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In the life he had come from Comus had been accustomed to think of individuals as definite masterful personalities , making their several marks on the circumstances that revolved around them ; they did well or ill , or in most cases indifferently , and were criticised , praised , blamed , thwarted or tolerated , or given way to . Whether or not they are injured is another thing . So when had they had the conversation to which he now referred ? This particular ball spanned all age groups : Park Avenue dowagers bought their thousand-dollar tickets and invited their granddaughters , who took the afternoon off from Spence or Brearley or Dalton to get their hair done . She had n't planned to attend and had n't been invited , but a group of nice girls from her dormitory had convinced her to come along with them . Thirty-eight people had been killed , 16 injured . Upon her fifteenth birthday , she was invited to join in her parents ' soirees , to hear firsthand the intellectual debate , and to add her own opinions so long as she 'd thought them through . The name of a shop , of a street , the address of a restaurant , came to him as a bitter reminder of the world he had lost , a world that ate and drank and flirted , gambled and made merry , a world that debated and intrigued and wire-pulled , fought or compromised political battles - and recked nothing of its outcasts wandering through forest paths and steamy swamps or lying in the grip of fever .