_Tumbleton Tumm, the Minstrel_
Ethel Bumpschus is rushing preparations for her wedding to the Duke
of Nocastle, and vastly amusing we find it. The upper floors of the
Bumpschus house, Pearl Veal tells me, look as though some large
business enterprise were being carried on, as there is a constant
coming and going of milliners, dress-makers, and tailors, hurrying the
costumes for the great show; and above it all sounds the ceaseless
click of Tumbleton Tumm's type-writer. Poor Tumm! He regularly writes
scandal for _Town Twaddle_ and has a hard time to keep that fact a
secret, retain his membership in one club, look respectable and make
both ends meet; so that when Mrs. Bumpschus called him in to help
them it was a great boon. They should give him a fat retainer for his
press-agent work, for I must say he is doing it well, as the papers
daily chronicle every act of the Duke and his fiancée. He realizes
how eagerly the public devours this kind of reading-matter, and his
type-writer goes all day as he prepares the feast. Interest has been
aroused to a high pitch. Were it not for Tumm's pride, he would do
well on the Rialto, for in some of his work he has evinced signs of
positive genius. I remember when Ethel's cousin married Nothingham
a furor was created by the illustrated-page articles describing her
entire trousseau. We have progressed wonderfully since then, for Tumm
is making that a serial story and got five columns on hosiery alone in
every Sunday paper in town. This is but one of many masterly strokes.
I must say that to me there is something pathetic in the picture of
this bearer of a fine old New York name, reduced to a task that cannot
but be distasteful to him, for though he may have a saving gleam of
humor, he cannot but feel that in every way he is the better of his
employers. But it is his father's fault. Hegerton Tumm was one of those
gentlemen of the old school, a Patriarch with a house in Washington
Square and all that. He never worked. He looked down on Grandfather
Bumpschus, who was busy wrecking railroads and piling up other people's
money. He died and left his children to social charity. I remember
before I took to golf and tennis, that somewhere in the church service
there was a reference to dust returning to dust. How keen those old
Bible fellows were! It seems as though they must have foreseen the
first Tumm crawling on his knees among the cabbages of his patch in
Union Square; must have foreseen real estate rise and carry with it
to power half a hundred Tumms; and, last, poor Tumbleton on his knees
again, a mere retainer in the railroad house of Bumpschus.
Pearl said to-day that Tumm was the Bumpschus jester. I protested, but
it was just one of those little cuts which make a woman all the more
lovely to those for whom she has only balm. I think of him, I told
her, as the minstrel of the house, at his type-writer all day long,
singing of its glories, of the riches of the master and the beauty of
the daughter, of the greatness of her lover and of their love--for
under a hundred flaring black heads the world has been told that this
is a love-match. A safety match, said Pearl, blowing a smoke ring
solemnly--she was evidently thinking of his Grace's debts. Singing,
I went on, for I always ignore these little jibes of hers, singing
and carolling of the vastness of the trousseau and the value of the
presents, of the smartness of the bridesmaids and the colors of their
dresses; singing of the ushers, of their waistcoats, their spats, their
gloves, and boutonnières; of the music at the wedding, of the breakfast
later, with its menu and its wines. Fortunate the world that every word
that Tumm, the minstrel, sings is caught upon the manifold, seized
by the educating press, illuminated with pen-sketch and photograph,
and sent forth to be read by the millions in the outer darkness!
Fortunate, indeed, said Pearl, for she always agrees with me in the end.
Sometimes I suspect that because she can always agree with me, she
declined the proffered heart and hand of his Grace, and now is
perfectly contented with the humbler rôle of maid of honor at the
great wedding of the season. I must confess that I was surprised that
Ethel Bumpschus asked Pearl to accompany her to the altar, but then
the reason was very evident when I saw the list of the wedding-party.
Ethel is going in for beauty. No expense is being spared on flowers and
music, and she must have been conscious of the discord created in the
first bars of many a grand sweet song by a procession of exquisitely
gowned ancients moving slowly down the aisle at the heels of a lovely
bride. Now Ethel is not beautiful, but she will have the advantage of a
veil.
