Not that he was a prig. He was what is known as a "regular fellow" in want of a better, or worse, word. Good-humored, good-natured, easy-going, generous, he had the gift of spreading about him a wave of happiness and joy.
So it was not altogether because of his rapidly growing bank account in the Old National that he was elected a member of the Club and invited to the best houses, both of proud Seventh Avenue and the more humble North side—the eternal North side of every Western town.
Of course mothers, mothers with daughters of marriageable age, that is, are the same the world over, and since Tom Graves was clean and straight and decent besides being well-to-do, the coming Spokane season was destined to witness a tug of war with Tom as the matrimonial prize; Mrs. Ryan clucking triumphantly when Tom danced the first one-step with Virginia Ryan, Mrs, Plournoy marking down a trick in her favor when the young Westerner led her daughter Cecily to the supper table.
But Tom was blind to all this byplay.
His heart was entirely taken up with Bertha Wedekind.
Dearer she was to him than the dwelling of kings, and, although even in his range days he had always been slightly dandyish, it was for her rather than for himself that gradually he abandoned the more pronounced horse-wrangling mode of dress and appeared in the streets, the restaurants, and the salons of Spokane in the garb of effete civilization—with a few notable exceptions. For he still remained faithful to his floppy, leather-encircled, alkali-stained stetson. He still refused resolutely to wear either vest or gloves.
