CHAPTER FOURTEEN
I must do Cousin Egbert the justice to say that he showed a due sense ofhis responsibility in meeting the Honourable George. By general consentthe honour had seemed to fall to him, both the Belknap-Jacksons and Mrs.Effie rather timidly conceding his claim that the distinguished guestwould prefer it so. Indeed, Cousin Egbert had been loudly arrogant inthe matter, speaking largely of his European intimacy with the "Judge"until, as he confided to me, he "had them all bisoned," or, I believe,"buffaloed" is the term he used, referring to the big-game animal thathas been swept from the American savannahs.
At all events no one further questioned his right to be at the stationwhen the Honourable George arrived, and for the first time almostsince his own homecoming he got himself up with some attention todetail. If left to himself I dare say he would have donned frock-coatand top-hat, but at my suggestion he chose his smartest lounge-suit,and I took pains to see that the minor details of hat, boots, hose,gloves, etc., were studiously correct without being at all assertive.
For my own part, I was also at some pains with my attire goingconsciously a bit further with details than Cousin Egbert, thinking itbest the Honourable George should at once observe a change in mybearing and social consequence so that nothing in his manner toward memight embarrassingly publish our former relations. The stick, gloves,and monocle would achieve this for the moment, and once alone I meantto tell him straight that all was over between us as master and man,we having passed out of each other's lives in that respect. Ifnecessary, I meant to read to him certain passages from the so-called"Declaration of Independence," and to show him the fateful little cardI had found, which would acquaint him, I made no doubt, with the greatchange that had come upon me, after which our intimacy would restsolely upon the mutual esteem which I knew to exist between us. I meanto say, it would never have done for one moment at home, but findingourselves together in this wild and lawless country we would neitherof us try to resist America, but face each other as one equal nativeto another.
Waiting on the station platform with Cousin Egbert, he confided to theloungers there that he was come to meet his friend Judge Basingwell,whereat all betrayed a friendly interest, though they were not at allpersons that mattered, being of the semi-leisured class who each daywent down, as they put it, "to see Number Six go through." There wasthus a rather tense air of expectancy when the train pulled in. Fromone of the Pullman night coaches emerged the Honourable George,preceded by a blackamoor or raccoon bearing bags and bundles, andfollowed by another uniformed raccoon and a white guard, also bearingbags and bundles, and all betraying a marked anxiety.
One glance at the Honourable George served to confirm certain fears Ihad suffered regarding his appearance. Topped by a deer-stalkingfore-and-aft cap in an inferior state of preservation, he wore thejacket of a lounge-suit, once possible, doubtless, but now demoded,and a blazered golfing waistcoat, striking for its poisonous greens,trousers from an outing suit that I myself had discarded after it cameto me, and boots of an entirely shocking character. Of his cravat Ihave not the heart to speak, but I may mention that all his garmentswere quite horrid with wrinkles and seemed to have been slept inrepeatedly.
Cousin Egbert at once rushed forward to greet his guest, while Ibusied myself in receiving the hand-luggage, wishing to have our guesteffaced from the scene and secluded, with all possible speed. Therewere three battered handbags, two rolls of travelling rugs, astick-case, a dispatch-case, a pair of binoculars, a hat-box, atop-coat, a storm-coat, a portfolio of correspondence materials, acamera, a medicine-case, some of these lacking either strap or handle.The attendants all emitted hearty sighs of relief when these articleshad been deposited upon the platform. Without being told, I divinedthat the Honourable George had greatly worried them during the longjourney with his fretful demands for service, and I tipped themhandsomely while he was still engaged with Cousin Egbert and thelatter's station-lounging friends to whom he was being presented. Atlast, observing me, he came forward, but halted on surveying theluggage, and screamed hoarsely to the last attendant who was nowboarding the train. The latter vanished, but reappeared, as the trainmoved off, with two more articles, a vacuum night-flask and a tin ofcharcoal biscuits, the absence of which had been swiftly detected bytheir owner.
It was at that moment that one of the loungers nearby made a peculiarobservation. "Gee!" said he to a native beside him, "it must take anawful lot of trouble to be an Englishman." At the moment this seemedto me to be pregnant with meaning, though doubtless it was because Ihad so long been a resident of the North American wilds.
