Here at the opera each moment, so long as the house-lights blazed, brought its own tribute of flattery to the Titan of the Street.  The men and women from whom these tributes came were the men and women whom the world envied, and cursed—­and worshiped.  Hamilton Burton realized, as he passed easily from box to box, chatting with this multi-millionaire and that jewelled lady, that no single figure was more often signaled out by pointing and envious fingers than his own.  When he handed Mary out of her limousine the street policeman had made the passage clear before him.  Ushers had kowtowed and the heads of fashionable women had nodded and smiled.  His way had been a march of triumph.  To Hamilton Burton it was all like the sniffing of frankincense and myrrh.  His inner emotions were those of a great tiger, purring like a house-cat.

That at his back, when he had passed on, these immaculately clad gentlemen muttered derogatory oaths only flattered him further; their hate, too, was a tribute to his power.

He came into Society’s world as a monarch walks among the proletariat, to receive homage and return to places where a monarch has better things to do.

But at last the overture ended and the curtain rose.  The opera had begun.

For Paul the evening was just beginning, but for Hamilton it was done.  He stifled a yawn and rose from his seat, effecting his escape unobserved from the box.  From that point on his mind shook off the lethargy of the incensed atmosphere and became dynamic.  He looked at his watch and found that his next appointment gave him an hour’s leisure.

To his chauffeur he said, “Drive me to my mother’s house.”

Hannah Burton would be the only member of the household at home and with her nephew would spend this leisure hour.  He knew she would be there because she was rarely elsewhere.  The man who flashed the searchlight of his thought into so many places at such broad angles smiled as he thought of his Aunt Hannah, but it was a tender smile.  He had transplanted and remodeled his family—­but Aunt Hannah he had been powerless to alter.

The room where she received him was an anomalous hermitage, for in spite of the generous comfort it reflected, there broke out here and there jarring notes from many survivals of the old order; things from which she refused to be parted.  Upon a mantel over which hung a Gobelin tapestry stood a tin alarm clock.  It was an old companion which had once shrilly announced that it was time to drag her rheumatic bones from bed and take up her daily round of dusting and sweeping.  Among carefully chosen paintings a screaming chromo issued by the Middle Fork general store proclaimed the superior quality of its staple and fancy groceries, hardware, queensware and feed.

The old lady herself, though silk-gowned, wore her white hair drawn severely back over parchment temples, as though repudiating the pomps and vanities of this wicked world.