TOLD BY BEECHY KIDDER
VII
A CHAPTER OF CHILDISHNESS
When I waked up that morning in the old monastery at San Dalmazzo, if
that's the way to call it, and especially to spell it, I really thought
for a few minutes that I must be dreaming. "There's no good getting up,"
I thought, "for if I do I shall somnambulize, and maybe break my rather
pleasing nose." Once, when I was a little girl, I fell down-stairs when I
was asleep, and made one of my front teeth come out. It was a front
tooth, and Mamma had promised me five dollars if I'd have it pulled; so
that was money in my pocket. But I haven't got any teeth to sell for
five dollars now, and it's well to be careful. Accordingly I just lay
still in that funny little iron bed, saying, "Beechy Kidder, is this
_you_?"
Perhaps it was because of all those bewildering impressions the day
before, or perhaps it was from having been so dead asleep that I felt
exactly as if I were no relation to myself. Anyhow, that was the way I
_did_ feel, and I began to be awfully afraid I should wake up back in
Denver months ago, before anything had happened, or seemed likely ever
to happen.
When I thought of Mamma and myself, as we used to be, I grew almost sure
that the things hadn't happened, because they didn't seem the kind of
things that could possibly happen to us.
Why, I didn't even need to shut my eyes to see our Denver house, for it
was so much more real than any other house I'd been in, or dreamed I'd
been in since, and especially more real than that tiny, whitewashed
room at the monastery with a green curtain of vines hanging over the
window.
A square, stone house, with a piazza in front (only people out of
America are so stupid, they don't know what I mean when I say "piazza");
about six feet of yard with some grass and flowers. Me at school; Mamma
reading novels with one eye, and darning papa's stockings with the
other. My goodness, what a different Mamma! When I thought of the
difference, I was surer than ever that I must be dreaming her as she is
now, and I had half a mind to go and peek into the next room to look,
and risk falling down-stairs bang into realities and Denver.
Would she have smooth, straight dark hair with a few threads of grey,
all streaked back flat to her head to please papa; or would she have
lovely auburn waves done on a frame, with a curl draped over her
forehead? Would her complexion be just as nice, comfortable, motherly
sort of complexion, of no particular colour; or would it be pink and
white like rose-leaves floating in cream? Would she have the kind of
figure to fit the corsets you can pick up at any shop, ready made for
fifty-nine and a half cents, and the dresses Miss Pettingill makes for
ten dollars, with the front breadth shorter than the back? Or would she
go in at the waist like an hour-glass and out like an hour-glass, to fit
three hundred-franc stays in Paris, and dresses that would be tight for
_me_?
Poor Mamma! I'd made lots of fun of her these last few months, if they
were real months, I said to myself; and if more real months of that kind
should come, I'd probably make lots of fun of her again. I am _like_
that; I can't help it. I suppose it's what Papa used to call his
"originality," and Mamma his "cantankerousness," coming out in me. But
lying there in the narrow bed, with the dream-dawn fluttering little
pale wings at the window, I seemed suddenly to understand how hard
everything had been for her.
At some minutes, on some days, you _do_ understand people with a queer
kind of clearness, almost as if you had created them yourself--even
people that you turn up your nose at, and think silly or uninteresting
at other times, when your senses aren't sharpened in that magic sort of
way. My "God-days," are what I call those strange days when I can
sympathize with every one as if I'd known their _whole_ history and all
their troubles and thoughts and struggles, ever since they were born. I
call them that, not to be irreverent, but because I suppose God _always_
feels so; and the little spark of Him that's in every human being--even
in a naughty, pert thing like me--comes out in us more on some days than
on others, though only for a few minutes at a stretch even then.
Well, my spark burned up quite brightly for a little while in the dawn,
as I was thinking of Mamma.
I don't suppose she could ever have been in love with Papa. I guess she
must have married him because her parents were poor, or because she was
too kind hearted to say no. Anyway, it must have been horrid for her to
know that he was rich enough to let her do anything she liked, but
wouldn't let her do anything nice, because he was a Consistent Democrat,
and didn't believe in show or "tomfoolery."
I'm sure I couldn't explain what a Consistent Democrat really is; but
Papa's idea of being it was to scorn "society people," not to have
pretty clothes or many servants, to look plain and speak plainly, always
to tell the whole truth, especially if you would hurt anybody's feelings
by doing so, and not to spend much money except on uninteresting books.
Mamma would have loved better than anything to be a society leader, and
have her name appear often in the papers, like other ladies in Denver
who, she used to tell me, didn't come from half as good family as she
did. But Papa wouldn't let her go out much, and she didn't know any of
the people she wanted to know--only quite common ones whose husbands
kept stores or had other businesses which she didn't consider refined.
I'm afraid I was never much comfort to poor Mamma either. That
cantankerousness of mine which makes me see how funny people and things
are, always came between us, and I expect it always will. I must have
been born old.
Her only real pleasure was reading novels on the sly, all about smart
society and the aristocracy, but especially English aristocracy. She
simply revelled in such stories; and when Papa died suddenly without
time to tie up his money so as to force Mamma to go on doing what _he_
wanted, and not what _she_ wanted, all the rest of her life, the first
thing that occurred to her was how to make up for lost time.
"We'll travel in Europe for a year or two," she said to me, "and when we
come back we'll just show Denver society people that we're _somebody_."
That was all she thought of in the beginning, but when we'd gone East to
Chicago for a change, and were staying at a big hotel there, a new idea
came into her head. Partly it was from seeing so many smart-looking
young women having a good time every minute of their lives, and feeling
what was the use of being free to enjoy herself at last, with plenty of
money, when she was dowdy and not so very young any more? (I could tell
just what was in her mind by the wistful way she looked at gorgeous
ladies who had the air of owning the world, with a fence
around it.) And partly it was seeing an advertisement in a
newspaper.
Mamma didn't mention the advertisement to me at first. But when she'd
been away one morning alone on a secret errand she stammered and
fidgetted a little, and said she had something to explain to me. Then it
all came out.
She'd been to call on a wonderful French madame who could make a woman
of thirty-eight (that's Mamma's Bible age) look twenty-five, and she
hoped I wouldn't lose respect for her as my mother or think her
frivolous and horrid if she put herself into the madame's hands for a
few weeks. I couldn't help laughing, but Mamma cried, and said that
she'd never had a real good time since she was grown up. She did long to
have one at last, very much, if only I'd let her do it in peace.
I stopped laughing and almost cried, myself; but I didn't let her see
that I wanted to. Instead, I asked what would be the sense of _looking_
twenty-five, anyhow, when everybody would know she _must_ be more, with
a daughter going on seventeen.
Mamma hadn't thought of that. She seemed years older than ever for a
minute; and then she put her hand in mine. Hers was as cold as ice.
"Would you mind going back a little, darling?" she asked. "It would be
_so_ kind and sweet of you, and it would make all the difference to me."
"Going back?" I repeated. "Whatever _do_ you mean?"
It made her dreadfully nervous to explain, because she was afraid I'd
poke fun at her, but she did get out the idea finally. "Going back" was
to bring on my second childhood prematurely. Thirteen was a nice age,
she thought, because many girls get their full growth then; and if I
wasn't more than thirteen she could begin life over again at
twenty-nine.
"What, let down my hair and wear my dresses short?" I asked.
She admitted that was what I'd have to do.
I thought for a whole minute, and at last I just couldn't bear to
disappoint her. But all the same, I reminded myself, I might as well
make a good bargain while I was about it.
"If I do what you want," said I, "you'll have to be mighty nice to me. I
must be given my way about important things. If you ever refuse to do
what I like, after I've done so much for you, I'll just turn up my hair
and put on a long frock. Then everybody'll see how old I am."
She would have promised anything, I guess; and that very afternoon she
gave me three lovely rings, and a ducky little bracelet-watch, when we
were out shopping for short clothes and babyfied hats. Soon we moved
away from that hotel to one on the north side, where nobody had seen us;
and the first thing I knew, I was a little girl again.
It certainly was fun. To really appreciate being a child, you ought to
have been grown up in another state of existence, and remember your
sensations. It was something like that with me, and my life was almost
as good as a play. I could say and do dreadfully naughty things, which
would have been outrageous for a grown-up young lady of nearly
seventeen. And _didn't_ I do them all? I never missed a single chance,
and I flatter myself that I haven't since.
The French madame made a real work of art of Mamma. The progress was
lovely to watch. She kept herself shut up in her room all day,
pretending to be an invalid, and drove out in a veil to the madame's.