Again the Honourable George approached me and grasped my hand beforecertain details of my attire and, I fancy, a certain change in mybearing, attracted his notice. Perhaps it was the single glass. Hisgrasp of my hand relaxed and he rubbed his eyes as if dazed from ablow, but I was able to carry the situation off quite nicely undercover of the confusion attending his many bags and bundles, beinghelped also at the moment by the deeply humiliating discovery of acertain omission from his attire. I could not at first believe my eyesand was obliged to look again and again, but there could be no doubtabout it: the Honourable George was wearing a single spat!
I cried out at this, pointing, I fancy, in a most undignified manner,so terrific had been the shock of it, and what was my amazement tohear him say: "But I _had_ only one, you silly! How could I wear'em both when the other was lost in that bally rabbit-hutch they putme in on shipboard? No bigger than a parcels-lift!" And he had tooplainly crossed North America in this shocking state! Glad I was thenthat Belknap-Jackson was not present. The others, I dare say,considered it a mere freak of fashion. As quickly as I could, Ihustled him into the waiting carriage, piling his luggage about him tothe best advantage and hurrying Cousin Egbert after him as rapidly asI could, though the latter, as on the occasion of my own arrival,halted our departure long enough to present the Honourable George tothe driver.
"Judge, shake hands with my friend Eddie Pierce." adding as theceremony was performed, "Eddie keeps a good team, any time you want ahack-ride."
"Sure, Judge," remarked the driver cordially. "Just call up Main 224,any time. Any friend of Sour-dough's can have anything they want nightor day." Whereupon he climbed to his box and we at last drove away.
The Honourable George had continued from the moment of our meeting toglance at me in a peculiar, side-long fashion. He seemed fascinatedand yet unequal to a straight look at me. He was undoubtedly dazed, asI could discern from his absent manner of opening the tin of charcoalbiscuits and munching one. I mean to say, it was too obviously a meremechanical impulse.
"I say," he remarked to Cousin Egbert, who was beaming fondly at him,"how strange it all is! It's quite foreign."
"The fastest-growing little town in the State," said Cousin Egbert.
"But what makes it grow so silly fast?" demanded the other.
"Enterprise and industries," answered Cousin Egbert loftily.
"Nothing to make a dust about," remarked the Honourable George,staring glassily at the main business thoroughfare. "I've seen largertowns--scores of them."
"You ain't begun to see this town yet," responded Cousin Egbertloyally, and he called to the driver, "Has he, Eddie?"
"Sure, he ain't!" said the driver person genially. "Wait till he seesthe new waterworks and the sash-and-blind factory!"
"Is he one of your gentleman drivers?" demanded the Honourable George."And why a blind factory?"
"Oh, Eddie's good people all right," answered the other, "and thefactory turns out blinds and things."
"Why turn them out?" he left this and continued: "He's like thatAmerican Johnny in London that drives his own coach to Brighton, yes?Ripping idea! Gentleman driver. But I say, you know, I'll sit on thebox with him. Pull up a bit, old son!"
To my consternation the driver chap halted, and before I couldremonstrate the Honourable George had mounted to the box beside him.Thankful I was we had left the main street, though in the residenceavenue where the ch
ange was made we attracted far more attention thanwas desirable. "Didn't I tell you he was some mixer?" demanded CousinEgbert of me, but I was too sickened to make any suitable response.The Honourable George's possession of a single spat was now flaunted,as it were, in the face of Red Gap's best families.
"How foreign it all is!" he repeated, turning back to us, yet withonly his side-glance for me. "But the American Johnny in London had amuch smarter coach than this, and better animals, too. You're not upto his class yet, old thing!"
"That dish-faced pinto on the off side," remarked the driver, "canoutrun anything in this town for fun, money, or marbles."
"Marbles!" called the Honourable George to us; "why marbles? Sillythings! It's all bally strange! And why do your villagers stare so?"
"Some little mixer, all right, all right," murmured Cousin Egbert in asort of ecstasy, as we drew up at the Floud home. "And yet one of themguys back there called him a typical Britisher. You bet I shut him upquick--saying a thing like that about a plumb stranger. I'd 'a' mixedit with him right there except I thought it was better to have thingsnice and not start something the minute the Judge got here."
With all possible speed I hurried the party indoors, for already faceswere appearing at the windows of neighbouring houses. Mrs. Effie, whomet us, allowed her glare at Cousin Egbert, I fancy, to affect thecordiality of her greeting to the Honourable George; at least sheseemed to be quite as dazed as he, and there was a moment ofconstraint before he went on up to the room that had been prepared forhim. Once safely within the room I contrived a moment alone with himand removed his single spat, not too gently, I fear, for the nervousstrain since his arrival had told upon me.
