_Sunday evening_
This day has been very wet. I had fully intended to go to church,
because I always make a point of doing so unless too ill to move, as I
consider it fully more a duty than a privilege, and example is
everything. However, after the fright I had yesterday, and the
shaking, I had such a pain in my right knee that devotion was out of
the question, even had my mantle been fit to put on (which it won't be
until Cecilia has mended all the trimming), so I resolved to stay
quietly in bed. After luncheon I could get no sleep, for Miss Pomeroy
was singing things which Cecilia says are camp meeting hymns. They
sounded to me like a circus, but they may introduce dance music at
church services in New York, and make horses dance to it, too.
Anything is possible to a people that can produce girls like Virginia
Pomeroy. One can hardly believe in looking at her that she belongs to
the nation of Longfellow, who wrote that lovely poem on 'Maidenhood.'
Poor Mr. MacGill used to be very fond of it:--
'Standing, with reluctant feet,
Where the brook and river meet.'
Even if there were a river here (we can see nothing of the Dart from
this hotel), one could never connect Miss Pomeroy with 'reluctant
feet' in any way. She has quite got hold of that unfortunate young
man. With my poor health, and sleeping so badly, it is very difficult
for me to interfere, but justice to the son of my old friend will make
me do what I can.
About half-past five I came down and could see nobody. Mrs. Pomeroy
suffers from the same tickling cough as I do, after drinking tea, and
had gone to her own room. Cecilia was nowhere to be seen. I asked the
waiter, who is red-faced, but a Methodist, to tell me where she was,
and he told me in the Billiard Room. Of course I didn't know where I
was going, or I should never have entered it, especially on a wet
Sunday afternoon; but when I opened the door I stood horrified by what
I saw.
Miss Pomeroy may be accustomed to such a place (I have read that they
are called 'brandy saloons' in America), but I never saw anything like
it. There was a great deal of tobacco, which at once set up my
tickling cough. Sir Archibald was holding what gamblers call a cue,
and rubbing it with chalk, I suppose to deaden the sound. On a
table--there were several chairs in the room, so it cannot have been
by mistake--sat Miss Pomeroy and Cecilia. The American was strumming
on a be-ribboned banjo.
'O Mrs. MacGill, I thought you were asleep,' said Cecilia.
'I wish I were; but I fear that what I see is only too true. Pray,
Cecilia, come away with me at once,' I exclaimed.
Sir Archibald had placed a chair for me, but I took no notice of it,
except to say, 'I'm surprised that you don't offer _me_ a seat on the
table.'
We left the room at once, and I spoke to Cecilia with some severity,
saying that I could never countenance such on-goings, and that Miss
Pomeroy was leading her all wrong. 'If she is determined to marry a
baronet,' I said, 'let her do it; but even an American might think it
more necessary that a baronet should be determined to marry her, and
might shrink from such a form of pursuit. Well, if you are determined
to laugh at me,' I went on, 'there must be some other arrangement
between us, but you cannot leave me at present, alone on a hillside
like this, just after influenza, amongst herds of wild ponies.'
Cecilia cried at last, and upset me so much that I had another bad
night, suffering much from my knee, and obliged to have a cup of cocoa
at 2.30 A.M. Cecilia appeared half asleep as she made it, although
the day before she could spring out of bed the moment the light came
in, to look at the sunrise. These so-called poetic natures are very
puzzling and inconsistent.