Who first blessed womankind with that artful covering? This question I
put to Pearl, and, of course, she did not know, but when I said that
she must wear a picture-hat at her own wedding, she smiled. She thought
this some subtle flattery, though I spoke in all sincerity, having seen
her that very day gowned as she will be when she follows the Duchess
of Nocastle down the aisle. Ethel Bumpschus is wise. She is putting
her close friends in good seats with the family while she will lead up
the aisle five of the fairest of the town. Angelica Clime and Gladys
Tumbleton, Clarissa Mudison and Emily Lumpley, Hebes every one, with
Pearl Veal still more glorious, will turn all eyes from the tiny Duke
and his towering bride. I should like to stand in a pew and watch them
myself as they move down the flowery pathway, for I am still simple
enough to find more charm in a lovely face than in a lovely voice or
a pedigree. But I shall have to follow them, to be of the unfortunate
four who risk everything to gain nothing, who win undying hatred by
putting aunts with the old family servants, husbands next former wives,
and mere business friends where the cousins ought to be; that bring
on themselves the ridicule of the society-writers who hover on the
outskirts of the charmed circle and scoff at us because we wear pink
waistcoats and white spats.
No, I do not suppose that I shall wear a pink waistcoat and white spats
at my own wedding. Heaven knows I would rather choose tennis flannels,
but I must follow orders for the Bumpschus nuptials, and we will do
things for a duke that we would do for no other man, particularly when
we contemplate spending a season in London. I do not think his Grace
has any ideas even on clothes, but attribute the pink waistcoats to
Ethel, and the white spats to her brother Williegilt. She wants pink
waistcoats to harmonize with the bridesmaids' gowns, and Williegilt's
hobby is spats. You can see him any day on the avenue displaying his
feet in a new shade. Pearl says that it distracts attention from his
head, but I protest against such an uncharitable view, for I must say
he has been extremely square to me. The Duke, of course, cabled for
his brother, Captain Lord Algernon Fitznit, to sail for this side at
once, as he is to be best man, which seems to be almost like taking
part in his own funeral, he being the heir to the dukedom. As the
Captain cannot get here until the day before the wedding, Williegilt
is arranging for the ushers, and while Ethel is going in for beauty,
he is choosing for size, to make some sort of a showing against the
soldier, who is six feet four. I think Williegilt with Stuyve Mint,
Tommy Clime and myself will average around six feet two, and, as I told
Pearl, when we get fixed up in our uniform we should make a rather
imposing showing, so I find myself looking forward to the occasion with
considerable interest. It will be a real adventure, no doubt, and I
am training for it--have even taken to spats, which I abhor, and have
accustomed myself to walking without looking at my feet, though I am a
little afraid white will rather discompose me.
Pearl declines to be excited at all, but she is an unusually quiet
soul, and says she is not going to rush herself into a decline simply
because Ethel Bumpschus, a mere acquaintance, is to marry a nobleman
that she could have had herself if she would have spent the money. She
will go to the church and walk down the aisle and back, looking as
well as she can, fight her way through the mob outside, drive to the
house, sip the health of the happy pair, and go home to oblivion. Of
course I am the oblivion. She must have some lingering regret for the
Duke, and I cannot blame her for it. She says frankly that she would
give anything to be the Dowager Duchess of Nocastle, but that title is
not purchasable, so she is perfectly satisfied with her real-estate
agent. Pearl has a way of saying things like that when we are walking
on Madison Avenue, but even there a few people are always about, which
makes it rather aggravating. And we walk on Madison Avenue a great
deal now, and she seems to delight in such maddening remarks, but when
we are home in the quiet of the library, when Mrs. Radigan has made
the tea and become absorbed in picture-papers, when she is in her deep
chair and I in mine, close by, I try again to draw them from her, but
she just smiles--blows a ring of smoke, and smiles inscrutably as she
watches it float away.