‚ÄúCome,‚Äù Cresswell invited. But just then the crowd pushed them apart and shot them along, and Mrs. ¬ÝCresswell found herself clinging to her husband amid two great whirling variegated throngs of driving, white-faced people. The band crashed and blared; the people laughed and pushed; and with rhythmic sound and swing the mighty throng was dancing.
It took much effort, but at last the Cresswell party escaped and rolled off in their carriages. They swept into the avenue and out again, then up 14th Street, where, turning for some street obstruction, they passed a throng of carriages on a cross street.
‚ÄúIt‚Äôs the other ball,‚Äù cried Mrs. ¬ÝVanderpool, and amid laughter she added, ‚ÄúLet‚Äôs go!‚Äù
It was‚ÅÝ‚Äîthe other ball. For Washington is itself, and something else besides. Along beside it ever runs that dark and haunting echo; that shadowy world-in-world with its accusing silence, its emphatic self-sufficiency.
Mrs. ¬ÝCresswell at first demurred. She thought of Elspeth‚Äôs cabin: the dirt, the smell, the squalor: of course, this would be different; but‚ÅÝ‚Äîwell, Mrs. ¬ÝCresswell had little inclination for slumming. She was interested in the underworld, but intellectually, not by personal contact. She did not know that this was a side-world, not an underworld. Yet the imposing building did not look sordid.
“Hired?” asked someone.
“No, owned.”
“Indeed!”
Then there was a hitch.
“Tickets?”