XI
REARRANGED FAMILIES
_June_ 10. Sylvia Latham has returned alone. Her father came with her as
far as Chicago, where, having business that would detain him for perhaps
ten days, and warm weather having set in, he insisted that Sylvia should
at once proceed eastward. At least that is what Miss Lavinia tells me;
but she has suddenly turned quite reticent in everything that concerns
the Lathams, which, together with Mrs. Jenks-Smith's random remarks, have
inevitably set me to thinking.
I had hoped to form a pleasant friendship with Sylvia, for though I have
only met her two or three times, I feel as if I really knew her; but
there will be little chance now, as they go on to Newport the first of
July, and the continual procession of house parties, for golf, tennis,
etc., at the Bluffs, even though they are called informal, necessarily
stand in the way of intimate neighbourly relations between us. Monty Bell
has been dividing his week ends between the Ponsonby, Vanderveer, and
Jenks-Smith households, yet he always is in the foreground when I have
been to see Sylvia, even though I have tried to slip in between times in
the morning.
I do not like this Monty Bell; he seems to be merely an eater of dinners
and a cajoler of dames, such superficial chivalry of speech as he
exhibits being only one of the many expedients that gain him the title of
"socially indispensable" that the Whirlpoolers accord him.
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