I
Last winter was socially the most disgusting that I remember ever having
known, because everybody lost money, except Sally's father and mine. We
didn't, of course, mind how much money our friends lost--they always had
plenty left; but we hated to have them talk about it, and complain all
the time, and say that it was the President's fault, or poor John
Rockefeller's, or Senator So-and-so's, or the life insurance people's.
When a man loses money it is, as a matter of fact, almost always his own
fault. I said so at the beginning of last winter, and I say so still.
And Sally, who is too lazy to think up original remarks, copied it from
me and made no bones about saying it to all the people she knew who she
thought needed that kind of comfort. But perhaps, now that I think of
it, Sally and I may have contributed to making the winter socially
disgusting. Be that as it may, we were the greatest sufferers.
We moved to Idle Island in September. And we were so delighted with what
the architects, and landscape-gardeners, and mosquito doctors had done
to make it habitable; with the house itself, and the grape-house, and
greenhouses, and gardens, and pergolas, and marble columns from Athens,
and terraces, and in-and-out door tennis-courts, and swimming-pools, and
boat-houses, and golf links, and all the other country-place
necessities, and particularly with a line of the most comfortable
lounging-chairs and divans in the world, that we decided to spend the
winter there. Sally telephoned to my father's secretary and asked him to
spend the winter with us, and make out lists for week-end parties, and
to be generally civil and useful. The secretary said that he would be
delighted to come if he could persuade my father and mother to go abroad
for the winter; and later he called Sally up, and said that he had
persuaded them.
Well, from the first our week-end parties were failures. On the first
Friday in October the President of the United States said that he hated
cheats and liars (only he mentioned names) and the stock-market went to
smash. Saturday it was still in a messy state, and the people who came
out Saturday afternoon couldn't or wouldn't talk about anything else.
They came by the 4:30 to Stepping-Stone, and were ferried over to the
island in the motor boat. Sally and I rode down to the pier in the
jinrikishas that my father's secretary had had imported for us for a
wedding present; and, I give you my word, the motor-boat as it slowed
into the pier looked like an excursion steamer out to view the beauties
of the Hudson. Everybody on board was hidden behind a newspaper.
"Fong," said Sally to her jinrikisha man, "take me back to the house."
He turned and trotted off with her, and they disappeared under the elms.
"Just because your guests aren't interested in you," I called after her,
"is no reason why you shouldn't be interested in them."
But she didn't answer, and I was afraid I'd hurt her feelings; so I said
to my man, or horse, or horse-man--it's hard to know what to call them:
"Long Lee, you go back to the house, clip-step."
Clip-step soon overtook Sally, and I asked her what she was mad about.
"I'm mad," she said, "because none of those people have ever seen this
beautiful island before, and they wouldn't look up from their dirty old
newspapers. What's the matter with them?"
"They're worried about the market," said I, "and each one wants the
others to think that he's more worried than they are. That's all."
"But the women!" said Sally. "There we sat waving to them, and not so
much as a look for our pains. My arm is all numb from waving
hospitably."
"Never mind," I said. "I'll--I'll--ask your maid to rub it for you. And
then we'll send the motor-boat for the very latest edition of the
papers, and we'll have Blenheim and Windermere fold them like ships and
cocked hats, the way they do the napkins, and put them at each person's
place at dinner. That will be the tactful way of showing them what _we_
think about it."
Sally, naturally enough, was delighted at this idea, and forgot all
about her poor, numb arm. But the scheme sounded better than it worked.
Because when we went in to dinner the guests, instead of being put to
shame by the sight of the newspapers, actually sputtered with pleasure,
and fell on them and unfolded them and opened them at the financial
pages. And then the men began to shout, and argue, and perspire, and
fling quotations about the table, and the women got very shrill, and
said they didn't know what they would do if the wretched market kept up,
or rather if it didn't keep up. And nobody admired the new furniture or
the pictures, or the old Fiffield plate, or Sally's gown, or said
anything pleasant and agreeable.
"Sam," said Tony Marshall to me, "I'm glad that you can empty your new
swimming-pool in three-quarters of an hour, but if you don't watch out
you may be so poor before the winter's over that you won't be able to
buy water enough to fill it."
"If you're not careful," I said, "I'll fill it with champagne and make
you people swim in it till you're more sprightly and agreeable. I never
saw such a lot of oafs. I--"
"I tell you, Sam," bellowed Billoo, "that the financial status of this
country, owing to that infernal lunatic in the White House--"
"If you must tell me again--" I began.
"Oh," he said disgustedly, "_you_ can't be serious about anything.
You're so da--a--ah--urn--rich that you never give a thought to the
suffering of the consumer."
"Don't I?" said I. "Did you happen to see me the morning after the
Clarion's ball last winter?--I thought about the consumer then, I can
tell you."
Billoo turned his back on me very rudely. I looked across the table to
Sally. She smiled feebly. She had drawn back her chair so that Tombs and
Randall could fight it out across her plate without hitting her in the
nose. They were frantically shaking their fists at each other, and they
kept saying very loud, and both at once:
"I tell _you!_" and they made that beginning over and over, and never
got any further.
At two o'clock the next morning Mrs. Giddings turned to Sally and said:
"And now, my dear, I can't wait another moment. You must show me all
over your lovely new house. I can think of nothing else."
"Can't you?" said Sally. "I can. It's two o'clock. But I'll show you to
your own lovely room, if you like."
In the morning I sent for Blenheim, and told him to take all the Sunday
papers as soon as they arrived and throw them overboard. All I meant to
be was tactful. But it wouldn't do. The first thing the men asked for
was the papers; and the second thing. And finally they made such a fuss
and threw out so many hints that I had to send the motor-boat over to
the main-land. This made me rather sore at the moment, and I wished that
the motor-boat was at the bottom of the Sound; but it wasn't, and had
to be sent.
Later in the day I was struck with an idea. It was one of the few that
ever struck me without outside help, and I will keep it dark for the
present. But when I got Sally alone I said to her:
"Now, Sally, answer prettily: do you or do you not know what plausible
weather is?"
"I do not," she said promptly.
"Of course, you do not," I said, "you miserable little ignoramus. It has
to do with an idea."
"No, Sam!" cried Sally.
"One of mine," I said.
"Oh, Sam!" she said. "Can I help?"
"You can."
"How?"
"You can pray for it."
"For the idea?" she asked.
"No, you silly little goat," I said. "For the plausible weather."
"Must I?" she asked.
"You must," I said. "If you have marrow-bones, prepare to use them now."
Sally looked really shocked.
"Knees," I explained. "They're the same thing. But now that I think of
it, you needn't use yours. If anybody were looking, it would be
different, of course. But nobody is, and you may use mine."
So Sally used my knees for the moment, and I explained the idea to her
briefly, and some other things at greater length; and then we both
laughed and prayed aloud for plausible weather.
But it was months coming.