On the Lungarno in Florence, in the cool of the evening, we walked
together, the Senator, momma, Dicky, and I. Dicky radiated depression,
if such a thing is atmospherically possible; we all moved in it. Mr. Dod
had been banished from the Portheris party, and he groaned over the
reflection that it was his own fault. At Pompeii I had exerted myself in
his interest to such an extent that Mr. Mafferton detached himself from
Mrs. Portheris and attached himself to momma for the drive home. Little
did I realise that one could be too agreeable in a good cause. Dicky
insinuated himself with difficulty into Mr. Mafferton's vacant place
opposite Mrs. Portheris, and even before the carriages started I saw
that he was going to have a bad time. His own version of the experience
was painful in the extreme, and he represented the climax as having
occurred just as they arrived at the hotel. The unfortunate youth must
have been goaded to his fate, for his general attitude toward matters of
orthodoxy was most discreet.
"There is something _Biblical_," said Mrs. Portheris (so Dicky related),
"that those Pompeiian remains remind me of, and I cannot think what it
is."
"Lot's wife, mamma?" said Isabel.
"_Quite_ right, my child--what a memory you have! That wretched woman
who stopped to look back at the city where careless friends and
relatives were enjoying themselves, indifferent to their coming fate, in
direct disobedience to the command. Of course, she turned to salt, and
these people to ashes, but she must have looked very much like them when
the process was completed."
That was Dicky's opportunity for restraint and submission, but he seemed
to have been physically unable to take it. He rushed, instead, blindly
to perdition. "I don't believe that yarn," he said.
There was a moment's awful silence, during which Dicky said he counted
his heart-beats and felt as if he had announced himself an atheist or a
Jew, and then his sentence fell.
"In that case, Mr. Dod, I must infer that you are opposed to the
doctrine of the complete inspiration of Holy Writ. If you do not believe
in that, I shudder to think of what you may not believe in. I will say
no more now, but after dinner I will be obliged to speak to you for a
few minutes, privately. Thank you, I can get out without assistance."
And after dinner, privately, Dicky learned that Mrs. Portheris had for
some time been seriously considering the effect of his, to her,
painfully flippant views, upon the opening mind of her daughter--the
child had only been out six months--and that his distressing
announcement of this morning left her in no further doubt as to her
path of duty. She would always endeavour to have as kindly a
recollection of him as possible, he had really been very obliging, but
for the present she must ask him to make some other travelling
arrangements. Cook, she believed, would always change one's tickets less
ten per cent., but she would leave that to Dicky. And she hoped, she
_sincerely_ hoped, that time would improve his views. When that was
accomplished she trusted he would write and tell her, but not before.
"And while I'm getting good and ready to pass an examination in Noah,
Jonah, and Methuselah," remarked Dicky bitterly, as we discussed the
situation on the Lungarno for the seventh time that day, "Mafferton
sails in."
"Why didn't you tell her plainly that you wanted to marry Isabel, and
would brook no opposition?" I demanded, for my stock of sympathy was
getting low.
"Now that's a valuable suggestion, isn't it?" returned Mr. Dod with
sarcasm. "Good old psychological moment that was, wasn't it? Talk about
girls having tact! Besides, I've never told Isabel herself yet, and I'm
not the American to give in to the effete and decaying custom of asking
a girl's poppa, or momma if it's a case of widow, first. Not Richard
Dod."
"What on earth," I exclaimed, "have you been doing all this time?"
"Now go slow, Mamie, and don't look at me like that. I've been trying to
make her acquainted with me--explaining the kind of fellow I
am--getting solid with her. See?"
"Showing her the beauties of your character!" I exclaimed derisively.
"I said something about the defects, too," said Dicky modestly, "though
not so much. And I was getting on beautifully, though it isn't so easy
with an English girl. They don't seem to think it's proper to analyse
your character. They're so maidenly."
"And so unenterprising," I said, but I said it to myself.
"Isabel was actually beginning to _lead up to the subject_," Dicky went
on. "She asked me the other day if it was true that all American men
were flirts. In another week I should have felt that she would know what
was proposing to her."
"And you were going to wait another week?"
"Well, a man wants every advantage," said Dicky blandly.
"Did you explain to Isabel that you were only joining our party in the
hope of meeting her accidentally soon again?"
"What else," asked he in pained surprise, "should I have joined it for?
No, I didn't; I hadn't the chance, for one thing. You took the first
train back to Rome next morning, you know. She wasn't up."
"True," I responded. "Momma said not another hour of her husband's Aunt
Caroline would she ever willingly endure. She said she would spend her
entire life, if necessary, in avoiding the woman." But Dicky had not
followed the drift of my thought.
I added vaguely, "I hope she will understand it"--I really couldn't be
more definite--and bade Mr. Dod good-night. He held my hand
absent-mindedly for a moment, and mentioned the effectiveness of the
Ponte Vecchio from that point of view.
