The Metropolis

were two sets of women; one to be toyed with and flung aside, and the other to be protected and esteemed. Such things as prostitutes and kept women might exist, but people of refinement did not talk about them, and were not concerned with them. But Montague was familiar with the saying, that if you follow the chain of the slave, you will find the other end about the wrist of the master; and he discovered that the Tenderloin was wreaking its vengeance upon Fifth Avenue. It was not merely that the men of wealth were carrying to their wives and chil-dren the diseases of vice; they were carrying also the manners and the ideals.

Montague had been amazed by the things he had found in New York Society; the smoking and drinking and gambling of women, their hard and cynical views of life, their continual telling of coarse stories. And here, in this underworld, he had come upon the fountainhead of the corruption. It was something which came to him in a sudden flash of intuition — the barriers between the two worlds were breaking down!

He could picture the process in a hundred different forms. There was Betty Wyman. His brother had meant to take her to the theatre, to let her see Rosalie, by way of a joke! So, of course, Betty knew of his escapades, and of those of his set; she and her girl friends were whispering and jesting about them. Here sat Oliver, smiling and cynical, toying with Rosalie as a cat might toy with a mouse; and to-morrow he would be with Betty — and could anyone

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doubt any longer whence Betty had derived her attitude to life? And the habits of mind that Oliver had taught her as a girl she would not forget as a wife; he might be anxious to keep her to himself, but there would be others whose interest was different.

And Montague recalled other things that he had seen or heard in Society, that he could put his finger upon, as having come out of this under-world. The more he thought of the explanation, the more it seemed to explain. This 'Society," which had perplexed him — now he could describe it: its manners and ideals of life were those which he would have expected to find in the "fast" side of stage life.

It was, of course, the women who made Society, and gave it its tone; and the women of Society were actresses. They were actresses in their love of notoriety and display; in their taste in clothes and jewels, their fondness for cigarettes and champagne. They made up like actresses; they talked and thought like actresses. The only obvious difference was that the women of the stage were carefully selected — were at least up to a certain standard of physical excellence; whereas the women of Society were not selected at all, and some were lean, and some were stout, and some were painfully homely.

Montague recalled cases where the two sets had met, as at some of the private entertainments. It was getting to be the fashion to hobnob with the stage people on such occasions ; and he recalled how naturally the younger people took to this. Only the older women held

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aloof; looking down upon the women of the

stage from an ineffable height, as belonging

to a lower caste—because they were obliged

to work for their livings. But it seemed

to Montague, as he sat and talked with this

30or chorus-girl who had sold herself for a

ittle pleasure, that it was easier to pardon

ler than the woman who had been bom to

uxury, and scorned those who produced her

wealth.

But most of all, one's sympathies went out to a person who was not to be met in either of these sets; to the girl who had not sold herself, but was struggling for a living in the midst of this ravening corruption. There were thousands of self-respecting women, even on the stage; Toodles herself had been among them, she told Montague. " I kept straight for a long time," she said, laughing cneerfuUy — "and on ten dollars a week! I used to go out on the road, and then they paid me sixteen; and think of trying to live on one-night stands — to board yourself and stop at hotels and dress for the theatre — on sixteen a week, and no job half the year! And all that time — do you know Cyril Chambers, the famous church painter?"

"I've heard of him," said Montague.

"Well, I was with a show here on Broadway the next winter; and every single night for six months he sent me a bunch of orchids that couldn't have cost less than seventy-five dollars ! And he told me he'd open accounts for me in all the stores I chose, if I'd spend the next summer in Europe with him. He said I could

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take my mother or my sister with me — and I was so green in those days, I thought that must mean he didn't intend anything wrong!"

Toodles smiled at the memory. Did you go?" asked the man.