"Then we'll lunch where there's lots of life and everybody is chatting
gayly about nothing.

"Then we'll go to the Moving Pictures unless there is a matinee, and then
we'll motor out to the Boulevard, and then back and have tea somewhere.

"Or, perhaps, we'll motor down to the Club at Burlingame for lunch and
chatter away the day on the veranda, or dance. This afternoon we'll
probably ring up a few that are still in town, and dance in Polly's
parlor at the Fairmont."

Helene's lip curled, her voice had risen. With, all her young enjoyment
of wealth and position, she had been bred in a class where to idle is a
crime. "Just putting in time--time that ought to be as precious as
youth and high spirits and ease and popularity! But what is one to do?
I have no talents, and I'd lose caste in my set if I had. I don't
wonder the Socialists hate us and want to put us all to work. No doubt
we should be much happier. But now--even if you retired from business,
you'd spend most of your time on the links. We poor women wouldn't be
much better off."

"It does seem an abnormal state of affairs; I've barely given it a
thought, it has always been such a pleasure to find you, after a hard
day's work, looking invariably dainty, and pretty, and eloquently
suggestive of leisure and repose. But--to the student of history--I
suppose it is a condition that cannot last. There must be some sort of
upheaval due. Well, I hope it will give me more of your society."