Then, when she was finished, we went right away from Chicago to New
York, where we meant to stay for a while till we sailed for Europe.
Mamma hadn't been East before, since she was a girl of twenty, for that
was when she married Papa, and he took her to live in Denver. We bought
lots of beautiful things in New York, and Mamma enjoyed herself so much,
being pretty and having people stare at her, that she was almost sick
from excitement.
When we'd seen all the sights and were tired of shopping, she remembered
that she'd got a niece staying in the country not far away, on the
Hudson River. I'd heard Mamma speak of her sister, who, when seventeen,
had married a Savant (whatever that is), and had gone to California soon
afterwards, because she was delicate. But evidently the change hadn't
done her much good, because she died when her baby was born. The Savant
went on living, but he couldn't love his daughter properly, as she'd
been the cause of her mother's death. Besides, he wasn't the kind of man
to understand children, so when Madeleine was nine or ten, he sent her
to a school--a very queer school. It was kept by a Sisterhood; not nuns
exactly, because they were Protestants, but almost as good or as bad;
and an elderly female cousin of the Savant's was the head of the
institution.
There Madeleine Destrey had been ever since, though Mamma said she must
be nineteen or twenty; and now her father was dead. That news had been
sent to Mamma months before we left Denver, but as she and the Savant
had written to each other only about once every five or six years, it
hadn't affected her much. However, she thought it would be nice to go
and see Madeleine, and I thought so too.
It was a short journey in the train, and the place where the Sisterhood
live is perfectly lovely, the most beautiful I ever saw, with quantities
of great trees on a flowery lawn sloping down to the river.
I was wondering what my cousin would be like--the only cousin I've got
in the world; and though Mamma said she must be pretty, if she was
anything like her mother, I didn't expect her to be half as pretty as
she really is.
We surprised her as much as she did us, for naturally she expected Mamma
to be like other aunts, which she isn't at all--now; and evidently she
considered me a _curiosity_. But she was very sweet, and when she found
Mamma didn't want to be called Aunt Kathryn, she tried hard always to
"Kitty" her.
We only intended to spend the day, but it turned out that the time of
our visit was rather critical for Maida. She was in the act of having
her twentieth birthday; and it seemed that in her father's will he had
"stipulated" (that's the word the cousin-Mother-Superior used) that his
daughter should be sent to travel in Europe when she was twenty, for a
whole year.
The reason of the stipulation was, that though he didn't care for Maida
as most fathers care for their children, he was a very just man, and was
afraid, after living so long in the Sisterhood his daughter might wish
to join the Order, without knowing enough about the outside world to
make up her mind whether it truly was her vocation for good and all.
That was why she was to go to Europe; for when you're twenty-one you can
become a novice in the Sisterhood, if you like.
The Mother Superior didn't really want Maida to go one bit. It was easy
to see her anxiety to have the "dear child safe in the fold." But Maida
wasn't to inherit a penny of her father's money if she didn't obey his
will, which wouldn't suit the Sisterhood at all; so the Mother had to
hustle round and think how to pack Maida off for the year.
When we happened to arrive on the scene, she thought we were like
Moses's ram caught in the bushes. She told Mamma the whole story--(a
ramrod of a lady with a white face, a white dress, and a long, floating
white veil, she was) asking right out if we'd take Maida with us to
Europe.
Mamma didn't like the idea of being chaperon for such a girl as Maida;
but it was her own sister's daughter, and Mamma is as good-natured as a
Mellin's Food Baby in a magazine, though she gets into little tempers
sometimes. So she said, "Yes," and a fort-night later we all three
sailed on a huge German steamer for Cherbourg. "At least, that's what we
did in the 'dream,'" I reminded myself, when I had got so far in my
thoughts, lying in the monastery bed. And by that time the light was so
clear in the tiny white room, that there was no longer any doubt about
it, I really was awake. I was dear little thirteen-year-old Beechy
Kidder, who wasn't telling fibs about her age, because she _was_
thirteen, and was it anybody's business if she were something more
besides?
VIII
A CHAPTER OF PLAYING DOLLS
I looked at my bracelet-watch, which I had tucked under my pillow last
night. It wasn't quite six o'clock, and we hadn't gone to bed till after
one; but I knew I couldn't sleep any more, and life seemed so
interesting that I thought I might as well get up to see what would come
next.
The water-pitcher didn't hold much more than a quart, but I took the
best bath I could, dressed, and decided to find out what the monastery
grounds were like. We were not to be called till half-past seven, and it
was arranged that we should start at nine, so there was an hour and a
half to spare. I wondered whether I should wake Maida, and get her to go
with me, but somehow I wasn't in the mood for Maida. I was afraid that,
being in a monastery, she would be thinking of her precious Sisterhood
and wanting to hurry back as fast as she could. She does mean to join
when her year is up, I know, which is so silly of her, when the world's
such a nice place; and it nearly gives me nervous prostration to hear
her talk about it. Not that she often does; but it's bad enough to see
it in her eyes.
Maida is a perfect dear, much too good for us, and she always knows the
proper etiquetical thing to do when Mamma and I are wobbly; but she is
such an edelweiss that I'm always being tempted to claw her down from
her high white crags and then regretting it afterwards. Mamma gets cross
with her too, when she's particularly exalted, but we both love her
dearly; and we ought to, for she's always doing something sweet for us.
Only she's a great deal too humble. I suppose it's the thing to be like
that in a Sisterhood, but Mamma and I _aren't_ a Sisterhood, and the
sooner Maida realizes that there's such a place as the world, the better
it will be for her.
So I didn't wake Maida, but went tiptoeing out into the long corridor,
and got lost several times looking for the way out of doors.
At last I was in the garden, though, and it was very quaint and pretty,
with unexpected nooks, old, moss-covered stone seats, and a sundial that
you'd pay hundreds of dollars for in America. Staring up at the house I
thought a window-shutter moved; but I didn't attach any importance to
that until, after I'd crossed several small bridges and discovered a
kind of island with the river rushing by on both sides, I saw Prince
Dalmar-Kalm coming towards me.
I was sitting on a bench on the little green island, where I pretended
to be gazing down at the water and not to see him till he was close by;
for I was in hope that he wouldn't notice me in my grey dress among the
trees. I don't believe the Prince's best friends would call him an early
morning man. He's the kind that oughtn't to be out before lunch, and he
goes especially well with gaslight or electricity. I felt sure he'd be
unbearable before breakfast--either his breakfast or mine.
"It's a pity," I thought, "that I can't run down as rapidly from the age
of thirteen to the age of one as I have from seventeen to thirteen. When
the Prince found me. I should be sitting on the grass playing with
dandelions and saying. 'Da, da?' which would disgust him so much that
he'd stalk away and leave me in peace to grow up in time for breakfast."
But even a child must draw the line somewhere; and presently the Prince
said "Good-morning" (so nicely that I thought he must have had a cracker
or two in his pocket), asking if he might sit by me on the bench.
"I was just going in to wake Mamma," I replied, and I wondered whether,
if I jumped up suddenly, his end of the bench would go down and tilt him
into the river. It would have been fun to see His Highness become His
Lowness, and to tell Sir Ralph Moray afterwards, but just as I was on
the point of making a spring, he remarked that he had seen me come out,
and followed for a particular reason. If I tumbled him into the water, I
might never hear that reason; so seventeen-year-old curiosity overcame
thirteen-year-old love of mischief, and I sat still.
"As you have only just come out, I don't see why you should be just
going in, unless it is to get away from me," said the Prince, "and I
should be sorry to think that, because you are such a dear little girl,
and I am very fond of you."
"So was Papa," said I, with my best twelve-and-a-half-year-old
expression.
"But I am not quite ancient enough to be your Papa," replied the Prince,
"so you need not name us together like that."
"_Aren't_ you?" I asked, with big eyes.
"Well, that depends on how old you are, my dear."
"I'm too old for you to call your dear, unless you _are_ old enough to
be my Papa," was the sage retort of Baby Beechy.
"I'm over thirty," said the Prince.
"Yes, I know," said I. "I found the Almanach de Gotha on the table of
our hotel at Cap Martin, and you were in it."
"Naturally," said the Prince, but he got rather red, as people always do
when they find out that you know just how far over thirty they've really
gone. "But I'm not married," he went on, "therefore you cannot think of
me as of your papa."
"I don't think of you much as anything," said I. "I'm too busy."
"Too busy! Doing what?"
"Playing dolls," I explained.
"I wish you were a little older," said the Prince, with a good imitation
of a sigh. "Ah, _why_ haven't you a few years more?"
"You might ask Mamma," I replied. "But then, if I had, _she_ would have
more too wouldn't she?"
"That would be a pity. She is charming as she is. She must have married
when almost a child."
"Did you come out here at this time of the morning to ask me about
Mamma's marriage?" I threw at him. "Because, if _that_ was your reason,
I'd rather go in to my dolls."
"No, no," protested the Prince, in a hurry. "I came to talk about
yourself."
I began to feel an attack of giggles coming on, but I stopped them by
holding my breath, as you do for hiccoughs, and thinking about Job,
which, if you can do it soon and solemnly enough, is quite a good
preventive. I knew now exactly why Prince Dalmar-Kalm had dashed on his
clothes at sight of me and come into the garden on an empty stomach. He
had thought, if he could get me all alone for half an hour (which he'd
often tried to do and never succeeded) he could find out a lot of things
that he would like to know. Perhaps he felt it was impossible for
anybody to be as young as I seem, so that was what he wanted to find out
about first. If I _wasn't_, he would flirt; if I _was_, he would merely
pump.
There wasn't much time to decide on a "course of action," as Mamma's
lawyer in Denver says; but I put on my thinking-cap and tied it tight
under my chin for a minute. "There's more fun to be had in playing with
him than with dolls," I said to myself, "if I set about it in the right
way. But what _is_ the right way? I can't be bothered having him for my
doll, because he'd take up too much time. Shall I give him to Maida? No,
I'll lend him to Mamma to play with, so long as she plays the way I want
her to, and doesn't get in earnest."
"What are you anxious to say about me that can't wait till breakfast?" I
asked.
"_Those men_ will be at breakfast," said he. "They are in the position
of your couriers, yet they put themselves forward, as if on an equality
with me. I do not find that conducive to conversation."
"Mamma asked Maida yesterday whether it was better to be an Austrian
prince, or an English baronet?" said I. "Sir Ralph Moray's a baronet."
"So he says," sneered the Prince.
"Oh, he is. Mamma looked him out in Burke the very day I found you were
thirty-nine in the Almanach de Gotha."
"Anybody can be a baronet. That is nothing. It is a mere word."
"It's in three syllables, and 'prince' is only in one. Besides,
Austrians are foreigners, and Englishmen aren't."
"Is that what Miss Destrey said to your Mamma?"
"No, because Mamma's a foreign Countess now, and it might have hurt her
feelings. Maida said she felt more at home with a plain mister--like Mr.
Barrymore, for instance; only he's far from plain."
"You consider him handsome?"
"Oh, yes, we all do."
"But I think you have not known him and Sir Ralph Moray for long. Your
Mamma has not mentioned how she met them, but from one or two things
that have been dropped, I feel sure they are in her employ--that she has
hired them to take you about in their very inadequate car; is it not
so?"
"I'll ask Mamma and tell you what she says, if you'd like me to," I
replied.
"No, no, dear child, you are too literal. It is your one fault. And I
find that you are all three too trusting of strangers. It is a beautiful
quality, but it must not be carried too far. Will you not let me be your
friend, Miss Beechy, and come to me for advice? I should be delighted to
give it, for you know what an interest I take in all connected with you.
There! Now you have heard what I followed you out especially to say. I
hoped that this would be a chance to establish a confidential
relationship between us. _Voulez-vous, ma chère petite?_"
"What kind of a relationship shall we establish, exactly?" I asked. "You
say you don't want to be my Papa."
"If I were your Papa, I should be dead."
"If you were my brother, and the age you are now, Mamma might as well be
dead."
"Ah, I would not be your brother on any consideration. Not even your
step-brother; though some step-relationships are delightful. But your
Mamma is too charming--you are _all_ too charming, for my peace of mind.
I do not know how I lived before I met you."
I thought that the money-lenders perhaps knew; but there are some things
even little Beechy can't say.
"Your Mamma must have great responsibilities for so young a woman," he
went on, while I pruned and prismed. "With her great fortune, and no one
to guard her, she must often feel the weight of her burden too heavy for
one pair of shoulders."
"One can always spend one's fortune, and so get rid of the burden, if
it's too big," said I.
The Prince looked horrified. "Surely she is more wise than that?" he
exclaimed.
"She hasn't spent it all yet, anyhow," I said.
"Are you not anxious lest, if your Mamma is extravagant, she may throw
away your fortune as well as her own; or did your Papa think of that
danger, and make you quite secure?"
"I guess I shall have a little something left, no matter what happens,"
I admitted.
"Then your Papa was thoughtful for you. But was he also jealous for
himself? Had I been the husband of so fascinating a woman as your Mamma,
I would have put into my will a clause that, if she married again, she
must forfeit everything. But it may be that Americans do not hug their
jealousy in the grave."
"I can't imagine poor Papa hugging anything," I said. "I never heard
that he objected to Mamma marrying again. Anyhow, she's had several
offers already."
"She should choose a man of title for her second husband," said the
Prince, very pleased with the way the pump was working.
"Maybe she will," I answered.
He started slightly.
"It should be a title worth having," he said, "and a man fitted to bear
it, not a paltry upstart whose father was perhaps a tradesman. You, Miss
Beechy, must watch over your dear Mamma and rescue her from fortune
hunters. I will help. And I will protect _you_, also. As for Miss
Destrey, beautiful as she is, I feel that she is safe from unworthy
persons who seek a woman only for her money. Her face is her fortune,
_n'est-ce pas_?"
"Well, it's fortune enough for any girl," said I, thinking again of Job
and all the other really solemn characters in the Old Testament as hard
as ever I could.
The Prince sighed, genuinely this time, as if my answer had confirmed
his worst suspicions. "He will be nice to Mamma, now," said little
Beechy to big Beechy. "No more vacillating. He'll come straight to
business." And promising myself some fun, I got up from the bench so
cautiously that the poor river was cheated of a victim. "Now I _must_ go
in," I exclaimed. "_Good_-bye, Prince. Let me see; what are we to each
other?"
"Confidants," he informed me. "You are to come to me with every
difficulty. But one more word before we part, dear child. Be on your
guard, and warn your Mamma to be on hers, with those two adventurers.
Perhaps, also, you had better warn Miss Destrey. Who knows how
unscrupulous the pair might be? And unfortunately, owing to the
regrettable arrangements at present existing, I cannot always be at hand
to watch over you all."
"Owing a little to your automobile too, maybe," said I. "By the way,
what is its state of health?"
"There has been no room for the automobile in my thoughts," said the
Prince, with a cooled-down step-fatherly smile. "But I have no doubt it
will be in good marching order by the time it is wanted, as my chauffeur
was to rise at four, knock up a mechanic at some shop in the village,
and make the new change-speed lever which was broken yesterday. If you
are determined to leave me so soon, I will console myself by finding
Joseph and seeing how he is getting on."
We walked together towards the house, which had opened several of its
green eyelids now, and at the mouth of a sort of stucco tunnel which led
to the door there was Joseph himself--a piteous, dishevelled Joseph,
looking as if birds had built nests on him and spiders had woven webs
round him for years.
"Well," exclaimed the Prince with the air of one warding off a blow.
"What has happened? Have you burnt my automobile, or are you always like
this when you get up early?"
"I am not an incendiary, Your Highness," said Joseph, in his precise
French, which it's easy to understand, because when he wishes to be
dignified he speaks slowly. "I do not know what I am like, unless it is
a wreck, in which case I resemble your automobile. As you left her last
night, so she is now, and so she is likely to remain, unless the
gentlemen of the other car will have the beneficence to pull her up a
still further and more violent hill to the village of Tenda. There finds
himself the only mechanic within fifty miles."
"I engaged _you_ as a mechanic!" cried the Prince.
"But not as a workshop, Your Highness. That I am not and shall not be
this side of Paradise. And it is a workshop that we must have."
"Do not let me keep you, Miss Beechy," said the Prince, "if you wish to
go to your Mamma. This little difficulty will arrange itself."
I adore rows, and I should have liked to stay; but I couldn't think of
any excuse, so I skipped into the house, and almost telescoped (as they
say of railroad trains) with the nice monk, who was talking to Maida in
the hall.
I supposed she was telling him about the Sisters, but she was quite
indignant at the suggestion, and said she had been asking if we could
have breakfast in the garden. The monk had given his consent, and she
had intended to have everything arranged out doors, as a surprise, by
the time we all came down.
"Aunt Kathryn is up; I've been doing her hair," explained Maida, "but we
didn't hear a sound from your room, so we decided not to disturb you.
What _have_ you been about, you weird child?"
"Playing dolls," said I, and ran off to help Mamma put on her
complexion.
But it was on already, all except the icing. I confessed the Prince to
her, and she looked at me sharply. "Don't forget that you're a little
girl now, Beechy," she reminded me. "What were you talking about?"
"You and my other dolls, Mamma," said I. "Even when I was seventeen I
never flirted fasting."
"What did you say about me, dearest?"
"Oh, it was the Prince who said things about you. You can have him to
play with, if you want to."
"Darling, you shouldn't talk of playing. This is a very serious
consideration," said Mamma. "I never heard much about Austrians at home.
Most foreigners there were Germans, which made one think of beer and
sausages. I do wonder what standing an Austrian Prince would have in
Denver? Should you suppose he would be preferred to--to persons of less
exalted rank who were--who were not quite so _foreign_?"
"Do the Prince and Sir Ralph Moray intend to go over as samples?" I
asked sweetly, but Mamma only simpered, and as a self-respecting child I
cannot approve of a parent's simpering.
"I wish you wouldn't be silly, Beechy," she said. "It is a step, being a
Countess, but it is not enough."
"You mean, the more crowns you have, the more crowns you want."
"I mean nothing of the sort," snapped Mamma, "but I have some ambition,
otherwise what would have been the good of coming to Europe? And if one
gets opportunities, it would be sinful to neglect them. Only--one wants
to be sure that one has taken the best."
"There they all three are, in the yard," I remarked, pointing out of the
window at the Opportunities, who were discoursing earnestly with Joseph.
"Of course, I'm too young _now_ to judge of such matters, but if it was
_I_ who had to choose--"
"Well?"
"I'd toss up a penny, and whichever side came, I'd take--"
"Yes?"
"Mr. Barrymore."
"Mr. Barrymore! But he has no title! I might as well have stayed in
America."
"I said that, because I think he'd be the hardest to get. The other
two--"
"What about them?"
"Well, you don't need to decide between them yet. Just wait till we've
travelled a little further, and see whether you come across anything
better worth having."
"Oh, Beechy, I never know whether you're poking fun at me or not,"
sighed poor Mamma, so forlornly that I was sorry--for a whole
minute--that I'd been born wicked; and I tied her tulle in a lovely bow
at the back of her neck, to make up.
IX
A CHAPTER OF REVELATIONS
Maida really was the prettiest thing ever created, when I looked down at
her from Mamma's window, as she arranged flowers and cups and saucers on
the table which the monk had carried out for her, into the garden. He
had quite a gallant air, in his innocent way, as if he were an old beau,
instead of a monk, and his poor face seemed to fall when Mamma's
untitled Opportunity--all unconscious that he was an Opportunity--saw
Maida, left Joseph, and sprang to her assistance. But no wonder those
two men, so different one from the other, found the same joy in waiting
on her! The morning sun sprinkled gold on her hair, and made her fair
skin look milky white, like pearl; then, when she would pass under the
arbour of trees, the shadows threw a glimmering veil over her, and
turned her into a mermaid deep down in the green light of the sea.
I don't believe our glorified chauffeur would have stopped talking motor
talk and run about with dishes for Mamma or me as he did for Maida. And
I wonder if one of us had adopted that little scarecrow of a black dog,
whether he would have given it a bath in the fountain and dried it with
his pocket-handkerchief?
That is often the way. If a girl has set her face against marriage and
would rather be good to the poor than flirt, every man she's reluctantly
forced to meet promptly falls in love with her, while all the thoroughly
nice, normal female things like Mamma and me have to take a back seat.
By the way, Mamma and I are literally in the back seat on this
automobile trip; but my name isn't Beechy Kidder if it's dull for any
length of time.
However, this reflection is only a parenthesis in the midst of
breakfast; for we all had breakfast together in the monastery garden and
were as "gay as grigs." (N.B.--Some kind of animal for which Sir Ralph
is responsible.)
The Prince was nice to the two "adventurers," because he didn't want
them to repent their promise to tow his car up to Tenda; Maida was nice
to everybody, because a monastery was next best to a convent; Mr.
Barrymore was nice to her dog; Sir Ralph and the Prince were both nice
to Mamma, and Breakfast (I spell it with a capital to make it more
important) was nice to the poor little girl who would have had nobody to
play with, if each one hadn't been a dancing doll of hers without
realizing it.
The monk wouldn't charge us a cent for our board, so we had
unconsciously been paying him a visit all the time, though paying
nothing else, and the Prince had actually found fault with the coffee!
However, Sir Ralph gave him a donation for the charities of the house,
which he accepted, so we could bid him good-bye without feeling like
tramps who had stolen a lodging in somebody's barn.
As our automobile had to drag the Prince's, and it appeared that Tenda
was less than three miles away, Maida and I decided to walk. Sir Ralph
walked with us, and the Prince looked as if he would like to, but after
our talk before breakfast, he naturally felt that his place was by the
side of Mamma. She comes down two inches in common-sense walking shoes,
so of course hills are not for her, now that she's trying to be as
beautiful as she feels; but the Prince persuaded her to sit in the
tonneau of his car, as it crawled up the steep white road behind Mr.
Barrymore and the Panhard, so slowly that he could pace beside her. Sir
Ralph talked to Maida, as we three trailed after the two motors, and I
began to wonder if I hadn't been a little too strenuous in making the
Prince entirely over to Mamma.
Not that I wanted him personally, but I
did want some one to want me, so presently I pretended to be tired, and
running after the toiling cars, asked Mr. Barrymore whether my weight
would make much difference if I sat by him.
"No more than a feather," said he, with such a delightful smile that I
wished myself back at seventeen again, so that he might not talk "down"
to me in that condescending, uncomfortable way that grown-ups think
themselves obliged to use when they're entertaining children. If he had
only known it, I should have been quite equal to entertaining _him_; but
I was a victim to my pigtails and six inches of black silk stocking.
"Do you like motoring?" he asked, conscientiously.
"Yes," said I. "And it _is_ a fine day. And I would rather travel than
go to school. And I admire Europe almost as much as America So you
needn't bother about asking me those questions. You can begin right now
with something you would really _like_ to ask."
He laughed. "As you're so fastidious, I'd better consider a little," he
said.
"Maybe it would save time if I should suggest some subjects," said I,
"for I suppose we'll be at Tenda soon, even though the Prince's car is
as big as a house, and this hill is as steep as the side of one. Would
you like to ask me about Mamma's Past?"
"Good gracious, what do you take me for?" exclaimed Mr. Barrymore.
"I haven't decided yet," I replied, "though the Prince has talked to me
quite a good deal about you."
"Has he, indeed? What does he know about me?" and our magnificent
chauffeur turned suddenly so red under his nice dark skin, that I
couldn't help wondering if, by any chance, the Prince were the least
little bit right about his being an adventurer. I almost hoped he was,
for it would make things so much more romantic. I felt like saying,
"Don't mind me, my dear young sir. If you've anything to conceal about
yourself, I shall like you all the better." But what I really did say
was that the Prince seemed much more interested in people's Pasts than
he--Mr. Barrymore--appeared to be.
"My future is more interesting to me than my own past, or any one
else's," he retorted. But I thought that he looked a little troubled, as
if he were racking his brain for what the Prince could have let out, and
was too proud or obstinate to ask.
"You _are_ selfish," I said. "Then there's no use my trying to make this
ride pleasant for you, by telling you anecdotes of my past--or Maida's."
At this his profile changed. I can't say his "face" because he was
steering a great deal more than was flattering to me, or necessary in
going up hill. Would the fish bite at that last tempting morsel of bait?
I wondered. The Prince would have snapped at it; but though Mr.
Barrymore's title is only that of chauffeur, he is more of a gentleman
in his little finger than the Prince in his whole body. He may be an
adventurer, but anyhow he isn't the kind who pumps naughty little girls
about their grown-up relations' affairs.
"I am only concerned with yours and Miss Destrey's present," he said
after a minute.
"But the present so soon becomes the past, doesn't it? There's never
more than just a minute of the present, really, if you come to look at
it in that way, all the rest is past and future."
"Never mind," said Mr. Barrymore. "You've got more future than any of
the party."
"And poor Maida has less."
He forgot about his old steering-wheel for part of a second, and gave me
such a glance that I knew I had him on my hook this time.
"Why do you say that?" he asked, quite sharply.
"Oh, you _are_ interested in somebody's future beside your own then?"
"Who could help being--in hers?"
"You look as if you thought I meant she was dying of a decline," said I.
"It isn't quite as bad as that, but--well, beautiful as Maida is I
wouldn't change places with her, unless I could change souls as well. It
would be a good deal better for Maida in _this_ world if she could have
mine, though just the opposite in the next."
"Such talk clouds the sunshine," said Mr. Barrymore, "even for a
stranger like me, when you prophesy gloomy mysteries for one who
deserves only happiness. You said something of the sort to Moray
yesterday. He told me, but I was in hope that you had been joking."
"No," said I. "But I suppose Maida doesn't think the mysteries gloomy,
or she wouldn't 'embrace' them--if that's the right word for it. Mamma
and I imagined that coming to Europe would make her see differently
perhaps, but it hadn't the last time I asked her. She thought Paris lots
of fun, but all the same she was homesick for the stupid old convent
where she was brought up, and which she is going to let _swallow_ her up
in a year."
"Good Heavens, how terrible!" exclaimed our chauffeur, looking
tragically handsome. "Can nothing be done to save her? Couldn't you and
your mother induce her to change her mind?"
"We've tried," said I. "She saw a lot of society in Paris and when we
were at Cap Martin, but it gave her the sensation of having made a whole
meal on candy. Mamma has the idea of being presented to your Queen
Alexandra next spring, if she can manage it, and she told Maida that, if
she'd tack on a little piece to her year of travel, _she_ might be done
too, at the same time. But Maida didn't seem to care particularly about
it; and the society novels that Mamma loves don't interest her a bit.
Her favourite authors are Shakspere and Thomas Hardy, and she reads
Cooper and Sir Walter Scott. So what _can_ you do with a girl like
that?"
"There are other things in life besides society."
"Mamma doesn't think so. I guess we've both done all we can. I'm afraid
poor Maida's doomed. But there's one comfort; she'll look perfectly
beautiful in the white robe and veil that her Sisterhood wears."
Mr. Barrymore gave a sort of groan. "What a vocation for a girl like
that!" he muttered, more to himself than to me, I imagine. "Something
desperate ought to be done."
"_You_ might try to influence her," I said. "Not that I think it's
likely you _could_. But there's no harm in trying."
He didn't answer, but his face was as grave as if I had just invited him
to a funeral, and as even Job couldn't have kept my features from
playing (why shouldn't features play, if they can work?), I hastily
sought the first excuse for laughter I could find lying about loose.
"Oh, how _funny_!" I exclaimed. "Ha, ha, ha, how _funny_!"
"What is funny?" drearily demanded our chauffeur.
"Why, that queer little grey-brown town we're coming to. It looks for
all the world like an exhibition of patent beehives at a country fair."
"That is Tenda," volunteered Mr. Barrymore, still plunged in the depths
of gloom. "Your unfortunate namesake, poor Beatrice di Tenda, would have
been surprised to hear such a simile applied to her native town."
"Who was she?" I felt bound to inquire.
"I was telling Miss Destrey about her yesterday. She seemed interested.
Miss Destrey is very fond of history, isn't she?"
"Yes. But I'm tired talking of her now. I want to hear about the other
Beatrice. I suppose, if she was Italian, she was Bice too; but I'm sure
her friends never made her rhyme with mice."
"Her husband made her rhyme with murder. Did you never hear of the opera
of Beatrice di Tenda? Her story is one of the most romantic tragedies in
history. Well, there she was born, and there she lived as a beautiful
young woman in that old castle whose ruined tower soars so high above
your collection of beehives. When she was in her gentle prime of beauty,
the ferocious Duke Filippo Maria Visconti came riding here from Milan to
court the sweetest lady of her day. She didn't care for him, of course,
but young women of high rank had less choice in those times than they
have in these, and that was the way all the mischief began. She did love
somebody else, and the wicked Duke starved her to death in the tower of
another old castle. When we get to Pavia, which we shall pass on the way
to Milan, I'll show you and Miss Destrey where your namesake lived when
she was a duchess, and died when her duke would have her for a duchess
no more, but wanted somebody else. Poor Beatrice, I wonder if her spirit
has ever been present at the performance of the opera, and whether she
approved."
"I hope she came with the man she loved, and sat in a box, and that the
duke was down in--in--"
"The pit," said Mr. Barrymore, laughing, and giving a glance back over
his shoulder for Maida and Sir Ralph, as he stopped the car in front of
a machinist's place. "Here we are, Joseph," he called to the Prince's
chauffeur, who was steering the broken car. "Now, how soon do you expect
to finish your job?"
"With proper tools, it should be no more than an hour's work," said
Joseph, jumping down.
"An hour? Why, I should have thought three would be more like it,"
exclaimed Mr. Barrymore.
"I am confident that I can do it in one all little hour," reiterated
Joseph, and for once the Prince regarded him benignly.
"Whatever Joseph's faults, he is an excellent mechanician," said His
Highness. "I did not intend to ask that you would wait, but if my car
can be ready so soon, perhaps you will have pity upon me, Countess, and
let me escort you to the castle while Joseph is working."
"Castle? I don't see any castle," returned Mamma, gazing around.
"What's left of it looks more like a walking-stick than a castle," said
I, pointing up to the tall, tapering finger of broken stone that almost
touched the clouds.
"Is Mamma's new property in Dalmatia as well perserved as that,
Prince?"
"You have always a joke ready, little Miss Beechy." His lips
smiled; but his eyes boxed my ears. Almost I felt them tingle; and
suddenly I said to myself, "Good gracious, Beechy Kidder, what if your
dolls should take to playing the game their own way, in spite of you,
now you've set them going! Where would you be _then_, I'd like to know?"
And a horrid creep ran down my spine, at the thought of Prince
Dalmar-Kalm as a step-father. Maybe he would shut _me_ up in a tower and
starve me to death, as the wicked duke did with the other Beatrice; and
it wouldn't comfort me a bit if some one wrote an opera about my
sufferings. But if he thinks he'll really get Mamma, he little knows Me,
that's all. We shall see what we shall see.
X
A CHAPTER OF THRILLS
The hotel at Tenda is apparently the one new thing in the town, and it
is new enough to more than make up for the oldness of everything else.
We went there to grumble because, after we had done the ruined castle
(and it had done Mamma), Joseph's "all little" hour threatened to
lengthen itself into at lest two of ordinary size.
Mr. Barrymore's eyebrows said, "I told you so," but his tongue said
nothing, which was nice of it; and the Prince did all the complaining as
we sat on perfectly new chairs, in a perfectly new parlour, with a smell
of perfectly new plaster in the air, and plu-perfectly old newspapers on
the table. According to him, Joseph was an absolutely unique villain,
with a combination of deceit, treachery, procrastination, laziness, and
stupidity mixed with low cunning, such as could not be paralleled in the
history of motor-men; and it was finally Mr. Barrymore who defended the
poor absent wretch.
"Really, you know," said he, "I don't think he's worse than other
chauffeurs. Curiously enough, the whole tribe seems to be alike in
several characteristics, and it would be an interesting study in motor
lore to discover whether they've all--by a singular coincidence--been
born with those peculiarities, whether they've been thrust upon them, or
whether they've achieved them!"
"Joseph never achieved anything," broke in the Prince.
"That disposes of one point of view, then," went on Mr. Barrymore.
"Anyhow, he's cut on an approved pattern. All the professional
chauffeurs I ever met have been utterly unable to calculate time or
provide for future emergencies. They're pessimists at the moment of an
accident, and optimists afterwards--until they find out their mistakes
by gloomy experience, which, however, seldom teaches them anything."
The Prince shrugged his shoulders in a superior way he has, and drawled,
"Well, you are better qualified to judge the brotherhood, than the rest
of us, at all events, my dear sir."
Mr. Barrymore got rather red, but he only laughed and answered, "Yes,
that's why I spoke in Joseph's defence. A fellow-feeling makes us
wondrous kind," while Maida looked as if she would like to set the new
dog at His Highness.
The fact is she has got into her head that our handsome chauffeur is
very unfortunate; and when Maida is sorry for anybody or anything she'll
stick by that creature--man, woman, or dog--through thick and thin. And
funnier still, _he_ is sorry for _her_. Well, it all comes into my game
of dolls. But I'm not sure that I shan't fall in love with him myself,
and want to keep him up my sleeve against the time when I'm seventeen
again.
The hotel clock was so new that it hadn't learned to go yet; and I never
saw people glance at their watches so much, even in the midst of a long
sermon, as we did, sitting on those new chairs in that new parlour. At
last Sir Ralph Moray proposed that we should have lunch; and we had it,
with delicious trout as new as the dish on which they came frizzling to
the table. While we were eating them Joseph was announced, and was
ordered to report himself in the dining-room. He seemed quite
cheerful--for him.
"I came to tell Your Highness that I shall be able to finish in time to
start by four o'clock this afternoon," said he complacently.
Up sprang the Prince in a rage and began to shout French things which
must have been shocking, for Sir Ralph and Mr. Barrymore both scowled at
him till he superficially calmed down.
Joseph had either forgotten that he'd promised to be ready hours ago,
or else he didn't see why we should attach the least importance to a
tiny discrepancy like that.
In the midst of the argument, while the Prince's language got hot and
his fish cold, Mr. Barrymore turned to Mamma and proposed that we should
start directly after lunch, as most probably the Prince wouldn't get off
till next morning.
The prospect of staying all night at Tenda, with nothing to do but sit
on the new chairs till bed time, was too much even for Mamma's wish to
please Titled Opportunity Number One. She nervously elected to go on
with Titled Opportunity Number Two and his friend.
I thought that the Prince would be plunged in gloom by this decision,
even if he didn't try to break it. To my surprise, however, he not only
made no objection, but encouraged the idea. He wouldn't wish to
sacrifice us on the altar of his misfortune, he said. We must go on,
dine at Cuneo, and he would meet us at the hotel there, which he could
easily do, as, when once his automobile was itself again, it would
travel at more than twice the speed of ours. "Especially up hill," he
added. "The landlord has told Joseph that beyond Tenda the ascent is
stupendous, nothing less than Alpine. You will be obliged to travel at a
snail's pace, even if you reach the top without every passenger walking
up the hill, which mounts, curve after curve, for miles."
Poor Mamma's face fell several inches. She had had enough walking up
hill for one day, as the Prince knew well, and no doubt he enjoyed the
chance of disgusting her with motoring in other people's automobiles.
But Mr. Barrymore's expression would have put spirit into a mock turtle.
"I know what the gradients are," he said, "and what we can do. To show
that I'm an exception which proves the rule I laid down for chauffeurs,
I'm not making any experiments without counting the cost. I hope we
shall get to Cuneo by tea-time, not dinner-time, and push on to
Alessandria as a better stopping-place for the night."
"Very well. In any case I shall expect to catch you up at Cuneo," said
the Prince, "and so, if you please, we will make a rendezvous at a
certain hotel."
Baedeker was produced, a hotel was selected, and half an hour later His
Highness was bidding us _au revoir_, as we settled ourselves in our
luggage-wreathed car, to leave the town of Beatrice and the dominating,
file-on-end shaped ruin.
We had all been up so early that it seemed as if the day were growing
old, but really it was only one o'clock, for we'd lunched at twelve, and
all the afternoon was before us in which to do, or not to do, our great
climbing act.
Just to see how our gorgeous chauffeur would look, I asked if I mightn't
sit on the front seat for a change, because my feet had gone to sleep in
the tonneau yesterday. I half-expected that he would shuffle round for
an excuse to keep Maida; but with an immovable face he said that was for
the three ladies to arrange. Of course, Maida must have wanted to be in
front, but she is so horribly unselfish that she glories in sacrificing
herself, so she gave up as meekly as if she had been a lady's-maid, or a
dormouse, and naturally I felt a little brute; but I usually do feel a
brute with Maida; she's so much better than any one I ever saw that I
can't help imposing on her, and neither can Mamma. It's a waste of good
material being so awfully pretty as Maida, if you're never going to do
anything for people to forgive.
Yesterday we had been too hot in our motor-coats till night came on.
To-day, when we had left Tenda a little way below, we opened our
shawl-straps and got out our fur stoles.
At first I thought that the Prince had only been trying to frighten us,
and make us wish we were in a big car like his, for the road went
curving up as gracefully and easily as a swan makes tracks in the water,
and our automobile hummed cheerfully to itself, forging steadily up. It
was so nice having nothing to drag that, by comparison with yesterday
afternoon, we moved like a ship under full sail; but suddenly the road
reared up on its hind feet and stood almost erect, as though it had been
frightened by the huge snow-capped mountains that all at once crowded
round us. An icy wind rushed down from the tops of the great white
towers, as if with the swooping wings of a giant bird, and it took our
car's breath away.
Instead of humming it began to pant, and I noticed the difference at
once. If I'd been Maida, I should probably have been too polite to put
questions about the thing's behaviour, for fear Mr. Barrymore might
think I hadn't proper confidence in him; but being Beechy, with no
convictions to live up to, I promptly asked if anything was the matter.
"The car's only trying to tell me that she can't manage to spurt up on
third speed any more," said he. "I shall put on the second, and you'll
hear what a relief it gives to the motor."
It certainly was as if the automobile had gulped down a stimulant, and
revived in a second. But as we turned a shoulder of the mountain, coming
in sight of a railroad depôt, a high embankment, and a monstrous wall of
mountain with the sky for a ceiling, I couldn't help giving a little
squeak.
"Is that a _road_?" I asked, pointing up to a network like a skein of
silk twisted in a hundred zigzags across the face of the mountain from
bottom to top. "Why, it's like the way up Jack's beanstalk. No sane
automobile could do it."
"Some could," said Mr. Barrymore, "but I dare say it's lucky for us that
ours hasn't got to. It's the old road, only used now to communicate with
that desolate fortress you see on the top shelf of the mountain,
standing up there on the sky-line like the ark on Ararat. All this
country is tremendously fortified by both the French and Italians, in
case they should ever come to loggerheads. Above us somewhere is a long
tunnel burrowing into the _col_, and the new road runs through that
instead of over the summit."
"Bump!" went the car, as he finished his explanation, and then we began
to wade jerkily through a thick layer of loose stones that had been
spread over the road like hard butter over stale bread.
"_Le corse_" (that is what our landlord had called the cruel wind
sweeping down from the snow mountains) was hurling itself into our
faces; our fat rubber tyres were bouncing over the stones like
baseballs, and I'd never been so uncomfortable nor so perfectly happy in
my life. I wished I were a cat, so that I could purr, for purring has
always struck me as the most thorough way of expressing satisfaction.
When other people are in automobiles, and you are walking or jogging
past with a pony, you glare and think what insufferable vehicles they
are; but when you're spinning, or even jolting, along in one of them
yourself, then you know that there's nothing else in the world as well
worth doing. I made a remark like that to Mr. Barrymore, and he gave me
such a friendly, appreciative look as he said, "Have you discovered all
this already?" that I decided at once to eat my heart out with a vain
love for him.
I haven't been really in love before since I was ten; so the sensation
was quite exciting, like picking up a lovely jewel on the street, which
you aren't sure won't be claimed by somebody else. I was trying to think
what else I could say to fascinate him when the car lost its breath
again, and--"r-r-retch" went in another speed.
"It's our 'first and last,'" said Mr. Barrymore. "Good old girl, she's
going to do it all right, though there's many a twenty-four horse-power
car that wouldn't rise to it. By Jove, this is a road--and a half. I
believe, Ralph, that you and I had better jump off and ease her a bit."
Mamma squeaked, and begged our chauffeur not to leave us to go up by
ourselves, or we should be over the awful precipice in an instant. But
Mr. Barrymore explained that he wasn't deserting the ship; and he walked
quickly along by the side of the car, through the bed of sharp stones,
keeping his hand always on the steering-wheel like a pilot guiding a
vessel among hidden rocks.
Maida would have been out too, in a flash, if Mr. Barrymore had let her,
but he told us all to sit still, so we did, happy (judging the others by
myself) in obeying him.
I hadn't supposed there could be such a road as
this. If one hadn't had hot and cold creeps in one's toes for fear the
"good old girl" would slide back down hill and vault into space with us
in her lap, one would have been struck dumb with admiration of its
magnificence. As a matter of fact, we were all three dumb as mutes, but
it wasn't only admiration that paralysed my tongue or Mamma's, I know,
whatever caused the phenomenon with Maida, who has no future worth
clinging to.
As we toiled up, in spite of the stones that did their best to keep us
back, we simply hung on the breathing of the motor, as Mamma used to on
mine when I was small and indulged in croup. When she gasped, we gasped
too; when she seemed to falter, we involuntarily strained as if the
working of our muscles could aid hers. All our bodies sympathized with
the efforts of her body, which she was making for our sakes, dragging us
up, up, into wonderful white, shining spaces where it seemed that summer
never had been and never would dare to come.
