“Who would have thought it?  You look so pure and gentle and refined that a man must have been a brute to treat you like that.  But you are happy now, thank goodness.  You have a husband worthy of you.”

Each had a host of things still unsaid when Littleton and Williams joined them.

“Well, my dear,” said Wilbur as they left the house, “that was a sort of Arabian Nights entertainment for us, wasn’t it?  A little barbaric, but handsome and well intentioned.  I hope it didn’t shock you too much.”

“It struck me as very pleasant, Wilbur.  I think I am beginning to understand New York a little better.  Every thing costs so much here that it seems necessary to make money, doesn’t it?  I don’t see exactly how poor people get along.  Do you know, Mr. Williams wished to bet me a pair of gloves that you buy stocks sometimes.”

“He would have lost his bet.”

“So I told him at once.  But he didn’t seem to believe me.  I was sure you never did.  He appears to be very successful; but I let him see that I knew it was gambling.  You consider it gambling, don’t you?”

“Not quite so bad as that.  Some stock-brokers are gamblers; but the occupation of buying and selling stocks for a commission is a well recognized and fashionable business.”

“Mr. Williams thinks that a great many Americans make money in stocks—­that we are gamblers as a nation.”

“I am, in my heart, of the same opinion.”

“Oh, Wilbur.  I find you are not so good a patriot as I supposed.”

“I hate bunkum.”

“What is that?”

“Saying things for effect, and professing virtue which we do not possess.”

Selma was silent a moment.  “What does champagne cost a bottle?”

“About three dollars and a half.”

“Do you really think their house barbaric?”

“It certainly suggests to me heterogeneous barbaric splendor.  They bought their upholstery as they did their pictures, with free-handed self-confidence.  Occasionally they made a brilliant shot, but oftener they never hit the target at all.”

“I think I like brighter colors than you do, Wilbur,” mused Selma.  “I used to consider things like that as wrong; but I suppose that was because our fathers wished Europe to understand that we disapproved of the luxury of courts and the empty lives of the nobility.  But if people here with purpose have money, it would seem sensible to furnish their houses prettily.”

“Subject always to the crucifying canons of art,” laughed Littleton.  “I’m glad you’re coming round to my view, Selma.  Only I deny the ability of the free-born American, with the overflowing purse, to indulge his newly acquired taste for gorgeous effects without professional assistance.”

“I suppose so.  I can see that their house is crude, though I do think that they have some handsome things.  It must be interesting to walk through shops and say:  ‘I’ll take that,’ just because it pleases you.”