ABSTRACT
Edwin Dodge had flowed out of her life when so much else flowed in, leaving her free on weekday afternoons to be at home to assorted guests, among them always [Carl] Van Vechten and Hutchins Hapgood, her two most faithful friends. But one afternoon Lincoln Steffens appeared and, astonishingly, no one else. The brisk, steel-like little man with bangs enjoyed a cup of tea before the glowing fire in the white marble fireplace. Then, taking advantage of his rare good fortune in finding his hostess alone, he began to study her through his rimless spectacles. “You have a certain faculty,” he said. “It's a centralizing, magnetic, social faculty. You attract, stimulate, and soothe people, and men like to sit with you and talk to themselves! You make them think more fluently, and they feel enhanced…. Now why don't you see what you can do with this gift of yours? Why not organize all this accidental, unplanned activity around you, this coming and going of visitors, and see these people at certain hours. Have Evenings!”
