She turned toward me with some surprise. Why, the promulgation of the
Divine Right of Kings as a dogma of the Church. We hope to have an
Œcumenical Council called for that purpose within the next twenty-five
years. I thought that of course you knew; in fact I assumed that you
were one of our workers.
I replied that I was both an American and a Protestant, an answer that I
felt relieved me of the burden of being a catholic royalist.
Oh, she said, we have many adherents who at first glance would appear to
have no interest in the movement: we have Jews and agnostics, artists,
and, yes, even anarchists.
I now felt quite sure that I was sitting beside an insane person. They
don't lock you up when you have millions, I said to myself. The idea of
trying to collect a Council, in the Twentieth Century, to give crowns a
supernatural sanction and to enroll the sanction among the articles of
obligatory belief, was no mere pious revery; it was lunacy. We were
prevented from returning to the subject that evening, but several times
I found her spacious half-mad glance resting on me with greater
implication of intimacy than I was quite ready to acknowledge.
I will send the car for you at eleven, she murmured as she passed me in
leaving the table. You must come. I shall have a great favor to ask of
you.
On returning to the drawing-rooms I found myself beside Ada Benoni,
daughter of a popular senator. Although she seemed almost too young to
go out in the evening, she had that soft cautious sophistication of well
brought up Italian girls. I asked her almost at once if she would tell
me about the Cabala.
Oh, the Cabala's only some people's joke, she answered. There is no
Cabala, really. But I know what you mean. And the young girl's eyes
carefully estimated the distance between us and the company on all
sides. By Cabala they mean a group of people that are always together
and have a lot in common.
Are they all rich? I asked.
No ... she answered thoughtfully. We mustn't speak so loudly. Cardinal
Vaini can't be rich, nor the Duchess d'Aquilanera.
But they're all intellectual?
The Princess d'Espoli isn't intellectual.
Then what have they in common?
Oh, they haven't anything in common, except ... except that they despise
most people, you and me and my father and so on. They've each got one
thing, some great gift and that binds them together.
Do you believe that they work together and plan trouble here and there?
The girl's forehead wrinkled and she reddened slightly. No, I don't
think they mean to, she said softly.
But they _do_? I insisted.
Well, they sit over there in Tivoli and talk about us and somehow,
without knowing it, they then _do_ something.
How many of them do you know?
Oh, I know all of them a little, she replied quickly. Everybody knows
all of them. Except, of course, the Cardinal. I love them all, too.
They're only bad when they're together, she explained.
Mlle. de Morfontaine has asked me to spend the week-end at her villa in
Tivoli. Will I see them there?
Oh, yes. We call that the hotbed.
Is it all right? Have you any advice to give me before I go?
No.
Yes, you have.
Well, she admitted, drawing her eyebrows together, I advise you to
be ... to be stupid. It's hard. You must expect them to be very cordial at
first. They have a way of getting very excited about people and then
getting tired of them and dropping them. Except every now and then they
find someone they like and they adopt him or her for good, and there's a
new member of the Cabala. Rome's full of people who went through the
rapids and didn't stick. Miss Grier's especially that way. She's just
met you lately hasn't she?
Why, yes,--just this afternoon.
Well, she'll have you around every minute of the day for a while. She's
coming over in a minute to ask you to stay to her midnight supper. She
has famous midnight suppers.
But I can't. I was here to tea and immediately asked to dinner. It would
be ridiculous to stay to midnight....
It's not ridiculous in Rome. You're just getting into the rapids, that's
all. Everybody cultivates their friendships in rushes. It's very
exciting. Don't try and fight against it. If you do that you lose the
best of everything. Do you want to know how I know about your being in
the rapids? Well, I'll tell you. My fiancé was to have come to the
dinner tonight, and an hour before, a note was brought to his house
asking him to come next Friday instead and go to the Opera also. She
does that often and it only means that she has found some new friend she
insists on keeping by her that evening. Of course the second invitation,
the consoling one, is always bigger and more showy than the first, but
we get angry.