"I didn't feel bound to change my tickets less ten per cent.," he said
hopefully, "and we're sure to come across them early and often. In the
meantime you might try and soften me a little--about Lot's wife."
Next day, in the Ufizzi, it was no surprise to meet the Miss Binghams.
We had a guilty consciousness of fellow-citizenship as we recognised
them, and did our best to look as if two weeks were quite long enough to
be forgotten in, but they seemed charitable and forgiving on this
account, said they had looked out for us everywhere, and _had_ we seen
the cuttings in the Vatican?
"The statues, you know," explained Miss Cora kindly, seeing that we did
not comprehend. "Marvellous--simply marvellous! We enjoyed nothing so
much as the marble department. It takes it out of you though--we were
awfully done afterwards."
I wondered what Phidias would have said to the "cuttings," and whether
the Miss Binghams imagined it a Briticism. It also occurred to me that
one should never mix one's colloquialisms; but that, of course, did not
prevent their coming round with us. I believe they did it partly to
diffuse their guide among a larger party. He was hanging, as they came
up, upon Miss Cora's reluctant earring, so to speak, and she was
mechanically saying, "Yes! Yes! Yes!" to his representations. "I
suppose," said she inadvertently, "there is no way of preventing their
giving one information," and after that when she hospitably pressed the
guide upon us we felt at liberty to be unappreciative.
I regret to write it of two maiden ladies of good New York family, and a
knowledge of the world; but the Miss Binghams capitulated to Dicky Dod
with a promptness and unanimity which would have been very bad for him
if nobody had been there to counteract its effects. He walked between
them through the vestibules, absorbing a flow of tribute from each side
with a complacency which his recent trying experiences made all the more
profound. There was always a something, Miss Nancy declared, about an
American who had made his home in England--you could always tell. "In
your case, Mr. Dod, there is an association of Bond Street. I can't
describe it, but it is there. I hope you don't mind my saying so."
"Oh, no," said Dicky, "I guess it's my tailor. He lives in Bond Street;"
but this was artless and not ironical. Miss Cora went further. "I should
have taken Mr. Dod for an Englishman," she said, at which the
miscalculated Mr. Dod looked alarmed.
"Is that so?" he responded. "Then I'll book my passage back at once.
I've been over there too long. You see I've been kind of obliged to
stay for reasons connected with the firm, but you ladies can take my
word for it that when you get through this sort of ridiculous veneer
I've picked up you'll find a regular all-wool-and-a-yard-wide
city-of-Chicago American, and I'm bound to ask you not to forget it.
This English way of talking is a thing that grows on a fellow
unconsciously, don't you know. It wears off when you get home."
At which Miss Cora and Miss Nancy looked at each other smilingly and
repeated "Don't you know" in derisive echo, and we all felt that our
young friend had been too modest about his acquirements.
"But we mustn't neglect our old masters," cried Miss Nancy as those of
the first corridor began to slip past us on the walls, with no desire to
interrupt. "What do you think of this Greek Byzantine style, Mr. Wick?
Somehow it doesn't seem to appeal to me, though whether it's the
flatness--or what----"
"It _is_ flat, certainly," agreed the Senator, "but that's a very
popular style of angel for Christmas cards--the more expensive kinds.
Here, I suppose, we get the original."
"That is Tuscan school, sir--madam," put in the guide, "and not
angel--Saint Cecilia. Fourteen century, but we do not know that artiss
his name. In the book you will see Cimabue, but it is not
Cimabue--unknown artiss."
"Dear me!" cried momma. "St. Cecilia, of course. Don't you remember her
expression--in the Catacombs?"
"She's sweet, always and everywhere," said Miss Cora, as we moved on,
leaving the guide explaining St. Cecilia with his hands behind his back.
"And you did go to Capri after all? Now I wonder, Nancy, if they had our
experience about the oysters?"
"A horrid little man!" cried momma.
"Who showed you the way to the steamer----"
"And hung around doing things the whole enduring time," continued my
parent, as Mark Antony's daughter turned her head aside, and Drusus, the
brother of Tiberius, frowned upon our passing.
"He must have been our man!" cried both the Misses Bingham, with
excitement.
"In the manner of Taddeo Gaddi," interrupted the guide, surprising us on
the flank with a Holy Family.
"All right," said the Senator. "Well, this fellow proposed to bring our
party oysters on the steamer, and we took him, of course, for the
steward's tout----"
"Exactly what we thought."
"Since _you_ are going to tell the story, Alexander, I may remind you
that he said they were the best in the world," remarked momma, with
several degrees of frost.
"My dear, the anecdote is yours. But you remember I told him they
wouldn't be in it with Blue Points."
"Now _what_," exclaimed Miss Nancy, with excitement, "did he ask you for
them?"
"Three francs a head, Nancy, wasn't it, Mrs. Wick? And you gave the
order, and the man disappeared. And you thought he'd gone to get them;
at least, we did. Nancy here had perfect confidence in him. She said he
had such dog-like eyes, and we were both perfectly certain they would be
served when the steamer stopped at the Blue Grotto----" Miss Cora paused
to smile.
