“No, I assure you,” Mrs. Pasmer heard her protest, “Mr. Saintsbury has, been very much interested in him.  I hope he has not put any troublesome ideas into his head.  Of course he’s very much interested in literature, from his point of view, and he’s glad to find any of the young men interested in it, and that’s apt to make him overdo matters a little.”

“Dan wished me to talk with him, and I shall certainly be glad to do so,” said the father, but in a tone which conveyed to Mrs. Pasmer the impression that though he was always open to conviction, his mind was made up on this point, whatever it was.

VI.

The party went to half a dozen spreads, some of which were on a scale of public grandeur approaching that of the Gymnasium, and others of a subdued elegance befitting the more private hospitalities in the students’ rooms.  Mrs. Pasmer was very much interested in these rooms, whose luxurious appointments testified to the advance of riches and of the taste to apply them since she used to visit students’ rooms in far-off Class Days.  The deep window nooks and easy-chairs upholstered in the leather that seems sacred alike to the seats and the shelves of libraries; the aesthetic bookcases, low and topped with bric-a-brac; the etchings and prints on the walls, which the elder Mavering went up to look at with a mystifying air of understanding such things; the foils crossed over the chimney, and the mantel with its pipes, and its photographs of theatrical celebrities tilted about over it—­spoke of conditions mostly foreign to Mrs. Pasmer’s memories of Harvard.  The photographed celebrities seemed to be chosen chiefly for their beauty, and for as much of their beauty as possible, Mrs. Pasmer perceived, with an obscure misgiving of the sort which an older generation always likes to feel concerning the younger, but with a tolerance, too, which was personal to herself; it was to be considered that the massive thought and honest amiability of Salvini’s face, and the deep and spiritualized power of Booth’s, varied the effect of these companies of posturing nymphs.

At many places she either met old friends with whom she clamoured over the wonder of their encounter there, or was made acquainted with new people by the Saintsburys.  She kept a mother’s eye on her daughter, to whom young Mavering presented everybody within hail or reach, and whom she could see, whenever she looked at her, a radiant centre of admiration.  She could hear her talk sometimes, and she said to herself that really Alice was coming out; she had never heard her say so many good things before; she did not know it was in her.  She was very glad then that she had let her wear that dress; it was certainly distinguished, and the girl carried it off, to her mother’s amusement, with the air of a superb lady of the period from which it dated.  She thought what a simple child Alice really was, all the time those other children, the Seniors, were stealing their glances of bold or timid worship at her, and doubtless thinking her a brilliant woman of the world.  But there could be no mistake that she was a success.