Mrs. Erlich shook her finger at him with conviction.  “You will see; your cousin Wilhelmina will be more interested in that boy than in any of the others!”

Julius thought if she were not too strongly opposed she might still yield her point.  “For one thing, Mother, Claude hasn’t any dinner clothes,” he murmured.  She nodded to him.  “That has been attended to, Herr Julius.  He is having some made.  When I sounded him, he told me he could easily afford it.”

The boys said if things had gone as far as that, they supposed they would have to make the best of it, and the eldest wrote down “Claude Wheeler” with a flourish.

If the Erlich boys were apprehensive, their anxiety was nothing to Claude’s.  He was to take Mrs. Erlich to Madame Schroeder-Schatz’s recital, and on the evening of the concert, when he appeared at the door, the boys dragged him in to look him over.  Otto turned on all the lights, and Mrs. Erlich, in her new black lace over white satin, fluttered into the parlour to see what figure her escort cut.

Claude pulled off his overcoat as he was bid, and presented himself in the sooty blackness of fresh broadcloth.  Mrs. Erlich’s eyes swept his long black legs, his smooth shoulders, and lastly his square red head, affectionately inclined toward her.  She laughed and clapped her hands.

“Now all the girls will turn round in their seats to look, and wonder where I got him!”

Claude began to bestow her belongings in his overcoat pockets; opera glasses in one, fan in another.  She put a lorgnette into her little bag, along with her powder-box, handkerchief and smelling salts,—­there was even a little silver box of peppermint drops, in case she might begin to cough.  She drew on her long gloves, arranged a lace scarf over her hair, and at last was ready to have the evening cloak which Claude held wound about her.  When she reached up and took his arm, bowing to her sons, they laughed and liked Claude better.  His steady, protecting air was a frame for the gay little picture she made.

The dinner party came off the next evening.  The guest of honour, Madame Wilhelmina Schroeder-Schatz, was some years younger than her cousin, Augusta Erlich.  She was short, stalwart, with an enormous chest, a fine head, and a commanding presence.  Her great contralto voice, which she used without much discretion, was a really superb organ and gave people a pleasure as substantial as food and drink.  At dinner she sat on the right of the oldest son.  Claude, beside Mrs. Erlich at the other end of the table, watched attentively the lady attired in green velvet and blazing rhinestones.

After dinner, as Madame Schroeder-Schatz swept out of the dining room, she dropped her cousin’s arm and stopped before Claude, who stood at attention behind his chair.

“If Cousin Augusta can spare you, we must have a little talk together.  We have been very far separated,” she said.