The orchestra and the caterer were brought from away, in the Amberson
manner, though this was really a gesture--perhaps one more of habit
than of ostentation--for servitors of gaiety as proficient as these
importations were nowadays to be found in the town. Even flowers and
plants and roped vines were brought from afar--not, however, until the
stock of the local florists proved insufficient to obliterate the
interior structure of the big house, in the Amberson way. It was the
last of the great, long remembered dances that "everybody talked
about"--there were getting to be so many people in town that no later
than the next year there were too many for "everybody" to hear of even
such a ball as the Ambersons'.

George, white-gloved, with a gardenia in his buttonhole, stood with
his mother and the Major, embowered in the big red and gold drawing
room downstairs, to "receive" the guests; and, standing thus together,
the trio offered a picturesque example of good looks persistent
through three generations. The Major, his daughter, and his grandson
were of a type all Amberson: tall, straight, and regular, with dark
eyes, short noses, good chins; and the grandfather's expression, no
less than the grandson's, was one of faintly amused condescension.
There was a difference, however. The grandson's unlined young face
had nothing to offer except this condescension; the grandfather's had
other things to say. It was a handsome, worldly old face, conscious
of its importance, but persuasive rather than arrogant, and not
without tokens of sufferings withstood. The Major's short white hair
was parted in the middle, like his grandson's, and in all he stood as
briskly equipped to the fashion as exquisite young George.

Isabel, standing between her father and her son caused a vague
amazement in the mind of the latter. Her age, just under forty, was