The real truth was that Mrs. Vanderlyn, made bold by the possession of her money, had thought it was the magic key which certainly would open every door for her.  There were doors in New York City, which, coming from the West, she had been palpitantly anxious to pass through, and, to her amazement, she found that money would not open them.  Then there had occurred to her the brilliant plan of conquering, first, the aristocracy of Europe, who, the newspapers had told her, bowed in great humility before the eagle on the Yankee gold-piece.  To the doors with crests upon their paneling, abroad, she had therefore borne her golden key that summer, only to discover that it fitted their locks quite as ill as those upon Fifth Avenue.  Her heart was saddened with the woe of failure.  The second officer could not guess that, sore from buffetings from those who would have none of her, she had been glad to secure passage on this ten-day boat, where, during the long voyage, she could haughtily refuse to notice those of whom she would have none.  She had searched for a place and found one where she could scorn as she had recently been scorned.  Her soul was black-and-blue from snubs.  She wished to snub.  A climber, who had failed to climb the highest social ladder, the handsome, haughty lady found a certain satisfaction in sitting for ten days upon the very apex of another ladder—­briefer, less important, very little, to be sure, but still a social ladder—­and giving it a quick, sharp shake as humble people put their feet upon it timidly, bowing and smiling tentatively at her unresponsive person.  It was a sort of balm to her sore soul so see them tumble metaphorically, upon their backs.  Her demeanor on the Rochester was the demeanor of a princess among aliens whom she utterly despises.  The Cook’s tourists, traveling school-teachers and young married couples homeward-bound after modest European honeymoons, were plainly scum to her, and it gave her ardent joy to see that most of them were hurt when she impressed this on them mercilessly.  It was safer for her son to talk about the interesting German couple to the second officer than it was for him to talk about them to his mother, but, lo! youth knows not wisdom.

“Mother,” he suggested upon the sixth day out, “I want to have you come and see a fascinating couple on the steerage-deck.”

“Another bride and groom?” she asked, in a bored voice.  Brides and grooms had come to be monotonous.  She had seen all sorts since she had started on this journey and now loathed the thought of newly married fellow-creatures.  She could not understand why John’s interest had been maintained in them.

He laughed.  “No, not a bride and groom.  The man is an old German, handsome and refined, evidently out of place upon the steerage-deck, the girl—­she—­why, mother, she’s a peach. She’d be out of place ’most anywhere but on a throne!”

“How very vulgar, John,” his mother answered with that cold assumption of superiority which had come to her with money.  “I cannot see how even you can link the steerage-deck with thrones.  Princesses do not travel steerage except between the covers of cheap books.”