Last and by no means least, with her eyes devouring every expression that flitted across the new arrival's face, there beamed out beside Miss Ann, a tail, willowy young person, whom Fred, in answer to an inquiring lifting of Oliver's eyebrows, designated as the belle of the house. This engaging young woman really lived with her mother, in the next street, but flitted in and out, dining, or breakfasting, or spending a week at a time with her aunts, the Misses Teetum, whenever an opportunity offered--the opportunity being a vacant and non-paying room, one of which she was at the time enjoying.
This fair damsel, who was known to the boarders on the top floor as "our Phemy," and to the world at large as Miss Euphemia Teetum--the real jewel in her name was Phoebe, but she had reset it--had been especially beloved, so Fred informed Oliver, by every member of the club except Waller, who, having lived in boarding-houses all his life, understood her thoroughly. Her last flame--the fire was still smouldering --had been the immaculate Tomlins, who had won her heart by going into raptures, in one of his stage whispers, over the classic outlines of her face.
This outburst resulted in Miss Euphemia appearing the following week in a silk gown, a Greek fillet and no hoops--a costume which Waller faithfully portrayed on the side-wall of the attic the night of her appearance--the fillet being reproduced by a strip of brass which the artist had torn from his easel and nailed to the plaster, and the classic curves of her hair by a ripple of brown paint.
This caricature nearly provoked a riot before the night was over, the whole club, including even the fun-loving McFudd, denouncing. Waller's act as an outrage. In fact, the Hibernian himself had once been so completely taken off his feet--it was the first week of his stay--by the winning ways of the young lady, that Miss Ann had begun to have high hopes of Euphemia's being finally installed mistress in one of those shadowy estates which the distinguished Hibernian described with such eloquence. That these hopes did not materialize was entirely due to Cockburn, who took pains to enlighten the good woman upon the intangible character of the Hibernian's possessions, thus saving the innocent maiden from the clutches of the bold, bad adventurer. At least, that had been Cockburn's account of it when he came upstairs.
But it was at dinner that same night--for Oliver at Fred's pressing invitation had come back to dinner --that the full galaxy of guests and regulars burst upon our hero. Then came not only Miss Euphemia Teetum in a costume especially selected for Oliver's capture, but a person still more startling and imposing --so imposing, in fact, that when she entered the room one-half of the gentlemen present made little backward movements with the legs of their chairs, as if intending to rise to their feet in honor of her presence.
This prominent figure in fashionable life, who had now settled herself on the right of Miss Ann--the post of honor at the table--and who was smiling in so gracious and condescending a manner as her eye lighted on the several recipients of her favor, was none other than the distinguished Mrs. Schuyler Van Tassell, of Tarrytown, another bird of passage, who had left her country-seat on the Hudson to spend the winter months in what she called the delights of "upper-tandem." She belonged to an ancient family--or, at least, her husband did--he was under the sod, poor soul, and therefore at peace--and, having inherited his estate--a considerable one--was to be treated with every distinction.
These several personages of low and high degree interested our young gentleman quite as much as our young gentleman interested them. He made friends with them all--especially with the ladies, who all agreed that he was a most charming and accomplished youth. This good opinion became permanent when Oliver had paid each in turn the compliment of rising from his seat when any one of them entered the room, as much a habit with the young fellow as the taking off of his hat when he came into a house, but which was so rare a courtesy at Miss Teetum's that each recipient appropriated the compliment as personal to herself.
These sentiments of admiration were shared, and to an alarming degree, by Miss Euphemia herself, who, on learning later that Oliver had decided to occupy half of Fred's room through the winter, had at once determined to remain during the week, the better to lay siege to his heart. This resolution, it is fair to Oliver to say, she abandoned before dinner was over, when her experienced eye detected a certain amused if not derisive smile playing around the corners of Oliver's mouth; a discovery which so impressed the young woman that she left him severely alone ever after.
And so it was that Oliver unpacked his trunk--the same old hair trunk, studded with brass nails, that had held his father's wardrobe at college--spread out and tacked up the various knick-knacks which his mother and Sue and Miss Clendenning had given him when he had left the old home, and began to make himself comfortable on the top floor of Miss Teetum's boarding-house on Union Square.
