in case I ever have 
 to go through with this flossy business again," he con 
 cluded. Coming from him, the argument sounded prac 
 tical, and struck a note of humorous common-sense; it 
 eluded criticism. And Everett sat down, disposing him 
 self and his raiment with grimacing care; he had not so 
 much as glanced into a mirror since entering the room. 
 
 " Had it made ? Gee, that didn t set your father back 
 a whole lot ! Oh, yes, it did not ! " remarked the boy they 
 called Sam with engaging frankness. Sam was not going 
 to appear in the Exhibition; in fact, he would not have 
 been much of an ornament to any scene, having just 
 reached that stage in a gentleman s career when he seems 
 to be all feet and hands, and nameless bones, knobs, joints; 
 and when nothing fits or stays in place, so that the ex 
 ceedingly cheap, ready-made suit he was wearing (and 
 outgrowing) probably looked as well on him as anything 
 could have, no matter how costly. Nor would Samuel s 
 blunt features, tawny skin and square mouth (which was 
 furnished with a very fine set of big white teeth that had 
 the look of imperishable strength and soundness) have 
 accorded handsomely with the gay and delicate frippery 
 Everett was sporting. " You haven t got your growth 
 yet, Ev," he went on. " Chances are in a year or two 
 
8 THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 
 
 you won t be able to get into that nappy vest. How 
 about it ? " 
 
 " Oh, I can always sell it," retorted Everett easily. " I 
 spoke about that to Dad. He said it was all right." 
 
 " Sell it, huh ? Well, I can t shake my father down 
 that easy ! " Sam said ; his tone expressed no discontent, 
 as might have been expected. Providence discriminates 
 in the matter of fathers, and Master Samuel accepted the 
 fact philosophically. " Yours didn t come ? " 
 
 "Who? Dad? No, he doesn t care for the Exhi 
 bitions." 
 
 " I saw your mother, though." 
 
 " Oh, Mother and Grandma are always on hand. 
 They d come if they had to walk ! " Everett said. 
 
 The other boy, who had been idly glancing about the 
 room, and at every newcomer when the door opened, as 
 he kept up this desultory talk, focussed, his alert blue 
 eyes on Everett for a moment questioningly. One might 
 have guessed that the thought going through his mind, 
 phrased roughly in his boy s language was : What if they 
 did walk ? It wouldn t hurt them. Nobody was too good 
 to walk. Sam s own mother had had to walk all her days. 
 But it must have been apparent to his shrewd scrutiny 
 that Everett had spoken without conscious ostentation; 
 his point of view was genuinely royal. At any rate, Sam 
 left the above comments unuttered. He merely said: 
 " Uh-huh," and continued to stare thoughtfully, cracking 
 one pair of fingers after another. 
 
 "Mother has to help Sandra change her dress any 
 how," Everett explained after a moment. " You know 
 she s going to be. in the Minuet after all. She s taking 
 Helen Carruthers place. Helen fell and sprained her 
 ankle ; you heard about that ? " 
 
 " Uh-huh," said Sam again. 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 9 
 
 " Sandra s going to do Helen s part, and her own too, 
 that Spanish dance, besides." 
 
 " Sandra s some dancer," Sam affirmed judicially. 
 
 " Well, of course, it wasn t much for her to learn the 
 Minuet with me right there to show her and coach her. 
 But she never has any trouble learning anyhow just 
 show her a step once. We re both that way. Been danc 
 ing all our lives, ever since we were kids." 
 
 " That so ? " said Sam, and studied the other again ; for 
 half a second the expression on his boyish face was not 
 boy-like. Then he remarked with the slightest possible 
 fleeting grin : " At home the folks think I m a kid still." 
 
 " Yes. It takes em forever to realize that we ve 
 grown up." Everett agreed in so serious, simple and 
 matter-of-fact a way that the other boy was impressed in 
 spite of himself. His grin vanished along with whatever 
 immature and uncertain suspicions he may have enter 
 tained of a certain irony in the spectacle of Everett. 
 
 " That s so! " he said, this time with warmth. " Gee, 
 don t it make you tired sometimes ? They re all right, of 
 course, but they re so funny. Say, do you have a night- 
 key?" 
 
 " No. I don t want one particularly," said Everett 
 calmly. " I could if I wanted." 
 
 It was on Sam s tongue to say : " Oh, bosh ! " Yet, 
 as before, he changed his mind ; as before, Everett s serene 
 assurance defeated him. Instead he began grumblingly 
 to describe a " run-in " he had had with his father on 
 this very subject that morning; he pulled up in the 
 middle of the tale, surprised at himself and rather 
 ashamed; and then saw with mingled relief and resent 
 ment that Everett was not listening. Indeed, the young 
 gentlemen s confidences had to end now, whether or no, 
 for the Exhibition was about to open. Chairs ceased 
 
10 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 to scrape in the hall; the last guest was seated. Miss 
 Hoffman (in a low-necked dress instead of her familiar 
 shirt-waist and skirt) was already on the platform at the 
 piano, strumming with one finger on A and gazing in 
 terestedly around at the audience, while the two violins 
 tuned alongside her. Mr. Matson was in his place by the 
 door, erect, with folded arms, and that expression of 
 adamantine patience which never entirely left his 
 countenance even in moments of conventional relaxation 
 such as this. Mrs. Matson and Mdlle. Mantegna were 
 marshalling the little girls of the Junior Class for the 
 entrance of the Will-o -the-wisps and the Night Breezes 
 preluding that of the Fairies. The boys filed in, un 
 obtrusively aligning themselves against the walls. 
 
 " What you and Everett Boardman having a heart-to- 
 heart about ? " some boy whispered in Sam s ear. 
 
 " Nothing/ said Sam gruffly. " We were just talk 
 ing." He was feeling a little out of temper with him 
 self, and visited his dissatisfaction upon Everett s head; 
 even the best of us are prone to dislike the person to whom 
 we have told too much. Samuel said inwardly that he 
 never did have any use for Everett Boardman; now 
 Sandra was different ; she was all right for a girl, that 
 is. She the Fairies appeared ! 
 
 They were very pretty and graceful, and gambolled 
 rhythmically about the stage with wands and chains of 
 flowers, to the complete gratification of their assembled 
 parents; after them a diminutive young lady in wav 
 ing multi-coloured chiffons " interpreted " Mendelssohn s 
 Spring Song in a series of leaps, swoops and circles, 
 scattering blossoms and picking them up with a somewhat 
 fixed and intent face for one so carelessly occupied; then 
 the Priestesses of Minerva had their innings, to put it 
 profanely; after that a pair of small boys with burnt- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 11 
 
 corked faces, extravagant collars and long-tailed coats did 
 a clog-dance that brought forth the first genuine applause 
 of the evening alas for classic ideals ! And then came : 
 " Fandango : Miss Alexandra Boardman " according to 
 the program. 
 
 Miss Alexandra Boardman entered boldly, a slim miss 
 with a red skirt, a ragged lace scarf twisted about her 
 waist and bare shoulders and sleek black head, a red rose 
 behind her ear, a gaudy fan ; her otherwise pallid cheeks 
 had been liberally embellished with daubs of rouge, as 
 also her thin and firm lips. She swaggered to the centre 
 of the stage, gave the audience a glance out of her great 
 black eyes at once indifferent and provocative, stuck one 
 arm akimbo, and with a volley from the castanets, the 
 dance began. 
 
 Our acquaintance, Mr. Samuel Thatcher, leaning 
 against the wall, with his coat crawling up across his 
 shoulders and his generous-sized feet being trodden upon 
 by various members of the community, watched her, un 
 conscious of both these discomforts. He knew her well, 
 and had never thought her pretty; in truth she was not 
 noticeably so. But Sam had no time, as it were, to take 
 account of her looks; some other quality about her flash 
 ing presence, something far more powerful than mere 
 beauty, yet too subtle for him to grasp, took the boy s 
 breath, held him gazing till his eyeballs ached. He did 
 not know that technically she presented an astonishly 
 faithful rendering of some Spanish hussy, dancing in a 
 tavern before a ring of bull-fighters, grooms, beggars, men- 
 about-town, Phrynes of low degree, herself no better ; her 
 fandango was a feat of imagination no less than an exhibi 
 tion of grace and accuracy, but Sam did not know that 
 He would have recoiled from thinking such things about 
 any nice girl like Sandra Boardman. He was dazed and 
 
12 THE BOAKDMAJST FAMILY 
 
 fascinated and perhaps even a little frightened; this 
 creature with her movements light. and ardent as a flame, 
 her exotic smile was so uncannily distinct from the girl 
 he knew. There was a great outburst of applause in 
 which he joined mechanically. Sandra came back and 
 bowed and bowed again. It was some time before the 
 audience, remembering its manners and that the other 
 young performers had not received such spontaneous ap 
 proval, ceased clapping. As the noise subsided, Sam heard 
 the fag-end of a murmured conversation between two 
 ladies in front of him. 
 
 ". . . too professional, really." 
 
 " Well, yes a little," the other admitted guardedly. 
 " I heard Matson considered her one of his best pupils." 
 
 "But he ought not to have let her, or encouraged her 
 . . . like an actress . . . it s not in good taste. Of 
 course, Mr. Matson is very nice, but after all, he s only 
 a dancing-teacher; you can t tell what sort of ideas he 
 was brought up with what kind of people he comes 
 from. . . . All very well if she were going on the stage, 
 but she s a young lady. I shouldn t think Mrs. Board- 
 man herself would like it. You want your daughter to 
 appear well in a ball-room naturally, but she doesn t need 
 to seem prepared for the Follies, or vaudeville. ... So 
 much nicer if she had just been simple and sweet and 
 girlish. This was altogether too Carmen-y. . . ." 
 
 Sam made an abrupt movement ; he almost interrupted 
 with : " But she did she was! When she got that en 
 core, she looked all right just the way she always does. 
 Didn t you notice ? Why, that s what gets me ! The way 
 she changed back to herself all at once. Do you mean 
 to say you didn t see it, too ? " But a due regard for his 
 reputation for sanity restrained him; "I d look bright 
 butting in, wouldn t I ? " he reflected prudently. The 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 13 
 
 two heads wagged together, the conversation flowed on 
 steadily under cover of the music while Samuel was still 
 considering the phenomenal ability at masking and un 
 masking just displayed by Sandra Boardman. All the 
 other girls on the stage had looked exactly like their 
 everyday selves; they were just dressed up differently, 
 but Sandra why, she was two girls, two separate people ! 
 Several other dancers came and went without getting 
 much attention from him; it was not until the lace- 
 like melody of BoccheriniV Minuet began to sound that 
 Sam gave up the riddle. He looked again toward the stage 
 with reviving interest, not in Miss Boardman personally 
 not at all ! but he would have freely owned to a vast 
 curiosity as to how she was going to carry off Helen 
 Carruthers part in a dance essentially different. 
 
 She carried it off with another exhibition of gifts akin 
 to those of a chameleon ! She was propriety itself in pan 
 niers and a fichu. To be sure, a slightly coquettish 
 propriety with an artful little black patch at the corner 
 of one of her dark eyes which could not help being big 
 and brilliant under their slender straight brows ; but other 
 wise as sweet and simple as you please, pacing through 
 the demure figures of the dance with a sweetness and 
 simplicity that must placate even the critics in Sam s 
 neighbourhood. Yet the boy himself was puzzled to find 
 her, or fancy her, as foreign in this role as in the other. 
 She seemed to have put off her own character for that 
 of the dance, gracious and artificial. Sam, comparing 
 her with the rest, decided in a confusion of opinions that 
 somehow left one main opinion clear, that Sandra was 
 not a bit better than they as far as the mere dancing was 
 concerned ; but there was not one of them who could " do 
 it " as well as she not even Everett who was con 
 spicuously perfect. What he meant by " doing it " 
 
14 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 Samuel could not have explained; but it was no idle 
 phrase. Sandra could " do it " and the others couldn t, 
 either because they couldn t learn, or because it was some 
 thing that could not be taught. It occurred to him that 
 she might not be aware of this curious power herself ; she 
 might " do it " without knowing it. He made up his 
 mind to ask her. 
 
 The Exhibition ended with the Minuet. Everybody 
 got up; a great shoving-back and carrying-out of chairs 
 began in preparation for the general dancing ; already some 
 adventurous couples were on the floor. Sam, who was 
 a conscientious youth, recalling certain injunctions, hunted 
 up his cousin Julia (the George Thatchers little girl, 
 Samuel was one of the Steven B. family) and took her 
 around the room in a two-step two-steps were still 
 popular at this date. Julia was a fat little chunk, very 
 light on her feet as many fat people are, so that dancing 
 with her was no piece of self-sacrifice, if she had not 
 been "such a kid." She was in the Eighth Grade and 
 young Mr. Thatcher had reached an age when he pre 
 ferred his ladies to be mature; like Miss Lorrie Gilbert, 
 for instance towards whom he was just now rather 
 sentimentally inclined who was in society before Sam 
 had emerged from kindergarten. Afterwards he found 
 another partner or two among the Fairies and Priestesses 
 who were now at large in the ball-room; Everett Board- 
 man was circulating faultlessly with one of them; and 
 presently Sam fell in with Sandra in her minuet costume, 
 under the chaperonage of a tall, thin, sallow old lady 
 with black eyes, between whom and Sandra herself there 
 existed a slight, ominous resemblance. Her dress was a 
 negligible matter to Samuel, but it may be noted here 
 that she wore not without distinction plain black 
 with a plain black toque; and in the fine jabot at her 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 15 
 
 throat there was fastened a plaque of jet on which was 
 dished up, so to speak, a cameo head in profile garnished 
 with a wreath of split pearls a portrait of the late Alex 
 ander Boardman whose widow she had been for years. The 
 growing taste for antiquity must have caused this brooch 
 to be rummaged out of some seldom-visited drawer, for the 
 late Alexander was not actually very late. He passed 
 from this sphere about eighteen-eighty-five, and Mrs. 
 Alexander was probably verging on seventy by this time; 
 but the glance she cast on young Sam Thatcher was still 
 quick and bright. He and Sandra exchanged salutations 
 with the breezy informality of their generation. 
 " Hello ! " they challenged each other. 
 
 " Congratulations ! " said Sam. " You and Ev were 
 the ringers ! " 
 
 She bobbed him a little curtsey. " Oh, Mr. Thatcher, 
 how kind ! Grandma, it s Sam. You know him." 
 
 " Do I ? " said the old lady with humorous surprise. 
 " Oh, yes, to be sure ! " She nodded at him in a manner 
 of friendly carelessness. 
 
 " Dance this, Sandra ? " 
 
 " All right." 
 
 They went off together. Mrs. Boardman, preserving 
 her air of pleasant detachment, went and found a chair 
 for herself in a corner. She was a rather unusual old 
 lady in the fact that nobody ever waited on her ; she never 
 seemed to need it. 
 
 " Honestly, you were great," said Sam as the two young 
 people circled the room. " I didn t know you at first." 
 
 " Well, I don t know whether that s a bouquet or a brick 
 bat!" 
 
 " Oh, of course I knew you. I didn t mean I didn t 
 recognize you. Only I don t see how you make your 
 self seem so different." 
 
16 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " Why, it s the costume and the paint, of course," said 
 Sandra, openly. " I was all made up. Black goo all 
 around my eyes, and everything, didn t you notice? 
 Mademoiselle put it on for me. She s been on the stage, 
 you know, so she knows exactly how it s going to look 
 to the audience. Awfully queer. You first smear all 
 over with cold cream, and then " 
 
 Sam interrupted unceremoniously. " Yes, I know. 
 That s not what I mean, either. Oh! (Oh, that s all 
 right! Excuse me! My fault!) It wasn t my fault all 
 the same, Sandra. I believe that fellow has something 
 against me; if I don t keep dodging him, we ll have an 
 other cute little collision directly. What I meant was 
 that you you weren t like yourself somehow." 
 
 "I should hope noil" Sandra declared with emphasis. 
 " In that fandango I had to be common like a common 
 girl, you know." 
 
 Sam pondered this statement while his feet moved in 
 time, and he automatically kept an eye out for less skilled 
 dancers. " Why ? " he asked at last. " Nobody was mak 
 ing you." 
 
 " Goodness, no ! But I well, I read up about it. 
 Those dances are only done by the commonest kind of 
 people in Spain. The nice ones dance just the way we 
 do. The kind that dance fandangoes and cachuchas and 
 things are awfully vulgar, it said. I wanted to do it 
 
 * 7 J. >* 
 
 rig lit. 
 
 " Well, I don t believe most girls would be as thorough 
 as all that," said Sam, after another moment of consid 
 eration. 
 
 " You don t like my doing it that way, either, then ? " 
 
 " Oh, I didn t say I didn t like it," said Sam, feeling 
 
 uncomfortably that she might really have penetrated to the 
 
 heart of the matter. " I thought it was great," he pro- 
 
THE BOAEDMAX FAMILY 17 
 
 tested anxiously. " Only I couldn t make out why you 
 seemed so different. Was it hard ? " 
 
 " No yes I don t know," Sandra said. They 
 dropped out of the dance, adjourning to the ice-water. 
 " Just the dancing wasn t hard," said Sandra between sips. 
 She began to laugh. " Ev and Mother didn t like it a 
 little bit!" 
 
 "They didn t?" 
 
 " No. Mother nearly had a fit over that paint. 
 Grandma just laughed and said something about local 
 colour. Grandma doesn t really care what anybody does; 
 she s always so easy." 
 
 " Didn t they know beforehand ? " 
 
 Sandra shook her head with a puzzled look. " They 
 didn t seem to take it in somehow, until they saw me 
 up there on the stage. Of course I d practised but you 
 don t look the same or feel the same, for that matter, 
 practising around in any old skirt and ordinary slippers. 
 I always know when I m doing it right, though," she 
 added without either complacency or false diffidence. 
 " Mademoiselle was too funny! She kissed me and said, 
 " Ca y esi!" and clicked with her tongue that way 
 she does as if she was tasting something extra good. 
 That was after the fandango, you know, when all the 
 while I knew by the look on Mother s face that she was 
 ready to roast Mademoiselle over a slow fire ! She thought 
 it was Mademoiselle had put it into my head, and it wasn t 
 at all ! I made it up all by myself." 
 
 " Well, look here, did you do that same way about 
 the minuet, too ? Eead up, and and all the rest of 
 it ? " Sam asked her, deeply interested. 
 
 " Yes, but it wasn t nearly so hard," the girl said. 
 " The minuet s awfully well flimsy, you know. It 
 makes me think of whipped cream and pink tissue-paper. 
 
18 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 and and bunches of flowers that are just a little faded 
 
 silly things like that. There isn t anything to it 
 it s just pretty. Hello ! " And before Samuel could ex 
 press his perplexity over these picturesque statements, she 
 had gone off with another partner. 
 
 He went meditatively back to the ball-room ; they were 
 playing a waltz, slow, languid and seductive in character, 
 a new waltz that Sam did not recognize (it was the Merry 
 Widoiv!) and he could see Sandra and her partner gyrat 
 ing deliberately and suavely. The girl s slim feet seemed 
 scarcely to move. Sam remarked to himself that she 
 sure could dance; and that that was a funny line of 
 talk she had been handing him, but he believed she 
 meant every word of it. In this simple language were 
 most of young Mr. Thatcher s thoughts framed. 
 
 It happened that a hurried-looking gentleman had come 
 in a few minutes before, and had first spoken to Mr. Mat- 
 son in a corner, and now was canvassing the audience and 
 dancers anxiously; and Mr. Matson, too, was going from 
 group to group with a perturbed face. Little Julia 
 Thatcher piped out in her high, youthful voice : " Why, 
 there s Daddy ! Here we are, Daddy ! " and that drew 
 Sam s attention; he saw his uncle coming towards him, 
 not seeming to heed Julia, and went to meet him, wonder 
 ing. 
 
 " Oh, Sam, here you are ! " said George Thatcher. " I 
 
 I m glad I found you." He stopped, hesitated, and 
 then said abruptly : " You must come home with me right 
 away. Your father s sick." 
 
 "Father? Sick? Why, he was all right at dinner," 
 said Sam, staring. But in another second he recovered 
 from his surprise, and said : " All right, Uncle George ! 
 Wait till I get my coat." 
 
 There was a little hush among those nearest as he 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 19 
 
 shouldered off to the dressing-room. Mrs. Thatcher came 
 and hurried Julia away. But the music and dancing 
 went on. Mr. Matson came back to Mr. Thatcher s side 
 and said in a low voice : " I m very sorry " and some 
 thing else about hoping it was not so serious as they 
 feared. 
 
 " It can t be any more serious," said George Thatcher 
 gloomily. Sam came out of the dressing-room, button 
 ing his overcoat, arid his uncle took him by the arm and 
 they went off together, walking fast. 
 
CHAPTEK II 
 
 IN pioneer days when this city was little more than a 
 settlement of log cabins around a log fort, one of a 
 meagre chain of such settlements along the Ohio and Miss 
 issippi rivers from Pittsburgh to the Gulf, there came out 
 from New England and added himself to us, Doctor Jacob 
 Boardman. Notwithstanding his title, the doctor s saddle 
 bags were stuffed with neither Bibles nor bottles of physic ; 
 on the contrary, it is likely that they held a considerable 
 supply of hard cash. Jacob was no ministering angel to 
 either bodily or spiritual needs, being, as I have heard, 
 an extremely practical and hard-headed gentleman, near- 
 ing middle-life ; and he had set out a-pioneering not from 
 any patriotic desire to extend our civilization, or grow 
 up with the country, but simply because he thought there 
 might be something in it financially. He had already 
 made a good deal of money and proposed to make more in 
 the new territory the new State, to speak correctly. 
 Nowadays he would have been called a speculator or pro 
 moter, perhaps ; in his own era he was " Doc." Boardman 
 whose occupation was trading round in real estate. 
 
 He must have traded round, on the whole, successfully ; 
 at any rate, his activities in that line are immortalized 
 in the name of one locality, Boardman Alley, and at the 
 abstract-and-guarantee offices they will tell you that ever 
 so many titles go back to Jacob Boardman. At the most 
 prosperous time in his career, he bought a large tract of 
 land lying along one of those shelves or benches where the 
 
 hills begin to descend to the river; it commanded a beau- 
 
 20 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 21 
 
 tiful view, was far enough from town to be elegantly 
 secluded, and near enough for convenience, and Doctor 
 Boardman who rarely forgot the main chance or neglected 
 to aim at two birds with one stone (whether he brought 
 them down or not) intended to erect thereon a handsome 
 residence for himself and render the place so attractive 
 that before long all the people in town of taste and sufficient 
 wealth would flock around him eager to make their homes, 
 too, on some of the numerous charming sites his property 
 offered. 
 
 He built the house, a huge old stone rookery which is 
 standing to this day, a monument to J acob s one bad guess ; 
 for those expectations of his were never realized. Some 
 how the tide of fashion in suburban building-plots set 
 another way for no reasonable reason, and ultimately left 
 the Boardman homestead stranded out of reach of every 
 body in an undesirable neighbourhood with the slums actu 
 ally encroaching upon it in later years, after the doctor s 
 day. He died a much poorer man though still very 
 well-to-do for having made that venture. 
 
 Doctor Boardman left the large family popular in his 
 time, Willis Boardman, Jacob junior, Rachel, Martha, 
 William no outsider can remember all the names ; 
 Alexander was the youngest, or came along towards the 
 last of them, anyhow ; he was the only one to remain here 
 and live in the house his father built and carry on the 
 Boardman dynasty among us. The others scattered as 
 families do, and founded new lines of Boardmans else 
 where, none of which, however, could have arrived at the 
 local dignity and importance of ours. In all probability 
 there is not another Boardman Alley on this continent ! 
 
 Alexander Boardman married a Miss Sarah Chase of 
 Washington, and half a dozen other places, for she was a 
 daughter of Commodore Chase of the Navy and had lived 
 
22 THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 
 
 all over the world. At that date during the fifties to 
 belong to the Army or Navy or to be an Episcopalian 
 definitely established a person s rank in our society; it is 
 true you might possess none of these qualifications and 
 still be well received, but possessing them, your position 
 was assured. So doubtless, when Alexander brought his 
 bride home to the Hillside Avenue house, he was consid 
 ered to have made a match suitable for a Boardman ; doubt 
 less, too, the new Mrs. Alexander s family and friends ap 
 proved, as the young man is said to have been very good- 
 looking and agreeable and in short promising in every way, 
 and the Boardman estate, even after being divided among 
 so many, had been large enough for his share to be a com 
 fortable nest-egg. In all their twenty-five or thirty years 
 of married life they had only one child, a son ; and Alex 
 ander died in that same old house on Hillside Avenue, at 
 the age of fifty-seven or thereabouts. 
 
 If there is a certain brevity about these notes on Alex 
 ander Boardman, it is accounted for by the fact that this 
 writer knows scarcely anything of him. Although the 
 last ten or fifteen years of his life a/e within the recol 
 lection of my generation, he was not interesting enough 
 to us to be known or remembered. Eor instance, I take it 
 for granted that he had some business or profession, for 
 with us every man works, but I do not know what it was. 
 Indeed, for some while before his death he was very much 
 broken in health and I believe not quite right mentally 
 besides, so that he could not have been able to work any 
 how. They used to take him for an outing about the 
 grounds in a wheel-chair which the negro man-servant 
 pushed, Mrs. Boardman walking firm and erect alongside ; 
 she was a homely woman in the face but of elegant figure 
 and carriage. 
 
 Dick Boardman, the son he was named Eichard Chase 
 
THE BOARDMAX FAMILY 23 
 
 after the old Commodore must have been about thirty 
 at the time of his father s death. Everybody said that he 
 was an unusually fine sort of fellow, and this I do 
 remember clearly for it is the kind of gossip that takes 
 hold of a young person s imagination that if it had not 
 been for his efforts during the last few years, the Board- 
 man name would have gone into total eclipse, as it were, 
 blotted out by mortgages and other disastrous obligations. 
 The Hillside Avenue property which was rapidly running 
 down and had always been a drain on them instead of the 
 rich source of revenue poor old Jacob had expected might 
 have been sold up for delinquent taxes, all sorts of dismal 
 financial transactions might have been aired in the courts, 
 if Richard had not stepped into the breach, even managing 
 to save out enough for his mother to live on in a plain 
 way. He took nothing himself did not need anything 
 for he had a good position with the Fenimore Tile Com 
 pany and was reported to be making money fast, and to 
 be a " solid man." There must have been some truth in 
 the talk, for a little later he married one of the Everett 
 girls and they had a comfortable home and lived well 
 and brought up two children, performances which require 
 " solidity " these days. 
 
 The first child, for whom its grandfather s name of 
 Alexander was in readiness, disappointed them meas 
 urably by turning out a girl. Not to be balked, they 
 named her Alexandra against her grandmother s protest. 
 " We may not have another one, and I m not going to take 
 any chances," Richard declared jocularly, yet in earnest. 
 " You know you don t really mind, Mother." And, sure 
 enough, Mrs. Boardman senior at once withdrew with a 
 little gesture of her fine, slender hands, a little smile. 
 Probably she did not mind ; at any rate she was an adept 
 in the art of giving in gracefully. Her way of yielding 
 
24 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 left the victor with none of that subtle dissatisfaction which 
 seems always to accompany victory. This and some other 
 qualities, such as a complete indifference about what there 
 was to eat, the management of the servants, and the cost 
 of running the house, made her an eminently easy person 
 to live with. " Oh, we never have a word. We d both 
 think words vulgar, anyway. But it s not that; it s just 
 that Mother thinks just the same way I do about every 
 thing, so we have nothing to disagree over ! " Mrs. Richard 
 Boardman would say. " I think those mother-in-law jokes 
 in the funny papers are horrid. Nice people don t behave 
 that way." 
 
 The younger Mrs. Boardman was rather short, with rich 
 black hair, and brows and lashes, clear light hazel eyes, 
 a rosy complexion, dimples, beautiful teeth, and a figure 
 of that suave roundnes in youth which becomes, in later 
 years, almost too round an exceedingly pretty woman, 
 in fine. She was Lucy Everett and all of the Everetts 
 were good-looking. The next arrival to the Boardman 
 couple gratified them not only by being a boy whom 
 they christened with his mother s maiden name but by 
 being an unusually handsome one; there used to be a 
 laughing argument between the parents as to the side from 
 which he derived this superior physical endowment. 
 Eichard would hold out vigorously for the paternal blood, 
 pointing to the life-size oil portrait of Alexander over the 
 dining-room mantelpiece, to the other life-size oil portrait 
 of Jacob over the sideboard, to the silhouettes, the daguer 
 reotypes, the yellowing photographs of dozens of related 
 Boardmans everywhere in the house, in support of his 
 claim ; Mrs. Richard, for her part, could not bring forward 
 quite so imposing a lot of ancestors, but on the other hand, 
 she had a perfect arsenal of contemporaries, stunning- 
 looking sisters, brothers and masculine cousins who might 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 25 
 
 have posed for Romeos. If the baby had the Boardman 
 nose, he had the Everett eyes, the hands of this one, the 
 feet of that one so with perennial relish, the simple fun 
 went on. Nobody ever quarrelled jokingly over the rival 
 claims of the Boardmans and Everetts in Alexandra s case ; 
 Alexandra, sad to relate, was not pretty. 
 
 They did not live in the Hillside Avenue house, in spite 
 of sentiment and associations. Richard s practical com 
 mon-sense declared against it, and even Mrs. Alexander, 
 though she had passed more than half her life there, as 
 a bride, a mother, a widow, approved of the change, or 
 at least accepted it with her customary agreeable reticence ; 
 to refrain from any sort of self-indulgence apparently cost 
 her nothing. After its escape from the sheriff s clutches, 
 and after an interval when it stood vacant with its great 
 old windows boarded up, with broken slates and chimney 
 pots rattling down in the high winds, with grass and weeds 
 running wild together in the yard, Richard succeeded 
 in leasing it to a man named Thatcher who had a 
 dairy-farm back in the country somewhere. Thatcher 
 had made some money dairy-farming and now, it 
 appeared, wanted to move his large family he had 
 ten or a dozen children, it was reported ! into 
 town so as to give them an education and social advantages. 
 " I suppose our old place must be the only one he can 
 find that s big enough and at the same time cheap enough," 
 Richard Boardman said in private. " We re lucky to get 
 respectable people in there." By which it will be seen how 
 much for the worse that neighbourhood had altered. How 
 ever, the Thatchers moved in and dwelt with the old marble 
 mantels and high ceilings, and splendid curving flights of 
 stairs; and sat in their shirtsleeves on the old columned 
 porches, and were not annoyed, let us hope, by the near 
 proximity of the Little Miami stockyards on one side, and 
 
26 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 the saloons and coloured settlements on the other. The 
 Boardmans, meanwhile, found a smaller modern house oil 
 the North Hill, and it was there that Kichard brought his 
 wife and there that the two children were born. 
 
 There they grew up, also, if not under the ancestral 
 roof-tree, at any rate surrounded by the ancestral belong 
 ings which of themselves amply sustained the patrician 
 legend. Massive mahogany pieces, old steel engravings, 
 Dr. Boardman s certificate of membership in the Order 
 of Cincinnatus engrossed on parchment and framed and 
 hanging up in the hall, the solid silver service presented 
 to Commodore Chase on his retirement by the officers and 
 seamen of the Susquehanna, those portraits already alluded 
 to, Jacob with his high collar and Napoleonic forelock, 
 Alexander with his low collar and spreading whiskers, Mrs. 
 Alexander, a pensive grande dame in black velvet showing 
 her graceful arms and shoulders, with a lace scarf thrown 
 over her head this is only to name a few of the evi 
 dences ef ancient distinction to be noticed in the Board- 
 man residence. They came in for a good deal of admiring 
 and interested comment from visitors and outsiders; the 
 family themselves were too accustomed to them to think 
 much about them, or at any rate to talk much; possibly 
 too the Boardman tradition enjoined certain manners, 
 certain attitudes of mind. In later years the only thrash 
 ing and the only severe words Everett Boardman could 
 remember ever to have received from his father were 
 incurred by some boyish boasting about the family inher 
 itances which the elder Boardman happened to overhear. 
 " I m a Boardman ! " said Everett pompously to the neigh 
 bourhood small fry, congregated on the front walk before 
 setting out for Sunday-school. " I m a Boardman ! We 
 don t have anybody but gentlemen in my family " 
 
 And here Kichard Boardman, who was reading the Sun- 
 
THE BOARDMA:N T FAMILY 27 
 
 day morning paper on the porch, laid it aside and rose 
 up with a stern and chilling countenance; and taking 
 Master Everett by the shoulder marched him into the 
 house and upstairs. He gave the boy a grave lecture before 
 applying the weapon of correction. u I am ashamed to 
 find out that my son goes around blowing and bragging 
 about his name and his family and his being a gentleman ; 
 I m ashamed of him for doing it, and I m more ashamed 
 of him for thinking that way," said Richard. " About the 
 cheapest thing a man can do is to bully a servant, and 
 the next cheapest and silliest is to tell people he s a gentle 
 man. I mean for you to remember this, Everett. Take 
 off your coat, sir ! " Let us not proceed any farther with 
 this painful, this classic scene. Everett did remember, it 
 is to be hoped profitably; he would sometimes recall the 
 occasion with a laugh. But Eichard Boardman, who used 
 often as he grew older to review with tender amusement 
 his children s peccadilloes and their punishments, never 
 referred to this particular incident ; he had been in earnest 
 when saying that he was ashamed. 
 
 Except that one time, Everett, to do him justice, scarcely 
 needed discipline. He grew up a nice boy, amiable, truth 
 ful, and of good spirit ; he stood well enough in his classes 
 though not destined to set the Ohio River on fire, the 
 teachers said to one another and was always pre-emi 
 nently good-looking, even at the coltish period of growth. 
 His mother was very proud of him, though, being a sen 
 sible woman, she heroically tried her best not to show it. 
 For that matter, little Mrs. Richard was innocently proud 
 and happy about a great many things of herself, her 
 enduring prettiness, her clothes, her house, her husband 
 who was such a prominent man, so successful, universally 
 so liked and respected, who gave her everything and let 
 her do everything she wanted, of her boy, of her girl, even 
 
28 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 of her association with her mother-in-law which, as has 
 been shown, was amicable to a degree rarely witnessed. 
 
 The daughter of the house of Boardman offered, per 
 haps, not quite so much to be proud of as some of those 
 other people and circumstances over which Mrs. Board 
 man junior was so set up. Sandra grew from an odd, 
 Pierrot-faced baby who had a disturbing fashion of crying 
 when she heard sad music or hymns, while she would 
 crow and chuckle at " Dixie " or the latest rag-time melody 
 on a hand-organ, into an equally odd little girl with a 
 clear and chalky-white complexion, with dead black hair 
 and eyes, and with arms, legs and whole body so slender 
 as to give her a misleading appearance of frail health. 
 In reality the youngster hardly ever knew a sick day ; her 
 delicately wiry frame had been dowered with strength and 
 soundness by some pioneer forebear or so the family 
 thought. She had more of a temper than Everett; the 
 children squabbled and made up as children will, honours 
 being about easy as to who provoked the quarrels and who 
 came off victor; neither one sulked or domineered, those 
 difficult traits not being in their characters, happily. Like 
 her brother Sandra got through her lessons creditably, but 
 without displaying an especial talent for anything. Both 
 of them played the piano by ear, and wore out the patience 
 of successive music-teachers by that laxity in practice and 
 study which this sort of amateur invariably exhibits. 
 
 " You needn t talk ! " Richard would say, laughing, to 
 his mother when she mildly urged the children to their 
 scales and finger-exercises. " They get that straight from 
 you. I ve heard you say over and over again that when 
 you were a girl nobody could make you work over your 
 music. It came too easy without work. You can t say 
 a word ! " 
 
 " Well, and see where my laziness landed me ! " retorted 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 29 
 
 Mrs. Alexander. " I m a horrible example. I might 
 have been a good musician, but I never got anywhere or 
 did anything except play over in a slouchy way whatever I 
 heard at concerts and places. To be sure, they didn t know 
 how to teach so well in those days as they do now." 
 
 " You didn t play slouchily either," cried out Richard. 
 " You played all right. Don t you remember how I loved 
 to have you play me to sleep when I was a little fellow? 
 Father would go out somewhere, and you used to tuck me 
 up in bed and then go down into our old drawing-room 
 and play you used to play The Last Rose of Summer 
 with variations I believe you made em up as you went 
 along " 
 
 Everett and Sandra exploded with hilarious scorn. The 
 Last Rose of Summer ! That fossil tune ! (rood-night ! 
 
 " It was very pretty," Richard asserted stoutly. " And 
 you played it beautifully, Mother." 
 
 " Seems Grandpa couldn t stand it," said Everett, grin 
 ning. " He went out ! " 
 
 " But aren t we getting a long way off from the question 
 of you two practising?" inquired Mrs. Boardman and 
 smiled, too, not in the least hurt by their ruthless amuse 
 ment, and turning the talk from herself as she somehow 
 always contrived to do unobtrusively. But Sandra, look 
 ing at her, sobered suddenly. 
 
 " I ll go right away and play my scales for an hour," she 
 announced, and jumped up and ran and kissed her grand 
 mother impulsively, before galloping downstairs to the 
 piano. She once confided to Everett that sometimes there 
 was something in the old lady s face " that makes me 
 want to do something for her," said the girl, not too clearly. 
 
 " Do something? Do what? " Everett asked, puzzled. 
 
 But Sandra could not explain. " I don t know. Even 
 when she s laughing and talking, it comes. I don t believe 
 
30 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 she knows it s there herself I think she d stop it if she 
 knew I think she s that kind of a person. She wouldn t 
 want me to he sorry for her. Anyhow I m not sorry 
 not exactly there s nothing for me to feel sorry about 
 unless it might be Grandpa being dead, and of course 
 I can t talk to her about that. I suppose that s what she s 
 thinking of when that look comes. I always feel as if I 
 simply wanted to help her " 
 
 " Ho ! I never saw her look like that," said Everett 
 in some contempt of feminine fancies. Very likely he 
 was right. Sandra was a rather imaginative girl, and 
 Mrs. Alexander s calm face, unlined even at her age, gave 
 no sign to the ordinary observer of hidden fires or dis 
 tresses past or present. In any case, Sandra divined that 
 her grandmother was not of the temperament to demand 
 sympathy ; she was not at all sorry for herself, and did not 
 ask any one else to be. Sandra once or twice thought 
 with a scared and apologetic feeling that the older Mrs. 
 Boardman would probably not care particularly even for 
 comfort offered from On High, though she would accept 
 it with the most well-bred manner in the world! Mrs. 
 Alexander never went to church though Sandra saw her 
 reading the Bible once in a while and never discussed 
 spiritual matters. 
 
 Richard himself was a rather tepid churchman, though 
 he gave liberally, irrespective of creeds ; but Mrs. Richard 
 more than made up for the two of them by the energy 
 of her religious observances. Not that she was devout; 
 she believed in Something hazy, remote, and to speak 
 plainly not very agreeable owing to an association with 
 that other hazy, remote and essentially disagreeable ab 
 straction, Death. But if her beliefs were thus unstable, 
 Mrs. Richard s convictions, on the other hand, were as 
 solid as a rock. That only " nice " people went to All 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 31 
 
 Saints , that therefore it was her imperative duty as a 
 mother to see that her children went there, in order that 
 they might mingle only with " nice " children, and see 
 and hear and be taught only things proper to and accepted 
 by the " nice " class these were opinions for which she 
 would have gone to the stake. She privately thought that 
 all the Protestant sects outside of the Protestant Episcopal 
 were " common" ; she did not know anybody in those con 
 gregations. Very good, kind people, of course; Mr. 
 Boardman knew a great many of them in business, but 
 she never met them anywhere. 
 
 She entertained the same prejudice against the free 
 schools which our well-meaning communities provide for 
 the education of our youth. Alas, they too were " com 
 mon," according to Mrs. Richard Boardman! Fortu 
 nately her husband s means afforded the best private school 
 for their girl at least to the best private school Sandra 
 went, whether her father could afford it or not. His wife 
 had a hundred arguments to justify the extravagance. 
 Boys being less susceptible to contamination from the 
 " common " element, as we may fairly infer, Everett 
 went hardily to the public school and high school there 
 after without visibly deteriorating, we are bound to admit, 
 in manners or morals. 
 
 When all is said, Mrs. Richard s small snobbery 
 if it was snobbery was harmless; she never hurt any 
 body s feelings with it; she had been herself too well 
 brought up, and was too kind and gentle by nature. The 
 same might be said of the children ; the atmospher? of their 
 home would have made them " nice," whatever outside 
 conditions happened to be. Still the mother had her mo 
 ments of anxiety. She would sometimes remark with 
 perplexity for the thing seemed to reverse parents usual 
 experience that she never worried half so much over 
 
32 THE BOARDMAlSr FAMILY 
 
 Everett, as over Alexandra. Everett s friends were all 
 " nice " boys, sons of friends of her own, or people who 
 could be placed as having entirely " nice " antecedents. 
 But she never could tell whom Sandra might pick up ! 
 
 " Look at that boy she is dancing with now ! " she com 
 plained under her breath to another mother. " Do you 
 know who he is? No? Well, I don t either. I never 
 saw him before in my life. Mr. Matson told me when I 
 let Sandra join this class that there wouldn t be anybody 
 but nice children in it he gave me the names, and I 
 thought I knew them all. Who do you suppose he is ? " 
 
 " Some new people, probably. There s somebody new 
 coming up all the time," said the friend, who was of a 
 more philosophical turn of mind. " It doesn t make much 
 difference when they are as young as this. They can 
 always drop them when they get a little older," she added 
 and if the last statements appear devoid of sense or 
 meaning, let the reader apply to some mother in Mrs. 
 Boardman s position. She will understand. 
 
 Mrs. Eichard, however, called the child Sandra was 
 about eleven years old at this time to her, when the 
 dance was finished, and inquired who her late partner 
 was. 
 
 " Oh, him ! " said Sandra as ungrammatically as if she 
 had not been a " nice " little girl at all. " Why, his 
 name s Sam Thatcher. Hasn t he got the reddest hair, 
 though ? " 
 
 He had; he also had a square, stocky figure, abundant 
 freckles, and a wide, wholesome grin. Mrs. Boardman 
 examined him without favour. " Thatcher ? I don t 
 know his mother. I never heard of any Mrs. Thatcher. 
 You see ! It s just as I was telling you," she said to the 
 other lady with a despairing shrug. 
 
 " He hasn t got any mother," said Sandra. " He hasn t 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 33 
 
 had any since he was a weenty little baby. He calls his 
 big sister Ma. Ma Susie. Isn t that funny ? That s her 
 over there." 
 
 " She, dear, don t say her. Mercy on us, who do you 
 suppose these people are?" Mrs. Boardman ejaculated 
 under her breath in a tragic aside to her neighbour. She 
 followed the child s gesture and saw a tall young woman, 
 twenty-odd years of age, as square of contour, stocky and 
 red-headed as Master Samuel himself, sitting patiently 
 on one of the chairs at the side of the room, watching the 
 dancers; she was not well dressed, and had on a prepos 
 terous hat all feathers and gewgaws " for all the world 
 like a servant-girl on her Sunday out ! " Mrs Kichard 
 thought. 
 
 " I know a Mrs. George Thatcher," said the friend un 
 expectedly. " They ve just begun coming to All Saints . 
 She s very interested in the Girls Friendly." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Mrs. Boardman, taken aback. " But it 
 can t be the same family," she added in polite incredulity. 
 
 " No. This Mrs. Thatcher that I know is too young to 
 be that girl s mother anyhow. She s just a young married 
 woman her children are little things." 
 
 " Sam goes to school with Ev," said Sandra, feeling 
 somehow on the defensive. " Ev knows him." 
 
 " Oh, a boy can know anybody," her mother said a little 
 impatiently ; " but I ve told you often, Sandra " and no 
 doubt there would have followed one of those sermons on 
 social distinctions to which Sandra was accustomed, if 
 Miss Hoffman had not most opportunely struck up another 
 dance. 
 
 Everett, on being interrogated later said : Yeah. Sure. 
 He knew a boy named Thatcher, only they didn t call him 
 Sam, they called him Mugsy. Yeah, his name was Sam 
 all right, but the fellows always called him Mugsy. He 
 
34 THE BOAKDMAX FAMILY 
 
 could wiggle his ears. He had a dog that would eat 
 sauerkraut aw, it would, too, he d seen it. Sometimes 
 the fellows would buy a cent s worth of the old sauer 
 kraut woman that came around, and give it to the dog just 
 to see him eat he d lop it all down, and wag around 
 asking for more! Some day they were all going out to 
 Mugsy s father s farm, and shoot rabbits. Mugsy could 
 shoot; he had the dandiest gun. Say, Dad, couldn t he 
 (Everett) have a gun ? 
 
 " Did you say Thatcher ? " said Boardman senior, com 
 ing out of a brown study. " Why, that must be the same 
 Thatchers that have our old place ! I think this George 
 Thatcher that is with the Gale and Bemis Machine-Tool 
 people is one of them, or some relation. Has this friend 
 of yours got a whole lot of brothers and sisters, Everett? 
 All ages, some of them nearly grown-up? Oh, yes, the 
 older ones must be quite grown-up by this time. I believe 
 it s the same people." 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 SAM THATCHER S forefathers did not come to this 
 country in the beginning years of its settlement, and 
 establish a dynasty or, if they did, local history has 
 taken no note of them. The first Thatcher of whom any 
 one here ever heard was Steven B., the same one who, not 
 much more than thirty years ago, moved in from his 
 dairy-farm and leased the old Boardman house. Sam 
 himself could not remember that event; he was a baby 
 at the time, the latest comer of all the brood, who ranged 
 in ages from fifteen-year-old Susie down to his own scant 
 six months, and so the gaunt barn of a house was the 
 first home he knew. 
 
 His mother did not regard it as a barn, nor did it ever 
 occur to her that the neighbours might be objectionable. 
 Neighbours of almost any sort were only too welcome to 
 her, who had always lived at least three miles from every 
 body and everywhere. All her life she had yearned for 
 town, for gas, sidewalks, fire-engines, policemen, noise, dis 
 traction, amusement if churches and schools figured in 
 the list, it was as incidentals; and now that her dreams 
 and desires were to be realized, she was too happily dazzled 
 to consider details. Moreover, the experience of spending 
 money freely on the things dear to every woman s heart 
 such as furnishings and decorations, was hers for the first 
 time. The Hillside Avenue house afforded an ample 
 background, yet scarcely ample enough, for the clutter of 
 Brussels carpets, Nottingham lace curtains and chenille 
 portieres, the department-store etchings, the bastard Wedg- 
 
 35 
 
36 THE BOAHDMAJST FAMILY 
 
 wood and Sevres and majolica bric-a-brac with which Mrs. 
 Thatcher s simple taste crowded it. Finished, it was a 
 gorgeous spectacle; there is something saddening in the 
 knowledge that she had so short a while to enjoy it. She 
 died very suddenly of pneumonia the following winter 
 before little Sam had learned to walk. 
 
 So there was poor Steven Thatcher with the raft of 
 children on his hands, and the house forlorn in spite of 
 all its magnificence. The widower, however, was a prac 
 tical man; he had graduated, so to speak, from dairying 
 into the produce and commission business in which his 
 capital was now invested, and the new duties left him not 
 much time for sentiment. He imported a distant cousin 
 of his wife s, Mattie Phillips, from some little town up 
 in Indiana, to keep the house, and presently everything 
 was going on as before. That is, everything went on as 
 before from Steven s point of view, and from that of all 
 of the children excepting his oldest daughter. Susie had 
 protested violently against the arrangement; she thought 
 she herself was old enough and capable enough to manage 
 the household, resented bitterly the obligation of obedience 
 to this intruder, and tormented herself with jealous fore 
 bodings that before long Mattie Phillips would be occupy 
 ing her mother s place in earnest. Not the least of her 
 grievances was that she could not reasonably complain of 
 Mattie s administration; Susie actually found it in her 
 heart to dislike the other for doing her duty well, for 
 making them all comfortable, and getting along cheerfully, 
 patiently and good-naturedly with everybody! It was 
 all " put on " in the same fell purpose according to Susie. 
 She kept her discontent to herself, however, pride or pru 
 dence withholding her from confiding in any one, even in 
 the other children, except baby Sam ; he was too young 
 to understand or betray her, and indeed used to bawl 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 37 
 
 dismally and squirm away whenever his sister expounded 
 her woes, or wept angrily over them and him in private. 
 
 Susie might have rested easy. Miss Phillips was a 
 trim, wide-awake, good-looking young woman with a fair 
 education, considerable taste in dress, and judgment about 
 money matters, and a surprising discernment in worldly 
 affairs and the business of making the most of oneself and 
 one s chances. If she had in the beginning any idea of 
 settling herself as the second Mrs. Steven Thatcher, she 
 speedily abandoned it in favour of having a house of 
 her own and children of her own. Dead people s shoes 
 are seldom a good fit; and besides, to tell the truth, poor 
 Mrs. Steven s were as brogans, carpet-slippers, hob-nailed 
 boots, compared to the sort of foot-gear Mattie meant to 
 have. In a single year of town, she saw more and learned 
 more than the late Mrs. Thatcher, god plain woman that 
 she was, would have seen and learned in her whole life. 
 The drawbacks to Hillside Avenue as a place of residence 
 would never have escaped Mattie ; even at the very outset 
 before she had acquired the sophistication and begun to 
 entertain the social ambitions of succeeding years, she 
 had a sharp inkling that the old Boardman house was not 
 a place where " anybody " would choose to live ; she very 
 soon found out who " anybody " was, and that she herself 
 was " nobody." That last was a condition Miss Phillips 
 determined some day to remedy. And as time went on 
 she erected certain other standards as definite and un 
 shakable as if she had got them by inheritance like 
 Mrs. Richard Boardman. In fact they strikingly resem 
 bled some of Mrs. Boardman s, on the surface, at any 
 rate; Mattie expressed the same opinions about being 
 " nice " and being "common"; she had the jargon per 
 fectly. 
 
 But by that time she had become Mrs. George Thatcher. 
 
38 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 George was a younger brother of Steven s whom the latter 
 had taken into business. He lived with them for a while 
 on Hillside Avenue. Mattie Phillips was then about 
 twenty-eight and had been keeping house for Steven and 
 the children some five years; perhaps she concluded that 
 she had had enough of it, or perhaps with that unerring 
 eye to the main chance that has been mentioned, perceived 
 that something might be made out of George, who w r as a 
 promising young fellow with a good head for business. 
 She liked him well enough, and after due hesitation (trust 
 Mattie not to omit any of the formulas!) accepted him; 
 and they were married and went to live in a little plain 
 cottage on one of the side streets leading off from Adams 
 Road. George was all for a freshly-opened sub-divi 
 sion farther out where the new brick houses stood in 
 rows close as peas in a pod and as nearly alike, every one 
 with a cement walk and all the modern conveniences, in 
 cluding the trolley-cars thundering by momentarily. He 
 could not understand his wife s preference for this rather 
 shabby old dwelling it actually had been a tenant-house 
 on the Henry D. Meigs property at one time tucked 
 into an out-of-the-way corner among the big North Hill 
 estates whose aloof and lofty neighbourhood made it seem 
 shabbier still. But Mrs. George stood firm. It was 
 genius ! 
 
 Thenceforward the social ascent of the George Thatchers 
 was sure and steady. For one thing, George made plenty 
 of money and plenty of money, sordid as it seems, must 
 be recognized as essential to success in this sort of climb 
 ing. The astute Mrs. George spent it, you may be sure, 
 where it would make the best and most effective showing. 
 She had the proper clothes, furnishings, servants ; she made 
 George join the right clubs, and dragged him diligently 
 to the right church, the right theatre, the right summer- 
 
THE BOARDMAX FAMILY 39 
 
 resort ; she sent the children to the right schools, and not 
 Mrs. Boardman herself could have been more careful to 
 see that they made the right friends. At the end of ten 
 years Mrs. George Thatcher had worked her way, with no 
 loss of dignity or self-respect, into the circle from which 
 nobodies and even anybodies are excluded ; she was one 
 of the somebodies. And by the end of another ten 
 though this is looking ahead she was in a fair way to 
 become the somebody. So much for adaptability and intel 
 ligence or at least cleverness and perseverance 1 
 
 In the meanwhile, where were the other Thatchers? 
 Steven made money, too ; he was a man of force, a sterling 
 character ; but one may easily guess that even with money, 
 no member of that family could achieve such heights as 
 Mattie. None of them had the gifts, or indeed the in 
 clination. Mattie herself, who was generous withal, and 
 had ambition to spare, could do nothing with or for them ; 
 she tried elevating first Susie, then Delia, then Kate 
 in the order of their ages as they became eligible. Susie 
 was a flat failure; perhaps she was a little too old by 
 that time. She would not learn to dance, and had abso 
 lutely no small-talk ; frocks and hats from the most expen 
 sive establishments could not make her look " right. 7 
 Besides which, she rebelled ungratefully at her aunt-ill- 
 law s interest, spoke of Mrs. Mattie s friends as " society 
 people " with vinegarish disapproval, and in the end fled 
 from their teas and luncheons and card-clubs, and went 
 back to putting up preserves and sewing on buttons with 
 a relieved zest. Delia Thatcher promised better, but alas, 
 she developed " common " tendencies, to the horror and 
 alarm of Mrs. George who saw her own hard-won position 
 threatened. Delia was more than willing to dress, but she 
 wore colours too loud, feathers too voluminous, heels too 
 high ; she went about saturated with perfume, saluted 
 
40 THE BOABD&AN FAMILY 
 
 young men by their nicknames to their faces, and spoke of 
 them as " fellows " behind their backs. In short, Delia 
 was impossible. Mrs. Thatcher politely but firmly gave 
 her up, and Delia promptly justified her by going off and 
 marrying a travelling whiskey-salesman by the name of 
 Hengstmuller ! Even the most liberal-minded will agree 
 with Mrs. George that a travelling whiskey-salesman by 
 the name of Hengstmuller cannot be imagined figuring 
 elegantly in society. After Delia came Kate who wore 
 eyeglasses, had taken the course at Wellesley and wanted 
 to teach. Kate was undoubtedly the brightest of the 
 Thatcher girls and if she had had the slightest bent for 
 it, she might have gone far in the career in which her aunt 
 tried to launch her. As far as she went she was a success ; 
 people were amused by her sharp little speeches, they 
 thought her piquant and attractive with her auburn curls 
 and turned-up nose on which her glasses perched daringly ; 
 the young men voted her " cute," took her out, danced 
 with her, sent her violets and bonbons during all of one 
 winter season. And at the beginning of the next one. 
 Kate coolly announced that she had taken the position of 
 assistant-instructor in Latin and mathematics at Martha 
 Washington College for Women; and shaking the dust 
 of society from her feet in a fine metaphor departed 
 for that educational institution the very next day. 
 
 Mrs. Thatcher gave up again for good this time. 
 She never attempted to do anything socially for the boys 
 of the family. " They don t need it. Young men are 
 always at a premium anyhow/ the shrewd lady said to 
 herself with a laugh ; she was not without a sense of hu 
 mour. And in fact the Thatcher boys there must have 
 been half a dozen of them all turned out well, made 
 friends, and appeared with credit if not in their Aunt 
 Mattie s circle, in other circles that touched, even some- 
 
THE BOAKDMAST FAMILY 41 
 
 times interlaced or overlapped it. But none of them went 
 to the big eastern colleges or belonged to the Country Club 
 or did any of those eminently " right " things which Mrs. 
 Mattie coerced her own boys into doing, so it is not sur 
 prising that she saw very little of them after they were 
 grown. Naturally also she did not know the girls they 
 married, though she punctiliously sent handsome presents 
 and invited the young couples to dinner. The only one in 
 whom she took any real interest was also that apple of his 
 sister Susie s eye, Master Samuel. 
 
 When Mattie Phillips went to the Thatchers, Sam was 
 a round, pudgy, jolly youngster, engaged in cutting his 
 teeth unostentatiously and without any fuss over the op 
 eration, crawling about on all fours, and playing content 
 edly the livelong day. Unbeknown to both of them, he 
 crawled on those fat little hands and knees straight into 
 Mattie s heart. The baby was so wholesome, so good- 
 natured, so attractively homely, so full of puppy tricks 
 and gambols, that it would have taken a much harder 
 nature than hers to resist him. At their first interview 
 he " went right to her " without fear or shrinking, to 
 Susie s inward fury; and the friendship was destined to 
 endure though subjected to the severe strain of Mattie s 
 quasi-maternal authority, which, however, she never ex 
 erted unjustly or in anger. She was a good woman ; and 
 Sam was a good, honest, manly little boy. Susie uncon 
 sciously did her best to spoil him with her irrational 
 worship, but some bulwark of common-sense or right- 
 mindedness in the lad s character protected him ; and then, 
 to be sure, it is not easy to spoil any one member of a 
 family of eight or ten, be he ever so spoil able! There 
 is too much give-and-take, too much live-and-let-live, too 
 ready an administration of barbaric justice in such a 
 camp. Sam did his share of the bossing and quarrelling 
 
42 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 and fighting, and had to stand up for himself, no doubt; 
 at an early date he made it plain that he desired nobody 
 else to stand up for him. " No. Do wan Harry s choo- 
 choo. Do wan no sings cep Sam s own sings ! " said 
 he with dignity, and gathered up the train of cars which 
 Harry had been ordered to let little brother play with 
 on pain of being thought selfish, and went and laid it in 
 Harry s hands. " Good work, sport ! You re all right ! " 
 said brother John, beholding this scene from the august 
 summit of his thirteen years, with mingled amusement 
 and approval. And " No sings cep Sam s own sings " 
 became a family by-word. They used to tell of him, too 
 but Susie never liked this anecdote that one day, after 
 being observed a while in deep thought, he inquired of 
 Mattie : " Which is my real mother, you or Ma Susie ? " 
 " Why, what makes you ask, Sam ? " said the other teas- 
 ingly. " Cos boys has ought to be diff runt to their 
 mothers," Sam stated gravely. They all laughed at the 
 time, but years afterward when Mattie Thatcher had sons 
 of her own and there was a rumour that the George 
 Thatchers had a good deal of trouble with that oldest boy 
 of theirs she thought of that speech of Sam s with a 
 certain wistfulness. 
 
 At twelve the youngest of the Thatchers was what is 
 popularly known as a pretty good chunk of a boy ; he was 
 tall for his age, sturdily built, with an open countenance 
 which as the young gentleman had now finally acquired 
 the whole of his second set of teeth was beginning around 
 his mouth and chin to settle into the squarish shape it 
 would wear through life. It must be acknowledged that 
 Samuel was hardly a model of masculine beauty, to the 
 impartial eye ; Susie, of course, thought he was the noblest- 
 looking specimen of boyhood on the globe. It was at 
 about this time that he fell in with Everett Boardman at 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 43 
 
 school. That circumstance, however, was not what led to 
 his knowing so well Everett s sister Alexandra ; we are too 
 well advised as to Mrs. Richard Boardman s views to 
 suppose for an instant that a casual meeting with her son 
 would be a passport to acquaintance with her daughter. 
 No, it was the discreetly active Mrs. George Thatcher 
 who set events in motion toward that end, though she 
 was not thinking of Alexandra in particular. 
 
 " Is Sam going to dancing-school ? He ought to be sent 
 to dancing-school," she said to Susie one afternoon when 
 she had gone out to Hillside Avenue for the call which 
 she conscientiously made three or four times a year. 
 
 Susie pinched her lips together in a fashion familiar 
 to the older woman. " No. And he s not going to go. 
 You re always thinking of things like that, Cousin Mattie. 
 I believe you think dancing-school is as important as real 
 school or church even." 
 
 "It is," said Mrs. Thatcher, undisturbed. "If you 
 want young people to know other nice young people and 
 have a good time socially, that is," 
 
 " Oh, socially ! I knew that was coming ! You think 
 society s everything!" said Susie, jerking the thread 
 through her work with brusque movements. " Sam doesn t 
 care anything about society now, and I hope he never 
 will" 
 
 Mrs. George looked at her tolerantly. She knew quite 
 well that Susie had always disliked her and been jealous 
 of her; nevertheless she had a regard for Susie. After 
 all, jealousy is a sort of left-handed compliment ; and, 
 setting that aside, she had the complacent pity of a mar 
 ried woman for an old maid it does not matter how 
 calamitously married the wife, or how happy and success 
 ful the spinster. " Poor thing ! She adores Sam ; she d 
 die to save him a moment s pain and yet she ll stand 
 
44 THE BOAEDMAX FAMILY 
 
 right in his light all her life without knowing it, if he 
 or somebody else doesn t shove her away ! " mused Mattie. 
 But aloud she only said : " Oh, of course you don t want 
 to make the boy do anything he doesn t like. Sam might 
 not be a very good dancer anyhow; some people can t 
 learn, you know. I was only thinking he ought to have 
 the same advantages as other children. It really is not so 
 expensive as Brother Steven probably thinks. Our little 
 Georgie is doing so nicely. I wish you d come to Mr. Mat- 
 son s some Saturday afternoon and see the children, 
 Susie. It s so pretty." 
 
 " Sam could learn to dance perfectly," said Susie ; she 
 flushed all over her freckles. "He can learn anything. 
 And I m sure father wouldn t grudge the money; I don t 
 think he s ever thought about the expense. That s not his 
 way. It never came into his head, that s all dancing- 
 school for Sam, I mean." But Mrs. George, wise as a 
 serpent while apparently harmless as a dove, would not 
 continue the subject; instead she glanced off upon servants 
 wages, cold-storage meats, the improvements in gas-ranges 
 and a dozen other irrelevant matters, and at last gathered 
 up her elegant skirts and wraps and departed without 
 seeming to hear Susie s question addressed to her with a 
 funny half-defiance : "How much is it for a term at 
 Matson s ? " Mattie smiled to herself as she went off along 
 the rickety board sidewalk; she had twice the humour, 
 insight, calculation, of the other woman. 
 
 In due time and not at all to the surprise of his cousin 
 Mattie the children still called her cousin Samuel 
 turned up at Mr. Matson s where he justified his sister s 
 loyal beliefs by learning his steps readily and becoming, 
 if not a star pupil like the Boardman boy, at least a very 
 acceptable partner. Susie used to go with him in her neat, 
 dowdy clothes, her square-toed, sensible, outlandish shoes, 
 
THE BOARDMAX FAMILY 45 
 
 her hats that might have been bought the day before yet 
 always had the look of having come out of the Ark. The 
 first Saturday she brought her tatting! " I just can t sit 
 still and hold my hands for two hours. Doing nothing s 
 the hardest work I know," she explained to her neighbour 
 on the next chair, catching her eye bent on the darting 
 shuttle. 
 
 The other, who was a tall, thin old lady with very white 
 hair and very black eyes, smiled in a way that made her 
 bony, high-featured face extraordinarily pleasant for an 
 instant. Although she said nothing, Susie did not feel 
 rebuffed; she was not much of a talker herself. She sat 
 beside the old lady and tatted in a kind of silent compan 
 ionship, through the rest of the lesson ; and when it was 
 over the other rose and gave Susie another ineffably charm 
 ing smile and salutation, and went away with a little 
 white-faced witch of a child hanging to her hand. Susie 
 had remarked this latter during the afternoon for her 
 sprightly dancing. George s wife joined her on the front 
 steps, and at once wanted to know where she had met 
 Mrs. Alexander Boardman? 
 
 "Mrs. Who?" said Susie, obtusely. "I haven t met 
 anybody. I didn t know a soul there. Sam, have you 
 got your rubbers on ? " 
 
 " That was Mrs. Boardman you were talking to. I 
 saw you talking to her. Did you just speak without being 
 introduced ? " asked Mrs. George, with a sinking sensation. 
 To approach Mrs. Boardman Mrs. Boardman of all 
 people, in that free-and-easy style ! 
 
 " Well, I guess I must have. I didn t know her from 
 Adam, but of course, everybody there is respectable. They 
 always are wherever there re children around," said Susie 
 with an ignorance and an indifference which the other 
 knew to be sincere, monstrous as the fact seemed. " I 
 
46 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 wish I had known it was one of the Boardmans, though," 
 Susie said after another moment with more interest. " I d 
 have asked her about tearing out those old partitions in 
 our attic. We ve had the house so long, I think they 
 might do that much for us, don t you? Goodness knows 
 father s put in enough improvements without ever saying 
 a word to them ! We ve hardly ever asked for anything." 
 
 Chilly horror crept along Mrs. Mattie s spine. She had 
 not bargained for this when she subtly engineered Sam s 
 attendance at Matson s ! 
 
 " The old lady likely don t know anything about 
 it, though," Susie concluded on further reflection. 
 "Wouldn t do much good to talk to her, I guess. I m 
 going to have those partitions out anyhow. There must 
 be a lot of little three-cornered places behind em, in 
 under where the roof comes down, and I ll bet they re full 
 of dust and dirt and stuff that would take fire awfully 
 easy. It s a wonder it never has and burned us all down to 
 the ground." 
 
 Mrs. George breathed again. " You ought to move, 
 Sue," she said. " You oughtn t to try to live there any 
 longer." 
 
 " Yes, I know. It s running down like everything, still 
 I d hate to move. Mother picked out all the things, 
 and they re all there just where she put them I d hate 
 to live anywhere else. And where d we get a house big 
 enough to put all the things in, anyhow ? " 
 
 " It would be hard," said Mrs. George sympathetically, 
 remembering the " things " with a shudder. Her own 
 taste was kept rigidly up to date. She herself had not 
 as yet met the Boardman ladies, either of whom, by the 
 way, would have been astonished to learn that they occu 
 pied in the eyes of some people a pinnacle which these 
 latter would have moved Heaven and earth to ascend. 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 47 
 
 It would have surprised Mrs. Alexander and Mrs. Richard 
 as much as it would have surprised plain, straightforward 
 Susie Thatcher to be told that her Sam capering about 
 yonder with Sandra was on the road to the same eminence, 
 and an object of envy to the mothers of some of the other 
 boys and girls therefore. Susie only thought that Sam 
 liked that Boardman girl pretty well, and she was a 
 homely little tyke, but a real sweet, well-behaved child 
 and she certainly could dance ! And it was kind of a pity 
 that the Boardman boy should be so good-looking and the 
 girl not; seemed as if by rights it ought to be the other 
 way, a man s looks not mattering near so much as a girl s. 
 With which simple reflections, Susie was apt to dismiss the 
 entire tribe of Boardman, root and branch, from her mind ; 
 ancestors and connections, name and fame, money or the 
 lack of it, were nothing to Susie; she was hopelessly un 
 sophisticated. 
 
 As for Sam, it was natural that he should not trouble 
 his head about such matters. He liked Sandra, and tol 
 erated Everett, who for his part was for a while one of 
 " Mugsy s " most devoted henchmen. Owing to the acci 
 dent that Sam s home was bigger than any other boy s in 
 the school, possessing a yard about half a square in extent 
 with dense shrubbery and an old barn well suited to the 
 purposes of Indians, explorers, bandits, circus-performers 
 and so on, and owing moreover to its being in a neighbour 
 hood where most of the boys had been forbidden to go, 
 Sam was a very popular person, and his " gang " never 
 lacked recruits. They were admitted with ceremonies 
 involving the bandaging of their eyes, torches, incantations, 
 tremendous oaths, descents into the bowels of the Thatcher 
 basement and fearful incarcerations there. Everett went 
 through this ordeal handsomely, and so came into full 
 knowledge of the secret grips and pass-words and other 
 
48 THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 
 
 solemn boyish absurdities; and spending with the rest 
 of the "gang" two or three afternoons a week there, he 
 grew to knowing the place well, Miss Thatcher herself 
 who gave the boys cookies and never seemed to mind their 
 racket in the least, Viney the maid-of-all-work they had 
 had for ten years, Hans Wagner the kraut-eating dog who 
 had many accomplishments besides that and was a dog 
 of parts, even Sam s father whom the boys would meet 
 sometimes getting off the car and walking up the hill. 
 Steven was beginning to look grey and care-worn these 
 days; he was about sixty, but might well have been a 
 hundred and sixty from the youngsters standpoint. 
 
 Once in a while, of course, members of the " gang," even 
 the captain, appeared at Everett s own home to confer 
 upon some weighty matter, or merely in the ordinary 
 course of fellowship ; so that Sam s red head and amiable 
 grin bye and bye became more or less familiar to the 
 Boardman household. Everett s father accepted the boys 
 presence philosophically. " Now, look here, Lucy, you 
 can t keep Everett by your side all his life," he said warn- 
 ingly when his wife shook her head over some of Everett s 
 associates. " You can t dictate to him who his friends 
 shall be, and you yourself would think he was a pretty 
 spineless sort of a boy if he took your say-so about them. 
 Girls are different, I suppose. But he s got to go out in 
 the world presently, and who knows who he ll meet ? Or 
 what are you going to do about it, even if you don t like 
 them? People generally find their level, I ve noticed; 
 anyhow, there re some things we can t help or hinder. 
 This Thatcher boy seems to be all right ; they re very good, 
 plain people not quite like ourselves, perhaps, but good 
 enough for us or anybody, just the same. Can t tell much 
 about boys, of course I mean about how they re going 
 to turn out. Can t tell about Everett, for that matter! 
 
THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 49 
 
 But if he never gets into any worse company, he ll be 
 lucky!" 
 
 So the Thatcher intimacy was kept up more by Everett, 
 to tell the truth, than by the older boy, who in his secret 
 heart was never sure whether he liked Everett or not. 
 Somewhere under Sam s red thatch, there lodged the sus 
 picion that Ev Boardman was " slick/ in spite of the 
 fact that he had never been known to betray anybody, 
 or to cheat in a game, or to shirk any enterprise involving 
 work or risk, or, in a word, to commit any of the crimes 
 known to boyhood whose cave-man creeds have to be lived 
 up to much more rigorously than yours or mine, oh civil 
 ized adult! Then why should Captain Mugsy have 
 privately distrusted him? He did not know. The rest 
 of the Boardmans Samuel liked well enough that is to 
 say, excepting Sandra, he had no feeling for them at all, 
 one way or the other. Sam was too busy with his own 
 concerns to spare much thought to grown-up people. He 
 knew Mr. Boardman in the same distant fashion that the 
 other boys knew his own father, and he punctiliously re 
 membered to take off his hat to the ladies, having had one 
 meeting with Mrs. Alexander which had served to impress 
 these older females of Sandra s family on his mind. 
 
