"Don't mind me--speak right out," she said with her good-natured
twinkle. "You might think it wasn't my hair, but it is. The color's
not, though, as you may be surprised to hear." The "surprised" was
broadly satirical.
"I prefer natural hair," said I, "and gray hair is most becoming. It
makes a woman look younger, not older."
"That's sensible," said she. "I never did care for bottled hair. I
think it looks bad from the set-off, and gets worse. The widow Pfizer
in our town got so that hers was bright green after she bottled it for
two years, trying to catch old man Coakley. And after she caught him
she bottled his, and it turned out green, too, after a while."
"Why run such a risk?" said I. "I'm sure your own hair done as your
maid can do it would be far more becoming."
Mrs. Burke was delighted. "I might have known better," she observed,
"but I found Mr. Burke bottling his beard, and he wanted me to; and it
seemed to me that somehow bottled hair just fitted right in with all
the rest of this foolishness here. How they would rear round at home if
they knew what kind of a place Washington is! Why, I hear that up at
the White House, when the President leaves the table for a while during
meals, all the ladies--women, I mean--his wife and all of them, have to
rise and stand till he comes back."
"Yes," I replied. "He's started that custom. I like ceremony, don't
you?"
"No, I can't say that I do," she drawled. "Out home all the drones and
pokes and nobodies are just crazy about getting out in feathers and
red plush aprons and clanking and pawing round, trying to make out
they're somebody. And I've always noticed that whenever anybody that
is a somebody hankers after that sort of thing it's because he's got a
streak of nobody in him. No, I don't like it in Cal Walters out home,
and I don't like it in the President."
"We've got to do as the other capitals do," said I. "Naturally, as we
get more and more ambassadors, and a bigger army, and the President
more powerful, we become like the European courts. And the President is
simply making a change abruptly that'd have to come gradually anyhow."
Her eyes began to twinkle. "First thing you know, the country'll turn
loose a herd of steers from the prairies in this town, and--But, long
as it's here, I suppose I've got to abide by it. So I'll do whatever
you say. It'll be a poor do, without my trying to find fault."
And she's being as good as her word. She makes me tell her exactly
what to do. She is so beautifully simple and ladylike in her frank
confessions of her ignorance--just as the Queen of England would be if
she were to land on the planet Mars and have to learn the ways--the
surface ways, I mean. I've no doubt that outside of a few frills which
silly people make a great fuss about, a lady is a lady from one end of
the universe to the other.
I'm making the rounds of my friends with Mrs. Burke in this period of
waiting for the season to begin. And she sits mum and keeps her eyes
moving. She's rapidly picking up the right way to say things--that
is, the self-assurance to say things in her own way. I took her
among my friends first because I wanted her to realize that I was
absolutely right in urging her to naturalness. There are so many in the
different sets she'll be brought into contact with who are ludicrously
self-conscious. Certainly, there's much truth in what she says about
the new order. We Americans don't do the European sort of thing well,
and, while the old way wasn't pretty to look at it, it was--it was our
own. However, I'm merely a social secretary, dealing with what is, and
not bothering my head about what ought to be. And as for the Burkes,
they're here to take advantage of what is, not to revolutionize things.
Mr. Burke himself was the next member of the family at whom I got a
chance with my great plans. When he had got it all out of me he began
to pace up and down the floor, pulling at his whiskers, and evidently
thinking. Finally he looked at me in a kindly, sharp way, and, in a
voice I recognized at once as the voice of the Thomas Burke who had
been able to pile up a fortune and buy into the Senate, said:
"I double your salary, Miss Talltowers. And I hope you understand that
expense isn't to be considered in carrying out your program. I want you
to act just as if this were all for yourself. And if we succeed I think
you'll find I'm not ungenerous." And before I could try to thank him he
was gone.
The last member was "Bucyrus." As I knew his parents wished to be
alone with him at first I kept out of the way, breakfasting in my
rooms, lunching and dining out a great deal. What little I saw of him
I didn't like. He ignored me most of the time--and I, for one woman,
don't like to be ignored by any man. When he did speak to me it was as
they speak to the governess in families where they haven't been used
to very much for very long. Perhaps this piqued me a little, but it
certainly amused me, and I spoke to him in an humble, deferential way
that seemed somehow to make him uneasy.
It was day before yesterday that he came into my office about an hour
after luncheon. He tried to look very dignified and superior.
"Miss Talltowers," he said, "I must request you to refrain from calling
me sir whenever you address me."