"You have reason to be thankful," I said, "that Belknap-Jackson wasnot present to witness this."
"They cost seven and six," he muttered, regarding the one spatwistfully. "But why Belknap-Jackson?"
"Mr. C. Belknap-Jackson of Boston and Red Gap," I returned sternly."He does himself perfectly. To think he might have seen you in thisrowdyish state!" And I hastened to seek a presentable lounge-suit fromhis bags.
"Everything is so strange," he muttered again, quite helplessly. "Andwhy the mural decoration at the edge of the settlement? Why keep one'seye upon it? Why should they do such things? I say, it's all quitemonstrous, you know."
I saw that indeed he was quite done for with amazement, so I ran him abath and procured him a dish of tea. He rambled oddly at moments ofthings the guard on the night-coach had told him of North America, ofNiagara Falls, and Missouri and other objects of interest. He wasstill almost quite a bit dotty when I was obliged to leave him for anappointment with the raccoon and his wife to discuss the menu of myopening dinner, but Cousin Egbert, who had rejoined us, was listeningsympathetically. As I left, the two were pegging it from a bottle ofhunting sherry which the Honourable George had carried in hisdispatch-case. I was about to warn him that he would come out spotted,but instantly I saw that there must be an end to such surveillance. Icould not manage an enterprise of the magnitude of the United StatesGrill and yet have an eye to his meat and drink. I resolved to letspots come as they would.
On all hands I was now congratulated by members of the North Side setupon the master-stroke I had played in adding the Honourable George totheir number. Not only did it promise to reunite certain warringfactions in the North Side set itself, but it truly bade fair todisintegrate the Bohemian set. Belknap-Jackson wrung my hand thatafternoon, begging me to inform the Honourable George that he wouldcall on the morrow to pay his respects. Mrs. Judge Ballard besought meto engage him for an early dinner, and Mrs. Effie, it is needless tosay, after recovering from the shock of his arrival, which sheattributed to Cousin Egbert's want of taste, thanked me with a wealthof genuine emotion.
Only by slight degrees, then, did it fall to be noticed that theHonourable George did not hold himself to be too strictly bound by oursocial conventions as to whom one should be pally with. Thus, on themorrow, at the hour when the Belknap-Jacksons called, he wasregrettably absent on what Cousin Egbert called "a hack-ride" with thedriver person he had met the day before, nor did they return untilafter the callers had waited the better part of two hours. CousinEgbert, as usual, received the blame for this, yet neither of theBelknap-Jacksons nor Mrs. Effie dared to upbraid him.
Being presented to the callers, I am bound to say that the HonourableGeorge showed himself to be immensely impressed by Belknap-Jackson,whom I had never beheld more perfectly vogue in all his appointments.He became, in fact, rather moody in the presence of this subtleniceness of detail, being made conscious, I dare say, of his ownsloppy lounge-suit, rumpled cravat, and shocking boots, and despiteBelknap-Jackson's amiable efforts to draw him into talk about huntingin the shires and our county society at home, I began to fear thatthey would not hit it off together. The Honourable George did,however, consent to drive with his caller the following day, and Irelied upon the tandem to recall him to his better self. But when thecallers had departed he became quite almost plaintive to me.
"I say, you know, I shan't be wanted to pal up much with that chap,shall I? I mean to say, he wears so many clothes. They make me writheas if I wore them myself. It won't do, you know."
I told him very firmly that this was piffle of the most wretched sort.That his caller wore but the prescribed number of garments, each vogueto the last note, and that he was a person whom one must know. Heresponded pettishly that he vastly preferred the gentleman driver withwhom he had spent the afternoon, and "Sour-dough," as he was nowcalling Cousin Egbert.
"Jolly chaps, with no swank," he insisted. "We drove quite almosteverywhere--waterworks, cemetery, sash-and-blind factory. You know Ithought 'blind factory' was some of their bally American slang for theshop of a chap who made eyeglasses and that sort of thing, but nothingof the kind. They saw up timbers there quite all over the place andnail them up again into articles. It's all quite foreign."
Nor was his account of his drive with Belknap-Jackson the followingday a bit more reassuring.