The twisted skein of silk we had looked up to was turning into a coil of
rope now, stretched taut and sharp from zig to zag, and on from zag to
zig again. Below, when we dared to look back and down, the coil of rope
lay looser, curled on itself. The mountain-top crowned by the fort
(which as Mr. Barrymore said, did certainly look like the ark on Ararat
when all the rest of creation was swept off the globe) didn't appear so
dimly remote now. We were coming almost into friendly relations with it,
and with neighbouring mountains whose summits had seemed, a little while
ago, as far away as Kingdom Come.
I began to feel at last as if I could speak without danger of giving the
motor palpitation of the heart. "What are you thinking of, Maida?" I
almost whispered.
"Oh!" she answered with a start, as if I'd waked her out of a dream. "I
was thinking, what if, while we're still in this world we could see
heaven, a far, shining city on a mountain-top like one of these. How
much harder we would strive after worthiness if we _saw_ the place
always with our bodily eyes; how much harder we'd try; and how much
less credit it would be for those who succeeded."
"What are _you_ thinking of, Mamma?" I asked. "Did the big mountains
give you a thought too?"
"Yes, they did," said she, "but I'm afraid it was more worldly than
Maida's. I was saying to myself, the difference in being down far below,
where we were, and high up as we are now, is like our old life in Denver
and our life here." As she went on to expound her parable, she lowered
her voice, so that Sir Ralph and Mr. Barrymore, walking, couldn't catch
a word. "In those days at home, it would have seemed as impossible that
we could have princes and baronets and--and such people for our most
_intimate_ friends, as it looked a little while ago for us to get near
that fort up there, or the mountain-tops. Yet we are, in--in every sense
of the word, _getting there_."
The thoughts which the mountains had put into Maida's golden head and
Mamma's (now) auburn one were so characteristic of the heads themselves
that I chuckled with glee, and our two men glanced round questioningly.
But in accordance with Mamma's simile, to explain to them would have
been like explaining to the mountains themselves.
By and by, though still going up, we were on snow level. Snow lay white
as Maida's thoughts on either side of the steep road, but _le corse_ had
run shrieking farther down the mountain, and was not at home in its own
high house. We were less cold than we had been; and when presently the
worst of the zigzags were past and a great black tunnel-mouth in sight
to show we'd reached the _col_, the sun was almost warm. A few moments
more, and (on our second best speed, with all five on board) we had shot
into that great black mouth.
I always thought that we had the longest and biggest of everything in
our country, but I never heard of a tunnel like this in America.
It was the queerest thing to look into I ever saw.
The lamps of our automobile which Mr. Barrymore had stopped to light
before plunging in, showed us a long, long, straight passage cut through
the mountain, with an oval roof arched like an egg. Except for a few
yards ahead, where the way was lit up and the arch of close-set stones
glimmered grey, the blackness would have been unbroken had it not been
for the tunnel-lights. They went on and on in a sparkling line as far as
our eyes could reach; and if the most famous whale in the world had had
a spine made of diamonds, Jonah would have got much the same effect that
we did as he wandered about in the dark trying to get his bearings.
It was only the most distant electric lamps that looked as if they were
diamonds stuck close together along the roof. The near ones were balls
of light under swaying umbrellas of ink-black shadow; and sometimes we
would flash past great sharp stalactites, which were, as Maida said,
like Titanesses' hatpins stuck through from the top of the mountain.
At first the tunnel road was inches thick with white dust; then, much to
our surprise, we ran into a track of greasy mud which made our car waltz
as it had in the Roya valley close to the precipice.
"It's the water filtering in through the holes your Titanesses' hatpins
have made in their big pincushion," explained Mr. Barrymore, who had
heard Maida make that remark. And the hateful creatures had so
honeycombed the whole mountain over our heads, that Mamma and I put up
umbrellas to save ourselves from being drenched.
"What a place this would be for an accident! Or--suppose we met
something that _objected_ to us!" Mamma shrieked, her voice all but
drowned by the reverberation made by our motor in the hollow vault.
With that, as if her words had "conjured it from the vasty deep"--to use
a quotation of Sir Ralph's--something appeared, and it did object to us
very much.
It was a horse, and it gleamed like silver as our front lamp pointed it
out to our startled eyes with a long, bright finger of light.
He was coming towards us, down the narrow, arched passage, walking on
his hind legs, with some one in a cart behind him, standing up and
hitting him on the head with a whip.
We were not really going very fast on account of the splashy mud; but
what with the roaring echo of the motor, the dripping of water, the
narrowness of the tunnel, the yapping of our little dog, the shouts of
the man in the cart, and the strangeness of the picture ahead--just like
a lighted disc on the screen of a magic lantern--it did seem as if
everybody concerned must come to awful grief in about three seconds.
I don't know whether I screamed or not; though I know Mamma did; a deaf
man would have known that. But the first thing I was really sure of was
that Mr. Barrymore had not only stopped the car but the motor, had
jumped down, and gone to the horse's head.
He said something quickly to the driver, which I couldn't understand,
because it was in Italian; but the man didn't yell or whip the horse any
more. Mr. Barrymore patted the poor beast, and talked to him, until he
seemed tired of dancing about as if he were popcorn over a hot fire.
Then, when he had quieted down, and remembered that his forefeet were
given him to walk with and not to paw the air, Mr. Barrymore led him
gently up to our automobile, patting his neck all the time. He snorted
and quivered for a minute, then smelt of what Mr. Barrymore calls the
"bonnet," with the funniest expression of disgust and curiosity.
I imagined the horse was thinking, "This is a very nasty thing, but it
seems to belong to the nicest, kindest man I ever met, so perhaps it
isn't as bad after all as I thought at first."
The driver's scowl turned to a smile, as he eventually drove by, we
waiting till he had got safely past.
"I think that was real nice of you, Mr. Barrymore," said Mamma, as we
went teuf-teufing on again.
She is always a little uneasy with him, because, though he's a friend of
Sir Ralph Moray's, he's only a chauffeur, and she isn't quite sure
whether she oughtn't to patronize him a little to keep up her dignity
as a Countess. But it was a good sign that she should remember his name
for once. As for me, I've given him one for use behind his back, which
is to make up for his lack of a title, express his gorgeousness and
define his profession all at the same time. It is "Chauffeulier," and I
rather pride myself on it.
"It was only decent," he answered Mamma. "I love horses, and I've enough
imagination to guess pretty well how one feels when he's called upon to
face some unknown horror, with no sympathy from behind. It would have
been sheer brutality not to stop motor and all for that poor white chap.
He won't be as bad next time; and perhaps his master will have learned a
little common sense too. All the same, that kind of adventure spells
delay, and I hope this tunnel isn't infested with timid horses. Luckily,
the line seems all clear ahead."
A few minutes more, and looking before and after, we could see far away
two little oval pearls of daylight, one straight ahead, one straight
behind. It was like having one's foresight as good as one's hindsight;
which in real life, outside tunnels, would save a lot of disasters. Mr.
Barrymore explained that we'd reached the apex of two slopes, and now we
would be descending gradually.
It gave us a shock to burst out into the sunlight again by-and-by, but
it was a glorious shock, with a thrill as the dazzling white mountains
seemed to leap at our eyes.
If you speak of zigzags going up hill, oughtn't you to call them zagzigs
going down? Anyway, there they were, hundreds of them apparently,
looking something as a huge corkscrew might look if it had been laid on
a railroad track for a train to flatten.
We began to fly down, faster and faster, the motor making no noise at
all. At each turn of the corkscrew it seemed to me as if we must leap
over into space, and I felt as if I had been struck by lightning; but
always our chauffeur steered so as to give plenty of margin between our
tyres and the edge of the precipice; and by-and-by I was thoroughly
charged with electricity so that I ceased to be actually afraid. All I
felt was that my soul was covered with a very thin, sensitive skin.
"Oh, Mr. Terrymore, for mercy's sake, for _heaven's_ sake...!" wailed
Mamma. "I don't feel _able_ to die to-day."
"You shan't, if I can help it," answered Mr. Barrymore, without looking
round; but as he never wears goggles, I could see his face plainly from
my place by his side, and I thought it had rather an odd, stern
expression. I wondered whether he were cross with Mamma for seeming to
doubt his skill, or whether something else was the matter. But instead
of fading away, the expression seemed to harden. He looked just as I
should think a man might look if he were going to fight in a battle. I
awfully wanted to ask if anything were wrong, but something
mysterious--a kind of atmosphere around him, like a barrier I could feel
but not see--wouldn't let me.