"I beg your pardon, sir," I replied meekly, "but I have never addressed
you. I hope I know my place and my duty better than that. Oh, no, sir,
I have always waited to be spoken to."
He blazed a furious red. "I must request you," he said, with his speech
at its most fancy-work like, "not to continue your present manner
toward me. Why, the very servants are laughing at me."
"Oh, sir," I said earnestly, "I'm sure that's not my fault." And I
didn't spoil it by putting accent on the "that" and the "my."
He got as pale as he had been red. "Are you trying to make it
impossible for us to remain under the same roof?" he demanded. What a
spoiled stupid!
"I'm sure, sir," said I, and I think my eyes must have shown what an
unpleasant mood his hinted threat had put me in, "that I'm not even
succeeding in making it impossible for us to remain in my private
office at the same time. Do you understand me, or do you wish me to
make my meaning--"
He had given a sort of snort and had rushed from the room.
I suppose I ought to be more charitable toward him. A small person,
brought up to regard himself as a sort of god, and able to buy
flattery, and permitted to act precisely as his humors might
suggest--what is to be expected of such a man? No, not a man but boy,
for he's only twenty-six. _Only_ twenty-six! One would think I was
forty to hear me talking in that way of twenty-six. But women always
seem older than men who are even many years older than they. And how
having to earn my own bread has aged me inside! I think Jessie was
right when she said in that solemn way of hers, "And although, dear
Augusta, they may think you haven't brains enough, I assure you you'll
develop them." Poor, dear Jessie! How she would amuse herself if she
could be as she is, and also have a sense of humor!
At any rate, Mr. Bucyrus came striding back after half an hour, and,
rather surlily but with a certain grudging manliness, said: "I beg your
pardon, Miss Talltowers, for what I said. I am ashamed of my having
forgotten myself and made that tyrannical speech to you."
"Thank you, sir," said I, without raising my eyes. "You are most
gracious."
"And I hope," he went on, "that you will try to treat me as an equal."
"It'll be very hard to do that, sir," said I. And I lifted my eyes and
let him see that I was laughing at him.
He shifted uneasily, red and white by turns. "I think you understand
me," he muttered.
"Perfectly," said I.
He waved his arm impatiently. "Please don't!" he exclaimed rather
imperiously. "I could have got my mother to--"
"I hope you won't complain of me to your mother," I pleaded.
He flushed and snorted, like a horse that is being teased by a fly it
can reach with neither teeth, hoofs nor tail. "You know I didn't mean
that. I'm not an utter cad--now, don't say, 'Aren't you, sir?'"
"I had no intention of doing so," said I. "In fact I've been trying
to make allowances for you--for your mother's sake. I appreciate that
you've been away from civilization for a long time. And I'm sure we
shall get on comfortably, once you've got your bearings again."
He was silent, stood biting his lips and looking out of the window.
Presently, when I had resumed my work, he said in an endurable tone and
manner: "I hope you will be kind enough to include me in that admirable
social scheme of yours. Are those your books?"
I explained them to him as briefly as I could. I had no intention
of making myself obnoxious, but on the other hand I did not, and do
not purpose to go out of my way to be courteous to this silly of an
overgrown, spoiled baby. He tried to be nice in praise of my system,
but I got rid of him as soon as I had explained all that my obligations
as social secretary to the family required. He thanked me as he was
leaving and said, in his most gracious tone, "I shall see that my
father raises your salary."
I fairly gasped at the impudence of this, but before I could collect
myself properly to deal with him he was gone. Perhaps it was just as
well. I must be careful not to be "sensitive"--that would make me as
ridiculous as he is.
And that's the man Jim Lafollette is fairly smoking with jealousy of!
He was dining at Rachel's last night, and Rachel put him next me. He
couldn't keep off the subject of "that young Burke." Jessie overheard
him after a while and leaned round and said to me, "How do you and
young Mr. Burke get on?" in her "strictly private" manner--Jessie's
strictly private manner is about as private as the Monument.
"Not badly," I replied, to punish Jim. "We're gradually getting
acquainted."
Jim sneered under his mustache. "It's the most shameful scheme two
women ever put up," he said, as if he were joking.
"Oh, has Jessie told you?" I exclaimed, pretending to be concealing my
vexation.
"It's the talk of the town," he answered, showing his teeth in a grin
that was all fury and no fun.
There may be women idiots enough to marry a man who warns them in
advance that he's rabidly jealous, but I'm not one of them. Better a
crust in quietness.