They lived
near the greatest city, they could have anything that art and
science provided, for the mere buying, no king could sleep in a
softer bed, or eat more delicious fare. When Mary Ingram asked
Nancy to go to the opera matinee with her, Nancy met women whose
names had been only a joke to her, a few years ago. She found them
rather like other persons, simple, friendly, interested in their
nurseries and their gardens and anxious to reach their own
firesides for tea. When Nancy and Bert went out with the Fieldings
they had a different experience; they had dinners that were works
of art, the finest box in the theatre, and wines that came
cobwebbed and dusty to the table.
So that there was no height left to scale; "if we could only
afford it," mused Nancy. Belle Fielding could afford it, of
course; her trouble was that the Fielding name was perhaps a
trifle too surely connected with fabulous sums of money. And Mary
Ingram could afford anything, despite her simple clothes and her
fancy for long tramps and quiet evenings with her delicate husband
and two big boys. Nancy sometimes wondered that with the Ingram
income anyone could be satisfied with Marlborough Gardens, but
after all, what was there better in all the world? Europe?--but
that meant hotel cooking for the man.
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