"He wouldn't stop again at the sash-and-blind factory, where I wishedto see the timbers being sawed and nailed, but drove me to a countryclub which was not in the country and wasn't a club; not a humanthere, not even a barman. Fancy a club of that sort! But he took me tohis own house for a glass of sherry and a biscuit, and there it wasn'tso rotten. Rather a mother-in-law I think, she is--bally old boominggrenadier--topping sort--no end of fun. We palled up immensely and Iquite forgot the Jackson chap till it was time for him to drive meback to these diggings. Rather sulky he was, I fancy; uppish sort.Told him the old one was quite like old Caroline, dowager duchess ofClewe, but couldn't tell if it pleased him. Seemed to like it andseemed not to: rather uncertain.
"Asked him why the people of the settlement pronounced his name'Belknap Hyphen Jackson,' and that seemed to make him snarky again. Imean to say names with hyphen marks in 'em--I'd never heard the hyphenpronounced before, but everything is so strange. He said only thelowest classes did it as a form of coarse wit, and that he was wastinghimself here. Wouldn't stay another day if it were not for familyreasons. Queer sort of wheeze to say 'hyphen' in a chap's name as ifit were a word, when it wasn't at all. The old girl, though--bellowershe is--perfectly top-hole; familiar with cattle--all that sort ofthing. Sent away the chap's sherry and had 'em bring whiskey and soda.The hyphen chap fidgeted a good bit--nervous sort, I take it. Lookedthrough a score of magazines, I dare say, when he found we didn'tnotice him much; turned the leaves too fast to see anything, though;made noises and coughed--that sort of thing. Fine old girl. Daughter,hyphen chap's wife, tried to talk, too, some rot about the seasonbeing well on here, and was there a good deal of society in London,and would I be free for dinner on the ninth?
"Silly chatter! old girl talked sense: cattle, mines, timber, blindfactory, two-year olds, that kind of thing. Shall see her often. Notthe hyphen chap, though; too much like one of those Bond Streetmilliner-chap managers."
Vague misgivings here beset me as to the value of
the HonourableGeorge to the North Side set. Nor could I feel at all reassured on thefollowing day when Mrs. Effie held an afternoon reception in hishonour. That he should be unaware of the event's importance was to beexpected, for as yet I had been unable to get him to take the Red Gapsocial crisis seriously. At the hour when he should have been dressedand ready I found him playing at cribbage with Cousin Egbert in thelatter's apartment, and to my dismay he insisted upon finishing therubber although guests were already arriving.
Even when the game was done he flatly refused to dress suitably,declaring that his lounge-suit should be entirely acceptable to theserough frontier people, and he consented to go down at all only oncondition that Cousin Egbert would accompany him. Thereafter for anhour the two of them drank tea uncomfortably as often as it was giventhem, and while the Honourable George undoubtedly made his impression,I could not but regret that he had so few conversational graces.
How different, I reflected, had been my own entree into this countysociety! As well as I might I again carried off the day for theHonourable George, endeavouring from time to time to put him at hisease, yet he breathed an unfeigned sigh of relief when the last guesthad left and he could resume his cribbage with Cousin Egbert. But hehad received one impression of which I was glad: an impression of myown altered social quality, for I had graced the occasion with anurbanity which was as far beyond him as it must have been astonishing.It was now that he began to take seriously what I had told him of mybusiness enterprise, so many of the guests having mentioned it to himin terms of the utmost enthusiasm. After my first accounts to him hehad persisted in referring to it as a tuck-shop, a sort of place whereschoolboys would exchange their halfpence for toffy, sweet-cakes, andmarbles.
Now he demanded to be shown the premises and was at once dulyimpressed both with their quiet elegance and my own business acumen.How it had all come about, and why I should be addressed as "ColonelRuggles" and treated as a person of some importance in the community,I dare say he has never comprehended to this day. As I had planned todo, I later endeavoured to explain to him that in North Americapersons were almost quite equal to one another--being born so--but atthis he told me not to be silly and continued to regard my rise as aninsoluble part of the strangeness he everywhere encountered, evenafter I added that Demosthenes was the son of a cutler, that CardinalWolsey's father had been a pork butcher, and that Garfield had workedon a canal-boat. I found him quite hopeless. "Chaps go dotty talkin'that piffle," was his comment.
At another time, I dare say, I should have been rather distressed overthis inability of the Honourable George to comprehend and adapthimself to the peculiarities of American life as readily as I haddone, but just now I was quite too taken up with the details of myopening to give it the deeper consideration it deserved. In fact,there were moments when I confessed to myself that I did not caretuppence about it, such was the strain upon my executive faculties.When decorators and furnishers had done their work, when the choicecarpet was laid, when the kitchen and table equipments were completedto the last detail, and when the lighting was artistically correct,there was still the matter of service.
