Archie was pacified by a copious luncheon in the Eclair restaurant,
which is almost as good as a second-class Paris restaurant, and after an
idle afternoon the couple went to a popular musical comedy to end their
day. Adelle's business with the trust company was now finished, and they
must decide upon their next move. Their first impulse after the rout
upon the dock had been to dart back to Europe as expeditiously as
possible, with Adelle's recovered lamp, and never darken again their
native shores. But this pettish mood had been largely forgotten during
the fortnight that ensued, and they remembered their plan of going to
California so that Archie might present himself in his new estate and
his wife to his own people. A cable from Sadie Paul, stating that she
had taken "the B. and T." (which being properly interpreted meant that
she had decided to marry her Hungarian count) and was returning to her
home to celebrate her wedding, determined them. They forthwith made
their arrangements to cross the continent and spend the summer on the
Pacific Coast.
It may as well be said that before departing Adelle had one quite
serious business talk with President West of the trust company and the
excellent Mr. Smith, whose had been the chastening hand at the time of
her elopement. Possibly the wisdom of his remarks was becoming more
evident to Adelle as marriage wore on, or it might be that she still did
usually as she was told, if she were told with sufficient authority. At
any rate, she agreed to leave in the hands of the Washington Trust
Company the bulk of her estate, not strictly in the form of a
trust,--they could not induce her to surrender the privilege of the lamp
to that extent,--but under an agreement by which she bound herself not
to disturb the principal of her fortune for a term of years. The bankers
represented to her tactfully that neither she nor Mr. Davis had yet had
extensive experience in the investment of money; that the operations of
the Clark's Field Associates were not finally wound up; that they had
had such success in their investments on her account that it would be
well to allow them to carry out their scheme of investment, etc. In
short, she signed the agreement, which was the last thing she did in
B----.
Archie, when he learned what she had done, was irritated. Naturally he
did not like Mr. Smith and had a grudge against the trust company as a
whole. He said that the arrangement reflected upon him and his dignity
as a husband, although, as Mr. West had pointed out to Adelle, it was
not customary for a husband to be entrusted with the disposal of all his
wife's property. Since the vogue of international marriages, American
fathers had taken refuge in the trust companies. In spite of argument
and sulks, however, Archie could not prevail upon Adelle to undo what
she had done, and he had to content himself with the shrewd reflection
that it was probably not legally binding and could be broken when
opportunity offered.
In this affair Adelle displayed an unexpected caution by her willingness
to let the trust company remain guardian of her magic lamp for the
present. She had a woman's instinctive confidence in an institution,
especially in one which years of use had made familiar to her. Archie,
she felt justly, must content himself with their income, which would be
more than two hundred thousand a year. That should satisfy their
immediate wants after the eighteen months of bread-and-butter probation.
And after all it was her own money, as the trust officers had said to
her again and again. This, however, she did not repeat to Archie. She
soothed his irritated pride in other ways, and in the end a fairly
contented and harmonious couple were whirled westward in the track of
the setting sun to that more golden shore of our continent, where other
fate awaited them.