BACK WITH CLARA BELLE
And me kiddin' myself I was fairly well parlor-broke. It seems not.
You'd 'most think, though, I'd had enough front-room trainin' to stand
me through in a place like Harbor Hills. I had a wild idea, too, that
when we moved into the country we'd tagged the reg'lar social stuff
good-by.
That was a poor hunch. I'm just discoverin' that there's more tea fights
and dinner dances and such goin's on out here in the commuter zone than
in any five blocks of Fifth Avenue you can name. And it seems that
anywhere within ten miles of this Piping Rock Club brings you into the
most active sector. So here we are, right in the thick of things.
At that, I expect it might have been quite some time before we was
bothered any if it hadn't been for our bein' sort of backed by the
Robert Ellinses. As their friends we're counted in right off the reel.
I've been joshed into lettin' my name go on the waitin' list at the
Country Club; I'm allowed to subscribe to this and that; some of the
neighbors have begun payin' first calls on Vee.
So I might have had sense enough to watch my step. Yet, here the other
afternoon, when I makes an early getaway from the Corrugated and hops
off the 5:17, I dashes across the back lots and comes into our place by
the rear instead of the front drive. You see, I'd been watchin' a row of
string-beans we had comin' along, and I wanted to spring the first ones
on Vee. Sure enough, I finds three or four pods 'most big enough to eat;
so I picks 'em and goes breezin' into the house, wavin' em gleeful.
"Oh, Vee!" I sings out, openin' the terrace door. "Come have a look."
And, as she don't appear on the jump, I keeps on into the livin'-room
and calls:
"Hey! What do you know about these? Beans! Perfectly good----"
Well, that's as far as I gets, for there's Vee, sittin' behind the
silver tea-urn, all dolled up; and Leon, in his black coat, holdin' a
plate of dinky little cakes; and a couple of strange ladies starin' at
me button-eyed. I'd crashed right into the midst of tea and callers.
Do I pull some easy johndrew lines and exit graceful? Not me. My feet
was glued to the rug.
"Beans!" says I, grinnin' simple and danglin' the specimens. "Perfectly
good string----"
Then I catches the eye of the stiff-necked dame with the straight nose
and the gun-metal hair. No, both eyes, it was; and a cold, suspicious,
stabby look is what they shoots my way. No wonder I chokes off the
feeble-minded remarks and turns sort of panicky to Vee, half expectin'
to find her blushin' painful or signalin' me to clear out. Nothing like
that from Vee, though.
"Not ours, Torchy?" says she, slidin' out from behind the tea-table and
rushin' over. "Not our very own?"
"Uh-huh!" says I. "Just picked 'em."
At which the other caller joins in unexpected.
"From your own garden?" says she. "How interesting! Oh, do show them to
me."
"Why, sure," says I. "Guess we're doin' our bit, ain't we?"
She's a wide, dumpy-built old girl, and dressed sort of freaky. Also her
line of talk is a kind of purry, throaty gush that's almost too soothin'
to be true. But anybody who makes only half a bluff at being interested
in our garden wins us. And not until she's inspected our first
string-beans through her gold lorgnette, and remarked twice more how
wonderful it was for us to raise anything like that, does it occur to
Vee to introduce me proper to both ladies.
The tall, stiff-necked dame turns out to be Mrs. Pemberton Foote.
Honest! Could you blame her for bein' jarred when I come bouncin' in
with garden truck?
Think of it! Why, she's one of the super-tax brigade and moves among the
smartest of the smart-setters. And Pemmy, he's on the polo team, you
know.
Oh, reg'lar people, the Pembroke Footes are. And the very fact that Mrs.
Foote is here callin' on Vee ought to have me thrilled to the bone.
Yet all I got sense enough to do is wave half-grown string-beans at her,
and then sit by gawpy, balancin' a cup of tea on my knee, and watch her
apply the refrigeratin' process to the dumpy old girl whose name I
didn't quite catch. Say, but she does it thorough and artistic. Only two
or three times did the dumpy one try to kick in on the chat, and when
she does, Mrs. Pemmy rolls them glittery eyes towards her slow, givin'
her the up-and-down like she was some kind of fat worm that had strayed
in from the cucumber bed.
Can't these women throw the harpoon into each other ruthless, though?
Why, you could see that old girl fairly squirm when she got one of them
assault-and-battery glances. Her under lip would quiver a bit, she'd
wink hard three or four times, and then she'd sort of collapse,
smotherin' a sigh and not finishin' what she'd started out to say. She
did want to be so folksy, too.