 The senior Mrs. Boardman was writing in her room 
 one day when there penetrated to her the rumour of sundry 
 pourparlers, alarms, excursions, first downstairs, then 
 upstairs, then outside her own door ; and directly an apol 
 ogetic maid ushered in a thick, straight, square boy whom 
 she remembered to have seen before about the place and 
 elsewhere. This time, instead of a bundle of school-books 
 in a strap, or a shinny-stick, or a pair of skates, he carried 
 under one arm a shoe-box tightly packed and bound about 
 with twine, and at his heels there sniffed and wagged, to 
 the impotent indignation of the maid, a large, smooth- 
 
50 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 haired, soiled white dog. Mrs. Boardman was not dis 
 turbed by the apparition; it was seldom that she allowed 
 herself to be disturbed or to betray the fact, at least 
 
 by any event, no matter what ; had the boy and his dog 
 been two South Sea islanders she might, conceivably, have 
 viewed them with the same agreeable composure. She 
 tranquilly laid down her pen and eyeglasses, and as the 
 servant began explanations, surveyed these callers and was 
 surveyed in her turn. The result, astonishing to relate, 
 appeared satisfactory to both sides! The homely old 
 woman smiled her transfiguring smile, Sam s freckled face 
 lit up as spontaneously; Hans Wagner pushed in bravely 
 and laid his honest, unpedigreed head on her knee. The 
 maid uttered a scandalized outcry. 
 
 " He won t bite," said Sam reassuringly. 
 
 " Of course not," said Mrs. Boardman, patting her 
 hand which was so beautifully and delicately shaped 
 that even Sam noticed it on the dog s flat, wedge-like 
 skull. " Dogs always like me. I understand, Maggie. 
 That will do. Everything is all right, thank you. Your 
 sister has found something in the house something that 
 belongs to us that we left there ? " she said to Sam in 
 faint surprise. " That s odd. I never missed anything 
 
 but there is such a quantity of stuff when one moves. 
 Think of its being there all this while nearly fifteen 
 years ! " 
 
 " Might be longer than that," Sam suggested. " The 
 carpenters found it when they went to tear out those old 
 walls in the attic." He hesitated ; and it might be taken 
 in proof of the confidence she had somehow inspired that 
 he blurted out with a kind of shy fun : " At first I thought 
 maybe it was hidden treasure like you read about, you 
 know I thought somebody might have stuck it away up 
 there!" 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 51 
 
 "Nobody in the Eoardman family, Sam," said Mrs. 
 Boardman with amusement. 
 
 " No, ma am. The carpenter said he guessed there must 
 have been lots of things standing around the way they 
 always are in garrets, you know, and these must have got 
 shoved into the corner and walled up without anybody 
 ever noticing them." 
 
 " That must have been the way it happened," Mrs. 
 Alexander agreed. And she thanked him; and Hans 
 Wagner sat up and spoke and shook hands ; and Sam de 
 parted, leaving her with the shoe-box on her knee. It con 
 tained, alas for romance, no missing will, no papers incrim 
 inating anybody or clearing up anything, nothing but some 
 unimportant and uninteresting old letters and a moth-eaten 
 pincushion ! But after that interview Mrs. Boardmau 
 senior never forgot Sam, and never failed to answer his 
 salute with a very bright, kind glance from her ordinarily 
 distant and reticent black eyes. Sandra was his only 
 other real friend in the family ; for not long after this date, 
 Everett s interest in the Thatchers began to wane. 
 
 " Sam says ma am and sir all the time when he 
 talks to old people, you know. Yes, ma am, No, 
 ma am just like that just as if he were somebody s 
 butler or gardener or something," he remarked fas 
 tidiously. " And he calls a person s people, folks. 
 How re all the folks at your house ? that s the way 
 he talks. It sounds so queer." 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 IT was not until the next morning after the Exhibition 
 that it became known what grave trouble had been 
 visited upon one of Mr. Matson s pupils. Only a few 
 people here and there noticed that Sam Thatcher left the 
 place earlier than usual and rather abruptly. Mrs. George 
 had allowed herself to be overlooked for once; she gath 
 ered up her youngsters and got them away hurriedly but 
 quietly. The dancing went on ; the carriages were called ; 
 Miss Hoffman put on her cloak; the drum-man loosened 
 up his drum-heads, the blase violinists packed off with 
 their instruments, and George the coloured man turned 
 out the lights. The performance was all over, and nobody 
 knew that a certain other performance had come to an 
 end, too, until, yawning down to breakfast, they read it 
 in the Observer, on the left-hand side of the inner sheet, 
 with the undertakers and florists and monument-cutters 
 advertisements conveniently ranged at the head of the 
 column. Mr. Boardman read it with an ejaculation of 
 surprise and concern. 
 
 " Steven Thatcher s dead. It must have been very 
 sudden. Why, I saw him on the street just the other day. 
 Sixty-five. He looked older. Well, well ! There goes a 
 mighty good tenant ! " said Richard, sipping his coffee, 
 and skimming on down the list of names. 
 
 " Does it say when it happened ? Mrs. George Thatcher 
 was at the dance last night, and of course she wouldn t 
 have not that it would make such a difference to her, 
 but for the looks of the thing. I don t think those two 
 
 52 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 53 
 
 families were ever very intimate," Mrs. Richard specu 
 lated. " Did you notice what a darling little dress that 
 little girl of hers had on ? She dresses her beautifully." 
 
 These remarks being launched at the table in general, 
 went unanswered; but after a moment Mrs. Alexander 
 said : " A good tenant gone, Dick ? Do you think the 
 other Thatchers will give up the house now ? " 
 
 " Hey ? Good gracious, mother, I don t know ! It s 
 a little too soon to be asking questions like that, isn t it ? " 
 said Richard with his eyes on the paper. " Hello, here s 
 something about it in the obituaries." He folded the 
 sheet over with a great crackling and rustling, and read: 
 " Steven B. Thatcher, the well-known head of the 
 Thatcher-Barnes firm, passed away at his residence, Hill 
 side Avenue, last night at ten o clock. Death was due to 
 cerebral hemorrhage. Mr. Thatcher was a native of 
 Clennont County, but had been a resident of this city 
 and of the Eightieth Ward for the past twenty years. He 
 was a brother of George II. Thatcher, at one time 
 associated with him in business, but now connected with 
 the Gale and Bemis Machine-Tool Company. Mr. 
 Thatcher is survived by : And here Mr. Board- 
 man, despite the solemnity of the subject, broke off with a 
 smile. " Well, by George ! " said he ; " this is the first 
 time I ever did know for certain how many children the old 
 man had ! " 
 
 " Don t forget that your grandfather had ten," said hia 
 mother. 
 
 " Well, but that wasn t anything in those times, mother," 
 cried Mrs. Richard, defensively. " Nowadays nobody has 
 those huge families, except Italians and people like that 
 in the slums." 
 
 Sandra got up and went around behind her father s 
 chair, reading over his shoulder. " Sam was there last 
 
54 THE BOAEDMAH FAMILY 
 
 night isn t that awful ! He must have gone home right 
 from the dancing and everything, and there his father 
 was isn t it ghastly, though ? " Her large black eyes 
 seemed to grow wider, deeper and blacker in her pale face 
 as she pictured this sudden onslaught of calamity. " Poor 
 Sam!" 
 
 " Must have been pretty rough," Everett agreed. " I 
 don t think there s anybody there but that funny old-maid 
 sister you know who I mean the one that wears those 
 weird cocky-doodle hats. She s a bird ! " 
 
 " Oh, don t talk that way, Ev. Miss Susy is nice. Of 
 course she s funny, but still " 
 
 " Oh, they re all very common people, you know that. 
 I suppose Sam ll drop out now. He told me he was going 
 to start to work pretty soon, and his father dying, he ll 
 probably begin right off. If he does, he ll drop out. 
 Fellows like that, that don t go to college or anything 
 are sure to drop out they get to going with another 
 set, and you never see them again. I ve often noticed 
 it," said Everett; young gentlemen are frequently very 
 wise, weary and disillusioned at sixteen. His statements, 
 however, may have been true, a fact which would remove 
 them from the class of mean and small-minded gossip. At 
 any rate, it was impossible to associate anything mean 
 and small-minded with Everett; he spoke with a fine de 
 tachment, equally indifferent and humane. 
 
 It was little enough thought that Sam, for his part, was 
 likely to give to his place in society at any time ; but at the 
 moment he was too busy to think about himself at all. It 
 seemed to the boy as if he never could forget the cold 
 night, the long, cold, noisy, crowded ride in the street 
 car, his uncle silently gnawing at a dead cigar, the struggle 
 up the hill against a sleety wind, the drunken chorus from 
 one of the doggeries down below on the Avenue coming 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 55 
 
 to them in gusts, Viney s strangely altered face as she 
 opened the door. The setting and the prelude were so 
 sombrely dramatic, why had he not known what was going 
 to happen, Sam wondered. He had had no idea of it! 
 The house felt very hot coming in from the winter night, 
 and there was a pungent smell of some drug that was all 
 that he noticed. 
 
 " Any change ? " his uncle asked, as he began to take 
 off his coat; in the very word and act he halted and he 
 and Viney looked at each other, a brief and comprehending 
 glance. She did not answer. Uncle George uttered a 
 subdued exclamation, standing with one arm in the sleeve 
 of his overcoat ; he shook his head. " Well ! " ho said 
 with a short sigh. Somebody came out of the parlour; it 
 was the doctor. 
 
 " Father s upstairs ? He s in bed, isn t he ? " said Sam. 
 
 " Oh, go on up, Sammy, go on ! She s up there all by 
 herself ! You go on ! " said Viney, beginning to cry. 
 Then all at once Sam knew. 
 
 There ensued days of that dismal, reverent hurly-burly 
 with which we are wont to put away the dead. People 
 came and went; the George Thatchers were most kind; 
 the sons and daughters from all over the country wrote 
 and telegraphed; Mr. Thatcher s business associates vol 
 unteered assistance in droves. At the funeral, the local 
 commandery of the Order of Iroquois, of which Steven had 
 been Grand Sachem, turned out in full force; there were 
 a great many "floral tributes," as the reporters called 
 them, pillows of violets, wreaths, anchors, and broken 
 columns of lilies and tuberoses. The choir from the 
 First M. E. Church sang, and Mr. Binns the pastor, a 
 young man recently arrived who had never met Mr. 
 Thatcher, preached a moving sermon that lasted an hour. 
 The conduct of the entire ceremony gave poor Susie deep 
 
56 THE BOARDMAK FAMILY 
 
 satisfaction, and probably caused Mrs. George Thatcher, 
 that disciple of correctness and exclusiveness, to writhe in 
 spirit. 
 
 As for Sam, he scarcely counted in anybody s estima 
 tion, one way or another. Though he did all the errands, 
 and met all of the people at the stations, and saw to their 
 comfort, and hunted up all the extra helpers, and notified 
 everybody and gathered everybody together in the right 
 place at the right time, and in short discharged a thousand 
 small but essential offices without forgetting or mismanag 
 ing a single one of them though he was so handy, use 
 ful and reliable as to be unquestioningly made a con 
 venience of by all of them, Sam was still to the rest of 
 the family nothing but a boy. His older brothers and 
 sisters hardly knew him; he was diffident about raising 
 his voice in their councils. Sometimes he thought that 
 every one, including himself, was a great deal more im 
 portant and busy than grieved. It came upon the honest 
 lad with horror that he was feeling nothing like such a 
 sense of loss and desolation as when poor Hans died. 
 Sam had wept in secret over Hans, and even now his 
 heart was sore for his old dog; he could not shed a tear 
 for his father ! His only real regret came with the recollec 
 tion of that foolish to-do he had made about having a night- 
 key ; it happened on the morning of his father s last day. 
 Sam wished he could take back some of the things he had 
 said. But, after all, did it matter, he thought reasonably 
 as he lay in bed the night after the funeral pondering 
 these things, gazing into the dark. His father and he 
 had generally been pretty good friends; maybe a son 
 ought to feel differently, but he couldn t somehow. And 
 anyway, Sam concluded firmly, the thing for him to do 
 now was to get busy and take care of Susie. 
 
 The fact was in his role of supernumerary, he had over- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 57 
 
 heard a good deal of conversation between the others on 
 a subject that Sam at first thought with his severe youth 
 ful intolerance, ought not to have been brought up at such 
 a time; in later years he came to know that it is in 
 variably the staple topic; namely, the amount of the dead 
 man s estate, and how it would be divided. They shook 
 their heads over these speculations, and listening re 
 luctantly he gathered that poor father never had been 
 much of a money-maker; all of his profits always went 
 straight back into the business, and in spite of that, it 
 never got to be a really big business just fair. He had 
 had to work hard to keep it going. Why, that was the 
 reason Uncle George got out of it; he saw there wasn t 
 any future for it. There couldn t be more than a little 
 dab all around, a few thousand dollars, maybe only a 
 few hundred, when it was wound up. Of course there 
 was the old farm probably father ought never to have 
 given up farming, or tried to do anything else, but he was 
 using his best judgment at the time. They did hope 
 Susie was provided for anyhow ; if he had made any differ 
 ence between the children, it would be in favour of the 
 girls, and Susie was the one who had stayed at home 
 with him, and never married. Neither had Kate, to be 
 sure, but she could take care of herself had for years 
 past, the same as the boys. 
 
 And so on, and so on. Sam heard with an astonish 
 ment and dismay not caused by the revelations them 
 selves but by certain unpleasant discoveries about him 
 self to which they led. He had never supposed his father 
 to be a rich man ; the trouble was, as he now perceived, 
 that he had never thought about their circumstances at 
 all. He had taken his home, his education, his clothes, 
 pocket-money, amusements, as he had taken the weather 
 and the seasons, without considering their source an in- 
 
58 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 stant. Disproportionate shame possessed him. He ought 
 to have known better; he ought to have known more; he 
 was nineteen years old, and might have been at work for 
 the last two years; lots of the other fellows were. Well, 
 he had wanted to, or at least had talked about it, but 
 Dad and Susie were so set on his graduating; and since 
 then Sam rammed the statement down his own throat 
 and found it a bitter mouthful since then he had done 
 nothing. That was the flat truth. He had always been 
 going to do something, but meanwhile he had loafed at 
 home, smoking cigarettes and reading novels and going 
 out to see girls and taking them places, and eating three 
 good meals a day, and teasing like a kid for a nightkey ! 
 He had even let Susie give him money; she had been 
 giving it to him ever since he was little, just as if she 
 had been his mother, and he had gone on taking 
 it from her. She loved to give him money, looking upon 
 him as a child still, but what had he been thinking of to 
 accept it? Was that the way for a man to act? How 
 much precious time he had wasted, and where was he 
 heading? Master Samuel spent more than one bad 
 quarter of an hour arraigned before the merciless court 
 of his own conscience; it will have been seen that he 
 took himself and his suddenly imposed responsibilities 
 very seriously; perhaps it was as well he did. Years 
 afterwards he could afford to look back upon that worried 
 boy of nineteen with a laugh. " Susie would have made a 
 mollycoddle of me a regular house-cat. But poor old 
 Dad died, and I got waked up. I waked up and I grew 
 up right then and there ! " he says. 
 
 It was Susie, the helpless, the unmarried, who of all 
 of them knew where the will might be found and took the 
 least interest in it. "Father kept it in his box at the 
 Safe Deposit. The pass-word s i Clara poor Ma s 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 59 
 
 name, you know," she told them, sighing. The instrument 
 confirmed the family judgment; there was a little in 
 dividually nobody was left out but the bulk went to 
 Susie " And that means Sam, eventually, of course," 
 the others remarked privately, bestowing more attention 
 on him than heretofore. His Uncle George inquired for 
 the first time what he was going to do ? " You re old 
 enough to be at something, Sam. Got any ideas about 
 it ? What do you think you can do, anyway ? " 
 
 " I don t know, sir," said Sam, truthfully. " Of course 
 I mean to get some kind of a job, if it s nothing but sweep 
 ing out an office. Susie wants to have a little flat some 
 where, and have me live with her, but I I don t want 
 to do that." 
 
 His uncle stared. "Why not? That seems to me to 
 be all right. Susie has enough to live on and naturally 
 she wants you with her." 
 
 " I m not going to have Susie staking me to my board 
 and lodgings," said Sam. " That s what it would amount 
 to. She wouldn t let me pay her anything, and she d 
 worry herself sick over me. If it was I taking care of 
 her, it would be different; I d be glad to. But not this 
 way. I ve got fifteen hundred dollars of my own that 
 Father left me, and I ll make that do me till I get to 
 making something myself. I won t use it all up unless 
 I get sick or have some pretty bad luck. But live on 
 Susie ! Not for me ! " announced the young fellow 
 stoutly, believing himself to be acting in the spirit of 
 independence and unselfishness. What he really wanted, 
 alas for poor devoted Susie, was to get away from the 
 petticoat dominion, to be done with the petting and purr 
 ing, the eternal small attentions, the petty anxieties. 
 Impatience to match himself with other men in the man s 
 world had belatedly overtaken him. It was freedom that 
 
60 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 he was after, and he was not thinking of Susie nearly 
 so much as of himself, but Sam, to do him justice, did 
 not know it, so easily do we dupe ourselves. 
 
 George Thatcher was at once slightly amused and 
 slightly concerned. "Well, if that s the way you feel 
 about it, Sam " said he, and broke off, as one who sus 
 pends judgment. " Only fifteen hundred dollars won t 
 last for ever," he added warningly. " And you won t get 
 it right off anyhow. Of course I ll settle everything up 
 as quick as I can, but those things take time." 
 
 Sam s face fell. He had been naively expecting to get 
 his money in his hand within a day or so, and to tell the 
 truth, looked forward to the hazard of new fortunes 
 with a certain exhilaration. But Uncle George was the 
 executor, and undoubtedly knew whereof he spoke. Sam 
 felt rather blank and foolish. " I didn t think about 
 that. I know a lot about business, don t I ? " he said, 
 with a rueful laugh. 
 
 But Mr. Thatcher did not smile; instead he took his 
 nephew s speech literally and coldly. " No, you don t 
 know the first thing but you ll learn, I hope," said he 
 with a disconcerting emphasis on the last word, and stood 
 a moment frowning and considering. Sam divined that 
 the older man s reflections were not complimentary to 
 himself. Indeed Mr. Thatcher was thinking with im 
 patience that the boy had been lamentably babied; the 
 youngest of all, and Susie ready to lie down and let him 
 walk over her it was natural. The other sons had all 
 started out early and were making their own living and 
 some of them even getting married when they were Sam s 
 age, or just a few years older. " I guess I can get you 
 a place somewhere. I ll look around," he said at length. 
 "Have you tried at all?" 
 
 " I spoke to Mr. Boardman when I went to tell him 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 61 
 
 that we d have to give up the house. He s going to let 
 us off the rest of the lease. He s first-rate ; he said such 
 nice things about Dad," Sam explained eagerly. " He 
 thinks maybe they ll want another man in the office, and 
 he said he d bear me in mind. He s great; he s a great 
 old fellow gentleman, I mean, of course." 
 
 George Thatcher grunted. " Old, hey ? Well, I sup 
 pose anybody that s past fifty seems as if he had one foot 
 in the grave to you." He paused and reflected again. " I 
 wouldn t go much on what he said, Sam. He just didn t 
 want to discourage you. Even if you went in his office, 
 it wouldn t be the best thing for you. Boardman s got 
 a boy of his own coming along, and presently there 
 wouldn t be room for two of you, and that would be your 
 finish. No, I wouldn t bank any on that prospect. I ll 
 see what I can do. Now according to my notion, you d 
 better live along quietly with Susie and manage the best 
 you can. I don t doubt you ll make good in time." 
 
 There now began for Sam that process of " dropping 
 out" which had been forecast. For it is to be feared 
 that young Mr. Thatcher s debut in the commercial world 
 was not exceptionally brilliant, or even promising. He 
 was conspicuously unlike those gifted youths we are con 
 stantly meeting with in fiction who, without previous 
 training or experience, can plunge into the thick of af 
 fairs, and not only hold their own magnificently but de 
 feat their elders repeatedly in pitched contests of wits, 
 resourcefulness, foresight and craft. They know every 
 thing, they fear nothing, they never make a mistake 
 except in sentimental matters, when they are in 
 variably the greatest boobies on earth. Even so, they are 
 sure owing to some final prodigious coup to come to 
 a satisfactory explanation with the heroine in the last 
 chapters. In real life we never come across these 
 
62 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 Napoleonic boys; it is doubtful if we would sit down 
 to table with them or allow them in our houses, their 
 manners generally leaving something to be desired; and 
 as this is a tale of real life, it will have to be admitted, 
 I say, that Sam Thatcher did not belong to their class. 
 Anything but ! Sam was sanguine enough about his own 
 powers; he fully believed that he had the stuff in him 
 to do as great things and do them as easily as those novel 
 ists young men about whom he, like the rest of us, had 
 read so much. He believed it until time and the world 
 " knocked it out of him " as he would say himself now 
 adays. 
 
 To begin with, it was obscurely disquieting to find 
 how many bright young men with a high-school educa 
 tion but no particular equipment otherwise were going 
 about in search of a job. At moments it seemed to Sam 
 as if some malign influence had deprived every boy in 
 the community of resources and driven him out to make 
 a living, while at the same time it removed from every 
 business concern the slightest necessity for a boy s serv 
 ices ! " Oh yes, we ve let some of our clerks go," he 
 actually heard a prosperous-looking man saying to an 
 other ; " might as well and save a little. We can hire em 
 again any time we need em. You can go out and get 
 all you want for thirteen dollars a week." It was the 
 truth, as Sam knew, worthy of Shylock though the speech 
 might be. 
 
 In the spring, however, he did get a position with the 
 Williamson News and Periodical Company which he held 
 for some six months, until, moved doubtless by the same 
 considerations as the thrifty person just quoted, they " let 
 him go." After that he was for nearly a year in a 
 broker s office on Walnut Street, about which there is an 
 impression abroad that the less said the better ; it appeared 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 63 
 
 that he was not indispensable there either. There was 
 an interval when he had no work; if history is not mis 
 taken there was another interval when he thought he 
 would study law, but upon trial discovered that he had 
 no turn for it; in all it must have been close upon three 
 years that Samuel was see-sawing about from one thing 
 to the next. Then one day at last he went with the 
 Victorgraph people merely as an extra salesman during a 
 rush season, but they kept him on afterwards, and there, 
 contrary to his own and everybody s expectation, Sam s 
 adventures and uncertainties ended. He is with the 
 Victorgraph Company now. He has been all over the 
 world selling these marvellous machines, and has strange 
 and laughable and sometimes hair-raising stories of in 
 stalling Victorgraphs in Esquimaux igloos, in South-Sea 
 palm shacks, for Afghan ameers, Philippine dattos, 
 Klondyke millionaires, the native Y. M. C. A. of Tokio, 
 Japan, the Seventh Day Adventist Church (coloured) of 
 Canopolis, Georgia. There is an especially glorious one 
 in Susie s parlour with a case wonderfully painted and 
 inlaid " The kind they ask the trade three thousand 
 dollars for," she says proudly. " Sam got one of those 
 big artists in London or Paris to make the design. I 
 can t remember his name but it s a very famous man. 
 Sam knows everybody." 
 
 He does indeed, and has wound up the records for 
 "Sole mio" (Caruso) and that celebrated fox-trot "/ 
 like a chicken in the spring-time " (The Victorgraph 
 Ukalele Band) before crowned heads, and amongst the 
 sands of the Soudan all s one to Sam. He is always 
 the same, though getting a little thicker in the waist now, 
 with hair as red as ever, and laughing-wrinkles at the 
 corners of his eyes, in which latter one may discern not a 
 little humour and sagacity. " Why, just drifted into it 
 
64 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 had to have something to do, you know, and just hap 
 pened to get this. I never dreamed it would turn out the 
 way it has," he will say, and laugji and shake his head 
 and perhaps branch off to one of his varied experiences, 
 a Sindbad of the disc and needle. There is only one 
 thing that he will not talk about: that fifteen hundred 
 dollars with which his career began years ago ; is it a co 
 incidence that he seldom mentions that time on Walnut 
 Street either? "Everybody gets bit once, I guess," he 
 has been heard to say. " Particularly the ones that think 
 they re too smart." And with a half-sigh, a half-chuckle, 
 " Lord, what fools we all are ! " 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 IT is not to be supposed that a great gap was created in 
 society by the dropping out of Mr. Samuel Thatcher. 
 The boys and girls of the Boardmans set, for instance, 
 scarcely noticed it; even Sandra herself who knew him 
 better than most of the others did, and liked him, all 
 but forgot him in a few months. The young things had 
 too much on their hands to miss anybody long; 
 they were absorbed in their affairs, going to college, going 
 to finishing-school, going incidentally to camp, to the 
 mountains, to the seashore in summer, to Coronado or 
 Miami in winter, to Europe at any season ; taking lessons 
 in all the arts; worrying or being worried over about 
 their clothes, their complexions, their manners; gay, 
 anxious, careless, hurried, incredibly happy and incredibly 
 unconscious of it. Everett went to Princeton that year, 
 Sandra to a well-known establishment for young ladies, 
 on the Hudson River, much patronized by Mid- Western 
 mothers of Mrs. Boardman s circle. It all cost Richard 
 Boardman a pretty penny, but being a parent is universally 
 conceded to be an expensive business more expensive, 
 it has been boasted, in our country than anywhere else; 
 and it probably never entered his head to deny the children 
 such reasonable advantages. He paid the tailors and 
 dressmakers bills, the countless extras, the constantly in 
 creasing allowances of pocket-money without a protest. 
 It was only about the housekeeping expenses at home 
 that he sometimes seemed to be concerned. 
 
 "I I suppose you look over these accounts every 
 
 65 
 
66 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 month and see that they are all right, Lucy ? " he said 
 gently; Richard never scolded, never found fault. 
 " Things must have gone up a good deal." 
 
 " Gone up a good deal ! " echoed his wife, in wonder 
 at his obtuseness. "Why, they ve gone up terribly! 
 Everybody s talking about it. Haven t you heard them? 
 We live just the same as we always have, Dick, it s just 
 that the grocers and all of them keep putting more on 
 the price of things every day. I don t know what we re 
 all going to do if it keeps on. I don t know how I can 
 manage any better." 
 
 " I know you try I mean I know you manage as 
 well as anybody can," said Richard apologetically. " But 
 it certainly does seem as if it cost us a great deal to live, 
 doesn t it ? I only thought we might well cut down 
 a little here and there ? " 
 
 " Well, I wish you d tell me where," said Mrs. Board- 
 man, still on the defensive. She looked across the table 
 at him a little resentful, a little alarmed. It was very 
 seldom in all their twenty-odd years of life together that 
 Richard had called in question anything she had done. 
 " Is anything the matter, Dick ? " she asked, not with 
 out a tremour. "Is there anything wrong at the office ? " 
 
 Her husband, detecting her tragic surmises, began to 
 laugh, in spite of himself. How dear she was and how 
 absurd ! " Great goodness, no ! As if I would worry you 
 with anything of that sort anyhow ! " he said. " Every 
 thing s all right. Only we ve got to be careful we ought 
 to save a little if we can on the children s account, you 
 know. Money doesn t go as far as it used to, somehow 
 or else we all of us want more. Things we used to 
 think were luxuries are just the commonest comforts now 
 adays; and we won t ever get back to the old standards, 
 I don t believe. But don t you worry, Lucy. We aren t 
 
THE BOARDMA^ FAMILY 67 
 
 going to the poor-house yet awhile. I ve always sup 
 ported my family, and I expect to keep it up." Richard 
 finished with humorous self-confidence. " Just don t 
 let them overcharge you. Be a little careful, you know. 
 That s all." And he took his hat and kissed her and 
 left the house, Mrs. Boardman watching him away, re 
 assured, yet uneasy. She wished remorsefully that she 
 had not bought had not had charged, that is that set 
 of new curtains for the living-room; she couldn t return 
 them now, they had been up a week, and they were so 
 pretty anyhow, just what she wanted. Why hadn t Dick 
 spoken about the bills before? Never mind, she would 
 pay for the curtains herself out of her allowance; if she 
 couldn t pay all of it at once, she could do it by degrees, 
 some every month. Dick need never see the bill; she 
 had had bills before that she kept from him. He wouldn t 
 like for her to pay that way; if he knew he would in 
 sist on paying the whole thing at once; but she hadn t 
 the face he was always so good about things like that. 
 She ordered the remains of the roast beef curried with 
 rice for luncheon, and sat down to the dish, cheered by 
 her good resolutions and by this piece of frugality. 
 
 Sandra Boardman came out one season during the second 
 administration of one of our best-known and most vari 
 ously estimated presidents, a gentleman who has arrived at 
 an equal celebrity going gunning for big game in Africa, 
 and for rival candidates here at home. It was the year of 
 a financial crisis that kept many a business-man tossing 
 through sleepless nights, drove new wrinkles by the score, 
 and sowed grey hairs broadcast. Sandra s father did not 
 escape; nevertheless she "came out," had her closet full 
 of new frocks, and her party at the Country Club where 
 her slim satin slippers twinkled along the dancing-floor 
 with just a little more grace and spirit than any of the 
 
68 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 others , according to her admirers. She gave the impres 
 sion of being pretty, owing to a deceptive brilliancy of 
 face, and to a very good figure, at once round and slender. 
 Her father and mother were decorously proud, her grand 
 mother openly and insistently so. " It is permissible for 
 a grandmother to be idiotic it is rather expected, in 
 fact," the old lady said with a kind of cool animation. 
 Yet somehow she contrived neither to be foolish herself 
 nor to make Sandra feel foolish the worst crimes which 
 age can commit in the eyes of youth. 
 
 There existed, however, a curious sympathy between the 
 girl and her grandmother. It was natural that Sandra 
 should accept the standards and subscribe to the opinions 
 of her elders, natural even that she should have very 
 nearly the same tastes, likes and dislikes; during her 
 career as a debutante, Sandra never gave anybody trouble 
 by being daring or original or unconventional. The odd 
 thing was that when she was beset by some social perplex 
 ity, she went to her grandmother with it rather than to 
 her mother. Mrs. Alexander possessed the unusual gift 
 of listening ; and the delicate reticence which she practised 
 about herself and her own affairs, gave one a profound 
 confidence in her. Whatever advice she gave never 
 without being urgently asked was always kind, practi 
 cal, good-humoured and to the point ; and she never made 
 the peculiarly irritating mistake of telling the young 
 people what they knew, or thought they knew, already. 
 Mrs. Richard was not so careful or so astute. " Mother 
 is the dearest ever. But you aren t afraid to tell Grand 
 ma anything/" Sandra would sum it up, in private. 
 
 Little Miss Boardman, without being noticeably more 
 popular or more sought by the men than other debutantes 
 there were not very many that winter, whether because 
 of the hard times, or from whatever reason had a highly 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 69 
 
 successful season. Everett came home for the holidays, 
 and, as it is by no means a drawback to a young lady 
 to have a good-looking brother with charming manners 
 or to have a brother of almost any description, for that 
 matter Everett, all unaware, perhaps contributed some 
 what to Sandra s success. The will would not have been 
 lacking, at any rate, for the young fellow was fond of his 
 sister, though unsparingly critical of her, her hair, her 
 dress, her conversation, according to the habit of male 
 relatives. When they went out, he was as carefully atten 
 tive as if she had been " any girl, you know," Sandra told 
 her grandmother. 
 
 " I don t see why I shouldn t be as nice to my sister 
 as to any girl," said Everett, amused, chancing to over 
 hear this speech. " A person ought not to have two sets 
 of manners." 
 
 " No. But lots of the men just drop their sisters 
 around anywhere, and never go near them again till the 
 end of the evening, and don t know whether they re having 
 a good time or not. You know they do, Ev. You ve seen 
 Harry Button " 
 
 " Oh, yes," Everett said dispassionately but with the 
 effect of heading off his sister s comments. It was against 
 his creed to listen to or to utter anything even remotely 
 disparaging about another man behind his back, especially 
 in the presence of women. He shifted the talk, dexter 
 ously enough. " That reminds me, I don t believe I can 
 go Thursday night, San. I ve asked Alice Church to go 
 to this Midsummer Night s Dream performance. They 
 say it s great. Annie Russell is Puck, you know. I 
 thought I ought to do something for Alice, the Churches 
 have been so nice to me, and I want to show some appre 
 ciation." 
 
 His grandmother surveyed his serious face with a smile. 
 
70 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " Praiseworthy motives, Everett ! But after all, it s not 
 exactly a penance to go to the theatre not this time, at 
 least and Alice seems to be a very sweet companion 
 able girl/ she said mischievously, a remark which brought 
 forth hot protest from Sandra. 
 
 " Oh, grandma, he s giving up the dinner-dance ! Alice 
 isn t asked. I think it s lovely of Ev. Most of the boys 
 would have to be made to do anything like that." 
 
 " The dance won t break up until four o clock in the 
 morning, at the earliest. It was nearly breakfast-time 
 before you got back from your last party. You will have 
 time to take Alice home, and go on there afterwards, 
 won t you ? " said Mrs. Alexander ; and though she still 
 smiled, there was studious inquiry in the eyes she turned 
 on her grandson. Sandra caught the expression and was 
 moved to a passing wonder : " What made grandma so 
 funny all at once ? " It was not like her ; she seemed to 
 be trying to pick some flaw in Everett, who, on his side, 
 offered no defence. He thought it unbecoming. Let his 
 grandmother, or let any woman be as waspish as she 
 chose ; that was the part of magnanimity. 
 
 " I could if we had an automobile," was all he said in 
 answer to the old lady s last suggestion. " You can get 
 around so much quicker." It was not the first time the 
 young people had brought up that subject. Everett had 
 pointed out the advantages of an automobile again that 
 very morning when he went to the office to ask his father 
 for the money to buy the theatre-tickets. Mr. Board- 
 man put off considering it until next year. 
 
 "Yes," said Mrs. Alexander. The look of interroga 
 tion faded from her face, giving place to her usual ex 
 pression of pleasant and courteous interest. " A carriage 
 is better than nothing, however, when one takes a lady 
 out, eh?" And rising up, she crossed the room to the 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 71 
 
 old desk in the Mid-Victorian " Gothic " style, all over 
 trefoils and pinnacles and openwork scrolls that stood in 
 one corner, and took some green bills out of one of its 
 drawers. She came back with them in her hand, per 
 forming the whole action with a slow elegance which both 
 the young people watched with admiration, thinking how 
 different she was from most old women. They were 
 generally mere bags of bones, or bags of flesh, tied with a 
 string around the middle ! " I like to see you so careful 
 about these small proprieties, Everett acknowledging 
 your social debts, and all that. I don t believe that 
 young men think about those things quite so much now 
 adays as they ought to," the old lady said, and with some 
 laughing hint about the high cost of living including such 
 items as carriage-hire, she presented the money to him in 
 the prettiest of ways. 
 
 Everett took it, flushing with pleasure and surprise. 
 " That s ever so kind of you, grandma but you re always 
 doing kind things." He stooped over her hand and kissed 
 it with a courtly flourish wherein fun and tenderness 
 mingled. Between them, the management of the little 
 scene was a masterpiece, if one recognizes the fact that 
 giving and taking are for most of us conspicuously awk 
 ward acts. 
 
 The season ended at last; a girl cannot be a debutante 
 year after year. The reflection had occurred to Sandra s 
 mother more than once with a relief she would not in 
 tentionally have acknowledged. " I don t mind the 
 running around with them, or waiting up till all hours, 
 or having the house upset and breakfast sent up at noon ; 
 and of course one likes to entertain and get the new 
 clothes for them, and see them having a good time. I 
 don t mind any of that one bit, though I m nearly dead 
 now it s over," she confided to Mrs. Alexander. " It does 
 
72 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 cost frightfully sometimes I ve felt as if we ought not 
 to be doing it but after all it s only once. Sandra can 
 have it only once in her whole life; it would have been 
 so hard for her to see all her friends coming out, and 
 not to have had the same chance herself. Because you 
 know how it is, Mother, if a girl doesn t have something 
 done for her right at the beginning, she simply is out of 
 it ! She misses ever so much. Well, anyway, we ve done 
 it. Next winter, I suppose they ll begin and call Sandra 
 one of the old girls that s the way they do, you know. 
 I hope she ll marry before she gets to be one of the real 
 old ones. Oh, of course I d like her to have two 
 or three winters of being a young lady; by that time 
 they ve had enough of it enough of the wild racing 
 around from one thing to the next every hour of the day 
 and night, I mean. And everybody else is getting mar 
 ried, so they feel as if they d better, too. I know that s 
 the way I did. That s what makes me feel as if that were 
 the proper way for every girl to do; have a beautiful 
 time first, and then get married ! " said Mrs. Kichard, 
 smilingly aware that these views were not exactly elevated, 
 but ready to stand up for them as being thoroughly practi 
 cal. Indeed, hers was the voice of every mother in her 
 set; and if catechized, they would one and all have ex 
 pressed the same sound feeling in the same rather cheap 
 words. 
 
 That summer the Richard Boardmans took a cottage at 
 Sag Harbor, and Sandra continued to have a beautiful 
 time in accordance with her mother s code. There was the 
 dearth of young men so often noticed at our summer-re 
 sorts, but Everett was with them; and the girls and boys 
 boated and played tennis and danced with a zest that took 
 no account of the hot weather, and it is to be feared not 
 much more of the fathers of the families in the offices at 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 73 
 
 home with the electric fans going, and the typewriters 
 clacking all day long. For it is needless to say that " the 
 Kichard Boardmans " did not include Kichard Boardman 
 himself; he could not take the time away from business 
 to spend even a week at the Sag Harbor cottage ; his wife 
 was a little worried by his appearance when she and 
 Sandra came back towards the end of September. 
 
 The treadmill of gaieties began again; new girls came 
 out, but the " old " ones, the weathered veterans of twenty- 
 one or -two or over, did not incontinently withdraw into the 
 background. Sandra and her set were scarcely less busy 
 than the winter before. " They simply never rest, they 
 never stay at home a minute. I don t believe her father 
 has seen Sandra once for weeks she s not up in the 
 mornings, of course, and so seldom in at night. It s the 
 hardest thing in the world to get hold of her even for a 
 fitting/ Mrs. Boardman would say in fatigued surprise. 
 " There s always something. If it isn t just an ordinary 
 bridge-party or a dance that somebody s giving, why, then 
 it s the theatre, or a charity, or the Garden Club, or the 
 Grafters or the Players or the Afternoon Musical. 
 They can t seem to get enough to do. Of course we went 
 like everything when I was a girl, but I don t remember 
 that there was so much always going on for the young 
 people. I think I ll have to take Sandra to Atlantic Gity 
 or somewhere in the spring for a complete rest. She 
 can t keep on like this." 
 
 Nevertheless she did keep on with all the others, some 
 times refreshed by a stay at Atlantic City or elsewhere, 
 sometimes not. That was Sandra s life for three years 
 - four years there came a time when she did not care 
 to count up the time it had lasted, when she thought 
 about it herself with wonder or misplaced shame. Mis 
 placed, because she surely was entitled to the pursuit of 
 
74 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 happiness as she saw it we have authority for that from 
 the mightiest document we Americans think was ever pro 
 duced and misplaced because she was not to blame for 
 a system of life in the fashioning of which she herself 
 had scarcely had a hand. The girl thought as she had 
 been directed, wanted what she had been told it was proper 
 to want, acted as it was the rule of her circle to act. No 
 marionette pulled by strings ever executed its movements 
 more faithfully or with less initiative. What would you 
 have? She did not lack sense, character, heart; but the 
 idea that there might be other ends besides that of being 
 a " nice " girl, and having a " beautiful time " had not 
 yet entered Sandra s young head. Her horizon was so 
 lovely a spectacle of rose and gold, that she could not 
 realize its pitiful narrowness. 
 
 Among the younger ones who, by coming out year after 
 year, gradually and inevitably reduced Miss Boardmari 
 and her contemporaries to the ranks of the " old girls " 
 was, of course, Miss Julia Thatcher. Equally of course, 
 she was the most successful debutante of her set; not for 
 nothing had her mother been busy all these years. No 
 matron in society was more firmly established than Mrs. 
 George Thatcher; to see her with her furs, her diamonds, 
 her limousine, her awesome butler, her smart house, who 
 would ever have recognized the little Mattie Phillips of 
 twenty-five years past, that went to State Normal, taught 
 school for a term or two up at Corncob Corners, made her 
 own clothes, and had only one new dress a year at that, 
 and was not unskilled at the stove and washboard besides, 
 before she came down here to keep house for Cousin 
 Steven? It is doubtful if her daughter Julia had ever 
 heard of that time Julia, who had her own little gaso 
 line runabout, her own little ingenue string of pearls, 
 maids to trail after, her, trunks upon trunks of Paris- 
 
THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 75 
 
 created millinery, frills and flounces. No wonder she 
 was a success! 
 
 Sandra Boardman was a good five years older than 
 Julia whom she scarcely knew. But the latter s appear 
 ance in society stirred certain memories in the older girl, 
 and Sandra one day made an opportunity to ask her what 
 had become of Sam I Lo, Julia could not tell ! " He s 
 travelling all the time," she said vaguely. " I don t know 
 where he is just now. You know Cousin Sam s so much 
 older than I am," she explained ingenuously ; " and being 
 away at school so long and in Europe all last year 
 I haven t seen him for ages." 
 
 By one of those startling coincidences which we have 
 all witnessed at least once, it was not three days later 
 that Sandra fell in with Sam Thatcher himself, very 
 much alive and considerably improved in looks over the 
 boy she had known. It was one spring afternoon when 
 starting for the Tennis Club she dropped in at the drug 
 store on the Adams Road corner for a nip of some stimulat 
 ing beverage like lemon-and-ginger-soda, say. The drug 
 store, which drove a humming trade among the youth 
 ful residents of the North Hill, was opulently supplied 
 with magazines, candy, cigars, letter-paper, tooth-brushes, 
 india-rubber appliances, alcohol lamps, and even some 
 drugs, as it were by an after-thought; besides which its 
 equipment embraced not only a great deal of plate-glass, 
 a handsome composition floor resembling petrified 
 sausage-meat and an onyx soda-fountain all glorious with 
 out and within, but also over in the corner by the weigh 
 ing-machine an instrument about the same size, elegantly 
 finished in mahogany, with a placard on it setting forth 
 that it was the new Electric Victorgraph. You dropped 
 a nickel in the slot, and were rewarded by any one of 
 a dozen ravishing harmonies, upon the pressing of the 
 
76 THE BOARDMASF FAMILY 
 
 proper button. The records were changed every week 
 the Sextette from Lucia Alabama Rag Nearer, my 
 God, to Thee Rogers Brothers in Panama Madame 
 Butterfly and so on were among this week s choice. 
 
 " If you don t see what you want ask for it ! " said a 
 man who was studying the list as Sandra entered. He got 
 out a nickel and presently, sure enough, the obedient 
 machine was making the place resound with " Rastus on 
 Parade." The man stood listening with a thoughtful grin. 
 
 " I should think that would draw em," he said, saunter 
 ing across to the clerk. 
 
 The clerk responded that it sure did ! " Of course it s 
 pretty hot right now, and there re not so many round as 
 in the evenings. But gee, you oughta see em when they re 
 waiting for the car sometimes! Bunch around the 
 machine can t get their money out fast enough," said 
 he, setting out Sandra s glass and providing her with 
 a long-handled spoon, two salt crackers on a plate, a 
 Japanese napkin and a five-cent check all with a single 
 expert motion. " What s yours ? " 
 
 The other was in the act of saying that he would take 
 a glass of vichy, when his eyes quite accidentally met 
 Sandra s in the ornate mirror that hung behind the 
 fountain; on a sudden he stumbled, stared hard, then 
 averted his gaze guiltily, and directly afterwards stole 
 another glance while endeavouring to look as if he were 
 watching the clerk. Sandra, for her part, had stared too, 
 for the fraction of a second; she thought she knew him 
 thought she did not know him said to herself that it 
 couldn t be decided that it was. This last was final ; 
 she was ready for him the next time he glanced her way, 
 caught his eye squarely, and spoke frankly and smilingly. 
 " Why, Mr. Thatcher ! I didn t know you for a minute ! " 
 
 He turned very red, and jerked off his hat, and came 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 77 
 
 up to her smiling too, pleased and confused. " I was 
 sure it was you. You look just the same." 
 
 " You don t. You seem so much older, somehow." 
 
 " Well, I am older " In these momentous words, 
 interspersed with laughter, was the old acquaintance re 
 newed. If there was any awkwardness about the en 
 counter, it was all on Sam s side; Sandra was by this 
 time far too experienced a woman of the world her 
 world to show embarrassment in any circumstances. 
 But the young man had scarcely spoken to a girl, unless 
 in the way of business for what seemed to him years and 
 years ; he felt all at once that he knew nothing about them 
 nothing about this particular kind of girl, at any rate. 
 For it crowded into his mind that though Sandra might 
 look the same she was in fact a great deal prettier, 
 he thought she was not really the same at all. She 
 was " Miss Boardman " now, for one thing, and he 
 was " Mr. Thatcher," and all the good old boy-and-girl 
 times were done and over with for ever. She was speak 
 ing. 
 
 " It s so odd. I was asking your cousin about you the 
 other day I haven t seen you for so long and here 
 you are ! " 
 
 " My cousin ? Oh yes, you mean Julia. I don t see 
 much of them once in a while, that s all. I m not at 
 home much." 
 
 " She said you were travelling." 
 
 "Well, yes. I m going and coming a good deal. 
 Everybody well at home ? " 
 
 " Oh, very, thank you. Is are er " In spite 
 of her self-possession, Sandra had to halt with a lost feel 
 ing ; she could not remember who or what or where Sam s 
 immediate family were. He might be married for all she 
 knew, and might possibly resent her ignorance or forget- 
 
78 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 fulness. But, to her relief, he answered at once without 
 noticing how she had fumbled. 
 
 " Why, my sister s all right, thanks. She doesn t 
 change a bit. Wants to run after me, and wait on me hand 
 and foot the same way she always did when we used to be 
 going to Matson s, remember ? Only of course I won t let 
 her, nowadays. Susie s getting along; she must be over 
 forty." And here, as Sandra got down from the stool, 
 and began to adjust her veil and gloves, Mr. Thatcher 
 abruptly changed the subject. "Er have a sundae, 
 won t you ? " 
 
 Sandra s acrobatic feminine mind had reached the con 
 clusion from the first part of his speech that he was not 
 married. No man talks about his sister when he can 
 talk about his wife. As to the last it needed no great 
 penetration or quickness to construe " Have a sundae ? " 
 as " Do stay and talk to me or let me talk to you for a 
 minute ! " His honest blue eyes told her that much for 
 that matter. She hesitated. 
 
 " Strawberry or chocolate ? Or maybe they ve got some 
 thing else ? " said Mr. Thatcher briskly. Sandra gave it 
 up; after all, why not? even if her mother did pro 
 nounce it " common " ? " Goodness, I m twenty-three. 
 That s old enough to know how to behave. And I ve 
 known him for ever so long at least I used to know 
 him. And it all depends on who you are, anyhow ! " she 
 thought swiftly, and sat down again laughing. 
 
 Sam was unaffectedly content. He would have liked 
 to sit there the rest of the afternoon, eating sundaes, 
 although that rich and sweet confection was ordinarily 
 not at all to his taste. The young fellow had just dis 
 covered that his life was intolerably lonesome. " I ve 
 gotten so that I feel like a stranger everywhere, even here 
 in my home town," he confided to Sandra, in the course 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 79 
 
 of a brief autobiography. " I m everlastingly on the 
 move, and never can stop long enough anywhere to make 
 friends, you know. Then I come back here, and nearly 
 everybody has forgotten me. Oh, I don t mind," he added 
 hastily, anxious not to be understood as complaining of 
 his work in which he was really profoundly interested, 
 or making a bid for sympathy, which he would have 
 scorned to do. " I like it, and I seem to be pretty well 
 suited to it. It s just bound to be a restless sort of busi 
 ness, that s all." 
 
 " My grandmother says that everybody is restless now 
 adays in business and everything else. She says I m 
 restless," said the girl, with some wonder. " And I never 
 do anything. I don t go nearly as much as some of the 
 girls." 
 
 " Maybe she s right, though. You ve got to get up and 
 hustle if you re going to do anything, or some other fellow 
 will get there first. Not much chance for people that 
 want to take it easy. I know that! " said the young man. 
 He paused reminiscently. " Your grandmother used to 
 be a very fine-looking old lady." 
 
 " Yes indeed, she is still." 
 
 " Of course she wouldn t remember me, but I do her 
 very well. She always had a look as if she didn t choose 
 to tell all she knew; as a boy, I recollect how that im 
 pressed me. Has she got that beautiful room still ? " 
 
 Sandra looked at him surprised and questioning. Her 
 grandmother had always had the same room at the top 
 of the house, wide, cool and grey. There were bare 
 walls, a shelf of books, the plain bed, the desk, the clock, 
 two little copper candlesticks. Mrs. Boardman indeed im 
 parted to it as she did to everything about her, her very 
 gloves and garments, her own air of gracious reserve, so 
 that the place had character, it even had something like 
 
80 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 a soul, but Sandra had never thought of it as beautiful. 
 She said so, adding, " I didn t know you had ever seen 
 it." 
 
 " I never did but once." He told her about it, de 
 scribing himself and Hans Wagner with a good deal of 
 humour. " She was just as nice as could be to both of 
 us. Nothing but a boy and his dog! I suppose that s 
 why I ve never forgotten it. I thought she was the most 
 wonderful old lady, and that room was the most beautiful 
 place I had ever seen. No fuss about muddy boots and 
 paws, and nothing to knock over and break. One wouldn t 
 ever feel restless there, I expect. When you re out in the 
 world, you like to think about a place like that sometimes." 
 
 " I ll tell her you said that." 
 
 "Gracious, don t!" said Sam, taken aback. " She ll 
 think I mean just the room, but I know it must be your 
 grandmother living in it. Nobody else could make it feel 
 that way, I don t believe." 
 
 "Perhaps not. There isn t anybody like her." 
 
 She rather expected that his next move would be to 
 ask if he might call, and was wondering just how he 
 would go about it, and preparing what she would say in 
 return. But as they rose and started towards the street, 
 Sam asked another question entirely different. 
 
 "What s Everett doing?" 
 
 " Why, he s looking around. He hasn t gotten into 
 anything yet," Sandra explained. That Everett was look 
 ing around and that he had not gotten into anything yet 
 were facts so familiar to her and so negligible that she was 
 surprised again to observe the seriousness with which 
 Sam took them. 
 
 " Is that so ? " said he in evident concern. " Why, I 
 thought he would go in with your father, most likely 
 if he didn t study a profession, law, or something." 
 
THE BOARDMAtf FAMILY 81 
 
 " He did have an idea of law for a while, but he gave 
 it up after he got through college. Ev doesn t care much 
 ahout tiles either; he thinks he ll like some other kind of 
 business better." 
 
 " Well, it takes a good while to get started at anything, 
 unless you ve had special training. You don t always 
 find the right thing, right off. It s pretty hard," said 
 Sam, still with a gravity that Sandra found inexplicable. 
 Everett himself was not in the least grave about his pros 
 pects. " You remember me to him, and tell him I m 
 wishing him luck," said Sam earnestly. A moment later 
 he was gone on the down-town car, and Sandra was taking 
 up her road in the opposite direction, towards the Tennis 
 Club. He had not said a word about calling, after all. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 FOR almost the first time in their history, the Board- 
 mans did not leave town that summer. The season 
 was as long and as hot as usual; everybody they knew 
 departed to the Michigan and Atlantic coast resorts, to 
 Canada, Colorado, the Adirondacks, but the Boardmans 
 stayed on at home. Sandra indeed had sundry invita 
 tions to visit friends in some of these localities, but she 
 declined. Her mother would have had her go ; it was the 
 girl herself who during the discussion of railroad arrange 
 ments, and the necessary additions to her wardrobe, ob 
 served an expression on her father s face that sent her 
 to bed unwontedly thoughtful. At breakfast the next 
 morning, Mrs. Boardman who had planned new dresses 
 and accessories until she fell asleep, and even then very 
 likely had gone on planning them in her dreams, began 
 to talk happily about going down town to shop when 
 Sandra interrupted with revolutionary words. 
 
 "I don t believe I care enough about it to take that 
 great long tiresome trip and make the changes and all," 
 she announced. " It will be awful in this weather. Of 
 course it s lovely at Biddef ord after you get there but 
 somehow I can t work myself up to going ; I feel too lazy 
 to make the effort. It isn t as if I d never been there, or 
 anywhere; I ve gone to the seashore dozens of times. I 
 don t care a thing in the world about it; it s not worth 
 while." 
 
 " Oh, but Sandra, you d have such a good time ! " her 
 
 82 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 83 
 
 mother protested, in as great a disappointment, as if she 
 herself were being denied the pleasure. " You ought not 
 to miss it." 
 
 " I always have a good time wherever I am I m hav 
 ing a good enough time now," said Sandra. " I d rather 
 spend the money on something else, if there was anvthing 
 I needed." 
 
 " Well, you could do that, of course," said Mrs. Board- 
 man hopefully. " What were you thinking of ? Painted 
 furniture for your room would be " 
 
 " No, no, I don t want it. I don t want anything ! " 
 Sandra interposed hurriedly. She began to laugh. " I 
 believe you just want to go down town and buy some 
 thing, Mother. I believe that s what you really like to 
 do the best of anything." 
 
 " I generally get my money s worth, too, miss," retorted 
 Mrs. Richard, laughing too. " It is ever so much fun to 
 shop," she added so simply and literally that Sandra broke 
 into fresh amusement. 
 
 " Oh, Mother, you are such a dear ! " She jumped up 
 and ran around the table, and seizing her mother s shoul 
 ders from behind, went through the process known to the 
 youthful Boardmaus as " woolling her around " that 
 is to say giving her a more or less rough-and-tumble 
 cuddling. They applied it also to kittens, the family dog, 
 little children, anything that could be petted or was at all 
 cuddle-able, in short. Mr. Boardman heard the outcry 
 that invariably accompanied it, and looked up across the 
 top of his paper with an absent smile. 
 
 " This child insists she s not going, Dick," cried out his 
 wife, ineffectually trying to defend herself. " Mercy, 
 Sandra, do be careful of my hair-net ! She actually pre 
 fers staying at home and roasting with the rest of us to 
 going to Biddeford ! " 
 
84 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " Do you really ? " said Kicliard, incredulously. " You 
 can go if you want to, you know, San." 
 
 " I don t, and I m not going ! " Sandra declared. She 
 was in earnest; to tell the truth, she had once or twice 
 felt, of late, that to be for ever " going " was the most mo 
 notonous business on earth. Supposing she did make this 
 Biddleford Pool visit, Sandra could visualize every inci 
 dent of it, the cinders, the heat, the abominable stuffy sleep 
 ing-car, the change at Boston, Marian meeting her, the 
 other girls and young men; she knew beforehand what 
 every one would wear, would say, would do, how they would 
 picnic and go clamming and sailing ; somebody would have 
 a guitar or banjo, somebody else or all of them would 
 sing; she herself would infallibly be asked to do some 
 fancy-dance. It would be the same old thing over and 
 over again ; nobody ever seemed able to think of anything 
 new; certainly she couldn t. No, she chose to stay at 
 home where she could have her room to herself, and not 
 be obliged to share civilly pretending that she liked it 
 with who knows how many other girls, who would get 
 their things mixed with hers and borrow them and lose 
 them, and talk about one another or about the men the 
 livelong day and night. She did not feel at all virtuous 
 over the renunciation, but rather cynical and world- 
 weary. " I ve had so much of that sort of thing," she 
 said; and self-occupied as she was, did not miss the 
 shadow of relief that passed over her father s face. 
 
 " Oh, very well, if that s the way you feel," was all he 
 said, and resumed the paper. 
 
 But Sandra could not put that look of his out of her 
 mind; thinking of it, she saw or fancied she saw, some 
 subtle change in her father. The difference in age between 
 their parents and themselves seems to children so vast that 
 a corresponding difference in appearance becomes merely 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 85 
 
 incidental. If any one had said to Sandra that her father 
 looked careworn and much older of late, she would have 
 answered in all good faith that he had always looked as 
 he did now; of course he was old; when she could first 
 remember Ijim, he must have been already thirty-odd! 
 He might as well have been a hundred and thirty, accord 
 ing to the ruthless reckoning of youth. Whatever alter 
 ation she divined in him, Sandra did not set it down to 
 years. But various phrases about " business- worry " and 
 " nervous collapse " floated through her mind disturbingly. 
 They united and took shape, as it were, in a longing to 
 ask a certain question, which unfortunately was precisely 
 the kind of question that in the Boardman family would 
 have been considered little short of indecent. Truly, her 
 elders had never laid down any hard-and-fast rule about 
 it; but that very fact, namely, that they never mentioned 
 the thing at all, was more significant than any making of 
 rules. Moreover, Sandra did not know whom to ask; 
 that her mother should know anything about it was un 
 thinkable; to go to her grandmother might prove nearly 
 as futile. Sandra was sure that, in accordance with their 
 creed, they had never allowed themselves to touch, even 
 ever so lightly on the subject. " In their day women 
 weren t supposed to know anything about money or bus 
 iness. They can t change themselves now," thought the 
 girl. There remained Everett, but to ask him would be 
 worse than asking their father ; he would be more shocked 
 and if he did not know he would hate to have to confess 
 it to her. Thus Sandra reasoned, showing by the way 
 some little discernment. In the end she went to Richard, 
 to headquarters. It took courage. 
 
 " Daddy, do you mind telling me something ? " 
 " I suppose not. That is, if it s something I know 
 something about," said Mr. Boardman in the tone he had 
 
86 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 adopted when Sandra, at fourteen, used to spread her 
 algebra problems before him. " What is it ? " 
 
 Sandra braced herself and let the bolt fall. " How 
 much have we got to live on ? " 
 
 It was out! She stood convicted of the ineffable bad 
 taste, the vulgarity, if you choose, of wanting to know the 
 size of their income, and by inference what was done 
 with it! Her father, however, did not seem horrified; 
 perhaps he was too astonished. After an instant of blank 
 staring, he ejaculated, "How much have we ! What 
 under the sun put that into your head ? " 
 
 "I I just thought I d like to know," stammered 
 Sandra in dire confusion. 
 
 There was another profound pause. Then Richard said 
 kindly in his kindness he carefully looked away from 
 her scarlet face, so as not to see her embarrassment 
 " What is the matter, Alexandra ? Haven t you er 
 that is haven t you quite enough to spend ? Is there 
 one of those dreadful, terrorizing bills from Madame 
 What s-her-name hanging over you ? Never mind, it will 
 be all right. I know you can t help it sometimes " 
 
 " ~No, no, it s nothing like that. I haven t anything 
 I mean I don t owe anybody 
 
 " You re sure about that ? " asked her father, know 
 ingly and humorously. ff No bills, hey ? Not even a 
 little teeny-weeny one for a hat or something ? " He got 
 out a cigar, and clipped the end off it, looking at her from 
 under his eyebrows with smiling slyness, mimicking her 
 fondly. "Sure?" 
 
 " Yes, I m sure. There ! I mean it ! " said the girl 
 almost crossly. She had expected the episode to be se 
 rious, had approached it with shrinking, if not fear; to 
 have it degenerate into farce somehow put her out of 
 countenance. And her father was now smiling with the 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 87 
 
 open and shameless amusement that women find so vex 
 atious. 
 
 " Well then," said he, reducing his features suddenly 
 to an owlish gravity ; " why this sudden interest in the 
 financial status ? " 
 
 " I just felt as if I d like to know," Sandra repeated 
 helplessly, conscious of something ineffective about her 
 appeal. It was as if she had addressed her father in some 
 language unknown to him. She tried again earnestly, 
 though still apologetically. " It seemed to me I 
 I ought to be told something about about things like 
 that, you know, Dad " 
 
 He cut her short good-naturedly, glancing at his watch. 
 " Oh, pshaw, you don t need to bother your head over what 
 we have to live on. You couldn t understand even if I 
 tried to explain a young girl like you ! Call up and 
 ask the exchange for the exact time, will you, please, 
 Sandra? I believe I m slow." 
 
 " I could understand as well as Ev, if I am a girl," 
 Sandra objected, lingering. " I m older than he is, and 
 Ev s never had anything to do with business either." 
 
 Mr. Boardman gave a kind of regretful laugh. " I m 
 afraid that s true, San. I declare I sometimes wish 
 Everett would go off and fall in love with some nice girl ! 
 If he wanted to get married, it might put some ambition 
 into him. But you don t need to take any measures of 
 that kind," he added hastily, half smiling, half sober. 
 " Well now, are you going to get me the correct time ? " 
 
 She obeyed baffled, vaguely reassured, yet vaguely dis 
 satisfied. It was not that she was really anxious about 
 their " financial status " as Mr. Boardman phrased it. 
 Sandra could not help knowing that they were not so well 
 off as the George Thatchers, for instance, or a dozen other 
 people she could name, but what of that ? " Mother and 
 
88 THE BOAKDMAtf FAMILY 
 
 Grandma and I aren t pining away for gold vanity-cases 
 and ermine stoles and butlers and chauffeurs and orchids 
 and all that/ said Sandra to herself with a laugh. They 
 were reasonable. But being so reasonable, why could not 
 her father have answered her ? What did he think would 
 happen if she knew to put it grossly how much he 
 made a year? She could be trusted not to run around 
 telling everybody in town. And as to explanations, a few 
 figures were all she wanted; she had not asked how the 
 money was made, but how much there was of it. Sandra 
 was willing to allow that " business " was a highly recondite 
 matter which she could not possibly grasp, but she knew 
 that two and two make four, the girl thought with a little 
 pique. Instead of meeting her question simply, he must 
 go chasing off these were Sandra s own words after 
 the notion that she was in trouble with the dressmaker, 
 and was trying to break it to him gently. She indignantly 
 told herself that she was above any such cheap and childish 
 devices, and Daddy ought to know it by this time. She 
 never had tried to sneak out of anything, or to lay the 
 blame on somebody else, or to blarney him with soft words. 
 But his first idea had been to set her mind at rest, to keep 
 her from worrying; and then when he found out the real 
 cause of her seriousness, instead of setting her mind at 
 rest, or keeping her from worrying, he had laughed! 
 His behaviour aroused in her two warring impulses; to 
 shake him and to hug him. He was so generous, so 
 forbearing, so infinitely good and so exasperating. 
 
 He had let fall a word about Everett, though, that man 
 ifestly came from the heart. Whatever their means, 
 there could not be enough to keep Everett in idleness, 
 Sandra reflected with a puckered brow. If anybody in 
 the family had a right to leisure, it was Dad, not Everett. 
 Somehow she had not thought about it before, but now 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 89 
 
 the fact thrust itself upon her that Everett was idle. 
 Idle was the word. He was not doing anything; they 
 were so accustomed to seeing him do nothing during vaca 
 tions, that they had forgotten he had been out of college 
 a year and a half. She recalled the look on Sam 
 Thatcher s face when they had spoken of her brother with 
 sudden illumination. Sam had viewed Everett s jobless 
 estate with grave sympathy, and had sent him what was 
 evidently meant for a cheering and heartening message 
 the circumstance had certain ironical aspects which 
 Sandra shrank from acknowledging even to herself. The 
 girl was invaded by a sense of personal responsibility 
 which her saner judgment told her was unreasonable, yet 
 which she could not shake off. It was in nowise her 
 fault that Everett was without a position; that she could 
 do nothing towards sharing or lightening her father s 
 burdens, he himself had made plain. Yet even while 
 reminding herself of these facts, Sandra felt upon her a 
 formless desire to account for herself in some way, to 
 vindicate her own existence. The difficulty was that she 
 did not know what she ought to do, or could do, or wanted 
 to do; for the first time the harness of class and sex 
 restrictions she had worn from her cradle, chafed. " If 
 I had been a boy, I d have been of some use. Dad would 
 have let me ! " she thought rebelliously. But she must 
 remain in her sphere of ornament, of insignificant joys, 
 varied by insignificant cares. They made her eat jam, 
 when she would just as lief have dined off of plain bread 
 and butter. The jam diet had always suited her mother, 
 therefore it must suit her. " Well, of course, Mother / " 
 Sandra said to herself tolerantly. 
 
 The mood passed ; it was a Jonah s-gourd sort of growth, 
 too exotic to the Boardman zone to flourish there long. 
 But it passed all the quicker because about this time 
 
90 THE BOAKDMAlSr FAMILY 
 
 Everett did actually get something to do at last. A friend 
 of his father s gave the young man a place in his office. 
 Although the monthly salary could be expressed in two 
 figures, neither of them among the biggest, there was the 
 prospect of advancement, and at any rate one must make 
 a beginning somewhere, somehow. Mr. Boardman was 
 perhaps both relieved and hopeful, although he preserved 
 the appearance of humorous indifference characteristic 
 of the American father. The delight of the women of 
 the family, on the other hand, was almost too great and 
 too openly voiced to be complimentary; it moved Everett 
 himself with a kind of annoyed amusement. 
 
 " Why, it isn t anything it s just until I get some 
 thing better/ he expostulated. " For Heaven s sake don t 
 act as if Fd just been appointed to the Cabinet! And 
 besides if you make such a fuss about it, people will begin 
 to think I was going to the dogs." 
 
 " Oh, but we don t make a fuss about it to outsiders, 
 Everett. That wouldn t be nice, and it always sounds so 
 silly. You know I wouldn t do anything like that," said 
 his mother, a little hurt. " You surely don t mind our 
 taking an interest and being pleased." 
 
 " Of course not only I m afraid you ll forget and give 
 yourselves away some time. Now you look out, or I ll 
 come over there and wool you around ! " the young fellow 
 threatened her in mock ferocity. "And you ought to 
 remember," he added with a self-respecting humbleness 
 that became him well, " that this is all Mr. Arnold. He 
 knows that he s not getting any prize in me. He s just 
 doing it on Dad s account." 
 
 Mrs. Richard looked troubled. " Yes, I know. I wish 
 I could think of some more tactful way to show him that 
 we appreciate it. You thanked him, of course, Everett, 
 but just what did you say ? " 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 91 
 
 The father and son exchanged a glance. " Oh, I I 
 guess Mr. Arnold knows how I feel, Mother," said Everett, 
 shrinkingly. " I guess he understands." 
 
 " Probably the best way for Everett to show his appre 
 ciation will be for him to make good in the position, 
 Lucy," said Mr. Boardman, in his gentle way. " I don t 
 think you need to do anything." 
 
 She looked from one of them to the other silenced, and 
 rather awed. The proposal she was about to make to 
 invite the Arnolds to dinner, died on her lips; a moment 
 before she had been considering it with some complacency 
 as a very nice little attention to show them, particularly 
 as it necessitated real effort on her part. For she would 
 naturally have to call on Mrs. Arnold beforehand; they 
 were quiet people whom Mrs. Richard Chase Boardman 
 had never known, never even met or seen, but they must 
 be familiar enough with society to realize that a visit 
 from her was a proper and gracious thing a nice thing, 
 in short, to do. Now, however, something in the manner 
 of her two men defeated the plan ; somehow it would not 
 do. The good, sweet woman felt herself rebuked, she 
 could not have said how or why. Sandra thought herself 
 wiser; as usual she confided her views privately to her 
 grandmother. 
 
 " Men don t like to have any fuss made over a thing 
 like that, I don t believe," she remarked sagely. " It 
 always seems as if they could be friends and could do a 
 lot of things for each other, make big sacrifices even, 
 without saying a word. Women want to tell everybody; 
 they want to have what they do noticed. They re terribly 
 petty." 
 
 " All except you and me, eh ? " said the old lady mis 
 chievously. 
 
 But Sandra would not joke. " You know it s so, grand- 
 
92 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 ma. Of course it s not as bad as it used to be. We ve 
 learned a lot, and we ve gotten all over those idiotic ideas 
 about having to stay at home and do fancy-work, and look 
 as if we never ate anything, and thinking it immodest to 
 mention your own body, or know anything about it. 
 We ve gotten all over that " 
 
 " We certainly have ! " said Mrs. Alexander with whim 
 sical enthusiasm. " Nowadays all you young women seem 
 to be most astonishingly and outspokenly aware." 
 
 " Aware ? How do you mean ? " 
 
 " Just aware" her grandmother repeated composedly. 
 " I think that word describes your generation of girls 
 better than any I know." 
 
 " Well, it s more sensible than not knowing anything," 
 cried Sandra with some warmth, glimpsing the other s 
 meaning. " Or pretending not to know anything. That 
 was the funniest notion ! Pretending to be ignorant and 
 helpless because it was pretty and womanly and all that ! " 
 
 " Yes. We don t pretend to be helpless any more ; we 
 pretend to be cultured," said Mrs. Boardman. " One 
 can hardly get along without pretending a little." 
 
 Sandra let that suggestion pass, perhaps not quite un 
 derstanding it; her grandmother not infrequently threw 
 out odd little dry speeches that seemed not to have much 
 meaning. Besides, the girl was absorbed in her specula 
 tions just now ; she went on talking earnestly. 
 
 " Do you know, I believe there always have been women 
 who weren t that useless, molly-coddle kind ; who were go- 
 ahead and and progressive, you know, and had plenty 
 of sense and could take care of themselves, even in the old 
 days. There always must have been some women like 
 that maybe just as many as there are now, only they 
 didn t have our chances to show it." 
 
 " Oh, yes. We used to call them strong-minded," said 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 93 
 
 Mrs. Alexander, with an innocence which, however, by 
 no means deceived the younger woman. " I have a dim 
 general impression that they all wanted to cut their hair 
 short and wear trousers and run for the presidency " 
 
 " You will make fun," said Sandra reproachfully ; " you 
 know that s not at all the kind of person I meant. Those 
 women were just freaks." 
 
 " Not at all, my dear. They were the straws which 
 show which way the wind blows." 
 
 " Why, you don t think we ll all be doing like that after 
 awhile?" 
 
 " Who knows ? " said the old lady with a Gallic move 
 ment of her still shapely shoulders, a Gallic smile charged 
 with amiable cynicism, liberality and .patience. " And 
 why not? I have seen so many complete reversals of 
 popular opinions and ideals and ways of thought in my 
 time so many social superstitions overthrown, so many 
 others built up. It seems scarcely worth while to question 
 anything, or to be shocked about anything, any more." 
 
