The Financier a novel by Theodore Dreiser

particularly the children, for both afternoon and evening, since Cowperwood 
was personally attracted to Aileen and despite the fact that the presence of 
the parents would be most unsatisfactory. Even Aileen as he knew was a 
little unsatisfactory to Anna and Mrs. Frank Cowperwood; and these two, 
when they were together supervising the list of invitations, often talked 
about it. 
"She's so hoidenish," observed Anna, to her sister-in-law, when they came to 
the name of Aileen. "She thinks she knows so much, and she isn't a bit 
refined. Her father! Well, if I had her father I wouldn't talk so smart." 
Mrs. Cowperwood, who was before her secretaire in her new boudoir, lifted 
her eyebrows. 
"You know, Anna, I sometimes wish that Frank's business did not compel 
me to have anything to do with them. Mrs. Butler is such a bore. She means 
well enough, but she doesn't know anything. And Aileen is too rough. She's 
too forward, I think. She comes over here and plays upon the piano, 
particularly when Frank's here. I wouldn't mind so much for myself, but I 
know it must annoy him. All her pieces are so noisy. She never plays 
anything really delicate and refined." 
"I don't like the way she dresses," observed Anna, sympathetically. "She gets 
herself up too conspicuously. Now, the other day I saw her out driving, and 
oh, dear! you should have seen her! She had on a crimson Zouave jacket 
heavily braided with black about the edges, and a turban with a huge 
crimson feather, and crimson ribbons reaching nearly to her waist. Imagine 
that kind of a hat to drive in. And her hands! You should have seen the way 
she held her hands—oh—just so—self-consciously. They were curved just 
so"—and she showed how. "She had on yellow gauntlets, and she held the 
reins in one hand and the whip in the other. She drives just like mad when 
she drives, anyhow, and William, the footman, was up behind her. You 
should just have seen her. Oh, dear! oh, dear! she does think she is so 
much!" And Anna giggled, half in reproach, half in amusement. 
"I suppose we'll have to invite her; I don't see how we can get out of it. I 
know just how she'll do, though. She'll walk about and pose and hold her 
nose up." 

---

"Really, I don't see how she can," commented Anna. "Now, I like Norah. 
She's much nicer. She doesn't think she's so much." 
"I like Norah, too," added Mrs. Cowperwood. "She's really very sweet, and to 
me she's prettier." 
"Oh, indeed, I think so, too." 
It was curious, though, that it was Aileen who commanded nearly all their 
attention and fixed their minds on her so-called idiosyncrasies. All they said 
was in its peculiar way true; but in addition the girl was really beautiful and 
much above the average intelligence and force. She was running deep with 
ambition, and she was all the more conspicuous, and in a way irritating to 
some, because she reflected in her own consciousness her social defects, 
against which she was inwardly fighting. She resented the fact that people 
could justly consider her parents ineligible, and for that reason her also. She 
was intrinsically as worth while as any one. Cowperwood, so able, and 
rapidly becoming so distinguished, seemed to realize it. The days that had 
been passing had brought them somewhat closer together in spirit. He was 
nice to her and liked to talk to her. Whenever he was at her home now, or 
she was at his and he was present, he managed somehow to say a word. He 
would come over quite near and look at her in a warm friendly fashion. 
"Well, Aileen"—she could see his genial eyes—"how is it with you? How are 
your father and mother? Been out driving? That's fine. I saw you to-day. You 
looked beautiful." 
"Oh, Mr. Cowperwood!" 
"You did. You looked stunning. A black riding-habit becomes you. I can tell 
your gold hair a long way off." 
"Oh, now, you mustn't say that to me. You'll make me vain. My mother and 
father tell me I'm too vain as it is." 
"Never mind your mother and father. I say you looked stunning, and you 
did. You always do." 
"Oh!" 
She gave a little gasp of delight. The color mounted to her cheeks and 
temples. Mr. Cowperwood knew of course. He was so informed and intensely 
forceful. And already he was so much admired by so many, her own father 
and mother included, and by Mr. Mollenhauer and Mr. Simpson, so she 
heard. And his own home and office were so beautiful. Besides, his quiet 
intensity matched her restless force. 
Aileen and her sister were accordingly invited to the reception but the 
Butlers mere and pere were given to understand, in as tactful a manner as 
possible, that the dance afterward was principally for young people. 