Course, she's an odd-lookin' party, with that bucket-shaped lid
decorated with pale green satin fruit, and the piles of thick blondine
hair that was turnin' gray, and her foolish big eyes with the puffy
rolls underneath and the crows'-feet in the corners. And of course
anybody with ankles suggestin' piano legs really shouldn't go in for
high-tide skirts and white silk stockin's with black butterflies worked
on 'em. Should they?
Still, she'd raved over our string-beans, so when she makes a last
fluttery try at jimmyin' her way into the conversation, and Mrs. Foote
squelches her prompt again, and she gives up for good, it's me jumpin'
snappy to tow her out and tuck her in the limousine. Havin' made my
escape, I stays outside until after Mrs. Pemmy has gone too, which
don't happen for near half an hour later. But when I hears the front
door shut on her, I sidles in at the back.
"Zowie!" says I. "You must have made more of a hit with our swell
neighbor than I did, Vee."
Vee smiles quizzin' and shrugs her shoulders.
"I'm not so sure," says she. "I almost feel as though we had been
visited by the Probation Officer, or someone like that."
"How do you mean?" says I.
"Of course," she goes on, "Mrs. Foote did not actually say that we were
on trial socially, but she hinted as much. And she made it quite plain
that unless we got started in the right set our case would be utterly
hopeless."
"Just think of that!" says I. "Real sweet of her, eh? Sort of inspector
general, is she? You should have asked her to show her badge, though."
"Oh, there's no doubt that she speaks with authority," says Vee. "She
wasn't snippy about it, either. And chiefly she was trying to warn me
against Mrs. Ben Tupper."
"The old girl with the pelican chin and the rovin' eyes?" I asks.
"What's the matter with her besides her looks?"
Well, accordin' to Mrs. Pemmy Foote, there was a lot. She had a past,
for one thing. She was a pushing, presumptuous person, for another. And,
besides, this Benjamin Tupper party--the male of the species--was wholly
impossible.
"You know who he is," adds Vee. "The tablet man."
"What?" says I. "'Tupper's Tablets for Indigestion--on Everybody's
Tongue.' Him?"
Vee nods. "And they live in that barny stucco house just as you turn off
Sagamore Boulevard--the one with the hideous red-tiled roof and the
concrete lions in front."
"Goodness Agnes!" says I. "Folks have been indicted for less than that.
I've seen Tupper, too; someone pointed him out goin' in on the express
only the other mornin'. Looks like a returned Nihilist who'd been
nominated in one of the back wards of Petrograd to run for the Duma on a
free-vodka platform. He's got wiry whiskers that he must trim with a
pair of tin-shears, tufts in his ears, and the general build of a
performin' chimpanzee. Oh, he's a rare one, Tupper."
"Then," says Vee, sort of draggy, "I--I suppose Mrs. Foote is right.
It's too bad, for that Mrs. Tupper did seem such a friendly old soul.
And I shall feel so snobbish if I don't return her call."
"Huh!" says I. "I don't see why Mrs. Pemmy couldn't let you find out
about her for yourself. Even if the old girl don't belong, what's the
use bein' so rough with her?"
"Do you know, Torchy," says Vee, "I felt that way about it when Mrs.
Foote was snubbing her. And yet--well, I wish I knew just what to do."
"Clean out of my line," says I.
I expect it was the roses that set me mullin' the case over again. They
was sent over for Vee a couple of days later--half a dozen great
busters, like young cabbages, with stems a yard long. They come with the
compliments of Mrs. Ben Tupper.
"I simply couldn't send them back," says Vee; "and yet----"
"I get you," says I. "But don't worry. Let the thing ride a while. I got
an idea."
It wasn't anything staggerin'. It had just struck me that if Vee had to
hand out any social smears she ought to do it on her own dope, and not
accordin' to Mrs. Pemmy Foote's say-so. Which is why I begins pumpin'
information out of anybody that came handy. Goin' into town next
mornin', I tackled three or four on the 8:03 in an offhand way.
Oh, yes, the Ben Tuppers! Business of hunchin' the shoulders. No, they
didn't belong to the Country Club, nor the Hunt Association, nor figure
on the Library or Hospital boards, or anything else. In fact, they don't
mingle much. Hadn't made the grade. Barred? We-e-ell, in a way, perhaps.
Why? Oh, there was Mrs. Ben. Wasn't she enough? An ex-actress with two
or three hubbys in the discard! Could she expect people to swallow that?
Only one gent, though, had anything definite to offer. He's a
middle-aged sport that seems to make a specialty of wearin' checked
suits and yellow gloves. He chuckles when I mentions Mrs. Tupper.
"Grand old girl, Clara Belle," says he.
"Eh?" says I. "Shoot the rest."
"Couldn't think of it, son," says he. "You're too young. But in my day
Clara Belle Kinney was some queen."
And that's all I can get out of him except more chuckles. I files away
the name, though; and that afternoon, while we was waitin' for a quorum
of directors to straggle into the General Offices, I springs it on Old
Hickory.
"Mr. Ellins," says I, "did you ever know of a Clara Belle Kinney?"
"Wha-a-at?" he gasps, almost swallowin' his cigar. "Listen to that,
Mason. Here's a young innocent asking if we ever knew Clara Belle
Kinney. Did we?"
And old K. W. Mason, what does he do but throw back his shiny dome, open
his mouth, and roar out:
"Yure right fut is crazy,
Yure left fut is lazy,
But if ye'll be aisy
I'll teach ye to waltz!"
After which them two old cut-ups wink at each other rakish and slap
their knees. All of which ain't so illuminatin'. But they keep on,
mentionin' Koster Bial's and the Cork Room, until I can patch together
quite a sketch of Mrs. Tupper's early career.
Seems she'd made her first hit in this old-time concert-hall when she
was a sweet young thing in her teens. One of her naughty stunts was
kickin' her slipper into an upper box, and gettin' it tossed back with a
mash note in it, or maybe a twenty-dollar bill. Then she'd graduated
into comic opera.
"Was there ever a Katishaw like her?" demands Old Hickory of K. W., who
responds by hummin' husky:
"I dote upon a tiger
From the Congo or the Niger,
Especially when lashing of his tail."
And, while they don't go into details, I gathered that they'd been Clara
Belle fans--had sent her orchids on openin' nights, and maybe had set up
wine suppers for her and her friends. They knew about a couple of her
matrimonial splurges. One was with her manager, of course; the next was
a young broker whose fam'ly got him to break it off. After that they'd
lost track of her.
"It seems to me," says Old Hickory, "that I heard she had married
someone in Buffalo, or Rochester, and had quit the stage. A patent
medicine chap, I think he was, who'd made a lot of money out of
something or other. I wonder what has become of her?"
That was my cue, all right, but I passes it up. I wasn't talkin' just
then; I was listenin'.
"Ah-h-h!" goes on Mr. Mason, foldin' his hands over his forward sponson
and rollin' his eyes sentimental. "Dear Clara Belle! I say, Ellins,
wouldn't you like to hear her sing that MacFadden song once more?"
"I'd give fifty dollars," says Old Hickory.
"I'd make it a hundred if she'd follow it with 'O Promise Me,'" says K.
W. "What was her record--six hundred nights on Broadway, wasn't it?"
Say, they went on reminiscin' so long, it's a wonder the monthly meetin'
ever got started at all. I might have forgot them hot-air bids of
theirs, too, if it hadn't been for something Vee announces that night
across the dinner-table.
Seems that Mrs. Robert Ellins had been rung into managin' one of these
war benefit stunts, and she's decided to use their new east terrace for
an outdoor stage and the big drawin'-room it opens off from as an
auditorium. You know, Mrs. Robert used to give violin recitals and do
concert work herself, so she ain't satisfied with amateur talent.
Besides, she knows so many professional people.
"And who do you think she is to have on the program?" demands Vee.
"Farrar!"
"Aw, come!" says I.
"And perhaps Mischa Elman," adds Vee. "Isn't that thrilling?"
I admits that it is.
"But say," I goes on, "with them big names on the bill, what does she
expect to tax people for the best seats?"
Vee says how they'd figured they might ask ten dollars for a few choice
chairs.
"Huh!" says I. "That won't get you far. Why don't you soak 'em proper?"
"But how?" asks Vee.
"You put in a bald-headed row," says I, "and I'll find you a party
who'll fill it at a hundred a throw."
Vee stares at me like she thought I'd been touched with the heat, and
wants to know who.
"Clara Belle Kinney," says I.
"Why, I never heard of any such person," says she.
"Oh, yes, you have," says I. "Alias Mrs. Ben Tupper."
Course, I had some job convincin' her I wasn't joshin'; and even after
I'd sketched out the whole story, and showed her that Clara Belle's past
wasn't anything to really shudder over, Vee is still doubtful.
"But can she sing now?" she asks.
"What's the odds," says I, "if a lot of them old-timers are willin' to
pay to hear her try?"
Vee shakes her head and suggests that we go up and talk it over with Mr.
and Mrs. Robert. Which we does.
"But if she has been off the stage for twenty years," suggests Mrs.
Robert, "perhaps she wouldn't attempt it."
"I'll bet she would for Vee," says I. "Any way, she wouldn't feel sore
at being asked And if you could sting a bunch of twenty or thirty for a
hundred apiece----"
"Just fancy!" says Mrs. Robert, drawin' in a long breath and doin'
rapid-fire mental arithmetic. "Verona, let's drive right over and see
her at once."