 Sandra contemplated her silently. " You re wonder 
 fully modern, grandma," she said after a while, abruptly. 
 " Ever so much more so than mother, and yet she s 
 younger. Mother would be ready to fly to pieces at the 
 idea of any of us doing anything the least bit out of the 
 way against the rules, you know. She d die rather 
 than break them. And the funny thing is that the kind 
 of rules they are, whether good ones or bad ones, doesn t 
 make any difference to her! If it was in the rules that 
 a lady must swear, why, mother would sw r ear like a dray 
 man, and would be after me to make me swear, too ! " 
 
 " Oh, come, now, Sandra " 
 
 " You know she would, grandma. If it s the thing/ 
 it s all right for mother. If it s done/ why, it might 
 as well be one of the Ten Commandments. Well, I must 
 
94 THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 
 
 say," Sandra interpolated generously : " it s great to have 
 somebody around that is that way, because they always 
 know exactly what to do, no matter what comes up. I 
 mean they always do the right thing, the tactful thing, you 
 know. Mother never makes a mistake. I remember my 
 first year out, it was perfectly fine to have mother to go 
 to, because every now and then something would happen, 
 and I wouldn t know quite what to do, and mother could 
 always tell me. She s a wonder, that way." 
 
 If Mrs. Alexander wanted to laugh at this ingenuous 
 tribute, she restrained it with a consideration which might 
 of itself have been a small lesson in good breeding. 
 " Your mother has had a great deal of social experience," 
 was all she said. 
 
 "Well, so have you, grandma. You never make any 
 mistakes either. But you aren t quite so well hide 
 bound, you know, as mother. You don t mind people 
 breaking loose once in a while." 
 
 This time the old lady did laugh outright. " Oh, don t 
 I ? If you will just define breaking loose ? for me ? " 
 
 " Oh, I don t mean anything like running off from your 
 husband or any low business like that all in the papers 
 and everybody talking ! " said Sandra, a little out of 
 patience. " I mean what is it ? " 
 
 " Nothing. Go on." 
 
 " Oh, I thought you spoke. What I mean is you don t 
 mind a person s being original, or doing something that 
 isn t done/ " said Sandra, laying rather scornful stress 
 on the last word. " For instance, that time I had a Span 
 ish costume and danced the cachucha at one of those old 
 exhibitions, don t you remember my getting Mademoiselle 
 to paint me all up, and how mother just gave it to me 
 afterwards? She thought the paint was awful, and she 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 95 
 
 thought the way I danced was awful, and the whole thing 
 was awful! You didn t inind one bit." 
 
 " Well er I don t know I probably didn t want 
 to say anything Mrs. Alexander began, somewhat 
 taken aback. 
 
 " Of course not. You realized that I was just trying 
 to to enter into the character, you know. I wanted to 
 be well artistically sincere," said the girl, hesitating 
 and colouring. " I know that sounds ridiculously affected 
 and and high-brow," she went on with a diffident laugh. 
 " But it was really so. Only imagine trying to make 
 mother see that ! She cant, that s all. You re different ; 
 you understand. Nobody ever did exactly that sort of 
 artistic thing when you were young; they didn t call 
 dancing one of the arts at all, I suppose. But that doesn t 
 keep you from thinking about it in a modern way, the 
 way people think nowadays. It s splendid to be so large- 
 minded and and emancipated/ 
 
 The emancipation was, perhaps, not quite so complete 
 as Sandra fancied. Hearing her, Mrs. Boardman sat 
 divided between amusement, uneasiness, a sneaking satis 
 faction in the girl s verdict on herself qualified by sym 
 pathy for her mother thus judged and dismissed offhand. 
 The old lady was acute enough to recognize every one of 
 these emotions, and surveyed them inwardly with caustic 
 mirth. She found herself not so " modern " but that these 
 theories and this " artistic " patter indefinably disturbed 
 her; what ideas were milling around in the child s head? 
 One could never guess what young people might be up 
 to nowadays. But after all, the world was theirs; their 
 lives were theirs ; and they must weather through by them 
 selves, come what, come may ! 
 
CHAPTEE VII 
 
 YOUNG Everett Boardman did not at once display 
 the turn for affairs possessed by his great-grand 
 father, pioneering old Jacob, or by his own father 
 Richard; even had he been stimulated in accordance with 
 the latter s whimsical wish by falling in love and wanting 
 to get married, it might not have operated to make a keen 
 business man out of him. But there is no telling for 
 Everett did not fall in love ; he worked along contentedly, 
 doing his exact share, no more and no less, as regular 
 in his habits as the oldest and most settled man in the 
 office, from whom, however, he differed conspicuously by 
 being much more of an ornament. Young Boardman was 
 one of the best looking and the best dressed young fellows 
 to be seen on " the Street " ! he had very pleasant manners, 
 plenty of fun, a manly liking for sport, an invulnerable 
 integrity he had, in short, so many good qualities that 
 it was impossible to believe he would not presently develop 
 one or two more. 
 
 " Give the boy a chance. He ll find himself after a 
 while. Of course he s a little slow and backward and 
 lacks push and initiative and doesn t seem to know what 
 he s here for, or to take all the interest he ought to; but 
 that s natural, he s so new to it. I d just as lief have him 
 that way as like some of these fresh lads that after they ve 
 been in the office a week, come breezing around telling 
 you how to run the business and just where you re making 
 mistakes and losing money. I ve seen that kind, too," 
 said Mr. Arnold, good-naturedly. He became very fond 
 
 of the young man, liking him for his good looks, his defer- 
 
 96 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 97, 
 
 ence to his elders, his decent and cleanly character, and 
 finally, or perhaps first of all for being the son of his 
 father for whom Mr. Arnold entertained a great friend 
 ship and respect. " Everett ll come out all right as soon 
 as he gets really started. It seems to take these college- 
 boys longer than the others. They have to find out that all 
 this Greek and trigonometry they ve been stuffing up for 
 four years isn t going to get em anything, and there isn t 
 any professor around to mark their papers and tell them 
 where they stand, and I expect they feel kind of surprised 
 and bothered, and don t know how to take hold. College 
 education is a good thing, of course, but it isn t prac 
 tical. It could be made practical, I believe, but they d 
 have to run the colleges along other lines from what they 
 do now," said Mr. Arnold, who was not a college-boy him 
 self far from it! He began his career at the age of 
 fourteen as elevator-boy in the old Masonic Temple 
 Building, and had pursued it with energy and success up 
 to the present time unhampered by much schooling of any 
 kind, except that bestowed gratis by years and years, ex 
 perience and hard work. 
 
 Everett liked him, too liked him well enough, that 
 is, though he sometimes wished that Mr. Arnold would 
 be more careful about taking off his hat when women 
 came into the office; and gave the family at home an 
 imitation of the " boss " getting something to eat at a 
 quick-lunch counter and the way he used his knife and 
 fork that sent Mrs. Richard and Sandra into fits of 
 laughter, and even drew an involuntary grin from Richard, 
 who disapproved of the exhibition. He thought the head 
 of a big business and a man to whom Everett was per 
 sonally indebted should be secure from this sort of rid 
 icule ; though the young man s humour was without malice 
 and he exercised it after the same fashion on everybody, 
 
98 THE BOAKDMAlsT FAMILY 
 
 high or low, visiting magnates, his brother clerks, those 
 in adjoining offices, the girl stenographers, the messenger- 
 boys, the very janitor and scrubwomen. " You see a 
 funny job-lot of people in business," he reported, wagging 
 his head. " I don t know where they all come from. You 
 never meet them anywhere else. You can t imagine wnat 
 their homes are like. Very nice respectable people, of 
 course, all of them/ he added quickly and generously. 
 " And by the way," said Everett, his thoughts evidently 
 leading him in a natural sequence from one group of 
 " funny " people to another " by the way, whom do 
 you think I ran into today, Sandra ? Why, Sam Thatcher, 
 of all men in the world! Kemember Sam? Big boy 
 with red hair and freckles. They used to live in our old 
 house." 
 
 " I remember him. He s Julia Thatcher s cousin," 
 said Sandra, rather shortly. Something in Everett s 
 manner grated on her. He would not speak of Julia in 
 that tone as if she belonged to the job-lot of nonentities, 
 she thought almost resentfully, and brought forward the 
 relationship in Sam s defence, as it were. But Everett 
 only laughed and said that was so ; he had forgotten that ; 
 he wondered what Miss Thatcher thought of having Sam 
 for a relative; they were such different sort of people. 
 He did not say that several hundred thousand dollars on 
 the George Thatcher side accounted for some of the differ 
 ences, because that idea did not occur to him, nor to 
 Sandra ; it was not in the Boardman creed to regard money 
 as capable of creating differences. He went on describing 
 his late encounter with interest and amusement. 
 
 " Sam s with the Victorgraph people. He goes around 
 selling the machines. It s a mystery to me how anybody 
 can do that get people to buy things of you, you know," 
 said Everett with a look of wonder and some distaste. 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 99 
 
 " Talk a thing up and brag and coax and palaver, and go 
 through all those huckstering tricks I m sure / never 
 could. But Sam seems to be perfectly happy and satis 
 fied. Talks about it all the time! Absolutely absorbed 
 in selling Victorgraphs to the exclusion of every other 
 interest though he did ask after you, Sandra. He said 
 he d seen you." 
 
 " Yes. It was months ago last spring some time 
 I forget when," said Sandra carelessly, though perhaps 
 her carelessness was not wholly geunine. " Didn t I tell 
 you ? I suppose I thought you wouldn t be interested." 
 
 " Well, I rather wish you had said something, because 
 it was a little embarrassing for a minute today when I 
 saw that he expected me to know all about him, and as a 
 matter of fact, I didn t know any more than the man in 
 the moon. However, I pretended, of course," said Ev 
 erett, who was always most scrupulous not to hurt any 
 body s feelings. " You knew about his Victorgraphs 
 then ? He must have talked about them to you, too. He 
 can t keep off the subject." 
 
 " Why, yes, a little but I thought it was very inter 
 esting," Sandra said, again on the defensive, she did not 
 know why. " I would have liked to hear more. He s 
 been to some such queer places." 
 
 Everett became more serious. " Yes, it s a kind of 
 pity that such opportunities for seeing the world have to 
 be wasted on a fellow like that. He reminds me of that 
 old story about the woman who remembered Kome or 
 Cairo because it was the place where she bought the silk 
 stockings ! Sam told me he had sold twenty-four Victor- 
 graphs in Honolulu. I asked him if he had seen that 
 wonderful volcano in the Hawaiian islands, and he said 
 yes, he d made a trip to it, and that it was just like 
 the descriptions you read, only they can t tell you all, ex- 
 
100 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 actly those are his words," and here Everett threw 
 back his head and laughed with thoroughgoing enjoyment. 
 " The next thing he got out a note-book and showed me a 
 little dictionary of Hawaiian or pidgin-English-French- 
 native words and phrases he had collected and written 
 down. " I don t like this interpreter business/ " Everett 
 quoted, mimicking admirably. " You don t get to ? em, 
 and having an interpreter all the time adds to your ex 
 pense-account. I ve made up my mind that after this 
 I ll always know a little of the language of every country 
 I strike. Why, I could sell a machine to every little 
 brown brother in the Pacific Islands if I could talk to 
 him, and I will yet before I m through with it. You 
 watch me ! Think of him with his red head inter 
 viewing a cannibal king with a missionary browning 
 over the coals for dinner while the Victorgraph grinds 
 out : Ah Don Wan To See Mali Baby Thrown Down ! " 
 
 Mr. Boardman laughed; but his face changed as he 
 asked Sam s age, and heard it placed at a scant two years 
 or so in advance of Everett s. " Well, it s not a bad thing 
 for a young man to be wrapped up in his work," he said. 
 
 " Yes, but you don t want him to talk about it the whole 
 time," said Everett fastidiously. " Other people don t 
 care to hear about it. Ordinarily that sort of thing is in 
 abysmally bad taste, but he was so funny unconsciously 
 funny, I mean that you didn t mind it for a little 
 while." 
 
 " I thought all the men ever talked about when they 
 were together was business," said his mother; and some 
 how that innocent remark ended the conversation as far 
 as concerned Sam Thatcher, that is, though it was uttered 
 in no such intention. Everett, after a minute, began to 
 speak of something else, and Sandra joined in, glad of 
 the change. She told herself frankly that she liked Sam 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 Mr. Thatcher, and disliked to hear him made fun of ; 
 Everett made him seem dull, whereas he was not in the 
 least dull; and he did not talk about his experiences all 
 the time, though if he should there would be some excuse, 
 for they were very unusual and entertaining. She won 
 dered, perhaps not for the first time, why, since he was 
 so lonesome and plainly so glad to see her that day, he 
 had not made some effort to see her again? It is easy 
 enough for men to see girls. 
 
 By a coincidence, the above great fundamental truth 
 must have just penetrated to the intelligence of Mr. Sam 
 uel Thatcher, for some time during the day, Sandra was 
 called to the telephone, and heard and knew at once the 
 young fellow s hearty voice, though it had an odd ring 
 of shyness and deference and anxiety, to which Sandra 
 in this era of familiar manners was sufficiently unaccus 
 tomed. She could fancy him colouring furiously and 
 standing before her pleased and bravely bashful as at their 
 drug-store meeting. He wanted to know with over 
 whelming diffidence if she remembered him (remembered 
 Mm!), and being assured on that point, if there was 
 " anything on " for that night ? If there wasn t, might 
 he come out ? He knew of course, that she was likely to 
 be knee-deep in engagements he didn t want to be in 
 the way the trouble was he only had a short time at 
 home he was just in from the road, and would have to 
 go out again Sunday to the Canal Zone, a couple of 
 months trip he thought he would like to see her this 
 time, if possible, before he left. This was the long-distance 
 he was talking to her over; he was up in JefFersonville. 
 If not tonight, maybe she would let him know what night 
 this week she would be at home? Sandra assured him 
 again ; there was nothing on for that night ; Everett had 
 told her he was back home; she heard he had a perfectly 
 
BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 wonderful time in Hawaii. Well, yes, it was some trip ; 
 he would tell her about it when he saw her ; he and 
 here another masculine voice intervened with sardonic 
 amiability advising him to tell it to her later, but to get 
 off the line now ! " You ve had your five minutes, honey- 
 boy," it remarked ; " and you can stick around tonight 
 telling her till the milk-wagons begin to run, if old scout 
 Pop don t object." Sandra slammed the instrument on 
 the hook and jumped up with a red face. " I didn t know 
 we had been talking that long I don t believe we did ! " 
 she thought violently; then tried to figure with some 
 uneasiness in spite of her steady championship how 
 he would look, act, be dressed. He certainly seemed to 
 be different from most of the other men she knew. Ev 
 erett was right about that, she was obliged to allow un 
 willingly. 
 
 However, when the Victorgraph hero rang the bell and 
 was ushered in that evening, he was entirely presentable 
 in any company; indeed he looked pleasingly big, fresh, 
 clean and strong, Sandra thought, and he had an em 
 inently civilized box of chocolates under one arm. He 
 had not brought any Hawaiian picture post-cards, or ko 
 daks or other banal trophies of adventure he was too 
 sophisticated or merely too sensible for that, at any rate. 
 Also he did not at once proceed to pour out the tale of 
 his commercial schemes and successes, although to be sure 
 he was with no great difficulty beguiled into talking about 
 himself what young man is too strong for that tempta 
 tion? When all was said, Sam did not seem disposed to 
 take himself too seriously ; Sandra decided that his humour 
 was not so unconscious as Everett had pronounced it. He 
 perceived the grotesque aspects of his achievements as 
 clearly and laughed at them with as keen a relish as any 
 outsider; yet he meant to succeed. The determination 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 103 
 
 " stuck out all over him " as the girl later reported to Mrs. 
 Alexander; she wondered at and admired and envied that 
 humorous force, that easy, unassuming yet resolute con 
 fidence in his own resources and his ultimate mastery of 
 circumstance. 
 
 " I wish I was a man. I d like to do things too," she 
 said, on top of these reflections, in sudden restlessness. 
 " It must be great." 
 
 Sam was puzzled. " Do things ? Why, I thought you 
 were doing something right along. I thought girls 
 your kind of girl, of course were on the dead jump 
 every minute. Parties and and dances, you know. 
 My little cousin Julia is the busiest ever." 
 
 " Oh, yes, but that gets to be tiresome after a while. 
 There s so much sameness. Sometimes we get very ener 
 getic and get up something for charity, or go down and 
 serve at the Woman s Exchange, or at the Art Students 
 League, or something like that. I have myself lots of 
 times, but it doesn t amount to anything; you re just 
 doing it because everybody else is doing it. There isn t 
 anything in it. I believe I d like work real work, the 
 same as a man s. Make-your-living work." 
 
 " Work ? You ? " said Sam. He gazed at her an 
 instant in silence, Sandra meeting his eyes unreservedly. 
 Her slim figure in a bright coloured dress rested among 
 some cushions in an old chair, at ease yet with an extra 
 ordinary effect of lightness ; she moved, clasped her hands, 
 or swung her foot, and it gave the impression of a com 
 mand of her muscles equally sure and facile. One could 
 not imagine that delicate grasp fumbling, that springy 
 step at fault. She work, indeed ! As well harness a 
 race-horse to the plough, or turn a fine sword-blade to 
 chipping kindlings, was what Sam thought, but had the 
 wisdom not to say. Coming from some one else he would 
 
104 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 receive these flowers of rhetoric with a certain distrust, 
 and so, no doubt, would she. 
 
 " Well, I ve seen something of women in business," he 
 said cautiously. " I meet them every once in a while. 
 They aren t exactly your style. I don t believe you d like 
 the life much." 
 
 " Oh, I don t mean I want to be a shop-girl, or a trained 
 nurse or anything like that, though of course that s 
 work " 
 
 " Yes, it is," said Sam soberly. 
 
 " I meant well, I don t know quite what," the girl 
 confessed with a rueful smile. " Something big and inde 
 pendent, I suppose. Bright of me, isn t it? I can t 
 really do anything." 
 
 " Oh, I expect you could if you tried," said Sam. 
 " But I hope you won t ever have to. I don t like it. 
 It s all wrong for a woman to get out in the world and 
 hustle for a living. If they fail, they worry themselves 
 to death, and if they succeed they get as hard as nails. 
 There s my sister Kate. She s been teaching for years, 
 and she s always made a good salary, and lived in a nice 
 way, and had about as good a time as anybody. She s 
 exceptionally successful. Now if she had been a man 
 it wouldn t have hurt her, or changed her unless for the 
 better ; a man that had got along as well as Kate has would 
 probably be a pretty good fellow. But she s just a stony 
 little old maid it s awful ! " said the young man with 
 so much horrified pity that Sandra, for the soul of her, 
 could not keep from laughing. " Oh, you may think it s 
 funny," he added, beginning to smile himself ; " but if 
 you could be with her once, you d understand. Even 
 her clothes have a hard, shiny, keep-off-the-grass sort of 
 look. You have a feeling that you can t make a dent on 
 her anywhere. It s unnatural." 
 
THE BOARDMAX FAMILY 105 
 
 Sandra fell back in fresh merriment. " Why her 
 
 u 
 
 clothes haven t got anything to do with it ! " 
 
 " Yes, they have ! " Sana asseverated stoutly. " She 
 thinks because she works like a man, she ought to dress 
 like a man. She might just as well have nice things all 
 soft and fluffy. That s the way women s clothes ought 
 to be." 
 
 Sandra sat upright among her cushions, flushing 
 slightly as she realized that this bit of description came 
 close to fitting her own toilette and surroundings, which 
 moreover as was evident from the expression of his honest 
 blue eyes were very much to Mr. Thatcher s taste. She 
 was about to point out that softness and fluffiness would 
 be misplaced at a teacher s desk, or in an oflice, when he 
 spoke again, this time to ask irrelevantly if she danced 
 as much as she used to? 
 
 " Oh, yes. They generally come after me to do some 
 stunt like that at entertainments amateur vaudeville 
 and things like that, you know. Ever so many of the girls 
 are taking up fancy dancing now, though. It s getting 
 to be a craze." 
 
 " Every time you move you make me think of how 
 you used to dance," said Sam, surveying her thought 
 fully. 
 
 " You used to dance too." 
 
 " I never was a star, though. Nobody ever suggested 
 that I could make a fortune on the stage. But I ve seen 
 plenty of them headliners, too, way up that couldn t 
 touch you." 
 
 Sandra incontinently bounced up and flourished him 
 an exaggerated curtsey. " Kind sir, I thank you ! " 
 
 The young man began to laugh, though his eyes were 
 full of a serious admiration. " There, that s just what 
 I mean," he declared ; " when you did that, you were 
 
106 THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 
 
 just like some kind of a little puff-ball as if there were 
 no weight to you at all ! " 
 
 They heard Everett whistling up the front steps and 
 his key in the door. He came in directly, hearing their 
 voices, and greeted Sam warmly, though glancing from 
 one to the other in a faint surprise, instantly sup 
 pressed with his careful courtesy. Sandra had not 
 warned the family of the impending visit. Why should 
 she, indeed ? Young men callers were no novelty. 
 Yet now for a single moment, she wished uncomfortably 
 that she had mentioned this one. Mr. Thatcher departed 
 ere long, and Everett, having closed the door on him, 
 came strolling back to the living-room fire with his hands 
 in his pockets and an amused quirk at the corners of 
 his lips. 
 
 " Well, well, evening-clothes and a flower in his button 
 hole. Quite doggish ! Can t tell him anything about 
 the proprieties, can you ? " 
 
 " You have on evening-clothes yourself, Ev." 
 
 " So I have, so I have ! " said Everett, affecting to look 
 himself over, and shaking his head as if disheartened 
 by the spectacle. " I don t come up to his level, though," 
 he sighed in defeat and resignation. 
 
 " I don t see why you re so down on Sam Thatcher 
 Mr. Thatcher ! " said his sister almost resentfully. 
 
 "Why, I m not down on him, San. I only think he s 
 funny. He seemed funnier than ever tonight all dressed 
 up and doing society. It doesn t suit him. You have 
 to be born to it, you have to be used to it all your life 
 from the beginning," said Everett, reasonably. There 
 could be no doubt that he himself had been " used to it 
 all his life from the beginning," even the most careless 
 observer would have known that. 
 
CHAPTEE VIII 
 
 YOUNG Thatcher, having made a fairly promising 
 start, continued to " do society " as exemplified 
 by attentions to Miss Boardman as persistently as his 
 lengthening and far-flung absences would allow. During 
 the brief intervals at home, he was for ever taking her 
 to the theatre, to the ball-game, to the automobile-races, 
 to the Horse-Show; he was lavish in flowers and candies; 
 she was the first person he called up on reaching town, 
 and the last of whom he took leave; and while away, 
 lest she forget, he wrote her surprisingly entertaining 
 letters with descriptions of queer scenes and encounters 
 interspersed with close and good-humoured comment on 
 the world as he found it that made very acceptable read 
 ing. Sandra showed some of them to her grandmother. 
 Inevitably rumour began to be busy with their two names, 
 and, as usual, met with all kinds of receptions, unexpect 
 edly warm and unexpectedly cool. For example Miss 
 Susie Thatcher, contrary to what might have been looked 
 for, when sundry friends benevolently undertook to en 
 lighten her, waved the matter aside without the smallest 
 show of jealousy, philosophical beyond belief! 
 
 " O, I know all about Sam courting the Boardman 
 girl," she said. " I guess she s a right nice girl, she was 
 real cute when she was little, along about ten or eleven 
 years old, coming to dancing-school. I used to see con 
 siderable of her then, not so much since she grew up, of 
 course. She s a society girl, and I m old enough to be 
 her mother anyway. But she comes of nice folks. 
 
 107 
 
108 THE BOAKDMAN" FAMILY 
 
 Father liked Mr. Boardnian. If Sam s taken a notion 
 to her, I don t see why it shouldn t be all right. I m 
 not crazy to see him married, but my goody, I can t 
 expect him to sit around with an old maid sister all his 
 natural life! Suppose he came bringing home a some 
 body from Korea or Patagonia or any of those outlandish 
 places he goes to ! It wouldn t make any difference how 
 I felt, I wouldn t say anything. I d treat her just as 
 nice as I knew how. But if it s going to be one of our 
 own home girls, I m just that much better pleased." 
 
 Mrs. George Thatcher but it was never possible 
 to say just what Mrs. George Thatcher thought; she did 
 not permit herself much leeway in the expression of feel 
 ings or enthusiasms, and besides in society one does not 
 become excited over anything, certainly not over the 
 prospect of a distant alliance with ahem ! another 
 old and elevated family. So Mrs. George only smiled dis 
 creetly when the subject came up ; it might be true oh, 
 no, she did not know anything positive about it Miss 
 Boardman was a charming girl Mr. Thatcher s nephew 
 a very nice, manly young fellow Julia was on tiptoe 
 with suspense! And so on, ending with a little laugh 
 which dismissed the matter. However, she asked them 
 both to her dinner preceding the Holiday Ball, though 
 she had taken scarcely any notice of Mr. Thatcher s manly 
 young nephew for years, and had been known to intimate 
 tactfully that Sandra Boardman s set of girls were really 
 a little too old for Julia ; and they went to the dinner and 
 to the Ball afterwards and had a memorable evening. 
 Mrs. George was the most agreeable of chaperons and 
 deservedly popular with the young people. 
 
 Nobody would ever know what were Mrs. Alexander 
 Boardman s views either. She displayed none of the 
 curiosity or of the garrulity of old age, and could have 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 109 
 
 been trusted with any secret. Mrs. Richard, of course, 
 would have sliced off her tongue, she would have perished 
 where she stood rather than betray any suspicion of what 
 was going forward. She was a. good woman, devoted to 
 her daughter, and as far from being a snob as from being 
 a money -worshipper; nevertheless it was at about this time 
 that she began to speak of twenty-four or -five as the suit 
 able and sensible age for a girl to be married (she used to 
 favour twenty-one !) and to point out that class distinctions 
 in our democratic country and in this day of lightning 
 mutations were absurd; it made no difference of what 
 humble stock a person came, it was only he himself that 
 counted all of which was so true that no one stopped to 
 remark what revolutionary doctrine it was for Mrs. Rich 
 ard Chase Boardman, who had been an Everett, to be 
 promulgating! As for Richard, he may have been too 
 deeply engrossed in business for the gossip to have reached 
 him; very likely he would have pooh-pooh d it after the 
 ridiculous and pathetic fashion of fathers, on the ground 
 that Sandra and the Thatcher boy were both too young to 
 be dreaming of marriage ; wasn t it but yesterday that she 
 was running around in socks with her head of black hair 
 bobbed off like a small black silk tassel ? Married non 
 sense ! Poor Richard ! Everett supported his father, 
 however, by pooh-poohing the idea too, though for a dif 
 ferent reason. 
 
 " No doubt that Thatcher s in earnest," he said to his 
 mother privately. " He shows all the signs. But San 
 will never take him in the world! " 
 
 " Don t you think so ? " asked the lady anxiously. 
 
 Everett made a grimace. " Oh, never ! She s just 
 having a good time, the way girls do sometimes. I don t 
 know that it s altogether fair to him I d rather Sandra 
 didn t encourage him. She oughtn t to have let him get 
 
110 THE BOARDMAJST FAMILY 
 
 so far, but I daresay it happened so gradually she didn t 
 realize it," the young man said, criticizing reluctantly and 
 humanely as was his wont. " But you can t say anything 
 to her. You can t stop it now. Our friend Samuel will 
 have to stand up and take his medicine, I m afraid." 
 
 " That s a pity. He he seems to be very nice." 
 Mrs. Richard murmured in a troubled and regretful voice. 
 " Somebody was saying the other day that he was quite 
 a a rising young man. Bright and successful, I think 
 they said. I I suppose he makes money, you know," 
 she hinted guiltily. 
 
 " I shouldn t wonder. He s that kind. Probably 
 thinks money is the biggest thing in the world ! " Everett 
 said with contempt. " Don t you worry though, Mother. 
 He s impossible, and Sandra knows it. She ll turn him 
 down." 
 
 " Oh, yes, of course. I m not worrying," said his 
 mother in spite of which assuring words, poor Mrs. 
 Lucy s countenance took on a very downcast and disap 
 pointed look, as soon as her son s back was turned. 
 
 Everett was right in one respect, at least ; whether as re 
 garded Sandra, who can tell ? Perhaps not even Sandra 
 herself. But Sam was in earnest. The straightforward 
 young fellow could not conceal it ; he scarcely tried, nor 
 had he any notion of the excuses, apologies and explana 
 tions Mrs. Richard made for him in the character of her 
 daughter s suitor. Sam was too kind-hearted and rather 
 too shrewd to take offence at her, had he known ; he would 
 merely have thought her foolish and a little funny. What 
 if Sandra was a Boardman with a bunch of old grand 
 fathers and grandmothers going back to the year One? 
 What earthly difference did that make? They had 
 nothing to do with her or him. He thought she was the 
 daintiest and dearest girl he had ever known; take her 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 111 
 
 any way you chose, watch, her dance, listen to her talk, 
 you would have to acknowledge that there was nobody 
 like her, nobody who approached her. She could say the 
 brightest things, and do so much on such different lines 
 and do it all so well; and with it all was not a bit vain, 
 but just as sweet and frank and full of fun and and 
 Sam exhausted his adjectives. He was dead in love, the 
 young man said to himself, reddening, with a half laugh ; 
 he was probably behaving like an absolute fool, but who 
 cares, he asked defiantly. It was nothing to be ashamed 
 of; if she liked him well enough, why shouldn t they 
 get married? He could take care of her, that was one 
 certain thing; he wouldn t think of asking her otherwise. 
 You had to have money to get married nowadays; this 
 love-in-a-cottage business didn t go any more. That was 
 right, too ; that was common-sense. Well, he made plenty 
 for two people to live on and maybe one or two more, 
 he thought, reddening again, all to himself. Live well, 
 too; he could give Sandra anything her father was able 
 to give her and here Sam glanced aside from his own 
 affairs long enough to wonder why Mr. Boardman didn t 
 retire. He looked ready to, and he must have got enough 
 by this time. Some men keep on and die in the harness, 
 though, and that might be the better way. "At any 
 rate, by the time I get to his age I mean to be fixed so 
 I won 4 have to worry," Samuel told himself with an 
 arrogance which he tempered the next moment by adding 
 prudently : " if my luck holds out." He did not feel 
 much afraid of announcing his candidacy for membership 
 in the family to Sandra s father. " I ll bet my bank- 
 account s as big as his this minute ! " he thought, revert 
 ing to the main issue. 
 
 He spent a good deal of time trying to make up his 
 mind what he would say to her, how he would go about 
 
112 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 offering himself. Once lie tried to write, but that was 
 so desperate a failure that after a dozen beginnings, Sam 
 threw all the scrawled papers into the trash-basket, dis 
 gusted. He was in San Francisco at the moment, very 
 lonely in the big hotel; the firm were going to send him 
 to Europe next, he knew ; that would make a nice wedding- 
 trip ; neither of them had ever been over there. If Sandra 
 said yes ! Maybe they d want him to start right away, 
 though, and girls always had to have a lot of things, new 
 clothes and all that. Well, she could get them over there 
 in Paris, by George ! She d like that. They would 
 go to the Opera, and to all those queer restaurants and 
 places you read about in the novels, and to the summer- 
 resorts on the coast of Normandy or wherever they were, 
 and to that gambling-place, Monte Carlo. They d put in 
 a good time, Sandra and he ! The gleaming prospect en 
 livened the rest of his stay, and he continued to plan 
 about it in a happy and hopeful excitement all the way 
 back, as his sleeper climbed the Sierras, climbed the Eock- 
 ies, rumbled across the continent towards Denver, Chicago, 
 Home. 
 
 Well, man proposes! Sam was only one of hundreds 
 of young fellows all over the country who were meditating 
 the same project; nine-tenths of them probably carried 
 it out and were married and lived happily ever after. 
 It seems hard that he should not have been of their number. 
 For Sandra might have said yes ; the family could scarcely 
 have raised any serious objection ; Society would have been 
 ready with congratulations, candlesticks, silver salad- 
 bowls, bibelots without end; this chapter would have 
 wound up with the famous strains from Lohengrin in a 
 mist of frock-coats, festive hats, smilax and bride-roses, 
 champagne and rice all this might have been had not 
 an unreasonable fate ruled otherwise. Unconscious that 
 
THE BOAKDMAIST FAMILY 113 
 
 it was dogging or lying in wait fur him, Samuel reached 
 home late one night there was a hi>ty cold luncheon 
 on the table, and {Susie was sitting up for him, in a kimono 
 with her hair in curlers, and the telegram announcing his 
 coming clutched in her hand as it had been ever since its 
 arrival and the next day he arose and went down to 
 Victorgraph headquarters, and held a long consultation 
 with his superiors in the inner office; and later declining 
 an invitation to the manager s club, started off for the 
 Woman s Exchange, a choice which moved his acquaint 
 ances in the salesroom to wonder and some mild ribaldry. 
 They warned him against corrupt associations and excess 
 in eating, wanted to know if he was celebrating on account 
 of his return, if he had gone on the water-wagon, etc. 
 "Why, I like the Exchange Tea-Room first-rate, that s 
 why I go," said Sam, defending himself as best he might. 
 " They have nice home-cooking, you know, chicken- 
 pies He escaped, pursued by the penetrating remark 
 that it might be chicken he was after, but not in pies, 
 which was a little too near the truth to suit the gentleman. 
 The Exchange was lodged upstairs over a row of small 
 shops built along the street on what had once been the 
 esplanade in front of the Old Church of Our Saviour. 
 This space had become too valuable there in the middle 
 of the business district to be left unoccupied and unpro 
 ductive; but the architects with a fine feeling both 
 aesthetic and reverent contrived to render the money-chang 
 ers on the steps of the temple as inoffensive as possible, 
 what with decorative gables, casement-windows, and a 
 grave arched entrance to the church itself. Miner trades 
 men, a jeweller, a florist, a stationer and so on had the 
 shops along the sidewalk, overhead the Exchange set out 
 its tables in three or four low-ceil inged rooms of 
 fascinatingly irregular shape with alcoves and bay- 
 
114 THE BOAKDMAST FAMILY 
 
 windows and snug little corners here and there, which 
 caused many people to proclaim it the quaintest and most 
 attractive tea-room in town. Moreover, it was a place 
 where you saw everybody you knew; it was like going 
 to an afternoon reception ; the lady patronesses took turns 
 at superintending for a week ; there were always charming 
 and novel trifles to buy, and one had the sensation of help 
 ing some poor and deserving person, more than likely a 
 gentlewoman whom it would have been impossible to help 
 any other way. 
 
 None of these arguments had any weight with young 
 Mr. Thatcher, however ; he was not going to the Exchange 
 because it was picturesque or fashionable or philanthropic 
 not he ! The hypocrite did not even care a rap for 
 the home-cooking; if taste in eating were to be consulted 
 Sam would much have preferred a glass of beer and a 
 huge, half-raw beefsteak Beamaise at the Cafe Metropole. 
 He had other and very different reasons for patronizing 
 the Exchange, and then too the same inexorable fate may 
 have helped him to the decision who knows ? He 
 walked up the stairs casting a glance on the way at the 
 jeweller s window where there was a blazing big solitaire 
 diamond which would have looked well on a hand he knew 
 of and ajb the top, entering the tea-room, ran into not 
 the light slight figure he was looking out for, with the 
 trim skirts and shirtwaist and the smartly twisted black 
 hair alack, no ! Instead, it was somebody weighing 
 upwards of a hundred pounds more and in trousers to boot, 
 namely: his uncle George! 
 
 " Hello, Sam ! " said this one, cordially. " Going "West, 
 I hear. Hey ? What, you ve been been and come 
 back ? Well, I can t keep track of you any more. Here s 
 a table, sit down here. Let s see what they ve got that s 
 good today." He fixed the eyeglasses on his big, strong 
 
THE BOAEDMAJST FAMILY 115 
 
 nose, and surveyed the card with an expression which 
 moved Sam to inquire if he came there often? 
 
 " Well, between ourselves, not any oftener than I can 
 help," said George, dropping his voice and glasses at the 
 same time as he leaned across the table with a look of 
 humorous secrecy. " I have to, once in a while, to please 
 your Aunt Mattie, you know. She s interested in this 
 thing all the ladies are. They all come down here and 
 help run it. They even have the girls helping too, behind 
 the counters, when they get into a rush." 
 
 " Do they ? " said Sam in accents of vast surprise, the 
 while his gaze roamed disappointedly about the place. 
 "You don t say so!" 
 
 " Sure. Julia s done it. They don t wait on the tables, 
 of course, but just over there where they sell the crochet- 
 work and fancy stuff. Take a chicken-pie, Sam, that s 
 about as good as anything they have. Believe I ll have a 
 tumbler of buttermilk " 
 
 " Is Julia here today ? They seem to be pretty busy," 
 Sam asked innocently. He had understood Sandra to 
 say in her last letter that she might have to officiate at 
 about this time ; but she was nowhere to be seen, although 
 their table, backed into the corner between a pillar and 
 a hatrack commanded almost all of the room. He would 
 telephone her after lunch and go out to the house tonight ; 
 but if there was a chance of seeing her in the meantime, 
 he didn t want to miss it. 
 
 " Why, yes, Julia was coming down, and then she said 
 something about something else having turned up I 
 don t remember what it was now. She was going to get 
 Miss Boardman or somebody to take her place, that s the 
 last I heard," said Mr. Thatcher, callously scoring down 
 chicken-pie, buttermilk, hot rolls, and apple meringue on 
 the order-pad, just as if he had not that instant breathed 
 
116 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 the most wonderful name on earth. " Good trip, Sam \ 
 You ought to be getting to be quite a salesman by this 
 time." 
 
 " I m pretty fair," said Sam with becoming modesty. 
 " The machines sell themselves really. Well, I d like to 
 have seen Julia. But Miss Boardman doesn t seem to be 
 here either." 
 
 Mr. Thatcher looked around. " No. Great business, 
 hey ? " said he with a grunt of good-natured and indulgent 
 sarcasm. " These girls ! Dependable, aren t they ? It s 
 lucky they aren t working for their living." And then, 
 following up some subconscious connection of ideas, he 
 added casually : " There s a man that s gone back a lot 
 these last few years .Dick Boardman." 
 
 " Hey ? "said Sam, a little startled. " Gone back how ? " 
 
 " Why, lost his grip, you know. That happens to men 
 sometimes, when they get a little past their prime," ex 
 plained Mr. Thatcher, forgetting that he himself was of 
 Dick Boardman s generation. " Oh, yes he s not the man 
 he was. It s quite noticeable at times. Not that he s 
 failed, of course; a man don t fail as early as sixty, un 
 less his health is bad, and I don t think anything s the 
 matter with Boardman that way. He s just got slow, 
 and everything seems to be terribly hard work for him. 
 You go to him and try to get him to go into anything, or 
 to do anything, and you ll find he can t; he can t get 
 started somehow. He ll put you off next month 
 next year that sort of talk. That s a sure sign. An 
 active man with all his faculties in good working order 
 don t put things off. He knows that anything he can do 
 next year he can do this year." 
 
 Sam was struck by this aphorism. "That s so! 
 That s one of the first things you have to learn," he said, 
 with the conviction of experience. 
 
THE LOAKmiAX FAMILY 117 
 
 " Yeah. And when you let yo, as I say, that s a sure 
 sign. That s what makes ine think he s done. He s 
 through, I guess. It s a pity. 1 hate to see as good a 
 man as Eoardman s been go like that," said George 
 Thatcher, peppering and salting and beginning to eat with 
 an appetite not at all impaired by his philosophical re 
 grets; the ranks were for ever thinning and closing up 
 again, how often in twenty-five years of business life 
 had he beheld that spectacle ! " They all know it in his 
 office they don t talk about it, of course, but they know 
 it." 
 
 " Well, now, I never noticed anything. I ve never tried 
 to do any business with Mr. Boardman, though," said 
 Sam concerned. 
 
 " Oh, there s nothing wrong with him. I didn t mean 
 to give you that impression," said his uncle hastily. " It s 
 only that he s not like he used to be hasn t got the life 
 and energy. No get up, no push, no snap to him any 
 more. That g all I meant." 
 
 " He doesn t have to work anyhow, I expect. He must 
 have enough to quit on." 
 
 " Nobody s got enough to quit nowadays," said the 
 older man sententiously. " Say you do make some money 
 those things are always exaggerated, and everybody 
 always supposes a man has a great deal more than he s 
 really got but say you do make money, you never know 
 where you are or who s going to take a crack at you next. 
 The cost of living going up steadily, and a pack of damn 
 fools tinkering with the laws all the time; I tell you 
 you can t afford to quit. I doubt if Boardman can any 
 how. He s alwnys made a good income probably, but he 
 can t have been able to save very much with that expensive 
 family that is urn - Mr. Thatcher interrupted 
 himself as memory nudged him; Mattie had said some- 
 
118 THE BOAEDMAIST FAMILY 
 
 thing about Sam and the Boardman girl ! " He s a very 
 fine man still nice people all the Boardmans ! " he 
 wound up rather lamely. 
 
 They went on talking about other things; two or three 
 acquaintances drifted in; the place was quite full by the 
 time they got up to go. And then Sam, having resigned 
 himself to the fact that Sandra was not there and not 
 coming, was on his way to ask the whereabouts of the 
 telephone-booth, when around the corner from the very 
 table where he and his uncle had lately been seated, he 
 came upon her ! 
 
 She was in a chair by one of the tables and must have 
 been having luncheon herself, for the dishes, scarcely 
 touched, were still before her; she sat staring at them 
 with a listless and absent air very unusual with her, 
 Sam noticed in the half-second before she sprang up and 
 greeted him. So he was back! Four weeks! Had it 
 been a perfectly grand trip ? Well, of course, he had been 
 there before, still it must always be interesting. Yes, 
 she had got his last letter, but she wasn t certain about 
 the day what ? She had said she might be down here 
 at the Exchange? The idea of his remembering that! 
 She had just mentioned it, she didn t dream he would 
 come Sandra grew bright pink under his eyes, and 
 laughed and rattled along in a style not natural to her. 
 Yes, she had been there quite a while, sitting right there, 
 it was funny they hadn t seen each other sooner. Wasn t 
 that his uncle that just went out ? Tonight ? Why, of 
 course ! She flashed off to her station behind the counters, 
 leaving Sam elate yet disturbed. In spite of her insistent 
 gaiety, he was assailed by dim fears that all was not 
 right; she might not be well, she had looked so tired and 
 out of spirits just now when she was sitting there alone, 
 thinking nobody saw her. 
 
CHAPTEE IX 
 
 MOST men, by the time they have arrived at mature 
 years, are willing to accept the fact that nearly all 
 their gods and goddesses ! have clay feet. When 
 all s said, it is not an uncomfortable discovery; in my 
 heart of hearts I do not want anybody, not even my par 
 ticular deity much less my next-door neighbour, to be per 
 fect ; his imperfections somehow give me a little room for 
 my own. But, as has been hinted, this philosophical 
 spirit is, generally speaking, masculine; the ladies will 
 be for ever looking for perfection or thinking they have 
 found it; and when the average father, son, brother or 
 husband takes a sober survey of himself upon the pedestal 
 where his womenkind have placed him, it must be with 
 an extraordinary hodge-podge of irritation, tenderness, 
 amusement and some shame. There is no telling what 
 would be his sensations on finding his dummy tumbled 
 down, because he never knows when that catastrophe oc 
 curs; the women guard it from him as carefully as they 
 guard it from the outside public. For that matter, given 
 half an excuse, they will try desperately to hide the 
 damage from themselves. 
 
 So now Sandra, a tragi-comic figure, sat before the 
 fragments of the super-father she had been brought up 
 to believe in, making futile efforts to patch him together 
 and replace him above the altar. It does not need to be 
 told that she had overheard every word of Mr. Thatcher s ; 
 in fact, she had been sitting there in unintentional con- 
 
 119 
 
120 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 cealment behind the hats and overcoats for some minutes 
 before the two gentlemen came in. Her own name was 
 spoken; and before she could move or announce herself, 
 the mischief was done. Down crashed poor Eichard 
 Boardman from his high niche; her father, the family 
 oracle, the ultimate power, the source of wisdom and 
 dollars, gave place in a twinkling as though honest George 
 had uttered some diabolical spell instead of his not 
 unkind statements to a man aging bodily and mentally 
 whose judgments were no longer stable, whose fortunes 
 were on the wane. In the first flash of unwelcome en 
 lightenment, Sandra s imagination nimbly reeled off be 
 fore her a film wherein bankruptcy courts, tenements, and 
 charity-homes were the least appalling features. If her 
 father grew to be totally unfit for business, or rather when 
 he grew to be, for the dire day must be approaching, what 
 would become of them all, what was going to happen, what 
 would they do ? She would have set the other man s 
 words down to envy or personal dislike or mere lack of 
 insight, but there was something dishearteningly convinc 
 ing about his compassionate indifference; one could not 
 associate it with ill-will or stupidity. He was right; 
 she began shrinkingly .to recall a hundred small signs she 
 herself had noticed and let pass, not knowing to what they 
 pointed. It could only be a matter of time until others 
 besides Mr. Thatcher noticed them too and then what ? 
 She thought of her mother and grandmother and wondered 
 if they knew; the feminine instinct advised her that even 
 if they did, they would not betray it to her. Nor would 
 she betray it; her father should never know that she 
 realized he was a failure, a broken man. He had always 
 been so good and kind ; and what had they been, she her 
 self and all the rest of them ? An expensive f amily, Mr. 
 Thatcher said, and he was right again. It was a scorch- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 121 
 
 ing appraisal that Sandra reviewed a good many times 
 that afternoon. 
 
 Let nobody laugh. She was not altogether funny with 
 her ignorance and her exaggerations; she was only a 
 " nice " girl, a finished specimen of her class. The girl 
 at the cashier s desk who was five years younger actually, 
 and ten years older in experience, capacity for work and 
 practical knowledge of the world, would have felt no such 
 dismay at the same information about her father; the 
 young women who waited on the tables would have gone 
 on serenely planning how to stretch their exiguous in 
 comes after they had paid Ma their board and helped 
 out with little Johnny s school-expenses to cover a pair 
 of silk stockings or a new hat, most likely ; they and 
 Miss Cashier had seen so much of incompetent or broken- 
 down fatherhood in their homespun lives that the spectacle 
 had lost its terrors. To have a job and to be emphatically 
 " on " it were the things of real importance from their 
 standpoint ; come death or the devil, there is no frighten 
 ing a woman who has a job and is intent on keeping it. 
 Poor Sandra, in her preoccupation, could not even stay 
 " on " the very simple job assigned to her that afternoon, 
 but made a dozen mistakes in reading price-tags, handling 
 change, tying up packages. She was planning, in the most 
 unselfish and at the same time the most self-centred way 
 in the world, what she could do to stem the oncoming 
 flood of calamity; it did not occur to her that a practical 
 move would have been to discharge thoroughly the duties 
 of her present position, if only as a means of accustoming 
 herself to work and responsibility. 
 
 She started home, still planning, even getting as far 
 as the conversation in which she would first lead up to, 
 and then announce, her intentions to the family. It would 
 have to be done, of course, with the utmost care ; none of 
 
122 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 them must suspect her recent discovery, least of all her 
 poor father already it was " poor father " with Sandra ! 
 There would be a tempest of objections which, however, 
 she would deal with resolutely. Everett would be the 
 hardest to win over, or better say, to ride over, for no 
 body would be really won. If Ev knew what she knew 
 and he might have found out just as she had he would 
 be sure to think any such enterprise as she contemplated 
 a direct slur upon himself; he was so touchy when the 
 women of his family were concerned, he would be so 
 anxious to save them from the hard contacts of the world, 
 to continue them in their blissful ignorance, the same 
 expensive drones they had always been. Sandra was very 
 fond of her brother; she admired him and had confidence 
 in him, but with a kind of ingenuous shrewdness, she 
 judged that in these circumstances Everett could do 
 nothing more and was no better prepared than herself. 
 It would be years, she thought, before he could make 
 enough to take care of them; it was all he could do to 
 take care of himself now. If he had been as lucky as 
 Sam Thatcher but it was impossible to figure Everett 
 succeeding in Sam Thatcher s place. 
 
 And here, it cannot be denied that one way out of some 
 of the difficulties, one escape from responsibility as far as 
 she herself was concerned, presented itself to Sandra. It 
 was the way the Mid-Victorians would have chosen 
 even her mother, even her grandmother. The poor things 
 knew of scarcely any other. And she liked Sam. That 
 was just it, Sandra thought, flushing with sudden 
 humiliated revolt. She liked him too well to marry him ; 
 it was too ignobly easy, too convenient. Besides, just 
 now, for an oddity, she was beginning to be conscious of 
 a subtle elation; the prospect of work, independence and 
 helpfulness somehow charmed and flattered ; the adventure 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 123 
 
 beckoned. And, remembering vaguely some heroic plati 
 tude about Life flinging down the gage which she must 
 have heard in a baccalaureate address, she pictured herself 
 taking it up proud, fearless, successful and applauded! 
 
 Nevertheless, it required a certain daring for her to take 
 what was obviously the first practical step on the course 
 she had already laid out, that is: to call at Mr. Matson s 
 on her way home. Her impulse was to put the visit 
 off until tomorrow ; but common-sense or mere impatience 
 counselled that there was no time like the present. Sandra 
 had enough sense of humour or ironic perception to smile 
 a little as she felt her confidence wavering. If it took all 
 this screwing-up to tell Mr. Matson and ask his advice, 
 what sort of spirit would she show when attempting to 
 carry her scheme through, she reflected, going up the well- 
 known steps. The darky porter who had been there so 
 many years knew her and let her in with a smiling flourish ; 
 full many a tip had he received from Miss Boardman and 
 from divers young gentlemen with whom she had 
 practised special dances for special occasions, and his 
 famous remark : " Pears lak dey ain t quite so much 
 goin on in our set this wintah as usual, Mistah Everett, 
 suh," quoted everywhere by that admirable mimic, had 
 become a classic. Sandra went into the familiar little 
 office on the right where appointments were made; it 
 served as a cloakroom, too, for parties and on exhibition- 
 nights; she had entered it scores of times to make ready 
 for some public appearance, but never in such a state of 
 excitement as now. A lesson was going on in the next 
 room on the other side of the sliding doors. Sandra 
 could hear the Yictorgraph one of Sam s Victorgraph s, 
 no doubt grinding out syncopated melody, and Mr. Mat- 
 son s voice; " One and, two and, turn, step out, turn, step 
 out. ..." What would it be like to keep that up with 
 
124 THE BOAKDMA^ FAMILY 
 
 successive batches of pupils day in and day out, all your 
 life ? Mr. Matson had been on the stage, it was known, had 
 probably cut a spirited figure, heard the sound of clapping 
 hands, responded to a curtain-call and this was what he 
 had come to, or had deliberately chosen ! The perspective 
 was not exhilarating; still, one can stand a good deal for 
 five dollars an hour, thought the girl with a new-born 
 philosophy, that augured not ill. 
 
 After all, the interview went off well enough that is 
 to say, it was not nearly so embarrassing as Sandra had 
 expected, perhaps because her assumption of this new 
 role was not so important an event as she had naively 
 imagined; Mr. Matson listened to her with a matter-of- 
 fact air which relieved even while it slightly disconcerted. 
 She had the grace to laugh at herself afterwards. What 
 ever her ancient teacher thought of Sandra s proposed 
 activities, whether he took the business for the vagary 
 of a rich, idle, bored, novelty-chasing young woman, or 
 whether he recognized her to be in earnest, he was too 
 worldly-wise or too humane, or it is even possible too 
 much interested not to give her serious attention and good 
 counsel. Sandra went home with a sheaf of what he 
 called " literature," letters, circulars and what-not pertain 
 ing to the subject, and dressed for the evening studying 
 them. At dinner she was so preoccupied that she forgot 
 to watch for those signs of decay in her father which 
 as it had seemed to her a few hours earlier must be 
 multiplying with sad rapidity; and when she reminded 
 herself, it suddenly became impossible to believe that any 
 thing was the matter with him, or that she, Sandra, was 
 presently going to be the sole prop and stay of the family ! 
 Even with Mr. Matson s literature stowed behind the sofa- 
 cushions in the parlour ready for further reading, even 
 with his practical suggestions still in her ears, her project 
 
THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 125 
 
 took on an air of inconsequence like a thousand other 
 projects about summer-trips or new dresses which she was 
 in the habit of dreaming over without any expectation 
 of carrying them out. There everybody sat, looking just 
 as usual. Grandma and Mother playing a game of 
 double-solitaire which they had invented between them, 
 Daddy reading " Joseph Vance " the novel recently out 
 by that new-old English writer, with intermittent short 
 naps; he often fell asleep nowadays over a book or maga 
 zine, but so did Sandra herself sometimes. Against this 
 comfortable, everyday background she and her plans all at 
 once became preposterous; thus it had always been, thus 
 it always would be; nothing had ever happened or could 
 happen to alter their scheme of life ; it was as firm-rooted 
 and unassailable as the everlasting hills. As if she could 
 do anything ! As if any effort on her part were needed ! 
 
 " Is anybody coming this evening, Sandra ? " her mother 
 asked, shuffling the cards. 
 
 " No. Oh, yes ! Mr. Thatcher." 
 
 " Oh," said Mrs. Richard, and began laying out the 
 pack afresh. It was a minute or more before she said with 
 her eyes fixed on the cards, as she adjusted them with 
 elaborate precision. " That grey foulard never has looked 
 well since it was cleaned. It seemed to change the colour 
 somehow, so it s not so becoming as it was at first. I m 
 afraid you ll have to give up wearing it." 
 
 " Oh, it s all right," said Sandra curtly. She got up 
 and went into the parlour in a sharp change of mood. 
 Her mother s words, translated into plain speech, advised 
 her to dress herself with greater care and look her best 
 so as to captivate Sam Thatcher so Sandra thought in 
 contempt of the out-of-date maternal guile. Anybody 
 could see through Mother. That was the way they did in 
 her day; and to be sure, girls practised the same or kindred 
 
126 THE BOAEDMA^ FAMILY 
 
 wiles now, but they were more straightforward about it, 
 they didn t try to cover it up with silly excuses; they 
 would even make fun of themselves for doing it. They 
 had more sense. Grey dress, indeed! Her mother was 
 probably about to hint in the same foolishly round 
 about manner that she put on her old-rose. Anybody 
 would suppose that the whole end and aim of a girl s life 
 was to catch some man. And why was Mother so anxious 
 all of a sudden for her to take Sam? Sandra, recalling 
 other occasions on which the elder lady had put in an 
 over-eager oar to help him along, grew grave. Rarely 
 does the American parent venture upon any interference 
 in these matters, so that to Sandra this behaviour of her 
 mother s seemed so extreme that she could only connect 
 it gloomily with her late discoveries. " Poor Moms ! 
 She has an idea of getting me settled and safe anyhow, 
 before Father goes to pieces ! " thought the girl ; and for 
 the second time that day : " That was the way all the 
 women used to do marry somebody, some poor fellow, 
 it didn t make any difference who. They couldn t help it ; 
 they didn t have half the chance then that they do now." 
 She fished out the circulars, and plunged into them again, 
 all her resolutions revived. 
 
 Sam found her in the middle of this reading on his 
 arrival an hour later; the ill-starred youth had shaved 
 and groomed himself to the last nicety, and was rather 
 nervous and voluble, with that headligbt of a solitaire 
 four hundred and fifty, he had furtively gone in and priced 
 it glimmering, so to speak, from the recesses of his 
 mind. He saw nothing amiss with the grey foulard; it 
 had a large white collar rolling back from Sandra s slim 
 throat, and deep white cuffs, all of which Sam thought 
 very tasteful, though indeed he abjectly admired every 
 thing she wore; and sitting by the lamp among her 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 127 
 
 cushions and circulars, she seemed to him "like a real 
 little home girl," he said fondly to himself. It occurred 
 to him that that might be a pretty good way to begin 
 to tell her she looked like a home girl would lead up to the 
 subject. And so, after the first perfunctory words, and 
 after he had gone into the other room and said a how- 
 d ye-do to her seniors with whom he had reasons for wish 
 ing to stand well, and had escaped from their uninteresting 
 civilities after all this, Samuel finally got himself down 
 in the chair in front of Sandra, and fidgeting a little with- 
 first one foot crossed on his knee and held in his hands 
 and then the other, began: 
 
 " It s great to get back. Seeing you sitting there gives 
 me more of a home feeling than than my own home 
 even ! " 
 
 " Gracious ! " ejaculated Sandra inwardly, with a slight 
 panicky feeling. " That doesn t sound very appreciative 
 of your sister," she announced primly. 
 
 " Oh, Susie s all right she s the best sister ever. 
 But you you re different, you know," said Sam, wonder 
 ing within him how he could sit there and utter such an 
 imbecility ; but aside from the one thing he wanted to talk 
 about, his brain was a vacuum ; in desperation he groped 
 for the cue he had fancied so felicitous. " You re just 
 like a a a little home girl." 
 
 Sandra wavered for a breath before the unconscious 
 pleading of his eyes. She liked him best of all the men 
 she knew ; he was so nice ; and just now he was so funny 
 and and dear, so awkward and anxious and afraid of 
 her, and he was having such a terrible time getting 
 started ! 
 
 " That s such a pretty dress you have on," said Sam 
 and privately pronounced himself a luridly qualified 
 chump. Why couldn t he think of something sensible to 
 
128 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 say? Or why couldn t he come to the point at once? 
 
 Alas, he had come to the point the turning point ! 
 That unlucky mention of the dress aroused anew all the 
 girl s heady pride; her anxieties, her ambitions crowded 
 back upon her. Quixotic, they exhibited the quixotic 
 quality of being creditable; there was something a little 
 noble in her extravagant misconception of the circum 
 stances and of her duty. Marry Sam, and set her 
 mother s mind at rest, and slip out of trouble ; marry him 
 and take it easy; marry him and let the family shift for 
 themselves, or saddle them on her husband s shoulders! 
 Oh, the shabby trick, the cheap, cheap expedient! He 
 learned forward and picked up a dangling end of her 
 girdle, slipping it through and through his fingers me 
 chanically; he cleared his throat; he would say the words 
 if she did not prevent him. Sandra sat upright, twitching 
 the ribbon out of his hands, and spoke precipitately. 
 
 " I want to tell you something. It seems as if you 
 ought to know. I I heard what you and Mr. Thatcher 
 were talking about at lunch today." 
 
 Sam stared at her, startled by the abrupt movement, 
 and the dramatic emphasis she put into a statement which, 
 for the moment, conveyed nothing to him. Uncle George 
 and the Exchange were miles out of his mind. 
 
 " Yes ? " he said inquiringly, and waited. 
 
 " I was skting right behind you all the time, and so 
 I couldn t help hearing everything. I didn t mean to; 
 but I I didn t think quick enough to stop you," said 
 Sandra. 
 
 Sam perceived that her tragic tone invited or awaited 
 something responsive, to which he found himself stupidly 
 inadequate. He could see nothing in the situation to 
 warrant growing so " intense " all of a sudden. The truth 
 was, his uncle s disclosures about Mr. Boardman had made 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 129 
 
 little or no impression on the young man ; it was natural 
 enough that men of that generation should be going down 
 hill; and at any rate, one heard all sorts of talk on the 
 street, to which it was not necessary to pay much atten 
 tion, nine-tenths of it being uttered in mistake or exag 
 geration. He was so far from recognizing what Sandra 
 referred to, that, searching his mind, he came upon the 
 horrid suspicion that maybe he and Uncle George had 
 been entertaining themselves with some off-colour joke or 
 anecdote, though neither one of them was much given that 
 way; then he dismissed the idea, sure that she wouldn t 
 have spoken of it, if that had been the case. 
 
 " Yes ? " he said again as sympathetically as he was 
 able. "I I guess it s all right. We weren t telling 
 any secrets." 
 
 " I suppose it wasn t any secret to your uncle," said 
 Sandra gloomily. " I suppose everybody knows. But I 
 know Mr. Thatcher wouldn t have spoken that way about 
 my father if he had dreamed I was anywhere around to 
 hear him. Of course I d have found out for myself sooner 
 or later anyhow, so I don t want you to think that I m 
 offended, or to feel badly because it s happened this way. 
 It seemed underhanded somehow not to tell you that I was 
 listening." 
 
 Now at last illumination descended upon Sam, to his 
 mortal embarrassment. " Oh, that ! That about that 
 is, what Uncle George said " he stammered. " Why 
 why, I wouldn t think anything of that! If I were in 
 your place, I mean. Uncle George was just talking, you 
 know." 
 
 " He meant it. He wouldn t have said it if he hadn t 
 thought it was true." 
 
 " Why, yes, he would he was just talking people 
 say a lot of things they don t really mean. They just 
 
130 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 get to talking, and it sounds different from what they 
 think they don t mean to be taken literally they re 
 just talking along carelessly," protested the young man, 
 troubled and regretful. " Anyway, what did Uncle 
 George say, really? I ve kind of forgotten what he did 
 say, so you see it didn t seem serious or important to 
 
 me" 
 
 " It wasn t your father." 
 
 " No, but still look here, don t feel so badly ! Why, 
 he only said Mr. Boardnaan wasn t in very good health, 
 didn t he? That s all he said. That doesn t mean that 
 that your father s going to to die. He s probably 
 not quite so strong this spring and needs a rest ; everybody 
 ought to take a rest once in a while. My goodness, I m 
 sorry this thing happened ! Uncle George would be wor 
 ried to death if he thought anything he said had got 
 you so worked up. He wouldn t have done it for any 
 thing" 
 
 " He didn t do anything but tell the truth when I hap 
 pened to be where I could hear him. Nobody s to blame. 
 Don t you feel so badly," said the girl generously. Cf I m 
 not sorry. Honestly, I m not. It s just as I say, I had 
 to find it out some day, and one time s as good as another. 
 It couldn t be easy for me whenever it happened." She 
 paused, glancing towards the living-room, and went on 
 in a lower voice. " Mr. Thatcher didn t say anything 
 about poor Dad s health. You knoiv that. You re just 
 trying to be kind, and and I think it s lovely of you, 
 but it s no use. That s not what s the matter with Dad." 
 
 Sam sat silent, feeling himself lamentably short of con 
 soling arguments. " Well, your father s getting older, of 
 course, and that tells on a man. You can t expect him to 
 be what he was a few years ago," he offered at length. 
 "But you mustn t worry about him. He s ten times as 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 131 
 
 capable as lots of men his age and younger. I ve heard 
 them speak of how Mr. Boardman can work oh, time 
 and time again ! " said Sam, warming to the subject. 
 " They all say he s a wonder, he s such a worker " 
 
 " He s had to be. He s had such a load always all 
 of us to take care of," said Sandra. 
 
 " Oh, pshaw, that hasn t got anything to do with it ! " 
 said Sam, helplessly conscious of having blundered again ; 
 it was indeed impossible to say the right thing, but he kept 
 on desperately. " He s the kind of man that wouldn t 
 be happy unless he was working, and taking care of a 
 family. He " 
 
 " Well, I ve made up my mind to one thing. I m not 
 going to be taken care of any longer," Sandra said. 
 
 " You re not ? You re ? " 
 
 " I m going to work." 
 
 There was a pause during which Mr. Thatcher assimi 
 lated this information with a blank countenance. " Going 
 to work ? " he repeated finally in a voice and with a 
 manner that fairly radiated objection, though he was 
 honestly endeavouring to render them perfectly non-com 
 mittal: Who was he to raise objections, and by what 
 right ? " Why, why ? What for ? What do you want to 
 go to work for? You don t have to." 
 
 " Oh, but I do or I will in a little while. I might 
 as well begin. I ve always wanted to anyhow I mean 
 that here recently I ve been thinking a good deal about 
 it," said Sandra, earnestly. She forgot the young fellow s 
 own plans and hopes, only relying on his sympathetic 
 understanding as she went on diffidently yet eagerly. " I 
 felt as if I d like to do something and be of some use 
 long before this. That s the reason I say I m not sorry 
 to to have had my eyes opened. I might have gone on 
 for ever in that slipshod way, just saying to myself 
 
132 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 that I d like to work ! And time is so important " 
 
 Sam made a movement. "Oh, time!" he said almost 
 angrily. " There isn t any such awful hurry. You act 
 as if the bottom had fallen out of everything! Why, 
 nothing s happened probably nothing ever will happen. 
 Of course I don t know anything about it, and it s none 
 of my business anyhow, but I haven t the least doubt 
 that your father s got plenty enough to live on, if he never 
 did another stroke of work in his life " 
 
 She arrested him with a solemn face. " There ! 
 You ve come to the very thing that first worried me. I 
 let it go out of my mind afterwards, but I thought of it 
 again this afternoon. Dad doesn t know how much he s 
 got. I asked him once and he put me off he wouldn t 
 answer. I see now what the matter was. He didn t 
 know ! " said Sandra, sure that this would definitely 
 establish the gravity of her father s case. " He doesn t 
 know this minute, how much he has to live on where 
 he stands, you know." 
 
 To her surprise the other s optimism (real or assumed 
 for her benefit) stood the test even of this damaging revela 
 tion. " That s nothing ! Dozens of men can t tell off 
 hand how much they have. They don t keep account of 
 everything down to the last cent; you really can t. I 
 wouldn t think anything of that." 
 
 " Don t you know ? " 
 
 " Well, I m on a salary, I can t help but know," said 
 Samuel uncomfortably, feeling himself cornered. " A 
 man running a business is different." 
 
 Sandra shook her head. " You can t make me believe 
 that. Nobody could get along that way," she said with 
 the appalling logic of a woman; and returned to her 
 theme. " I know you don t approve of women working, 
 but if you just stop to think you can see how much better 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 133 
 
 it will be for me to be independent. It wouldn t be right 
 for me to stay at home and let things go on just as they 
 are until Dad until something happens. I couldn t do 
 it. I won t be a drag. Even if I don t do anything 
 except help to take care of myself and I want to 
 help take care of Mother and Grandma too, of course 
 but even if I don t do anything but support myself, it 
 will be better than nothing." 
 
 The young man listened to her again dismally silent, 
 beholding his own dreams fade off, dwindle to the vanish 
 ing-point. Was ever woman in this humour wooed? 
 She was obsessed with this independence-and-save-Father 
 idea ; and after all that was just like her. It was nonsense, 
 but it was splendid. He drew a long sigh. 
 
 " Well, of course if that s how you feel Only 
 I hate to think of you driving away in one of these frowzy 
 old offices all day long, Sandra oh, I I beg your 
 pardon I er " 
 
 " Why, I don t mind. We always used to call each other 
 by our first names when we were at school. I don t mind 
 a bit," she assured him so kindly and unconcernedly that 
 poor Sam s last spark of hope flickered out. " I ll call you 
 by yours, if you like. Shall I ? " 
 
 " I would ever so much " 
 
 " All right ! " He looked so forlorn and was so mani 
 festly safe now that Sandra felt impelled to more con 
 fidences. " You don t need to feel badly about my going 
 into an office either, because I don t think I ll be in an 
 office. I don t like the idea myself. And besides I 
 haven t had any office training, and it would take a good 
 while to learn. I thought it would be better to start doing 
 something that I could do right away. So I I m going 
 to dance." 
 
 "What!" shouted Sam. 
 
134: THE BOARDMAJST FAMILY 
 
 " Sh-h ; they might hear you/ said Sandra with another 
 warning glance towards the next roonu And even in his 
 consternation the young man felt a delicious thrill when 
 she added not without a faint embarrassment : " You see 
 they don t know yet. You re the first person I ve told 
 Sam." 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 SANDRA, except in one or two particulars, had not 
 been very wide of the mark in her forecast of the 
 way in which the family would receive her project. She 
 was prepared for her mother s incredulity advancing 
 through successive stages of alarm, dismay and distress 
 to a certainty that was still somehow desperately in 
 credulous. For the poor lady, it was if the old tale had 
 been reversed, and her swan had developed into an ugly 
 duckling at the last; she was more disappointed than 
 actually grieved or shocked. Mrs. Richard was reason 
 ably progressive ; she had indeed surmounted some of the 
 prejudices of her generation almost without knowing it. 
 It no longer appeared to her dreadful or deplorable that 
 a young woman of her own class should go out and work 
 whether by choice or necessity. Too many of her own 
 friends girls went to college or to special courses here 
 at home, even in such bizarre branches as sewing and 
 cookery, avowedly to prepare themselves to face the world 
 " in case anything happened." Too many of them, going 
 a step farther afterwards, took positions, teacher here, 
 librarian there, secretary elsewhere, acts which their 
 mothers explained as due to Gladys or Janet s or Mary 
 Jane s restlessness, to her ambition or eccentricity 
 when they did not bluntly set it down to the young woman s 
 desire for more pocket-money than her father could afford 
 to give her. Mrs. Boardman, listening, never failed to 
 show exactly the right amount and quality of interest; 
 she would be surprised or amused or indulgent in aocord- 
 
 135 
 
136 THE BOAEDMA^" FAMILY 
 
 ance with the other mother s attitude. She was well 
 up in all the stock phrases: the young people did 
 very strange things nowadays; but the world moves, we 
 must move with it; at any rate, let us not be stumbling- 
 blocks, hobble-chains, old fogies! These were Mrs. 
 Richard s publicly expressed sentiments, and she honestly 
 believed that she believed them. The truth was that in 
 her heart of hearts, Sandra s mother, along with dozens 
 of other mothers who made just as good a show of being 
 prodigiously up-to-date, clung invincibly to the ancient 
 creed of women, that a girl s business in life was to get 
 married. All this talk about Gladys and Janet and Mary 
 Jane being restless, being ambitious, being independent, 
 being tired of society, was stuff and nonsense, mere ex 
 cuses, vamped up to save their faces. The real trouble 
 was that they had missed their chances ; old-maidhood was 
 imminent, was upon them already ; they were failures ! 
 
 Now here was Sandra proposing to join their ranks! 
 Everybody would think that she had never had an offer, 
 and had grown tired of sitting around waiting, Mrs. Kich- 
 ard reflected bitterly. And she herself must go about 
 reciting those stories about restlessness, independence and 
 so on, which nobody would believe, but which all would 
 hear with the humane good breeding she had always prac 
 tised. That her report would be true, and that, by infer 
 ence, the other mothers reports might be true too, did not 
 enter into her considerations. Even Sandra s choice of 
 a profession, outlandish as it was, affected the mother, as 
 it were, incidentally; she raised objections on that score, 
 of course, but her real concern was not over Sandra s 
 dancing. 
 
