There was the silence of utter surprise in the room.  After a pause, Mrs. White raised a gloved hand.  Permission from the chair was given Mrs. White to speak.

“Your idea would be to give the Old Paloma girls a dance here, Mrs. Burgoyne?”

“Regular dances, yes,” said Sidney, standing up.  “To let them use the clubhouse, say, two nights a week.  Reading, and singing, and sewing one night, perhaps, and a dance another.  Or we could get good moving-picture films, or have a concert or play, and ask the mothers and fathers now and then; charades and Morris dances, something like that.”

“Dancing and moving-pictures—­oh, dear, dear!” said Mrs. White, with a whimsical smile and a shake of her head, and there was laughter.

“All those things take costuming, and that takes money,” said the chairman, after a silence, rather hesitatingly.

“Money isn’t the problem,” Mrs. Burgoyne rejoined eagerly; “you’ll find that they spend a good deal now, even for the wretched pleasures they have.”

There was another silence.  Then Mrs. White again gained permission to speak, and rose to do so.

“I think perhaps Mrs. Burgoyne, being a newcomer here, doesn’t quite understand our feeling toward our little club,” she said very pleasantly.  “We built it,” she went on, with a slight touch of emotion, “as a little refuge from everything jarring and unpleasant; we meant it to stand for something a little better and Finer than the things of everyday life can possibly be.  Perhaps we felt that there are already too many dances and too many moving-picture shows in the world; perhaps we felt that if we could forget those things for a little while—­I don’t mean,” said Mrs. White smilingly reasonable, “that the reform of wayward girls isn’t a splendid and ennobling thing; I believe heartily in the work institutions and schools are doing along those lines, but—­” and with a pretty little gesture of helplessness she flung out her hands—­“but we can’t have a Hull House in every little town, you know, and I’m afraid we shouldn’t find very many Jane Addamses if we did!  Good girls don’t need this sort of thing, and bad girls—­well, unfortunately, the world has always had bad girls and always will have!  We would merely turn our lovely clubhouse over to a lot of little romping hoydens.”

“But—­” began Mrs. Burgoyne eagerly.

“Just one moment,” said the President, sweetly, and Mrs. Burgoyne sat down with blazing cheeks.  “I only want to say that I think this is outside the purpose for which the club was formed,” added Mrs. White.  “If the club would care to vote on this, it seems to me that would be the wisest way of settling the matter; but perhaps we could hear from a few more members first?”

There was a little rustle of applause at this, and Sidney felt her heart give a sick plunge, and raged within herself because her own act had placed her at so great a disadvantage.  In another moment, however, general attention was directed to a tall, plainly dressed, gentle woman, who rose and said rather shyly: