Among the forgotten fashions of the years from eighteen-eighty to
eighty-five was that of giving our parties, evening or afternoon,
for young people or old, of whatever kind, in short, in our own
homes; the easy hospitality of clubs or fashionable hotels was not
yet known. Houses with double-parlours and a dining-room back were
considered ideal for any sort of entertainment; and, of course, such
an architectural triumph as the old Gwynne house with that splendid
ballroom on the third floor, was _hors concours_. There was not another
home in town to compare with it. Mrs. Pallinder could entertain without
disturbing a single piece of the peacock-blue and old-gold furniture;
she meant, however, to have the whole place floor-clothed the night
of the twelfth. "I can't risk my Moquette carpets with a mob of young
people tearing around all over the house, you know, my dear," she said
with a smiling pretence of severity; and her guests, eying the rich
scrolls and garlands underfoot, gravely acquiesced. Everywhere else,
all the movables, except the bookcases and piano, were marshalled
upstairs or out on the back porch. The little sofas in our parlours
generally went into retirement under the stairs at the rear end of the
hall. In the afternoons we were just beginning to have progressive
euchres, and what we actually called "high teas." It is doubtless
impossible for the mind of to-day to conceive of a society so devoid
of education and good taste as to call any species of entertainment
a "high tea," but such is the appalling fact. You may pick up a
_Journal_ or _Evening Despatch_ of that date, and read not one but many
notices such as this:
"At Mrs. Henderson P. Gates' high tea on Monday in the fashionable
crush were observed:
Mrs. Colonel Pallinder in a toilet of ottoman silk and silk plush
in two shades of electric blue, with garniture of chenille and
pearl fringes, and a capote of feathers en suite.
Miss Pallinder in wine-coloured surah with sleeves and draperies
of spotted silk grenadine.
Miss Ponsonby-Baxter wore a redingote of crushed-strawberry pekin
opening over a brocaded front in shades of the same, with panels
of----"
No, I have not the heart to go on with the gaudy details of Muriel's
panels and passementerie. But I remember that dress well, and,
believe it or not, she looked as nobly and placidly beautiful in the
crushed-strawberry redingote as had she been draped like the Winged
Victory. Mrs. Gates continued her party with a dance that same evening.
"The house was all torn up anyhow," Lily Gates told us; "and mamma
thought she might just as well go ahead."
Muriel and J. B., or Mr. Taylor, as she decorously called him,--he
was only J. B. to college mates or others who knew him well,--were
sitting out a waltz on the top step of the Henderson P. Gates' stairs.
It was a long flight, turning sharply at a little landing to reach the
upper hall; and the musicians penned in the alcove behind the steps
on the first floor were discoursing "A Medley of Popular Airs," with
admirable command of rhythm and expression. "Wh-i-te Wings," "Swee-ee-t
Vi-o-_lets_," the sounds travelled up to them as through a chimney.
There was a smothering scent of lilacs--the house had been decorated
with them--and in pauses of the noise one could hear the window-panes
shuddering to the assaults of successive blasts of wind and rain
commingled. The spring was early that year. A discreet twilight on the
top step held out opportunities for flirtation which Mazie Pallinder
never would have neglected in the world; but neither J. B. nor Muriel
had any notion of taking advantage of them. The girl was absorbed in
a certain dilemma; her even delicate brows were slightly drawn as
she studied the pattern of her fan, and wondered how she could lead,
draw, drag the conversation around to the desired point. And J. B. was
thinking that "Pretty Pond-lilies" was a good waltz, and if it hadn't
been so hot, and Miss Baxter something of an armful to pull around--and
she couldn't reverse--he would have suggested a turn. He looked at
her. It would be desirable, I suppose, to record minutely what Muriel
wore that night; I refer you to the columns of the _Journal_; but does
anyone remember that full dress in the eighties--in common with dress
for all occasions--comprehended those two aids to beauty, "bangs," and
"bustles"? Muriel's pretty copper-brown hair was arranged in the fringe
down to the eyebrows, the knot low on the nape of her neck, to which
a famous stage-beauty had lately given her name; and I am afraid her
black lace skirts were crinolined in the height of the fashion. But the
young man thought she looked like Juno--Juno with a bustle! They had
been talking about Doctor Vardaman.
"The doctor's really awfully fond of his queer old things," J. B.
remarked. "If you show the least interest--and it's not put on with
me, I _am_ interested--he'll take you around, and explain to you who
all the big-bugs, his ancestors in the portraits were, and what they
did, and tell you about his first editions, and the old wine he's got
laid away, and the autograph-letters to his grandfather from Benjamin
Franklin and all the rest of it."
"How odd!" said Muriel.
"Yes, I suppose it's funny to you, but you see over here we don't have
all that the way you do. People aren't used to seeing it about them
all the time. I expect that's the reason Huddesley fits in with the
doctor so well; he cares for everything and understands--the way old
family-servants do in novels you know. He's so English----"
"No, he isn't," said Muriel decidedly. "You think so, but none of you
_know_. Nobody talks like that at home."