 Sandra knew it ; she knew every thought in her mother s 
 head, and alas, it may be doubted if she set an overhigL. 
 value on them. With her father, it was different; the 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 137 
 
 girl was a little frightened at first by the ease with which 
 she won him ; it confirmed her, it confirmed Mr. Thatcher, 
 too emphatically. To be sure she was not absolutely frank 
 with him ; he did not quite know what she meant to do, or 
 why; she could not tell him poor father! In truth, 
 others besides poor father might have found Sandra s halt 
 ing and ambiguous exposition somewhat difficult to follow ; 
 it was not natural to her to be indirect. 
 
 "As I understand it, Sandra, you want to go to New 
 York and take a course in fancy dancing at some school or 
 with one of these star dancers that have been going around 
 the country so much here lately Russians and French 
 and all the rest of them," said Richard at last. He pon 
 dered. " Well now, I guess you can do that. Only your 
 mother or somebody will have to go and be with you, won t 
 she ? New York isn t much of a place for a girl you ve 
 never been there by yourself in your life. It will be 
 very different. And dancing well I don t know what 
 sort of people you will be thrown with. It wouldn t have 
 done at all twenty-five years go. There has been a great 
 change, I know " 
 
 Sandra began eager explanations and assurances the 
 more eager because here at least was a point on which she 
 could speak openly, and he listened to her with an occa 
 sional nod of understanding; also he looked over the cir 
 culars without disapproval, in fact with lively interest. 
 
 " Very straightforward and business-like, aren t they ? 
 Like any other school prospectus ! " he said in surprise. 
 " Seems funny. I can t get over the idea that dancing 
 isn t a study, let alone an art or a science or whatever they 
 call it nowadays. We all used to think that you only 
 went to dancing-school when you were a little tad eight 
 or ten years old, along there. But goodness gracious, listen 
 to this ! " And here Mr. Boardman read aloud from one 
 
138 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 of the pamphlets with thorough relish : " One of the vital 
 accomplishments by which men, women and children are 
 measured is their mastery of Dancing which brings to the 
 surface the highest standards of magnetic personality. 
 ... It introduces into the actions of an individual a 
 mental and physical tone which is the result of no other 
 form of education. My, my, think of dancing doing 
 all that for you! I begin to regret my misspent youth, 
 merely learning to read and write. And what s this ? A 
 few common terms used in Buck, Clog, Jig and Reel 
 Dancing: Slap Step, Hopping Beat, Pick up Tap, 
 Single Eoll, Double Roll, Cutting Shuffle, Flam. My, 
 my," said Richard again, solemnly. "Are you go 
 ing to come back to us from New York with your 
 magnetic personality augmented by knowing how to to 
 Flaunt" 
 
 Sandra laughed with him, though uncertain whether 
 she resented or was glad of, the very apparent fact that he 
 was not taking her seriously. " I ll show him I ll show 
 them all some day ! " she thought almost fiercely, but only 
 said : " I can clog a little already. That course must be 
 intended mainly for men, anyhow." 
 
 " Men! " repeated her father. " Well, of course they 
 have to go to school and learn too, if they are going to 
 make a trade of it," he added on second thought. " But 
 of all queer ways for a man to earn his living! " 
 
 " That s what Ev says," said Sandra. " But some of 
 them make a great deal of money, you know, Dad." 
 
 Her father glanced into the young face, smiling ; but at 
 something he saw there, some un-girlish and most un- 
 Sandra-like hardness or coldness, the smile vanished. It 
 came to him that he did not know, he could not even guess 
 at what was going on within the little smooth dark head 
 that was so infinitely dear ; for one painful instant he sat 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 139 
 
 beside his own child as if in the company of a stranger, and 
 felt the essential isolation of every human being. 
 
 " It isn t so easy and cheap as Ev thinks," said Sandra, 
 her eyes on the cut of Benson and Mazie, Eccentric Soft- 
 Shoe Team, extraordinarily interlaced, so that it was im 
 possible to assign their respective arms and legs. " You 
 have to work; you have to do your best all the time. And 
 somehow, Dad/ she went on with sudden vehemence, " you 
 never seem to be doing your best, no matter how hard you 
 try. IVe often felt that when I ve been dancing doing 
 a dance on the stage before people, you know." 
 
 " You dance beautifully, Sandra," said her father, 
 fondly. 
 
 " I know, I know ! " She made an impatient gesture. 
 " I can dance yes ! But I never seem to myself quite 
 to to get there. It s strange," said Sandra, medita 
 tively. " I feel perfectly confident that I can do it, and 
 yet all the while deep down in my heart, I know that I 
 can t ever do it ! " 
 
 " I ll have to give that up. It s too profound a propo 
 sition for me," said Richard, wagging his head, whereat 
 Sandra laughed or pretended to laugh, inwardly berating 
 herself soundly. She never could make anybody under 
 stand how she felt about her dancing; it was silly to try, 
 silly to talk about it at all. 
 
 Everett had not only said what Sandra reported, he had 
 said a great deal more in as severe language as he could 
 bring himself to use to a girl his own sister at that. 
 According to him, the whole idea of this experiment was 
 outrageous. Dancing-lessons? What did Sandra want 
 with more dancing-lessons ? Why should she go and mix 
 herself up with a lot of second-rate people, in a big city 
 where she didn t know anybody, and would have no one 
 to look after her? "Profession? Oh, stuff!" he said 
 
140 THE BOAEDMAIST FAMILY 
 
 when Sandra tentatively presented that view. " You 
 couldn t ever follow it as a profession. It isn t the sort 
 of thing that you could do. Girls from families like ours 
 do sometimes go on the stage, of course, but not as dancers. 
 You might as well be a circus-rider. I daresay Genee and 
 Pavlova and the others come of decent enough people, but 
 not our kind. Of course, they are great artists, and it 
 wouldn t make any difference where they came from," said 
 Everett, liberally. "But you why, it s preposterous! 
 If you want to fit yourself for doing something, if anything 
 happened so that you d have to, for Heaven s sake, take 
 up something such as the rest of the girls go into. Teach 
 ing, or " 
 
 " Teaching? What could I teach ? " cried out Sandra. 
 " Everybody always pokes teaching at a girl, or book 
 keeping or shorthand, something like that, regardless of 
 what she s fitted for or has a taste for. It saves time to go 
 ahead with something that you know a little about al 
 ready." 
 
 " There isn t any question of saving time in your case, 
 though. You don t have to do anything, and you won t 
 ever have to as long as Father and I are here to take care 
 of you," said Everett ; and he added with forbearance and 
 dignity : " Of course the time may come when we can t 
 give you everything you want; something might happen. 
 But in the meanwhile, it seems to me you might think of 
 us a little, and not do these extreme things that make 
 everybody talk." 
 
 Sandra was silent; not, indeed, that his argument had 
 caused her to change her mind in the least. Perhaps that 
 remark about great artists stung her into a more stubborn 
 determination than ever ; she would sliow him. But at the 
 moment there did not seem to be anything to say. He 
 made her feel herself an ungrateful creature, doggedly 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 141 
 
 sacrificing everybody to her own selfish whims; yet con 
 science timidly assured her that she was nothing of the 
 sort. Everett, so far from " taking care " of her, had 
 never hitherto given her a penny, but Sandra, even when 
 she remembered that fact, did not dream of retorting upon 
 him with it ; she would have thought it vulgar and mean ; 
 Everett meant to give to her when he made enough so that 
 he could afford it. 
 
 Mrs. Alexander heard what was afoot with her habitual 
 philosophical urbanity, her first concern being, like Rich 
 ard s, the practical one as to where and with whom her 
 granddaughter would be. But when Sandra, colouring 
 faintly, told her that she thought of being with a sister 
 of Mr. Thatcher s, the old lady, for once in her life, looked 
 in utter bewilderment. 
 
 " A sister of Mr. Thatcher s ? " she echoed. " Does 
 your mother know her? I had no idea you were at all 
 intimate with the Thatchers except, of course, this 
 young Mr. Thatcher that comes here the one named 
 Sam. Is it his family you are going to visit ? Or does 
 the sister take boarders ? " 
 
 " No, no ! " said Sandra, laughing awkwardly, disturbed 
 to feel her face getting redder still. " I didn t put it very 
 clearly. It s that Mr. Thatcher s sister I m talking about 
 Miss Kate Thatcher but I m not going to stay with 
 her, and she doesn t keep a boarding-house. She herself 
 boards, and I thought I would board in the same house. 
 I don t know her, but he I mean Mr. Thatcher 
 thought I might like to be near her. She s a good deal 
 older than I am, and she knows all about New York 
 she s lived there for years. She has a position in a school, 
 and " 
 
 " A private school ? " her mother asked keenly. 
 
 " Yes. It s all right, Mother, I m sure she s nice " 
 
142 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " One of the thousand-a-year kind ? " pursued Mrs. 
 Richard. 
 
 " Yes, oh yes ! " said Sandra, who knew nothing what 
 ever about it, fibbing desperately. She wondered to find 
 herself, with the most honest and honourable of purposes, 
 involved in this web of small deceits ; it did not seem pos 
 sible to tell the family the whole truth, even about insig 
 nificant details ; they would not understand ; she could hear 
 in fancy the outcry they would raise. Maybe some day 
 when she had conquered all the other obstacles and had 
 reached a point where nothing she did would be questioned 
 and her antecedents would not matter any more than 
 Genee s or Pavlova s, when she had become a " great ar 
 tist" in short maybe then she could confide in her 
 mother and the rest. It was doubtless one of life s little 
 ironic adjustments that there were moments when Miss 
 Alexandra Boardman wished vehemently that she had been 
 born Smith or Schwartz or anything you please, the daugh 
 ter of a groceryman, a tailor, a hotel-keeper ! " Then I 
 could do anything I wanted without having to be eternally 
 explaining and telling stories. People like that don t 
 care ! " she thought. 
 
 " Oh, well then, it must be one of those finishing-schools, 
 where the girls are generally nice not that the rate of 
 tuition has anything to do with it, of course. It merely 
 gives one something to judge by," said Sandra s mother, 
 satisfied. " They have to keep the teachers up to a high 
 standard, too. Miss Thatcher is probably accustomed to 
 chaperoning girls like yourself, Sandra " 
 
 " I don t expect her to chaperon me. I m nearly 
 twenty-five and if I don t know enough to go around by 
 myself now, I ll never learn," said Sandra with an asperity 
 born of distaste for her position. 
 
 Mrs. Richard looked both shocked and hurt for a second, 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 143 
 
 then another thought made her smile. " Well, to be sure, 
 when I was that age, I wouldn t have thanked any one who 
 wanted to chaperon me," she said leniently. " But I had 
 been married five years and had two children. You are 
 a girl still, you see. I suppose you really are old enough 
 
 only you always seem so young to me." 
 
 " How long do you think you will be away, Sandra ? " 
 her grandmother asked. 
 
 " I don t know," said the girl, with a fresh sense of 
 guilt. " It depends on on what kind of a course I de 
 cide to take. They have three-month ones, and six-months 
 
 different kinds it s like any other school, you know." 
 " And then what ? " asked the old lady. Her black eyes 
 
 rested on the girl with disquieting penetration. " Is this 
 an experiment, or an adventure, or a a prelude ? " 
 
 " Maybe it s a little of all three," said Sandra, truth 
 fully enough. " How can I tell what it s going to turn 
 out?" 
 
 Mrs. Alexander asked no more questions at that time; 
 in fact she contrived, in her unobtrusive way, to intervene 
 between Sandra and the curiosity, the suspicious aston 
 ishment of their world. It was amusing. The old gentle 
 woman sat invincible within her fortress of Victorian good 
 manners, and inquiry retired from the attack not only 
 baffled but convicted of vulgarity. Yet she never snubbed 
 anybody, never gave offence, never was evasive, or em 
 barrassed, or formal or affected. Sandra, belonging to 
 a generation not so thoroughly versed in these subtleties 
 of behaviour, witnessed her senior s performances with in 
 creasing confidence that " you could tell Grandma any 
 thing." So that, when the older lady one day when they 
 happened to be alone together, said : " What is it you are 
 really planning to do, Sandra ? " the girl answered her 
 fully and freely. 
 
144 THE BOAEDMAIsr FAMILY 
 
 If Mrs. Boardman was surprised or scandalized, she 
 justified Sandra s belief in her, by not showing it. After 
 a while she said : " I don t think the family quite realizes 
 this. Of course outsiders don t. But your father and 
 mother " 
 
 " I can t tell them. They wouldn t " 
 
 Mrs. Boardman waved her hand. " I understand," she 
 said, conclusively. 
 
 " You you suspected something anyhow, didn t 
 you?" 
 
 " Well perhaps," Mrs. Boardman admitted. She 
 considered for another while. " In the old days, dancers 
 Taglioni, Fannie Ellsler, all of them, high and low 
 were women of no reputation as we used to say. We 
 thought the same of actresses of any woman in public 
 life. We thought a dancing-teacher was one remove from 
 a barber or man-cook. We profess to have outgrown all 
 those ideas, but I think so still " 
 
 " There, you see ! I can t make any of you understand, 
 not even you. That s the reason I haven t told them. 
 There s no use," said Sandra, grimly. 
 
 " No, I suppose there isn t any use, since I myself can t 
 get rid of these old ingrained beliefs. They are just like 
 any other beliefs they haven t anything to do with rea 
 son or common-sense," said the old lady. " I was brought 
 up to think that Methodists were very common people, who 
 went bawling around about their spiritual experiences in 
 the worst possible taste, and addressed the Creator with 
 offensive familiarity. Well, I daresay Methodists don t 
 do those things any more: maybe they never did: but I 
 still think Methodists are very common people! In the 
 same way I still think that ballet dancers are dreadful 
 young women, whereas nowadays they may be as respect 
 able as I am ! " 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 145 
 
 " Ob, but I m not going to be an ordinary ballet-dancer, 
 Grandma ! " Sandra protested, not without temper. 
 
 " Ob ! I thought they all had to begin in the ranks," 
 said Mrs. Alexander. " Another misconception ! An 
 other prejudice ! " she remarked, polishing her eyeglasses. 
 
 " Why yes, of course, when they dance in that style 
 toe-dancing. But I m different that s not what I intend 
 to do at all," Sandra explained heatedly. " There re ever 
 so many styles of dancing. Why, you know that ! " 
 
 " Yes, to be sure I should have remembered," said 
 Mrs. Boardman, and veered away to a safer topic. " But 
 after you get through your er your studies, you do 
 expect to dance publicly ? " 
 
 " If I can get an engagement, yes indeed ! " said Sandra. 
 " Gracious, I ve danced in public often enough as an ama 
 teur. Why shouldn t I do it professionally? The audi 
 ence doesn t care, so long as it thinks it s getting its money s 
 worth. But Dad and Mother and Everett don t know ; I m 
 afraid to tell them. They think I just want to be doing 
 something. And perhaps after all I may end by just 
 teaching dancing; I may make a failure on the stage," 
 Sandra ended as if in warning to herself. Whatever her 
 other limitations, at least she had in some measure the 
 artist s equipment of mingled self-confidence and humility. 
 
 The preparations went forward, their simplicity appall 
 ing Mrs. Richard whose visits to New York had always 
 necessitated lengthy negotiations about clothes, accommo 
 dations and what-not. But Sandra stood firm ; there must 
 be nothing new, no hats, no dresses; she would have the 
 plain room in the plain boarding-house on the plain side- 
 street where " nobody " lived and " nobody " ever went. 
 As it was, her expenses would be heavy enough ; some day 
 she might be able to pay Dad back 
 
 " Sandra ! You talk like a working-girl ! " her mother 
 
146 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 interposed, horrified. "Your father would feel terribly 
 to hear you. You mustn t say anything like that to him 
 about paying him back ! You mustn t make such a fuss 
 about money ; it s it s sordid it s " 
 
 " Well, I m playing at being a working-girl for a while, 
 you know, Mother," said Sandra, quickly, regretting her 
 unwary confidences, smoothing the matter over as best she 
 might. "I I was just in fun. Be careful now, Mrs. 
 Boardman, I m going to wool you around ! " 
 
 The day before she went, Sam Thatcher came in the 
 smart runabout he had lately treated himself to, and be 
 sought her so earnestly, that Sandra yielded against her 
 wiser judgment, and ran upstairs and got her last-season s 
 motor-coat, her old hat that her mother had fruitlessly 
 implored her to throw away, and went out with him. 
 " He ll be so busy with the gears and things, he won t have 
 any chance to get foolish," she thought. In fact, Samuel 
 was quite silent and preoccupied during the first part of 
 the ride. They went out Adams Road to the open country. 
 It was November, and the trees and hillsides showed every 
 where a hectic brightness of the passing year. Troops of 
 children were out nutting; they met a company of boy- 
 scouts on a hike ; and further along at a crossroads came 
 upon the spectacle of a brother runabout inert by the 
 road, with another couple like themselves standing over 
 it as at the bedside of a dying or dead friend. 
 
 " Engine s gone on the blink," the young man explained 
 succinctly, when Sam, who was of a humane disposition, 
 slowed down to inquire what was the matter, and if he 
 might be of any use. " I can t locate the trouble ; she just 
 naturally laid down. Look here ! " He stooped to the 
 crank and heaved it around with might and main ; a feeble 
 mutter arose, swelled, died away convulsively somewhere 
 within the mechanism; the car somehow took on a more 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 147 
 
 corpse-like aspect than ever. Its owner straightened up, 
 looking at Sam obliquely with a species of solemn grin. 
 " The gyasticutas is out of connection with the hew- 
 gag," said he. " That s the way I figure it ! " 
 
 " Let me try/ said Sam, feeling himself challenged. 
 He jumped out and applied his whole strength to the crank- 
 ing-up process with precisely the same result. 
 
 " Nix ! " said the other, watching him. 
 
 " You are a stranger around here ? " Sam asked him. 
 
 " More or less. We re touring that is, we were tour 
 ing until we took to standing still." 
 
 " Well, I was going to say that you aren t too far out 
 to telephone to the city and get a mechanic here ; it wouldn t 
 take him an hour. All these farmhouses have tele 
 phones " 
 
 "I thought about that," said the other young man; 
 " But I don t like to go off hunting a telephone, and leave 
 my wife sitting here all by herself ; she d be scared to, any 
 way. And she s no good at walking " 
 
 " Shoo, I d just as lief, Charlie," interrupted the young 
 woman. " He just thinks I can t walk because I ve got 
 high heels on," she added to Sandra with a confidential 
 smile. " Ain t that man all over, though ! " 
 
 " Yeah, I ve heard that before, and you have too, likely," 
 said the husband, looking at Sam. He plunged both hands 
 down in his pockets and surveyed the automobile phil 
 osophically. " Here," said he, " is where the first farmer 
 that comes along with a team gets ahead about twentv-five 
 bucks " 
 
 " Twenty-five ! Why don t you hire a farmer ? You 
 don t have to buy one ! " said Sam. 
 
 " I guess you ve never had much experience with the 
 merry, merry rustics," the other retorted, obscurely. 
 " Here come some of em now ! " 
 
148 THE BOABDMAST FAMILY 
 
 They were not farmers, however, but the hand of boy- 
 scouts. They came up, alertly proffering assistance, half 
 a dozen tanned, sturdy twelve-year-olds in their khaki and 
 their little tramping boots of which they were visibly proud, 
 with a serious-faced older boy in spectacles for a leader. 
 And altogether, Sam lending a hand, they propelled the 
 machine off of the " right of way " as the boys called it 
 with a great display of technical knowledge; after which 
 first one, and then another attempted to ( turn her over 
 another technicality the engine steadily refusing to 
 be turned over. So finally at Sam s suggestion, a scout 
 perched on the running-board of his car, to be transported 
 to the nearest telephone ; Sam climbed in and settled him 
 self at the wheel; the boy with the spectacles obligingly 
 cranked for him ; the remaining scouts, led by the young 
 man and his wife, gave them a burlesque cheer. Looking 
 back from the next rise, Sandra could see them all sitting 
 in a row on the rail fence, cheerfully patient to see the 
 affair through. 
 
 " It s nice of you boys to help people this way," she said 
 to their scout warmly. " I suppose that s what the organ 
 ization is for, though, isn t it ? " 
 
 " Yeah. It s for most anything," said the scout, 
 vaguely. " Gee, I wisht they d have a war, though ! 
 What make s this machine, mister ? " 
 
 They set him down at the first farmhouse, and after a 
 conference with an old woman at the side-door, he shrilly 
 reported that " th folks had a phone all right." They 
 went on. 
 
 " Those were nice people," said Sam, turning the wheel. 
 " Lots of men would have been swearing till the air was 
 blue, but he took it as a kind of a joke. And those boys. 
 Nice people. You meet all kinds, going around as much 
 as I do, but they re mostly nice, I think. And it s funny 
 
THE BOAKDHAN FAMILY 149 
 
 how everybody gets together to help, if there s trouble. 
 You don t have to run around and drum them up; every 
 body pitches in, and helps the one nearest him, without 
 being told. It seems to be instinctive. I was in a train- 
 wreck once " he was abruptly silent, having perhaps 
 evoked dread memories and pictures. 
 
 Sandra had thought the stranded tourists rather com 
 mon; their very good-nature and hail-fellow-well-met 
 friendliness stamped them of the lower caste. She had 
 been about to say so, but now some better feeling with 
 held her. It may have been that through Sam s uncal- 
 culated words, as through the flickering of a camera-shutter, 
 she glimpsed the world unrecognizably illuminated, or an 
 other world the existence of which she had only lately 
 begun to suspect. 
 
 " I hope they ll get the mechanic, and get their machine 
 fixed," she said. " Oughtn t we to turn back here to 
 go back, you know ? " 
 
 Sam obediently swung the car around, though he said : 
 " Why, we haven t gone any distance. Are you tired ? " 
 
 " No, I love it ! But it s my last day at home. I feel 
 as if I shouldn t stay away too long." 
 
 " No telling when I ll see you again, either," said Sam. 
 And then, on a sudden, without leading up to it, compar 
 able to the bolt from the blue of which we have all heard : 
 " I didn t say anything when you first told me that 
 night " - he said huskily ; " I was going to ask you then, 
 but it didn t seem as if there was any use, after the way 
 you talked and felt. I I wish you d give up this danc 
 ing scheme, Sandra, and and marry me." 
 
 " Oh, I can t do that, Sam," said the girl, much troubled. 
 " I can t do that," 
 
 " Why not ? Is there somebody else ? " 
 
 " No, no, but " 
 
150 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " You just don t care about me, is that it ? " said Sam, 
 bravely. 
 
 " I m I m afraid I don t," Sandra said, not knowing 
 whether she spoke the truth or not; tears came into her 
 eyes. " I didn t want you to I hate to have you 
 think I mean I didn t mean " she stammered, almost 
 sobbing. 
 
 " That s all right, I know you didn t mean to," said Sam, 
 miraculously comprehending. " You re not that sort of a 
 girl. And you couldn t have stopped me anyhow, Sandra 
 I couldn t have stopped myself. But don t you think 
 maybe some day ? " 
 
 " I don t know," Sandra said. And with such meagre 
 comfort as he could get from that half-admission, Samuel 
 had to be content. 
 
 She went to bed early that night ; and after a while Mrs. 
 Alexander Boardman, going quietly upstairs, stopped at 
 her granddaughter s door and looked in. There was some 
 disorder; Sandra s trunk had already gone, but her little 
 valise stood open on a chair, waiting for the last odds and 
 ends ; there were her gloves and hat and her nattily rolled 
 umbrella laid together. Mrs. Alexander went in a step ; by 
 the light from the hall she could see Sandra sound asleep, 
 with her long, thick, black hair braided and tied up in a 
 ribbon, lying across the pillow ; she looked very small and 
 young. On the night-stand beside the bed, there was the 
 watch her father had given her on her nineteenth birthday, 
 a girl s watch that never kept time, a foolish elegant trifle ; 
 and there was a half-eaten apple which she had probably 
 been too sleepy to finish. Somehow these things, this in 
 efficient watch, this apple with a bite or two out of it, sud 
 denly seemed to the old lady poignantly pathetic; a hun 
 dred times she had seen Sandra thus in her crib, with a toy, 
 a cooky alongside ; Richard too, when he was a baby. Old 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 151 
 
 Sarah Chase Board-man, whose past, like everybody s past, 
 must have held some unpleasing chapters, who went to 
 church and subscribed to charities and practised an un 
 swerving courtesy all for no better reason than because it 
 appeared to her the part of a lady, who believed nothing 
 about God save that, if He existed, He must surely be a 
 gentleman old Sarah Boardman got down on her knees 
 then and there and put up some lame petition for this 
 young girl. 
 
 Mrs. Richard, passing by, saw her in the attitude with 
 surprise and alarm. " Good gracious, Mother, what is the 
 matter ? " she wanted to know, in a guarded voice. 
 
 " Nothing," said Mrs. Alexander, rising stiffly. " I 
 dropped my little gold pin. Never mind, Lucy, I found 
 it, thank you ! " 
 

PAKT II 
 
CHAPTEE I 
 
 MISS BOAKDMAN S principal emotion during her 
 journey to the metropolis and in the first days of 
 her establishment there, was one of wonder and satisfaction 
 at the discovery that a girl of her " set " could travel ahout 
 this country unchaperoned by her mother, unprotected by 
 any male member of her family, under nobody s wing, in 
 short, without finding herself disagreeably conspicuous, 
 and without the slightest difficulty in making arrangements 
 about her tickets, her berth, her baggage, all the suppos 
 edly intricate details which hitherto somebody had always 
 attended to for her. Never in her life had Alexandra been 
 allowed to go fifty miles from home by herself; never in 
 her life had she been ultimately responsible for a dollar, 
 and here she was in the city of New York, with the 
 banking-association cheques her father had given her still 
 unscathed in her handbag, with all the porters and baggage 
 men properly tipped, her telegrams to the anxious people 
 at home despatched, her hat on the bed, her trunk un 
 strapped, herself in as good order outwardly as if she had 
 been managing her own affairs since her cradle! In 
 wardly, to be sure, she quaked with the sense of adventure 
 and loneliness ; but Sandra was not likely to betray herself. 
 Indeed, she scarcely would have known how; self-posses 
 sion is the first commandment taught, the first habit ac 
 quired by young women of her class, and in the end it 
 becomes second nature. Besides, with all her funny pride 
 in the capability she had shown thus far, the girl had 
 enough sense of humour to realize that the achievement 
 of coming all the way to New York by herself was nothing 
 
 155 
 
156 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 to startle the world with not the world wherein she 
 must dwell, at all events. "An ordinary working-girl 
 wouldn t think anything of it; they go around alone all 
 the time," she warned herself ; " and a girl like that 
 wouldn t have taken a taxi from the station; she d have 
 walked and carried her bag and things, and saved fifty 
 cents. I ll do that another time. It s queer, I have to 
 keep reminding myself that I m in earnest about this 
 thing. It seems as if it couldn t be true somehow." 
 
 Her gaze wandered around the room. There was no 
 lack of atmosphere about it, at any rate ; it was the classic 
 resort of youthful poverty and ambition, a hall bedroom. 
 Next to a garret there is no locality better known to ro 
 mance. Nevertheless, this was a hall bedroom de luxe as 
 one might say, a ten-dollar-a-week hall bedroom ; by Board- 
 man standards, it was the last word in economy. There 
 was a window in one end of it, the door in the other, and 
 between, ranged along the parallel walls, on one side a 
 small wardrobe, an iron cot-bed, a desk; on the other a 
 chest of drawers, a wash-stand, Sandra s trunk. There 
 was space for a single chair, and Sandra calculated that in 
 the aisle between these articles of furniture she might 
 practise any dance-step that did not require too much pos 
 turing. From the window one looked down into a brick- 
 paved cubicle, with a locust-tree growing grimily out of a 
 grimy depression in the middle of it, upon the brick walls 
 crowned with broken glass which divided the hollow of the 
 square into other cubicles, upon the other rear windows, 
 and the roofs of extensions to the first and second stories 
 of the buildings. Sandra was up two flights of stairs from 
 the parlour-floor, and there were more flights both above 
 and below. Mounting the high front steps, she had caught 
 glimpses of faces and furnishings in the basement; and 
 now and again feet sped up the padded stairs outside her 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 157 
 
 door to unguessed destinations overhead. The arrange 
 ment recalled the circles of the Inferno, and perhaps there 
 were other points of resemblance. But to Sandra, coming 
 from her city of the Middle West with its hill-tops where 
 " everybody " lived, among lawns and trees, the New York 
 boarding-house was an entertaining novelty; indeed, she 
 had made up her mind to be interested in everything. 
 
 A card on the white-painted walls of her cell notified 
 her that the hours for meals were such and such, that there 
 would be an extra charge of twenty-five cents for trays car 
 ried to the rooms, and that guests were under no circum 
 stances allowed to do laundry-work in the bathrooms. 
 This last Sandra found infinitely diverting ; as if anybody 
 could possibly want to wash anything in a boarding-house 
 bathroom! She told her grandmother about it in the 
 letter she was just writing . . . " As this is Sunday, 
 dinner is at one o clock ; but when I dressed and went 
 down there were very few people there, and no Miss 
 Thatcher. Mrs. Tower says she is out of town for the 
 week-end. The dining-room is a great, huge place with 
 the walls all covered with weird-looking fret-work of dark 
 wood with mirrors set in everywhere, rather like an old- 
 style Pullman car. I don t recognize the wood, so it s 
 probably what Dad calls solid pannyjambia. We have 
 little tables for two or four, which is much nicer than I 
 expected, with a little pressed-glass candlestick and a can 
 dle with a frowsy pink silk shade, on each table terribly 
 stylish ! I had my table all to myself, in fact, I had the 
 whole dining-room to myself for a while, and I heard Mrs. 
 Tower shouting at the servants in the pantry and sharpen 
 ing a carving-knife with a perfectly ferocious sound. I 
 know it was she and I know she did the carving, for all 
 the noise stopped the minute she came into the dining- 
 room, looking very warm and wiping her face. And right 
 
158 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 after that I got a grand, big slab of rare roast beef, luke 
 warm, to be sure, but good enough. I am telling you this 
 so that Mother can see I m being properly nourished 
 as all the hygiene books say. Mrs. Tower is stout and 
 grey-haired, about fifty, I think, and looks as if she had 
 been keeping a boarding-house the whole fifty years, ever 
 since she was born. The only other guests were a man 
 and his wife and daughter (I suppose) very common all 
 of them, with the same look that Mrs. Tower has, only 
 the other side. I mean, as if they had boarded all their 
 lives. Mrs. Tower herself has a round table in the bay- 
 window with a big-nosed girl, and a big-nosed young man 
 sitting with her. They seem like a family-party, and I 
 heard the girl call Mrs. Tower Auntie Lou but the man 
 didn t say anything but you to either one of them, so 
 I couldn t make out whether he and the girl were married 
 or engaged or nothing, just brother and sister. 
 
 " Tomorrow I am going over to 36th Street, to the 
 Claude School (the one I have been corresponding with, 
 you know) to see what it looks like and what M. and Mme. 
 Claude are like, and to make an appointment for an en 
 trance examination. I think I will take my ballet-slip 
 pers and other things in my suitcase as the place isn t far 
 from here, and I can easily carry them, and they may be 
 ready to see me dance at once. Their prospectus says that 
 entrance examinations are optional with the student, so 
 I op to take one; the idea is that they can tell how you 
 dance simply by looking at you, I suppose, but it must be 
 very seldom that they get anybody like me. I thought I 
 would take that MacDowell music, Oreadentanz, and the 
 music for one of those dances I made up myself, the 
 Scherzo from the Fifth Symphony, maybe. I think those 
 are the best things I do ; only hope they ll have somebody 
 there that can play them for me! The costumes look 
 
THE BOARDMAST FAMILY 159 
 
 rather stringy from being packed, especially the Oread s 
 green chiffon, and her wreath of oak-leaves is flattened 
 out like this sheet of paper, but I think I can work it 
 back into shape again, or pin it around my head so that 
 it will look all right, and chiffon blows and floats around 
 so, that it doesn t make much difference if it is 
 stringy . . . 
 
 " Later, nine o clock this evening. I ve met Miss 
 Thatcher. She came back in time for Sunday evening 
 tea, and came and tapped at my door, before she had 
 taken any of her things off, just as I was getting the cos 
 tumes out. She is very nice! I don t know why I was 
 so surprised; I must have been expecting her to be prim 
 and teacher-y. Of course she is old, thirty-five, at least, 
 but she doesn t show it much, and was dressed in beautiful 
 taste, a black suit that must have been made by Sampson 
 or some other good Fifth Avenue tailor, and perfectly 
 lovely black furs, and a hat that suited her and was put 
 on right. She has red hair, and a darling little figure 
 such tiny hands and feet, and wears eyeglasses. It 
 sounds funny to say it, but I was a good deal relieved ; this 
 place had seemed rather awful at first, but when I saw 
 Miss Thatcher, I thought, Well, if she can stand it, I 
 ought to be able to ! I told her so, and she laughed and 
 said that she had lived here several years, and that it was 
 as good as any New York boarding-house could be! that 
 is, one could endure it ! The big-nosed man and the big- 
 nosed girl aren t related to each other, and they aren t 
 married yet, but they are going to be as soon as he makes 
 enough. His name is Gus Beckley and he is a book-keeper 
 at Me. Chesney s, and hers is Mary Schultze and she is a 
 stenographer in some lawyer s office. It seems almost 
 everybody in the house all the women, Miss Thatcher 
 says does something, some kind of work, I mean. Miss 
 
160 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 Thatcher says there are always a good many women, be 
 cause people like that somehow drift together in places like 
 this; women hardly ever make money enough to have 
 homes of their own, she says . . . You see we had a 
 grand time gossipping about the other boarders, but it was 
 my own doing, really; I asked her to tell me. I wonder 
 what they will say when they hear what I do. Miss 
 Thatcher didn t seem to think anything of it, one way or 
 the other. She just said, I understand from my brother 
 that you are taking up dancing, and went on talking about 
 something else. Of course she may feel that she doesn t 
 know me well enough to say anything; or perhaps she 
 simply isn t interested, anyhow. . . . Afterwards at tea, 
 I half expected that she would come and sit with me, or 
 offer to, but she didn t; just smiled in a pleasant, cool 
 way, and went past to her own table. All the other people 
 were there and some more, but nobody paid any attention 
 to me. For that matter I noticed that very few of them 
 paid any attention to the others anyhow; just one person 
 here and there spoke to somebody else at another table, or 
 nodded as Miss Thatcher did to me. It s so odd. I 
 thought that everybody in boarding-houses always got very 
 friendly right away; Mother kept warning me against 
 that, you know; she thought it would be such an annoy 
 ance. But if they keep on like this, she doesn t need to 
 worry . . ." 
 
 Possibly Miss Alexandra Boardman who was one of the 
 Boardmans whom " everybody " knew or knew of, whose 
 doings were of not inconsiderable interest to society, whose 
 acquaintance had been more or less diligently sought by 
 people not so fortunately placed possibly, I say, the 
 young lady went to bed that night feeling rather lonesome. 
 It may be that she would not have frowned upon those 
 annoying advances which her mother feared ; one may read 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 161 
 
 a certain nai ve surprise and discomfiture in the tone with 
 which she announces her discoveries. And it is a fact that 
 although she had proclaimed vigorously before leaving 
 home that she would have no time to look up any of the 
 school-friends or ex-residents of her native city, now living 
 in New York, and did not expect to see or hear of them, 
 Sandra planned calls upon half a dozen before she fell 
 asleep ! However, the morning almost always brings fresh 
 council ; and she got up and dressed and packed her chiffons 
 and went downstairs to breakfast with her normal views 
 and attitude fully restored, so that she received the ten 
 tative smile of the big-nosed girl with a distant courtesy 
 which ought effectually to discourage that variety of an 
 noyance, though carefully graded so as not to hurt the 
 other s feelings. Her brother Everett himself could have 
 done no better ! 
 
 The Claude School was housed in another tall, narrow, 
 four-stories-and-basement building, with a fagade of grey 
 stone; the lower ranges of windows opened inwards with 
 long casements, and there was a further decoration of 
 stone balustraded balconies and small, pointed, dusty 
 Christmas-trees in stone pots. It was entered from the 
 sidewalk level by two doors ; Sandra read on a typewritten 
 slip pasted to the glass panes in the upper part of the 
 first door she came to : " Sain Lippert company rehearsing 
 take the other entrance." Not being a member of the Sam 
 Lippert company, she rang, and the door was opened by 
 a charwoman with a bucket and rag. Within there was a 
 Pompeian looking vestibule with a mosaic floor, a fountain 
 in the middle of it, a stone bench, a pair of wrought-iron 
 torcheres, all in a space not more than eight feet square; 
 and closing up the vista, a flight of steps up to a lauding 
 with rails enclosing a desk and stool, a green-shaded elec 
 tric light, and other accessories which reminded one rather 
 
162 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 too pointedly of a ticket-office. On the heels of the char 
 woman there came from some cellar-like retreat behind 
 the steps a girl about Sandra s own age, with a tremendous 
 supply of light auburn hair arranged in too advanced a 
 mode to suit Miss Boardman s fastidious taste, and with 
 furthermore a wide mouth, a salient nose and a look of 
 race so pronounced that Sandra was not at all surprised on 
 hearing later that her name was Alma Marx. She sur 
 veyed the newcomer with an impersonal interest. 
 
 " This is the Claude School ? " asked Sandra, in some 
 uncertainty. 
 
 " Yes. I m the secretary. What is it, please ? " 
 
 " Oh, the secretary ? Oh, then, you know about me al 
 ready. I m Miss Boardman," said Sandra ingenuously 
 supposing this to be a complete introduction. 
 
 " Miss ? Beg pardon ? " said the other girl, with a 
 blank look. Her face brightened a little, however, when 
 Sandra reminded her of their correspondence. " Miss 
 Boardman! Oh, yes, I remember! Let s see, you re 
 from out West somewhere Kansas City, isn t it ? " 
 
 Sandra corrected her, with a return of last night s oddly 
 discomfited sensation. " Of course you have so many ap 
 plications, you can t remember all of us," she said, trying 
 to laugh. 
 
 " No, indeed ! " assented the secretary pleasantly ; and 
 she nimbly mounted the rostrum at the top of the steps. 
 " What course was it you wanted to take ? I guess it was 
 the regular one wasn t it ? That s twenty-five dollars for 
 the first week, and fifteen a week afterwards; that takes 
 in everything, you know." She opened a ledger, got a pen 
 in readiness, patted down her blonde coiffure, all with 
 highly efficient movements, and gave Sandra a wide smile 
 amiable though perfunctory. 
 
 " Well, I I expected to see Mr. or Mrs. Claude first," 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 163 
 
 stammered Sandra, "I thought they ought to see me 
 dance " 
 
 " Oh, they aren t here they re in Europe. It s their 
 school still, but they don t come here any more," Miss Marx 
 explained unconcernedly. She seemed to have acquired 
 a masterly detachment, owing, without doubt, to her voca 
 tion; no display of ignorance, no outlandish requests or 
 behaviour could move her to curiosity or impatience or 
 amusement. " Mr. de Voyna s here, of course. He has 
 the ballet class. If you had one of our folders, you saw 
 about Mrs. Perry s work the interpretative and panto 
 mime, you know Mrs. Elaine Perry. That s part of 
 Mrs. Palmer s course she gives that and the social 
 dancing. It all comes in the twenty-five dollars begin 
 ning with twenty-five, I mean. That s the one everybody 
 takes, because of getting so much, you see. It s two hours 
 practice-class every day except Saturdays and Sundays. 
 Unless you want to take something special private les 
 sons, you know." 
 
 Sandra stood for an instant, dumb before this cataract 
 of information. All at once she saw herself, and her 
 aspirations, and her local celebrity, and her suitcase full 
 of costumes dwindling to something less even than ab 
 surdities. " Who gives the private lessons ? " she finally 
 managed to inquire. 
 
 " You can have em of any of the instructors," said 
 the other girl. " Ten dollars an hour, one person, one les 
 son, you know. That s from Mr. de Voyna. Of course 
 ball-room dancing is less six for thirty. You see how 
 much more you get for your money, the other way. We 
 advise everybody to take the regular course. Not that it 
 makes any difference to us ; we just consider it s for your 
 best interests, you know. You can take anything you 
 want. You a teacher ? " 
 
164: THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " I I thought of teaching," said Sandra, meekly. 
 
 " Well, the regular course is what you want, then." 
 
 Sandra uttered her thought aloud. " I suppose I ll have 
 to make a beginning somehow. It will be the same every 
 where," she said, in a confusion of disappointment, irres 
 olution and doubt. Nothing could be simpler, easier of 
 comprehension, or more reasonable than the proposals of 
 the Claude School ; but nothing could have been more dif 
 ferent from what Sandra had expected, and rehearsed in 
 imagination. If it was to be merely a matter of going to 
 dancing-school she might as well have stayed at home, and 
 kept on with Mademoiselle Mantegna, the girl thought in 
 a kind of vexed derision of herself. She was helplessly 
 aware that she had thought nothing out in detail before 
 hand, for all the fancied thoroughness of her preparations ; 
 and what was worse, an ignorance and inexperience which 
 loomed more monumental every moment kept her from 
 thinking at all to the point now. She did not know what 
 to do, and stood aghast at her own indecision. Yet it 
 seemed imperative that she must make up her mind some 
 how; truly she had never before believed that time was 
 money, but with every second that went by leaving her 
 idle, Sandra felt the force of that homely aphorism. 
 
 " Oh, yes, the rates are the same, but you don t get near 
 so much at the other schools," said the girl at the desk; 
 " of course they ll all give you lessons in any of those 
 branches, but our system grounds you thoroughly in all 
 of it, and then you can go on and specialize afterwards if 
 you want to. Then there re those other places where they 
 advertise they ll teach you anything for fifty cents; I 
 guess you don t want any of tliem. They re fierce if 
 you ll excuse that slang/ said Miss Marx, smiling. She 
 reached for a pad of receipt-blanks with so frank and win- 
 
THE BOARDMAlsr FAMILY 165 
 
 ning a confidence, that Sandra got out her purse in a 
 state of hypnotic obedience. 
 
 " There didn t seem to be anything else to do," she 
 wrote home. " I didn t feel as if I could take the time to 
 go running all over New York, looking up the other places, 
 particularly as I was sure there wouldn t be a very great 
 difference. After Miss Marx had got me signed up 
 if you II excuse that slang! I asked her when I could 
 begin, and she said right then. Mr. de Yoyna s class starts 
 at eleven every morning, so they were just going up. I 
 left my suitcase and things in a dressing-room they have 
 in a crypt down in the basement, and she took me up some 
 more steps behind the desk to a long narrow salon done in 
 French grey, with ever so many mirrors between the panels 
 all around and rows of slender little grey chairs along the 
 sides ; it s really in very good style, or would be if they d 
 only keep the floor a little cleaner. At the end towards 
 the street there are the French windows I noticed from 
 the outside, and a raised platform with a piano and one 
 of the large-sized Victorgraphs ; and this morning there 
 was a squabby little fat girl, another Jewess by her looks, 
 arranging some music with two other girls loafing around 
 talking to her. They all three hailed Miss Marx very 
 jordially, and never even glanced at me ! I suppose they re 
 used to seeing new students coming and going all the time. 
 It turned out that the fat one was the pianist and was just 
 getting ready for the morning class, so Miss Marx handed 
 me over to her, and went back to her desk. The pianist 
 and the two other girls who acted as if they knew all about 
 it went along talking and laughing together, and I trailed 
 after them, through a door in the other end of the salon, 
 which I rather expected to open into another salon in white 
 and gold perhaps, like the pictures of Parisian interiors 
 
166 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 in Vogue. Well, it didn t! All the magnificence 
 stopped off short on the other side of that door. There 
 was a little, dark, smelly sort of a pantry with a tin water- 
 cooler; and we went through that into a lot of long, dark, 
 dirty, tenement-house-y halls and stairways with a light- 
 shaft in the middle, and rags stuffed into broken window- 
 panes, and more rags and dirty papers and rubbish every 
 where. One place I looked through one of the inside win 
 dows and saw a rough-and-ready kitchen fixed up in a room, 
 and a fat woman washing mountains of dishes. All this 
 while we kept passing troops of weird-looking people, 
 mostly girls going up or down, and when we got higher 
 up, we could hear a piano thumping away, and some man s 
 voice shouting orders, and lots of people singing choruses 
 awfully off the key. The other girls said it was the Sam 
 Lippert show rehearsing; and I could tell by their expres 
 sion and the way they spoke that they thought the Sam 
 Lippert show and everybody connected with it simply too 
 low-down for words ! 
 
 " At last we came to a loft at the top of the building, 
 and there were the class and Mr. de Voyna himself. This 
 place has whitewashed walls with posts here and there to 
 hold the roof up; tnere is some kind of brown burlap 
 stretched tight like a carpet on the part of the floor where 
 we dance, and hand-holds fixed to the posts and walls, for 
 the ballet-dancers to steady themselves by, and if you ll 
 believe me, more mirrors! Only these are just pieces of 
 looking-glass , some of them broken into all kinds of shapes, 
 and there are no frames. 
 
 " Mr. de Voyna, who is said in the prospectus to have 
 been a member of the Russian Imperial Ballet at Warsaw, 
 and a dancing- partner of Julie Sedova, is a little bald, 
 and getting stout and wears eyeglasses! He has a very 
 nice face, though ; you would take him for a doctor. He 
 
THE BOAEDMAtf FAMILY 167 
 
 wears knee-breeches, and carries a little wand that he 
 uses in directing us. There are about a dozen in the class ; 
 the two girls that came with me, a tall Irish-looking girl 
 that looks exactly like some dining-room maid we have 
 had, two little snub-nosed ones, a very pretty one with black 
 hair, one woman of sixty ! she looks it anyhow and 
 another about thirty-five. They had on all kinds of clothes, 
 middies and bloomers, bathing-suits, everything you can 
 think of, except the two old ones who were in cheesecloth 
 draperies a la Isadora Duncan ! This is my class ; I was 
 going to say you must fix them in your mind, but some 
 how I can t fix them in my own. I don t know any of 
 their names, of course, as yet, but that s of no importance. 
 I can t imagine meeting them anywhere else or knowing 
 them outside the school. They re all just as respectable 
 as they can be, they dress nicely on the street, and I m sure 
 they have good table-manners ; but it s the strangest thing, 
 I can t picture to myself who they are and where they 
 come from. They aren t in the least like shopgirls or 
 trained nurses or stenographers; they re very much above 
 cooks and hairdressers and dressmakers ; I think they must 
 be the people that the Ladies Domestic Monthly is pub 
 lished for. 
 
 " Mr. de Voyna doesn t bother about names either. He 
 calls us, l Miss Tennessee, Miss Albany, and so on, 
 speaking English very well, with only a slight accent. He 
 just put us through the ordinary exercises ; and once while 
 we were resting, he actually strolled over to me and said, 
 You are Mees ? I said, I m Miss Ohio. So? 
 You have danced before, Mees Ohio ? I said Yes, and 
 that ended the conversation. He strolled off again, and 
 did a little practising by himself, pirouetting in front of 
 one of the slabs of looking-glass, and I must say he pirou 
 etted beautifully, eyeglasses and bald spot and all. This 
 
168 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 is the first (and so far the last) notice anybody has taken 
 of me, and it didn t amount to an ovation, as you see. 
 However, IVe begun to realize that a rhinoceros might go 
 waltzing up Fifth Avenue on its hind legs, and nobody 
 would turn around to look at it twice; so you needn t won 
 der that I was so perfectly paralyzed at Mr. de Voyna s 
 seeing me, let alone speaking to me, that I had to write to 
 you about it. 
 
 "... After the hour with Mr. de Voyna was up, 
 we went down to the crypt and changed our clothes. That 
 is, the others did. I had to dance in my shirt-waist and 
 skirt, as I hadn t brought anything else, except ballet- 
 slippers ; and let me tell you it s some stunt to do a grande 
 echappe where your legs are as far apart as they can go, 
 with a tight tailor-suit skirt on! Oh, I forgot! Excuse 
 that slang! We don t use slang at all in the Claude School, 
 or if we do, we apologize profoundly. Everybody is just 
 as careful and correct as can be ... The next thing we 
 went up to the grey salon to Mrs. Palmer s class. She is 
 on the Goddess of Liberty style as to figure and weight, 
 but with a rather babyish, pretty little face. Some more 
 people now turned up, a sort of youngish-middle-aged 
 woman in a changeable blue taffeta one-piece dress and 
 soiled white boots, one or two mothers who didn t take 
 the lesson, but sat at the sides and looked on, as they might 
 have done in any dancing-school, and two men. One of 
 them was young and ordinarily nice-looking; he was just 
 like al 1 the rest of them, I don t know where he belongs, I 
 can t place him. But I judged from his reckless courage 
 in coming to a class of women, and from the fact that he 
 seemed to know most of them, that he might be some per 
 son in the perfesh a teacher, perhaps, from out of 
 town, brushing up, or learning the latest steps. The other 
 man wasn t a dancer, whatever he was too old and heavy- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 169 
 
 set, with a shoe-brush moustache. He didn t seem to be 
 anybody s father, either; I don t know who he was. I 
 don t know whether I ll ever find out who anybody is ! 
 He didn t talk to any one except to Mrs. Palmer, just sat 
 and fingered his shoe-brush. 
 
 " Class on the floor, please ! said Mrs. Palmer, so we 
 all stood up in a row, and she stood by herself on the 
 other side of the room, facing us, and the pianist (her 
 name is Stella Lipmann) began a little, trilling, piping 
 tune, and I thought : Well, here goes ! But what sort of 
 waltz or fox-trot can they be going to dance to that ? 
 Justement, as Mademoiselle used to say, we didn t dance 
 to it ! Mrs. Palmer began to recite, with gestures and 
 poses, and we all gestured and posed after her. 
 
 " I am Syrinx, soul of the reed, 
 In me the rhythm of Life is freed. 
 The immortal Mu-u-u-sic all men know 
 Lurks at my lip, but a god must blow. " 
 
 " There s a lot more ; I copied it out of another girl s 
 book ; we re expected to memorize it, you know. However, 
 one verse will be enough for you ; one verse is one too many 
 for anybody, / think. Mrs. Palmer elocutes grandly, 
 bearing down hard on all the big, important words and sort 
 of whispering the rest, and rounding her eyes, and waving 
 her big white arms, while the accompaniment which is 
 really very pretty and musical tee-diddles along. 1 1 
 am Syrinx, soul of the reed ! says Mrs. P. reaching up 
 above her head and soul. i Now push, girls, push up with 
 your hand like this ! And we all pushed with might and 
 main. I thought it wasn t a bad idea to push your soul 
 up ; maybe it needs it. But when she came to i Lurks at 
 my lip/ she made a gesture for all the world like taking 
 pins out of her mouth ; just as if nobody would know where 
 
170 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 or what a lip was if she didn t point it out ! We all cop 
 ied her religiously, the whole roomful taking pins out of 
 their mouths . . . 
 
 " The blue-taffeta woman dropped out early in the pro 
 ceedings with a very snippy expression. She sat down 
 with the other women, and I heard her saying to her nearest 
 neighbour that this was all nonsense. 
 
 " Oh, my, I think it s just beautiful ! said the other 
 woman. She is the mother of one of the snub-nosed girls, 
 and anything that child does is beautiful to her, you can 
 see that. I thought it was very sweet to see her eyes fol 
 low little Miss Snub-nose around the room. 
 
 " Well, you try it on a lot of society women, and see 
 em laugh at you ! said Blue-taffeta. They don t want 
 to interpret poetry, they want to dance. What s a dancing- 
 school for anyhow? I ve got one down in Waco, Texas, 
 and I don t come all the way to New York to fool away my 
 time on this stuff. If it wasn t for Mrs. Palmer reciting, 
 you d think they were all hanging out the wash. Inter 
 pretative, huh ! 
 
 . . . " The shoe-brush man made one solitary remark. 
 It was when Mrs. Palmer came to a line like this : 
 
 " For ever the dry cicada sings, 
 
 And the sultry locust flaps its wings. 
 
 He said : Locusts don t make that gritty sound with their 
 wings. They make it with their hind-legs." 
 
 . . . " It seems this is Mrs. Elaine Perry s work. I 
 feel about it a good deal as Blue- taffeta does. However, if 
 it all com.es in the course, I suppose I might as well go on 
 with it. Finally we got to the ball-room dancing, and Mrs. 
 Palmer really did teach us something. I mean new fig 
 ures and combinations of steps, you know; she can dance, 
 if she does weigh a hundred and sixty ... I danced 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 171 
 
 most of the time with the young man, and he thanked me 
 very carefully after we got through. Everybody is pain 
 fully polite . . . As I went out, I saw another man 
 sitting at a desk in one of the basement rooms, looking 
 awfully busy and important, talking to Mrs. Palmer. 
 Who do you suppose he is ? Mr. Palmer ? . . . 
 
 " I told you wrong ; somebody else beside Mr. de Voyna 
 saw me. It was Shoe-brush Moustache, Esquire. He was 
 standing on the corner of the Avenue waiting for the bus, 
 I think, when I passed. He looked at me very hard, but 
 not impudently, and started to take off his hat, and hes 
 itated, and started again, so I bowed to save him any more 
 embarrassment for he was quite red in the face by that 
 time, and in a dreadful confusion and he got the hat 
 all the way off at last, and seemed relieved ..." 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 BY the end of a month or so, Sandra had settled down 
 to the new life, albeit feeling herself " very much 
 outside of it all," as she privately described her situation. 
 She knew more names among her fellow-boarders and 
 fellow-pupils, but without really knowing their owners; 
 and she had ceased to be disconcerted by the indifference 
 with which they accepted her, name and all. Even Miss 
 Thatcher, from whom at least some show of interest might 
 have been expected, remained pleasantly aloof; her im 
 personal kindness gave the same impression as the im 
 personal disregard of the others, namely, that life was 
 already too crowded and too occupied to allow of any en 
 largement. Sandra divined that she was lost among count 
 less circles of people whose friends, affairs, opinions, likes 
 and dislikes were all definitely arranged, so that they had 
 no desire or incentive to break through or expand; every 
 circle and every single soul in it, she fancied complete and 
 isolated as an electric-light bulb, and as incandescent. 
 She was " on the outside/ not because of their ill-will, 
 for they had no more feeling against than for her ; they did 
 not, in fact could not, think about her at all. Even among 
 the old-time acquaintances whom from time to time she 
 was driven to hunt up, the girl sensed the same atmosphere, 
 though they one and all painstakingly did their social 
 duty, " showing her some attention " Sandra knew full 
 well the very phrase in which they would refer to these 
 efforts. She was wise enough in the ways of her own 
 world; and, remembering the treatment she herself had 
 accorded " outsiders " back there at home in days which 
 
 172 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 173 
 
 were already beginning to seem distant, the ironic aspect 
 of her present position did not escape her. " How we used 
 to laugh at them ! " she thought ; " how we used to call 
 them climbers, and talk about their trying to get in and 
 all that ! How bored Mother is often when she has to go 
 and call on strangers, and " show them some attention ! " 
 All the while the poor things are horribly lonesome. It 
 doesn t make any difference how nice they are; we don t 
 care to find out ; we deliberately don t want to bother know 
 ing them. Now I know how they feel. I never thought 
 about it before ; it seems inhuman. But you can t blame 
 people ; one can t know everybody," Alexandra would wind 
 up, sagely, returning to the shibboleth of her class. 
 " And anyhow I m not here to do society. I m here to 
 work." 
 
 This work, meanwhile, progressed on the whole satis 
 factorily; that is to say, Sandra was conscious that if she 
 was not being singled out for notice, she was nevertheless, 
 not being overlooked. In fact, in gymnasium costume, 
 her black locks bound up in a cardinal ribbon, under which 
 her face always of a clear pallor with irregular mobile 
 features and darting black eyes, appeared disturbingly 
 brilliant, Sandra, poising, leaping, alighting, balancing to 
 the music with an arrowy grace and directness, was not a 
 figure to pass unremarked. She had the distinction not 
 merely of doing the thing well, but of doing it with an 
 ineffable air of ease, authority, spontaneity, a delicate aban 
 don, a careless yet unerring taste. That she displayed in 
 the performance of routine ballet-exercises (grandes 
 echappes, for instance!) and ball-room steps that rare en 
 dowment of intelligence and romantic feeling which people 
 call the artistic temperament, is a statement which Sandra 
 herself would have received with laughter; yet without 
 doubt it was that very quality which set her so apart from 
 
174 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 the others that they themselves perceived it. From casual 
 notice of the facts that she never seemed to get out of 
 breath, never changed colour, " picked up " a step at a 
 single demonstration and never forgot it thereafter, and 
 could stand on one foot, and hold by the ankle the other 
 leg extended level with her hip at the first trial with no 
 apparent effort, they progressed to an inquisitive wonder, 
 tinted with suspicion. 
 
 " You ve been on the stage ? " the pretty, dark girl asked, 
 or rather asserted one day. " I know I ve seen you be 
 fore." 
 
 Sandra acknowledged that she had danced publicly at 
 home "for charities, and things like that, you know." 
 
 " Well, it couldn t have been there that I saw you. I ve 
 never been there," said the other girl, eyeing her uncon 
 vinced j " but I know I have. You re sure you haven t 
 been on the stage? Maybe it was some place else then 
 at the Cataracts, or the Crystal Room, or somewhere. 
 Oh, / remember! You used to be Thorley s dancing 
 partner, weren t you ? " She would not believe Sandra s 
 smiling denial. " Mr. de Voyna said you must have been 
 on the stage," she insisted. 
 
 " Did he ? " said Sandra, taken by surprise. De Voyna 
 had scarcely spoken to her since the first lesson ; certainly 
 he had looked at her, had watched her indeed very sharply 
 and steadily now and then, but she supposed he passed 
 them all in review after the same fashion, and would not 
 have been embarrassed by it in any event. In spite of the 
 artistic conscience that never let her rest, that urged her 
 unremittingly to a finer endeavour, Sandra was capable 
 of saying to herself coolly that de Voyna would find no 
 one in the class who was doing better than herself, no 
 one who was doing half so well, no one who could touch 
 her! Let him watch! 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 175 
 
 This same day, as they were practising, there presented 
 themselves at the studio such, it developed, was the 
 technical title for Mr. de Voyna s loft two young girls 
 and a young man, who, after some low-voiced conference 
 with the ballet-master, went and sat down in a corner, 
 obviously waiting till the lesson should be over. This 
 sort of audience was no new thing to Mr. de Voyna s 
 assemblage of coryphees; relatives or acquaintances of 
 their own, stray members of the Sam Lippert company 
 (which still kept up an energetic rehearsing overhead) 
 prospective students with their relatives and acquaintances, 
 detached individuals on no specific errand apparently, like 
 the man with the shoe-brush moustache, were for ever 
 loitering in, staying a while, loitering out again. The 
 classes worked on, oblivious; the visitors themselves, for 
 that matter, never seemed to be particularly interested. 
 In the antique phrase, they cared for nobody, no, not they, 
 and nobody cared for them! To Sandra, it was only 
 another manifestation of the metropolitan habit and usage 
 which she herself was rapidly acquiring. But today, 
 during the ten minutes rest, one of the girls whispered 
 around the information that this trio wanted to dance for 
 de Voyna. 
 
 " At least, one of them is going to," she amended. " I 
 think it s that youngest girl the one with the white 
 Angora fuzzy stuff on her coat. The other two brought 
 her; they want to get her in the grand-opera ballet. I 
 couldn t hear all they said a person doesn t want to 
 hang around and listen, you know but I think that s 
 what they were talking about." 
 
 Sandra heard her alertly. She herself had not thought 
 of asking for an audience with de Voyna, having her 
 mind fixed on the Claude couple, Monsieur and Madame, 
 who were still in Europe. As time went on, and the 
 
176 THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 
 
 gossip of the school bubbled about her, Sandra gradually 
 received further enlightenment about these famous and 
 wonderful artists. It transpired that they lent the school 
 their name, precisely as they lent their name to a number 
 of other worthy enterprises, with which they had no actual 
 connection, Claude hats, Claude corsets, Claude pumps 
 lent being, Sandra was told, a euphemism for sold. 
 Never were people more widely, more skilfully, or more 
 profitably advertised. Nor, when all is said, was any 
 body wronged by this piece of amiable obliquity; the 
 Claude pumps and corsets were very likely good pumps and 
 corsets, even as the Claude dancing-school was a good 
 dancing-school ; it did everything that it professed to do, 
 Sandra thought reasonably. There was a good deal of 
 sharp comment among her fellow-students as to an alleged 
 ]ack of appreciation suffered by Mrs. Palmer. Why wasn t 
 it called the Palmer School, they demanded; she was 
 the mainstay of the place ; just let her take another posi 
 tion and people would see how much the Claude name 
 amounted to; all the Claudes did was to take down the 
 money excuse that slang ! They prophesied freely that 
 it couldn t go on long this way; the Claudes had passed 
 the height of their popularity; they hadn t introduced 
 anything new lately; and so forth and so on. They were 
 quite fiercely partisan, all knowing one another well, and 
 speaking freely before and to Sandra, who must necessarily 
 keep silence, not being so conversant with these facts as the 
 rest. It abated her feeling of loneliness, however, to be 
 thus accepted by any circle amongst this vast agglomera 
 tion of circles ; she would not have thought so a few weeks 
 earlier, but possibly Sandra s feelings and points of view 
 were undergoing some subtle alteration. Sundry ideas 
 had insinuated themselves to her, which would have caused 
 preceding generations of Boardmans to turn over, scandal- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 177 
 
 ized, in their graves if all theories about the departed 
 be correct. For instance, the young woman not only 
 thought about money but would discuss it openly ; and, in 
 considering Mrs. Palmer s case, Sandra would say to her 
 self with a shrewdness and a business-instinct appalling 
 to discover in a gentleman s daughter, that the Syrinx 
 which was her profane nickname for Mrs. Palmer was 
 not wasting away under carking cares ; on the contrary she 
 had a pretty good thing ! And there might be worse ways 
 of making a living than being at the head of a school which 
 charged twenty-five dollars for the first week and fifteen 
 weekly thereafter, to say nothing of the altitudinous 
 private lessons and special courses, even if one had to 
 divide up with a set of Claudes. Numbers of eminent 
 artists ended their careers by teaching; as well begin that 
 way. At any rate, it was always a recourse. She was of 
 the same mind with that other philosophical adventurer 
 amongst the arts who pointed out that when poetry fails 
 there is always the wash-tub. 
 
 Here, however, was a new idea. There might be no 
 Claudes to dance for, but there was de Voyna, who was 
 just as good a critic, and whose word since they brought 
 grand-opera aspirants to him must be of just as much 
 weight. Sandra scanned the other girl appraisingly. 
 She was eighteen or so, not particularly good- or ill-look 
 ing, not particularly well or badly dressed, ordinarily 
 rouged and powdered, with a face just now entirely ex 
 pressionless. Her companions matched her. Sandra 
 found herself as usual unable to classify these people; 
 she could not guess who they were, whence they, came, 
 and what their homes and friends were like or what their 
 normal occupations. New York City swarmed with them ; 
 she herself might be taken for one of them by people 
 who didn t know, she thought; and, with a slight start, 
 
178 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 remembered that nobody did know. To all intents and 
 purposes she was one of them. 
 
 " Let s stay and see her dance/ suggested the Irish- 
 looking girl whose name, Sandra had recently discovered 
 was not Eyan or Conroy as might have been expected, 
 but Schwab! So the class withdrew to its accustomed 
 roosts on the window-sills and the few rickety chairs of 
 the studio, the unknown tucked up her skirt which was 
 already sufficiently short, and rather too narrow in accord 
 ance with that season s fashion, removed her walking- 
 shoes and tied on a pair of ballet-slippers with the help 
 of her friends, and Miss Lipmann began the ballet-music 
 from " Sylvia." 
 
 It was, Sandra coldly decided, just the performance to 
 be looked for; not particularly good, not particularly bad, 
 like the dancer s own appearance; of no character at all. 
 " She hasn t an idea in her head about it," thought this 
 ruthless young critic contemptuously. " She can move in 
 time to the music, but she doesn t feel it, any more than 
 those dolls they fasten to the Victorgraph discs. She 
 smiles and shows her teeth, because she s been told to 
 and it s never once occurred to her that you can show 
 other feelings in other ways. You don t have to smile all 
 the time. It s stupid. Dancing isn t just steps and mo 
 tions; she ought to Jcnow that. She s studied hard, but 
 she hasn t seen into it somehow. If you can t be original, 
 you can at least pick out the right person to imitate, but 
 this poor thing hasn t even done that. I should think 
 Mr. de Yoyna would tell her, or give her some advice about 
 it stir her up some way. Mediocrity oughtn t to be 
 encouraged." 
 
 Whatever Mr. de Voyna thought, however, he kept to 
 himself. His handsome, regular features of a slightly 
 Calmuck cast were gravely immobile while the dancer 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 179 
 
 twirled, rose and sank, mechanically smiling, before him. 
 " Very nice, very nice," he said at the end ; and the three 
 surrounded him again with murmured conversation. The 
 class filed off to the next lesson, equally sparing of com 
 ment; either they were uninterested, or were bent on pre 
 serving the metropolitan pose of a lack of interest, or, 
 like Sandra herself, kept their opinions private out of 
 common prudence and humanity. It may be, though, that 
 Miss Boardman was not so successful in this well-meant 
 effort as she believed; she could not emulate de Voyna s 
 masterly impassivity. For when, later on, she applied 
 to him for an audience, fortified by the argument that if 
 he could stand any one so thoroughly unendowed and un 
 inspired as the other girl, he could certainly stand her, 
 the Russian looked her over sharply with a little, dis 
 concerting smile of comprehension and good-humoured 
 malice. 
 
 " Ah, ah, we can dance much better, oh but much better 
 than the mees the other day, hein? " said he. " We think 
 that she was all that there is of the most banal, is it not ? 
 Ouf, that smile ! It is to make on want to bite, eh ? " 
 And here Mr. de Voyna with a shrug, trailed off into a 
 sibilant French phrase or two, while Sandra, who did 
 not understand the language, stood before him embarrassed 
 but confident. He checked himself abruptly. " So you 
 want to dance for me? A la bonne heure! I imagined 
 to myself that that would be next," he said, eyeing her. 
 " Where have you danced ? " 
 
 Sandra felt sure that he had not asked the other girl 
 any such question. She told him, and was not ill-pleased 
 to see him receive the information with a face of polite 
 disbelief, though he did not press the inquiry. 
 
 " For charity ? So ? As you choose, mees. What do 
 you wish to dance for me ? " 
 
180 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " There s some music called the Oreadentanz Dance 
 of the Oreads, that is " Sandra began. 
 
 " Assez! I speak nine languages, Mees Ohio, and I 
 know all the dance music but all of it ! " said Mr. de 
 Voyna. " You want to dance the Oreadentanz of your 
 compatriot, Mr. McDowell. Very good. And what then ? 
 Can you do anything else ? " 
 
 " Anything else ? " repeated Sandra in a blaze of temper 
 so fierce and sudden as to astonish herself in retrospect. 
 " Anything you choose. I will improvise if you like. I 
 will dance to music I never heard before. I can do any 
 thing ! " She stopped, aghast, yet angry still. She found 
 de Voyna insufferable with his Olympian airs ; he did not 
 know with whom he had to deal; she was no simpering 
 automaton ; she was a dancer ; she 
 
 " Oh, la, la, la, now it is you who will bite ! " observed 
 the ballet-master so amiably that instant mortification en 
 gulfed the girl. She was almost frightened to hear him 
 echo aloud her very thought. " You are a dancer, eh ? It 
 is not for an old un-deux-trois-attention-mesdames like me 
 to command you, an artist. C est bien ga! I, also " 
 Mr. de Voyna broke off with another shrug, a smile, a sigh 
 of infinite patience and melancholy resignation which 
 Sandra was far too occupied with herself to understand, 
 even to perceive. " Va pour I Oreadentanz alors! And 
 for whatever besides suits you que diable ! You shall 
 stay and dance for me tomorrow after the lesson. On 
 pourra bien se passer de cette sale Syrinx, Tiein?" said 
 de Voyna, expressing himself with a certain liberty, per 
 haps because he knew it to be quite safe ! 
 
 The audience would not have been highly satisfactory 
 to most candidates ; and whoever awaits the news that this 
 heroine, after stirring de Voyna to a hurricane en 
 thusiasm, sprang at once into prominence, the limelight, 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 181 
 
 and a salary of staggering magnitude at some Broadway 
 theatre whoever looks for statements like these, I say, 
 had better close the book. Something of the kind un 
 doubtedly did arrive in the course of time, but not at this 
 point. But Sandra herself was somehow not disappointed, 
 though de Voyna, so far from commending her perform 
 ance, did not even reward it with his " \ 7 ery nice " a 
 formula which, for that matter, the girl did not want 
 to hear. The ex-ballet-dancer watched her for an hour; 
 once or twice he uttered a " Tiens! " and she thought he 
 swore in Russian under his breath repeatedly in Rus 
 sian or in some other of his nine languages. At the last, 
 he stopped her roughly in the middle of a tarantelle which 
 she thought she was dancing with great spirit, pushed her 
 to one side, shouted at the pianist to go on, and danced 
 a dozen measures himself, mimicking her brutally. " A 
 tarantelle is not what you call a cake-walk, Mees Ohio. 
 It is not a clog-dance. You dance like a nigger! Like 
 this and this Bah ! " He made a gesture of disgust 
 complete and convincing. " Listen to me ! You have 
 been bitten by the spider whose bite is death you who 
 are young, beautiful, desired you who love ! It is the 
 end. And you dance, you who know it is the end ! You 
 dance with agony in your heart, with passion, with despair 
 you dance ! You would give your soul to weep, to pray, 
 to cry one last word of love and farewell and you must 
 dance ! " De Voyna wrung his hands, he clutched hia 
 temples, he moved his eyes wildly. " Mon Dieu, feel a 
 little of all that! Dance it, dance it!" he screeched. 
 
