enemy to youth; solitude its destruction.

When the twins were fifteen they went to their first party. A week of
superficial self-restraint and inward delirium was their preparation, a
brief hour of passive bewilderment the realisation. Dazed by the sight
and touch and clamor of the throng, they moved and spoke as in a vision.
The presence of their own kind in such numbers confused them;
overwhelmed, they found no voices to answer the call of happiness. Their
capacity to respond was too limited.

As in a dream they were removed earlier than anybody else--taken away by
a footman and a maid with decorous pomp and circumstance, carefully
muffled in motor robes, and embedded in a limousine.

The daily papers, with that lofty purpose which always characterises
them, recorded next morning the important fact that the famous Seagrave
twins had appeared at their first party.

* * * * *

Between the ages of fifteen and sixteen the twins might have entered
Harvard, for the entrance examinations were tried on both children, and
both passed brilliantly.

For a year or two they found a substitute for happiness in pretending
that they were really at college; they simulated, day by day, the life
that they supposed was led there; they became devoted to their new game.
Excited through tales told by tutor and friend, they developed a
passionate loyalty for their college and class; they were solemnly
elected to coveted societies, they witnessed Harvard victories, they