The next five days Angela spent in seeing the country her father had
helped to create, and in breaking down in the blue motor-car at brief and
inconvenient intervals. At first they were unexpected intervals; but soon
they were taken for granted; for the more she knew of Mr. Sealman's
invention the less was Angela surprised at anything it chose to do. The
Model was a model of all the vices. It smoked like a chimney, drank like a
fish, and developed, one after another or all together, every malady to
which motor-metal is heir. The stages of the way, even to the Mission of
San Gabriel, in its sleepy old Mexican village on the fringe of Los
Angeles, were punctuated with disasters. A burst tire was a comma;
carburetor trouble a colon; nervous prostration of the sparking-plug a
period. But Mr. Sealman never lost confidence. He explained everything,
justified himself and the car; told anecdotes of his courage, and let fall
pathetic words concerning an invalid mother dependent on him and his
success.
"I'm a pioneer, I tell you," he said. "You and I are making history this
minute."
Angela would gladly have turned from so lurid an occupation to any other
pursuit; but Mr. Sealman looked as if his health were more fragile than
that of the car. When he clawed obscurely at the crystallized sugar
ornaments under the bright bonnet of the fainting Model, his air looked so
dejected, his eyes so hollow, and his smile so wan that Angela's fury
melted into pity. Passionate resolves to shed him and his blue abomination
died within her as she watched his struggles. His whole future depended,
he said, on the Model. If Mrs. May should throw him over and hire another
car, the news would fly like lightning from garage to garage of Los
Angeles; indeed, from end to end of California. He would be ruined. His
mother, who had been forbidden excitement, would, without doubt, die of
heart failure.
The heart of Angela failed also, again and yet again. She began to see
that Mr. Sealman had cast himself for the part of Old Man of the Sea, in a
travel drama of which she was heroine. She felt alone in the world. "It
will probably end in my having to buy the little blue brute and burn it,"
she thought. "But even then the codfish will probably insist on being my
butler."
These gloomy forebodings shadowed her mind one morning when the Model
broke down about half a mile from fantastic little Venice, the Coney
Island of South California. In a rage she got out and walked, past a
kaleidoscopic pattern of tiny bazaars, shooting-galleries, paper icebergs,
and cardboard mountains. She threaded her way through a good-natured crowd
of tall, tanned young Americans, pretty girls with wonderful erections of
golden hair, dark-faced Mexicans, yellow-faced Japanese, a few Hindus and
negroes. Then, by the pier, she saw an old Spanish galleon disguised as a
restaurant, and drifted in to lunch on fried sand-dabs attractively
advertised in big black letters. How old, how Spanish, and how galleon
the craft might really be, none could tell--or would. But the sand-dabs
were delicious; and from the queer window near her table--a window cut in
the ship's side--she could see the Pacific, blue in distance, green where
it tossed white foam-blossoms on a beach of gold.
"Breakdowns would be fun if I'd some one to laugh at them with me," she
thought; and her mind conjured up the image of Nick Hilliard, seating him
opposite her at the little table.
She had ordered him home and he had apparently obeyed; which seemed unkind
and poor-spirited, and altogether unlike him. Ever until now he had been
at hand to save her from all that was disagreeable. Even at Los Angeles he
had jumped off the train to circumvent Mr. Millard. His ways had been like
the ways of story-book heroes, who, by some extraordinary coincidence,
invariably appear in time to rescue the heroine from a villain, a mad
bull, a runaway horse or a burning house. The only difference was that Mr.
Hilliard could not possibly be the hero of this story, and his opportune
arrival was, on his own confession, never a coincidence. He came on
purpose; and that was bad taste. But as he had done it so often, why
couldn't he have transgressed just once again, to rescue her from Sealman?
She thought of the tall forest creature with yearnings, which interfered
with her appetite for sand-dabs. He might unobtrusively have stayed, she
thought, and put himself at her service. Not the most clinging Old Man of
the Sea could continue to cling if that square-chinned bronze statue
pointed out the wisdom of letting go. But no doubt _he_ was at home near
Bakersfield, before this--Angela seldom named Nick in her mind--otherwise
she must have run across him somewhere that first day at the City of the
Angels when she had spun gaily from park to park, the Model for once
behaving well. Almost, she had expected to see him the next morning when
the car refused to move, and she had taken a trolley car, halfway to San
Gabriel. It would have seemed appropriate, somehow, to meet him strolling
in front of the Mission, his hands in his pockets, gazing up at the
beautiful half-ruined facade, with its delicate chain-armour of gold
lichen, its tower, and its flowers like blossoming barnacles.