 Miss Lipmann at the piano, stared; to her he was a 
 middle-aged and hitherto respectable foreign gentleman 
 suddenly gone off his head, stamping and raving. But 
 Sandra whose initial feeling had been furious resentment, 
 now forgot everything in the illumination he let in upon 
 
182 THE BOARDMAIST FAMILY 
 
 her. " Play ! " she cried out, in her turn sharply. 
 " Begin, why don t you ? Play ! " 
 
 " And believe me, I played ! " avowed the pianist, in 
 recounting the experience afterwards. " I played for all 
 I was worth. I didn t want those two nuts to get any 
 nuttier if my playing could stop it ! " 
 
 " Well, how did it come out ? Did she do it to suit him 
 the second time ? " was asked. 
 
 " I don t know. I guess so," said Miss Lipmann in 
 differently. " They neither of ? em said much. She has 
 to die at the end, you know, and I thought she did that 
 part beautifully. So many of em can t fall down well; 
 she went down light as a feather; you couldn t hear a 
 sound, and yet it was just as if she d been struck by 
 lightning. She certainly did that part awfully well. He 
 went and helped her up that s something I never saw 
 him do for anybody else " interpolated Miss Lipmann 
 thoughtfully ; " and then they just kind of looked at each 
 other for a minute. And that ended it. I wasn t just 
 what you d call sorry. It s work playing for people to 
 dance." Thus did Miss Lipmann view the very first 
 rendition of a dance that for poetry and fire became one 
 of the most celebrated in Sandra s repertory. One might 
 suppose the little Jewess would have made some capital 
 out of the fact, but she was a simple soul and probably 
 never thought of such a thing, lurid as the episode was, 
 not even when the Sunday supplements began to be busy 
 with Sandra s features, costumes, poses, and biography. 
 "Well, what do you know about that? I ve played for 
 her dozens of times! When she was going to Claude s, 
 that last year before the school broke up. What d ye know 
 about that ? " she would remark unemotionally. 
 
 But this was not until some while later. Sandra went 
 on with her technical exercises in the attic studio and the 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 183 
 
 first-floor salon of the Claude establishment, and every 
 thing was as before except in the solitary respect that de 
 Voyna now accorded her several hours a week privately. 
 It was his own proposal, and Sandra met it at first with a 
 bluntness of speech that showed how much she must have 
 already fallen away from original standards. 
 
 " Mr. de Voyna, I haven t the money. You re ever so 
 kind, but I can t afford it." 
 
 " That is my affair," said the Eussian. 
 
 That was the only arrangement made, and Sandra s 
 family knew nothing about it. Why should she tell them, 
 the girl argued. They would not understand. They 
 would be ridiculously shocked, to begin with, at the notion 
 of her going to him without any chaperon! And they 
 would think it did not " look well " for him to be giving 
 her lessons for nothing. Not to " look well " connoted 
 with them a number of things about which they were for 
 ever coaching and warning Sandra in language carefully 
 veiled, but none the less emphatic. Alas, the young 
 woman was not in the least grateful, nor did she take their 
 words to heart; she would laugh, or throw the letters 
 with all their affectionate anxiety into the waste-basket. 
 She was sick and tired, Sandra said to herself, of this 
 solemn twaddle about untrustworthy men, and the dangers 
 a girl ran; the novels were full of it, the women s mag 
 azines fairly dripped with it. It was all the veriest stuff. 
 No girl who behaved herself, and kept her mind on her 
 work had anything to fear. Perhaps there was some solid 
 foundation for these theories ; for it is a fact that Sandra 
 went undamaged throughout her career both as a student 
 and artist. She never encountered any of those wolves 
 in masculine garb, or those harpy-like ladies about whom 
 all of us have heard so authoritatively; either they 
 avoided her instinctively, or with her steady young vision 
 
184 THE BOARDMAIST FAMILY 
 
 fixed on the heights, with " her mind on her work," as she 
 said, she never was aware of them and their tawdry tempta 
 tions. 
 
 There were, indeed, other matters which Sandra kept 
 from her people. Mrs. Richard had no inkling of the 
 girl s moments of loneliness and low spirits and of her 
 impulses to go home to the easy, aimless life. Sandra s 
 letters were always gay, sanguine, sensible; she made a 
 little comedy out of her experiences as a working-girl. 
 . . . "I have been taking taxis right and left whenever 
 I felt tired, or it was raining, and have been going to 
 places for luncheon where I would have to pay at least 
 sixty cents for a sandwich and bouillon and a chocolate 
 eclair. Just the other day I suddenly thought : Here, 
 this won t do! I m poor! I live in a hall-bedroom. I 
 ought to work up some local colour. So since then I ve 
 tried a whole lot of cafeterias and places like Child s, 
 and it s really a good deal of fun, and perfectly surpris 
 ing how much you can get for a quarter. . . Mrs. Tower 
 came into my room and sat for an hour, and told me 
 all about ever so many love-affairs she had had, and 
 what a time Mr. Tower had getting her, and how there 
 was another girl after him. Then when he died (she 
 didn t seem to feel very badly over it) she started this 
 boarding-house ; and she told me what a perfectly wonder 
 ful success it was, on account of her system of never being 
 intimate with the boarders, or telling them anything about 
 her affairs! She raised her niece, whose father and 
 mother are both dead ... I think Miss Schultze, by the 
 way, is really a very nice girl, not a bit like the aunt; 
 but I haven t had much to do with her, of course. . . ." 
 
 " Mercy, I hope not! " ejaculates Mrs. Richard. " They 
 must be dreadfully ordinary people >" 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 185 
 
 " Harmless, though, and rather amusing, it seems to 
 me," says Mrs. Alexander mildly. 
 
 " Well, I don t know about their being so harmless, 
 Mother. That sort of person is very liable to fasten on a 
 girl like Sandra, one who they can see has had greater 
 advantages socially, you know and er all that. 
 They think so much of things like that. They re likely 
 to be very pushing and disagreeable," said the wise Mrs. 
 Kichard. "Listen to this: "She" that s this 
 Schultze girl, you know came and offered to hook 
 me up the other night, when I was going to Mildred 
 Staccy s Mildred Barnes , that is and I was glad she 
 did, for it was my black-and-silver, and I couldn t have 
 got into it by myself So now, of course, she will 
 expect Sandra to reciprocate by hooking her, and then she 
 will begin calling her by her first name, and all that," 
 said Sandra s mother. " That s the way those people 
 always do. I ll have to write to Sandra. She s never 
 been thrown with that class before, and I can see she 
 doesn t quite know how to keep them at a distance. 
 One can do it without being unkind " 
 
 She went on reading: " Last Saturday night she and 
 Mr. Beckley wanted me to go with them and another man 
 
 some friend who is in the same office as Mr. Beckley 
 
 to a moving-picture theatre, and then to supper some 
 where afterwards There, 1 told you liow it would be! 
 but I declined Thank goodness! But I might have 
 known Sandra would be careful as nicely as I could 
 Of course. You dont want to hurt their feelings 
 I told them I had already been out late two nights this 
 week, and that was my limit. It was the truth, too. 
 You must be in perfect physical condition if you want to 
 do your best, and that means denying yourself a good deal 
 
186 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 How seriously the child takes it, doesn t she? You d 
 think she had to make her living ( I danced for them 
 the other night at Mildred s. Nobody could play, but they 
 had a Victorgraph. Everybody seemed to like it, at least 
 they applauded. . . . 
 
 " What do you think ? I ve lately had two offers. I 
 don t mean offers, so don t get excited. One of the men 
 that I dance with a good deal at the school told me he 
 knew of an " opening " at an " exclusive tea-room " (it 
 was the Astorbilt, which is really nice, you know) and 
 if I would " go in with him " he was sure we would 
 "make a hit." He meant exhibition-dancing, you know. 
 Now please don t imagine there was anything sentimental 
 about this. He wasn t thinking of a thing in the world 
 but business. He dances beautifully himself, and of 
 course he knows it, but he isn t at all silly about it. He 
 has to dance beautifully ; it s his bread and butter ! He 
 said : " This is a very high-class proposition, Miss 
 Boardman, or I wouldn t consider it a minute either for 
 you or myself. You wouldn t be brought into any unpleas 
 ant association whatever. When the management came to 
 me, I made them understand distinctly that the young 
 lady I hoped to get for dancing-partner was not to 
 be obliged to mingle with the guests. They said that was 
 just exactly what they were anxious to get; they mean 
 to make a point of our keeping strictly to ourselves." . . . 
 
 " The other " proposition," which was just as busi 
 ness-like, came through the Syrinx. Some man, the 
 manager of some big hotel down in Aiken or San Antonio, 
 or maybe it was at Palm Beach, one of those Southern 
 winter resorts anyhow, wanted somebody like me to be a 
 kind of resident professional entertainer for the people 
 be around whenever any one wanted to dance or play 
 tennis or make up a bridge-table, and things like that. 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 187 
 
 Don t you remember, Mother, seeing girls like that, or 
 sometimes some man, at those places? I always thought 
 it was such a queer thing to do; but it s a regular job 
 like anything else! Mrs. Palmer never cracked a smile 
 when she told me ; she didn t see anything queer about it. 
 She said that the school ordinarily did not undertake to 
 supply people for positions, but that this was an excep 
 tional case. They wanted somebody who would " fit in 
 with the tone of the place which is exceedingly exclusive 
 and refined " so she at once thought of me ! Wasn t that 
 a bouquet, though? You get all your expenses coming 
 and going and while you re there. " Of course you can 
 put all the clothes you want in the laundry. They expect 
 that," the Syrinx said. " But I don t need to tell a girl 
 like you anything about that or the proper style of dress. 
 You know. . . ." 
 
 " Mr. Thatcher is here. He crossed on the Altruria, 
 and says it was terribly rough all the way. Only think, 
 he s just been in St. Petersburg, and now he has to go to 
 Buenos Aires !... 
 
 Sandra s mother sighed gently as she folded up the 
 letter. " He has a very interesting life, going everywhere 
 and seeing everything. Sandra likes travelling, too, and 
 doing rather out-of-the-way things like this dancing- 
 school fad, for instance. They re unusually congenial," 
 she remarked, and sighed again. 
 
 " She doesn t say anything about having declined those 
 two positions as she calls them," said the older Mrs. 
 Boardman. 
 
 " Eh ? Why, no. I suppose she thought she didn t 
 need to tell us that. Fancy Sandra doing anything of 
 that kind!" 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 MAEY SCHULTZE, in spite of a metropolitan bring 
 ing up, her office-girl position and that aggressive 
 looking nose which Sandra has remarked upon, was a 
 rather shy and quiet girl. She was aware that in sum 
 total her slight figure, soft, smooth, straight, light-coloured 
 hair, and gentle blue eyes lacked effect; aware, too, that 
 this lack was not to be supplied or overcome. Sick or 
 well, young, old, dressed like a princess or going in rags, 
 she still would have been a very cipher for unimpressive- 
 ness ; neither good nor ill fortune nor any sort of honours 
 or achievements could have invested her with the indefin 
 able quality which she called " personality." It is, how 
 ever, no uncommon lot to feel oneself a nonentity in !frTew 
 York, so Mary, being a sensible enough girl, did not be 
 moan the fact ; it only stirred in her a fervent admiration 
 untainted by envy or jealousy for anybody like Alexandra 
 Boardman. This slender and elegant creature with her 
 fine unconscious distinction that was so superior to physi 
 cal perfection, that had nothing to do with dress or sur 
 roundings, set up a new standard for Miss Schultze. It 
 remained unshaken even by the graciously administered 
 rebuffs which her first timid advances met. Somehow or 
 other, Mary found it natural and appropriate that so 
 eminently endowed a being should be courteously in 
 accessible; warmth or informality of manner would not 
 have become her. 
 
 " It isn t that she s got so much style she declared to 
 Mr. Beckley. " She s awfully aristocratic, through and 
 
 through." 
 
 188 
 
THE BOABDMAtf FAMILY 189 
 
 " Huh ! Studying to be an actress, isn t she ? " 
 
 " No. It s aesthetic dancing." 
 
 " Well, great goodness. I don t see anything so 
 aristocratic about that!" said Gus. 
 
 " I don t think she has to. I think she s just doing it 
 to be doing something. It s that kind of extreme thing 
 society girls do, you know " 
 
 " Yeah. Like one of these millionaires giving a dinner 
 for a pet bull-dog, or some stunt on that order," the young 
 man acquiesced. 
 
 " Oh, no, that s just sort of crazy and silly. This is 
 more like taking a course in kindergarten or library- 
 work. It s kind of like playing that they have to work. 
 It isn t much like the real thing, but they don t know that," 
 Mary said, not without a certain odd condescension. " I 
 expect Miss Boardman can stop whenever she wants to." 
 
 " She couldn t stop too soon for me ! " said Augustus 
 rather grimly. " Dancing ! I don t believe her folks can 
 be such a much, or they wouldn t let her do it. Maybe 
 it s because they live out West in Ohio or wherever it 
 is and don t know anything. If they d ever seen what 
 goes on at these cabaret places " 
 
 "Oh, my, she isn t thinking of going anywhere like 
 that ! " Mary protested, shocked. " She s going to be one 
 of the the high-up ones 
 
 " She is, is she ? " said Gus with sarcastic significance. 
 He opined that she was due to learn a good deal before 
 she was throiigh with it if she stuck, that is. And 
 Mary s blue eyes, clouding a little, gave tacit assent. 
 The two looked not unlike as they sat together on the sofa 
 in the boarding-house parlour; in the lines already 
 mapping their young faces one might read a similar 
 experience of life, not exactly hard, only changeless and 
 devoid of illusions. Both of them had always had good 
 
190 THE BOARDMAiNT FAMILY 
 
 enough homes, good enough health, good enough luck gen 
 erally. There were no drunkards or wastrels or invalids 
 on either side, no tragic burdens. Mary could not re 
 member her father and mother and got on comfortably 
 with Mrs. Tower, who was kind to the girl; she did not 
 resent the necessity for work, but spent or saved her ten 
 dollars a week with satisfaction, and did a little em 
 broidery for her wedding-outfit, and good-naturedly with 
 stood the "joshing" of her companion office-girls, and 
 waited patiently for Gus, and was not unhappy or out of 
 temper over the flavourless dish fate had spread for her. 
 Young Beckley had to support his mother; he got seventy 
 dollars a month at McChesney s, with no prospect of 
 getting any more soon, if ever. But he did not look upon 
 these circumstances as hardships; everybody has to start 
 in a small way; he was doing as well as any one could 
 reasonably expect, and some day would do a great deal 
 better. There are thousands upon thousands of just such 
 couples all over the country all over the universe ! 
 and like Gus and Mary, if they sometimes glimpse for a 
 moment the monotony of their existence, they are saved 
 by the belief, in nine cases out of ten never to be realized, 
 that it is not always going to be so. 
 
 "I wouldn t take twenty of that Miss Boardman for 
 one of you, anyhow," said Augustus loyally. " There s 
 nothing to those society girls." He reached out for her 
 hand and squeezed it. " Say, Mary, when we get mar 
 ried " 
 
 " Oh, Gus, don t ! Somebody ll see you ! " 
 About this time Mr. Thatcher landed from the AUruria; 
 and coming around to see Sandra he erelong made the 
 acquaintance of the other young people. That is to say, 
 Samuel, who was no stickler for formalities, beginning by 
 off-hand conversation with young Beckley, was presently 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 191 
 
 with scarcely an introduction on friendly terms with Miss 
 Schultze. The latter swiftly divined the situation between 
 him and Miss Boardman divined it with compassion. 
 
 " I shouldn t wonder if he d been after her for ever so 
 long," she communicated to Gus ; " and of course she won t 
 have him. I feel so sorry for him." 
 
 "<Of course ?" echoed Mr. Beckley. "Why of 
 course ? He s why, he s a prince ! He must make 
 a lot. He probably gets a big salary and commissions on 
 the side. He s all right. What s the matter with her ? " 
 
 " Oh, he isn t the kind that would ever appeal to her, 
 Gus. He might just as well give it up. I do feel so 
 sorry for him. If you were a girl, you d understand." 
 
 Miss Thatcher, having been a girl, no doubt did under 
 stand. She accepted Sam s presents and dutiful fraternal 
 attentions good-humouredly, went about with him as 
 much as she thought advisable, and then diplomatically 
 withdrew without betraying any annoying sisterly jeal 
 ousy, without feeling any, in fact, for Kate was very 
 nearly as cool-hearted as she was cool-headed and had long 
 been used to " paddling her own canoe " as she herself said 
 sometimes adding with a laugh that she never allowed 
 anybody to rock it, either. Notwithstanding her pro 
 fessed detachment, however, she did give Samuel a word 
 of warning in regard to one project be broached. 
 
 " I don t think I d do that if I were in your place, 
 Sam. You can t go mixing Miss Boardman up with those 
 people." 
 
 " Oh, pshaw, she likes them. She told me Miss 
 Schultze was a nice girl. She doesn t seem to know 
 Beckley very well, but they ve been right here in the 
 house with her for months 
 
 " Yes, and she s never had anything to do with them ! " 
 interrupted her sister. Then all at once she began to 
 
192 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 laugh. " Oh, well, go ahead ! You ll have to find out 
 for yourself." 
 
 But Sam, as it happened, did not find out. " Let s go 
 to the Hippodrome some night before I sail. And I ll tell 
 you what I d like to do. I d like to take Beckley and his 
 girl, your little stenographer friend. They don t have 
 much fun. I judge he doesn t make a great deal, and he 
 can t spend any of it. I d like to give em a good time," 
 he said to Sandra, never doubting her response. And to 
 be sure, Sandra, after one blank instant, spoke with 
 sufficient cordiality. 
 
 " Oh, you feel as if you ought to show them some atten 
 tion. Why yes, of course. I think that would be a very 
 nice thing to do." 
 
 So they went, and to Sandra s inward surprise, it turned 
 out to be no such ordeal after all. Mr. Beckley and Miss 
 Schultze were properly dressed, and there was nothing 
 " common " about their conduct ; Sam s entertainment was 
 not too lavish; everything went off so well that Miss 
 Boardman ended by having a very good time herself! 
 They did not see any one she knew, or the others knew, 
 whereat Sandra was a little relieved, though she said to 
 herself recklessly that she would not have minded; what 
 difference did it make on this coast of Bohemia? But 
 afterwards she and Mary did call each other by the first 
 name, dreadful to relate; and Mr. Beckley was notice 
 ably easier in his manner; and they even made some sly 
 references to Mr. Thatcher s aspirations! The expedi 
 tion and its results had to be added to the increasing list 
 of matters that she omitted to mention in her letters home. 
 
 Late that winter the Claude School, fulfilling the 
 prophecies and rumours which had been in circulation 
 all season, collapsed. The pupils scattered; Mrs. Palmer 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 193 
 
 went to another establishment farther up town connected 
 with some fashionable dramatic enterprise, it was under 
 stood ; de Voyna enlisted a compatriot, " late of the Royal 
 Ballet" at Vienna, St. Petersburg, Stockholm or where 
 you choose, and started a school of his own; Miss Lip- 
 mann "got a job" playing in a moving-picture theatre; 
 the Claudes business representative was to be seen for 
 some days before the close busy over the books with Miss 
 Marx; and Sandra now discovered that that hitherto 
 negligible individual, the shoe-brush-moustached man oc 
 cupied this position ! No wonder he had been " around " 
 so often, she reflected; she had fallen into the habit of 
 nodding to him, moved by his own habit of eyeing her 
 waveringly, with halfway gestures towards his hat in a 
 perennial and visibly harassing uncertainty as to whether 
 she recognized him or not. Flesh and blood could not en 
 dure the spectacle; it was like attending the efforts of a 
 stammerer to enunciate clearly; Sandra bowed in self-de 
 fence, to settle her own nerves ; and on every occasion the 
 shoe-brush moustache finished his salutation with the same 
 air of relief, the girl said, as if he had just escaped from 
 the dentist s chair. But she did not know his name 
 until one morning as she ran up the steps past Miss Marx s 
 desk, the book-keeper stopped her with a gesture. 
 
 " Oh, Miss Boardman why just a minute, 
 please ! " she said ; and as Sandra paused and turned with 
 a foot on the next step, Miss Marx, manoeuvering into 
 close range, gave her an almost imperceptible grimace of 
 meaning. " Meet Mr. Levison Mr. Max Levison." 
 
 Mr. Max Levison bowed, muttering incoherently under 
 his moustache, and half-extending his hand with the in 
 decision seemingly characteristic of him. Sandra, as 
 usual, put an end to it in sheer humanity, by holding out 
 
194 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 her own, which he took and retained for an instant with a 
 fearful care as if it had been of the texture of an egg 
 shell. 
 
 " Miss Boardman s one of our stars," Alma told him. 
 
 " Oh, I know that ! " said Mr. Levison with a nervous 
 smile. " I saw her when she first came. Let s see, that s 
 been three or four months, hasn t it? I guess she knew 
 something about dancing before she came, but she must 
 have liked us pretty well, or she wouldn t have stayed, 
 hey ? " Having got himself started in this rather quaint 
 fashion, speaking of Sandra instead of to her, he was 
 apparently unable to abandon it, but went on addressing 
 the tDok-keeper with a kind of flurried and involuntary 
 fluency. " It s a pity we ve got to close up but she must 
 have noticed how the attendance has been falling off 
 it s run down steadily ever since she came Oh, I I 
 mean I didn t mean " 
 
 Sandra s laugh was so spontaneous and sincere that 
 Miss Marx, after an embarrassed moment, joined her un 
 restrainedly. Levison looked at them at first doubtfully, 
 then with a dawning grin. 
 
 " Now look here, don t you start kidding me about that 
 break. You know perfectly well what I meant both of 
 you," said he, and something in the cast of his speech, or 
 in his manner, aroused Sandra to the fact that he was a 
 younger man than she had supposed perhaps under 
 thirty-five. There was only a streak or two of grey in 
 his strong black hair. " Do you know yet what you re 
 going to do ? After the break-up, you know ? Made any 
 plans ? " he asked of her directly, for the first time. 
 
 Sandra told him she was going home for a rest. 
 
 "Oh, home! Oh, you re going to go home!" echoed 
 Mr. Levison blankly, fingering the shoe-brush. " Where 
 is vour home ? " 
 
THE BOAEDMAX FAMILY 195 
 
 Sandra told him that, too, glancing at the clock, and be 
 ginning to move on her way. 
 
 " Oh, yes, I ve been there. But why er lis 
 ten ! " said Levison urgently. " You re coming back ? 
 You re going to keep on? You re not going to give it 
 up?" 
 
 " I want to keep on," said Sandra, politely chilly. 
 " So sorry, Mr. Levison, I have to go to my lesson 
 now," and she sped off up the stairs, feeling his gaze fol 
 low her. 
 
 Miss Marx made an opportunity afterwards to explain 
 that she could not avoid the introduction. " He asked 
 me flat out, and I couldn t help it. He d been at me 
 before to do it, and I had kind of put him off, you know, 
 because I thought maybe you wouldn t be crazy about it ; 
 but this time I couldn t help myself. Besides I feel as 
 if I ought to keep in with him. It s business," she said 
 simply. 
 
 "Oh, I --I m sure Mr. Levison is very nice," said 
 Sandra in some confusion. She could think of no answer 
 that would have been entirely proper and adequate, as she 
 later told the family, describing this incident with laugh 
 ter. 
 
 " Oh, yes, he s got plenty, I expect," said Alma. " He s 
 interested with the Rosenbergs. They re pretty solid peo 
 ple to be in with. They ve got a name on Broadway, and 
 every now and then one of their shows makes a big hit, 
 but I don t believe that s where they make the money. 
 No, sir, that s where they spend it ! It s funny, a Broad 
 way reputation isn t any special good on Broadway, but 
 you can play it to the limit if you don t mind my using 
 that sporty-sounding expression all over the rest of 
 the country. It s the Rosenberg Circuit where the money 
 comes from, since all the stars have taken to vaudeville. 
 
196 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 They ve got Olga Nethersole and Mrs. Campbell and 
 Eaversham oh, I don t know who all! I expect Mr. 
 Levison could tell you all about it, though ; he s on the in 
 side. He told me Mr. and Mrs. Claude were going out 
 next season on the Circuit, you know " and so on, and 
 so on. 
 
 Sandra went home at the Easter holidays according to 
 her plans. Everett met her at the station, looking more 
 debonair than ever; seeing the young fellow s handsome, 
 well-cut head and fine shoulders above the crowd, from the 
 top of her Pullman steps, Sandra felt a throb of pride in 
 him. How splendid he was! How common everybody 
 seemed beside him ! How good it felt to be back among 
 one s own people! She even laughed in delighted recog 
 nition of the fact that he had picked up a porter, though 
 there was a great crowd and nobody else had one ; that was 
 Everett all over ! He had never carried a bag in his life ; 
 everybody was always ready and eager to wait on him. 
 To be sure he tipped the servants regally, and perhaps they 
 scented that, but anyhow they always admired and ap 
 plauded and followed him. Everett was glad to see her, 
 too, although of course he would not show much feeling 
 before such an audience; the brother and sister greeted 
 each other decorously, though they chattered like magpies 
 once in the taxi together. So much seemed to have hap 
 pened in these few months. Ted So-and-So, was en 
 gaged to some Buffalo girl and after the way he 
 had rushed Frances So-and-So, too! Mrs. Henry D. 
 Meigs and the rest of the Meigs family had come 
 back from Europe and opened up that old barracks 
 of a place on the North Hill it looked like the Arabian 
 Nights now. " They said " that Nellie Maranda Nellie 
 Loring was going to get a divorce from that Loring 
 fellow ; the wonder was she hadn t done it before. Didn t 
 
THE BOARDMA1ST FAMILY 197 
 
 the old town look natural, though ? It did, the dear, famil 
 iar, dirty old town! 
 
 At the house, there were the family waiting, and her 
 room all prettily done over with a new wall-paper that had 
 high-handled baskets of flowers tied with streamers of pink 
 and blue ribbon on it; her favourite soup, her favourite 
 dessert were ready; the old gilt-and-white china epergne 
 that was all that was left of Mrs. Jacob Boardman s dinner- 
 service, and that always stood on the lacquered table Com 
 modore Chase had brought from the Orient in one of his 
 cruises eighty years ago, was filled with cards of invita 
 tion for Miss Boardman. There was to be a Kermess for 
 the benefit of the Orphans Home in which she had been 
 asked to dance as a matter of course. Everett was in it, 
 too ; all the young people were in it. 
 
 " You won t know a great many of them. They come 
 from the suburbs and all over everywhere people you 
 never saw before, and probably will never see again," her 
 mother said. " It s just like all the charity entertain 
 ments in that way. But this Miss Somebody that they ve 
 gotten to come here and manage the thing, seems to be 
 very careful and judicious. She gets the girls and men 
 that know one another, and are in the same set, together, 
 and that prevents any unpleasantness. You don t have to 
 go outside of your own group." 
 
 Sandra did not answer, and Mrs. Richard talked on, not 
 questioning that she had expressed sentiments so natural 
 and reasonable as to need no answer ; in fact, Sandra would 
 have found them so, too, once upon a time ; she would have 
 entirely concurred with the judgment that pronounced 
 Miss Somebody to be very careful and judicious, and that 
 it avoided unpleasantness to keep to your own group. 
 That was less than six months before ; why was it that now 
 her mother s words moved the girl preposterously with a 
 
198 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 desire to laugh or cry, she scarcely knew which? She 
 looked around the table, at her father s kind, tired face; 
 at Everett sitting opposite inimitably well-dressed, and 
 well- mannered ; at her dainty grey-haired mother ; at her 
 grandmother s harsh, high features and beautiful hands; 
 at the simple, charming room, even at the maid in the 
 background, who was a little awkward and flustered, noth 
 ing like the finished servant Mrs. Boardman s maids used 
 to be. She was new, and they kept only one, nowadays, it 
 seemed. This, Sandra said to herself, was her group ; she 
 loved them, she was proud of them, she understood them 
 to the very core, she was happy to be with them for 
 two weeks! What was the matter with her, she thought 
 guiltily, that the life they lived should suddenly seem so 
 distasteful? She was actually thinking of her shabby 
 boarding-house, of de Voyna, of the turbulent, indifferent 
 city, of those two " offers " she had temporized about, at 
 tracted and repelled, unable definitely to accept or decline 
 
 she was actually thinking of these things with restless 
 ness and eagerness! She was ashamed of the feeling, 
 terrified lest the others should guess at it. What would 
 they think of her, this dear, admiring, devoted family? 
 What would her mother think if she knew how much like 
 a sweet child she seemed, with a pretty playhouse, and a 
 "group" of nice, lovable little girl friends, with play 
 houses ! Remorse shook her to the soul ; and yet and 
 yet two weeks would be all she could endure of it. 
 
 " Sandra, that s your sauce remoulade on the asparagus 
 
 you know you re so fond of it Sandra! Dearie 
 why, you re not crying ! " 
 
 " I c-can t help it I m I m so glad to be here ! " 
 Sandra stammered, gallantly untruthful, raging at her 
 self. She choked back the sob, and jumped up, seizing 
 hold of her mother. " I m going to wool you around ! " 
 
THE UOAKDMAN FAMILY 199 
 
 The mood persisted in varying degrees all through her 
 stay. Everybody was kind, interested, more or less inquis 
 itive, very complimentary about her dancing. The return 
 of Misss Alexandra Boardman, the parties given for her, 
 her appearance in the Kirmess must have been a perfect 
 boon to the society reporters. Sandra was grateful, or 
 tried to be ; after the lonesome winter, she felt she should 
 be more appreciative, should cling to every minute with her 
 family and friends. Alas, the truth was, as she acknowl 
 edged inwardly with shame, that she was counting the 
 minutes off with relief ! And as to appreciation, the girl 
 knew that she would rather have one half-hour with de 
 Voyna storming, sneering, grudgingly approving by turns, 
 than a year of plaudits from these good and polite people. 
 What did they know about it, she thought with contempt ; 
 even if they had been competent critics they would still 
 have carefully sugar-coated their words to her. For that 
 matter, she did not need them to tell her she could dance ! 
 The sober fact was, that, like every other artistic endeav- 
 ourer that ever lived, she did need and feel greatly the 
 stimulus of an admiration which intrinsically she found 
 valueless, even despised. Nothing could really satisfy her 
 except the pursuit of her art with struggles, conquests and 
 defeats of which only she herself could ever know. 
 
 It will be seen that Miss Boardman, in this brief space, 
 owing to nobody knows what influences, the isolation of 
 New York, the vindication of her belief in her own tal 
 ents, the contact with another social world, or what-not, 
 had undergone some disturbing change, spiritual or mental 
 or both. She was no longer the anxious, visionary young 
 person who had gone off upon a quixotic impulse to save 
 her father from bankruptcy. If that purpose had still 
 been uppermost in Sandra s mind, she might have been con 
 firmed in it by certain patent small facts, as that the house 
 
200 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 and table were not so well supplied as formerly, the ward 
 robes of the two elder ladies not so liberal, and her father s 
 verging on shabbiness, and by other signs of curtailment of 
 expenses everywhere visible, though kept in the back 
 ground. But the girl scarcely remarked these things at 
 all. She was of a generous disposition, and still thought 
 by fits and starts of how much she was going to help the 
 family; but she thought much oftener and with incom 
 parably greater intensity of what an artist she was going 
 to be. She was naively surprised at the disappointment 
 and trouble that gathered in the others faces when she 
 spoke of going back to New York. 
 
 " We we thought you d stay at home for a while 
 now," her mother said at last. " You seemed so glad to 
 get home. We had that room papered I wanted every 
 thing to look pretty and attractive to you " Her voice 
 shook a little ; having that room papered had entailed some 
 scrimping and pinching and " going without." 
 
 " It is pretty and attractive, Moms it s just as sweet 
 as it can be. I love it ! " Sandra cried out. " Only I 
 can t stay anyhow. I I have to work I have to go 
 back, don t you see ? " She wondered, with a kind of 
 vexed pity, why it should be so hard to make them under 
 stand what was so plain to herself ; and went on trying to 
 explain with an insistence that was growing somewhat hys 
 terical when Mr. Boardman cut her short abruptly. 
 
 "Very well, Sandra, you can go back if you want to 
 so much. Don t let s have any more talk about it ! " he 
 said. And there fell that awed silence which occasionally 
 follows a paternal decision not too pleasantly announced. 
 
 " Dad, I " Sandra began and halted. She had been 
 about to say that she knew it was costing him a good deal 
 and that she would pay him back as soon as she was able, 
 but the words stuck in her throat. Even if he was not 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 201 
 
 affronted by the suggestion, he would not believe that she 
 could carry it out. He did not believe in her; none of 
 them believed in her. Mrs. Alexander may have been an 
 exception, but she sat silent, looking at her granddaughter 
 speculatively. No revelation of youthful selfishness or 
 ambition, justifiable or not, could move Mrs. Alexander 
 much, to outward seeming, at least. 
 
 " You found the banking association cheques convenient, 
 didn t you ? " Sandra s father asked presently. " I ll get 
 you some more " 
 
 " It it won t take I don t want very much " 
 Sandra faltered unhappily. 
 
 " Everett can see about your ticket tomorrow," Kichard 
 went on in a manner that closed her mouth again. " Just 
 now I m rather busy, but Everett always has plenty of 
 time." If there was a trace of bitterness in the last words, 
 Sandra was too absorbed in her own affairs to distinguish 
 it. She had not observed whether her brother was busy 
 or not ; he still had his position with Mr. Arnold. 
 
CHAPTEB IV 
 
 AMONG the first acquaintances Sandra encountered on 
 her return to New York was, oddly enough, the most 
 recent one, Mr. Max Levison, whom she met on Fifth 
 Avenue just outside a famous hotel. Strictly speaking, 
 they did not meet, for Mr. Levison overtook her, a few 
 steps past the impressive wrought-iron-and-glass entrance, 
 breathing a little hurriedly as if he might have made some 
 haste about it. 
 
 " Say, is this the way you treat your friends people 
 you know, I mean ? Go right by em without taking any 
 notice ? " he said with a species of forced and hollow joc 
 ularity; Sandra, turning at the voice in her ear with a 
 start, perceived even in her surprise, that for all the free 
 dom of this address, Mr. Levison was in reality quaking 
 in one of his seizures of diffidence. 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Levison ! Why, I didn t see you ! I didn t 
 know I had gone right by you ! " she assured him with the 
 unnecessary warmth to which this exhibition always moved 
 her ; and gave him her hand, which he hesitated over and at 
 last took gingerly, as before. 
 
 " I was right there in the window. I don t see how you 
 missed me," said he; and without further question fell 
 into step by her side. Sandra had time to reflect on the 
 refreshing lack of sophistication which assumed first that 
 she would walk along staring into hotel windows, or even so 
 much as glancing in that direction, and secondly that his 
 company would be so welcome, when he spoke again. 
 " You ve got back, I see." 
 
 " Yes, I m back," said Sandra, quelling a desire to retort 
 
 202 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 203 
 
 oh, no, she was not back, she was in Timbuctoo ! Setting 
 apart her instinctive knowledge that that sort of lightness 
 would not do at all with Levison, she was somehow aware 
 that he was not dull, he was merely more or less crippled 
 by bashf ulness and that was strange too, she thought, 
 for it was only too apparent that he came of a race whose 
 distinguishing trait is not bashfulness rather the re 
 verse. 
 
 " Well, I guess you showed em something about dancing 
 back in the old home town, Podunk-on-the-Miami, hey ? " 
 was his next remark, made with the same desperate false 
 ease, of which he seemed immediately to repent. " Oh, 
 say, I m not making fun of it, you know, I I was just 
 talking. It s a nice place. I know some people there 
 named Hirsch Dr. David Hirsch he s a dentist." 
 
 Sandra said obligingly that she had heard of Dr. Hirsch, 
 who indeed was an eminent person in his professional 
 sphere. Mr. Levison then remarked that these specialists 
 generally made a good deal they could charge almost 
 anything they wanted to; and for his part, he thought it 
 was all right ; they did a lot in charity, too, and if they got 
 even by soaking him, or some other fellow that they thought 
 had the the goods, you know, why, you couldn t alto 
 gether blame them. He never kicked about a doctor s bill ; 
 he just came across with the amount, and hoped he 
 wouldn t have another he never had had very many, in 
 fact, he d always had first-class health ; but doctors earned 
 their money in the long run. Lo, Charlie! How s 
 everything ? All to the mustard, hey ? 
 
 The last part of this speech was delivered not without 
 relief, as if he were snatching at a chance to interrupt his 
 own unwilling but apparently uncontrollable flow of words 
 at a short, stout gentleman, very much dressed, with 
 whom they almost collided in the crowd. He did not at 
 
204 THE BOAEDMAIST FAMILY 
 
 first see Miss Boardman, then copied Levison s gesture, 
 taking off his hat with a rapid inventorying glance. The 
 Avenue swallowed him up, leaving her with an impression 
 of dazzlingly polished boots, and the latest thing in haber 
 dashery. 
 
 " That s Charlie Rosenberg," said Levison, as they went 
 on. And he suddenly asked " What are you doing now, 
 Miss Boardman ? " 
 
 " What am I doing now ? " repeated Sandra, taken by 
 surprise. 
 
 " Yes. Have you got into anything ? You finally 
 turned Suydam down, I understand. There might have 
 been something in that a person never can tell. But of 
 course you know what you want to do." 
 
 Sandra stared at him, dumbfounded. Suydam was the 
 young man of the Astorbilt tea-room enterprise. " How 
 . how did you know ? " she stammered at length. 
 
 " Oh, I know him ; I know lots of em. You know who 
 J am, don t you ? Well, then ! " Levison said, with an 
 expressive shrug. " I keep a line on a whole lot of peo 
 ple. That s what I m for partly." The unnatural 
 manner dropped from him as he spoke ; it was plain that 
 Mr. Levison s foot was on his native heath now. " As I 
 was saying, that Astorbilt business you may have made 
 a mistake there. There s more future to it than you think. 
 That s how the Claudes got their start, and Miss So-and- 
 So " he named her " and this young Whoosis, her 
 dancing-partner. She began on the stage, and never got 
 a look-in absolutely never was nearer the spot-light than 
 number six counting from the end, third row back, the 
 one with the red tassel on her spear. Well, then, somehow 
 or other, she got hold of this young fellow and I don t 
 know which one of em had the idea, or what kind of a 
 steer they had, but the dancing-craze came on, and the 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 205 
 
 first thing you know they re It! Of course she has to 
 keep everlastingly at it something new every other min 
 ute, and costumes from Lucile, and her picture in four 
 teen different poses in the ladies magazines every issue 
 she s got a pretty busy little press-agent, that girl has ; 
 that counts some," Mr. Levison wound up. " But you see 
 how it is. There s something in it." 
 
 " Well, I I wasn t thinking " Sandra began con 
 fusedly. The man meant well, she thought; how could 
 he understand her attitude towards her art, he whose sole 
 measure was dollars and cents? And after all, the com 
 mercial side was not to be ignored that was the troubling 
 thing ! If you want to know whether what you do is worth 
 anything, try to sell it ! 
 
 " You ve got something else in view ? " Levison inquired. 
 
 " Why, Mr. de Voyna " 
 
 Levison made a sound that was almost a snarl. " De 
 Voyna! Why, Miss Boardman, you can t put any reli 
 ance on people like him. Now he s started this school, 
 he ll have troubles of his own, anyway. He won t have 
 the time to do anything for you, and I doubt if he ever 
 could do much. He wouldn t know how to push you, and 
 you ve got to be pushed. Oh, I m not saying you haven t 
 got the talent and all that " he interrupted himself with 
 sudden anxious vehemence " You ve got talent to burn. 
 As far as talent goes, you re right at the top. But nobody 
 can get anywhere on talent. You ve got to bang the big 
 bell for all you re worth, or nobody ll even know you re 
 around ! " 
 
 He was so disinterested, so much in earnest, so desirous 
 of giving her what he considered much-needed advice that 
 Sandra found herself replying to him more openly and 
 argumentatively than she would have believed possible a 
 while before. " But suppose I don t care about that kind 
 
206 THE BOABDHAN FAMILY 
 
 of success, Mr. Levison ? Where you go after people and 
 drum them up, and get yourself talked about, and and 
 bang the big bell all the time. That s just cheap popular 
 ity, or notoriety ; that isn t " And here Miss Board- 
 man coloured and hesitated but finally brought the word 
 out " that isn t fame." 
 
 He did not laugh; indeed, it was obvious that laughter 
 was the farthest thing in the world from his mind, and the 
 genuine gravity of his answer and manner was an uncon 
 scious compliment. " Fame ? Yes, I used to have that 
 bug, too. I know how you feel about it. But say, listen ! 
 What s the difference? Between fame and notoriety, I 
 mean? Hey, what s the difference? One sounds a little 
 better than the other, that s all. And popularity isn t 
 ever cheap ; you ve got to go after it, and work and slave 
 and lay awake nights planning for it. You can t get any 
 thing easy. I know all that stuff about Art for Art s 
 sake and all the rest of it, but say, listen ! It doesn t hurt 
 your Art to make it pay. You can dance just as well if 
 you re getting five hundred or a thousand a week for it, 
 as if you were dancing for Art, and nothing on the side. 
 I ve known lots of the big ones actors, singers, all of 
 em and they re keen after the dollars. They ve got to 
 be! There isn t anything low about it. Say, listen! 
 There s only one kind of success. That s success! 1 was 
 pretty sure you had some of these high-brow ideas, but 
 My God! " Levison ejaculated with an explosive Israel- 
 itish gesture ; " My God, you ve got to get over ? em, art 
 or no art ! " 
 
 "Maybe I will, Mr. Levison, I ll I ll try!" said 
 Sandra hastily, in terror of the notice her companion might 
 attract. " You you re ever so kind to tell me " 
 She stopped, turning suggestively. " This is my corner. 
 Good " 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 207 
 
 " Hey ? Oh, you live down that way 2 " said Levison, 
 nodding towards the row of brown-stone fronts. " Which 
 house is it ? " 
 
 She told him perforce, though after a blank moment 
 which should have been a sufficient hint, she thought. It 
 did not penetrate Levison, however. 
 
 "Number Nineteen? I ve been wondering where you 
 lived," he remarked, keeping pace with her as before! 
 And he went on talking energetically in the same strain 
 to the flight of steps, and up them to the very door, where 
 he shook hands with her, and took his leave with the an 
 nouncement that he was going to come around some night, 
 and " talk this thing over with her." There was no want 
 of " push " about him, at any rate, once he was set in mo 
 tion, Sandra reflected with a laugh. 
 
 All the same, she admitted reluctantly that there was 
 truth in what he said. It was, of course a poor pot-boiling 
 morality to preach ; but no real art could be the worse for 
 being advertised with trumpets and banners and sold at 
 an inflated figure; there was no reason why it should be 
 affected at all. If Mr. Levison should carry out his inten 
 tion and " come around " with some sort of business pro 
 posal and Sandra suspected with a slight flutter that 
 that was what he had in mind she would at least listen 
 to him. That involved no descent from high ideals. 
 
 However he did not " come around " ; it was some time 
 before Sandra saw him again. She read among the bul 
 letins of theatrical folk that he had gone to Europe witk 
 a pocketful of contracts on the trail of various celebrities. 
 It began to be very hot, and the native population fled to 
 be replaced by Western and Mid-Western visitors sight 
 seeing or pausing to shop on their way to the coast resorts. 
 Sandra now regarded them with metropolitan callousness 
 although not infrequently there were people she knew 
 
208 THE BOAKDMAIST FAMILY 
 
 among them people from home. More than once, in 
 deed, she deliberately evaded them, turning off at a corner, 
 or dashing across the Avenue in a crowd of traffic where 
 she calculated these provincials would not venture. She 
 felt a morose disinclination to meeting them, to answering 
 their questions, to accepting or offering perfunctory civil 
 ities. The root of the trouble was that our young friend 
 Miss Boardman, not having yet abandoned the idea if 
 indeed any one of us ever wholly abandons it that she 
 was a person of as much importance to the world as to 
 herself, now suffered from the sub-conscious feeling that 
 everybody by this time must be expecting her to do some 
 thing, was looking for her head to appear above the nick, 
 that there was a general demand for her to justify herself, 
 to " make good," in short, as Mr. Levison would undoubt 
 edly have said ; and she was not doing anything, nor was 
 there any immediate prospect of her doing anything ! She 
 went back to her hall-bedroom every night, and waked up 
 therein every morning, surveying it with incredible de 
 spondency; never since it was built, had that bare, con 
 tracted, not too well-kept place been the object of so cling 
 ing an affection. Sandra contemplated with harassing 
 anxiety the change not to a barer, dirtier, cheaper room 
 and boarding-house, but to her own room in her own home ! 
 Yes, it was those baskets of ribbons and roses, it was the 
 dainty apartment her poor mother had been at such pains 
 to prettify for her that the girl did not want to see. But 
 that calamity loomed imminent. She could not continue 
 in New York without presently asking her father for more 
 money, and she could not bend her pride to that. In con 
 science, she had had enough already. She began a fever 
 ish practice of economies, mending un-mend-able gloves, 
 darning stockings that ought to have been in the rag-bag; 
 she covered reams of note-paper (with the Boardman crest 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 209 
 
 of a phoenix and their motto Eesurgam on it) with 
 schedules of expenses to which no mortal given the same 
 means could have managed to adhere. It was a melan 
 choly time, and not less so because Sandra realized that 
 to many, many people she would have been merely silly; 
 the sum that seemed to her so insufficient would have been 
 affluence to them. She was not starving, she was not in 
 want; she could go and be safe and taken care of, any 
 moment that she chose. Her tragedy was ridiculous, and 
 Sandra knew it. 
 
 About this time, Mary Schultze came to her one day 
 with the timid request that she would show Gus some 
 dance-steps. Mr. Beckley had never taken the time for 
 this particular accomplishment, and now " He feels 
 awfully out of it, whenever we go to a cafe, or almost any 
 where. Nobody does anything but dance, and he says 
 he feels like a perfect rube, but he d look like a worse one 
 getting up and not trying without knowing how. Besides, 
 you know you get asked to places a lot oftener, and it 
 makes you ever so much more popular, if you re a good 
 dancer. If you just would? " said Mary wistfully. " I 
 don t think he ll be hard; I think he ll pick it up pretty 
 quick. He used to play the banjo a little. I can dance 
 myself nothing grand, of course, but I can do all right 
 if I m with some man that knows how to lead. But I 
 couldn t teach anybody to save my life. Anyhow, I 
 wouldn t want to begin on Gus somehow. He wouldn t 
 take anything from me, but you would be different. If 
 you just would? " 
 
 Sandra acquiesced ; she could not find it in her heart to 
 refuse, and was too humane or perhaps simply too man 
 nerly to betray the ironic mirth to which this, the single 
 outcome of all her work and dreams and trials, moved her. 
 The other might think that she was laughing at the idea of 
 
210 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 teaching Gus Beckley, whereas in truth Sandra was laugh 
 ing quite as much at herself. " It may do me good to 
 practise teaching anyhow," the girl told herself with what 
 philosophy she could muster. The grapes were so very, 
 very sour that she deserves some credit for swallowing them 
 gallantly. 
 
 Thereafter, one night or another through the week, the 
 three young people, occasionally augmented hy a fourth, 
 some bookkeeping or typewriting friend of Gus s or Mary s, 
 rolled up and shoved aside the " Art Square " which cov 
 ered the middle of the parlour floor, moved hack the plush 
 chairs, set the Victorgraph going, and fell to work, with 
 alternate fits of laughter and seriousness. They were 
 under bond to Mrs. Tower who feared for her other board 
 ers, not to keep it up more than an hour; indeed, had it 
 not been for the fact that the house emptied as summer 
 advanced save for a stray " transient " now and then whose 
 evenings were always spent elsewhere among the sights, 
 she warned them they would have had to forego these 
 studies. " It doesn t make much difference right now, 
 but you young folks will have to do your dancing at the 
 regular dance-places, the minute my season opens," she 
 proclaimed roundly. " You can t raise that rag-time 
 racket under people s heads that want to go to sleep, I 
 don t care how much of a craze it is." 
 
 " You should worry about next season ! " Gus observed 
 sardonically. " By that time, just as I ve got so I can 
 steer a girl around the room without walking all over her, 
 or up some other fellow s back, why, dancing will go out 
 entirely, and they ll be doing something else aeroplan- 
 ing, likely ! " 
 
 Mr. Beckley, nevertheless, was not so dull a pupil as 
 might be inferred from his gloomy self-depreciation. He 
 had a sufficiently good ear and sense of rhythm; and sue- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 211 
 
 ceeded amazingly as long as he had Sandra for a partner. 
 " Anybody could dance with her, though. You don t feel 
 as if you were holding anything at all. She goes right 
 around with you no matter what kind of weird steps you 
 take. She s a wonder ! " he said to Mary, lost in enthu 
 siasm. 
 
 " Of course ! She s almost a professional. And then 
 you re learning yourself, Gus. You can dance as well as 
 anybody," said Mary loyally and without jealousy. 
 
 " Sure I can ! I ve got all those Russian stars beat 
 a mile ! " Mr. Beckley declared in fine irony. " Hon 
 estly I d hate to get up at a iay-donsong , for fear of mak 
 ing all the other men feel bad ! " 
 
 "We ought to go to the Astorbilt or some place some 
 time. You and Miss Boardman could dance." 
 
 " She d just love it, of course ! " said Gus in the same 
 vein ; then he scowled thoughtfully at his cigarette. " All 
 the same seems as if we ought to do something for her 
 before long, Mary. It makes me uncomfortable not to 
 pay her, because you bet it s work teaching me to dance ! " 
 he avowed with conviction. " We made a big mistake in 
 the beginning not putting this thing on a business basis. 
 Trouble was, it seemed so awkward with a girl like her. 
 I didn t know how to go at it, scarcely. I thought I d 
 put it off till I got to know her better ; but after a couple 
 of months, it s awkwarder than ever." 
 
 " Well, you ve always brought a box of candy, and tried 
 to do everything you could for her," Mary pointed out. 
 " It isn t as if you had gone ahead without showing any 
 appreciation. I really don t believe she s ever thought 
 of your paying her. I don t know what you could do, 
 unless entertain her somewhere, like I was saying." 
 
 " Well, I couldn t take her to the Astorbilt, that s one 
 certain thing. I couldn t reach" said the young fellow, 
 
212 THE BOAKDMAtf FAMILY 
 
 illustrating his metaphor with a gesture. " Those places 
 just tipping the hat-boy busts you. But there s other 
 kinds of funny little joints that strangers like to go to," he 
 added meditatively. " Say, Mary, that s an idea." 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 SANDRA revised her first impulse to decline the 
 Schultze-Beckley invitation upon the recollection 
 that she had declined rather too many such invitations 
 already. Mrs. Richard herself would have advised ac 
 ceptance, arguing that another of these systematic refusals 
 might reasonably give offence ; and to hurt the feelings of 
 harmless, well-meaning, second-class people was the lowest 
 crime in a gentlewoman s calendar. So Miss Boardman 
 agreed to go with the carefully acted spontaneity her 
 mother also enjoined in such circumstances. Make a 
 round of the little cafes some night ? Why, grand ! 
 Wouldn t that be fun! She gave so finished a represen 
 tation of enthusiasm that Mary was led into the familiarity 
 of an allusion to Mr. Thatcher. 
 
 " You don t care, of course, but I d like it ever so much 
 better if he could be there," she said roguishly. 
 
 " Well, he can t. He s out West, a thousand or two 
 miles off ! " said Sandra, reddening. 
 
 " What, you know where he is every minute of the time ? 
 Isn t that strange ? " 
 
 The two girls looked at each other, and Sandra began 
 to laugh with the other in spite of herself. Her mother 
 would not have approved ; her mother would have warned 
 her that once you let a person like Mary Schultze become 
 too intimate, you are committed irrevocably to the inti 
 macy, which is certain to prove irksome sometime. But 
 Alexandra had been thinking lately that her mother, while 
 the dearest and sweetest that ever lived, and of course thor- 
 
 213 
 
214 THE BOABDMAJST FAMILY 
 
 oughly qualified to advise on some social matters, was 
 often mistaken in her judgments and outlook or if not 
 mistaken, sadly limited. 
 
 Mr. Beckley brought home on the appointed evening a 
 Mr. Bert Givens who had made a fourth on some of their 
 evenings before, though Jiors concours as regarded dancing, 
 as little in need of instruction as Sandra herself. " Bert s 
 a bear at it ! " Augustus would say. He was in the men s 
 wear department at McChesney s, so naturally Jiors con 
 cours in the matter of dress, too, a slender, pallid and 
 extraordinarily natty youth with his hair brushed sleekly 
 back, and a tie and socks in tender summer hues. Al 
 though somewhat taken with Sandra, he was still capable 
 of surveying her with a coldly technical eye, and wonder 
 ing how it was that she managed to create so " nifty " an 
 effect in a white suit which was past the prime of fashion. 
 She had style, he decided ; and in truth, the girl did have 
 a style of her own, like her good looks elusive yet authen 
 tic. 
 
 The young men, between them, had made up a list 
 of " joints " worth visiting u The Green Bough," 
 "Tony s," " All-the-Arts," and so on. "We thought 
 we d take the bus down to Washington Square, and be 
 ginning at this end, work around in a sort of a circle till 
 we got back Greenwich Village, MacDougal, Waverly 
 Place, all through that art student district," Gus explained. 
 " A man I know told me the best places to go to. They 
 aren t any of era tough just kind of queer and go-as- 
 you-please-y, you know. They mostly set a cheap table 
 d hote dinner he said the eating was often pretty good, 
 though and there s always a weird, long-haired crowd. 
 I thought it would be interesting for Miss Boardman, 
 coming here from the West, to see that side of life here." 
 
 "Well, I come from the North from Hundred-and- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 215 
 
 Twenty-Eighth Street/ said Givens facetiously ; " and I ve 
 never seen that side of life here either. Real New York 
 ers don t. Do they dance, d you know ? " 
 
 " Sure. Dance on the tables, I guess, if you want to. 
 Everything goes down there, they say within limits, of 
 course," Mr. Beckley hastened to add, perceiving alarm on 
 Mary s face. Both the young men noticed that Miss 
 Boardman remained undisturbed; apparently she did not 
 care whether the entertainment was respectable or not. 
 
 However, the first resorts they entered were respectable 
 to an almost disappointing degree. In one there was a 
 quartette of " Plantation Melodists " as they were entitled 
 on the establishment s cards, four negroes, attired as for 
 the minstrel stage, and going through a program of songs 
 and monologues, than which no drearier parody of either 
 fun or sentiment could be imagined. At another a fat, 
 very blonde woman wandered among the cabaret tables, 
 pausing here and there to sing a verse or two pointedly at 
 one of the masculine patrons to the hysterically extrava 
 gant amusement of his party. " That s all fixed up before 
 hand, of course. They all belong to some troupe," Augus 
 tus observed cynically. Upon his motion, they went on; 
 and next they came to some half-dozen of girls shepherded 
 by a wizened young gentleman playing alternately the 
 violin or piano, as the musical score demanded, and a tall 
 lank older man whose instrument was the drum, and who 
 seemed to be the leader of the whole flock. The girls were 
 dressed in sprigged muslins with fichus, and corkscrew 
 curls of the crinoline period; and one after another they 
 arose and rendered ditties about the moon being bright and 
 the breeze so light under the Southern skies, or rhythmi 
 cally announced that there re a hundred thousand girls 
 but not a one like you-oo-oo, So true-oo-oo, With eyes so 
 blue-oo-oo until Bert Givens in his own language, balked 
 
216 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 at hearing any more of it. He said this thing was getting 
 on his nerves. 
 
 " That outfit is the Methodist Church Choir from New 
 Galilee, Connecticut, I ll bet ! " said he. " Full of pep, 
 aren t they? Night life in a great city, hey? Isn t it 
 dizzy, though, Miss Boardman ? And where do we dance ? 
 They all have cards up saying you can, but I haven t seen 
 a decent floor yet. What s next, Gus ? " He took the list 
 and ran over it. " We don t seem to have had much luck 
 playing these sure things in order. Let s take a long shot 
 how about the Restaurant Continentale ? " 
 
 To the Restaurant Continentale they went accordingly, 
 and found it bigger and more brilliant than any of those 
 yet visited, with a fine, wide, smooth expanse of dancing- 
 floor, from which the surrounding border of tables was 
 divided by rich red velvet ropes. A band of dark-skinned 
 artists in white shirts and trousers and scarlet sashes, with 
 wreaths of scarlet flowers slung about their necks, dis 
 coursed tuneful and eminently dance-able music from the 
 dais at one end. 
 
 " Hawaiians," Givens murmured knowingly. " Hawai- 
 ians from up here between Avenue A and East River. 
 They say there re more Italians there than in Naples. 
 Say, this is something like, don t you think ? More atmos 
 phere to it, somehow." 
 
 Gus remarked epigrammatically that you might call it 
 atmosphere to him it seemed two-thirds solid tobacco- 
 smoke ! But young Givens was right, as their whole party 
 presently felt, looking about with quickened spirits. 
 Whatever they understood by the term, this was what they 
 had been seeking. Besides the tobacco-smoke, one was 
 conscious of bizarre odours of garlic-flavoured cookery, 
 cheap wines, cheap perfumes ; the noise had the unfamiliar 
 character of alien tongues; there was no great difference 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 217 
 
 in appearance between the swarthy, moustached, effer 
 vescing men, the chromolike women (some of them with 
 moustaches, too ! ) at the tables, and the performers on the 
 platform. Strangest thing of all, there were numbers 
 of children; and near by a portly, middle-aged man was 
 feeding the year-old baby on his fat knees with bits of 
 bread sopped in the thick, gravy-like soup in front of him. 
 
 " Well, this is Little Italy and Little Spain and Little 
 Holland and Little Everywhere," Mary ejaculated. " Did 
 you ever! Do you believe it s clean? " 
 
 " I like it," said Sandra. 
 
 They found a table, and the young men, after a consul 
 tation with the opera-bouffe looking waiter, ordered spa 
 ghetti and cheese and rye bread and some of the dark wine 
 which they observed their neighbours to be drinking out 
 of bulb-shaped bottles cased in basket-work. Bert Givens 
 hardily got out his cigarette-case. 
 
 " You don t mind, do you ? " he asked Sandra who smil 
 ingly shook her head. Somehow Bert had a notion that 
 Miss Boardman was much more of a sport in a per 
 fectly ladylike way, of course than the other girl. 
 " Newport Lenox Long Island that brand," he 
 thought, pluming himself on his discernment and knowl 
 edge of the world. " They do whatever they want to, 
 those girls. They re too way-up to care what people 
 think." 
 
 One of the Hawaiians got up and sang in an agree 
 able throaty baritone some Venetian boating-song with a 
 long-drawn falling refrain, that drew vigorous applause 
 from all around the room; everybody hammered lustily, 
 calling for a repetition which the soloist obligingly ac 
 corded. 
 
 " Catchy thing, that." said Gus, although he found to 
 his surprise, upon essaying, that he could not catch it; 
 
218 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 people around them were humming and whistling it, under 
 the breath, with the singer. " These dagoes are full of 
 music just full of it," he said, wagging his head appre 
 ciatively. 
 
 " Not any fuller than Miss Boardman here," Givens 
 said, seeing her make some slight answering movement at 
 the opening bars of a czardas the musicians had now begun. 
 She did not beat time; it was as if the music pulsed 
 through her whole body. " She s just like one of em." 
 
 " Why, Mr. Givens ! " Mary uttered, shocked. 
 
 " I only meant kind of foreign, you know I I " 
 
 " Oh, I don t mind ! " Sandra assured him, laughing. 
 She fell to on the pungent dishes with frank zest. Mary 
 minced politely in her plate. She was quite sure that the 
 place was not clean, and was, moreover, possessed by a 
 vague uneasiness about it and about her companions. 
 The men liked that nasty, sour wine too much, and they 
 were getting altogether too free-and-easy smoking and 
 talking even Gus, who had always shown himself such 
 a gentleman. Miss Boardman seemed to be perfectly 
 reckless, and evidently had no idea (or else didn t care) 
 how conspicuous she was with that chalky-white face and 
 thin red lips and black hair and black eyes. Sundry young 
 men perfect strangers ! had walked up and down past 
 their table and stared at her ; Mary s conviction that they 
 were not staring at herself was as well-grounded as it was 
 unconsciously pathetic. She wished uncomfortably that 
 they had stopped in one of the other cafes where you under 
 stood what the people were singing and talking about, at 
 least. This was so strange and outlandish. Even the 
 familiar strains of ff I like a chicken in the spring-time " 
 failed to reassure her. 
 
 " Dance ? " said young Givens to Sandra. They stood 
 up. 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 219 
 
 " Nobody s on the floor yet. You don t want to be the 
 only ones, do you ? " Mary faintly expostulated. 
 
 " Oh, piffle ! Why not ? " said Bert discourteously. 
 
 " You and Mr. Beckley come along then, and keep us 
 company," said Sandra as she and Givens moved off. A 
 few more couples appeared; so Gus and Mary followed 
 them, at first with misgivings, then in rapidly increasing 
 confidence. 
 
 " I believe I ve got the hang of it at last, Mary. We 
 aren t having any trouble." 
 
 " Oh, Gus, it s lovely ! " breathed Mary ecstatically, all 
 her trouble momentarily forgotten. 
 
 But a new one was in store. The last chord was 
 thrummed, blared and pounded out ; they were just sitting 
 down, both men had gone off to waylay the waiter for ice- 
 water, when the music began again, a one-step this time, 
 and horrors ! One of those piratical starers walked up 
 to Miss Boardman with as much confidence as if he had 
 known her all his life, and said in hissing syllables under 
 his little black moustache : " You dance zees wiss me, 
 senorita, please ? You gif me mooch delight ? " And 
 horrors upon horrors, Miss Boardman did it ! 
 
 " Hello, what s become of our other girl ? " said Bert 
 Givens, returning; a form of inquiry which showed what 
 a damaging effect the " atmosphere " had already had upon 
 him, too. But alas, Mr. Beckley had also succumbed to 
 it ; for, upon being informed what had occurred, he merely 
 said : " Had his nerve, didn t he ? Got a cigarette, Bert ? " 
 And Bert said that any girl that could dance like that was 
 bound to be popular ! 
 
 They watched Sandra circle for a while, presently with 
 another olive-complexioned partner and dancing another 
 step of such complications that only one or two couples 
 attempted it ; and, at the next pause, a big young man in 
 
220 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 what Miss Schultze called a sailor-suit with U. 8. 8. Lou 
 isiana in gold letters around the band of his cap, rose from 
 a table where he had been sitting with three more sailor- 
 suits, and standing in front of Sandra, said in a boyishly 
 grave, direct manner : " You re the professional here, 
 aren t you, Miss ? I d like the next, if you please." 
 
 " All right," said Sandra, conveniently forgetting to 
 clear up the question of her status in the Restaurant Con- 
 tinentale. She danced with all the sailors from the battle 
 ship Louisiana in turn. They were nice boys. " 1 sup 
 pose they d have to go and fight if we ever got into a 
 war. And if they re good enough to fight for me, they re 
 good enough to dance with me ! " said Alexandra Board- 
 man to herself. I think the shade of that stout old mar 
 iner, Commodore Chase, though he doubtless observed the 
 line between enlisted men and oificers with the utmost 
 severity, would have looked upon his granddaughter with 
 approval. And when one of them, with a hesitating gal 
 lantry invited her to sit down with them and " have some 
 thing," she was not in the least insulted. 
 
 " Oh, thank you, but the management doesn t allow it," 
 she said glibly in the hearing of the appalled Mary, and 
 to the amusement of their two escorts. Young Givens 
 shook his head at Miss Boardman, grinning. 
 
 " That was a quick come-back ! " said he, not without 
 real admiration. One of the sailors directing a shrewd 
 glance around the party, drew Bert aside, and spoke con 
 fidentially under cover of a vocal selection by the musicians 
 during an interval while the dancers rested. 
 
 " Say, the kid made a kind of a break, didn t he ? Of 
 fering to treat, you know? Say, she s some swell dame 
 out for a good time, she don t belong here, hey? You 
 don t any of you belong here, honest ? " 
 
 er that s all right ! " drawled Bert, dis- 
 
THE BOAEDMAlSr FAMILY 221 
 
 seinbliiig an immense inward gratification. " That s per 
 fectly all right er old chap ! It was a superb mo 
 ment for a clerk in the men s wear department at Mc- 
 Chesney s. 
 
 But now, as they sat near the musicians stand, a short, 
 bald man whom they might have noticed before undem- 
 onstratively active about the place, came towards them, 
 singling Sandra out and looking her over with a keen but 
 not unfriendly eye. In fact, he smiled benevolently, 
 while revealing the fact that he was the " management." 
 " Where do you dance regularly ? " he wanted to know. 
 And then some expression he saw or fancied he saw on 
 her face moved him to add quickly : " I mean what theatre ? 
 I know you don t dance in my cabaret." As Sandra stood 
 before him, still dumb, Mr. Richter he was a Swiss by 
 birth, a naturalized American now, but a native of every 
 country on this created globe if travel, experience and 
 familiarity count for anything had another illumina 
 tion. " Eh ? You d rather not say ? " he said, smiling 
 more broadly and benevolently than ever. 
 
 " I d rather dance," Sandra said ; and at that instant 
 the band struck into Sinding s tarantelle. " I ll dance 
 that ! " said the girl, upon what wild impulse she never 
 could tell. 
 
 Eichter stared for half a second ; then with a lightning 
 readiness, he wheeled, shouted an order at the orchestra, 
 silencing them, seized Sandra by the hand and led her 
 to the centre of the room, bawled some announcement to 
 the company, repeating it in half a dozen languages with 
 equal speed and facility, signalled to the music again, and 
 bowed himself back from the girl with a flourish. The 
 guitars hummed resonantly, the castanets bickered, Sandra 
 danced. 
 
 She was scarcely conscious of anything but the music. 
 
222 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 The crowd, some of tbem standing on chairs and tables, 
 the four sailors gaping transfixed, Mary Schultze shrink 
 ing into the background, Eichter s smiling face she saw 
 them as she heard the rising applause, or felt the heat, 
 or the waxed floor beneath her swift feet, as mere incidents. 
 She came to her senses (as she said afterwards) only to 
 wards the finale when there burst out a great uproar of 
 cheering, stamping and clapping, and some Latin enthu 
 siast threw down a handful of money at her feet, thereby 
 setting a fashion; it rattled all around her and a dollar 
 struck her on the shoulder. She bowed and smiled by a 
 kind of instinct. 
 
 Here another impossible thing occurred ; it was a night 
 of impossible happenings. To wit: Mr. Max Levison 
 turned up in the exact nick of time, with the precision of 
 melodrama, a god from the machine. He turned up to 
 some purpose, shouldering through the audience, and 
 grasping Sandra s arm. " That s right ! Just bow ! 
 Don t give em any encore don t you do it ! Just 
 bow ! " he admonished her energetically. " Hey ? How d 
 I get here ? " He laughed as he echoed her dazed ques 
 tion. " Why, I often come here. I just happened in to 
 night, though just happened in. How s that for luck, 
 hey ? The Lord loves the Irish, don t he ? " And here 
 Mr. Levison, apparently realizing fully the depth of differ 
 ence between his own race and that which he named, and 
 savouring an exquisite joke in the juxtaposition, chuckled 
 with intense relish. Al the while he was steadily making 
 their way towards the exit. " That s all right. I ll get 
 you out of it yes, I spoke to Richter just now he 
 understands he knows me I ve been coming here for 
 years. I hadn t a notion of finding you here, though. 
 How s that for luck? This is the time for you to make 
 your get-away, see ? Right now, see ? " said Mr. Levison 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 223 
 
 whose equipment as a manager of theatrical enterprises 
 evidently included a fine sense of climax. " It makes a 
 better effect, don t you see ? Hey, taxi ! Call a taxi out 
 there ! Beg pardon, Miss Boardman ? " At last pausing 
 to catch what Sandra had been trying to tell him for the 
 last two minutes, he immediately altered the order. 
 "Hey! Call two taxis! Your party, did you say? 
 Where are they? Oh er Mr. Er ! Pleased to 
 meet you. Come on now, everybody ! " 
 
CHAPTEK VI 
 
 SANDKA used to say that her sudden attainment of 
 fame or that popularity or notoriety which Lev- 
 isoii contended amount to the same thing was due to 
 luck, nothing but luck. People thought this a mere piece 
 of posing with her, but she was honest. If she had not 
 gone with Mary and Gus and Bert that evening, if they 
 had not stumbled on the Cafe Continentale, if she had not 
 been insanely prompted to dance, if Levison had chosen 
 some other place of entertainment in fine, if nothing 
 had happened which did happen, nobody knows how long 
 she might have been on the difficult climb, if indeed she 
 ever arrived. Thus Sandra argued to herself, and would 
 have argued to any one that inquired, if Levison had not 
 counselled otherwise ; if he had not forbade her, in truth. 
 
 " You don t know how to put up a front, so you d better 
 not talk at all. It makes a better effect anyhow, see? 
 Unapproachable that s your style. It doesn t make 
 people mad not if it s done right. They kind of like 
 it. You re Sandra, you know. The Sandra the only 
 Sandra! Nobody can get at you at all. You don t go 
 anywhere except with some regular strong-arm of a lady s- 
 maid and chaperon with a thirty-degrees-below-zero eye. 
 You came down to the theatre every night in the limou 
 sine, and who is this that meets you at the stage-door, and 
 sends the dress-suit lads, and the club rounders and the 
 college-boys on their way? Who but trusty Max, the 
 heroine s faithful follower ? Who kindly but firmly inter- 
 
 224 
 
THE BOAEDMAK FAMILY 225 
 
 views the newspaper-man, and the photographer and the 
 ladies tailor and the beauty-doctor and the costume-shark 
 and all the rest? Max again! He ll give em all the 
 facts they want, and even some things that aren t facts. 
 But no use for the public in general to try to see Sandra. 
 It s not that you re ungracious oh, far, far from that ! 
 You love the dear public, only you can t stand it. It gets 
 your artistic sensibilities all frazzled up. You d fly to 
 pieces blow up die right then and there! That s 
 your style ! " Mr. Levison pronounced genially but imper 
 atively. 
 
 Sandra acquiesced readily enough; he was actually not 
 far out in his jocose analysis of her temperament; and 
 though she knew perfectly well that this guarded isolation, 
 this ostentatious hedging about with mystery were only 
 more of Levison s many devices to whet the public interest 
 and curiosity, to bang the big bell, in short, she was too 
 relieved and too inordinately grateful to him to care. 
 
