Twilight Sleep by Edith Wharton

entered the
high–perched studio where he gathered his group of the enlightened.
These privileged persons, in the absence of chairs, had disposed
themselves on the cushions and mattresses scattered about a floor
painted to imitate a cunning perspective of black and white marble.
Tall lamps under black domes shed their light on bare shoulders,
heads sleek or tousled, and a lavish show of flesh–coloured legs
and sandalled feet. Ardwin, unbosoming himself to a devotee, held
up a guttering church–candle to a canvas which simulated a window
open on a geometrical representation of brick walls, fire escapes
and back–yards. "Sham? Oh, of course. I had the real window
blocked up. It looked out on that stupid old 'night–piece' of
Brooklyn Bridge and the East River. Everybody who came here said:
'A Whistler nocturne!' and I got so bored. Besides, it was REALLY
THERE: and I hate things that are really where you think they are.
They're as tiresome as truthful people. Everything in art should
be false. Everything in life should be art. Ergo, everything in
life should be false: complexions, teeth, hair, wives …
specially wives. Oh, Miss Manford, that you? Do come in. Mislaid
Lita?"
    "Isn't she here?"
    "IS she?" He pivoted about on the company. When he was not
dancing he looked, with his small snaky head and too square
shoulders, like a cross between a Japanese waiter and a full–page
advertisement for silk underwear. "IS Lita here? Any of you
fellows got her dissembled about your persons? Now, then, out with
her! Jossie Keiler, YOU'RE not Mrs. James Wyant disguised as a
dryad, are you?" There was a general guffaw as Miss Jossie Keiler,
the octoroon pianist, scrambled to her pudgy feet and assembled a
series of sausage arms and bolster legs in a provocative pose.
"Knew I'd get found out," she lisped.
    A short man with a deceptively blond head, thick lips under a
stubby blond moustache, and eyes like needles behind tortoiseshell–
rimmed glasses, stood before the fire, bulging a glossy shirtfront
and solitaire pearl toward the company. "Don't this lady dance?"
he enquired, in a voice like melted butter, a few drops of which
seemed to trickle down his lips and be licked back at intervals
behind a thickly ringed hand.
    "Miss Manford? Bet she does! Come along, Nona; shed your togs and
let's show Mr. Klawhammer here present that Lita's not the only
peb—"
    "Gracious! Wait till I get into the saddle!" screamed Miss Keiler,
tiny hands like blueish mice darting out at the keyboard from the
end of her bludgeon arms.
    Nona perched herself on the edge of a refectory table. "Thanks.
I'm not a candidate for 'Herodias.' My sister–in–law is sure to
turn up in a minute."
    Even Mrs. Dexter Manford's perfectly run house was not a
particularly appetizing place to return to at four o'clock on the
morning after a dance. The last motor was gone, the last overcoat
and opera cloak had vanished from hall and dressing–rooms, and only
one hanging lamp lit the dusky tapestries and the monumental
balustrade of the staircase. But empty cocktail glasses and
ravaged cigar–boxes littered the hall tables, wisps of torn tulle
and trampled orchids strewed the stair–carpet, and the thicket of
forced lilacs and Japanese plums in front of the lift drooped
mournfully in the hot air. Nona, letting herself in with her latch–
key, scanned the scene with a feeling of disgust. What was it all
for, and what was left when it was over? Only a huge clearing–up
for Maisie and the servants, and a new list to make out for the
next time… She remembered mild spring nights at Cedarledge,
when she was a little girl, and she and Jim used to slip downstairs
in stocking feet, go to the lake, loose the canoe, and drift on a
silver path among islets fringed with budding dogwood. She hurried
on past the desecrated shrubs.
    Above, the house was dark but for a line of light under the library
door. Funny—at that hour; her father must still be up. Very
likely he too had just