The other consequences were abnormal, becoming social and political, and followed him to the end of his career.
Valentine was not a man to be smudged out of the picture. He was a person of power and influence. The loss of his historic position was of no pecuniary moment, for he was very rich; it was a blow at his prestige and a hurt to his pride, inflicted in the limelight. His grievance against Galt was irredressible. Honestly, too, he believed Galt to be a dangerous man. But he was a fair fighter within the rules and would perhaps never himself have carried the warfare outside of Wall Street where it belonged.
Mrs. Valentine was the one to do that. She was the social tyrant of her time, ruling by fear and might that little herd of human beings who practice self-worship and exclusion as a mysterious rite, import and invent manners, learn the supercilious gesture which means “One does not know them,” and in short get the goat of vulgus. Her favor was the one magic passport to the inner realm of New York society. Her disfavor was a writ of execution. She was a turbulent woman, whose tongue knew no inhibitions. Whom she liked she terrified; whom she disliked she sacrificed.
Now she took up the fight in two dimensions. Galt she slandered outrageously, implanting distrust of him in the minds of men who would carry it far and high,--to the Senate, even to the heart of the Administration. Then as you would expect, from her position as social dictator she struck at the Galt women. That was easy. With one word she cast them into limbo.
Mrs. Galt had inalienable rights of caste. She belonged to a family that had been of the elect for three generations. Her aunt once held the position now occupied by Mrs. Valentine. Galt’s family, though not at all distinguished, was yet quite acceptable. Marriage therefore did not alter Mrs. Galt’s social status. She had voluntarily relinquished it, without prejudice, under pressure of forbidding circumstances. These were a lack of wealth, a chronic sense of insecurity and Galt’s unfortunate temperament.
Gradually she sank into social obscurity, morose and embittered. She made no effort to introduce her daughters into the society she had forsaken; and as she was unwilling for them to move on a lower plane the result was that they were nurtured in exile.