 For it seemed to Sandra that, after luck, Levison had 
 done everything for her, although the truth was she did 
 not know what he had done, did not know exactly what 
 anybody had done in the excitement and scrambling hurry 
 of the days following that Continentale episode. She al 
 ways remembered with a vivid fidelity the strange look 
 and smell and feeling of the little empty Theatre of the 
 Marionettes, the morning she went down to dance. It 
 was being renovated before the opening of the season the 
 first week in October, and there was scaffolding up, and 
 dirty drab cloths spread over the seats, and the pretty 
 Pompadour decorations, crystal pendants, fragile gilded 
 mouldings were hardly visible by a light half artificial. 
 She remembered the serious, intent and alert face of the 
 Italian orchestra-leader below her, his moving baton, his 
 attention miraculously divided between herself and the 
 
226 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 score; the musicians, strings, brasses and wood-winds, in 
 shirt-sleeves mostly and not greatly interested for their 
 part, sawing and blowing ; the stage-hands, and carpenters, 
 arrested in their duties, looking on from the step-ladders 
 and platforms ; a white blur out there amongst the farthest 
 orchestra-chairs which she knew to be Mr. Charles Rosen 
 berg s summer-suit; and near at hand, quite distinguish 
 able in one of the stage boxes, the other Rosenberg, listen 
 ing silently while Levison talked in a lowered voice with 
 those Israelitish gestures to which he reverted in moments 
 of forgetfulness. Afterwards the coloured woman in the 
 dressing-room helped her change back to her street- 
 clothing; and the three Jewish gentlemen took her some 
 where to an office where another Jewish gentleman, an 
 attorney-at-law, as it appeared, offered her something to 
 sign; and she signed it, and they all signed it; and she 
 remembered the odd expression with which the other 
 Rosenberg read out her name as he looked at the paper. 
 
 " Boardman ! You can t put that over. Boardman 
 Nah ! What are you going to do bout that, Maxy ? " 
 
 Levison considered a brief moment. " Well, her name s 
 Alexandra Sandra for short. What s the matter with 
 calling her Mademoiselle Sandra ? Or no ! Say, listen ! 
 Call her La Sandra. That ll go big on the bill-boards. 
 La Sandra. Some name, hey ? " 
 
 Charles Rosenberg said : " Uh-huh." But the other 
 Rosenberg, the older one, who had been lighting a cigar, 
 made a slight negative motion of the head; then he an 
 nounced an Olympian decision. 
 
 "Nah! You re way off. Call her Sandra. Just 
 Sandra and no dees nor lahs nor frills to it. Sandra." 
 
 After a pause, Levison said : " Well, that listens all right 
 to me." Which apparently settled the question, Sandra 
 herself not having been consulted at all. Perhaps this 
 
THE BOARDUAN FAMILY 227 
 
 was just as well, for, as she confessed to Levison after 
 wards, she felt as if she were in a trance. 
 
 " I don t have to do anything but dance that s all 
 I can do, anyhow. But I don t have to worry about those 
 other things, do I ? " she asked childishly. 
 
 Mr. Levison informed her that she sure didn t ! " Your 
 interests are going to be looked after by your uncle, and 
 you can believe he s not going to go to sleep over em. I 
 mean me Max himself," he added, interpreting cor 
 rectly her bewildered look ; and he laughed, observing that 
 they often acted dazed that way " But it doesn t last 
 long the daze doesn t ! " 
 
 However, either he was sometimes mistaken, or Sandra 
 was an exception; for months later, there would still be 
 moments when the girl felt as if she were going about in 
 a dream, completely mistress of herself only while danc 
 ing, at which times indeed she had always been most col 
 lected and aware. Her nerves that were unstable enough 
 ordinarily, her slight frame that looked as brittle as the 
 stem of a flower, could both endure and execute with 
 astounding strength, vigour, reliability, when called upon ; 
 they never failed her. The puzzle, the thing that gave 
 her an ever-present sense of unreality was the stupefying 
 ease with which the heights had been reached. Of stage- 
 life she saw scarcely any more than in previous experi 
 ences as an amateur ; in private she worked with the same 
 ambition and constancy; she still had timesof discourage 
 ment, she was still always trying to do her best and still 
 never quite doing it, never satisfying her own ideals ; noth 
 ing about herself had undergone the least change yet 
 now she was Sandra, the Sandra, even as Levison said! 
 She had naively expected some tremendous, some vital dif 
 ference and lo, here was no difference whatever. 
 
 No difference except as concerned worldly goods, that 
 
228 THE BOAKDMAJST FAMILY 
 
 is. Sandra surveyed her first cheque in the same chaos of 
 wonder and disbelief and humbleness of spirit and grati 
 fied vanity with which she heard her first round of ap 
 plause, and bowed to her first curtain-call. She had never 
 earned a penny in her life ; it was more in one lump than 
 her father could have afforded to give her in a year ; more, 
 she divined, than many a man of her acquaintance made 
 in a like short period. And this was only the beginning, 
 Levison told her. " If they think I m worth that much, 
 I ll show them ! " she thought arrogantly ; and then, with 
 a flash of terror that maybe she would never be able to do 
 so well again, that she might lose her powers, that she 
 ought to have begun long ago long ago. She sat down 
 and wrote to the family at home. "... I didn t tell 
 you anything about it, because I knew you would object, 
 and I didn t want to make you feel badly, or to have any 
 fuss. It seems underhanded, but I thought it was best 
 ... I have wanted to do something like this (I didn t 
 quite know what) for a long while, and now I am doing 
 it, and getting along all right, as you see, so you 
 don t need to worry over me any more. I can take care 
 of myself. I want Dad to take out the money I owe him, 
 and put the rest in bank; I didn t know quite how much 
 it was, but am sending enough, I think, to cover it. Mr. 
 Levison has given me the name of a banking-firm here, 
 people he knows, Kahn, Loew & Company, that I am going 
 to open an account with ... I suppose people at home 
 as soon as they find out who Sandra is, will talk like 
 everything, but it doesn t make any difference about them. 
 I mean whatever they think and say is of no conse 
 quence . . . 
 
 " The Marionettes is a new theatre that the Eosenbergs 
 started here last year . . . They do have the smartest 
 posters ; Mr. Levison told me he had to pay fifteen hundred 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 229 
 
 for just one of the ( Little Bo-Peep bills, but he says it 
 was worth it, for you can t pass it by. The artist was 
 
 K . Of course they get the very highest-paid men, 
 
 the very best. . . . The scenery and costumes are by the 
 same sort of people, perfectly stunning. You ought to 
 see mine for the i Peacock Dance ; it s cloth of gold and 
 some kind of iridescent gauze changing to steel-blue and 
 purple, and I have to wear a headdress of feathers, with 
 a band and chains of pearls and things false, of course, 
 but they had to be made especially and cost as much as lots 
 of real tiaras you see. Mr. Levison had it put in the con 
 tract that the management were to furnish my costumes, 
 or I don t know where I d be ! In the other, the grotesque 
 dance, where I come on as the Queen of Spades, the top- 
 card in the pack, I have a very Chinese-y costume of black 
 and blue and jade-green brocade with magnificent embroi 
 deries that are the real thing, imported from China, and 
 huge silk-and-bead tassels, and red lacquer clogs. This is 
 the dance that made the hit the biggest hit, that is. 
 The music is Tambourin Cliinois by Kreisler, you 
 know; Signor Galetti made an arrangement of it for the 
 orchestra. . . . 
 
 "Mr. Levison prophesies three hundred nights for 
 Little Bo-Peep ; after that, I suppose they will take it 
 on the road. I don t think I care to travel with a road 
 show, though most of the company will probably go ; Mr. 
 Levison is against it. However, that won t be until next 
 season; when it comes, you must all go and see it. But 
 I wish you could come here and see me in it; I ll send 
 Mother the money if she ll come ..." 
 
 To say that this letter, with something less than a bale 
 of sample posters, advertisements, photographs and news 
 paper-notices raised the commotion in the Boardman 
 household that Sandra had forseen and avoided, would 
 
230 THE BOARDMAlsT FAMILY 
 
 be only partly true. The girl expected to be condemned 
 unreservedly, not reckoning on their pride and their af 
 fection. They could not have been angry with her long or 
 deeply in any event, but at first they were too stunned 
 to be angry at all. And, alas for Boardman traditions, 
 the first item that emerged to fix their attention was the 
 figure of Sandra s weekly salary! In fact, families even 
 more exalted, if any such exist, might well have been 
 arrested by it ; it was of that incredible spaciousness which 
 we have all read about in connection with the theatrical 
 profession as we read about the dimensions of the Grand 
 Canon. And money talks; yes, money is most eloquent, 
 whether we will or no, amongst clowns or gentlefolk, 
 Boardmans or nobodies. It went farther than they them 
 selves were aware towards converting the family to the 
 view that Sandra was a great artist, and as such, exempt 
 from judgment farther than any of her triumphs or 
 achievements. Mrs. Richard, when she at last came to 
 think everything over, was more hurt by Sandra s not un 
 natural supposition that the family would " make a fuss " 
 than by anything the girl had done or said. 
 
 " We wouldn t have said a word. We never have said 
 anything; we have let her do just as she chose. I always 
 knew that Sandra wanted to to have a career. I don t 
 see why she thought we d stand in her way. It was very 
 unjust of her ! " 
 
 " Oh, don t talk like that, Lucy ! We would have ob 
 jected, of course. I never expected to see a daughter of 
 mine on the stage but I don t know what we can do 
 about it now. It s all fixed and settled, it seems," said 
 Richard gloomily. u She ought to have told us. "Not 
 but that it would probably have turned out the same way 
 in the end; I doubt if we could have stopped her. But 
 she ought to have told us. As it is, outsiders have known 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 231 
 
 about it before we did actually they ve known more 
 about Sandra s affairs than her own father and mother! 
 I don t like that idea but it can t be helped now ! " He 
 looked at the scintillating amount Sandra named with a 
 return of wonder. " Good gracious, do you suppose they 
 pay them all at this rate? And Sandra seems to be ex 
 pecting more after a while ! " 
 
 " Richard, you you re not going to do that ? What 
 Sandra said ? Pay yourself out of her money ? You re 
 not going to ? " his wife asked, somehow a little nervously. 
 
 " I ll open an account for her at our bank here," said 
 Sandra s father with something like a sigh. 
 
 He lay awake a good while that night, thinking about 
 Sandra when she was a little girl about a time when he 
 had taken her to a circus about how he taught her to 
 swim one summer up at Wequetonsing about some 
 photographs he had made with that old box-camera, the 
 first one they had, of Sandra on the back porch holding 
 Frumpy in her arms, or one of Frumpy s kittens. Good 
 Lord, he had not thought of Frumpy these twenty years; 
 the old cat must have been dead at least that long! It 
 seemed to him the little girl was dead too dead and gone 
 for ever. He heard a sound by his side that moved him 
 to reach out a hand and to ask gently : " What s the 
 matter, Lucy ? " 
 
 " Oh, Dick, she said she didn t need us any m-more 
 that is it wasn t that exactly, but that s what she 
 meant," sobbed Sandra s mother. " Of course, she s grown 
 up and making all that money I don t w-want to be 
 silly, but but " 
 
 " I know, my dear, I know," said Richard. They tried 
 to comfort each other in the dark. 
 
 Afterwards they tried also most gallantly to enact en 
 thusiastic approval ; because, as Mrs. Richard pointed out, 
 
232 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 it would affect Sandra s art disastrously if she felt that 
 she had displeased them. " I have known her to be ter 
 ribly upset by a hostile atmosphere or criticism, so that 
 she couldn t dance at all. It s temperament, you know," 
 said the poor lady, clinging desperately, in spite of her 
 sad intuitions, to the figment that parents are necessary 
 to their children. She went about answering questions, 
 smilingly receiving congratulations, writing letters to 
 Sandra full of applause and praise and playful correction 
 all the while in an inward revolt which she knew to be 
 unreasonable and told herself moreover was unworthy and 
 ungrateful. Why could she not be more glad of having 
 this brilliant and gifted child, why could she not be more 
 proud ? Why, indeed? Perhaps the lives of people at 
 tached to celebrities are not so interesting and enviable 
 as we are prone to imagine, for, when all s said and done, 
 who really wants to be valet to a hero? 
 
 There was one member of the Boar dm an family, how 
 ever, who spiritedly refused to be a party to the conspiracy 
 of commendation, and that was Everett. He heard about 
 Sandra s professional debut with acute mortification, 
 equally shocked at the idea of his sister being in such 
 a position and at the deliberate secrecy with which the 
 thing had been accomplished. 
 
 " Write to her ? Why, I don t know what to say ! I 
 can t pretend to be pleased. I don t know what to make 
 of it. I can t imagine what got into Sandra ! " he said. 
 " We ve once in a while talked about her going on the 
 stage, but I why, I wasn t in earnest, I didn t for a 
 minute believe she would. I never dreamed of such a 
 thing. I thought this studying dancing was just one of 
 those weird freaks girls take. Like Estelle Aldis going 
 off and setting up that tea-house for motor-tourists, 
 you know. I supposed Sandra was just crazy to do 
 
THE BOAKDMAJST FAMILY 233 
 
 something, like the rest of them; they think it s 
 the smart thing to do something. But I never 
 thought Why, it s abominable ! And then to go spring 
 ing it on us this way! She knew we d never consent in 
 this wide world she knew / wouldn t, anyhow. Good 
 reason she kept it so dark! I hate to think of Sandra 
 running down that way doing cheap, tricky things like 
 that. It s Xew York, that s what has done it," said the 
 young man, shaking his head in depression. " It s bound 
 to have an effect on anybody as impressionable as she is. 
 She s got to thinking about money the whole time. Her 
 letters are full of it. Money and some kind of sensa 
 tional business like this, that s all she cares about. Why, 
 she says so in so many words! What people think and 
 feel here at home is of no consequence. Her family 
 and all her friends that have known her all her life are 
 of no consequence ! She did have the grace to keep 
 our name out of it, that s something to be thankful for. 
 I suppose it actually did strike her as a little incongruous 
 to mix up Miss Boardman with a lot of chorus-girls and 
 low comedians and second-rate musicians and Jew theatri 
 cal producers like this Levison she keeps referring to 
 every other word. If that fellow didn t start out as 
 Levi s-son, I miss my guess. Max Levison ! That name s 
 a give-away! And his friends Kahn, Loew and Com 
 pany! I expect all that was a little too much even for 
 Sandra," said Everett, fiercely humorous. "Well, you 
 can pretend to like it if you want to. I won t ! " 
 
 His grandmother broke the painful silence that followed 
 by asking: " Can t you do something, Everett ? Couldn t 
 you get Sandra to to break her contract, if that s the 
 proper term ? I mean couldn t you get it annulled some 
 how?" 
 
 " No, no, that couldn t be done. I wouldn t persuade 
 
234 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 Sandra to try anything like that/ 7 said Everett hastily. 
 Then he explained to the old lady in a manner which he 
 strove to keep from being pitying or patronizing. " You 
 can t do things like that, Grandma. A contract s a con 
 tract. And anyhow, think of the publicity ! " 
 
 " Well, as I understand it, it only lasts for a year, and 
 Sandra doesn t have to renew it," said Mrs. Alexander. 
 " In the meantime, we may as well put the best face we 
 can on the matter." 
 
 " I can t put any face on it at all, and I m not going 
 to try," Everett said implacably. He must have been 
 as good as his word, for in the course of time people shied 
 away from the subject when in his company; they grew 
 wary even of mentioning his sister s name. You might 
 have thought nobody knew he had a sister. And as to 
 Sandra herself, she cried bitterly over the one letter he 
 wrote her. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 GOING back through the newspaper-files of 1912- 13, 
 one may gather a prodigious amount of information 
 about " Sandra," so picturesquely varied and contra 
 dictory that it is something of an adventure to decide 
 what to believe if anything! and what to reject. 
 She was the daughter of a well-known California million 
 aire, masquerading on the stage under an assumed name ; 
 she was a Sicilian girl from some New Orleans slum ; she 
 was a Spanish countess with a romantic history; she was 
 a Roumanian gipsy with no history at all that would 
 bear repeating. The Claudes discovered her, de Voyna 
 discovered her, Rosenberg Brothers discovered her, every 
 body discovered her except the real discoverer, Max 
 Levison. She got a thousand, two thousand, any number 
 of thousands you choose, a week; some enthusiasts even 
 went so far as to calculate in dollars and cents exactly 
 what she got for every step and every minute of her time 
 during the performance. Her hobbies were uncut rubies, 
 Persian cats, empty bottles, aeroplaning, making cheese, 
 drawing illustrations for the Bible. She would not dance 
 if the leader of the orchestra had blue eyes; she would 
 not dance unless the leader of the orchestra had blue eyes. 
 She spent her leisure at her castle in the Tyrol, her 
 Rocky Mountain cattle-ranch, her estate on Long Island, 
 her coffee plantation in Ceylon. She was born club-footed 
 with one leg shorter than the other, but a marvellous system 
 of physical training had not only corrected these defects 
 but developed her talent. She had had a phenomenal 
 
 235 
 
236 THE BOAEDMAtf FAMILY 
 
 voice and had been educated for the operatic stage, 
 but being suddenly struck dumb as the result of falling 
 down an elevator-shaft from the eleventh floor at the age 
 of sixteen, she had turned her attention to her present 
 art. 
 
 And so on without limit. How much of all this Levison 
 was indirectly responsible for, nobody knows; certainly 
 he himself could not have told. He was incapable of 
 inventing any of it ; but native shrewdness, coupled with 
 experience had long ago taught Max the needlessness of 
 inventive effort on his part. There were always stories 
 in circulation, and all he had to do was to hear them with 
 a grunt, a gesture non-committal, or susceptible of any 
 sort of translation. So his star was talked about, he was 
 not too particular as to what was said. At the same time, 
 in a private arid personal capacity, Mr. Levison was 
 particular to an extreme, surrounding Sandra with a 
 system of proprieties which scandalous purpose might as 
 sail in vain, and of which he constituted himself, as he 
 had promised, the first outwork. Seldom did she appear 
 in public and never on the stage without his shoebrush 
 moustache potentially aggressive in the background. He 
 would always be standing in the wings when she went 
 on for her dances, chewing an unlighted cigar, his quick 
 eyes here, there and everywhere except on Sandra her 
 self. He probably perceived her to be the kind of young 
 woman who, as a young woman, does not require watch 
 ing; and as an artist, so many were the dancers Max 
 had seen, so many the celebrities he had " produced " 
 that one would have had to be more than human to stir him 
 to any demonstrations now. He scarcely looked at 
 Sandra, and never applauded, though it was credibly re 
 ported that he sometimes stimulated the applause " out 
 in front " by mysterious agencies which he had at com- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 237 
 
 mand. But why should he himself lend a hand to it? 
 " She s making good, isn t she ? " he would inquire ; " well 
 ! " His shrug completed the vindication. And : 
 " Kosenberg audiences have confidence in me, because 
 I ve never handed em a lemon," was his favourite boast. 
 Not one person in a hundred of those who crowded the 
 Marionettes every night, or stood in line and reserved 
 seats three weeks ahead, had ever heard the name of 
 Levison, but that mattered naught ; their very presence in 
 the theatre confirmed him. As an agent in bringing 
 genius before the world, he was content with a kind of 
 vicarious renown, and well he might be, for he knew him 
 self the autocrat of his queer kingdom. His power was 
 much more real, undisputed, final than that of any actual 
 monarch, and few there were who could swagger as rea 
 sonably. 
 
 His care of Sandra extended not only to the placing of 
 her bank account with Messrs. Kahn, Loew and Company, 
 but more or less to the management of all her affairs. 
 Sandra, without having noticed how it came to pass, 
 presently found herself the tenant of a choice little apart 
 ment in a choice section of town which she rented of 
 a Mr. Isadore Bettmann; her stage-costumes were being 
 made by Madame Lilli whose name in earlier days had 
 been Sadie Rheinstrom, her physician was Dr. Joseph 
 Marcus. They were all exceedingly efficient people. 
 One never sees the Bettmanns, Rheinstroms and Mar 
 cuses of any community in menial positions, so that 
 Sandra s servants were of other nationalities, the chauffeur, 
 for instance, a coloured man, her maid a middle-aged and 
 tight-lipped Scotchwoman, both of them of steely re 
 spectability. Mr. Levison had seen to that, too, busy 
 man as he was. JSTo detail in regard to her was too small 
 for him. He even took it upon him to remind her per- 
 
238 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 sistently that she must have a chaperon, or a female com 
 panion of some such quality as the term chaperon con 
 notes. 
 
 " Abroad they call them dames de compagnie, and 
 everybody everybody like you, I mean has one, the 
 same way everybody has one of these fancy dogs that they 
 pay all kinds of money for. Say, that s an idea, by the 
 way ! You ought to have a dog ; why don t you have a dog ? 
 Funny thing I never thought of that before! I ll get 
 you a dog one of these now what d you call em ? 
 A Pom that s it! A Pom or a Pekel That s it! 
 The floor-mop style. You have your picture taken with 
 him. That s the stunt. You have your picture taken, 
 and I ll get it into one of the society-magazines, the read- 
 ing-from-left-to-right kind, you know, with one of those 
 snappy little notices they always fix up to put under 
 neath it. I ll attend to that right away." He got out his 
 note-book and pencil, and made a memorandum; then re 
 turned to the first subject. " You ought to have a 
 chaperon. It s the thing to do for your kind, I mean. 
 You re one of the ones that can do this now social 
 stunt, see? Some can t because they er well, they 
 can t," said Mr. Levison, reticently. " Your mother 
 now? She s living? Seems as if I ve heard you talk 
 about her. Don t you want her? You d have to pay 
 anybody else a salary. I should think you d like to have 
 your mother." 
 
 " Mother ? " said Sandra dubiously. A hundred ob 
 jections, not one of which Levison could have understood, 
 crowded into her mind at once. "Why, she I don t 
 believe she " 
 
 " She wouldn t like it, hey ? " said Levison ; and read 
 ing or misreading her expression, he added quickly with 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 239 
 
 that feeling for old age which most nobly and beautifully 
 characterizes his race : " You don t want to put it up to 
 her? Well, that s right. When they get along in years, 
 they oughtn t to be worried. Only you may be mis 
 taken. I shouldn t wonder if the old lady would like it 
 first-rate. Nothing to do but ride around with you in the 
 machine, and boss the servants they all love that 
 and have everybody tell her what a wonder her daughter 
 is. I should think it would just suit her. But you know 
 best." 
 
 Sandra did indeed know best; Levison s conception of 
 the delights Mrs. Boardman might enjoy would have made 
 her laugh but for its very simplicity. It would have 
 been impossible to explain to him why her mother would 
 be lost in such an existence as he pictured; Levison had 
 never met her type of woman in his life. It somehow 
 pained Sandra to think that he could not fail to be im 
 pressed by Mrs. Richard s fine, fading beauty, her taste, 
 her manners, her distinction all of which he would deeply 
 admire, whereas the Victorian grande dame herself would 
 inevitably set him down as a common, commercial, in a 
 word impossible. And not her mother alone, but every 
 body else at home. She tried to explain their attitude 
 to herself by her customary argument ; they did not know, 
 they did not understand : but in the middle of the formula 
 stopped short almost frightened by the discovery that 
 it was her own attitude, not theirs, that needed explana 
 tion. They were the same, but who was she? What 
 had become of the original Alexandra Boardman? Years 
 of time, leagues of distance, seemed to separate her from 
 that girl. Sandra picked up a photograph of the " Queen 
 of Spades, the top-card in the pack " a phrase which 
 was bandied about town a good deal that season and 
 
240 THE BOARDMAlSr FAMILY 
 
 studied it a long while and laid it down at last with a sigh, 
 wondering if the change in her was really a deterioration 
 as Everett had all but said outright in his letter. 
 
 The question of a companion she settled finally by 
 getting Mary Schultze, of all people, to undertake that 
 office. Levison, who was at first amazed and amused, and 
 inclined to be skeptical as to Mary s qualifications, 
 eventually acknowledged with increasing amazement and 
 amusement that no better selection could have been made. 
 " Why, that girl was just born to tag somebody around ! " 
 he declared. " Her being young makes no difference ; 
 she might be twenty-five or fifty or a thousand it s all 
 one! She isn t pretty, she isn t homely, she isn t any 
 thing. You don t think of her being around to play 
 propriety; you don t think about her at all. She just 
 seems to be necessary and natural, like a shadow. She 
 makes the best effect I ever saw. It s it s " Mr. 
 Levison had to resort to his gesticulations to express him 
 self. "My God!" said he. "It s atmosphere, that s 
 what she is ! Atmosphere ! " 
 
 Mary, for her part, had required considerable persuad 
 ing, and left her position in the law-office with hesitation 
 and misgivings. She was not so much timid as cautious, 
 feeling that a good, steady job as hum-drum as it may be, 
 should not be relinquished for the uncertainties of life 
 with a stage-favourite, no matter how glittering and easy 
 and well-paid. Nobody could tell how long it would last. 
 All very fine just now, but suppose Miss Boardman got 
 out of health, or had an accident so that she couldn t dance 
 any more, or lost her hold on popular regard, or married 
 and retired? Then where would Mary be? All very 
 fine too, to say that she had her stenography to fall back 
 on, but after you have been out of it for a while, you get 
 out of touch with people; ;they forget you; and anyhow 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 241 
 
 stenographers situations are never easy to get in New 
 York with dozens of girls after every one of them. On 
 the other hand, no mortal young woman, not even Mary, 
 could have been indifferent to the allurements of the 
 prospect. She would be where nine-tenths of the 
 girls she knew and hundreds of others, for that 
 matter would give their eyebrows to be, " on the 
 inside." She would know all about that subject of 
 perennial and eating curiosity, the private life of a public 
 personage. She was certain to meet or at least to see 
 intimately all sorts of famous people, and to travel to 
 all parts of the world; already Mr. Levison was talking 
 about taking Miss Boardman to Europe, and requests to 
 perform before small, chosen audiences in the most dis 
 tinguished houses for fabulous sums, of course were 
 said to rain upon her as upon the more notable actors 
 and opera-singers. To Gus s objection that a companion 
 was in a very ill-defined and uncomfortable position be 
 tween the upper mill-stone of her employer and the nether 
 one of the domestics (these were not the young man s 
 words, but their substance) Mary retorted spiritedly that 
 as far as that went, what was she in Messrs. Hogue and 
 Sterrett s office? Just a clerk. Would Mrs. Hogue or 
 Mrs. Sterrett think of inviting her to their houses ? They 
 never had, anyhow. She was just about the same to them 
 as a nursemaid. Miss Boardman knew that she was a 
 lady, called her Mary and insisted on being called Sandra, 
 and was as sweet and unaffected as if she were nobody 
 at all, or still studying dancing in Aunt Lou s hall-bed 
 room. That discussion clinched the business! Mary 
 packed up her few belongings, took her last pay-envelope, 
 and said good-bye to the office; her destination having 
 been noised abroad, the departure occasioned uncommon 
 excitement, even the heads of the firm betraying some 
 
242 THE BOARDMA1S T FAMILY 
 
 interest, and Mr. Sterrett going so far as a jocose sug 
 gestion that she " chalk his hat " to a performance at the 
 Marionettes some night. 
 
 " You can tell her you say her real name s Board- 
 man? Funny! I thought she was a Russian or some 
 kind of foreigner you tell her I ve done my best to 
 hoost her. I ve been to see her dance and taken my wife. 
 At two dollars and a half per it runs into money, but I 
 like to help a struggling young thing like her, and I see 
 by the paper she only gets about twenty-five hundred a 
 week/ said he with facetious solemnity. " Orchestra- 
 chairs about twelve rows back are where I like to sit, but 
 a row either way will do. I m the easiest man on earth 
 to satisfy." 
 
 " I can speak to Mr. Levison about it," said Mary, 
 deliberately literal. Mr. Sterrett had always been kind 
 enough whenever he noticed her at all ; but at the moment 
 he somehow personified the fate that had heretofore con 
 demned her to unimportance, and Mary could not resist 
 taking that thrust at it. 
 
 She entertained vague purposes of keeping a diary, and 
 years afterwards writing it over into such a book as she 
 sometimes saw advertised, or in the shop-windows. The 
 title might be " Glimpses of a Great Artist" or " Behind 
 the Scenes with Sandra," or ff My Life with a Celebrated 
 Dancer." There was a great deal of money in books like 
 that, Mary had heard; cultured persons bought them, and 
 they were talked about in all the refined circles. Un 
 fortunately being Behind the Scenes with Sandra, and 
 Mary s Life with a Celebrated Dancer turned out, take it 
 by and large, as monotonous and uneventful as can well 
 be imagined! The diary project fell through from sheer 
 lack of material. Nothing exciting happened; nothing 
 whatever was allowed to happen, if possible to prevent it, 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 243 
 
 that might disturb the ordered and narrow routine of 
 Sandra s days. Physical health, it appeared, was the 
 prime requisite; she must have such and such food pre 
 pared thus and thus; so much time was parcelled out to 
 deep, to practise, to exercise, to rest, to recreation. An 
 equal duty was the care of her looks ; she must not lose in 
 weight, she must not gain in weight ; a wrinkle, a trouble 
 some tooth, a grey hair would be the very climax and 
 vanishing-point of tragedy. Sandra took it all most 
 seriously ; she had always taken everything that pertained 
 to her dancing seriously ; and indeed she had good reason 
 to nowadays, Mary thought simply, as soon as she got 
 over her first surprise. Twenty-five hundred a week was 
 serious enough, in all conscience. 
 
 Perhaps it was not that much, perhaps it was more, 
 but no one was likely to find out from Mary. The young 
 woman was naturally discreet, and her years in an office 
 had developed a certain " business-sense," as Levison 
 pronounced it. She relieved him, as time went on and 
 he found her to be essentially reliable, of many of the 
 cares incident to keeping the public away from his star. 
 She escorted Sandra to and fro, interviewed the inter 
 viewers, made the appointments, read the letters. She 
 was invaluable. That Levison grew to have entire con 
 fidence in her is evidenced by the fact that one day he 
 waylaid her in private and with an embarrassment which 
 sat oddly on him asked her what was done about now 
 the soft-heads and the er the fellows with the coin, 
 you know, that wrote notes and er all that ? 
 
 " You know what I mean any girl that s been born 
 and brought up in this town ! " he said with a meaning 
 look. " Of course I I can t say anything to her about 
 it. That s what you re here for, anyhow, to look after 
 that end." 
 
244 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 Mary told him circumstantially what was done with all 
 the letters. There were a great many appeals for charity 
 from people both in and out of the profession, which 
 Sandra almost always responded to generously too gen 
 erously by far, and too indiscriminately, Mary bought ; as 
 many more came from stage-struck young girls and un 
 recognized geniuses who wanted her to get or give them 
 an audience; and when it came to the promoters, stock 
 brokers, automobile-dealers, real-estate agents, purveyors 
 of candy, champagne, furs, diamonds and so on, their name 
 was legion. Sandra " turned down " most of them ; she 
 was not without some business-sense too, it would seem 
 
 " Yeah, I know, I know," Levison interrupted im 
 patiently. " But the others the chappies ? " 
 
 " I was coming to those," said Mary, with tranquillity. 
 " I read all of their letters, only I ve got so I just skip 
 through. They always say about the same thing. We 
 used to read them together and nearly kill ourselves laugh 
 ing, but Sandra won t bother with them now " 
 
 " Oh, she won t hey ? " said Levison, distinctly relieved. 
 " I thought women never got tired of the heart-stuff. I 
 thought you couldn t pull it too strong for em. I didn t 
 know but what she might now fall for it sometimes. 
 What do you do about em, though ? " 
 
 " Why, throw em away or burn ein up she doesn t 
 care. Of course, there re flowers and candy. I thought 
 it would be nice to give them around to the chorus, but I 
 tried it once, and do you know, Mr. Levison, those girls 
 got just as mad ! I found out they got quantities them 
 selves. They asked me if I thought I was visiting the 
 Old Ladies Home, and things like that," said Mary, smil 
 ing a little herself as Levison roared out laughing. 
 "Well, I didn t know any better. I hadn t any idea 
 they d be so insulted. Now I give them to that old 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 245 
 
 carpenter that s been here so long. You know? The one 
 that limps ? I think his name is Grant. And then I give 
 some to Sunny Jim and to Mr. Potter, and 
 oh, around to everybody. Then the people that are all 
 the time sending and asking if they can t install some new 
 kind of electric piano-player or decorate her boudoir, or 
 demonstrate something, or give her a course of treatments, 
 massage or something, you know, without being paid for 
 it, just for the advertisement sometimes even, they offer 
 to pay her, if she ll recommend them why, we just 
 turn them down, too. Goodness, if Sandra tried them all, 
 she wouldn t have time for anything else ! " Mary said. 
 And here, whether she felt Mr. Levison s attention to be 
 flagging and desired to attract it again, or whether the fact 
 occurred to her as casually as she mentioned it, she added : 
 " I didn t know what to do about the jewellery that time, 
 but Sandra " 
 
 " Hey ? Jewellery ? " said Levison, aroused at once 
 and scowling. " You mean some fellow she knew sent 
 it?" 
 
 " Oh, no no, it wasn t anybody she knew. She d 
 never even seen him. He wrote and said he was crazy 
 about her, and if she d wear it that night he d be in Box 
 A, and he d know she d meet him after the performance. 
 Imagine! It was a perfectly lovely chain and pendant, 
 a sautoir, you know awfully stylish it came from 
 Tiffany s. The pendant was purple enamel with a kind 
 of star of pearls and diamonds in the middle, and then 
 there were little kind of knobs of pearls and diamonds 
 and amethysts every few inches along the chain it was a 
 platinum chain oh, it was simply gorgeous!" said 
 Mary, warming to the recital. " We did try it on, both 
 of us," she confessed and laughed shamefacedly ; " before 
 Sandra sent it back." 
 
246 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " Sent it back ? Wasn t it real ? " said Levison. 
 
 " I don t know. I guess so, though. It looked real. 
 She wouldn t hear of keeping it, let alone wear it that 
 night " 
 
 Levison grunted. 
 
 " He was in Box A sure enough. That is, there was 
 a man in that box, in a dress-suit " 
 
 " limp ! What d he look like ? Young ? " 
 
 " Why, no sort of middling. Sandra had one of the 
 ushers take the box around to him " 
 
 " Didn t she write anything in it ? " Levison interposed 
 suspiciously. 
 
 " ~No. She just wrapped it up in the same paper it 
 came in, and sent it out to him. And he just took it and 
 went away. He didn t even stay to see her dance." 
 
 Levison grunted again. " Had a nerve, didn t he ? " 
 said he in accents highly uncomplimentary to the un 
 known. And then inconsistently : " Poor devil ! " He 
 thought a moment, then asked another question : " Was 
 that all ? She hasn t heard any more of him ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 After further frowning meditation, Levison said: 
 " Well, if any of em get too rank, just let me know," and 
 was moving away, when some second thought halted him. 
 " You understand, Miss Schultze, I er I ve got to 
 keep a line well there s a lot of marrying in the stage 
 business too much ! I ve seen plenty of good perform 
 ers spoiled by it or set back anyway. That s what s 
 on my mind," he said, as if feeling that so much curiosity 
 needed some explanation; there was a species of uneasy 
 challenge in his eye. 
 
 Mary nodded readily with an open countenance, thereby 
 displaying the astonishing powers of duplicity possessed 
 by even the most guileless of women. Miss Schultze 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 247 
 
 was transparently honest and not too clever ; nevertheless 
 at that moment, whatever he chose to say or even if he 
 had kept silence, she guessed accurately what was on Mr. 
 Levison s mind! 
 
 If this incident and others slight in themselves but 
 straws which showed which way the wind blew increased 
 Mary s new and pleasing feeling of importance she was 
 not the person to presume on it. The great gratification 
 to be derived from possessing certain sorts of informa 
 tion is simply the possession, the keeping your knowledge 
 to yourself. It was none of her business, Mary argued 
 cannily, to tell Sandra about Mr. Levison; pretty soon 
 everybody would be telling her, anyhow, or he would 
 betray himself. And, by a similar line of reasoning, why 
 reveal to Levison the existence of Mr. Thatcher? So 
 her catalogue of letter-writers did not include the latter 
 gentleman who, nevertheless, was the most persistent of 
 them all. " Only his aren t like love letters. They re 
 just nice letters," Mary said to herself with some dis 
 appointment. Such faithfulness and devotion as Sam s 
 ought to have been romantic ; but romance and sandy hair, 
 a hundred-and-seventy pounds weight, a very solid bank ac 
 count, and shall it be hinted ? some sense of humour, 
 cannot be associated together. Sam himself would have 
 made fun of the notion. 
 
 For all that he occasionally performed some high-flown 
 feat about which there was a flavour of romance ro 
 mance strictly a la twentieth century such, for instance, 
 as cabling from Madrid where he happened to be on the 
 night of Sandra s debut, a long and monstrously expensive 
 message of congratulation, jokes and nonsense inter 
 mingled. He did not know whether the event was a 
 success or not, until two weeks later when he picked up 
 a Times at his Brussels hotel; whereupon Samuel 
 
248 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 rushed out and sent another cable equally boyish and ex 
 uberant, and also costly. His progress to Vienna, Buda- 
 Pesth, Rome, Cairo, half around the world was indicated 
 by more cablegrams, some of them addressed to a Fifth 
 Avenue florist in terms inviting bankruptcy. Thus does 
 the knight of today exhibit his chivalry ; and on the whole 
 few ways have been discovered that are more convincing. 
 Sam himself reached New York City on the heels of his 
 last communication, a wireless sent from mid-ocean. He 
 would have gone tearing up from the docks to Sandra s 
 apartment, but the common-sense which achieves kind 
 ness restrained him. " I expect she has to be let alone in 
 the daytime so she can rest and take care of herself," 
 he thought, influenced as usual by the deceptive fragility 
 of her appearance; and a little perhaps by previous ex 
 periences with stars of Sandra s degree. It was strange 
 to think of her amongst them. He went to the office and 
 lunched with his chief, and craftily introducing her name, 
 heard her spoken of as a Cuban young woman (educated 
 in a convent from which she had escaped and made her 
 way to New York to avoid marriage with some half -negro 
 sugar-planter whose estates adjoined!) with much private 
 amusement; and after luncheon walked two or three 
 squares out of his way around by the Theatre of the 
 Marionettes. He spelled out " Little Bo-Peep " from the 
 Tin! if. electric-sign over the entrance, and below it 
 " Sandra " in letters only a fraction smaller. Levison s 
 chic and daring posters flaunted on either hand; the 
 vestibule was lined with photographs of her in forty dif 
 ferent poses, as the " Peacock-Girl " ; as the " Queen of 
 Spades " ; as " Pierrette " in company with a chalked and 
 be-ruffled young man for whom Mr. Thatcher instantly 
 conceived a strong dislike ; and in a new dance just added 
 to the evening s entertainment, the "Falling Leaf." 
 
THE BOAKDMAlSr FAMILY 249 
 
 They were good pictures; the lightness of her movement 
 survived even in the camera, and it was Sandra s own 
 face, so potently expressive, that looked from among the 
 scarfs, plumes, embroideries, hedizenments. Sam caught 
 himself thinking not only of old dancing-school days and 
 Mr. Matson s " Exhibitions," which was natural enough, 
 but of the faces of other Boardmans, on those handsome 
 old canvases which he recalled hanging on the walls of 
 Sandra s home. If it seemed strange to him, what would 
 they have thought of it ? 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 WHEN Sam finally reached his lady s presence, it 
 was with a relief of which he was ashamed that he 
 found her unchanged. He had not seen her for nearly a 
 year, not since long before she wrote him the great news of 
 the Rosenberg engagement; and Sam, with sundry figures 
 of stage women he had known forcing themselves upon his 
 reluctant memory, realized that in spite of himself he had 
 feared some difference in her. But it was the same Sandra 
 in a little grey dress that recalled one he had used to ad 
 mire, sitting with that same air of thistledown weight 
 lessness among cushions on the lounge while she talked 
 to him eagerly just as on a night which he remembered with 
 rueful distinctness some three or four years ago. To be 
 sure, the lounge was no such shabbily cozy affair as their 
 old friend of the Boardman parlour. Mr. Sigmond Mor- 
 hardt of the firm of Morhardt, Inc., Decorators, would have 
 veiled his eyes in horror before that Victorian relic. San 
 dra s little reception-room was as stunningly stylish as the 
 apartments Mr. Morhardt created for the stage, which 
 indeed it strongly resembled. There were pale panelled 
 walls, attenuated chairs, consoles with chaste marble tops, 
 mirrors cut up into panes like windows, drifts of shadowy 
 gauze draperies, embankments of satin, lace and chiffon 
 pillows shading imperceptibly through all the colours of the 
 spectrum to dead black. It was a triumph; no greater 
 proof is needed than the fact that it had been photographed 
 five several times from every angle for the Sunday sup 
 plements, the leading women s magazines, and the most no- 
 
 250 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 251 
 
 table of those periodicals which Mr. Levison not inaccu 
 rately described as " the reading-from-left-to-right kind." 
 
 " You have to let them do that sort of thing, you know," 
 Sandra said with a complete indifference. " It s part of 
 the work." 
 
 " You don t have much privacy, I suppose," said Sam 
 sympathetically. 
 
 She looked at him a little surprised. " Why yes, all the 
 privacy I want. For instance, you didn t find it so easy to 
 get at me, now did you ? " 
 
 Sam had to own with a laugh that he did not. " Miss 
 Schultze was as wary as a cat. But when she finally made 
 out who it was at the telephone she begged my pardon two 
 or three times and seemed to be a good deal upset -though 
 I kept telling her I understood how it was. You d be 
 hounded to death " 
 
 " Oh, no, it s not so bad as you think. Of course they d 
 worry me ; but the funny thing is if nobody took any notice 
 of me in that way, at all, I d be ever so much more worried ! 
 The wardrobe-woman at the Marionettes used to be quite 
 well-known on the stage she was leading-lady with Mc- 
 Cullough, and talks a lot about those way-back ones, Maggy 
 Mitchell, you know, and all those real old-timers and 
 she asked me once how many letters I got in the morning s 
 mail ? Why, goodness, I haven t any idea ! I said. 
 I ve never counted them. It s true, too. I d never have 
 thought of counting them. But what do you think ? She 
 gave me a funny kind of look, and said : When you be 
 gin to count em, dearie, you ll know you re done ! It 
 frightened me, somehow " 
 
 " Oh, stuff, Sandra ! She talked that way just because 
 she s a a croaking old has-been herself ! " Sam declared 
 hotly. " She probably never amounted to much anyhow. 
 Not like you! " 
 
252 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " Do you really think I m I m pretty good, Sam ? " 
 asked the girl with far more anxiety than she had ever be 
 trayed after any of the thousand-and-one amateur enter 
 tainments in which he had seen her ; yet for technical fin 
 ish, for power and originality those performances could 
 not compare with what she was capable of nowadays ! 
 
 " Sandra, it s beautiful ! I ve never seen anything that 
 could touch it ! " 
 
 " I m always afraid you feel that way because you know 
 me. It s not fair to corner people and ask them flat out, 
 anyhow. They can t tell me what they honestly think. 
 But that s another queer thing. I know when I m good! 
 I know it better than anybody else. But I can t help ask 
 ing people all the time ! It s silly, but I don t seem to be 
 able to stop myself." 
 
 " Well, maybe I m prejudiced in your favour, and then 
 again maybe I only want to be polite because I m cornered. 
 But they re turning em away at the box-office. I only 
 happened to get a seat because some man came in and gave 
 his up at the last minute. That shows that the general 
 public thinks you re the worst ever, of course. And those 
 recalls the other night. No use talking, it was a frost ! " 
 said Sam, guessing correctly that this bit of genial irony 
 would be more reassuring than any amount of enthusiastic 
 protest; it sounded so sane and practical. He had heard 
 and seen a good deal, professionally, of people in Sandra s 
 position, and their vanity and touchiness, their dependence 
 on applause and their distrust of it, had always struck him 
 as being more pathetic than ridiculous or irritating. Con 
 sider the lives they led: what self-control and self-forget- 
 fulness, what concentration, what tremendous expenditure 
 of nervous force a single performance demanded! They 
 were so long in arriving, and they had so short a time, ten 
 years, twenty years at most; and what cruel oblivion 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 253 
 
 awaited them ! Fear of it, fear of waning powers stalked 
 them even in their prime, as it was stalking Sandra at this 
 very moment. She sat, her black eyes gazing wistfully, 
 her fingers twining in and out of the tassel at the corner of 
 one of Mr. ILorhardt s opulent cushions, one foot swinging 
 
 a familiar attitude and movement ; and watching her, 
 Sam felt the old familiar delighted surprise that anything 
 so uncalculated could be so charming. He checked a sigh. 
 
 " Well, Sandra, you got there," he said. 
 
 " Yes," said Sandra. There was no complacency in her 
 tone. Sam, who himself had also " got there " so far as 
 that locution implies success in a career was in a sense pre 
 pared for her next words. " It hasn t been all my doing, 
 though. I ve had luck. Of course I ve worked. And I 
 know I ve got it in me. That part isn t luck. But " 
 She made a little expressive gesture, smiling. " I hadn t 
 any sense when I started out. I thought I was going to go 
 to the top at one jump, right off! And I thought that 
 once I got to the top, I wouldn t have another thing to do 
 simply sit back and be be It, you know. Well now, 
 here I am and I work harder than ever, and think about 
 it a great deal more ! It isn t grand and easy and all plain 
 sailing at all anything but ! " 
 
 Sam nodded, " But you like it ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes! I d rather do it than anything on earth I 
 always have felt that way, though. Only now I seem to 
 feel so much more responsible. It s because I have a name 
 and reputation, something to be responsible for, I suppose. 
 I m afraid all the time that I m not doing my best I m 
 afraid of being satisfied. You can t afford to be satisfied 
 
 you must keep on on on! " Sandra said with vio 
 lence, her face harrowed momentarily by some feeling 
 higher than ambition. Sam thought again: What lives 
 thev lead ! 
 
254 THE BOARDMAIST FAMILY 
 
 " Well, don t wear yourself out," he said ; and something 
 inadequate in this rejoinder to Sandra s tragic outburst 
 made them both laugh. 
 
 " That sounded like Mother," the girl said. 
 
 " What do the family think ? " 
 
 " Oh, they they are pleased, I believe. You know 
 how they are. I suppose they would have preferred me to 
 make a success at something else. But they they like 
 it well enough," said Sandra with constraint, worrying 
 the tassel. " They haven t said much all but Everett, 
 that is. Everett has been outspoken about not liking it." 
 
 " What s his objection ? " 
 
 " Well, he objects to it all. He thinks it will well, 
 vulgarize me make me common, you know." 
 
 Sam felt indeed, he actually looked for a second 
 as if every red hair on his head were about to blaze up. 
 Hitherto Everett had seemed to him negligible a good 
 enough sort of fellow all right probably, only not of 
 much force perhaps he had never had a real opportu 
 nity to show what was in him. Now, however, Sam s in 
 difference was suddenly transmuted to angry contempt. 
 He forgot that he himself not such a great while before had 
 been troubled by doubt as to what Sandra s life and en 
 vironment might have done to her! He was righteously 
 indignant. One must make allowances for the elder 
 Boardmans, he thought; they had different ideas which 
 they could not be expected to overcome in a hurry. But 
 Everett ! He of all people, was in no position to criti 
 cize; he ought to be proud of being Sandra s brother; he 
 ought to be encouraging her with might and main, instead 
 of making her unhappy in a way displaying a species of 
 petty dexterity that was in itself unworthy unmanly. 
 But when Samuel spoke, it was with moderation. 
 
 " I don t know why Everett should feel anxious. There 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 255 
 
 are dancers, of course But there isn t any art or calling 
 on earth that can t be made vulgar. It s a matter of the 
 individual. Xobody that knows you " 
 
 " You don t understand. Everett doesn t mean that, 
 exactly," Sandra interrupted him. " He knows I won t 
 do anything the family would be ashamed of. He only 
 thinks I ll get to thinking too much about money and ap 
 plause and publicity and and all that. It does coarsen 
 one; I m a little afraid of it myself. Of course Everett 
 doesn t like the the surroundings he has the ideas 
 that most people have about the stage he doesn t realize 
 that I am very isolated, and that my life is all given up 
 to one thing; he can t take it in that what I do is work; it 
 doesn t look like work to him. Why, I used to think that 
 way myself! Don t you know, I was just telling you? 
 But it s the money part of it that he hates the worst." 
 
 She spoke so earnestly and simply that Sam Thatcher 
 was fairly silenced. It came into his mind that Everett 
 might actually be just such a quixotic fool as Sandra un 
 consciously described ; but Sam shook his head mentally 
 over that notion. There was evidence in plenty that the 
 Boardinan fortunes which had been visibly declining were 
 now on the road to a complete reinstatement. Whose do 
 ing was it ? Not Mr. Boardmaii s, certainly ; the poor old 
 gentleman did what he could, but there wasn t much work 
 left in him, Sam thought compassionately. And not Ev 
 erett s. Everett was probably getting at the outside about 
 eighty dollars a month, and spending every cent of it on 
 himself. Sandra must be the one; she was the mainstay 
 of the family, just as she had dreamed of being; and in 
 that case, Everett who hated money ! must profit in 
 directly, or even directly. 
 
 " Mr. Levison says people like me ought not to have any 
 family," said Sandra, with a half smile. 
 
256 THE BOAKDMAtf FAMILY 
 
 " He said something ! " said Samuel, dryly. 
 
 Mr. Thatcher and Mr. Levison had met; they kept on 
 meeting, naturally, and in fact discovered a number of 
 mutual acquaintances besides Sandra, Sam s affairs fre 
 quently bringing him into contact with the theatrical folk 
 amongst whom Levison lived, moved and had his being. 
 If the two men did not seek each other s society very ear 
 nestly, it is to be remembered that each was a busy person, 
 whose friendships were already formed, so that, after the 
 manner of New York they had no time for anything or 
 anybody extra. But Mary Schultze found this explana 
 tion unconvincing; according to her, their lack of inter 
 est was too studied. 
 
 "They Tcnow, both of em! Each one knows by the 
 way the other looks at her. They pretend not to, of 
 course ; they try to look as if they didn t see anything, and 
 didn t care anyhow, but they re both on pins and needles 
 the whole time," she told Gus. 
 
 In spite of their having differed seriously over Mary s 
 present job at the time she undertook it, neither of these 
 practical minded lovers had wavered from allegiance to 
 the other. The glittering masculine personalities of the 
 " Bo-Peep " company had no attractions for Mary nor she 
 for them. As a matter of fact, they were mostly re 
 spectable married men with children whom they were 
 anxious to bring up and educate for other careers than the 
 stage; and a nice little farm somewhere, not too far from 
 Broadway, with chickens and a Ford and a house supplied 
 with modern conveniences, summed up their ambitions in 
 almost every case. They had snap-shots of the baby 
 hugging the fox-terrior and squinting at the sun inside 
 their watch-cases, innocent uninteresting treasures which 
 they would show you with the utmost pride and affection; 
 and then go out to the footlights and sing one of the risky 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 257 
 
 songs or utter the not-too-witty ambiguities that seasoned 
 the piece with the clearest conscience in the world ! After 
 her first curiosity wore off, Mary accepted them as she had 
 accepted the men clerks in Messrs. Hogue and Sterrett s of 
 fice ; they did not seem one whit more picturesque. As for 
 Augustus, though he was as impervious as Mary to the lure 
 of the theatre which is a phrase he would have admired 
 but hesitated to use he presently began to relish the 
 association. It made him an object of envy to the whole 
 of McChesney s ; not every day did you come across some 
 one who knew " Sandra " personally, whose " girl " was 
 her companion, who had seen her rehearse in private and 
 could speak authoritatively of what they were going to put 
 on next at the Marionettes, who went in and out by the 
 stage-door, and behind the scenes habitually, had a nod 
 ding acquaintance with the stars and had even gone er 
 rands for some of them, and was called by his last name 
 by " Sandra s " manager Beckley, just like that ! Gus, 
 like Mary, enjoyed his importance, even while he had a 
 fair idea of its worth or worthlessness. Every celebrity 
 or half-way celebrity whose name was carried on the Ma 
 rionettes program trailed a variegated collection of camp- 
 followers, so that Augustus position was nowise unique; 
 but he held these others in secret contempt. In his opin 
 ion they were mere hangers-on, good for nothing else, 
 whereas he felt that he frequented the place as might any 
 rich young man-about-town or literary fellow in search of 
 material ; it entertained him and appeased a mild spirit of 
 adventure. 
 
 " Do you think slie knows ? " he asked. 
 
 " About Mr. Thatcher ? Goodness, yes ! He s asked 
 her over and over again; it s been going on for ever so 
 long. Don t you remember I used to tell you about it 
 when he came to see her that first time at Aunt Lou s ? I 
 
258 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 should think she d know about the other one, too, by this 
 time I don t see how she can help it. But she s never 
 said anything. She wouldn t anyhow, I don t believe. 
 But honestly I wouldn t be surprised if she d never no 
 ticed ! She s so wrapped up in that dancing, she doesn t 
 think about another thing ! " 
 
 " Well, of course, she s a great dancer," said Gus, with 
 the detachment of a connoisseur. " She has a right to be 
 at the top. All the same, she d have been a long while 
 getting there, if it hadn t been for him. This town s full 
 of good dancers; there s lots of luck about it. If he d 
 taken a fancy to some other girl, bet you by this time he d 
 have had her up just as high, and everybody running to 
 see her, and making money by the truck-load just the same 
 as this one." 
 
 " Oh, I don t know about that, Gus, I wouldn t say 
 that," said Mary, disturbed. " Mr. Levison can t do it all. 
 He couldn t have pushed her if she hadn t made good. Of 
 course she owes him a lot, but she knows it. That s where 
 she s different from some of them, I guess. I m sometimes 
 kind of afraid she might " Mary paused significantly. 
 " Just on account of being grateful to him " she fin 
 ished no less significantly. 
 
 " Well, say she did, it s a lot your affair, isn t it ? " said 
 Augustus ironically. " I don t know what you re afraid 
 about." 
 
 " Oh, I can t help it. He s a Jew, for one thing." 
 
 " Well ! " 
 
 "Why, Gus Beckley, you know perfectly well ! 
 You re just talking that way to be contrary," said Mary, 
 without much severity, however. 
 
 " No, I m not," Gus insisted. " He isn t nearly as 
 Jew-y as most of them. And you know these stage-peo 
 ple it seems as if it didn t make much difference about 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 259 
 
 them. You don t care much \?hat they are, somehow." 
 
 " You would if it came to marrying them yourself, 
 though," said Miss Schultze with force. 
 
 " Maybe I would." And here another question oc 
 curred to Mr. Beckley which he propounded with the grav 
 ity it deserved. " Say, Mary, suppose he did ask her, and 
 suppose she turned him down. What s next, hey ? D you 
 suppose all this keeps up ? " His glance and gesture com 
 prehended not only the apartment but a host of things un 
 seen appertaining to Sandra herself, to Levison, to the 
 Marionettes, even to the outside world. The suggestion 
 was sufficiently vague, but Mary caught it. 
 
 "Gracious, I don t know! I never thought of that!" 
 she ejaculated. 
 
 After a thoughtful silence, Gus said, wrinkling his eyes 
 sagely : " Well, you couldn t blame him if he laid down 
 on it. After all he s done ! It would be too much like 
 working for nothing and getting nothing for it; and no 
 white man s going to keep that up, let alone a Jew ! Well, 
 of course, I don t literally mean he isn t white ; I just mean 
 they re not the same as ourselves." 
 
 ff There! You see! You feel just like everybody else, 
 you know you do ! " said Mary triumphantly. 
 
 Of the gossip that milled thus around her, Sandra was 
 quite unconscious. Notwithstanding a succession of ex 
 periences during the last few years which had insensibly 
 shifted her outlook, perhaps even worked some subtle 
 change in her character, she still measured people more or 
 less by the Boardman rule. In Mary s position, Sandra 
 would have felt it a kind of disloyalty to discuss her em 
 ployer so freely. Likewise she never suspected that in 
 the cramped little world of the theatre there were people 
 who were jealous of her, who sneered at her success, and 
 who were not above trying to impair her performance in 
 
260 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 small ways known to the profession. Sandra herself was 
 jealous of nobody; why, she would have argued naively, 
 should anybody be jealous of her ? As for the other mean 
 nesses, being incapable of them, she could scarcely under 
 stand when Levison warned her against them. He men 
 tioned a certain Miss Vera Lloyd, of whom Sandra had 
 never taken much notice, classing her with the other hand 
 some, showy young women with whom the piece was plen 
 tifully supplied. Two or three years ago, she would have 
 laughed and wondered at their manners, their voices, their 
 taste in dress, and would have written home letters filled 
 with not very sympathetic comment. But nowadays 
 either she was less observant or less critical, or the whole 
 matter seemed of less importance. 
 
 " You don t mean to say you haven t got onto her ? 
 Why, say, listen, that girl would crab the whole act, if she 
 could. She couldn t have meant it? Nobody d do a 
 thing like that ? " he echoed Sandra s objection. " Maybe 
 not ! Maybe not ! " 
 
 " But I don t see " 
 
 " You don t ! " said Levison epigrammatically. He 
 looked down at her odd transparently pale face which just 
 now wore a puzzled and distressed expression that made it 
 seem touchingly youthful, even childish. " You ought 
 to have a guardian appointed. I d like to know what 
 you re going to do when I m not here." 
 
 " When you re not here ? Mr. Levison ! You re not 
 going away ? " Sandra asked in an alarm which should 
 have been comical. But Levison did not smile. He 
 moved nervously, checked himself, and stood eyeing her 
 sidelong, fidgetting with his watch-chain, which, by the 
 way, was a massive and expensive creation with a Masonic- 
 looking charm or insignia of some sort dangling down from 
 it, twinkling with diamonds. Sandra thought the thing in 
 
THE BOARiniAX FAMILY 261 
 
 atrocious taste, aud often wished there were some tactful 
 way of suggesting to him not to wear it. 
 
 " Why, I expect I ll have to go some of these days. 
 Got to get over to the other side once in every so often 
 to look em over, you know," he said. "Why? Think 
 you ll miss me? " 
 
 " Awfully ! I ll feel lost. I I ve gotten to relying 
 on you so. And no wonder ! Look at all you ve done ! " 
 said the girl, with an honest and open warmth which 
 should have effectively banished, destroyed, knocked on the 
 head any sentimental hopes. There was something 
 equally deadly in the practical character of her next words. 
 " I wouldn t know who to go to to tell me what to do. I m 
 so used to you. Who would you want me to go to in case 
 you shouldn t be here ? You know ? About contracts and 
 all that legal part ? I don t know anything." 
 
 Levison abandoned the watch-chain. " Don t go to any 
 body," he said gruffly. " I m your manager. If any 
 thing comes up, let it wait till I get back, or cable me." 
 
 " All right. I m glad I asked you, and I m glad you 
 don t want to turn me over to somebody else. I d be 
 afraid of him. Even if he meant well and was very effi 
 cient and all that, it wouldn t be you. He wouldn t have 
 your judgment, nor have seen so much probably. You ve 
 been at it so long " 
 
 " Oh, Pop knows everything ! " said Levison in a scoff 
 ing tone. " Say, how old do you think I am ? Thirty- 
 seven ! That s some age, isn t it ? Methuselah hasn t got 
 anything on me, hey ? " 
 
 The strange thing is that if Sandra had been the Alex 
 andra Boardman of other days, she would long ere this 
 have divined Mr. Levison s state of mind ; the girls of her 
 class were not more keenly on the lookout for suitors than 
 any other girls, nor did they set too high a value on any 
 
262 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 man s attentions, being in the main sensible; but any one 
 of them, including Sandra herself would have been very 
 much alive to the fact that some man was in love with her. 
 Nowadays everything of the sort seemed to Sandra to be 
 long to that previous existence that was so featureless, so 
 little worth while; she had no time to think about love or 
 marriage. When her mother wrote her about So-and-so s 
 engagement, and Such-a-one s " darling baby," she had to 
 make an effort to feel interested. In entering the world 
 of art, she had somehow cut off nearly all communication 
 with the other worlds; she would complain of her isola 
 tion arid yet was at heart glad to be isolated. How else, 
 Sandra thought seriously, could she do her work ? 
 
 She had a vague idea that all this was profoundly self 
 ish, and salved her conscience by various generosities to 
 the family ; yet when they thanked her always excepting 
 Everett who continued to hold aloof Sandra shrank 
 painfully. It seemed to be all wrong, a reversal of the 
 natural order for her father and mother to be thanking 
 her. She was facing, without knowing it, the fact that be 
 tween individuals there is no wholly kind way of giving, 
 and no gift that does not entail a certain humiliation ; and 
 it bewildered her to find that she was not happy in doing 
 something from which she had expected the greatest hap 
 piness. She could not be, at one and the same time, San 
 dra the dancer, and Sandra the daughter in her father s 
 house ; the discovery troubled her, but she did not want to 
 resume her old place. When they spoke affectionately of 
 her coming and resting at home, during her vacation, San 
 dra was startled and ashamed to find that she did not want 
 to resume it even for that brief period; she had actually 
 been planning for a nook of her own in the country some 
 where not too far from Broadway, exactly like all the rest 
 of the Marionettes crew ! 
 
THE BOAKDMAX FAMILY 263 
 
 A Mr. Simeon Sturm whom Levison introduced to her, 
 knew just the thing she would like, as it transpired, and 
 volunteered to take her out to look at it in his automobile 
 one Sunday afternoon. So Sandra and Mary and Levison 
 went; and the poodle with which Levison had provided 
 her went; and a photographer whom it is quite possible 
 Levison had provided too, took pictures of the party, get 
 ting out of their machine, eating luncheon at the tea-house, 
 lounging among elaborately rustic settings, putting the dog 
 through his tricks, and so on, all against the enchanting 
 background of the Catskills. Sandra was a good deal 
 taken with the farm which was a farm de luxe, with a de 
 lightful twenty-room " cottage " of English architecture 
 snuggled cozily among trees, terraces, and gardens formal, 
 Japanese, Puritan, any style. Buildings of a like homely 
 elegance housed the machinery of utilities ; it was perfect, 
 at a towering price, which, however, Mr. Sturm intimated 
 might be subject to revision " shaded a little " was what 
 he really said. They reached the city again late, Sandra 
 still undecided. 
 
 After dinner, as she and Mary were sitting in the grey 
 salon, the bell rang and Mary got up, saying: "There s 
 Gus, I expect," and went to open the door herself. But 
 instead of Gus there stood on the threshold a tall young 
 man who might, she thought, have been the original of 
 those fine, superlatively good-looking yet withal manly 
 young fellows whom Mr. Charles Dana Gibson sets forth 
 with so felicitous a pencil. Mary gazed at him in a flut 
 ter of admiration. She did not hear the question he asked 
 in a voice as satisfying as his appearance but Sandra 
 did, and rushed to the door in a great excitement. 
 
 " Everett ! " she cried out ; and with a sob as he put out 
 his arms to her : " Oh, Ev ! " 
 
CHAPTEE IX 
 
 SANDRA S delight at seeing her brother was only 
 equalled by Everett s own astonishment and concern 
 when he finally made out from her broken, distressful ex 
 planations that all this while she had supposed him to be 
 angry with her, or worse, disappointed, even disgusted. 
 
 " Why, good gracious, Sandra, I had no idea ! Of 
 course I didn t particularly like it at first none of us 
 did, you knew that all along. I didn t want to stand in 
 your way, but at the same time I didn t want to take the 
 responsibility of encouraging you. The whole thing 
 seemed so so radical somehow, so different from any 
 thing we ve ever done," he said earnestly. " It sort of 
 hurt me to think of your doing it, at first. I couldn t get 
 over it my sister dancing for money ; for anybody and 
 everybody to go and stare at, that had the price of a ticket. 
 You know we weren t brought up to think of that as some 
 thing a girl like you could do. Of course, times have 
 changed like everything. I can see now that that old idea 
 was all rot; and Dad and Mother weren t to blame for 
 cramming us full of it. They believed it themselves de 
 voutly. But I didn t mean for you ever to suspect 
 well, I suppose I must have showed how I felt at the be 
 ginning, without knowing it. I must have written some 
 thing, though I can t remember, I can t imagine what it 
 could have been. What you ve done yourself has been to 
 go to work and exaggerate it and brood over it, and make 
 yourself wretched. Why, I wish I d never said a word 
 
 one way or the other ! If I d dreamed how seriously you 
 
 264 
 
THE BOARDMAX FAMILY 265 
 
 were going to take it His fine face was full of 
 
 trouble, affection and perplexity. 
 
 " Well, you know, Ev, you only wrote that one time," 
 said Sandra, a little perplexed herself in the midst of 
 her happiness and relief. " And I I thought " 
 
 " Yes, I m not very good at writing. In fact, I m 
 shamefully careless. I leave letters unanswered until the 
 statute of limitations lets me out," said Everett, grimac 
 ing comically ; " Don t rub it in, San ! " 
 
 But indeed Sandra had no idea of rubbing it in; she 
 was only too glad to have him there with her, arid to know 
 that the coldness of the past year had been nothing but her 
 own unhappy mistake. She took the blame with eager 
 ness, upbraiding herself for not having known better. Ev 
 erett was as much interested in and as proud of her as the 
 others ; was he not her only brother, and had he not always 
 been as fond of her and as good to her as any brother 
 could be ? She recalled with increased pity girls whom 
 she had known who were nothing like so fortunate in their 
 brothers; setting apart the fact that Everett had the ad 
 vantage of them in brains and character, there was no 
 comparison as far as mere presence went. 
 
 And mere presence goes a good way! We may talk 
 as wisely as we please about appearances being deceitful, 
 we may quote doughty old warnings to the effect that hand 
 some is that handsome does and beauty is but skin-deep all 
 day long, there is not one of us but recognizes the value 
 of a pleasing outside; and I, for one, would hate to be 
 offered the choice between introducing to Society an 
 empty-headed Adonis, and a disfigured hunchback with 
 the wits of Solomon ! Everett was not an Adonis ; he 
 escaped being too good-looking. And neither was he emp 
 ty-headed ; on the contrary he had plenty of sense and 
 humour; it was no wonder Sandra took a simple pleasure 
 
266 THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 
 
 in going about with and showing off as her brother a young 
 man so eminently presentable. To be sure she had not 
 much time for this diversion ; but Everett with that consid 
 erate tact in which they had both been drilled, would not 
 for a moment allow her mind to be burdened or distracted 
 by the thought of him and his entertainment. 
 
 " Now look here, San, you must go on just as if I were 
 not here," he said with a pleasant authority. " Don t 
 bother your head about me. Of course I want to know 
 all about the theatre and the way you live and everything. 
 It would all be curious and interesting, even if you weren t 
 my sister. But I ll just prowl around on my own, and 
 stop, look and listen whenever I feel like it. I ll find out a 
 lot more that way, and besides it somehow seems as if it 
 wouldn t look well for you to have a brother hanging 
 around," said the young fellow; he made a face of hu 
 morous distaste. " You re f Sandra you know 
 you re somebody and a string of relatives I don t 
 know what makes the idea so ridiculous, but it is ridicu 
 lous. People would be wanting to know if I was Mr. 
 George W. Sandra and all that sort of thing ! " 
 
 They both laughed, Sandra with a certain inarticulate 
 satisfaction ; Everett s feeling, she thought, became him 
 so well. He was not going to be classed with the shoddy 
 pack of satellites that tagged about the theatre, and in 
 termittently besought influence her s, Mary s, any 
 body s with Levison to get a job. None of that for 
 Everett Boardman ! 
 
 " I can t help introducing you to some of them, though 
 to Mr. Levison anyhow. You ll have to know him. 
 And the rest really, Ev, I want to do it, just to see their 
 faces ! " she told him with a pride that shyly took cover 
 in the guise of fun. " They have never met or dreamed 
 of anybody like you. Wait till you see the chorus-men ! 
 
THE BOARDMAN" FAMILY 267 
 
 I don t know any of them, but you probably will, if you 
 stay long enough." 
 
 " Oh, I can stay as long as I please," said Everett easily. 
 " I ve given up at Arnold s." Her startled face amused 
 him. "What s the matter? Didn t you feel the earth 
 wobble a little the other day ? That s when I walked out 
 of the office." 
 
 " Why, I don t know I somehow took it for granted 
 that you would stay with Mr. Arnold the rest of your life 
 
 like Dad, you know. He s always stuck to the one 
 thing," said Sandra. " What are you going to do ? " 
 
 Time was when she would have shrunk from so frank a 
 comment, and from the direct question; but so far had 
 Sandra travelled from the Boardman paths that she was 
 not even reminded of them by the raised eyebrows and the 
 face of withheld disapproval which Everett turned upon 
 her. " What are you going to do, Ev ? " she repeated. 
 
 " Why, how business-like you ve gotten to be ! " her 
 brother ejaculated. " I don t know what I m going to do 
 
 as yet." Perhaps the last two words were a concession 
 to some force in Sandra which he could not evade; they 
 came out almost against his will. Otherwise Everett had 
 employed the tone of amiable tolerance touched with 
 amusement, with which he would have snubbed any other 
 over-inquisitive person ; and time was too when Sandra 
 would have recognized that tone at once. But now she 
 looked at him, wrinkling her forehead slightly, not at all 
 snubbed. 
 
 " l As yet ? " she said after him. " Do you mean you 
 have something in view? You re going with somebodv 
 else?" 
 
 " No," said Everett, preserving his negligent air. " Is 
 this a catechism, San ? " 
 
 Even that hint fell without reaching her, like a spent 
 
268 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 arrow. " Oh, you re looking around still," Sandra said, 
 practically as before. " Well, New York is a good place 
 only it s pretty big " she shook her head wisely. It 
 was on her tongue to ask him what he could do what 
 kind of office- work? She had never known exactly what 
 his position with Mr. Arnold was, except that it had re 
 mained the same all these five years or so, and now guessed 
 that if he had been promoted he would not have given it 
 up; along with that, the conviction wormed itself into her 
 mind that the kind of work Everett could do was probably 
 about the same kind of work that Gus Beckley did not 
 very exalted, truly ! Of course Everett was worth a dozen 
 Gus Beckleys, Sandra told herself hastily; but people 
 didn t know that. You had to have some luck to bring out 
 what was in you ; look at her own c ase ! She resolved to 
 ask no more questions; Everett s chance would come, and 
 in the meanwhile he ought to take a rest, and have a good 
 time, she thought maternally. 
 
