It seemed that Mrs. Condor was giving a
little musicale in Ned Stillman's apartments on the following Friday
night, and, if one could believe such a thing, the lady implied that the
evening would scarcely be complete without the presence of Claire
Robson--or, to put it more properly, Claire Robson and her _mother_.
As Claire had scarcely said a half-dozen words to Mrs. Condor on the
night of the Red Cross concert, this invitation seemed little short of
extraordinary. But, as Claire thought it over, she recalled that there
had been some general conversation about music, in which she had
admitted a discreet passion for this form of entertainment, even going
so far as to confess that she played the piano herself upon occasion.
Her first impulse, clinched by the familiar feminine excuse that she had
nothing suitable to wear, was to send her regrets. At once she thought
of the scorned finery that Gertrude Sinclair had included in her last
box, and the more she thought about it the more convinced she became
that she had no real reason for refusing. But a swift, strange regret
that her mother had been included in the invitation took the edge off
her anticipations. She tried to dismiss this feeling, but it grew more
definite as the morning progressed.
For days Claire had been striking at the shackles of habit with a rancor
bred of disillusionment.
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