"Well, not nice people of course, but servants----"
"No, not servants either. He's no more like a real servant at home than
our stage-Yankees are like you."
"You've never come into contact with his class much, I guess," said J.
B., remembering that the treatment accorded servants varies widely.
"Everything is different with us; now the doctor likes to make him
talk. We're all going down there to dinner Friday night, did you know
it?"
"What, all of us? Why, that's the night we----"
"No, only the men, I mean. The doctor told Mrs. Pallinder he'd like to
have us, and he thought maybe she'd just as lief we were out of the
house, while all of you were getting ready for the performance. There
are so many of us, you know, for 'William Tell.' Some of the fellows
have sent their clothes out to his house, and are going to dress there."
Muriel looked at him timidly. He was unconsciously opening a door for
the entrance of that all-important topic; she was not quick, however,
and besides she was in doubt whether--whether it would be quite proper
for her to speak to him about it at all! Next moment the opportunity
was gone.
"If we get everybody in a good humour with the first performance, they
won't care if 'Mrs. Tankerville' _is_ a little rocky," J. B. observed
sagely. "Teddy isn't so good as _Jenks the butler_. He's not--not
convincing. Ted doesn't look as if he could steal a potato, let alone
a hatful of diamonds. And then he hasn't the chances to be funny there
are in 'Tell.' Nobody knows their part yet, and here the thing's set
for Friday!"
"I'm rather sure of myself all except one place," Muriel said. "We've
been going so we haven't had much time to study."
"I know. It's an awful rush this season. The girls can stand it, of
course; they rest in the daytime. But a fellow's got to go to business.
Somebody said to Arch. Lewis the other day, 'Oh, never mind. They don't
need you at the office.' He said, 'Yes, but hang it all, I don't want
'em to find that out!'"
Muriel listened and assented vaguely; she was not accustomed to young
men who had businesses and offices. Time was passing, and they were no
nearer the point than they were ten minutes ago. She hesitated; and J.
B. admired, yet a little wondered at, the swift changes of colour in
her cheeks. "These English girls beat everything at blushing," he said
to himself; and then removed his eyes with a sudden guilty flush over
his own face as he realised that he had been staring too hard. But,
Jove, what a beauty she was!
"You all think Mr. Johns is very good in his part, don't you?" said
Muriel, nervously conscious that they had been silent too long.
American men, she had noticed, expected the girls to do the most of the
talking; and, somehow, the girls did.
"Why, yes, especially in 'Tell,' don't _you_?"
"Well, I--I don't always understand, you know. And the last night we
rehearsed, after we went to that dinner at the Ellises', I couldn't
even make out some of the words he said, he spoke so----"
"He--he wasn't very well--we had to call the rehearsal off, you
remember?" interrupted the young man hastily. Muriel was surprised to
see him redden and avoid her eyes. There was an awkward pause--the kind
of pause that, had Muriel been an American girl, with their uncanny
sharpness of intuition, she would not have allowed to occur. But, had
Muriel been an American girl, this history would have remained forever
unwritten. But for her visit to the Pallinders' there would have been
no 'Tell,' no 'Mrs. Tankerville,' no dinner at Doctor Vardaman's--who
can say what might have happened instead?
"Ted can imitate Billy Rice first-rate," said J. B., anxious to
steer gracefully away from an uncomfortable situation. "We had a
minstrel-show one time, and he made up to look like Rice and sang that
song of his:
"Arthur, they say, will em-i-grate,"
"Then all the rest of us had to shout, you know,
"WHEN?"
"Bye-and-bye!
Into the ma-tri-mo-ni-al state."
"WHEN?"
"Bye-and-bye!"
"They're all the time getting off something about the President
marrying again, you know. Teddy was as good as Rice any day."
"Billy Rice?" repeated Muriel. She had not thought the fragment of
comic song very comic (and therein I dare say she was right), and she
knew no more who Billy Rice was than--than the average reader of these
lines. Time has dismissed that fat, jolly troubadour. Upon what bank of
misty Acheron does he now perform his melodies? And where are the snows
of yester-year?
"He's a big fat fellow--a white man, you know. They're all white, but
blacked up, in the minstrel-shows," J. B. explained patiently.
"Fancy! What do they do?"
"Why, sing and dance; buck-and-wing, and all that. It's rather
knock-down-and-drag-out fun, some of it; and some's pretty good."
"I don't believe I'd understand the jokes," said Muriel forlornly.
"It's so different at home--it's quite simple. Everyone always knows
when to laugh. But you know that song you sing in 'Tell,' 'The Maiden
on the Icy Plank,' that first verse--would you mind explaining? You
know where it says:
"The maiden on the icy plank
Showed conduct quite surprising,
She went and got a cake of yeast--
Then fell instead of rising!"