"I believe the thing is broken, somehow," I said to myself; and the
thought was so awful, when I stared down at all those separate layers of
precipice which we would have to risk before we reached human-level (if
we ever reached it) that my heart pounded like a hammer in my side. It
was a terrible sensation, yet I revelled in it with a kind of desperate
joy; for everything depended on the eye, and nerve, and hand of this one
man whom it was so thrilling to trust.
Each time we twisted round a corkscrew I gave a sigh of relief; for it
was one less peril to pass on the way to safety.
"Do just stop for a moment and let us breathe," cried Mamma; and my
suspicions were confirmed by Mr. Barrymore's answer, thrown over his
shoulder. "It's best not, Countess," he said. "I'll explain afterwards."
Mamma is always ecstatic for an instant after any one has addressed her
as "Countess," so she didn't insist, and only murmured to herself, "Oh,
_why_ did I leave my peaceful home?" in a minor wail which showed me
that she wasn't really half as anxious as I was. But if she could have
seen Mr. Barrymore's profile, and had the inspiration to read it as I
did, she would probably have jumped out of the automobile in full
flight. Whereupon, though she might have gained a crown to wear upon her
forehead, all those on her brushes and powder-pots, and satchels and
trunks, would have been wasted. Poor little Mamma!
We plunged down below the snow-line; we saw far beneath us a wide, green
valley, where other people, the size of flies, were safe if not happy.
We passed some barracks, where a lot of sturdy little mountain soldiers
stopped bowling balls in a dull, stony square to watch us fly by. We
frightened some mules; we almost made a horse faint away; but the
Chauffeulier showed no desire to stop and let them admire our "bonnet"
at close quarters.
The excitement of the drive, and my conviction that Mr. Barrymore was
silently fighting some unseen danger for us all, filled me with a kind
of intoxication. I could have screamed; but if I had, it wouldn't have
been with cowardly fear. Partly, perhaps, the strange exhilaration came
from the beauty of the world on which we were descending almost as if we
were falling from the sky. I felt that I could have lovely thoughts
about it--almost as poetical as Maida's--if only I had had time; but as
it was, the ideas jostled each other in my mind like a crowd of people
rushing to catch a train.
From behind, I could hear Maida's voice from moment to moment, as she
talked to Mamma or Sir Ralph, innocently unsuspicious of any hidden
danger.
"Isn't it all wonderful?" she was saying. "Day before yesterday we left
riotous, tumultuous summer on the Riviera; found autumn in the Roya
valley, chill and grim, though so magnificent; and came into winter
snows this morning. Now we've dropped down into spring. It's like a
fairy story I read once, about a girl whose cruel stepmother drove her
from home penniless, and sent her into the mountains at dead of night,
telling her never to come back unless she could bring an apronful of
strawberries for her stepsister. The poor girl wandered on and on in the
dark in a terrible storm, until at last she strayed to a wild
mountain-top, where the twelve Months lived. Some were old men, wrapped
in long cloaks; some were young and ardent; some were laughing boys.
With a stroke of his staff, each Month could make what he would with the
weather. Father January had but to wave his stick to cause the snow to
fall; May, in pity for the girl's tears, created a rose garden, while
his brother's snow-wreaths were melting; but it was June who finally
understood what she wanted, and gave her a bed of fragrant strawberries.
I feel as if _we_ had wandered to the house of the Months, and they were
waving their staffs to create miracles for us."
"It will be a miracle if we ever get out of the house of the Months and
into one of our own," I said to myself, almost spitefully, for the talk
in the tonneau did seem frivolous when I glanced up furtively at that
tight-set mouth of Mr. Barrymore's. And after that, to look down from a
frame of snow mountains through a pinky-white haze of plum, cherry, and
pear blossoms to delicate green meadows sparkling with a thick gold-dust
of dandelions, was for me like going out to be tried for my life in a
frock made by a fairy.
I hardly breathed until the corkscrew uncurled itself at last and turned
into an ordinary downhill road. Our car slackened speed, and finally, as
we came upon the first long, level stretch, to my astonishment moved
slower and more slowly until it stopped dead.
XI
A CHAPTER OF BRAKES AND WORMS
Mamma laughed one of those coquettish, twenty-five-year-old laughs that
go with her auburn hair and her crowns.
"Well, have you decided to give us a chance to breathe, after all?" she
asked. "I should say it was about time."
"I'm afraid you'll breathe maledictions when you hear what is the
matter," said our Chauffeulier.
"Good gracious! what's happened?" exclaimed Mamma. "If the thing's going
to explode, do let us get out and run."
"So far from exploding, she's likely to be silent for some time," Mr.
Barrymore went on, jumping down and going to the automobile's head. "I'm
awfully sorry. After the delays we've suffered, you won't think motoring
is all it's painted, when I tell you that we're in for another."
"Why, what is it this time?" Mamma asked.
"I'm not quite sure yet," said Mr. Barrymore, "but the chains are wrong
for one thing, and I'm inclined to think there's some deep-seated
trouble. I shall soon find out, but whatever it is, I hope you won't
blame the car too much. She's a trump, really; but she had a big strain
put upon her endurance yesterday and this morning. Dragging another car
twice her size for thirty miles or more up a mountain pass isn't a joke
for a twelve horse-power car."
Any one would think the automobile was his instead of Sir Ralph's by the
pride he takes in it. Sir Ralph doesn't seem to care half as much; but
then I don't believe he's a born sports-man like his friend. You can be
a motor-car owner if you've got money enough; but I guess you have to be
_born_ a motor-car man.
"Well, this isn't exactly an ideal place for an accident," remarked
Mamma, "as it seems to be miles from anywhere; but we ought to be
thankful to Providence for not letting the break come up there on that
awful mountain."
I saw a faint twinkle in Mr. Barrymore's eyes and a twitch of his lips,
as he bent down over the machinery without answering a word, and I
couldn't resist the temptation of letting him see that I was in his
secret. There couldn't be any harm in it's coming out now.
"Thankful to Mr. Barrymore for bringing us safely down the 'awful
mountain' when the break _had_ come at the top," I corrected Mamma, with
my chin in the air.
"Good Heavens, Beechy, what _do_ you mean?" she gasped, while our
Chauffeulier flashed me a quick look of surprise.
"Oh, only that the accident, whatever it was, happened soon after we
came out of the tunnel, and if Mr. Barrymore'd stopped when you wanted
him to, he couldn't have started again, for we were just running
downhill with our own weight; and I knew it all the time," I explained
airily.
"You're joking, Beechy, and I think it's horrid of you," said Mamma,
looking as if she were going to cry.
"Am I joking, Mr. Barrymore?" I asked, turning to him.
"I had no idea that you guessed, and I don't see now how you did; but
it's true that the accident happened up there," he admitted, and he
looked so grave that I began to feel guilty for telling.
"Then it was only by a merciful dispensation that we weren't hurled over
the precipice and dashed to pieces," exclaimed Mamma.
"That depends on one's definition of a merciful dispensation," said Mr.
Barrymore. "From one point of view every breath we draw is a merciful
dispensation, for we might easily choke to death at any instant. We were
never for a single moment in danger. If I hadn't been sure of that, of
course I would have stopped the car at any cost. As a matter of fact,
when we began the descent I found that the hand-brake wouldn't act, and
knew the chains had gone wrong. If I'd thought it was only that I could
have put on our spare chains, but I believed there was more and worse,
so I determined to get on as far towards civilization as I could before
stopping the car."
"You brought us down those ghastly hills without a brake!" Mamma cried
out, losing her temper. "And Sir Ralph called you careful! I can never
trust you again."
I could have slapped her and myself too.
"Aunt Kathryn!" exclaimed Maida. Then I could have slapped her as well
for interfering. It would serve her right if I married her off to the
Prince.
The Chauffeulier looked for a second as if he were going to say "Very
well, madam; do as you like about that." But Maida's little reproachful
exclamation apparently poured balm upon his troubled soul.
"Not without a brake," he answered, with great patience and politeness,
"but with one instead of two. If the foot-brake had burned, as possibly
it might, the compression of the gas in the cylinder could have been
made to act as a brake. The steering-gear was in perfect order, which
was the most important consideration in the circumstances, and I felt
that I was undertaking a responsibility which the car and I together
were well able to carry out. But as I thought that amateurs were likely
to be alarmed if they knew what had happened, I naturally kept my
knowledge to myself."
"I saw that something was wrong by the set expression of your face,"
said I, "and I wasn't a bit afraid, because I felt, whatever it was,
you'd bring us through all right. But I'm sorry I spoke now."
"You needn't be," said he. "I shouldn't have done so myself yet I
wasn't silent for my own sake; and I should do the same if it had to be
done over again."