Page:The Breath of Scandal (1922).djvu/261

 and persistency amazing to Marjorie Hale, whom Evanston had considered a good deal of a goer. But, taken together, all the different social sets of Evanston, with which Marjorie Hale had become acquainted in ten years, did not on any night offer her the option in entertainment which Clara Seeley considered lay before her every night in the dance halls, gardens, hotels, rinks, chop-suey restaurants, movie theaters and the myriad other places of public entertainment in Chicago.

Marjorie Hale, with some of her friends, had descended from Evanston for various forays into the Green Mill, the Marigold and other gardens and into the marvelous motion picture palaces of this new uptown Chicago; but these visits had been excursions apart, and they held no place in the regular order of social activities advancing you from the association of families of less importance and prominence toward the ranks of the leaders. But here, with Clara, the places of public amusement created her world; with no need of sanction from anybody and with requirement of nothing more than a moderately decent dress and—usually—a male companion, a girl could go almost anywhere and have a wonderful time. And you had nothing to bother your mind as to whether attendance at this entertainment or at that would advance you most socially; for you weren't trying to advance anywhere; where you were, you had arrived; and all you had to worry about was how to buy yourself a new dress, when your present dancing gown ceased to be presentable, and how to keep yourself supplied with escorts who would pay for your entertainment and refreshment and demand of you only your company and friendship

The ethics of the game, as Clara played it, required