---

The reception brought a throng of people. There were many, very many, 
introductions. There were tactful descriptions of little effects Mr. Ellsworth 
had achieved under rather trying circumstances; walks under the pergola; 
viewings of both homes in detail. Many of the guests were old friends. They 
gathered in the libraries and dining-rooms and talked. There was much 
jesting, some slappings of shoulders, some good story-telling, and so the 
afternoon waned into evening, and they went away. 
Aileen had created an impression in a street costume of dark blue silk with 
velvet pelisse to match, and trimmed with elaborate pleatings and shirrings 
of the same materials. A toque of blue velvet, with high crown and one large 
dark-red imitation orchid, had given her a jaunty, dashing air. Beneath the 
toque her red-gold hair was arranged in an enormous chignon, with one 
long curl escaping over her collar. She was not exactly as daring as she 
seemed, but she loved to give that impression. 
"You look wonderful," Cowperwood said as she passed him. 
"I'll look different to-night," was her answer. 
She had swung herself with a slight, swaggering stride into the dining-room 
and disappeared. Norah and her mother stayed to chat with Mrs. 
Cowperwood. 
"Well, it's lovely now, isn't it?" breathed Mrs. Butler. "Sure you'll be happy 
here. Sure you will. When Eddie fixed the house we're in now, says I: 'Eddie, 
it's almost too fine for us altogether—surely it is,' and he says, says 'e, 
'Norah, nothin' this side o' heavin or beyond is too good for ye'—and he 
kissed me. Now what d'ye think of that fer a big, hulkin' gossoon?" 
"It's perfectly lovely, I think, Mrs. Butler," commented Mrs. Cowperwood, a 
little bit nervous because of others. 
"Mama does love to talk so. Come on, mama. Let's look at the dining-room." 
It was Norah talking. 
"Well, may ye always be happy in it. I wish ye that. I've always been happy 
in mine. May ye always be happy." And she waddled good-naturedly along. 
The Cowperwood family dined hastily alone between seven and eight. At 
nine the evening guests began to arrive, and now the throng was of a 
different complexion—girls in mauve and cream-white and salmon-pink and 
silver-gray, laying aside lace shawls and loose dolmans, and the men in 
smooth black helping them. Outside in the cold, the carriage doors were 
slamming, and new guests were arriving constantly. Mrs. Cowperwood stood 
with her husband and Anna in the main entrance to the reception room, 
while Joseph and Edward Cowperwood and Mr. and Mrs. Henry W. 
Cowperwood lingered in the background. Lillian looked charming in a train 

---

gown of old rose, with a low, square neck showing a delicate chemisette of 
fine lace. Her face and figure were still notable, though her face was not as 
smoothly sweet as it had been years before when Cowperwood had first met 
her. Anna Cowperwood was not pretty, though she could not be said to be 
homely. She was small and dark, with a turned-up nose, snapping black 
eyes, a pert, inquisitive, intelligent, and alas, somewhat critical, air. She had 
considerable tact in the matter of dressing. Black, in spite of her darkness, 
with shining beads of sequins on it, helped her complexion greatly, as did a 
red rose in her hair. She had smooth, white well-rounded arms and 
shoulders. Bright eyes, a pert manner, clever remarks—these assisted to 
create an illusion of charm, though, as she often said, it was of little use. 
"Men want the dolly things." 
In the evening inpour of young men and women came Aileen and Norah, the 
former throwing off a thin net veil of black lace and a dolman of black silk, 
which her brother Owen took from her. Norah was with Callum, a straight, 
erect, smiling young Irishman, who looked as though he might carve a 
notable career for himself. She wore a short, girlish dress that came to a 
little below her shoe-tops, a pale-figured lavender and white silk, with a 
fluffy hoop-skirt of dainty laced-edged ruffles, against which tiny bows of 
lavender stood out in odd places. There was a great sash of lavender about 
her waist, and in her hair a rosette of the same color. She looked 
exceedingly winsome—eager and bright-eyed. 
But behind her was her sister in ravishing black satin, scaled as a fish with 
glistening crimsoned-silver sequins, her round, smooth arms bare to the 
shoulders, her corsage cut as low in the front and back as her daring, in 
relation to her sense of the proprieties, permitted. She was naturally of 
exquisite figure, erect, full-breasted, with somewhat more than gently 
swelling hips, which, nevertheless, melted into lovely, harmonious lines; and 
this low-cut corsage, receding back and front into a deep V, above a short, 
gracefully draped overskirt of black tulle and silver tissue, set her off to 
perfection. Her full, smooth, roundly modeled neck was enhanced in its 
cream-pink whiteness by an inch-wide necklet of black jet cut in many 
faceted black squares. Her complexion, naturally high in tone because of the 
pink of health, was enhanced by the tiniest speck of black court-plaster laid 
upon her cheekbone; and her hair, heightened in its reddish-gold by her 
dress, was fluffed loosely and adroitly about her eyes. The main mass of this 
treasure was done in two loose braids caught up in a black spangled net at 
the back of her neck; and her eyebrows had been emphasized by a pencil 
into something almost as significant as her hair. She was, for the occasion, 
a little too emphatic, perhaps, and yet more because of her burning vitality 
than of her costume. Art for her should have meant subduing her physical 
and spiritual significance. Life for her meant emphasizing them. 

---

"Lillian!" Anna nudged her sister-in-law. She was grieved to think that Aileen 
was wearing black and looked so much better than either of them. 
"I see," Lillian replied, in a subdued tone. 
"So you're back again." She was addressing Aileen. "It's chilly out, isn't it?" 
"I don't mind. Don't the rooms look lovely?" 
She was gazing at the softly lighted chambers and the throng before her. 
Norah began to babble to Anna. "You know, I just thought I never would get 
this old thing on." She was speaking of her dress. "Aileen wouldn't help me—
the mean thing!" 
Aileen had swept on to Cowperwood and his mother, who was near him. She 
had removed from her arm the black satin ribbon which held her train and 
kicked the skirts loose and free. Her eyes gleamed almost pleadingly for all 
her hauteur, like a spirited collie's, and her even teeth showed beautifully. 
Cowperwood understood her precisely, as he did any fine, spirited animal. 
"I can't tell you how nice you look," he whispered to her, familiarly, as 
though there was an old understanding between them. "You're like fire and 
song." 
He did not know why he said this. He was not especially poetic. He had not 
formulated the phrase beforehand. Since his first glimpse of her in the hall, 
his feelings and ideas had been leaping and plunging like spirited horses. 
This girl made him set his teeth and narrow his eyes. Involuntarily he 
squared his jaw, looking more defiant, forceful, efficient, as she drew near. 
But Aileen and her sister were almost instantly surrounded by young men 
seeking to be introduced and to write their names on dance-cards, and for 
the time being she was lost to view.