Angela knew now that she had felt certain of meeting Hilliard
"accidentally," in the Mission church. That while she walked beside the
elderly Spanish verger, chatting of his native Cordova, listening to tales
of Father Juniperra Serra, Father Somera, and the legend of the Indians
with the miraculous portrait of the Madonna, she had started more than
once at a footfall, fancying it that of her lost hero.
Of course, if he had ventured to show himself at any time she would have
known that it was no coincidence; and she would have lifted her eyebrows
in silent reproach, talking more earnestly to the verger, who had been
happy because she knew Cordova and all his beloved Spanish cathedrals.
Nevertheless, the bronze statue would have fitted well into the scene, and
something lacked because it was absent.
"I do think he might write from his ranch and acknowledge the money I sent
him," she told herself now, neglecting the sand-dabs to stare through the
galleon window at the floating seaweed on the tide-dark gold-green kelp,
like lost laurel-wreaths torn from the brows of drowned divinities. "I
posted the letter myself, that first day. He must have got it--if he _is_
at home."
Just then a tall, dark young man walked into the ship-restaurant, taking
off a sombrero. Angela gathered herself together, ready to administer a
gentle snub. But she might have saved herself the trouble. It was not
Nick. She could have cried with disappointment. Snubs of the past were
coming home to roost.
There was time to buy California jewels in the bazaars--tourmalines and
pearl-blisters--before the car came up, purring sweetly, and looking
innocent as a cat gorged with canary birds. Mr. Sealman was so sure that
nothing could or would go wrong ever again that Angela had no heart to
receive him coldly.
They started off for a run through bungalow-land, and the Model conducted
itself like a newly converted sinner.
"I've been thinking out a dandy plan, while I was tinkering on the auto,"
remarked Mr. Sealman in an engaging manner. "What do you say to doing a
tour of the Missions? You know, I guess, there's a chain of 'em, and the
fine thing it would be to see the lot by road! I tell you, this little
auto's going to be all right--all right. It'd be the best kind of a stunt
for a lady from Europe; and if the papers got hold of it, I bet they'd
give us a bang-up notice--a photo too, maybe, you could send your friends
on the other side."
Angela shuddered. She could hardly bear even to hear this proposal from
the codfish, for a pilgrimage to the Missions of California had been a
dream of Franklin Merriam's. He and she were to have followed the
footsteps of the Franciscan Fathers, stage by stage; and if a Mission here
or there were falling into ruin, Merriam had talked of offering to restore
it at his own expense. Now the money had gone to restore the Palazzo di
Sereno, and to buy motors and aeroplanes and ladies' favours for the
Prince of that name. Yet some day Angela meant to make the pilgrimage,
when she had built her house and given herself a starting-point.
"I've other things to do," she replied coldly. "I shall see only the
Missions I may happen to pass on this tour."
"Well, some folks'd ruther save this trip for a weddin' journey," Sealman
suggested. "I suppose widows have weddin' trips, don't they?" He gazed
thoughtfully at the gray coat and gray-veiled motor hat which Angela wore
to protect her from the dust. She sat in front beside the chauffeur for
the motion of the car was less there, but she decided that, if she were
ever hypnotized into associating with the Model again, she would take the
back seat.
"The Missions for mine," he went on, when his passenger made no reply.
"There's some prefers the Yosemite, but there's no motorin' there. And if
I was a girl I wouldn't feel married without a motor. In the Yosemite
there's; so much honeymoonin', the minute you see a lady with a man you
put 'em down for bride and groom."
Angela had cause to remember this remark later.
"Speakin' of honeymoons, looks as if there'd been some around here," the
codfish continued chattily.
They were running about through the suburbs of Los Angeles, and if
Sealman's passenger had deigned to answer she would have been compelled
to agree. It was ideal honeymoon-land; a moving picture, painted in
colours, seemingly by rival artists of different nations, for the mingling
of effects was mysterious as the scenery of dreams.
Just as Angela told herself that it was like Holland in the jewel-box
neatness of little streets and little houses--behold the Riviera, with
groups of palms among tropical flowers, and feathery pepper-trees,
graceful and large as giant willows! Then, when she had decided on Italy
or Southern France as a simile, far-off, sharp mountain peaks, a dark,
grotesquely branching pine in filmy distance, and a doll's house with a
red pointed roof, suggested a sketch on a Japanese fan.
