Big Poker Site hazard of new fortunes 66

however briefly, before the train stopped. They had to walk up four blocks and then half a block across before they came to the indistinctive brownstone house where the Dryfooses lived. It was larger than some in the same block, but the next neighborhood of a huge apartment-house dwarfed it again. March thought he recognized the very flat in which he had disciplined the surly janitor, but he did not tell his wife; he made her notice the transition character of the street, which had been mostly built up in apartment-houses, with here and there a single dwelling dropped far down beneath and beside them, to that jag-toothed effect on the sky-line so often observable in such New York streets. "I dont know exactly what the old gentleman bought here for," he said, as they waited on the steps after ringing, "unless he expects to turn it into flats by-and-by. Otherwise, I dont believe hell get his money back." An Irish serving-man, with a certain surprise that delayed him, said the ladies were at home, and let the Marches in, and then carried their cards up-stairs. The drawing-room, where he said they could sit down while he went on this errand, was delicately, decorated in white and gold, and furnished with a sort of extravagant good taste; there was nothing to object to in the satin furniture, the pale, soft, rich carpet, the pictures, and the bronze and china bric-a-brac, except that their costliness was too evident; everything in the room meant money too plainly, and too much of it. The Marches recognized this in the hoarse whispers which people cannot get their voices above when they try to talk away the interval of waiting in such circumstances; they conjectured from what they had heard of the Dryfooses that this tasteful luxury in no wise expressed their civilization. "Though when you come to that," said March, "I dont know that Mrs. Greens gimcrackery expresses ours." "Well, Basil, I didnt take the gimcrackery. That was your--" The rustle of skirts on the stairs without arrested Mrs. March in the well-merited punishment which she never failed to inflict upon her husband when the question of the gimcrackery--they always called it that--came up. She rose at the entrance of a bright-looking, pretty-looking, mature, youngish lady, in black silk of a neutral implication, who put out her hand to her, and said, with a very cheery, very ladylike accent, "Mrs. March?" and then added to both of them, while she shook hands with March, and before they could get the name out of their months: "No, not Miss Dryfoos! Neither of them; nor Mrs. Dryfoos. Mrs. Mandel. The ladies will be down in a moment. Wont you throw off your sacque, Mrs. March? Im afraid its rather warm here, coming from the outside." "I will throw it back, if youll allow me," said Mrs. March, with a sort of provisionality, as if, pending some uncertainty as to Mrs. Mandels quality and authority, she did not feel herself justified in going further. But if she did not know about Mrs. Mandel, Mrs. Mandel seemed to know about her. "Oh, well, do!" she said, with a sort of recognition of the propriety of her caution. "I hope you are feeling a little at home in New York. We heard so much of your trouble in getting a flat, from Mr. Fulkerson." "Well, a true Bostonian doesnt give up quite so soon," said Mrs. March. "But I will say New York doesnt seem so far away, now were here." "Im sure youll like it. Every one does." Mrs. Mandel added to March, "Its very sharp out, isnt it?" "Rather sharp. But after our Boston winters I dont know but I ought to repudiate the word." "Ah, wait till you have been here through March!" said Mrs. Mandel. She began with him, but skillfully transferred the close of her remark, and the little smile of menace that went with it, to his wife. "Yes," said Mrs. March, "or April, either: Talk about our east winds!" "Oh, Im sure they cant be worse than our winds," Mrs. Mandel returned, caressingly. "If we escape New York pneumonia," March laughed, "it will only be to fall a prey to New York malaria as soon as the frost is out of the ground." "Oh, but you know," said Mrs. Mandel, "I think our malaria has really been slandered a little. Its more a matter of drainage--of plumbing. I dont believe it would be possible for malaria to get into this house, weve had it gone over so thoroughly." Mrs. March said,

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