As to this, I conceived and carried out what I fancy was rather abrilliant stroke, which was nothing less than to eliminate the fellowHobbs as a social factor of even the Bohemian set. In contracting withhim for my bread and rolls, I took an early opportunity of setting thechap in his place, as indeed it was not difficult to do when he hadobserved the splendid scale on which I was operating. At our secondinterview he was removing his hat and addressing me as "sir."
While I have found that I can quite gracefully place myself on a levelwith the middle-class American, there is a serving type of our ownpeople to which I shall eternally feel superior; the Hobbs fellow wasof this sort, having undeniably the soul of a lackey. In addition tojobbing his bread and rolls, I engaged him as pantry man, and took onsuch members of his numerous family as were competent. His wife was toassist my raccoon cook in the kitchen, three of his sons were to serveas waiters, and his youngest, a lad in his teens, I installed asvestiare, garbing him in a smart uniform and posting him to relieve mygentleman patrons of their hats and top-coats. A daughter wassimilarly installed as maid, and the two achieved an effect ofsmartness unprecedented in Red Gap, an effect to which I am glad tosay that the community responded instantly.
In other establishments it was the custom for patrons to hang theirgarments on hat-pegs, often under a printed warning that theproprietor would disclaim responsibility in case of loss. In the oneknown as "Bert's Place" indeed the warning was positively vulgar:"Watch Your Overcoat." Of course that sort of coarseness would havebeen impossible in my own place.
As another important detail I had taken over from Mrs. Judson herstock of jellies and compotes which I had found to be of a mostexcellent character, and had ordered as much more as she could manageto produce, together with cut flowers from her garden for my tables.She, herself, being a young woman of the most pleasing capabilities,had done a bit of charring for me and was now to be in charge of theglassware, linen, and silver. I had found her, indeed, highlysympathetic with my highest aims, and not a few of her suggestions asto management proved to be entirely sound. Her unspeakable dogcontinued his quite objectionable advances to me at every opportunity,in spite of my hitting him about, rather, when I could do sounobserved, but the sinister interpretation that might be placed uponthis by the baser-minded was now happily answered by the circumstanceof her being in my employment. Her child, I regret to say, was stillgrossly overfed, seldom having its face free from jam or other smears.It persisted, moreover, in twisting my name into "Ruggums," which Ifound not a little embarrassing.
The night of my opening found me calmly awaiting the triumph that wasdue me. As some one has said of Napoleon, I had won my battle in mytent before the firing of a single shot. I mean to say, I had lookedso conscientiously after details, even to assuring myself that CousinEgbert and the Honourable George would appear in evening dress, mylast act having been to coerce each of them into purchasing varnishedboots, the former submitting meekly enough, though the HonourableGeorge insisted it was a silly fuss.
At seven o'clock, having devoted a final inspection to the kitchenwhere the female raccoon was well on with the dinner, and having notedthat the members of my staff were in their places, I gave a lastpleased survey of my dining-room, with its smartly equipped tables,flower-bedecked, gleaming in the softened light from my shadedcandlesticks. Truly it was a scene of refined elegance such as Red Gaphad never before witnessed within its own confines, and I had seen toit that the dinner as well would mark an epoch in the lives of thesesimple but worthy people.
Not a heavy nor a cloying repast would they find. Indeed, the baresimplicity of my menu, had it been previously disclosed, woulddoubtless have disappointed more than one of my dinner-givingpatronesses; but each item had been perfected to an extent neverachieved by them. Their weakness had ever been to serve a profusion ofneutral dishes, pleasing enough to the eye, but unedifying except as aspectacle. I mean to say, as food it was noncommittal; it failed tointrigue.
I should serve only a thin soup, a fish, small birds, two vegetables,a salad, a sweet and a savoury, but each item would prove worthy ofthe profoundest consideration. In the matter of thin soup, forexample, the local practice was to serve a fluid of which, beyond thecircumstance that it was warmish and slightly tinted, nothing ofinterest could ever be ascertained. My own thin soup would be arevelation to them. Again, in the matter of fish. This course with thehostesses of Red Gap had seemed to be merely an excuse for a pause. Ihad truly sympathized with Cousin Egbert's bitter complaint: "Theyhand you a dab of something about the size of a watch-charm with twostrings of potato."
