IX
PRELUDE
Even the most delightful vacation following a death in the family must end, and after two months Dorothy and her mother terminated their two weeks’ visit to Atlantic City. There had been talk of a trip to Europe, but Uncle Elliott had vetoed the plan. Dorothy was ready for her début. A year in Europe would postpone this important event. Dorothy was prepared to begin her professional career. A year in Europe would find her stale. There is no time like the present. Do it now!
Dorothy abandoned heavy mourning apparel on her return from the city of too little trouble, but her mother preferred to retain the emblems of bereavement. Samuel Charles Loamford was fading quickly. He was already a fairly well-established tradition. Dorothy rarely mentioned him, and her mother brought him into conversation in only one way: “As I used to tell my poor dear husband.”
It was late in September that Dorothy rummaged through her desk for the address of the Underwood Concert Corporation. The bureau was in a great office building in the early forties near Fifth Avenue. It was an edifice seemingly dedicated to concert managements. The doors to most of these establishments were almost always ajar, and the voyager in the corridors had only to peep within to see enormous lithographs of most of the popular artists of the day. Surrounded by half a dozen rival agencies was the Underwood Concert Corporation, Saul Maxwell, Mgr.
Mrs. Loamford had made an appointment with Mr.
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