"But they weren't," suggested momma feebly.
"No, indeed, and hadn't the slightest intention of being." Miss Nancy
took up the tale. "Not until we were taking off our gloves in the hotel
verandah, and making up our minds to a good hot lunch, did those oysters
appear--exactly half a dozen, and bread and butter extra! And we
couldn't say we hadn't ordered them. And the lunch was only two francs
fifty, _complet_. But we felt we ought to content ourselves with the
oysters, though, of course, you wouldn't with gentlemen in your party.
Now, what course _did_ you pursue, Mrs. Wick?"
"Really," said momma distantly, "I don't remember. I believe we had
enough to eat. Surely that is little Moses being taken from the
bulrushes! How it adds to one's interest to recognise the subject."
"By B. Luti," responded Miss Nancy. "I _hope_ he isn't very well known,
for I never heard of him before. Now, there's a Domenichino; I can tell
it from here. I do love Domenichino, don't you?"
I suppose the Senator knew that momma didn't love Domenichino, and would
possibly be at a loss to say why; at all events, he remarked that,
talking of Capri, he hoped the Miss Binghams had not felt as badly about
inconveniencing the donkeys that took them to the top of the cliff as
momma had. "Mrs. Wick," he informed them, "rode an ass by the name of
Michael Angelo, perfectly accustomed to the climate, and, do you believe
it, she held her parasol over that animal's head the whole way." At
which everybody laughed, and momma, invested with an original and
amiable weakness, was appeased.
"Of Michelangelo we have not here much," said the guide patiently.
"Drawings yes, and one holy Family--magnificent! But all in another room
w'ich----"
"Now what Bramley said about the Ufizzi was this," continued the
Senator. "'You'll see on those walls,' he said, 'the best picture show
in the world, both for pedigree and quality of goods displayed. I'd go
as far as to say they're all worth looking at, even those that have been
presented to the institution. But don't you look at them,' Bramley said,
'as a whole. You keep all your absorbing-power for one apartment,' he
said--'the Tribune. You'll want it.' Bramley gave me to understand that
it wasn't any use he didn't profess to be able to describe his sublimer
emotions, but when he sat down in the Tribune he had a sort of
instinctive idea that he'd got the cream of it--he didn't want to go any
further."
We decided, therefore, in spite of such minor attractions as those of
Niobe and her daughters, at once to achieve the Tribune, feeling, as
poppa said, that it would be most unfortunate to have our admiration all
used up before we reached it. The guide led the way, and it was beguiled
with the fascinating experience of the Miss Binghams, who had met Queen
Marguerite driving in the Villa Borghese at Rome and had received a bow
from her Majesty of which nothing would ever be able to deprive them.
"Of course we drew up to let her pass," said Miss Nancy, "and were
careful not to make ourselves in any way conspicuous, merely standing up
in the carriage as an ordinary mark of respect. And she looked charming,
all in pink and white, with a faded old maid of honour that set her off
beautifully, didn't she, Cora? And such a pretty smile she gave us--they
say she likes the better class of Americans."
"Oh, we've nothing to regret about Rome," rejoined Cora. "Even Peter's
toe. I wouldn't have kissed it at the time if the guide hadn't said it
was really Jupiter's. I was sure our dear vicar wouldn't mind my kissing
Jupiter's toe. But now I'm glad I did it in any case. People always ask
you that."
When we arrived at the little octagonal treasure chamber Mr. Dod and
Miss Cora sat down together on one of the less conspicuous sofas, and I
saw that Dicky was already warmed to confidence. Momma at once gave up
her soul to the young St. John, having had an engraving of it ever since
she was a little girl, and the Senator went solemnly from canvas to
canvas on tip-toe with a mind equally open to Job and the Fornarina. He
assured Miss Nancy and me that Bramley was perfectly right in thinking
everything of the Tribune, and with reference to the Dancing Fawn, that
it was worth a visit to see Michael Angelo's notion of executing repairs
to statuary alone. He gave the place the benefit of his most serious
attention, pulling his beard a good deal before Titian's Venus (which
poppa always did in connection with this goddess, however, entirely
apart from the merit of the painting) and obviously making allowances
for her of Medici on account of her great age. At the end of the hour we
spent there it had the same effect upon him as upon Colonel Bramley, he
did not wish to go any further; and we parted from the Miss Binghams,
who did. As I said good-bye to Miss Cora she gave my hand a subtly
sympathetic pressure, whispered tenderly, "He's very nice," and
roguishly escaped before I could ask who was, or what difference it
made. Having thought it over, I took the first opportunity of inquiring
of Dicky how much of his private affairs he had unburdened to Miss Cora.
"Oh," said he, "hardly anything. She knows a former young lady friend of
mine in Syracuse--we still exchange Christmas cards--and that led me on
to say I thought of getting married this winter. Of course I didn't
mention Isabel."