This was a spick-and-span little world for a perpetual honeymoon, and at
the entrance of the streets there should have been signs, Angela thought,
saying, "No one but brides and grooms need apply." It was all
distractingly pretty; and though Angela had already admired the big
handsome houses of Los Angeles and Pasadena, these rose-bowered bungalows
caught her fancy more. After all, there is a sameness about millionaires'
mansions the whole world over; but here was something new, invented by
California.
Cupid himself might have been the architect so daintily was each little
dwelling planned for the happiness of two lovers; so, of course, all the
women who lived in these houses must be young and beautiful. All the men
must be handsome, and husbands and wives must adore each other. No
creatures old or fat or inclined to be disagreeable would dare come
house-hunting here; or if they did come, surely some wise suburban by-law
would rule them out! Once in, as residents, the happy lovers would remain
forever young.
"It's to be Riverside to-morrow, ain't it?" Sealman inquired, when, full
two hours later than she had expected, he brought her back to the door of
her hotel.
Angela hesitated. In California, at most times of year, it is hopeless to
use the weather as a handle to hang an excuse upon. She looked at the sky.
It was a vast inverted cup of turquoise.
"Are you sure the car is equal to so long a run?" she asked mildly.
The likeness between Mr. Sealman and a codfish became so marked that
Angela feared he was going to be ill.
"You don't know what the car can do," he answered reproachfully.
"Perhaps not," she admitted. "Very well, we'll start at eight."
"Better make it earlier."
She made it earlier, and was actually ready; but at half-past eight
Sealman appeared on foot. Of the car's health he said nothing, but of his
mother's health he said much. She had suffered a relapse. The doctor had
been with her all night. How Sealman was going to pay the bill he did not
know. Would Mrs. May go to Santa Catalina Island this morning, and to
Riverside to-morrow? There was time to catch the boat.
The doctor's bill was a trump card. Angela consented to wait for
Riverside, and she took Kate to that fair island loved by Californians,
and by fishermen all over the world.
The name Avalon alone would have lured her; for who would not set sail for
Avalon at a moment's notice?
Santa Catalina is Corsica in miniature, Corsica without Napoleon or
vendetta. But it has sea-gardens, fathoms deep under green water, where
flowers bloom and fish glitter in a dazzle of jewelled armour beneath the
glass floors of flat-bottomed boats. The fishermen were catching
yellow-tail that day, too, just as Franklin Merriam had caught them in his
time; and his daughter went back to Los Angeles full of thoughts of him.
To-morrow was to be held sacred to her father's memory; for his old home,
vanished off the face of the earth now, had been near Riverside. Angela
wanted the day to be perfect, unmarred by trouble or vexation; and though
she had her fears, when morning came the Model started off so well that
hope began to rise.
Making a detour, they spun past the old Mission San Gabriel, where she had
arrived ignominiously by trolley four days ago; and turning for a look at
the facade, Angela saw a yellow car drawn up in the fleecy shadow of a
pepper-tree. A chauffeur sat next the driver's empty seat, apparently half
asleep.
"That's the motor I wanted to ask you about, a day or two ago," Angela
said, bending forward to speak to Sealman--for she had kept her resolution
to sit behind him. "It's the handsomest I've seen; and we've met it
several times; two men in it always, in chauffeur's caps and goggles."
"Oh, _that_ car!" remarked the inventor with indifference. "That's what we
call Smith's Folly. Thad Smith, a fellow who made a pile of money, had the
thing built to order, and it brought him bad luck--lost every cent the
day she was finished, and he's been trying to sell her ever since. _I_
wouldn't take her for a present."
Angela leaned back, hiding a smile behind her motor veil. She did not
believe that Mr. Sealman would have the offer. His little car looked a
badly made toy compared with that golden chariot. She wondered if it had
been sold, or if it would be worth while to make inquiries. Somebody was
perhaps trying it, she thought, for often it followed the road taken by
Sealman; or, when their car broke down, as it usually did, the yellow
giant shot ahead, disappeared and occasionally appeared again.
"I should like to find out if it's still for sale," she said to herself,
gazing back admiringly. "Why shouldn't I have a motor of my own?"
As the Model trundled her out of sight, a man walked round the corner,
and, springing into the yellow car, took the driver's seat.