 Everett established himself, on this tacit understanding, 
 very willingly. He contrived to make no trouble in the 
 small household; like any other Boardman, he knew the 
 ethics of hospitality backwards and forwards, and could 
 have preached a sermon on the whole duty of guests, facts 
 to which the admiration and devotion of all the servants 
 bore eloquent witness. He had a room at the apartment 
 and a key and came and went at his pleasure privileges 
 he never abused, for Everett was a decent and temperate 
 man ; even if his morals had been less stable, he would have 
 held himself in check in his sister s house. Noblesse 
 oblige! He might have been tramping the streets from 
 morning to night in search of employment; but if so, he 
 did not speak of it, and appeared every day fresh, point- 
 devise, and high-bred of air much more like a young prince 
 sojourning incognito than a clerk out of a job. Some- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 269 
 
 times he went with Sandra to the theatre where his in 
 troduction made just the sensation she had predicted, to 
 her huge entertainment. Everett, for his own part, was a 
 good deal embarrassed by it ; he was not at all vain of his 
 looks and would have preferred to be remarked for other 
 gifts or attributes, as for instance, his skill at billiards, or 
 his powers of repartee. When any of the girls commented 
 rapturously in words intended for him to overhear on the 
 cut of his profile, and the breadth of his shoulders, Mr. 
 Boardman, far from feeling flattered, departed abruptly 
 from their neighboiirhood, in a fume. " Couple of damn 
 fools ! " he would ejaculate. " Oh, forgive me, Sandra, 
 I couldn t help it ! " 
 
 Sandra only laughed ; like most women she did not ob 
 ject to a good, mouth-filling oath from one of her own man 
 kind once in a while. " You know looks arc a terribly im 
 portant matter to stage-people, Ev," she reminded him. 
 " At least, they think about it and talk about it more than 
 outsiders. The funny thing is that all the while, one can 
 get along perfectly well without any looks to speak of! 
 I m not really pretty, but I make up well, and " 
 
 " Well, no, you haven t got regular features, but 
 you ve got something else, San, that s ever so much better. 
 You ve always had it. I don t know what it is, but it 
 makes the rest of them look like pikers," said her brother 
 with pride and fondness. " Here now, don t do that ! " he 
 expostulated in alarm, seeing tears brim to her eyes. 
 
 " It s it s because I love to have you pleased with 
 me," said Sandra, swallowing hard. 
 
 " Well, don t get er temperamental, and all that, 
 you know, and work up a scene ! " said Everett, with 
 strong distaste. " That would be stage-y, sure enough ! " 
 
 Sandra choked herself off in a panic; notwithstanding 
 his disavowals, she could not wholly rid her mind of the 
 
270 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 fear that Everett was on the watch for signs of deteriora 
 tion in her. He might have found them, the girl thought, 
 nervously aware of changes in herself, and wondering if 
 they could possibly be changes for the worse. The very 
 finish of Everett s manners disturbed her; he infallibly 
 said and did the right thing, he was always interested or 
 pretended to be, pleasant, companionable, yet armoured 
 impalpably with reserves. Just so had she herself been 
 when she first essayed this life; what had happened to 
 her ? She doubted if she could take up and practice again 
 all the graceful social artifices at which she had been so 
 adept once upon a time. The distinctions that loomed so 
 important in those days had all levelled down; she could 
 not care, she could not take the time, to draw the line be 
 tween " nice " and " common " people nowadays ; the 
 world across the footlights was made up of both, whose 
 money paid her equally, and to whom she owed an equal 
 duty. And for the world this side, it was a place where 
 who you were and from what sprung were of no slightest 
 interest to anybody; the single thing that mattered was 
 what you could do. Sandra found that she had insen 
 sibly fallen into the habit of thinking that that was all 
 that mattered anywhere ; but now Everett intentionally or 
 not, in a hundred slight ways, by a hundred slight words, 
 reminded her of the old standards disquietingly. The 
 young women who made eyes at him, the young men most 
 of whom tried covertly and not successfully to copy him, 
 Miss Vera Lloyd whose persecutions and intrigues magi 
 cally ceased immediately after his appearance behind the 
 Marionettes curtain, Levison whom he had considerably 
 impressed what would they have thought if they had 
 known what Everett said when their backs were safely 
 turned, how he laughed at and parodied them, what a com- 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 271 
 
 edy he made of neatly avoiding being seen with them, or 
 allowing them to become, as he said, " too friendly " ? 
 
 Aforetime Sandra had said and done the same things in 
 the same spirit ; the society to which the Boardman young 
 people were born saw no harm in this particular species 
 of two-facedness. There, it was understood that nobody 
 could be at one and the same time sincere and polite; 
 to take others literally or at their surface value was to 
 be calamitously unsophisticated. Everybody was on his 
 guard, and the rules of the game were somewhat better 
 known and, shocking to admit, much more consistently ob 
 served than the Ten Commandments. But the population 
 of the Marionettes exhibited a singular ignorance of all 
 this finesse; they were direct and simple as children; class 
 traditions, class standards, class feeling did not exist for 
 them ; it was an atmosphere wherein every tub stood on 
 its own bottom. They were not dull and the youngest of 
 them was a veteran beside Everett Boardman when it 
 came to practical knowledge of the world ; yet, compared 
 with him, they gave an effect of unworldliness. For one 
 item, it was not possible to imagine a society in which 
 Everett would not have appeared becomingly, to which he 
 could not have accommodated himself; whereas, in num 
 berless circles, high and low alike, the poor Marionettes 
 would have been a terrific misfit. The fact was part and 
 parcel of an advantage he had over them which Sandra, 
 unreasonably enough, found a little unfair. 
 
 The season closed. After a run which had exceeded in 
 length Levison s original calculation by half again the fig 
 ure, continuing through the devastating heat of one entire 
 summer and well into the next. " Little Bo-Peep " was to 
 take the road in the autumn, being succeeded on the boards 
 of the Marionettes by " Hey-Diddle-Diddle " another of 
 
272 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 the miscellaneous collections of young women, low come 
 dians, scenery, songs, dances, rapid-fire dialogues and deaf 
 ening orchestral effects for which that place of sterling 
 entertainment was noted. The new piece, however, would 
 riot begin its career until October, a date to which the 
 Rosenbergs religiously or superstitiously adhered for all 
 their openings; everybody would be busy with rehearsals 
 for weeks beforehand, but in the meantime the Marionettes 
 thankfully rested, at their homes if they happened to have 
 homes, at the camps and resorts favoured by their kind, at 
 those farms they talked about so much, and Sandra herself 
 at the Catskill retreat which she had leased. Her part in 
 the forthcoming production would put the Queen of 
 Spades, the top card in the pack completely in the shade, 
 Levison enthusiastically believed not that it gave op 
 portunities for the display of histrionic talent; the last 
 thing required of any actor, male or female, on the Mar 
 ionettes staff was that he or she should be able to act ! 
 " They can go to these Ibsen-Shaw-Maeterlirick-Irish-Gse- 
 lic joints if they want the high-brow stuff," Levison ob 
 served without animus. " Say, listen ! The average 
 theatre crowd and that means the visiting crowd that 
 comes to New York from all over the country, they re the 
 ones that fill the theatres the average crowd wants to 
 be amused. They want to hear the latest slang, and see 
 the clothes, and get a line on the last song-hit or dance- 
 step, so they can go back home and swell around and tell 
 the folks who s who on Broadway. What gets em is a 
 good peppy show, the kind we put on, with some fellow 
 that can make em laugh, and a chorus of peaches and a 
 special attraction like like Sandra/ " he brought out 
 with an awkwardly humorous glance. " Well, that s the 
 public we cater to, and I guess we do it all right, or they 
 wouldn t keep on coming. And say, listen, maybe we 
 
THE BOAR MI AX FAMILY 273 
 
 don t earn our money, huh ? Anybody that thinks that 
 kind of a show is the easiest to get up, fools himself badly. 
 We spent twenty-five thousand on Bo-Peep before 
 the curtain went up. These lads that are elevating 
 the stage with plays that if they were printed so the au 
 thorities could get on to em, they wouldn t let em through 
 the mails all they ve got to do is to hire some other ele 
 vator, only the artist kind, to paint a back-drop that looks 
 like a view of the coal-cellar at midnight when you go 
 down without a light, set a couple of chairs in front of it, 
 and there you are ! It s all part of the the dope, you 
 know. I could do it if I wanted to ; it s easy enough when 
 you know how, to flimflam the culture crowd. But Fd 
 rather stick in the straight show business where you give 
 the public their money s worth." 
 
 " I hope they ll keep on liking me," said Sandra. 
 
 " They re all right till they get tired. Nobody can 
 hold em after they get tired," Levison said with a sort of 
 circuitous frankness. " It won t be your I mean it 
 won t be anybody s fault when that happens. They just 
 get tired. That s why so many shows are taken off when it 
 looks like they re so popular they could go on forever; the 
 management gets wise to that tired feeling coming along. 
 It s all part of a system; you have to have system in this 
 business same as in any other business. Rosenberg Broth 
 ers always send em on tour for one more season, and that 
 ends em. Enough s a plenty. Of course, lots of old stuff 
 is all the time being overhauled and named something else, 
 and brought up-to-date and tried out just as if it was some 
 thing new, and like as not, the second time or so, it gets 
 over ! Take ( A Cereal Story for instance, that they 
 put on up at the Acme last winter. Swinnerton had that 
 first at the Fifty-ninth Street house, and they called it 
 Mush-and-Milk ? and it was a first-class fizzle. Then 
 
274 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 Swinny got it fixed up a little, and changed the name to 
 * Breakfast for Two and went over to the Shakespeare 
 with it, and scored another fizzle. Then he hired Danny 
 Fitzgerald ; and this guy that nobody ever heard of before, 
 Milton Legree, turns up with this song, Register Love/ 
 and they call the show A Cereal Story and move up to 
 the Acme, and Fitz sings the song, and the next night 
 they re turning em away ! That s how it goes. The pub 
 lic don t notice. Anyhow I sometimes think people like 
 to laugh at the same old jokes, and cry in the same old 
 places they always have, only you mustn t let em know 
 it s old. And you have to vary your stellar attraction on 
 that account " 
 
 " I won t be new next year " 
 
 " What makes you think you ve got to do the worry 
 ing ? " interrupted Sandra s manager jocosely. " Let 
 Max do it ! That s what I m for and I don t look as if I 
 was losing sleep over it, now do I ? You ll have to have 
 new costumes we ll feature that big. Better get ? em 
 from this now what s her name ? Louise. And 
 of course new dances. Say, listen, that makes me think 
 of something. That Falling Leaf, you know " he 
 paused. " You can t guess right every time." 
 
 Sandra understood him. The " Falling Leaf " dance 
 had not been a pronounced success. It was designed to 
 exhibit her versatility, and for a foil, as it were, to the 
 fiery, or coquettish, or sentimental, or merely " cute " roles 
 so to call them wherein she achieved such triumphs. 
 The title conveyed a sombre suggestion which Sandra, with 
 her conscientious artistry had striven to illustrate, as it 
 turned out, only too well. In sad-coloured chiffons with 
 a wreath of sere maple, she was the ghost of summer, of de 
 parted youth, of dead hopes, drifting or whirling about the 
 stage with a mad and heart-breaking futility. Marion- 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 275 
 
 ettes audiences, of whom Levison s estimate was fairly cor 
 rect, while they did not quite know what to make of the 
 spectacle, beheld it with a vague discomfort which they 
 vaguely resented. They applauded but with a hint of re 
 serve which the well-skilled faculties of the Rosenbergs 
 speedily detected. The " Falling Leaf " vanished from 
 the program overnight; Sandra s next novelty was " Pow 
 der-Puff " in which she was brought on in a pink and gilt 
 box, and emerging swathed Huffily in white with bobbing 
 balls of eiderdown, executed any number of dainty pirou 
 ettes and poses in the style to which her followers were ac 
 customed, which they associated with her, this time win 
 ning an unstinted, a whole-souled expression of approval. 
 The episode should have been a valuable lesson. 
 
 " I know. They didn t like it," she assented at once ; 
 but added wistfully, " I liked it, though, I can t see what 
 was the matter with it. Do I have to give up that kind of 
 dance altogether ? Why ? Why can t I - 
 
 Levison wagged his head. " Too bad ! " said he, convey 
 ing his adverse judgment indirectly, yet conclusively as 
 before. " I liked the Falling Leaf too I thought it 
 was beautiful. But what s the use? You ve got to give 
 the public what it wants. Now the i Powder-Puff 
 dance " 
 
 Sandra interrupted with a little impatient gesture. " Oh, 
 that!" 
 
 " You thought it was nothing but fluff, hey ? " said Lev 
 ison. " All the same it caught em and the other didn t. 
 What s the use ? I expect Danny Fitzgerald would rather 
 sing Pagliacci than Register Love/ and I expect he 
 could sing it all right, too. But he sticks to Register 
 Love/ and shows his business-head. I don t believe in 
 knocking the poor old public for not having good taste. 
 That doesn t get you anything. It doesn t get you any- 
 
276 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 thing like this anyhow/ he finished, indicating their sur 
 roundings with a sagacious smile. 
 
 They were sitting on the terrace of Sandra s cottage, 
 whose un-cottage-like facade provided a back-drop almost 
 as theatrically conceived as those before which she was 
 wont to figure nightly. Ivy wrapped the chimnies, a case 
 ment opened out here and there, a delightful wrought-iron 
 weather-vane stood from the comb of the steep-pitched roof 
 against the clear, hot sky. From the balustrade in front 
 of them flights of steps dropped to a lower level whence 
 arose all sorts of garden fragrances. There was a distant 
 view of a mountain with a flat shining loop of water about 
 its base. In the middle of the scene, the big green-and- 
 white striped umbrella shading them, the table and loung- 
 ing-chairs and green-and- white striped cushions appeared 
 with a deliberately count ryfied smartness not incongru 
 ous. 
 
 " Some place ! " said Levison. " Hello, who is that 
 down there coming along behind that row of what d ye 
 call ems? Those tall thick green bushes, I mean. See 
 em?" 
 
 " Everett and Mary, probably. They must be coming 
 back from the postoffice; that s where they said they were 
 going. The green things are supposed to be a screen- 
 planting of cypress, Mr. Levison." 
 
 " Cypress, hey ? It looks nice, but I don t believe it 
 grew there naturally. Some landscape artist laid the place 
 out. Those fellows are pretty high-priced, and I guess 
 they get a rake-off on all these fancy, imported shrubs and 
 things from the nursery-man they give the order to. Well, 
 a place like this is bound to run into money," said Levison 
 philosophically. " There they come again ! Yes, that s 
 your brother. It s kind of funny to see him with little 
 Schultze. Like like " he searched his mind for a 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 277 
 
 simile. "Like a Ford and a Packard alongside! He 
 seems to like her pretty well, though." 
 
 " Does he ? " said Sandra, rather startled but by the 
 other s manner more than his words. " I hadn t noticed." 
 
 " Well, put it that she seems to like him pretty well, 
 then," said Levison, grinning significantly. 
 
 " Yes, but Mary s engaged." 
 
 " Sure enough, sure enough ! And of course she 
 wouldn t throw friend Beckley down for a prince like your 
 brother, if she got the chance. No girl was ever known to 
 do a thing like that," retorted Levison. " Never mind, I 
 don t see him tieing himself up with anybody getting 
 married runs into money, too. And he won t have more 
 than enough even if I land him a job with Rosenbergs " 
 
 Her face of stark astonishment and half articulated ex 
 clamation arrested him. " Why, didn t you know ? 
 Why, I thought I took it for granted you well, I 
 knew you wouldn t put him up to asking me exactly but 
 still I thought you might " he stammered. " It 
 wouldn t have been anything out-of-the-way if you had. 
 I wouldn t have thought anything of it. I I d like to 
 to to do anything you wanted " and here Mr. Lev 
 ison abandoned the attempt at explanation, probably find 
 ing himself floundering into deeper water than ever. 
 " Why, yes, he s been after me ever since he got here 
 ever since you introduced him. I thought you knew all 
 along!" 
 
 Sandra sat dumbfounded. Why Everett should not 
 have taken her into his confidence fully and freely at the 
 beginning was incomprehensible to her; but not more in 
 comprehensible than that he should have thrown up his 
 position at home and come to New York with such a proj 
 ect. After all that he had said all that he was still 
 saying! 
 
278 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " I got it into my head you d written him to come," said 
 Levison, wondering to see her so disturbed over what was 
 to him an everyday occurrence, as she knew. If he had to 
 count up all the people who approached him to get places 
 for their relatives, he would need as many volumes as the 
 Congressional Record, was his private comment. " It 
 would have been all right if you had," he assured her 
 again. 
 
 " I didn t write," said Sandra. " What what sort of 
 a position does he want ? " 
 
 Levison stared. "What sort of a Why, with some 
 show, of course. With the Rosenbergs, or anybody. He 
 knows I wouldn t have much pull if he was after a seat on 
 the stock exchange," he said with uneasy jocularity. She 
 did not smile, however ; and whatever else was wrong, Lev 
 ison was seized with the fear that he himself had offended. 
 Truly he had done nothing; but she was so different. 
 " Say, listen ! I know you wouldn t ask any favours, not 
 for yourself nor your brother, nor anybody. I know 
 you re not that kind," he said humbly. " I didn t mean 
 I just thought maybe " 
 
 " What does Everett want to do ? " Sandra asked. 
 
 " Why oh, well, anything. He can dance some, and 
 sing, and play the piano a little, can t he ? He told me he 
 could. And he s right there on the looks. He could do 
 all right, I guess. Say, listen, don t get yourself all 
 worked up. It s going to be all right. I ll get him some 
 thing." 
 
 He spoke with real kindness. Everett could mimic his 
 " Say, listen ! " his way of flourishing his hands perfectly. 
 ISTose, moustache, jewellery, ostentatious cane, top-hat, fur- 
 lined overcoat, loud laughter, cheap slang, commercialized 
 tastes there was not a thing about him, inside or out, 
 that Everett had not found material for entertainment, for 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 279 
 
 hilarious contempt. Sandra herself had joined in the 
 laughter, a recollection peculiarly hateful at this moment. 
 
 " You are very kind, I I want to thank you very 
 much/ 7 she got out with a miserable stiffness. There was 
 really nothing to say. Levison eyed her doubtfully; but 
 the next instant, Everett and Mary, mounting the steps, 
 put an end to this scene. 
 
 They had the day s paper, which, for at once, as Ever 
 ett reported gaily, actually contained some news. An Aus 
 trian grandduke or crown prince or somebody and his wife 
 had been assassinated at one of those places with a jaw- 
 breaking name, those Balkan places where they were al 
 ways having trouble. Some anarchist threw a bomb into 
 their automobile as they were riding along the street. 
 "He didn t like the idea of having these royalties from 
 outside coming to run the country, so in his freedom-lov 
 ing, high-spirited way, he blew them up. That s what you 
 might call practical patriotism. Fine fellow! Fine 
 race ! " said Everett, smilingly satirical, lighting a ciga 
 rette. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 BY the time Sandra had a chance to speak to her brother 
 in private, Mr. Levison s late communication had 
 somewhat dwindled in importance; so that she was meas 
 urably satisfied by Everett s explanation that he had kept 
 silence expressly to avoid worrying her it was all in 
 the air anyhow he could not tell how he would suit the 
 stage or how the stage would suit him he knew very well 
 he was no such born dancer as herself, for instance he 
 had not the makings of a star but Levison and one or 
 two others had been rather encouraging, and he was going 
 to make a stab at it no harm in trying. Meanwhile he 
 was determined, first of all, that she should not wear her 
 self to a frazzle over him, and secondly, that nobody should 
 have any ground for saying that he had gotten a start 
 through being his sister s brother. Everett made this last 
 declaration with a smiling vehemence, which masked, San 
 dra thought, a very serious pride and resolution. She 
 could scarcely find fault with him for conduct which was, 
 after all, so " Boardman-ish," the girl told herself. Ev 
 erett, for all he had the advantage of being a man, was 
 just as impractical and just as visionary as she had been 
 at the outset ; and he was as thoroughly steeped in the fam 
 ily ideas, about which, take them for all in all, she could 
 still perceive a kind of wrong-headed dignity. The trou 
 ble was they were calamitously out of date now and never 
 should have been taken literally at any time. She had 
 ceased to consider them, and Everett would too, presently. 
 
 " I know I understand," she said warmly. " The 
 
 280 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 281 
 
 only thing, Ev, is that after a while you ll find out it 
 doesn t make a bit of difference to anybody how you get 
 a start. Suppose some manager had given you a try-out 
 just because you told him you were my brother. Nobody 
 would have cared. You might just as well have come to 
 me in the beginning, and let me help you. All this time I 
 thought you were looking around for a position in a bank 
 or something like that the same sort of thing you had 
 had at home. You could have been working taking les 
 sons and practising the way I did " 
 
 " Oh, I don t think that would do me much good. I 
 don t expect to be a star, I tell you. Anyway I can t very 
 well take lessons," said Everett, reticently. 
 
 Sandra recognized with a dart of impatience the Board- 
 man convention which withheld him from telling her in 
 plain words that he had not the money. " That will be 
 all right. I ll see de Voyna, and arrange with him to 
 give you some drill," she said; and sure enough, Ev 
 erett acquiesced without impolite curiosity as to how she 
 would " arrange." 
 
 " It sounds so odd to hear you call people by their last 
 names that way de Voyna/ " was his only comment. 
 " That seems to be one of the Marionettes little ways, 
 though. Nobody ever troubles about Miss or Mister. 
 It s delightfully informal." 
 
 " I suppose I ve picked it up from the others," said San 
 dra, a little taken aback. " I didn t know I was doing it." 
 
 " Well, you ought to be careful, San. It s easy to get 
 into common ways when you have to be so much with these 
 people." 
 
 There was a moment of silence while Sandra looked at 
 him, shrinking before the first rays of an unwelcome en 
 lightenment. She would have offered herself her usual 
 excuses for Everett, but realized reluctantly that they were 
 
282 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 inadequate ; for once, the Boardnaan code could not be held 
 responsible. " Everett," she said at length ; " you know I 
 I don t think you ought to talk in that way in that 
 tone, I mean about these people, as if as if they 
 were beneath us. I don t think you ought to feel that 
 way. Perhaps they weren t brought up the same way we 
 were, but that doesn t make them an inferior order of be 
 ings. We re all on the same level here, anyhow ; if there s 
 any difference, it s in their favour. Any one of these 
 people can do the very thing you want to do, and do it 
 better. If you are going to to cast in your lot with 
 them, you ought you ought not " 
 
 Everett s whimsically arched eyebrows silenced her. 
 " Inferior order of beings " " Cast in our lot with 
 them! he quoted. "Wheel Isn t that the elegant 
 language, though ? But you didn t need to give me such a 
 blast, San. You don t suppose I m going to let them see 
 what I think of them? What put that into your head? 
 I ve always been very careful not to hurt their feelings, 
 you know that. I ve no doubt they re all very good, kind, 
 decent people if they do have erroneous ideas about dress 
 and table-manners, and how to behave in a public place, 
 and a few other little things on the same order," Everett 
 began to laugh in his good-humoured, tolerant, disarming 
 way. " Come now, Sandra, you know yourself they re 
 impossible as companions friends socially you 
 know what I mean." 
 
 Sandra did indeed know what he meant and a sense of 
 futility invaded her. Everything her brother said was 
 reasonable, and his exposition of his principles was just; 
 he would have thought it boorish to be unkind in so cheap 
 and stupid a fashion as he had outlined. He would no 
 more hurt their feelings outright than he would take a 
 bludgeon to their bodies. There were other ways of 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 283 
 
 achieving the same end but with skill and subtlety, which, 
 perhaps, he did not condemn. Sandra knew all about 
 them, too. A certain axiom of her mother s to the effect 
 that a gentlewoman had only one kind of manners, oc 
 curred to her. " Only one kind of manners, 7 Mrs. Rich 
 ard would announce firmly and then proceed to practise 
 half a dozen kinds with an untroubled spirit! Sandra 
 had already fumblingly discovered that this sophisticated 
 humanity was in its essence not humane, that it was at 
 the very opposite pole from the authentic feeling of human 
 fellowship, equal effort and equal responsibility. The girl 
 had learned in this queer school, from teachers who never 
 suspected that they were teaching; now she was oppressed 
 by the conviction that Everett would never learn, and yet 
 more heavily by the other conviction that the fault lay not 
 as much with the Boardman system as with Everett himself. 
 In the middle of all this, another of Levison s state 
 ments coming into her head, caused Sandra to smile, in 
 stead of adding to her anxieties as might have been sup 
 posed. The system had, at least, the qualities of its de 
 fects; Everett, she was confident, would not deliberately 
 get into any sort of philandering complication with Mary 
 Schultze. He looked upon Mary very much as he looked 
 upon a waitress, a ladies maid, an office-girl; namely, as 
 a young woman to whom no matter how pretty and attrac 
 tive and ladylike she was, no gentleman, no Boardman, 
 would pay attentions. Letting morals alone, it would 
 show the extreme of bad taste, according to Everett ; if he 
 had wanted to carry on a flirtation, he possibly might not 
 have boggled over such a point as the Juliet s being mar 
 ried or single; the emphatic requirement was that she 
 should belong to his own class. He treated Mary precisely 
 as he treated everybody, with a charming, frank, sponta 
 neous, considerate courtesy; and in private got unlimited 
 
284 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 fun out of her awkwardnesses, her literal spirit, her affair 
 with " Gus," her boarding-house aunt, her big angular nose, 
 the fashionless fashion in which she combed her extraor 
 dinarily meek-looking fair hair, and wore her prosaic gar 
 ments. Sandra judged him correctly, for once; he had 
 no idea of pursuing Mary. Alack and alas, it was the 
 other way about, as she presently observed with dismay. 
 
 For poor Mary had discovered in Everett that prince of 
 romance, that noble, ardent, mushy, conqueringly hand 
 some being, spotless but with a spice of the devil in him ! 
 whom every girl enshrines imaginatively every girl 
 and hosts of maturer females, wives and spinsters alike, if 
 the truth were known. He seldom comes true, luckily, for 
 a male population composed of these paragons would be, in 
 the profane view, nothing short of a public calamity; but 
 this very rarity enhanced Everett, in Mary s eyes. She 
 had never seen anybody like him; the magazine young 
 men, as smooth and long-legged and straight-featured as 
 they were, couldn t hold a candle to him; the moving-pic 
 ture heroes, to adopt the vernacular as did Mary her 
 self weren t " in it " alongside of Everett Boardman. 
 All the qualities which she so admired in Sandra, he pos 
 sessed in double measure; and besides the distinction, the 
 manners that were at once so fine and so natural, Everett 
 was indisputably good-looking. Whereas even her warm 
 est admirers would allow that Miss Boardman s charm was 
 not based upon physical perfection, they would contend 
 that that fact went to prove her ability. She could make 
 you believe momentarily that she was beautiful or hideous, 
 or what she chose; she could be Titania, she could be the 
 Witch of Endor and all the while she was nothing but a 
 wiry little white-faced girl with brilliant eyes. 
 
 That Everett was similarly endowed, Mary was positive, 
 though nothing he had done so far warranted her. To 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 285 
 
 any one who made that point she would have retorted that 
 Mr. Boardman had not been given the chance, and that he 
 would be just as much of a hit as his sister if a certain 
 person were to take the same kind of interest in him. She 
 had no patience with de Voyna for not displaying more 
 enthusiasm over the new pupil, and did not scruple to ac 
 cuse him of jealousy; and even reproached Sandra her 
 self for not influencing the certain person in her brother s 
 behalf. To attack the Rosenbergs was a little beyond her 
 courage, but according to Levisoii s own cynically grinning 
 declaration, she would have pestered the life out of him if 
 he had not craftily dodged whenever he saw her coming. 
 She quarrelled with the unfortunate Gus, broke off the en 
 gagement and sent him about his business. Never was 
 there so complete and disastrous a change wrought in a 
 mild, prudent, sensible young woman ; it was a sorry spec 
 tacle, the more so because the foolishness was all on one 
 side, the wrong side, the girl s side. 
 
 For Everett was not foolish not he ! Instead he was 
 at least in the beginning amused and annoyed and 
 afraid of being made ridiculous, and rather chivalrously 
 distressed. He did not want Mary to trail him around, 
 he did not want her to sit in his presence unnaturally silent 
 or unnaturally gay, staring at him with great eyes, start 
 ing when he spoke to her, and getting red all over her 
 face, particularly at the tip of that melancholy nose. He 
 did not want her fussing maternally over him, boring other 
 people about him. He did not want her any way at aj], 
 but he could not help being polite to her, and he could not 
 help her misconstruing his politeness. " Confound these 
 people ! " the young man thought impatiently ; " they take 
 everything in dead earnest. If you look once at a girl, 
 she thinks you re interested ; and if you look twice Good 
 Lord, you might as well prono.-p ! They re ready to get 
 
286 THE BOABDHAN FAMILY 
 
 married at the drop of a hat. Of course they haven t got 
 any people or homes or positions to consider ; they haven t 
 had any social experience, and nine out of ten don t know 
 what their own grandfather s names were. I suppose that 
 accounts for them." 
 
 Mr. Levison, meanwhile, was as good as his word. He 
 got Everett taken on as an " extra " man with the Climax 
 Film Company, one of the directors, Mr. Ferd Solomons, 
 being a personal friend. They were about to produce a 
 screen version of Rip "Van Winkle, and, as it chanced, had 
 selected a site among the mountains, not far from Sandra s 
 own boundaries. Everett could journey to and from his 
 daily labours by motor, Levison benevolently pointed out. 
 " They only pay the extras three dollars a day, but it s an 
 opening," said he. " Say, * listen ! " He addressed 
 Sandra ; " they were keen to get you, when they heard 
 about his being your brother. I said I didn t see how they 
 could work you into that Eip Van Winkle stuff. There 
 wouldn t be any part for you, not if they played it like Joe 
 Jefferson used to. Ferd was all ready for me, though. 
 He was going to fix it up for you to come on as the Queen 
 of the Fairies, or one of these now gnomes, you know, 
 and do a dance by moonlight with a ravine and waterfall 
 in the back. Some scene, hey ? You ve got to hand it to 
 Ferd for the ideas! Still I turned it down," said Mr. 
 Levison not without some regret. " It wouldn t be good 
 business just now, in my judgment. Lots of people have a 
 notion that when a star goes in the movies, it s because she 
 he isn t drawing any more on the regular stage. All 
 piffle, of course, but you ve got to study the public 
 you ve got to keep right in touch with em every minute. 
 Anyhow, what s the hurry? You can do it any time. 
 Your brother here is in a different position. It s an 
 opening for him, as I was saying." 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 287 
 
 Everett thanked him with much the same manner. 
 Sandra thought, that he would have bestowed a tip. No 
 body else could possibly have found fault with it; it was 
 perfect of its kind; but Sandra was unquestionably by 
 way of being somewhat touchy these days. She was con 
 scious of it, and set it down to nerves, over-work, tem 
 perament, anything, in short, except the real cause which 
 she would not acknowledge to herself; that is, a creeping 
 dissatisfaction or disappointment or disillusion about 
 Everett. 
 
 The young man undertook this not very elevated em 
 ployment with a kind of light-hearted and aloof interest, 
 preserving that attitude of Prince Hal perversely frolick 
 ing with his inferiors which only Sandra recognized and 
 resented. " Another Jew ! Apparently there re nobody 
 but Jews in the business ! " he reported after meeting Solo 
 mons. " Have to be careful " He aimed a burlesque 
 blow at his own nose and dodged it. " Ouch ! That was 
 a close one! This Solomons fellow looks it all over, 
 though ; he s much more of a type than our friend the late 
 Mr. Levi s son. Solomons is the real, orthodox, pawn- 
 broking, kosher-meat kind that we have so many of at 
 home. You ought to see him dashing around in his shirt 
 sleeves, bawling at us supes to get action/ But he s 
 greatest when he s showing Gretchen and Rip and the rest 
 how to ( register anger and suspense and scorn and grief, 
 and all that. Think of a Jew Eip, if you can, without 
 laughing! It s all I can do to keep my face straight. 
 But if you ll believe me, nobody else seems to see anything 
 funny in it; they re as sober as judges, every man-jack, 
 and try to do just what he says ! " Everett himself, far 
 ing to the Climax encampment day by day in the big 
 automobile, at ease and cool and dressed with an in 
 comparable careless good taste, was an unique apparition 
 
288 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 for an extra, and one which greatly intrigued the other 
 extras, until they heard who he was. He brought back 
 more amusing stories of their naive curiosity. Along with 
 them he appeared in the roles of villager and soldier; 
 anon as one of Hudson s phantom crew, and in the May 
 pole dance which Solomons, the fertile in devices, intro 
 duced for an appropriate wind-up to the performance. 
 Everett attracted some notice professionally also; he car 
 ried off even the ungainly costume of the Dutch colonists 
 to advantage, and posed, walked, swung his staff or saluted 
 a lady with so much more grace and dignity than can 
 commonly be got for three dollars a day that the director 
 was a little impressed and once or twice spoke vaguely 
 of advancing him. His fellow-extras kindly warned him 
 that there was nothing in these fair words; but indeed 
 Everett was not likely to be carried away by them; he 
 regarded Mr. Solomons with the same negligent forbear 
 ance which he felt for everybody else connected with the 
 theatrical profession. 
 
 It exasperated Sandra; all the more, perhaps, because 
 she wanted to be proud of her brother, wanted her lifelong 
 admiration and affection to be justified. She was far 
 more jealous for him than for herself, and if he had en 
 tered the ranks with her and eclipsed her, would have been 
 happy over it. If, failing that, he had merely adapted 
 himself to this world, tried to understand it, met it on its 
 own simple, plain and forthright terms, she would have 
 been satisfied. But it was as if the ideas of caste in which 
 they had both been brought up had encased Everett, heart 
 and brain, in some shell of crystalline hardness and bril 
 liancy, impenetrable. Sandra told herself that she could 
 not get at him. When she attempted, lamely enough, to 
 argue, he either put her aside with a laugh or listened 
 with a blank courtesy, as if her speech were Sanskrit; 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 289 
 
 when she stormed, he would warn her with genuine re 
 luctance, against descending to melodrama. Sandra had 
 no answer for that; it threw her into a panic, calling up 
 an image of herself, excited, shrill-voiced, vulgar, making 
 a scene; so that Everett who never lost his temper or forgot 
 himself for an instant, though he must have been sorely 
 tried, invariably retired with the honours. She was 
 right; it was impossible to get at him, by the means that 
 Sandra could command at any rate ; and every day seemed 
 to add another course to the intangible wall building be 
 tween them. 
 
 Levison, arriving unexpectedly from town, and walking 
 in upon her immediately after one of these tilts it hap 
 pened, as often before, that he himself had been the bone 
 of contention ! was mightily perturbed. " What s the 
 matter? What have you been crying about? You 
 haven t got any bad news from home? Is your mother 
 sick or or anything ? " he insisted on knowing. He 
 has been quoted as of the opinion that artistic stars should 
 not have any sort of domestic ties, and now inwardly 
 reaffirmed it with a strong anathema directed at the Board- 
 man connection to the farthest degree of relationship. 
 
 " Xo, nothing s the matter. Everybody is all right " 
 Sandra managed to tell him ; then, to her helpless conster 
 nation, broke down suddenly and utterly. " Oh, I can t 
 bear the way Everett the t-things he s-says " she 
 sobbed, with her hands over her face. All at once she 
 experienced a strange comfort in thus giving way; Levison 
 would understand; lie would see nothing melodramatic, 
 nothing unworthy about it ! 
 
 " Everett, hey ? " he said, gnawing the shoe-brush mous 
 tache thoughtfully. " Well, don t cry so hard; you ll hurt 
 yourself. Everett? Well, now, almost all brothers and 
 sisters have a a little run-in once in a while. It s 
 
290 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 funny; you get madder at each other than you would at 
 an outsider, and say worse things. Never mind him. 
 He s all right - 
 
 " You don t know he you don t know ! " cried out 
 Sandra. The very kindness of the other s manner, of his 
 effort to rehabilitate Everett, humiliated her. 
 
 Levison studied her with the eye of an expert diagnos 
 tician. Privately he inquired of himself, could he beat it ? 
 And further confided to the same person that " brother " 
 was a bird ! " Brother has a little this-style-two-for-a- 
 nickel job keeping books or something back home; 
 i brother don t amount to a row of pins. But he s in 
 society, and stage-dancers aren t isn t it just too shock 
 ing about sister ? He s so ashamed of her he can t hardly 
 hold up his head till he gets wise to her making about 
 forty-eleven times as much money as he s ever seen and 
 then why shouldn t he come east and get in the game him 
 self ? He can live off of her in the meanwhile. Fine! 
 Splendid ! At-a-boy ! " thought Sandra s director with a 
 species of admiring contempt. But aloud he only haz 
 arded : " Has he been asking you that is, does he 
 now want money ? " 
 
 " No, no ! Not now not this time. But I don t 
 mind that I want to I like to! If it was only 
 that / But he doesn t appreciate he doesn t under 
 stand I can t make him understand! Everything 
 you ve done for him, I mean. You re all the time doing 
 something and he he seems to think it s nothing 
 he I hate the way he talks " 
 
 Levison stood over her unaesthetically posed, with his 
 hands in his pockets, looking down at her bowed head; 
 she did not see a dark colour mount quickly all over his 
 coarse-complexioned face, and as quickly fade, leaving it 
 paler than usual. " Talks about me ? You re crying be- 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 291 
 
 cause ? " he began precipitately, but at once checked 
 himself as if before some obstacle the approaches to which 
 must first be reconnoitred. " He don t appreciate what 
 I ve done? Well, now maybe I didn t do it just for 
 him quite." 
 
 " I know," said Sandra simply. " It s because of his 
 being my brother. But just the same, he oughtn t to 
 he ought to " 
 
 He sat down beside her with a movement conveying a 
 certain resolution made and acted upon point-blank. 
 " Say, listen ! I know all about your brother. He s a 
 society fellow and an aristocrat, and I know he looks down 
 on everybody that isn t " 
 
 " Oh, no, please ! Everett doesn t he s not like that 
 he doesn t do that " Sandra stammered, horrified at 
 the bald statement; it belonged in the same category as 
 other truths too unseemly to be uttered. " Everett 
 wouldn t " 
 
 " No, of course he wouldn t tell anybody so," pursued 
 Levison undisturbed in fact, with a flickering grin. 
 " He wouldn t go around swelling himself all up and tell 
 ing people: I m Everett Boardman ! Who in the 
 blankety-blank are you ? That would be crude, you 
 know. Besides, he doesn t have to. He looks the part 
 all over ; he acts it, without saying a word. He can t any 
 more help it than he can help breathing. Well, now, if 
 you don t mind my saying so, that s all he s got. That s 
 all there is to him, and he s right to play it up. As far as 
 it goes, it s invaluable. There isn t one man in a thousand 
 that s got it." 
 
 Sandra was without words ; she sat gazing at him, bend 
 ing all her energies to grasp what he was saying. 
 
 " Fact ! " said Levison, nodding at her. " That air, or 
 manner, or front, or whatever you want to call it, ought 
 
292 THE BOAKDMAJST FAMILY 
 
 to be worth dollars to him. In addition, he s a very hand 
 some man, but looks don t stick. And if he doesn t watch 
 out, and lets himself get two or three inches thicker round 
 the waist, and a little round bald spot on top, it ll be harder 
 for him to play that aristocratic business. And that s all 
 lie s got!" repeated Levison forcibly. He was serious 
 now; his seriousness dominated, despite the grotesque 
 image he evoked; and Sandra saw Everett stout, middle- 
 aged, devoid of charm, the figure of cheap tragedy that he 
 would undoubtedly be. 
 
 "All lies got!" said Levison again. "If you 
 don t mind my saying so ? " And as Sandra, still 
 speechless, shook her head, he added : " You know what I 
 mean ? You ve got it yourself." 
 
 " I have it ? " ejaculated Sandra. Panic struck through 
 her. 
 
 " Oh, you ve got a lot more besides. You ve got every 
 thing ! " Levison said in swift understanding. He paused 
 a moment, then said, lowering his voice : " You re differ 
 ent. There isn t anybody like you. That s what took me 
 at the very first." 
 
 His manner said so much more than his words that 
 Sandra withdrew her eyes in another panic of very differ 
 ent origin. She felt herself growing scarlet, cast des 
 perately about for something to say, and found her mind 
 empty. The sofa creaked as Levison hitched himself 
 nearer her. 
 
 " You knew, didn t you ? Girls always do." 
 
 "I I suppose I did," faltered Sandra miserably. 
 She was wishing wildly that he was not a Jew; that his 
 skin was not so oily and shiny; that the sofa had not 
 creaked with his weight just now ; that his hands were not 
 so thick and excessively manicured and covered with black 
 hair on the backs ; that he did not use perfumed soap and 
 
THE BOAEDMAIST FAMILY 293 
 
 wear shoes that pinched ; that he would speak in a natural 
 voice, and not breathe in that gasping way. She wished 
 that she could stop thinking these silly and degrading 
 things. She was in an anguish of compassion, of unrea 
 sonable fury at herself. 
 
 " It was a case of first sight with me," said Levison. 
 He moved toward her again, dropping his arm along the 
 back of the sofa behind her. Their shoulders almost 
 touched. Suddenly he began to talk eagerly, without re 
 straint. " Say, listen ! The minute I saw you at that 
 Claude outfit, I said to myself : Here s the girl that gets 
 mine ! You don t know what you looked like in that 
 bunch of selling platers. Why, they weren t even good 
 enough for scenery for you ! I saw right off the kind you 
 were aristocrat through and through. Say, you know 
 I was afraid you d see I was crazy about you, and yet I 
 wanted you to. You used to bow to me on the street 
 before we d been regularly introduced, but I knew too 
 much to get fresh with you because of that; I knew you 
 were only doing it out of kindness. You d have done it 
 for a hired man a chauffeur or a butler or anybody like 
 that, if you happened to know em. I used to plan what 
 I d say to you when we met, and then when we did meet 
 I couldn t say a word of it ; I couldn t say anything sensi 
 ble. I used to wonder how many different kinds of a fool 
 you thought I was " 
 
 " No, no, Mr. Levison, I I didn t think I didn t 
 notice " 
 
 " Then when I got over that, when I got so I could talk 
 like my natural self, I was still kind of afraid afraid 
 you d know, and afraid you wouldn t know! And I 
 couldn t get up the nerve to tell you. One time I nearly 
 did ; that time when we were talking about my going away, 
 remember ? " 
 
294: THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 It seemed to Sandra abominable that she did not remem 
 ber at all, abominable to tell him so, abominable to encour 
 age him by a humane fib. But she was spared the choice 
 for Levison went on without waiting for her, pouring out 
 the fulness of his heart with an abandon in which the 
 girl could detect a note of confident expectation naive and 
 pathetic and terrifying. 
 
 " I saw you weren t ready for me. You knew, but you 
 sort of shied off from the notion. You wanted to take 
 your own time about it. Well, I thought to myself, that 
 was all right ! I guess that s a girl s privilege. So I held 
 myself down to strictly business relations, like I ve always 
 done. But, my God, it s been hard ! " he uttered, with 
 the gesture Everett so often burlesqued. Some ironic 
 demon brought her brother before Sandra s eyes, flourish 
 ing his hands, raising his shoulders, copying the other s 
 intonation with subtle exaggerations. She did not dare 
 to look at her unfortunate suitor. 
 
 Levison drew a long, tremulous sigh. " I ve told you 
 now anyhow. I couldn t hold in any longer." He 
 stooped towards her. " Say, little girl, it s all right ? 
 You do care a little, hey ? " 
 
 Sandra sat dumb; at the moment she would have sold 
 her soul to have cared for him, even to have been able to 
 pretend it. 
 
 " I don t mean you feel the way I do," said Levison. 
 " A woman can t, I guess. I why, I d lay down and 
 let you walk over me ; I d stick my hand in the fire, if it 
 would get you anything. Maybe you think that Marion 
 ettes job and that record-breaker salary I held up Rosen 
 berg for, maybe you think that s a whole lot ! Why, say, 
 listen, it s nothing to what I d do for you, if if if we 
 got married. You could have anything you wanted. You 
 could keep on dancing, if you re set on it. I ll let you do 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 295 
 
 anything you feel like. I don t care just so you re 
 happy." 
 
 He took her hand with a kind of timid violence. San 
 dra, within the circle of his trembling arm, was rigid. 
 " I love you/ said Levison, hoarsely. 
 
 There was a pause of sheer horror to the girl. Her 
 hand lay in his inert; she divined that the contact which 
 turned her to stone sent thrills of fierce rapture through 
 the man, and the knowledge somehow shamed her. 
 
 " Can t you say something to me, Sandra ? " 
 
 " I want to think," Sandra articulated with her cold lips. 
 
 " I m going away, you know. It s a sure thing this 
 time," said Levison with an ingenuous hopefulness. 
 " I ve got to. I was going to take my passage this coming 
 Saturday, and then I thought I thought maybe I d bet 
 ter wait and and see if I wouldn t want two passages. 
 I d get one of those deck-suites on a fast boat, you know. 
 The best s good enough for us, hey ? " 
 
 Sandra could not control her recoil. "I oh, 
 please ! " 
 
 He let her slip from his arms in a little alarm. " Why, 
 little girl, what s the matter ? My God, don t cry ; don t ! 
 What did I do? Was I rough? Say, listen, I didn t 
 mean to scare you. I I just had to tell you. Say, I 
 guess I am a fool all right, all right ! I hadn t any busi 
 ness talking about deck-suites, and and speeding things 
 up that way. You re the one to decide all that, of course. 
 Say, forget it! You ve got to have more time to think 
 about it, you said just now, anyhow. Well " he heaved 
 another sigh. " I suppose you haven t been thinking 
 about pretty much nothing else for months and months, 
 like I ve been. I ought to have remembered that. A 
 thoroughbred like you is just a bundle of nerves, anyhow. 
 Say, want me to go away ? " 
 
296 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " Yes, please only you ve been so good to me I m 
 so sorry " stammered the girl. " I don t know what s 
 the matter with me I I can t - 
 
 " Can t make up your mind ? " Levison queried. She 
 moved her head non-committally, incapable of the truth. 
 Levison got up lingeringly. " Well all right take 
 your time/ he said with forced patience. " I guess I ll 
 have to go over by myself. I can go and get back in four 
 weeks or six maybe. Then you ll be ready, hey ? " 
 
 He went, looking serious, but not particularly downcast ; 
 perhaps his prospects did not seem so dubious to him as 
 they would have to any impartial eavesdropper on the 
 scene. He went; and when Mary Schultze, guessing at 
 what had occurred, imparted her suspicions to Everett, 
 and when Everett by a roundabout joke or two hinted at 
 Levison s pretensions, Sandra made no attempt at denial. 
 
 " He asked me to marry him, Everett," she said wearily. 
 " I daresay you know it already. I m to give him an an 
 swer when he gets back from Europe. He s sailing the 
 first week in August." 
 
 Everett did not laugh, he did not sneer, he did not 
 bring forward in objection Levison s race or manners or 
 social standing, although any of these actions would have 
 been natural from him. Instead he whistled under his 
 breath, paused, then said with the semi-humorous gravity 
 which he often assumed : " Well, San, he s the czar 
 the main guy, as Miss Lloyd would say. One wouldn t 
 want to offend him one wouldn t want to offend any 
 body, of course ; but Levison could make it very unpleasant 
 with all the authority he has. I suppose you re you re 
 going to temporize ? Girls know all kinds of ways." 
 
 Sandra did not answer ; she felt hopelessly that she had 
 known beforehand just what Everett would say. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 LEVISON sailed on a steamer christened in compli 
 ment to an august foreign personage whom it is pos 
 sible history will remember only because of this use of 
 her name if indeed history takes any note of the lady 
 at all. The crowded records of our times will scarcely 
 give much space to princesses, unless in some such con 
 nection. Sandra did not see her manager again before 
 his departure, a fact for which the girl was remorsefully 
 thankful ; but the morning he left, she received a square, 
 neat, taut envelope of roughened paper with the sign of a 
 well-known photographer in one corner, which being 
 opened revealed a sepia-coloured likeness that had " Yours 
 faithfully, Max," sprawled slantwise across the bottom of 
 it, with a great flourish trailing off from the final letter. 
 There he stood, cane, silk hat, moustache, watch-chain, 
 eye-compelling waistcoat and all, in a " grand-opera atti 
 tude, as Everett characterized it with laughter, for which 
 nobody endowed with a grain of humour could have blamed 
 him. Sandra heroically set the picture up on her desk. 
 
 If she did not miss her lover, with all the sentimental 
 implications of that phrase, she certainly felt a deeper 
 sense of isolation which might have gratified him ; it 
 frightened Sandra by making evident the extent of her 
 dependence on him. She had often and freely said that 
 she owed Levison everything, but now for the first time 
 realized with what mortified and rebellious vanity, with 
 what dire forebodings, that it was literally true. She did 
 
 owe him everything, and, more bitter realization still, she 
 
 297 
 
298 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 must continue to owe him. For, no matter how secure 
 her position might appear, Sandra knew in her heart that 
 were Levison s support and interest and advice to be with 
 drawn, she could riot sustain herself an instant. Yes, she 
 might laugh at, she might disdain his huckstering meth 
 ods, his dollar-mark ethics, his pushing, clamorous, in 
 sistent pursuit of the public, but without all that, where 
 would she be? She clung to her belief in herself w r ith a 
 kind of despairing arrogance, repeating that she knew she 
 could dance ; but she could not do these other things which, 
 ironically, seemed to be just as necessary to the success 
 of an artist. It humiliated her strangely to discover that 
 Levison, for his part, did not believe in her ; his innocent 
 boasting proved it ; he would have done the same, namely : 
 made a popular star out of her, forced her down the pub 
 lic throat one way or another, had she been incapable of 
 dancing a step. To be sure, her talent, such as it was, 
 must have facilitated the enterprise, but to Levison that 
 was merely incidental. He did not care whether she could 
 dance or not; he had been governed all along by the old, 
 the immemorially old desire of the man in love to get his 
 beloved what she wanted, and be rewarded for it. 
 
 Well, then, Sandra sometimes thought desperately, why 
 not reward him, and be done with it? He was a good 
 man, she told herself warmly; there were fine qualities 
 in his character besides the force which she had always 
 recognized and respected; he loved her genuinely, and he 
 had a right to expect some return for all he had done. 
 If only he had not expected this particular kind of return ! 
 If only there had not been something hideously comic 
 about the idea of being Mrs. Max Levison ! She could see 
 her mother s face; and imagination pitilessly rehearsed 
 for her the poor lady s efforts to be gracious to such a son- 
 in-law, to account for him and for Sandra herself, to save 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 299 
 
 the Boardman face, in short, before the Boardman world. 
 As for that world, Sandra assured herself vehemently that 
 she was done with it for good and all; at its best, repre 
 sented by her mother, it was occupied with trivial mat 
 ters and spent its strength in trivial pursuits; and at its 
 worst, represented by Mrs. George Thatcher, it was a 
 place of struggles and ambitions which in success or fail 
 ure were equally ignoble. Nevertheless, she flinched in 
 forecasting the comment which experience taught her 
 would follow the news. So Sandra Boardman had fallen 
 in line with the rest of them! Everybody on the stage 
 gets married half-a-dozen times, you know; it s a habit! 
 Sandra was just getting a start; the divorce would follow 
 in due order; give her time. This first venture was her 
 manager. Oh, yes, that was quite en regie, like having 
 your jewels stolen ; you married your manager, or else tore 
 his eyes out anything to get into the newspapers ! He 
 was a Jew. No, really ? What an anti-climax ! So that 
 was all her wonderful, gorgeous career had come to. Dear 
 me, she could have stayed at home and done that much 
 married a Jew! 
 
 It never entered her head to write home and invite 
 counsel; the proceeding would have been as preposterous 
 as to have referred Levison to her father. To shoulder 
 her own responsibilities, to be completely alone in any 
 crisis, were the privileges of independence. She would 
 not have relinquished them ; yet in her melancholy moods 
 Sandra looked back wistfully upon the old order, com 
 pared it with the present, and wondered if the game were 
 worth the candle after all. 
 
 As it happened, even if she had dreamed of returning 
 to the role of the home-dwelling girl, it would have been 
 impracticable; for that summer Mr. and Mrs. Eichard 
 had set out on a tour of the West which Sandra herself 
 
300 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 persuaded them to take. " It s a wedding-present from 
 me for your thirtieth anniversary," she had written. The 
 Grand Canon, San Francisco, Seattle, the National Park 
 and Royal Gorge letters and brilliantly illuminated 
 postcards visited her from all these places; there were 
 photographs of the two, smiling broadly, shrugged up in 
 mufflers and winter coats on Pike s Peak while the East 
 ern summer-resorts sweltered through July days. They 
 wrote gaily of misadventures and funny happenings, of the 
 " weird " people they met, Cook s tourists, bands of the 
 Fraternal Order of Owls, Buffaloes or what-not, on an 
 outing. Over and over again they assured her that they 
 were "having a beautiful time just like a bride and 
 groom, for all our two old grey heads ! " Mrs. Boardman 
 wrote. They seemed more like a pair of children, Sandra 
 thought tenderly. Poor Moms, poor Dad, they had not 
 been anywhere for a long while; she could not remember 
 their having gone off on a jaunt together like this since she 
 and Everett had grown up. The reason was not far to 
 seek. She meant to make it up to them all those years 
 of self-denial, all the money and care they had lavished 
 on their boy and girl. She had made a beginning already ; 
 next year she would Sandra stopped short in the mid 
 dle of her Alnaschar planning, envisaging the likelihood 
 that what she would do next year depended on what she 
 did this, on what she did at the end of four weeks, or six 
 weeks. 
 
 That was the time set by Levison. Hundreds and thou 
 sands of Americans were looking ahead as confidently, 
 millions of other races all over the world were going about 
 their tiny, all-important affairs, taking reasonable thought 
 for the morrow, with the huge drag-net of Circumstance 
 about the feet of every one. Wherever men are, they have 
 always lived in the midst of great events and daily mira- 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 301 
 
 cles ; but it is only lately that we Lave become aware of it. 
 Ominous news was circling the globe when Levison set 
 out, arsenals were busy, troops in motion ; a famous phrase 
 concerning scraps of paper was already uttered; a young 
 king had ringingly declared that his country was a coun 
 try, not a road. And presently more news of as grave 
 import clicked down the wireless mast of the princess s 
 namesake, and caused that well-advised vessel to turn about 
 in full career and make all speed on the backward route. 
 Levison liked to tell of being waked at dawn by the sun 
 light blazing through the port where it had no business 
 to enter, and wondering whether he had gotten drunk or 
 been drugged, or suddenly gone insane overnight, so that 
 the ship authorities had been obliged to confine him in 
 another cabin on the opposite side. He hurried into some 
 clothes and on deck, and found many other passengers 
 similarly aroused, shivering in groups, besieging the of 
 ficers as they passed. They told him what they had al 
 ready heard. The Germans were advancing on the Bel 
 gian frontier; England had declared war; the whole con 
 tinent of Europe was mad mad ! 
 
 The magnitude of the facts confounded their minds, like 
 the incomprehensible magnitudes of the universe. War 
 amongst half a dozen of the ultra-civilized nations at this 
 date in this twentieth century ! It was an anachro 
 nism, an abhorrent absurdity. But one thing, at all events, 
 was very certain : it could not last. Not with the terrific 
 engines of destruction modern science has devised. Some 
 few bets were laid that three or four months at most would 
 see the end of it. They joked a little, with characteristic 
 American levity. Thanksgivings that the United States 
 were out of the struggle were unanimous. The ship with 
 her population of safe, ignorant, careless, prosperous souls 
 figured the entire country this side the Atlantic. 
 
302 THE BOAKDMAN" FAMILY 
 
 " There s one thing sure : if it lasts any time, it ll put a 
 crimp in the Victorgraph business," one passenger re 
 marked without a very deep-seated pessimism, however. 
 " Kound about Christmas is our heaviest trade." 
 
 " I don t see all of you talking-machine people going to 
 the poor-house, though, because of your exports falling off 
 for a little while. We re sure to be neutral, and there are 
 others. It s none of our fuss. Let em fight it out till 
 the cows come home; it s nothing to us," another man 
 pointed out. 
 
 Somebody else thoughtfully observed that all the same 
 he d like mighty well to know what happened on the stock- 
 market the day England went in. Levison frankly ex 
 pressed a complete indifference to the stock-market, even 
 to the war itself, except as the fluctuations of both affected 
 the pockets of his audiences. He was deeply annoyed at 
 the delay and the disarrangement of his plans. " I ve got 
 dates with a dozen people on the other side, and they aren t 
 the kind that will stick around and wait for me either. 
 Now I ve got to go back home and start all over again 
 on another boat, and this infernal fool of a wireless man 
 won t take a single message for me, no difference what I 
 offer/ he lamented disgustedly. Many of the rest sym 
 pathized with him; they had engagements equally press 
 ing, and they too had found the wireless man impregnable. 
 
 " You should worry, though," one of them said. " If 
 they keep on fighting in Europe, you ought to have a ban 
 ner season in the show business. With Paris and Monte 
 Carlo shut up there won t be any place for us to go when 
 we want a good time, so we ll all have to spend our money 
 at home. That s where the theatrical managers and 
 movie-men and hotel-keepers go to bat, hey? Am I 
 right?" 
 
 " Yeah, but maybe you won t have any money to spend," 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 303 
 
 retorted Levison. " If the bottom goes out of everything 
 like that Saint Louis broker what s-his-name said it 
 might." However, the others point of view was cheer 
 ing. Max was able to return to the poker game whereat 
 he was a seasoned and astute practitioner with almost 
 his usual relish. Even if the rest of the country went 
 broke, there was always money in New York, he said to 
 himself; there was the hope of something else in New 
 York, the thought of which set his pulses thumping. She 
 was to give him his answer at the end of this trip, and 
 wasn t this the end of it \ Once or twice he felt uneasily 
 that it might not be considered quite sporting to hold her 
 down to the letter of her promise in these circumstances; 
 it was like taking advantage of a technicality. Well, that 
 was what any smart lawyer would do. And anyhow, she 
 was about ready to say yes ; she only wanted to be coaxed. 
 His impatience and excitement got a little out of control ; 
 he played recklessly, but won, and took it as a good sign, 
 and got rather boisterous and ordered champagne. At 
 Bar Harbor, where the ship put in, he was violently 
 tempted to land and take the express to New York; but 
 with what in later and calmer moments he regarded as his 
 last saving vestige of common-sense, remained on board. 
 It was a feat of self-restraint of which he sometimes 
 boasted. " I didn t have to be nailed down to the deck 
 either. I kept reminding myself that I d paid three hun 
 dred dollars for my passage, and by G , I meant to get 
 
 the worth of it ! And say, listen, I heard afterwards that 
 lots of em that got off, and went down to New York by 
 train, and expected the company would refund some of 
 their money, got fooled ! " 
 
 He reached home and the newspapers to find that the 
 situation was even more complicated than he and his trav 
 elling companions, marooned as they had been on board 
 
304 THE BOARDMAlsr FAMILY 
 
 ship without benefit of the wireless, had surmised. The 
 Atlantic was rumoured to be alive with German raiders, 
 ready to pounce down on any of their enemies vessels; 
 that is, on nearly every one in the passenger traffic. 
 Europe was out of the question, for the time, at any rate ; 
 Americans over there were scrambling to get away; there 
 was no money to be had; the United States was going to 
 send a cruiser loaded to the gunwales with specie to help 
 out some of the unfortunates. " Charlie ll be camping 
 on the docks waiting for her, with his pockets turned in 
 side out," Levison said to himself with a cynical grin. 
 The younger Rosenberg had gone over earlier in the sum 
 mer. Levison went up to the office, and received a morose 
 welcome from the other Rosenberg. Nothing doing in 
 cablegrams, it appeared ; you had to stand in line, and at 
 the rate they were going it would be three days before you 
 got your message even taken down and filed and then they 
 couldn t tell you when they would be able to transmit it. 
 The other Rosenberg swore fervidly. His concern was 
 not fraternal ; Charlie was equal to taking care of himself. 
 Mr. Rosenberg was thinking of unsigned contracts, and 
 opportunities lost " gone blah," as he tersely put it, add 
 ing a few remarks to the general effect that you couldn t 
 hold the public without novelties; he bitterly enumerated 
 some that he had expected to ensnare. Levison cheerfully 
 reminded him of " Sandra " ; but Rosenberg senior only 
 turned a cold eye upon him with the statement that he 
 (Levison) made him (Rosenberg) tired, and relapsed into 
 moody silence. Sandra s manager went away with a 
 thoughtful countenance. 
 
 He telegraphed her. "... Was coming up today "but 
 unexpected business. Got a new scheme for you. Don t 
 worry. See you tomorrow. Yours, Max 9 he wrote, 
 smiling fatuously ; and, in fact, telling himself that a man 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 305 
 
 in love was a good deal of a fool, but he couldn t help it, 
 and the little girl would think it funny if he didn t burn 
 up the road getting to her right off. Of course she knew 
 of his sudden return ; she must have seen the papers. She 
 had indeed with a trapped sensation. But honest Max 
 had no slightest suspicion of his lady s actual state of 
 mind; he regarded himself as an engaged man already, 
 and on his arrival at the Catskill cottage only refrained 
 from certain proprietary acts because of the presence of 
 her brother and Miss Schultze, one of whom Sandra con 
 trived to keep constantly by her. The lover took this as a 
 fresh evidence of the aristocratic delicacy which had 
 charmed him from the first, and obliged himself to be con 
 tent with looking at her in a way which Everett thought 
 it the part of a gentleman not to notice. 
 
 " Well, here I am back again ! " was Mr. Levison s 
 highly original greeting; he allowed himself to give San 
 dra s hand a significant pressure, while he nodded at the 
 others. " The little old U. S. looks pretty good to me, too. 
 What d ye suppose has got into all of em over there ? " 
 He gave them some account of his three or four days 
 cruise. " Say, you know it was such a queer experience 
 that I don t mind having had it, even if it was a fierce 
 waste of time, and knocks everything gaily-west. It seems 
 the old boat was carrying over a lot of money real 
 money, I mean, dollars, you know and that s the reason 
 she put back in such a hurry. They were afraid the Ger 
 mans would nip it. We didn t know that they didn t 
 tell the passengers, of course, or we d all have been worse 
 frightened than we were. They wouldn t have done any 
 thing to us, if they had caught us ; we haven t got anything 
 to do with their war. All the same, it was kind of scare-y. 
 Your friend Thatcher was on board." 
 
 " Was he ? " said Sandra ; her colour flamed and died. 
 
306 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 V 
 
 Mary glanced at her, and went on crocheting with calm 
 fingers. There was a letter from Sam which had come 
 in that morning s mail lying on Sandra s desk at the very 
 moment. Miss Schultze s expressionless face did not be 
 tray her instantly conceived design of shoving that letter 
 under the lid out of sight as soon as she could slip away. 
 " If he saw it, he might make a fuss, and what s the use ? " 
 she thought. 
 
 " Yes. He was worrying ahout business like everybody 
 else. I don t believe in that myself. If a thing falls 
 through, why, don t stand around and hold a wake over it. 
 Start something else ! " said Levison briskly. " Take our 
 own case. In uncertain times the show business is the 
 first to feel the bad effects, and gets hit the hardest. Eight 
 now you d think Broadway was " he made an expressive 
 gesture " Ring the bell softly ; there s crape on the 
 door ! " he declaimed with burlesque solemnity. " You 
 can t hardly find your way into our office ; there s a dense 
 black cloud of gloom in there that used to be Abe Rosen 
 berg ! I m glad I m home, and say, listen, maybe I didn t 
 do some hustling yesterday ! You know I wired you I 
 had a scheme " and having thus, in a measure, prepared 
 their minds, Sandra s manager proceeded to divulge the 
 result of his observations and activities to his stunned and 
 silent audience. If the war lasted any time, if it went 
 through the winter, say and it might, there was no 
 telling he wouldn t be surprised a little bit if " Hey- 
 Diddle-Diddle " went on the rocks, and the Marionettes 
 closed up. Anyhow the Rosenbergs wouldn t put any more 
 money into it than they could help. In hard times there 
 wasn t anything in a high-priced show; the cheap ones, 
 the two-a-day and the movies coined money; people want 
 to be amused but not at two dollars and a half a throw. 
 Believe him, there would be a lot of Mrs. Fiskes and John 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 307 
 
 Drews leaving their watches to be regulated this winter! 
 (Here Mr. Levison screwed up one eye with an effect of 
 diabolical significance.) The marrow of all this was that 
 Sandra was to leave the cast of " Hey-Diddle-Diddle " ; 
 he had made a ten- weeks engagement for her to dance 
 nightly at " Aladdin s Palace." That was a sure thing 
 anyhow ; and by the time the ten weeks were up " some 
 thing will happen over in Europe something decisive s 
 got to happen before long; they can t keep it up at this 
 rate. And then we ll all know where we re at," he finished 
 confidently, and looked at Sandra with an indescribable 
 mingling of deference and complacent, vindicated self- 
 assert iveuess, feeling that he had demonstrated beyond 
 question the reality and the scope of his power. 
 
 He did not suspect how little Sandra was inclined to 
 doubt it ; she exaggerated, if anything, telling herself that 
 he had made and could unmake her, and submissively 
 accepting the figures he presently laid before her, as if she 
 had no will or desire of her own in the matter a mari 
 onette indeed ! 
 
 " It doesn t make any difference where I dance," she 
 said, with a perfunctory glance at the formal phrases in 
 which Alexandra Boardmau, designated hereinafter as the 
 party of the first part, did hereby agree with Lewis Schaff- 
 ner and Co., designated hereinafter as the party of the 
 second part, for and in consideration of the sum of etc., 
 etc. " Do I sign here ? " 
 
 " Oh, Aladdin s Palace is all right," said Max ear 
 nestly. " Schaffner s don t run anything but high-class 
 entertainments. Rosenbergs don t either," he added with 
 loyalty ; " but I didn t want you hiking all over the coun 
 try on the Circuit; it s killing work, and I couldn t trail 
 along after you I ve got to stay right here with the job. 
 It s funny, in boom times when everything is humming 
 
308 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 and you have to increase the office-force and there s a dozen 
 people waiting in the outside room to see you when you 
 get down in the morning, why, you take a day off whenever 
 you feel like it ; you loaf around and play pool after lunch, 
 and go to the races or the ball-game, and everybody s 
 happy. And when money s tight, and everybody s scared, 
 and the Street s dead, and you can sit at your desk from 
 morning to night without seeing a soul why, that s just 
 when you stick to business the hardest. You re afraid to 
 leave the office a second for fear something good ll get by ! 
 Say, listen wait a minute - you don t have to sign. 
 You you " he hesitated with an embarrassed yet con 
 fidential glance towards the others, and finally ended: 
 " you don t have to do anything you don t want." 
 
 " Oh, I ll sign," said Sandra, evading his hand, which 
 visibly lingered at her touch, and seizing hold of the pen 
 rather feverishly. 
 
 " She s not quite old enough to retire yet," Everett said 
 with his caressing raillery. 
 
 There was an infinitesimal pause while Sandra s pen 
 scratched, and Levison gave her brother an enigmatic, 
 fleeting survey. " She s old enough anyhow to know her 
 own mind. I don t want to put on any pressure," he said, 
 slightly emphasizing the pronoun, and spoke to Sandra 
 again. " You won t have anything to do with the other 
 attractions, of course, any more than you did in Bo-Peep. 
 I ll be right there." 
 
 Behind her back, Mary made some signal which Everett, 
 although they had had no previous understanding, was too 
 well versed in social strategy to let escape him ; a moment 
 after she had unostentatiously left the room, he unosten 
 tatiously lounged out after her. 
 
 " She wanted us to stick around, but he ought to have 
 some show," said the girl in a guarded voice, once they 
 
THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 309 
 
 were both outside ; she was moved mainly by certain selfish 
 considerations, but to do her justice in part also by that 
 sympathy with the masculine lover which is natural to 
 women. Everett nodded silently. And though neither 
 one said a word or would have owned to it, both were 
 asking inwardly the same question : what was Sandra going 
 to get out of him for Everett ? She would surely get some 
 thing out of him in return for for Very likely they 
 did not name even to themselves the probable terms of the 
 bargain. 
 
 The room was still for a second after the door closed. 
 " My God ! I thought they never would go ! " ejaculated 
 Levison, and laughed nervously and moved nearer to her. 
 " Say, it s it s all right, little girl ? " 
 
 " Why I yes. Only not right away, please ! " 
 
 " I thought you d say that ! That s just what I thought 
 you d say ! " said Levison, laughing again, this time in 
 genuine mirth; and in relief and triumph and sheer de 
 light. He boldly put an arm around her, and drew her 
 to him. Not right away! " he mimicked her fondly, 
 chuckling. " All right ! I m a pretty good guesser 
 what ? That s the reason I fixed up that engagement with 
 Lew Shaffner." 
 
 " I d like to to make some more money before 
 before - " the girl stammered, holding him off. " I feel 
 as if I ought to, you know." 
 
 " Sure ! You don t want to keep on stage work after 
 we re married. Say, listen, I wouldn t have said a word, 
 but I d have hated like sin to have my wife on the stage. 
 Like I couldn t support her! I d have hated it, but if 
 you d wanted to, you d never have heard a yip out of me. 
 But now when ? " 
 
 " And and Everett Mr. Levison ? " 
 
 " Oh, say Max ; can t you, girlie ? " He lifted her hand 
 
310 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 to his lips to the shoebrush moustache ! " Well, what 
 about Everett ? Can t let business alone, can you ? " he 
 asked with facetious patience. " Has he blown ? I mean 
 has the movie-man let him go? Huh? Is that it? I 
 suppose Solomons took his address and told him he d let 
 him know when he might want him again. Hey ? Well, 
 can t all of us be Charlie Chaplins, you know." 
 
 "But can t you ?" 
 