For the first time, then, the fish course in Red Gap was to be anevent, an abundant portion of native fish with a lobster sauce which Ihad carried out to its highest power. My birds, hot from the oven,would be food in the strictest sense of the word, my vegetables cookedwith a zealous attention, and my sweet
immensely appealing withoutbeing pretentiously spectacular. And for what I believed to be quitethe first time in the town, good coffee would be served.Disheartening, indeed, had been the various attenuations of coffeewhich had been imposed upon me in my brief career as a diner-out amongthese people. Not one among them had possessed the genius to master anacceptable decoction of the berry, the bald simplicity of the correctformula being doubtless incredible to them.
The blare of a motor horn aroused me from this musing, and from thatmoment I had little time for meditation until the evening, as the_Journal_ recorded the next morning, "had gone down into history."My patrons arrived in groups, couples, or singly, almost faster thanI could seat them. The Hobbs lad, as vestiare, would halt them forhats and wraps, during which pause they would emit subdued cries ofsurprise and delight at my beautifully toned ensemble, after which,as they walked to their tables, it was not difficult to see that theywere properly impressed.
Mrs. Effie, escorted by the Honourable George and cousin Egbert, wasamong the early arrivals; the Senator being absent from town at asitting of the House. These were quickly followed by theBelknap-Jacksons and the Mixer, resplendent in purple satin anddiamonds, all being at one of my large tables, so that the HonourableGeorge sat between Mrs. Belknap-Jackson and Mrs. Effie, though he atfirst made a somewhat undignified essay to seat himself next theMixer. Needless to say, all were in evening dress, though theHonourable George had fumbled grossly with his cravat and rumpled hisshirt, nor had he submitted to having his beard trimmed, as I hadwarned him to do. As for Belknap-Jackson, I had never beheld him moretruly vogue in every detail, and his slightly austere manner in anyRed Gap gathering had never set him better. Both Mrs. Belknap-Jacksonand Mrs. Effie wielded their lorgnons upon the later comers, thusgiving their table quite an air.
Mrs. Judge Ballard, who had come to be one of my staunchest adherents,occupied an adjacent table with her family party and two or three ofthe younger dancing set. The Indian Tuttle with his wife and twodaughters were also among the early comers, and I could not but marvelanew at the red man's histrionic powers. In almost quite correctevening attire, and entirely decorous in speech and gesture, he mightreadily have been thought some one that mattered, had he not at anearly opportunity caught my eye and winked with a sly significance.
Quite almost every one of the North Side set was present, imparting tomy room a general air of distinguished smartness, and in additionthere were not a few of what Belknap-Jackson had called the "rabble,"persons of no social value, to be sure, but honest, well-manneredfolk, small tradesmen, shop-assistants, and the like. These plainpeople, I may say, I took especial pains to welcome and put at theirease, for I had resolved, in effect, to be one of them, after themanner prescribed by their Declaration thing.
With quite all of them I chatted easily a moment or two, expressingthe hope that they would be well pleased with their entertainment. Inoted while thus engaged that Belknap-Jackson eyed me with frank andsuperior cynicism, but this affected me quite not at all and I tookpains to point my indifference, chatting with increased urbanity withthe two cow-persons, Hank and Buck, who had entered ratheruncertainly, not in evening dress, to be sure, but in decent black asbefitted their stations. When I had prevailed upon them to surrendertheir hats to the vestiare and had seated them at a table for two,they informed me in hoarse undertones that they were prepared to "puta bet down on every card from soda to hock," so that I at firstsuspected they had thought me conducting a gaming establishment, butultimately gathered that they were merely expressing a cordialdetermination to enter into the spirit of the occasion.
There then entered, somewhat to my uneasiness, the Klondike woman andher party. Being almost the last, it will be understood that theycreated no little sensation as she led them down the thronged room toher table. She was wearing an evening gown of lustrous black with theapparently simple lines that are so baffling to any but the expertmaker, with a black picture hat that suited her no end. I saw morethan one matron of the North Side set stiffen in her seat, while Mrs.Belknap-Jackson and Mrs. Effie turned upon her the chilling broadsideof their lorgnons. Belknap-Jackson merely drew himself up austerely.The three other women of her party, flutterers rather, did little butset off their hostess. The four men were of a youngish sort, chaps inbanks, chemists' assistants, that sort of thing, who were constantlyto be seen in her train. They were especially reprobated by thematrons of the correct set by reason of their deliberately choosing toally themselves with the Bohemian set.
