nights and the saxophone-player of the reigning orchestra intermittently croons into a microphone, beginning at nine. It is the Mark Hopkins, most frivolous of the local hotels; “the Mark” to the younger crowd. At dinnerdances lights are dimmed in the main dining-room and through its arched windows the ghostly roofs of the city grow visible. The dancers move in viscous rhythm, the music blares and throbs, youths in pairs slither in from the bar, merge in the gloom, and the mass of undulating bodies swallows them up. “The Mark.” Perhaps it is well that Uncle Mark is safe in the little marble
...more
