Edith Wharton

“ Fairford had named she found it even more crowded than Fifth Avenue; and some of the ladies and gentlemen wedged before the pictures had the "look" which signified social consecration. As Undine made her way among them, she was aware of attracting almost as much notice as in the street, and she flung herself into rapt attitudes before the canvases, scribbling notes in the catalogue in imitation of a tall girl in sables, while ripples of self-consciousness played up and down her watchful back. ”

“ Spragg was obliged to own.
Her daughter looked at her with a kind of chill commiseration. "You never CAN," she murmured, turning away.
She stretched herself out moodily on one of the pink and gold sofas, and lay there brooding, an unread novel on her knee. Mrs. Spragg timidly slipped a cushion under her daughter's head, and then dissembled herself behind the lace window-curtains and sat watching the lights spring out down the long street and spread their glittering net across the Park. It was one of Mrs. Spragg's chief occupations to watch the nightly lighting of New York. ”

“ Undine went for a ride, not because she felt particularly disposed for the exercise, but because she wished to discipline her mother. She was almost sure she would get her opera box, but she did not see why she should have to struggle for her rights, and she was especially annoyed with Mrs. Spragg for seconding her so half-heartedly. If she and her mother did not hold together in such crises she would have twice the work to do.
Undine hated "scenes": she was essentially peace-loving, and would have preferred to live on terms of unbroken harmony with her parents. ”

“ Mrs. Spragg cast a frightened glance at her husband. These struggles between two resolute wills always brought on her palpitations, and she wished she had her phial of digitalis with her.
"A parterre box costs a hundred and twenty-five dollars a night," said Mr. Spragg, transferring a toothpick to his waistcoat pocket.
"I only want it once."
He looked at her with a quizzical puckering of his crows'-feet. "You only want most things once. Undine." ”

“ It was on the day the Spraggs left Skog Harbour that Undine vowed to herself with set lips: "I'll never try anything again till I try New York." Now she had gained her point and tried New York, and so far, it seemed, with no better success. From small things to great, everything went against her. ”

“ Her eyes grew absent-minded, as they always did when he alluded to business. THAT was man's province; and what did men go "down town" for but to bring back the spoils to their women? She rose abruptly, leaving her parents seated, and said, more to herself than the others: "Think I'll go for a ride."
"Oh, Undine!" fluttered Mrs. Spragg. She always had palpitations when Undine rode, and since the Aaronson episode her fears were not confined to what the horse might do.
"Why don't you take your mother out shopping a little?" Mr. Spragg suggested, conscious of the limitation of his resources. ”

“ Undine's brows drew together: she was struggling with her long patent-leather boot.
"Meet anybody? Do you mean anybody I know? I don't KNOW anybody--I never shall, if father can't afford to let me go round with people!"
The boot was off with a wrench, and she flung it violently across the old-rose carpet, while Mrs. Spragg, turning away to hide a look of inexpressible relief, slipped discreetly from the room.
The day wore on. Undine had meant to go down and tell Mabel Lipscomb about the Fairford dinner, but its aftertaste was flat on her lips. What would it lead to? ”

“ Of course they would have preferred to hire a house, but the "hole," if one could believe it, didn't offer one; so they had simply shut themselves off as best they could from the "hotel crew"--had her friend, Miss Wincher parenthetically asked, happened to notice the Sunday young men? They were queerer even than the "belles" they came for--and had escaped the promiscuity of the dinner-hour by turning one of their rooms into a dining-room, and picnicking there--with the Persimmon House standards, one couldn't describe it in any other way! ”

“ There was something still better beyond, then--more luxurious, more exciting, more worthy of her! She once said to herself, afterward, that it was always her fate to find out just too late about the "something beyond." ”

“ Undine, who rose too late to share the family breakfast, usually had her chocolate brought to her in bed by Celeste, after the manner described in the articles on "A Society Woman's Day" which were appearing in Boudoir Chat. Her mere appearance in the restaurant therefore prepared her parents for those symptoms of excessive tension which a nearer inspection confirmed, and Mr. Spragg folded his paper and hooked his glasses to his waistcoat with the air of a man who prefers to know the worst and have it over. ”

“ Undine answered with a darkening brow. He looked at her humorously. "You invited the whole dinner-party, I suppose?"
"No--no one."
"Going all alone in a box?" She was disdainfully silent. "I don't s'pose you're thinking of taking mother and me?"
This was so obviously comic that they all laughed--even Mrs. Spragg--and Undine went on more mildly: "I want to do something for Mabel Lipscomb: make some return. She's always taking me 'round, and I've never done a thing for her--not a single thing." ”