Acutely feeling the antagonism aroused by this group, I wasmomentarily discouraged in a design I had half formed of using myundoubted influence to unite the warring social factions of Red Gap,even as Bismarck had once brought the warring Prussian states togetherin a federated Germany. I began to see that the Klondike woman wouldforever prove unacceptable to the North Side set. The cliques wouldunite against her, even if one should find in her a spirit ofreconciliation, which I supremely doubted.
The bustle having in a measure subsided, I gave orders for the soup tobe served, at the same time turning the current into the electricpianoforte. I had wished for this opening number something attractiveyet dignified, which would in a manner of speaking symbolize anoccasion to me at least highly momentous. To this end I had chosenHandel's celebrated Largo, and at the first strains of this highlymeritorious composition I knew that I had chosen surely. I am sure thepiece was indelibly engraved upon the minds of those manydinner-givers who were for the first time in their lives realizingthat a thin soup may be made a thing to take seriously.
Nominally, I occupied a seat at the table with the Belknap-Jacksonsand Mrs. Effie, though I apprehended having to be more or less up anddown in the direction of my staff. Having now seated myself to soup, Iwas for the first time made aware of the curious behaviour of theHonourable George. Disregarding his own soup, which was of itselfunusual with him, he was staring straight ahead with a curiousintensity. A half turn of my head was enough. He sat facing theKlondike woman. As I again turned a bit I saw that under cover of heranimated converse with her table companions she was at intervalsallowing her very effective eyes to rest, as if absently, upon him. Imay say now that a curious chill seized me, bringing with it a suddenpsychic warning that all was not going to be as it should be. Somecalamity impended. The man was quite apparently fascinated, staringwith a fixed, hypnotic intensity that had already been noted by hiscompanions on either side.
With a word about the soup, shot quickly and directly at him, Imanaged to divert his gaze, but his eyes had returned even before thespoon had gone once to his lips. The second time there was a soupstain upon his already rumpled shirt front. Presently it became onlytoo horribly certain that the man was out of himself, for when thefish course was served he remained serenely unconscious that none ofthe lobster sauce accompanied his own portion. It was a rich sauce,and the almost immediate effect of shell-fish upon his complexionbeing only too well known to me, I had directed that his fish shouldbe served without it, though I had fully expected him to row me for itand perhaps create a scene. The circumstance of his blindly attackingthe unsauced fish was eloquent indeed.
The Belknap-Jacksons and Mrs. Effie were now plainly alarmed, andsomewhat feverishly sought to engage his attention, with the resultonly that he snapped monosyllables at them without removing his gazefrom its mark. And the woman was now too obviously pluming herselfupon the effect she had achieved; upon us all she flashed an amusedconsciousness of her power, yet with a fine affectation of quiteignoring us. I was here obliged to leave the table to oversee theserving of the wine, returning after an interval to find the situationunchanged, save that the woman no longer glanced at the HonourableGeorge. Such were her tactics. Having enmeshed him, she confidentlyleft him to complete his own undoing. I had returned with the servingof the small birds. Observing his own before him, the HonourableGeorge wished to be told why he had not been served with fish, andonly with difficulty could be convinced that he had partaken of this."Of course in public places one m
ust expect to come into contact withpersons of that sort," remarked Mrs. Effie.
"Something should be done about it," observed Mrs. Belknap-Jackson,and they both murmured "Creature!" though it was plain that theHonourable George had little notion to whom they referred. Observing,however, that the woman no longer glanced at him, he fell to his birdsomewhat whole-heartedly, as indeed did all my guests.
From every side I could hear eager approval of the repast which wasnow being supplemented at most of the tables by a sound wine of theBurgundy type which I had recommended or by a dry champagne. Meantime,the electric pianoforte played steadily through a repertoire that hadprogressed from the Largo to more vivacious pieces of the Americanfolkdance school. As was said in the press the following day, "Gayetyand good-feeling reigned supreme, and one and all felt that it wasindeed good to be there."
Through the sweet and the savoury the dinner progressed, the latterproving to be a novelty that the hostesses of Red Gap thereafterslavishly copied, and with the advent of the coffee ensued anoticeable relaxation. People began to visit one another's tables andthere was a blithe undercurrent of praise for my efforts to smartenthe town's public dining.
The Klondike woman, I fancy, was the first to light a cigarette,though quickly followed by the ladies of her party. Mrs.Belknap-Jackson and Mrs. Effie, after a period of futile glaring ather through the lorgnons, seemed to make their resolvessimultaneously, and forthwith themselves lighted cigarettes.