They're some hustlers, that pair. All I have to do is map out the
scheme, and they goes after it with a rush.
And say, I want to tell you that was a perfectly good charity concert,
judged by the box-office receipts or any way you want to size it up.
Bein' the official press-agent, who's got a better right to admit it?
True, Elman didn't show up, but his alibi was sound. And not until the
last minute was we sure whether the fair Geraldine would get there or
not. But my contribution to the headliners was there from the first tap
of the bell.
Vee says she actually wept on her shoulder when the proposition was
sprung on her. Seems she'd been livin' in Harbor Hills for nearly three
years without havin' been let in on a thing--with nobody callin' on her,
or even noddin' as she drove by. Most of her neighbors was a lot
younger, folks who barely remembered that there had been such a party as
Clara Belle Kinney, and who couldn't have told whether she'd been a
singer or a bareback rider. They only knew her as a dumpy freakish
dressed old girl whose drugged hair was turnin' gray.
"Of course," she says, sort of timid and trembly, "I have kept up my
singing as well as I could. Mr. Tupper likes to have me. But I know my
voice isn't what it was once. It's dear of you to ask me, though,
and--and I'll do my best."
I don't take any credit for fillin' that double row of wicker chairs we
put down front and had the nerve to ask that hold-up price for. When the
word was passed around that Clara Belle Kinney was to be among the
performers, they almost mobbed me for tickets. Why, I collected from
two-thirds of the Corrugated directors without turnin' a hand, and for
two days there about all I did was answer 'phone calls from Broad Street
and the clubs--brokers, bank presidents, and so on, who wanted to know
if there was any left.
A fine bunch of silver-tops they was, too, when we got 'em all lined up.
You wouldn't have suspected it of some of them dignified old scouts,
either. Back of 'em, fillin' every corner of the long room and spillin'
out into the big hall, was the top crust of our local smart set, come to
hear Farrar at close range.
Yep, Geraldine made quite a hit. Nothing strange about that. And that
piece from "Madame Butterfly" she gave just brought 'em right up on
their toes. But say, you should hear what breaks loose when it's
announced that the third number will be an old favorite revival by Clara
Belle Kinney. That's all the name we gave. What if most of the audience
was simply starin' puzzled and stretchin' their necks to see who was
comin'? Them old boys down front seemed to know what they was howlin'
about.
Yes, Clara Belle does show up a bit husky in evenin' dress. Talk about
elbow dimples! And I was wishin' she'd forgot to do her hair that
antique way, all piled up on her head, with a few coy ringlets over one
ear. But she'd landscaped her facial scenery artistic, and she sure does
know how to roll them big eyes of hers.
I didn't much enjoy listenin' through them first few bars, though. There
wasn't merely a crack here and there. Her voice went to a complete smash
at times, besides bein' weak and wabbly. It's like listenin' to the
ghost of a voice. I heard a few titters from the back rows.
But them old boys don't seem to mind. It was a voice comin' to them from
'way back in the '90's. And when she struggles through the first verse
of "O Promise Me," and pauses to get her second wind, maybe they don't
give her a hand. That seemed to pep her up a lot. She gets a better grip
on the high notes, the tremolo effect wears off, and she goes to it like
a winner. Begins to get the crowd with her, too. Why, say, even Farrar
stands up and leads in the call for an encore. She ain't alone.
"MacFadden! MacFadden!" K. W. Mason is shoutin'.
So in a minute more Clara Belle, her eyes shinin', has swung into that
raggy old tune, and when she gets to the chorus she beckons to the front
rows and says: "Now, all together, boys!
"Wan--two--three!
Balance like me----"
Did they come in on it? Say, they roared it out like so many young
college hicks riotin' around the campus after a session at a
rathskeller. You should have seen Old Hickory standin' out front with
his arms wavin' and his face red.
Then they demands some of the Katishaw stuff, and "Comrades," and
"Little Annie Rooney." And with every encore Clara Belle seems to shake
off five or ten years, until you could almost see what a footlight
charmer she must have been.
In the midst of it all Vee gives me the nudge.
"Do look at Mr. Tupper, will you!"
Yes, he's sittin' over in a corner, with his white shirt-front bulgin',
his neck stretched forward eager, and his big hairy paws grippin' the
chair-back in front. And hanged if a drop of brine ain't tricklin' down
one side of his nose.
"Gosh!" says I. "His emotions are leakin' into his whiskers. Maybe the
old boy is human, after all."
A minute later, as I slides easy out of my end seat, Vee asks:
"Where are you going, Torchy?"
"I want a glimpse of Mrs. Pemmy Foote's face, that's all," says I.