 " My God, yes ! I ll do anything you want, if you ll 
 just stop talking about everybody but us us you and 
 me for a while. Say ! " And here Mr. Levison, 
 still holding Sandra s pliant, slim body against his side 
 with one arm, unconscious of the kind of latent resistance 
 that animated it, fished in his waistcoat pocket with the 
 free hand. " Let me put it on. Well, I knew it would 
 be too big for you, but you can see what it s going to look 
 like, anyhow. We can measure your finger with a string, 
 and I ll take it back to town with me, and have the jeweller 
 cut a piece out, so it ll fit. Some stone, hey? I got it 
 from a man I know; cost him eight hundred dollars. 
 Well, he s a gambler, but he was telling me the truth. He 
 knew he couldn t fool me on diamonds. I only gave him 
 two-fifty two hundred and fifty, I mean, of course. He 
 needed the money. He got off a line of talk about hating 
 to part with it, and only doing it to oblige me, on account 
 of being such friends I ve heard all of it before. He 
 finally let it go for two-fifty meant to all along, I guess. 
 He had, to have the money," said Sandra s lover her 
 affianced lover ! not without considerable self-satisfac 
 tion. Tor an instant he held her hand, turning the great 
 glaring ring, which, in fact, was much too large, round 
 and round on her finger. He looked at her with scared, 
 eager eyes, his breath coming short. " Say, listen, let me 
 let me kiss you ? Just once ? " 
 
CHAPTEE XII 
 
 * T TE Y-DIDDLE-DIDDLE " opened in October with 
 [ the noise and glitter, the resounding press-notices, 
 and the actual or marvellously simulated warmth of wel 
 come which attended all Marionettes openings. Levison, 
 however, sentimentally preoccupied, was far too earnest a 
 business man to " overlook any bets " as he himself said ; 
 he spared no effort to make the new piece a success, spite 
 of the gloomy expectations he had voiced to Sandra. Con 
 trariwise also, the Eosenbergs produced it upon as spacious 
 and sumptuous a scale as their other ventures; and the 
 public, forgetting financial woes or seeking distraction 
 from them, continued to crowd the theatre nightly, just as 
 if there were no war and alas ! as if there never had 
 been any Sandra. 
 
 However, none of the journals omitted to note that that 
 popular favourite had gone over to Aladdin s Palace, and 
 " scored a triumph." She might not be missed at the 
 Marionettes, but she was vociferously asserted to be an 
 invaluable addition to Aladdin s staff of " attractions." 
 She had her own stage-setting, especially designed by 
 let us say Mr. Parrishfield Max, with orange-coloured 
 velvet curtains, marble columns, gigantic gilded baskets 
 of fruit, and a background of pine-boughs framing a mys 
 tic sunrise or sunset. There were half a dozen dances, 
 all new, with new costumes, new music, new effects in illu 
 mination, new everything except the artist. Levison saw 
 to all that, too: he outdid himself in advertising devices, 
 
 311 
 
312 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 perhaps feeling a little on his mettle, ambitious of vindi 
 cation in the eyes of the Rosenbergs, of Schaffner and 
 Company, of Sandra herself. It is only necessary to call 
 to mind the " Cat-and-the-Fiddle " dance, the (news 
 paper) rumpus following its first presentation, the (news 
 paper) claims that it had been lifted bodily from the orig 
 inal scheme of " Hey-Diddle-Diddle/ the (newspaper) 
 rumours of legal proceedings in consequence, with inter 
 views and photographs and stray anecdotes I say, it is 
 only necessary to recall this single episode to realize the 
 extent and variety and potency of Mr. Levison s methods. 
 Whatever its intrinsic merit, the " Cat-and-the-Fiddle " 
 had an amazing succes de curiosiie, filling scores of seats 
 night after night, and bringing the Schaffner management 
 uncounted dollars. " You gotta hand it to Max ! " his 
 brothers of the profession observed in cynical admiration. 
 This was the dance in which Everett appeared, taking 
 the grotesque role of the Fiddle ; as conceived, it called for 
 certain more or less acrobatic steps and gestures which 
 should have been attractively droll, a kind of humorous 
 complement to Sandra s performance of the Cat. A very 
 moderate supply of intelligence and a light pair of heels 
 would have sufficed, one would think; but Everett, though 
 of course he possessed much more than the above qualifica 
 tions, was not conspicuously successful in the part. It 
 bored him; he said that it was clowning, not dancing, 
 which, perhaps, was correct ; and he went through it with 
 a slow and monotonous elegance which would have blighted 
 the entire act, had it not been for Levison s ingenious 
 efforts, and for Sandra herself. She frisked about in a 
 furry costume with a bell and ribbon around her neck, 
 and a cap finished off with little ears which the women 
 in the audience who were always in a great majority, 
 being her most fervent admirers voted altogether cute 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 313 
 
 and darling. Everett was negligible, and probably pre 
 ferred to be so. 
 
 " He s a wonder ! " Levison said sardonically. " I 
 could step around here to the Marionettes or the Twentieth 
 Century Review and shut my eyes and pick a dozen fel 
 lows out of the chorus that could make that Fiddle part the 
 biggest hit this season. There ought to be a barrel of 
 money in it. He don t hurt the act to speak of ; she s the 
 whole thing anyhow, and most people think she won t 
 have anybody but a a cheese dancing opposite her, so 
 she can grab all the applause. They think it s good busi 
 ness. But I hate to see a good chance going to waste. 
 Oh, well, what s the use ? " And in the same philosophic 
 spirit he refrained from advising or directing the young 
 man, except in the matter of a change of name which he 
 declared to be imperatively necessary. 
 
 " * Everett, you know, it s a fine name all right, but it 
 won t go on the stage," he said firmly. " It s well 
 it s too fluffy somehow, if you don t mind my saying so. 
 They stick names like that onto all the simp-parts in the 
 movie-plays. It s got so that every time the crowd sees a 
 name like Everett or Percival or Montmorency, they think 
 there s a laugh coming. You ll have to call yourself some 
 thing else. Sorry." 
 
 " No occasion for apologies, Mr. Levison," said the 
 other. " My name won t suffer by being er kept out 
 of it. How about Johnson ? Is that ordinary enough not 
 to raise a laugh ? " 
 
 " Yes, that s the idea. Johnson Jackson any 
 thing on that order will do for you," Levison agreed with 
 an innocent readiness which it may be Everett misinter 
 preted, for he reddened, glancing suspiciously. There 
 was nothing at which one could take offence in the man 
 ager s cheerful and indifferent countenance, however; so 
 
314 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 young Mr. Everett Chase Boardman swallowed his an 
 noyance and became, not Johnson indeed, but Mr. Chase 
 Trever, without provoking any comment. 
 
 " Little Everett is too wise to start anything with me," 
 Levison said afterwards with a species of good-humoured 
 sneer. " Why, I m his meal-ticket ! " 
 
 In truth, that fact was perfectly apparent not only to 
 Everett but to the entire professional circle at the Palace. 
 They viewed him leniently, understanding the footing he 
 occupied and too used to the spectacle of graceful, useless 
 appendages to wonder at or condemn him. Not a few 
 took it for granted that he was Sandra s husband; but, 
 upon hearing that he was her brother, evinced only a lan 
 guid surprise. If Levison " stood for " him, if the Schaff- 
 ner management " stood for " him, it was no affair of 
 theirs. As for Sandra, she endeavoured with intermittent 
 success, not to think about Everett s position at all, and 
 about her own as little as possible. The girl achieved a 
 degree of callousness by working desperately hard, with 
 results on the whole satisfactory even to her exacting con 
 science. The work proved such a refuge she went at it 
 with an abandon which heretofore she had somewhat 
 lacked or deliberately held in check. It surprised Levison 
 and moreover moved him to an enthusiasm as much com 
 mercial as sentimental. 
 
 "We sure have to take that honeymoon trip to the 
 other side this spring, little girl, war or no war. I d like 
 to have em see you. What do you know about that ? " 
 he said, amused at his own inconsistencies. " Not to 
 Paris, of course. I wouldn t go on the continent with 
 you, even to the places where there isn t any fighting, 
 like Spain or Italy. There wouldn t be any danger, but 
 we d be likely to have trouble getting around. No, I may 
 have to run over myself, but I wouldn t take my wife any 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 315 
 
 such trip. You can stay in London and have a good time. 
 I ve been getting word from era, and they all say the 
 shows are running full blast, and to come along with what 
 ever I ve got. Mrs. Claude s over there creating a fu 
 rore, as the press-agent lad says. You could give her 
 cards and spades. I m beginning to feel as if I d like to 
 show em a real dancer." 
 
 And so on endlessly, Sandra sitting by in assenting 
 silence. She had never said in so many words that she 
 would marry him in the spring, but that had somehow 
 come to be the understanding. 
 
 " You aren t just rolling me along, now, honey ? " Levi- 
 son once demanded in sudden suspicion. " You wouldn t 
 treat a man like that ? " And Sandra reassured him, won 
 dering at herself. She had thought Everett s counsel to 
 temporize contemptible, but what else was she doing? 
 
 Meanwhile the war went on with a succession of grisly 
 surprises. The Emden was sunk; Louvain sacked; the 
 English coast-towns fired on; Antwerp fell; winter set in 
 with Poe-like tales from the trenches. Relief-work for the 
 war-stricken countries began. All kinds of committees 
 organized all kinds of entertainments to which all kinds 
 of people were besought to contribute their services in the 
 name of mercy. Sandra presently found herself, as in 
 old days, appearing with other professionals and many 
 ambitious amateurs in charity vaudevilles and charity 
 pageants in the studios or private houses of celebrities, at 
 theatres, here, there and everywhere. There were the 
 hordes of girls and young men, headlong, heedless, calling 
 one another by nicknames, exchanging shibboleth only 
 comprehended by themselves; there were the mothers 
 wearily and heroically gracious, well-preserved, beautifully 
 dressed; there were the unobtrusive fathers, not too san 
 guine of aspect, congregating together in the background 
 
316 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 to compare notes about taxes, the price of raw materials, 
 the orders they could not get, the other orders they could 
 not fill; there were the hired musical directors, the hired 
 stage-mechanics bored beyond belief, yet assiduous. All 
 was exactly as she had been accustomed to it five years 
 back ten years back her whole life. The very man 
 ner towards herself of mingled envy and curiosity and dis 
 trust and scrupulous politeness recalled her own start- 
 lingly. Just so had she thought and talked and acted. 
 She would overhear them sibilant in groups, with a wary 
 eye cocked in her direction. " She s not any taller than I 
 am. I stood right beside her " " Thin ! Do you sup 
 pose it s dancing does it ? " "I wonder if she ever gives 
 lessons " " I heard " " Oh, no, Nannie ; she s per 
 fectly decent. Father says so. Mother made him make 
 inquiries, and men always Tcnow " " Yes, but they 
 don t always tell you " " Married ? " " Did you see 
 those furs she had on yesterday ? " " Why, she speaks 
 English perfectly " Tom Harris says we ought to 
 have got Maizie de Forest, that one that s dancing at the 
 Roof. He says she s ever so much better than this one 
 and besides she s new. Everybody s seen this one over 
 and over again " 
 
 Sandra moved away, contriving to look as if she had 
 heard nothing with a skill which should have testified to a 
 long course of social training, had any of them been ob 
 servant enough to remark it. But nobody did; it never 
 occurred to a single one of these honest young folks that 
 she could be a gentlewoman; the fact would go to show 
 that gentility is not so unmistakable as Mrs. Richard 
 Boardman, for instance, would have contended. By 
 turns, Sandra resented her isolation or was glad of it, or 
 pitied herself, or merely laughed. There were times 
 when it seemed to her fantastically that they were the 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 317 
 
 show, these people ; they were the real performers, mounte 
 banks, and she the audience. 
 
 All this winter she did not see Sam, which was odd, as 
 New York being headquarters for the business he was con 
 stantly dodging in and out of town and heretofore had not 
 once failed to come or telephone. Neither did he write. 
 Sandra was frightened to find out how much she missed 
 him, how much she feared that he had heard the only piece 
 of news which could keep him away. The dismal cer 
 tainty that he had was gradually forcing itself upon her 
 some while before Mary casually mentioned one day hav 
 ing met Mr. Thatcher. " He wanted to be remembered to 
 you, and said he sent you both his best wishes," said Mary. 
 
 " Best wishes," Sandra repeated mechanically. Then 
 she collected herself with an effort. "How did he 
 know ? " she asked. 
 
 " Why, I told him, of course. But he d heard some 
 thing already, because he asked the minute he saw me. 
 Just think! He s been over there again. He went to 
 England and then he went to Russia. He says he s going 
 again this spring. I said : Oh, Mr. Thatcher, I should 
 think you d be afraid. Being on the ocean is bad enough 
 anyhow, and now they re saying they re going to go after 
 all the ships they think have arms and things for the 
 Allies on them and any ship might have. He said he 
 guessed that was all blow. " Well, " I says, " Just the 
 same they re warning people not to go over. I thought 
 that was pretty fair of the Germans. Of course they don t 
 really want to hurt people that aren t trying to hurt them. 
 But Mr. Thatcher just looked sort of square- jawed, that 
 way he does sometimes, and said he didn t think warning 
 innocent people that were minding their own business 
 justified murdering em if they didn t take the warning. 
 He said the Black Hand warned people. And then he 
 
318 THE BOAKDMAIST FAMILY 
 
 says: " Anyhow, " he says, " Seems to me I d be a 
 pretty poor citizen if I took orders from any government 
 but my own ! Isn t that just like him, though ? Well, 
 there re always two sides to every question," Mary summed 
 up. 
 
 " You didn t need to have told him," said Sandra. 
 
 " Told him what ? Oh, about you and Mr. Levison. 
 Why, it isn t any secret," said Mary, with wide-open eyes. 
 
 " No, but something might happen " 
 
 " Something might happen ? " Mary echoed ; after an 
 instant, she began to laugh in a knowing fashion, " Oh, I 
 see!" 
 
 " No, you don t you don t see at all," cried out San 
 dra vehemently. " Of course I am going to marry Mr. 
 Levison. I m not just I mean I haven t the least idea 
 of of anything else. I I it s not the way you 
 think at all " she kept on protesting, conscious that this 
 very insistence was a betrayal, fairly hating Mary for her 
 ready acquiescence, her ingenuous disclaimers, her amused, 
 admiring, unconvinced eyes. 
 
 The news of the British naval victory off the Falkland 
 Islands came as a distinct relief to numbers of worthy 
 persons interested in the shipping and allied industries 
 all over the United States. By that time the entire com 
 munity was divided into two camps, pro-Allies and pro- 
 German ; friendships were undergoing a severe strain, but 
 business relations continued comparatively undisturbed; 
 and most people agreed that to have the seas swept free of 
 raiders and of a fleet of warships with which a chance 
 encounter would certainly prove exceedingly inconvenient 
 to any merchantman, was on the whole, reassuring, no 
 matter with which party you sided. Ocean-travel was 
 safe now, one said to another ; not that a man would let his 
 wife and daughters go to Europe for the summer as here- 
 
THE BOARDMAJST FAMILY 319 
 
 tofore, of course; there would be no fun in going now 
 adays, anyhow ; but running across on a business trip was 
 no longer a serious risk, and business was showing signs 
 of vitality at last after six moribund months. If there 
 was a dark significance about the fact that the revival was 
 earliest and strongest among the munitions and army- 
 supplies trades, it went unnoticed by common consent. To 
 most minds the United States had neither part nor lot in 
 the struggle; our dearest wish was to keep out of it; but 
 since it was going to go on with or without us, what harm 
 in profiting by it? The war was horrible, the cases of 
 Belgium, of Servia, of Poland (though probably reports 
 were grossly exaggerated), were horrible, but we were do 
 ing what we could for the sufferers, and we ourselves were 
 incredibly safe and presently would be incredibly pros 
 perous. 
 
 Mr. Max Levison was one of the heartiest subscribers to 
 the above opinions ; for that matter he had never been dis 
 posed to trouble his head much over the rights and wrongs 
 of the quarrel, and would agree with the last man who 
 talked about it rather than take time to argue. " Nobody 
 really knows what the mix-up is about ; but they all want to 
 tell me," he would say with a grin. " I m the only real 
 neutral there is." 
 
 " Maybe that s because you haven t any real country, 
 Mr. Levison," Everett Boardman once suggested. Ev 
 erett, as was becoming and natural to one of his name and 
 lineage, championed the cause of the Allies at the begin 
 ning, and could plead it very convincingly, keeping himself 
 well-informed and marshalling his dates and facts, which 
 were always accurate, with no little skill. 
 
 " Hey ? What d ye mean, no real country ? " de 
 manded Levison, astonished. " I m just as good United 
 States as anybody oil ! " his face changed slightly, but 
 
320 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 it was without resentment that he added : " I get you. 
 Well, I guess that s so, only I never thought of it that way 
 before. My father came from somewhere over there, Bo 
 hemia or some place like that I never did know just 
 where ; he probably didn t like it any too well, or he d have 
 talked about it more. I was born over here ; though, and 
 you bet I m glad of it ! Sometimes they start something 
 about all the Jewish people going back to Palestine where 
 they came from originally funny idea ! " He wagged 
 his head. " Me for Broadway ! " 
 
 He had renewed Sandra s engagement at the Palace to 
 run till the first of March. Then, if they sailed in April, 
 she would have a month in which to " rest up a little 
 and get some things, and go out to see your folks, you 
 know," he said tentatively. The truth was, honest Max 
 took it for granted that it was the part, in fact the preroga 
 tive, of the bride to make all these decisions and arrange 
 ments; most of the grooms he had ever had to do with 
 needed only to buy a license and a ring. He would have 
 liked Sandra to show more excitement and more desire to 
 have her own way ; but set her attitude down to the teach 
 ings of the refined circles to which she belonged, where, he 
 understood, a supreme self-control was manifested by 
 everybody under all circumstances. " You I hope you 
 haven t got any plan about a big wedding in your home 
 town ? " he inquired with a trepidation that was only half 
 burlesque. " Bridesmaids and pearl stick-pins for me to 
 give the ushers and shower-bouquets and all that stuff 
 like in the society papers ? " 
 
 " Mercy, no ! " said Sandra aghast ; then giving way to 
 hysterical laughter. She checked herself in fear of his 
 divining why she was horrified and why amused. " I hate 
 all that fuss and always have," she explained hastily and 
 untruthfully. " I ve been bridesmaid two or three times 
 
THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 321 
 
 and it s always the same old thing and tiresome as can be." 
 
 " Well, a society-girl like you you know all about it. 
 I thought maybe that was what you wanted," said Levison, 
 taking obvious pride and pleasure in the statement. " Far 
 as I m concerned, any justice of the peace right here " 
 
 "Oh, I don t think I wouldn t feel it wouldn t 
 seem like being married at all," said Sandra, shrinking. 
 She had not been inside a church for two or three years, 
 and her beliefs were too vague to deserve the name; yet 
 the idea of marriage otherwise than by the Episcopal ritual 
 inexpressibly repelled her. 
 
 " All right, all right, just as you say ! " said Levison, 
 still more pleased. " You re the one to decide. Only 
 you aren t a Roman Catholic, are you? Episcopalian, 
 hey? I thought they were pretty much the same thing. 
 They ve got Episcopal churches all over and a minister 
 for every one, of course. Got any preference? I ll put 
 his name down." 
 
 He had out notebook and pencil on the instant, as usual, 
 but Sandra, realizing wretchedly that with another word 
 she would be cornered, played a desperate card. 
 
 " Oh, but I thought that is, I was planning some 
 thing else. I thought it would be so nice to have it over 
 there in London in one of those English churches. 
 It would be so different, you know " 
 
 Levison s features expressed not so much disappoint 
 ment as stark surprise ; he opened his mouth to hint at cer 
 tain obstacles which even his not highly conventional train 
 ing caused him to recognize, but Sandra forestalled him. 
 
 " Everett wants to go, and I meant to take Mary any 
 how. I wouldn t want to stay anywhere all by myself 
 while you were off on business," she said with feverish 
 glibness. " Don t you think it would be would be in 
 teresting ? " 
 
322 THE EOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 Notwithstanding sundry other emotions confused and 
 inharmonious but none of them in the least approaching 
 amusement, Levison laughed at that last word. " Inter 
 esting ! You can t beat that ! It sounds like a line out 
 of one of those old comic-operas Gilbert and Sullivan used 
 to get up. Say, listen, what s your idea of a honeymoon, 
 anyhow ? I was thinking it would be kind of i interest 
 ing to go over us two all to ourselves. Of course, little 
 Miss Schultze is about like a chair or a steamer-rug. She 
 wouldn t be in the way, but your brother " 
 
 " She won t go a step unless he does." 
 
 " Well, let em both stay at home, then ! " said Levison 
 roundly. " Let s us be married right here. Come on ! 
 I can t imagine what put that London bug into your head. 
 Come on ! We d have lots of fun going over," he pleaded. 
 
 " No, we wouldn t ! Everybody would know we were 
 a bride and groom, and it would be awful anyhow. You 
 don t know. I m a perfectly wretched sailor. If it 
 should happen to be the least bit rough that s one reason 
 I wanted to have Mary " Sandra was urging, when she 
 saw the discontent and impatience of her lover s face dis 
 solve in laughter that was whole-hearted enough this time. 
 
 " Oh, I see ! Well, it s not very becoming. I m never 
 sick a minute myself eat like a shark," he asserted with 
 the pride all such hardy voyagers invariably take in the 
 statement. " I bob right up when there s nobody in the 
 dining-room but me, and even the stewards look green 
 around the gills. Say, it is funny ; you can t help laugh 
 ing to save your life." 
 
 " I d hate it ! " said Sandra with vehemence. 
 
 " Sure ! But we ll take the biggest and fastest boat we 
 can get. You get over in five days, and you don t feel 
 the motion at all hardly. I mean one of the palm-room, 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 323 
 
 Ritz service, seven-deck, dress-suit-every-evening kind. 
 You d like that " 
 
 Sandra stood firm, however, exhibiting for the first time 
 the sweet petulance and unreasonableness and obstinacy 
 which, in his heart, poor Levison yearned for. " You just 
 boss me around like a slave. I see my finish after we re 
 married," he sighed delightedly. " All right ! Have it 
 your own way ! Don t want to take over any more of the 
 family and a friend or two, do you ? Well, I didn t know 
 thought you might. With seventeen trunks and the dog 
 and Everett and little Mary and me, a few more wouldn t 
 make much difference. The procession will be five hours 
 passing a given point anyhow. There s one thing; it 
 won t be anything new to the steamship company. 
 They re used to all the Metropolitan stars and the other 
 big foreign artists travelling around with just such a 
 string. Most of the tenors and the prima-donna ladies 
 manage to slip something about it to the papers, too. 
 That s not such a bad idea, either," he ended meditatively. 
 
 And accordingly Sandra was not surprised to read a 
 few days later that " the famous little dancer, at the con 
 clusion of her season at Aladdin s Palace (the new Schaff- 
 ner enterprise) would sail for England with her own com 
 pany. She was under contract to dance at the Metro 
 politan Arcade," etc. Nothing was said about what else 
 was to happen. " You don t want the public ever to get 
 wind of anything of that kind. You want to keep em 
 guessing they like to guess and to get up stories," Levi 
 son said. " But on the whole they d rather a stage favour 
 ite wasn t married particularly a dancer. Queer thing, 
 but it s so. You re not intending to stay on the stage, but 
 a person never can tell." 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 SANDRA went home in March, following out Levi- 
 son s program Levison, of whom she could not 
 bring herself to say a word during the entire w r eek of 
 her stay! Everett must have kept silence, too, though 
 there had been no open agreement between the brother 
 and sister; the family knew nothing about the engage 
 ment. Sandra s mother met her at the train and took her 
 out to the house in the smart little electric brougham the 
 girl herself had given them. They were tremendously 
 excited over the visit, fonder and prouder of her than 
 ever, but with a strange note in the fondness and pride, 
 a kind of deference that was infinitely pathetic. The 
 older people were a little afraid of her, anxious about 
 her likes and dislikes, expectant of some " temperamental " 
 outbursts. They asked naive questions like children, and 
 observed small, heart-breaking formalities which they 
 never would have dreamed of, had she been merely their 
 daughter, instead of " Sandra " who was known all over 
 the country, who made fabulous sums a year, whose dances, 
 " Will-o -th -Wisp," " Tarantelle," " Pierrette " were 
 imitated and parodied right and left, who for a climax ! 
 had set a fashion of hair-dressing, and had an out of 
 the way shade of tawny yellow named after her. These 
 things amount to fame, for most of us, and fame, somehow 
 or other, is not expected to be sociable or domestic. 
 
 " Yes, I was going to give a little tea for her," Mrs. 
 Richard explained ; " but people in her position they 
 get so much of that sort of thing, you know they re 
 
 324 
 
THE BQAKDMAN FAMILY 325 
 
 being lion-hunted continually. I decided not to, after 
 Sandra told me she just wanted a little quiet time here 
 at home with ourselves and some of her oldest friends, to 
 say good-bye before she sails. Oh, of course she will be 
 delighted to see you, but don t bring anybody else, and 
 don t say anything to her about her dancing or her career. 
 Everybody always begins at once on that, and I sup 
 pose they I mean artists like Sandra get really 
 bored to death with it." 
 
 However, there was a good deal of entertaining; small 
 dinners, and Mr. Donelson Meigs gave one of his delight 
 ful studio parties. No dances, of course. " None of the 
 men would have the nerve to ask you even for a one-step ! 
 And anyhow I should think the best kind of vacation you 
 could have would be not to hear a single bar of dance- 
 music the whole time you re here," one uncommonly out 
 spoken friend ventured to tell her. Sandra s set of 
 debutantes was all broken up, married, scattered. A 
 dozen sets had come along since then, to whom she was 
 simply a celebrity, not Alexandra Boardman. She moved 
 amongst them, here in this place which had been her home, 
 still isolated within her charmed circle of footlights, 
 grease-paint, publicity, like as she thought, recalling some 
 old fairy-tale, the princess enchanted in the crystal box; or, 
 she had another and weirder fancy, as if she were dead, 
 and in an impossible detachment, witnessing her own 
 immortality. Sometimes she had to answer inquiries 
 about Everett, but not often. Sandra knew why; she 
 knew that all these people were commiserating her father 
 and mother behind their backs for having such a son as 
 Everett such a disappointment ! Society, including 
 her own family, had grown reconciled to her being on the 
 stage, and no longer felt it beneath a Boardman. There 
 is no occupation hardly even a dishonest occupation 
 
326 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 that may not be dignified by success. But Everett was 
 no more successful at dancing than at anything else; no 
 body imitated him; nobody ever read his name on a bill 
 board. He was doing exactly what she did ; but obscurely, 
 therefore unbecomingly. It was kindest, most tactful, not 
 to mention him! If they only knew it, the root of the 
 matter was that there had never been any Max Levison 
 for Everett, Sandra thought sardonically. And yet there 
 were moments when she told herself that she would have 
 come to her own in time, without Levison; it would have 
 taken longer, there would have been less tinsel and 
 trumpeting about it, but she knew she could dance. At 
 least she would not finally have got into this miserable en 
 tanglement, from which yet she lacked the strength or 
 spirit to break away. 
 
 She went back to New York, to days of shopping and 
 packing and scurrying to and fro. Levison haunted the 
 apartment, rushing in at all hours, excited and foolish as 
 a boy, bringing her presents, fur-lined slippers, the latest, 
 most complete and costly camera devised, a dressing-case 
 of royal-purple crushed leather, scented, brocade-lined, 
 fitted with a squad of gold-topped bottles " solid gold " 
 he told her impressively new-fangled folding umbrellas 
 and hat-boxes, innumerable fripperies. He was so eager, 
 so buoyant, so happy himself and so sure that she was 
 happy, that the spectacle of him shamed Sandra to the 
 very soul. She showed the things to Everett experi 
 mentally. Her brother, who also was quite busy provid 
 ing himself with little niceties in the purchase of which 
 he exercised the finest taste and discrimination, surveyed 
 Levison s offerings with a faint displeasure. 
 
 " He ought to know better than to crowd all those ex 
 pensive things on you, San. It s not good style. And 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 327 
 
 you can t accept them anyhow at least, I don t sup 
 pose you will. It s funny that after all this while he 
 doesn t realize what sort of a girl you are. Why don t 
 you drop him a gentle hint? Or tell him outright that 
 that kind of thing isn t done among nice people." 
 
 " But if we re engaged ? " said Sandra. 
 
 Everett gave her a humorous oblique glance. " To be 
 sure," said he drily. " Something might happen, though. 
 It would save lots of trouble, according to what I ve heard 
 about such cases, to send em back now, instead of later." 
 
 " Nothing that I can think of is going to happen to 
 keep us from being married," said Sandra with delibera 
 tion. 
 
 Everett looked startled for a second, then he smiled. 
 " Aw f g wan!" he said, quoting a Hey-Diddle-Diddle 
 comedian who had made one of the hits of the season 
 merely by the frequent enunciation of this simple phrase. 
 
 It was a raw spring day when they sailed. Levison 
 came around to the apartment in the morning and took 
 Sandra off, leaving the others to follow in a taxi with 
 the dog and most of the hand-baggage, like the crew of 
 retainers they resembled. It was an arrangement which 
 Everett may not have greatly fancied, but his manners 
 were much too good to permit of his openly avoiding it, 
 or making the semi-facetious, semi-malicious comments 
 which undoubtedly occurred to him. He handed Mary 
 and the poodle into the cab and took his place beside them 
 with the air of doing the thing of his choice which he 
 knew so well how to assume. There was no acting on 
 Mary s side ; she was always timorously happy to be with 
 him, and not even Pixy himself who also loved and 
 admired Everett with the whole strength of his canine 
 heart demanded less in return, or showed a more un- 
 
328 THE B OAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 selfish devotion. Mary took care not to be so demonstra 
 tive as Pixy, however; she had found out that the hero 
 did not like it. 
 
 At the pier there was almost as much of a crowd, both 
 of travellers and of stay-at-homes, as there would have 
 been in past days before anybody was dreaming of war. 
 Passengers went down and found their quarters, and de 
 posited their luggage and tipped the porters, and read the 
 little notices stuck up alongside the mirrors directing the 
 occupant of that stateroom to lifeboat number so-and-so, 
 and thought of the Titanic, it may be with a slight thrill. 
 But there were never going to be any more awful ocean 
 tragedies like that, they reflected ; steamship captains were 
 too careful nowadays, since that lesson. In the smoking- 
 room that evening Everett told Levison with a laugh that 
 a man had come up to him on the dock, as they were 
 all crowding into line to go on board, and warned him 
 mysteriously " like the second assistant villain in a melo 
 drama " not to sail. 
 
 " Somebody did that to me, too," another passenger said, 
 overhearing him. 
 
 " Is that so ? None of em took the pains to tip me 
 off," said Levison, in mock indignation. " There s been 
 a serious oversight. I ll have to notify the management. 
 They ve been warning the government too, I understand. 
 Say, that s a great bluff ! " And the word putting him in 
 mind of a favourite recreation, he proposed it to an 
 acquaintance or two whom he had already run into on 
 board. He was a familiar figure on the decks of Atlantic 
 liners, as in the theatrical and sporting societies of half a 
 dozen foreign cities, and was likely to happen upon some 
 body he knew in almost any quarter of the globe. " First 
 thing I do usually, crossing, is to start a game, poker, 
 auction, whatever I can get up. There s nothing like it 
 
THE BOAKDMAtf FAMILY 329 
 
 for passing the time. Only I guess I won t have so much 
 trouble that way this trip," he said to Sandra with senti 
 mental significance. 
 
 So, although Mr. Levison by no means neglected his 
 card-table, he spent the better part of the days with Sandra 
 whenever she was visible, fetching and carrying, bribing 
 the stewards magnificently in her presence to do this or 
 that which he fancied she wanted or needed done, cuddling 
 her into her wraps and taking her to walk outside, active, 
 officious and lover-like to a terrifying degree. Sandra 
 submitted lifelessly, thankful that, at least, her privacy 
 was not invaded by fellow-passengers, though occasion 
 ally they stared and whispered together when she ap 
 peared. In twenty-four hours it was known on board who 
 was the slim, foreign-looking woman with the big black 
 eyes who had one of the extravagant suites with a dog 
 and a valet and a maid thus Everett and Mary figured ! 
 and was to be seen in the rare sunshiny hours, buried 
 in furs, promenading with the unquestionably Israelitish 
 manager, agent, impresario, whatever you chose to call 
 him, who was taking her over ; there was always somebody 
 like that in charge of those people. Presumably, if they 
 were not thus policed, they might get temperamental and 
 bite a purser s ear off, or smash up the cabin furniture! 
 Sandra was used to stares and murmurings, which had 
 long ceased to annoy her; for that matter she had never 
 been at all self-conscious. She was reported to have a 
 most gracious and charming manner by the few who, 
 adventuring greatly, spoke to her a young girl who 
 asked shyly for an autograph, a lady with a little boy who 
 stopped to pat the poodle, a Pittsburgh steel millionaire 
 going over to close a contract with the British government ; 
 Sandra had danced at a Belgian Relief entertainment 
 given at his house early in the winter. He told her there 
 
330 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 was " quite a er a galaxy, as you might say, of talent 
 on board. Yourself, to begin with, and then there s So- 
 and So, and Such-a-One," he named them, winding up 
 with: "Plenty of jobs in London for all of you gifted 
 people. Seems they re crazy for entertainment more than 
 ever before, and no wonder! They see enough of the 
 serious side of things in all conscience. Must have some 
 relaxation." 
 
 And Levison coming up at this point, the steel man who 
 knew who he was, uttered a brief greeting, and got up and 
 walked off; he would just as lief be seen talking to 
 " Sandra," but probably had no great relish for her man 
 ager s company except over a poker-hand and maybe a 
 Scotch-and-soda. " Told you it would be just as com 
 fortable as the Biltmore, now didn t I ? " said Levison 
 jubilantly, taking the seat the other vacated. " Say, this 
 is the boat for me! Easiest crossing I ever made. We 
 struck some pretty heavy seas last night, and did you 
 notice how little she rolled ? None of that swooping down 
 wards, and raising the screws out of water, so that they 
 fairly shake the teeth out of your head. How s things, 
 anyhow ? Stewards treating you all right ? " 
 
 " Everybody is as nice as can be," Sandra told him 
 quickly. 
 
 " Yeah, I expect they are. I ve got em all fixed," said 
 Levison in a shrewd and competent style. 
 
 " I think they d be nice anyhow. They re all so 
 English, aren t they? That little man with the crooked 
 nose have you seen him ? He s the one that comes with 
 my bouillon every morning such a nice, funny little 
 man. And such an English accent ! Kound the Kipe 
 the Kipe of Good Ope, mem, that s where you get the 
 followin seas/ he told me. And the other day when I 
 asked him what it was like outside, he said it was a bit 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 331 
 
 izy. I had to think awhile before it dawned on me that 
 he meant hazy, of course." 
 
 " Izy ? Oh, yes, hazy ha-ha ! " said Levison laugh 
 ing a little absently, as he gazed at her momentarily ani 
 mated face. " Lots of fun your first trip over always. 
 Everything s so new. After a while, it gets to be an old 
 story but we re always going to have a good time, 
 aren t we, hey ? " he said, and added tenderly under his 
 breath, " Sweetheart ! " 
 
 Mary Schultze and Everett, meanwhile, enjoyed them 
 selves with considerably more freedom, having, as Everett 
 pointed out with much good humour, the advantages of 
 their unimportance. " We aren t anybody ! " the young 
 fellow said. " Nobody s afraid to speak to us. We can 
 fraternize with the cook s galley whatever that is, they 
 always had em on board ships, even pirate-ships, in those 
 bloodthirsty sea-yarns I used to read when I was a boy. 
 We can be just as low-down and sociable as we choose. 
 And where are the diabolical card-sharks we ve heard so 
 much about as infesting the big liners? No one s tried 
 to gamble my money out of me, so far. Maybe they know 
 I haven t got any ! " He had turned out a dependable 
 sailor, suffering no qualms even when the sea was most 
 trying, was in the highest spirits and made the best trav 
 elling-companion imaginable. 
 
 It was one day when the fog had been so heavy that the 
 electric lights were burning all over the ship as indeed 
 was not unusual that Sandra came out of the cabin with 
 all her wraps to take one of those turns in the open air 
 which Levison insisted were so beneficial ; in reality he 
 was not so solicitous about her health, which had never 
 undergone a day s set-back all the time he had known her, 
 as desirous of tucking her arm under his, and walking up 
 and down in that blissful contact, " having her all to him- 
 
332 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 self " as he put it. Sandra went through the lounge, meet 
 ing Mary likewise clad for the outside, but hurrying in 
 the opposite direction. 
 
 " It isn t so bad out just raw. I m going to get poor 
 little Fix. He does love to go out so, and I couldn t take 
 him yesterday. I ll put his blanket on," she called out 
 hastily in explanation, as they passed, and went on down 
 the corridor. Sandra never saw her again. 
 
 Levison in his fur-lined and befrogged overcoat was 
 waiting for her at the double-doors. A penetrating buffet 
 of cold air struck them, emerging. " We must be in the 
 Gulf Stream," Levison said jocularly. Everett, standing 
 near, muffled to the eyes, with the glowing end of a cigar 
 protruding from some point within his defences, laughed 
 and repeated the famous old version of a famous old line : 
 " Sprig, jeddle Sprig, ethereal bildness, cub ! " mimick 
 ing with his native skill, a bad cold in the head. And 
 just then, as they were all standing, they felt a shock. 
 
 It made Sandra stumble forward and back, and she had 
 to clutch Levison s arm, who himself grasped at a hand 
 hold ; some of the others lost their footing and went slid 
 ing and floundering with the deck-chairs ; and they heard 
 some sort of heavy noise; and the motion of the ship 
 ceased with a kind of lingering heave. 
 
 Sandra said : " Oh, we ve struck something ! " 
 
 A very tall man near by said : " No, it struck us. 
 They ve done it after all ! " 
 
 " Not the Germans ? Do you think it was a torpedo ? " 
 said Levison. 
 
 The tall man said yes. Then he said, " Yes, sure it 
 was a torpedo ! " And then he added, looking vaguely 
 around, " What do you suppose made em think that was 
 a smart thing to do ? " 
 
 There began to be a movement, trampling and noises, 
 
THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 333 
 
 and suddenly they were in a crowd. Sandra felt Levison 
 pushing her along. The deck was at a difficult slant be 
 neath her feet; it was like walking sideways across the 
 face of a hill. She saw men very thick and busy about a 
 certain place, but there were too many people between for 
 her to make out clearly what was being done. She asked 
 Levison : " Are we badly hurt ? Is there any danger ? 
 Let s ask somebody." 
 
 One of the ship s officers who seemed to be stationed at 
 the point they were just passing heard and answered her. 
 " Oh, no, ma am, no trouble at all. Only it s orders pas 
 sengers must get into the boats." He raised his voice and 
 repeated the speech to others coming behind. " ISTo 
 trouble ! No danger ! Just move up, please ! " He was 
 a young fellow, with a high English colour which did not 
 fade, nor did his hearty and reassuring voice falter. 
 " That s it, step along, please ! No, we ll be delayed a 
 little, that s all!" 
 
 A man beside Sandra jostled her involuntarily, and said, 
 " Oh, pardon me ! " The movement of the crowd had 
 halted abruptly, throwing him against her. In a second 
 they began to press forward again; there was very little 
 confusion, however, not so much as in an ordinary crowd 
 of excursionists; numbers of men were standing disen 
 gaged from the current of people, against the rail, or the 
 bulkheads, not doing anything, merely looking on, as it 
 seemed; some of them smoked. There were faces at the 
 windows of the saloons and staterooms. Sandra saw her 
 brother who, she thought was immediately back of her, 
 among those detached men on the outskirts; she saw him 
 bearing back, flattening himself, to let some one get by 
 him. She cried out : " Everett, where s Mary ? Have 
 you seen Mary ? " 
 
 He waved his hand at her and smiled, and called back : 
 
334 THE BOARDM AN FAMILY 
 
 "It s all right! 1*11 get her!" Just at the instant, a 
 woman came up to him with a life-belt in her hands, and 
 said urgently : " Oh, sir, could you please tell me how to 
 put this on ? " 
 
 Everett took it from her with his habitual slight cour 
 teous gesture, and began to adjust it on her methodically, 
 with intent eyes, frowning a little over some fastening. 
 The crowd, intervening, shut him from Sandra s vision. 
 She tugged at Levison s arm, and said : " Everett s there 
 right over there! He s going for Mary. Don t you 
 want to wait for them ? Let s wait ! " 
 
 " Come on ! " said Levison hoarsely, pulling her. The 
 deck shifted again under their feet ; it settled a little. 
 
 They reached the busy spot, which, as she now saw, was 
 at the foot of an improvised gangway where some of the 
 ship s officers were gathered, passing people to a lifeboat. 
 The officer farther away could still be heard reiterating 
 his : " No danger ! Just move on, please ! " 
 
 Levison all at once began to speak to Sandra in a hurried 
 undertone : " Where s your money ? Where s all your 
 jewellery and stuff ? Where d you keep it ? Is it on you ? " 
 
 " In the cabin," said Sandra, startled. " Why ? Shall 
 I go and get it ? " 
 
 " No, no ! " He grasped her arm violently. " What 
 are you thinking about? The lights are all out anyhow. 
 Here ! " He made some abortive gesture towards his 
 own garments, but as suddenly abandoned whatever pur 
 pose he had with a grunt of impatience. " Pshaw ! It s 
 all in my belt underneath everything. I couldn t get at 
 it in a thousand years Here ! " He crowded something 
 into her hand, fairly closing her surprised and slow fingera 
 over it. " Get hold of it, put it away ! Haven t you got 
 a pocket ? Women never have any pockets ! " 
 
 Sandra held it mechanically. Levison said something 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 335 
 
 else as confused and incomprehensible as his other words, 
 but this last she did not even catch. She found herself 
 on the gang-plank with the man who had jostled her. An 
 officer was saying to him civilly : " Step back, please, sir. 
 Men s turn comes after the ladies." 
 
 " I know, I know ! " said the man ; " don t you see I 
 just want to pass my little boy to my wife ? That s her ! " 
 He had a child in his arms, to be sure, as Sandra now 
 saw, a stout little two-year-old in a red worsted knitted 
 cap, staring with round eyes over his father s shoulder. 
 They handed him over like a bundle. 
 
 She was in the lifeboat, almost the last one. Somebody 
 shouted orders; the boat seemed to totter giddily in the 
 air for an instant, but there was no sensation of being 
 lowered ; instead, it was as if the water rushed up to the 
 keel with a staggering impact. The sea which had looked 
 smooth enough from the ship, was a huddle of marching 
 waves amongst whose great shoulders the boat rolled and 
 recovered balance and rolled again with a hideous inde 
 cision. All the while the men there were not more 
 than half a dozen all told shouted at one another from 
 bow to stern, and bent to the sweeps frantically. Some one 
 shrieked out : " Oh, it s falling over on us ! Look, it s 
 falling over on us ! " In fact, looking upward from the 
 water s level, the enormous hull, by some illusion of the 
 eye, seemed to beetle above them threateningly; but this 
 only endured momentarily, departing as the distance 
 widened. So towering was the ship s bulk that already 
 faces and figures were indistinguishable overhead, and the 
 farther end of her was lost in stealing fog. On a sudden, 
 with the realization of this size and of the life that pop 
 ulated it, there descended upon the lifeboat a terrible and 
 pitiless illumination. One of the women struggled to her 
 feet, with arms outstretched and screamed " John ! John ! " 
 
336 THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 
 
 in a wild voice. They pulled her down. Sandra, with, 
 incredible effort, articulated a question to the man at 
 the oar nearest her : " Will there be room for everybody ? 
 There will be room for everybody ? " 
 
 " Oh, plenty of room, yes, ma am. Plenty of room," 
 he answered her automatically, straining with the rest to 
 keep their toy-like craft head on to the seas ; with all their 
 endeavour, water slapped over the gunwales from time 
 to time. Sandra sat with the other women in an unthink 
 ing blankness of mind, staring at the ship as they receded. 
 No one spoke, yet the boat was full of dreadful sounds like 
 those of animals in agony. Presently Sandra, upon some 
 boding impulse, bent over hiding her face on her knees, 
 and covering up her eyes and ears in the thick folds of 
 her clothing. While she crouched, a longer wave lifted 
 the boat; and there was a kind of wail. After what 
 seemed to her a long, long while, she lifted her head 
 but without looking anywhere, and spoke to the man again, 
 with the same slow and painful labour. 
 
 " It s gone ? The ship s gone ? " 
 
 " Yes, ma am," he said. He kept on rowing. 
 
 There was another long, long while. Then she 
 screamed, clawing at his arm and pointing : " Stop, stop ! 
 Can t you see ? Stop ! Make the others stop ! " 
 
 It swept down the waves towards them, within an oar s 
 length, but they did not stop. " Oh, my Gawd, ma am, it s 
 gone! It s dead and drownded. The pore little thing s 
 dead and drownded, and the bother one as it s ead bashed 
 in struck a davitt, likely, goin over, or somethink. 
 Tain t no use stoppin ," said the man. 
 
 Sandra had not seen that there was another one. She 
 crouched together, hiding her face again. It was bitterly 
 cold. After an interval of hours, or perhaps minutes, she 
 could not have told, Sandra felt rather than heard the 
 
THE BOAKDMAF FAMILY 337 
 
 man speaking to her urgently. Rousing herself enough 
 to look upon him, she saw it was some one she knew ; and 
 then, with the emotionless acquiescence of a dream, recog 
 nized the little steward with the crooked nose. He spoke 
 again, contorting his features out of hahit into something 
 which would have been his ordinary civil smile. 
 
 " Beg parding, ma am, d ye think you could bail a little ? 
 She s takin in fast. If you could manage to bail a 
 little ?" 
 
 She became aware that he was trying to put something 
 into her hand, a can, a dipper or what-not, and mutely 
 opening her fingers to receive it, found that there was 
 already something in them. She looked down. It was 
 Levison s watch and chain which he had thrust into her 
 hands at that last moment. 
 
 " Won t you try to bail, ma am ? Thank you," said the 
 steward. 
 
 Sandra bailed; the icy cold water washing to and fro 
 in the bottom of the boat was above her ankles. She 
 scooped at it with her thimble measure for hours and 
 hours or again, only minutes, she never knew. Some 
 times she wondered how it was that her feet could be at 
 once numb and exquisitely painful ; sometimes she watched 
 the slow, stiff and regular movements of her own hands 
 with a distant curiosity; they seemed to work independ 
 ently of her. She did not think at all not even of 
 Mary, not even of Levison at the bottom of the sea, or of 
 Everett whose body was washed up on shore, hard by the 
 Old Head of Kinsale three days later. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 SAM THATCHER, sitting in the lounge of the little 
 old-fashioned hotel on Trafalgar Square where he 
 always stayed during his London visits, read the news 
 paper accounts of the disaster with the astounded and at 
 first unbelieving horror felt by untold thousands of his 
 countrymen. The mind rebelled against it, as earlier it 
 had rebelled against the tales from Belgium and northern 
 France. In the twentieth century, among civilized 
 people, such things were impossible; nobody would con 
 ceive them, nobody could be found to carry them out. 
 All the stories were sensational rubbish ; neswpapers must 
 talk, must publish something, must live in short. But 
 now ! " Why, it was all true ! Every one of the sick 
 ening, diabolical details was true ! " Sam thought. " It 
 was deliberately planned and executed in cold blood 
 like this. I can believe anything of them now." 
 
 He read the lists of victims over and over, vaguely 
 hoping to find some mistake of his own or the reporters 
 He knew others of the passengers besides Sandra. She 
 appeared two or three times, as Miss A. Boardman on the 
 ship s register in one column, in another as Mademoiselle 
 Sandra, elsewhere in brief paragraphs referring to her 
 professional celebrity. She was among the handful of 
 survivors at the hospital, all of them in a critical condi 
 tion; some picked up in her boat and others, or clinging 
 to rafts and wreckage had since died. Bodies were being 
 recovered daily. There were notices of Levison "A fa 
 miliar* figure in the Rialto, a park in New York much 
 
 338 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 339 
 
 frequented by the theatrical fraternity/ the English paper 
 said; the description might have made Sam smile at an 
 other time. Everett Boardman had registered under his 
 stage name, which it happened Sam had never heard or 
 had forgotten, so that he did not know that his schoolboy 
 friend was among the lost until later, when more detailed 
 accounts came out. He identified Mary Schultze, how 
 ever, with the M. Schultze who was listed as Miss Board- 
 man s maid. Strangely enough, Mary s death made a 
 deeper impression on Sam than any other single fact, 
 though of all that company wherein figured more than 
 one name of renown, she was the least and most obscure. 
 Sam had grown to know her well ; he recalled the last time 
 he had seen her, the time she told him of Sandra s engage 
 ment. It was a mid-winter afternoon, and Mary was 
 struggling around the corner of the Flat-Iron Building 
 against a high wind that bounced her skirts unbecomingly 
 her skirts that were always so hopelessly un-stylish, as 
 even Sam was aware ; her hat was over one ear and straight 
 strands of hair switched across her face, and her long nose 
 was reddened at the tip; she raised to him pale-blue eyes 
 that watered a little with the wind " Oh, Mr. Thatcher ! " 
 Poor Mary, poor dowdy, harmless creature, now elevated 
 to the rank of martyrs by the disproportionate tragedy of 
 her end. This death that gained nothing for the mur 
 derers, that led to nothing, that served no imaginable pur 
 pose, epitomized for Sam Thatcher the imbecile barbarity 
 of the whole slaughter. That a great government, a great 
 power, should bend its monstrous energies to the destruc 
 tion of Mary Schultze! He saw the thing defeated 
 justice, and left men with no recourse but revenge; and 
 felt the awful obligation laid upon himself. 
 
 He went out, and found when the next ship sailed for 
 home, went to the Victorgraph offices, dictated some letters, 
 
340 THE BOABDMAN FAMILY 
 
 managed to get two or three cable messages sent, bought 
 more papers and read them and walked about- the streets 
 restlessly. Everybody seemed to be doing the same thing ; 
 Sam had not supposed it was in English people to be so 
 ready to talk, so open. He had some queer experiences, 
 not all grave. Once he got caught in a jam of people at 
 a corner where there were bulletins posted up, and as he 
 was trying to worm his way through, a fine Victorian- 
 looking equipage of a carriage with a team of bays, and 
 with footmen in livery came down the cross-street, with a 
 stout, high-featured old lady sitting erect within and a 
 young boy in the short jacket and pot-hat of a famous 
 school which Sam always beheld with an affectionate 
 amusement wholly American. The old lady, chancing to 
 look in his direction, commanded her coachman to halt, 
 and to Sam s astonishment, beckoned him imperiously. 
 He stepped to the side of the carriage, wondering within 
 him, and took off his hat. 
 
 " You want to enlist, my man ? " asked, or rather an 
 nounced the old lady, fixing him with an eye which must 
 have made the underlings of her household tremble; and 
 before he could answer, went on : " You can stand on the 
 step and I will take you around the other way to the re 
 cruiting-office. That will be quicker for you than try 
 ing to get through from this side." 
 
 " Thank you, but I m not going to enlist here " Sam 
 was beginning, when she cut him short severely. 
 
 "What, you aren t? For shame! A great, strapping 
 fellow like you ! Are you going to let them butcher women 
 and babies ? " 
 
 " I said I wasn t going to enlist here" said Sam. 
 
 Something in his face or intonation arrested her. 
 " Ho ! " said the old lady, putting up a lorgnette. " Ho ! 
 You re an American. I don t like Americans can t 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 341 
 
 bear em. You don t care about anything but money. Go 
 on, Forbes ! " 
 
 And she went on, without another look at Sam, who re 
 turned to his slow advance with the first smile that had 
 visited his face for three days. But the adventure was 
 not yet over, for directly the boy who had been in the 
 carriage came elbowing up after him, breathlessly jerking 
 out, " Sir, sir ! " and followed by one of the footmen with 
 a rather disturbed expression. 
 
 " I say, y know, I I hope you don t mind my grand 
 mother ? Calling you my man and and all that ? 
 She didn t see you were a gentleman; she doesn t always 
 look," said the boy stammering, very red and embarrassed. 
 He was a thin, overgrown stripling, and did not look 
 strong, as Sam now observed. 
 
 " That s all right, son. I don t mind being called a 
 man," he said. 
 
 " She didn t mean that about Americans, either. She 
 doesn t know any Americans. She just she just " 
 
 " That s all right, too. Just tell her I m going to enlist 
 when I get back home, and I m going back right away/ 
 Sam told him. 
 
 " They won t let me. I m not old enough," said the 
 lad wistfully. " Crowder s going, though, aren t you, 
 Crowder?" 
 
 " Yes, m lord," said the footman, and touched his hat. 
 
 " Good old Crowdy ! " said the boy approvingly. He 
 spoke again to Sam, thrusting out his hand with an en 
 gaging mixture of shyness and straightforwardness. " My 
 name s Jack Vincent. If it lasts long enough, maybe I ll 
 get out there after all, and we might meet, eh ? " 
 
 Sam shook his hand cordially, and told him his own 
 name and added something about hoping to see him " out 
 there," thinking meanwhile that this poor delicate child s 
 
342 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 doom was much more likely to fall at home in his bed, than 
 by some German bullet. Months afterwards, reading in 
 some London obituaries that John Gregory Howard Vin 
 cent, Lord Carr, had died at Mentone of tuberculosis in the 
 eighteenth year of his age and that with him the title 
 became extinct, Sam wondered if it were the same. 
 
 Another time he fell in with a clergyman, and passed 
 a whole morning roaming the streets with him, the rev 
 erend gentleman seeming not to have any duties or not 
 to be capable of attending to them, and sticking to Sain 
 " like a burr " as the latter said. " He was about half- 
 crazy, that man was, from brooding over the thing, you 
 know. His cure of souls was down in Kent somewhere, 
 he told me the place but didn t give his name, and didn t 
 ask mine. Nobody on the ship belonged to him ; he didn t 
 even know a soul on board of her. I think he must just 
 have run away from home and gone on the loose, because 
 he simply couldn t sit still and think about it. It didn t 
 gee with what he had been trained to preach and think 
 about about his religion, you know. He kept say 
 ing: Sir, I am a believing Christian! I am solemnly 
 convinced that the Lord does not willingly afflict or grieve 
 the children of men. And he d quote things out of the 
 Bible about Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, and 
 another place where it says : * Thus saith the Lord : I will 
 set before thee the thing that thou hast done. He wanted 
 to know if I didn t think that was the worst punishment 
 men could be threatened with, and talked about people s 
 consciences being their most awful judge, didn t I think 
 so ? Well, I don t know I said to him. Pioneer times 
 in my country the Indians used to scalp people and torture 
 them and burn them to death women and children too, 
 they didn t mind women and children any more than these 
 Germans do. I guess you couldn t set before the Iroquois 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 343 
 
 the things they did ; the pioneers didn t try anyhow. They 
 went after em with guns. You can t set before a New 
 Guinea cannibal the thing he does; but you can fix him 
 so he won t do it any more. I don t think the Lord would 
 go at punishing that kind of people that way ; He d know 
 it wouldn t be any use. I m not a church member, but I 
 don t mean any irreverence when I say it looks as if He d 
 left us the job. That s what I mean, that s what I mean : 
 He will point us the way. The Almighty purpose will 
 be achieved through man s agency ! says the parson. 
 < That s what I have contended. It is not incompatible 
 with a Christian attitude of mind. He hadn t said any 
 thing of the kind, but I wasn t going to argue with him. 
 The poor devil was about half-crazy," Sam would conclude, 
 shaking his head. " Nice, quiet-looking little man as you 
 ever saw ! " 
 
 He kind-heartedly endured this companionship until 
 chance relieved him of it. They passed a knot of weather- 
 beaten men, sailors by their looks, in front of a public- 
 house and heard one of them orating earnestly : "The 
 Titanic now, the Titanic, as yer might say, was the ack 
 of God. But, mates, yer wouldn t think men would go 
 to do such a thing, now would yer ? " 
 
 The clergyman gave a kind of groan and stood still 
 covering his face. Sam, thinking he had been suddenly 
 taken ill, exclaimed in concern, but the other dropping 
 his hands with a despairing gesture showed him a coun 
 tenance so ravaged by spiritual doubts and questions of 
 which Sam had no conception that his offers of help died 
 on his lips. " You heard him ? You heard that poor, 
 honest, simple fellow ? " said the minister wildly. " Sir, 
 I am a believing Christian the ways of God are not 
 our ways until light is vouchsafed us, we can make no 
 answer we can onlv lean on the rock of our faith " 
 
THE BOAKDMAX FAMILY 
 
 Sam felt a kind of indecency in listening; he stood by 
 for a moment, awkwardly muttering whatever common 
 places occarred to him; and then, seeing himself forgotten, 
 escaped at last, thankfollv. 
 
 He witnessed many scenes at the steamship and tele 
 graph companies offices of which he never afterwards 
 would speak or indeed think, if he could prevent him 
 self. ETCH the few instances of good luck, the few happy 
 surprises were only a little less painful to look upon than 
 the impotent misery of the others. Once he went to the 
 aid of a young girl whom he saw standing by a bench 
 whereon there sat an elderly man apparently verging on 
 some sort of collapse, both of them sobbing hysterically. 
 " You ve had bad news!" said Sam. "Let me help 
 let me do something for you ! Maybe it s not true. Can t 
 I i s ~>-:_:::j : " He addressed himself more partic 
 ularly to the girl, who was not more than sixteen years 
 old, dressed all in black, and looked pitifully helpless, as 
 S.iii - "_. :_:"--. Y in faAfcaft nek : Tell ~o L^r: y.u 
 live and Til take you home," 
 
 " Oh, thank you that is, we ll go home we re going 
 home now only don t bother ! Nothing has happened, 
 and we re so glad, that* s all ! " said the girl disjointedly 
 bgjtfffn her sobs. And the Tnan ? looking up, commanded 
 himself with an effort, and blew his nose very loud, and 
 wiped his eyes, and said: "I ve taken cold somehow, I 
 believe very annoying! Tst, tet, Gracie, there s noth 
 ing to cry about there, there, now " He got up, and 
 patted her on the shoulder, and said to Sam apologetically, 
 " She s been under a severe strain, but it s over now, thank 
 God!" 
 
 He was a ruddy-faced Englishman, neatly dressed, with 
 mutton-chop whiskers, the very counterpart of John Bull 
 in the comic cartoons. All at once he began to talk! 
 
THE BOARDMAX FAMILY 
 
 " Her father my son, sir, an only son was killed at 
 the Marae last f afl. My daughter is married in the States 
 11 are from the States, I believe! Quite so! she 
 has been living there some years, a place called Iowa, JOB 
 perhaps know it! Ah, quite so! She was comix 
 to be with us, to to cheer us up a bit, yon will 
 stand? Xaturafly we have been very lonely my 
 sir, an only son, Grade s father it left us very lonely. 
 She has two little girls she was bringing them over. 
 We understood she had taken passage on this ship that 
 was her plan. Sir, it has been a very hard time " His 
 voice failed. "A very hard time three days we 
 
 didn t sail!" He broke down again ; and as for Sannel 
 Thatcher, he too had to get out his handkerchief. 
 
 "Yon think Doctor Wilson wffl er take active 
 
 tral now, sir f " the old gentleman said to him earnestly. 
 -urenoi! I m going home so as to get into die army," 
 
 "" "~" *^L. j. ~~~ .1 "* "" 1 _ IL Z 
 
 from the United States with every issue of die papers, 
 and had answered the same question thus a score of tunes. 
 
 He saw Sandra at last. She was mending slowly 
 " An astonishingly rigorous constitution, for a woman of 
 so frail a build," the worn-looking doctor said. He had 
 been on dnty for thirty-six boors u on end," he 
 casually and not at all in a complaining 
 in explanation that they were short-handed as to 
 men, especially smguuua, great numbers of them having 
 gone into the Service, He did not as 
 being probably too fatigued, or surfeited with 
 stories ; but the nurses were frankly inquisitive and 
 ested Wai true that tike lady was an actress 
 dancer? Dear me, wasn t that too had, though! Her 
 
346 THE BOAEDMA1ST FAMILY 
 
 feet had been something awful ; she was lucky not to lose 
 them. They seemed to be coming round fairly well now, 
 owing to her being so wonderfully strong, and no gangrene, 
 for a wonder; but a dancer! It was a dreadful pity. 
 Her brother and her sweetheart had both been lost, did 
 Sam know about it ? He himself was ? Oh, just a 
 friend. They looked at him speculatively, and stopped 
 outside the door with parting injunctions to be careful and 
 not to let her talk about it too much and get excited 
 " Though I must say," one of them remarked ; " that they 
 aren t any of em anywhere near so excited, in general, as 
 the visitors ! Seems as if they ve been through too much, 
 and there wasn t any special point in getting up a how-de- 
 do about it now, poor souls ! " 
 
 " I suppose I ought not to stay any length of time ? " 
 Sam asked. 
 
 " Bless you, sir, we ll take care you don t ! " said the 
 nurse with a laugh. 
 
 Sandra looked very small and fragile propped up in 
 the hospital bed; but the voice in which she spoke his 
 name was normal, and her hand though it fluttered un 
 manageably felt warm and natural in Sam s big grasp. 
 " I knew you d come if you were anywhere near," she 
 said; and began to talk about her father and mother. 
 " I cabled them some one did it for me, I mean as 
 soon as I could. They ve been so kind here they ve 
 done everything, everything! And the ship that picked 
 us up I don t remember much except that they were 
 kind they kept trying to make us warm. Everybody 
 is so good. I can t write yet, but I got the nurse it s 
 that one that came with you to write for me to 
 Mother, you know and I signed my name. I don t 
 want them to worry about me. Poor Mother, it s going 
 to be so hard for her ! You knew about Everett, Sam ? " 
 
THE BOAEDMAN FAMILY 347 
 
 Sam knew by that time, and told her so, and that he too 
 had cabled and written to the family to say that he was 
 there and would look after her and take charge of of 
 everything, if they so desired. " Your father just cabled 
 back, Yes. He couldn t send any long message, of 
 course. There are hundreds of them waiting to be sent, 
 though they gave ours precedence over everything else," 
 said Sam. " In the meanwhile I thought I d just take 
 it on myself to do what I could whatever seemed advis 
 able" 
 
 " I haven t any money, Sam I " Her face 
 changed so tragically as to silence Sam s hasty assur 
 ances that that was of no consequence, his adjurations not 
 to think about anything like that. She told him then 
 about Levison, pulling out the watch from under the 
 pillow. " It was the last thing he did. He was trying 
 to take care of me the very last minute he had on earth. 
 He asked me if I had any money I didn t understand 
 I didn t know. I never even said good-bye ! It was 
 all so quick we didn t know what was happening 
 we women, I mean we did what the men told us to do. 
 We re so used to that we didn t think what it meant this 
 time. I didn t, anyhow. The men knew some of them 
 knew. Maybe Everett did; at least he didn t try to get 
 away. But lie knew. He asked if I had my money and 
 jewellery. We were in a crowd, you know, and I I only 
 thought how like him it was to be asking that ; I thought 
 he was thinking of pickpockets. And all the while he 
 was only trying " she was silent abruptly. Throughout 
 she had spoken a little brokenly, but without any sug 
 gestion of hysteria, and without tears. It was plain she 
 was mistress of herself; the awful thing had not shaken 
 her mentally, as well it might have. Sam found time 
 to wonder at the uncertainty she betrayed about Everett, 
 
348 THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 
 
 and decided that it was unconscious. He had never trusted 
 Everett Boardrnan but this was no time to harbour 
 recollections like that, he thought in self-rebuke. He 
 looked at poor Levison s great, showy, bedizened watch 
 and chain and charm, moved and with respect. He said 
 the only thing he could think of the only thing any 
 body could think of. 
 
 " Well, they died like men ! " And Sam added humbly, 
 " I hope I d have had the spirit to, if I d been there." 
 
 " They wouldn t have been there, if it hadn t been for 
 me/ 7 said Sandra. " Mary too ! I know it wasn t 
 all my fault, but " She turned her eyes beseechingly to 
 Sam s face, and said, as if confident of his understanding 
 in fact, Sam did understand after a fashion "I 
 didn t care for him, Sam the way he wanted me to, I 
 mean. He thought I cared for him, and I tried to I 
 tried my best. He d done so much for me, and that was 
 all he wanted for me to to love him. I kept thinking 
 that I could I kept thinking I ought to. But you can t 
 make yourself do things like that. I was going to tell 
 him I was going to stop it all, and be honest, no matter 
 what came of it. People can t live any way but honestly. 
 As soon as I began to see that deep down in my heart what 
 I wanted was to keep on dancing for the excitement and 
 the money and the feeling that I was doing so much for 
 them at home why, then I knew that it was too con 
 temptible I couldn t do it ! " She made a slight move 
 ment with her hands, expressing finality ; it had the beauty 
 and the unmistakable meaning of all her gestures. " It s 
 over now. That part of my life is all over and done with 
 for ever. I could dance but I don t suppose I ever will 
 again." 
 
 Sam was inwardly amazed that the doctors and nurses 
 should have allowed her to suspect this grave probability. 
 
THE BOAKDMAN FAMILY 349 
 
 He was starting some protest when she interrrupted him 
 quite calmly. " They don t say they won t tell me out 
 right, of course, but I shouldn t be surprised. It doesn t 
 matter. That sort of life isn t the happiest for a woman. 
 Perhaps if I were a great genius . But I m not, I m 
 only an ordinary girl." 
 
 The nurse came to the door, and Sam obediently got 
 up. " You re going home ? " the girl said longingly. 
 
 " Next boat if you re well enough to travel. We ll 
 wait and see," said Sam, with his strong wholesome hand 
 holding hers. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE other day there was an entertainment given in 
 the Y. M. C. A. hall at Camp Andrew Jackson for 
 the enlisted men assembled there. Lemonade and ginger- 
 snaps were dispensed by ladies who in the intervals of 
 their activities sat and knitted behind the counter at one 
 end of the room; at the other end a mammoth Victor- 
 graph donated by the local branch of the company rendered 
 the latest dance-tunes and in between any number of uni 
 formed young men some with set and earnest faces tense 
 with high resolve, others mechanically smiling, still others 
 as mechanically scowling, turned, advanced, retreated, slid 
 to one side and otherwise performed in time to the music 
 with an equal number of girls. The floor of new pine 
 boards was none too smooth, the place as bare as a barn 
 save for a scarf here and there of tri-coloured bunting, 
 none of the men and only a few of the girls looked as if 
 they were taking the least pleasure in the occasion, yet 
 a feeling of intense, sober enjoyment extraordinarily per 
 vaded the atmosphere! When the record spun out the 
 last bars, there was always an uproarious clapping demand 
 for more; and the obliging little man who was operating 
 the machine his name was Hoffmeister, his father had 
 carried a musket under Sigel, he himself had applied at 
 the recruiting-offices eight times and been rejected because 
 of defective eyesight, he gave his services free, owned a 
 Liberty Bond, subscribed steadily to the Red Cross, and 
 cursed the Kaiser upstairs and down with thorough 
 sincerity this " hyphenated " citizen always complied 
 
 with an engaging zest. Once he appeared to be in some 
 
 350 
 
THE BOARDMAX FAMILY :: 
 
 difficulty widi die mrrhammi, aad a bifr 
 officer who had been standing near the door with 
 
 : .".V. i. . - ... .:!".: . ; I - . ": I . * 1.7 JL . .V. 
 
 "Oh, flcf* die way? Someddng new, ain t it? I 
 nerer aaw one that worked Hke diat before." 
 
 "I hare I used to be in Ac bushuss," mid the red- 
 
 the Vktorgraph, and Halted a 
 fox-trot They fell into desultory enmnatm. Hoff- 
 matter aaid that this was a good wwk that the Bed Tri- 
 
 _ ,| _-,, _ - - - - . -m m . . . _ 
 
 noys, mey jvac neaxeo. can. nice 
 and gave em a good time; that was better than talking 
 
 in bis opinion. It kept 
 
 if -- . * f ^* t 
 
 . _ . . :-.;_--:. . .". _ L 
 
 and peopk hadn t been able to do Oat for mne of 
 
 ^.-L: _, : i. , .: - .- .- -... . .- - . >-: :: 
 
 ^^A! wlft^frw I^A *^af^ si ^^ WWA ww* ^^ J^ ^nM^si m ^hmwv^sn^^aittn^snnnBjAnVk 
 
 AA -OT^^hft-s ^^**^] w%%tf] fa mtmm I MM I ~ - - - - - * - --. - 
 
 ^.^ *-^ i _ - -_ ^ - ^ ^_ -7 __T --L - 
 
 those two rockers the ladies had. They were nice ladies, 
 and aQ die girls were nice; a good many of them had 
 
 - :,, V 7 : - 
 
 Yon couldn t tefl the diffe 
 
 Yvitfv* TTo ^rrBnl^frt f ^mwltfaw 
 
 * -- __ _____ J B_*_ j -f 
 
 - 
 
 ^t didn t hurt em! It 
 
 ;::::- : /. - :7: -, :: -- 
 the others atteatioai to 
 
 I - 
 
352 THE BOARDMAN FAMILY 
 
 " You are ? Oh, you she ? " 
 
 " My wife," said the other proudly. 
 
 " Oh ! " They watched her for a second. " She sure 
 is an elegant dancer," said Hoffmeister. " Say, I said 
 just the right thing that time to the^ight man, hey? 
 Well, I meant it!" 
 
 " She can t keep it up for more than a few minutes at 
 a time," said the big man, his eyes following her a little 
 anxiously. " I don t know that she ought to dance at all. 
 But she was like you ; she wanted to do something so as to 
 be < in it. " 
 
 " You re good and in it yourself," said Hoffmeister, 
 eyeing his shoulder-straps, with a faint sigh. " Been 
 married long? One of these war-weddings, hey? Any 
 idea when you ll get to go over there ? " 
 
 " No no more than anybody else. Soon, I hope." 
 
 " Me too ! " little Hoffmeister declared with force. 
 " Gee, but I d have liked to have a crack at em ! " 
 
 The dance ended and the officer s wife paused in front 
 of them, laughing, though she limped slightly. They 
 heard her late partner inquiring curiously : " Say what s 
 the emblem for the one you got on that chain? You 
 ain t a Elk or a Buffalo, or anything? They don t take 
 in ladies." 
 
 " It s a keepsake, that s all." 
 
 Hoffmeister was bending over changing the record; he 
 raised up in time to see the couple about to depart, and 
 caught the officer s eye, and saluted cheerfully. "Well, 
 so long! Maybe you ll be started before the next time 
 I m here. Hit the Kaiser one for me, will you ? " 
 
 THE END 
 
 PRINTED IN THE UNITED 1TATKS OF AMERICA 
 
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