"Of course it's done in the smart English restaurants," murmuredBelknap-Jackson as he assisted the ladies to their lights. ThereuponMrs. Judge Ballard, farther down the room, began to smoke what Ibelieve was her first cigarette, which proved to be a signal for otherladies of the Onwards and Upwards Society to do the same, Mrs. Ballardbeing their president. It occurred to me that these ladies were grimlybent on showing the Klondike woman that they could trifle quite asgracefully as she with the lesser vices of Bohemia; or perhaps theywished to demonstrate to the younger dancing men in her train that theNorth Side set was not desolately austere in its recreation. TheHonourable George, I regret to say, produced a smelly pipe which hewould have lighted; but at a shocked and cold glance from me he put itby and allowed the Mixer to roll him one of the yellow papercigarettes from a sack of tobacco which she had produced from somesecret recess of her costume.
Cousin Egbert had been excitedly happy throughout the meal and nowpaid me a quaint compliment upon the food. "Some eats, Bill!" hecalled to me. "I got to hand it to you," though what precisely it washe wished to hand me I never ascertained, for the Mixer at that momentclaimed my attention with a compliment of her own. "That," said she,"is the only dinner I've eaten for a long time that was composedentirely of food."
This hour succeeding the repast I found quite entirely agreeable, morethan one person that mattered assuring me that I had assisted Red Gapto a notable advance in the finest and correctest sense of the word,and it was with a very definite regret that I beheld my guestsdeparting. Returning to our table from a group of these who had calledme to make their adieus, I saw that a most regrettable incident hadoccurred--nothing less than the formal presentation of the HonourableGeorge to the Klondike woman. And the Mixer had appallingly done it!
"Everything is so strange here," I heard him saying as I passed theirtable, and the woman echoed, "Everything!" while her glance envelopedhim with a curious effect of appraisal. The others of her party weremaking much of him, I could see, quite as if they had preposterousdesigns of wresting him from the North Side set to be one ofthemselves. Mrs. Belknap-Jackson and Mrs. Effie affected to ignore themeeting. Belknap-Jackson stared into vacancy with a quite shockedexpression as if vandals had desecrated an altar in his presence.Cousin Egbert having drawn off one of his newly purchased boots duringthe dinner was now replacing it with audible groans, but I caught hisjoyous comment a moment later: "Didn't I tell you the Judge was somemixer?"
"Mixing, indeed," snapped the ladies.
A half-hour later the historic evening had come to an end. The lastguest had departed, and all of my staff, save Mrs. Judson and her malechild. These I begged to escort to their home, since the way wasrather far and dark. The child, incautiously left in the kitchen atthe mercy of the female black, had with criminal stupidity beenstuffed with food, traces of almost every course of the dinner beingapparent upon its puffy countenance. Being now in a stupor fromoverfeeding, I was obliged to lug the thing over my shoulder. Iresolved to warn the mother at an early opportunity of the perils ofan unrestricted diet, although the deluded creature seemed actually toglory in its corpulence. I discovered when halfway to her residencethat the thing was still tightly clutching the gnawed thigh-bone of afowl which was spotting the shoulder of my smartest top-coat. Themother, however, was so ingenuously delighted with my success and sofull of prattle concerning my future triumphs that I forbore toinstruct her at this time. I may say that of all my staff she hadbetrayed the most intelligent understanding of my ideals, and I badeher good-night with a strong conviction that she would greatly assistme in the future. She also promised that Mr. Barker should thereafterbe locked in a cellar at such times as she was serving me.
Returning through the town, I heard strains of music from theestablishment known as "Bert's Place," and was shocked on staringthrough his show window to observe the Honourable George and CousinEgbert waltzing madly with the cow-persons, Hank and Buck, to thestrains of a mechanical piano. The Honourable George had exchanged histop-hat for his partner's cow-person hat, which came down over hisears in a most regrettable manner.
I thought it best not to intrude upon their coarse amusement and wenton to the grill to see that all was safe for the night. Returning frommy inspection some half-hour later, I came upon the two, Cousin Egbertin the lead, the Honourable George behind him. They greeted mesomewhat boisterously, but I saw that they were now content to returnhome and to bed. As they walked somewhat mincingly, I noticed thatthey were in their hose, carrying their varnished boots in eitherhand.
Of the Honourable George, who still wore the cow-person's hat, I begannow to have the gravest doubts. There had been an evil light in theeyes of the Klondike woman and her Bohemian cohorts as they surveyedhim. As he preceded me I heard him murmur ecstatically: "Sush islife."