guessed I’d better be going, and Miss Sheila said “Oh, no, dear!” But I
insisted, and so she kissed me, and I went off, to pause at the end of
that rose sheltered terrace and wave back at her. Then I went through
the rest of the garden, and past the little chapel where a sweet-faced
young girl knelt before the altar--she was about to take the vows, I
heard later--and out through the gate and down the very long, wide,
shady stone steps that are guarded on either side by tall cypress trees
which, there, seemed like sentinels.
Then--up a little hill to the Piazza at Fiesole, which was wild with a
high, hot breeze, and there I took the car that clanged its way down
the hillside into sultry Florence.
That day began my visiting Miss Sheila, and I went up to Fiesole by
myself four times in the next two weeks, and then again with Viola, and
Leslie and Ben Forbes--who seemed to linger on--and it was on that last
afternoon that Miss Sheila said, “Bother! Why didn’t I think of Sam!
I wanted to meet him, and you knew it, Jane! Why didn’t you speak of
asking him to-day?”
I hadn’t thought that she would want him, and I said so, for I had
supposed that the party was to be sort of a family affair because of
Leslie’s and Ben’s engagement.
“Well,” said Miss Sheila, “no matter. Bring him up Sunday afternoon.”
Sunday was a beautiful day in spite of the fact that there was no air
stirring and a feeling of weight over everything. Leslie said she knew
it would rain--she was angry over it, because she and Ben had planned
to motor in the Cascine and then out somewhere in the country--but
I said I thought it wouldn’t, _without_ rapping on wood; and as I
may have said before, it never hurts to rap on wood, whether you are
superstitious, or not. But I didn’t. Instead, I placed my entire trust
in Fate and put on a white lawn dress and the hat I had bought at the
Mercato Nuovo which I had trimmed with some flowers that cost very
little.
At one I started out with Sam, for he had asked me to go somewhere and
have lunch with him before we started up to the Convent on the hillside.
We had a good time over our lunch--which we had in the coolest and most
shadowed outdoor café we could find--and Sam ordered the green macaroni
which is manufactured in Bologna--and some cold chicken and a salad,
and some wine of course, and then a sweet that is very famous in Rome,
and wonderfully good. And as we ate we talked the way we always do,
which is hard.
Then we stood up, and I brushed the crumbs from my lap, and told Sam
that he had a piece of green macaroni on the lapel of his coat, and
after that we started toward the Piazza del Duomo, walking slowly and
keeping on the shady side of the deep, narrow streets.
In the Piazza Sam bought me a little bunch of blue flowers which were
combined with yellow daisies, and I slipped these in under my broad
sash, and after that we took the car and began our ride up to Fiesole.
“I’m awfully keen to meet Miss Parrish,” said Sam, “because you like
her so. She isn’t like her niece, is she?”
“Oh, no!” I answered quickly, “not at all!”
“Does she believe in careers for women and all that sort of rot?”
asked Sam, as a fat woman who carried a baby and was followed by five
children and a poodle dog, got on.
“No,” I answered, and then I told him what Miss Sheila had advised.
“Going to take her advice?” asked Sam, and he turned in the seat and
leaned way over me until he could see under the brim of my broad hat.
“I don’t know,” I answered, although I did, all suddenly and at that
minute.
“_Don’t_ you?” he repeated, “Oh, _Jane_!”
And he looked so miserable--he really did--that I said I did know. And
then I looked out of the window, although there wasn’t much to see just
at that point except a tan stucco wall, with pink and blue tiles set in
it.
“You’re too young to bother,” said Sam, as he plaited the end of my
sash which I had been careful not to sit on because I didn’t want it
crushed, “but when you get along to the age when I _dare_ court you,
I’ll tell _you_--” he drew a deep breath--“_Well_, you’ll see!” he
ended, in a half threatening way.
I didn’t answer that.
“And if I hear of your _looking_ at anybody else,” he went on, “I’ll
come over and fill him up with buckshot.”
That made me laugh.
“It’s no joke,” he said quickly, “I’m miserable over--your going
off--and when I think that some one else may _make_ you like him--oh,
the dickens of a lot--well, then I can’t--I simply can’t see
_straight_--”
“I won’t look at anybody,” I promised, “until you come--”
It seemed to please him. In fact it seemed to please him so much that
I had to remind him that we were in a street-car and that people might
think it strange to see him kiss my hand--for he did that--but he said
he didn’t give two hundred darns what they thought, and he asked me
again if I meant it, and I knew I did, and I said I did; and he said,
“Well, then, what’s two years?” and he slipped a funny, old hand-made
ring with a garnet setting, that he had always worn, over my finger,
and I let it stay there.
Then we reached Fiesole, and the woman who carried a baby, called
her five children and the poodle dog, and they got off and the other
passengers, all in Sunday dress, followed, and then Sam and I.
Miss Sheila met us at the head of the long, broad, cool, shady steps.
“Hello, Sam,” she said in her dear way, “I’m glad to see you--”
He bowed, and she said suddenly, “You _are_ a nice boy,” and, after
he smiled and flushed and thanked her, she added, “I was afraid you
weren’t nice _enough_--”
And then I felt myself grow pink.
“Children,” she said, after that, “I want you to come in and wait until
I get on my hat, and then walk with me. Will you, or have you been
walking and are you tired?”
I said we weren’t and that it would be fine, and Sam echoed it and
Miss Sheila put in a quick, “Good!” and turned and hurried toward the
building.
“Isn’t she beautiful, and lovely?” said Sam.
“_Isn’t_ she?” I answered.
“By jings,” he went on, “I wish Mr. Wake would come meet her. . . . Why
won’t he? He got all rattled the other day when Leslie asked him to
call on Miss Sheila with her--said he couldn’t talk to women, all that
sort of rot, and you know he’s always simply tip-top--wonder--”
“Look here, Sam,” I said, “I can’t tell you, but--”
And then Miss Sheila came back and put an end to my explaining nothing
to Sam, and at the same time asking him not to press the matter of Mr.
Wake’s meeting Miss Sheila.
She looked as pretty as I had ever seen her look. She had on a lavender
voile dress that had frilly collars and cuffs on it and a broad low
sash, and she had on her head a drooping hat of the most delicate pink
shade with bunches of lilacs trailing from it, and the combination was
beautiful.
“Ready,” she said with a smile, “and whither?”
I suggested going up to the Roman theater and baths, but Sam, who was
that afternoon so light hearted that he was almost silly, said he’d had
a bath only about two hours before, and Miss Sheila said she’d had one
only a few minutes before, and that she preferred walking down hill.
“But you’ll have to walk back,” I said, for I didn’t want to get _near_
Mr. Wake’s house!
“Not until the sun’s lower,” said Sam.
“And then we could ride,” said Miss Sheila.
“Exactly Mr. Wake’s spirit,” said Sam. “She ought to know him, now
oughtn’t she, Jane?”
I could do nothing with him. He acted just exactly as Daddy does
when we have guests and Mother tries to head him off with a little
kick under the table. He always looks at her, and says, “Did you kick
me, my dear? Forgotten to serve some one, or something? Let me see!”
which makes it all the worse, because almost always at that point, he
is serving everything in the dish to one person, or telling a story
he tells about a quick remarriage--to the guest who is remarried. I
imagine most men are like that.
Anyway, Sam talked--no, he did what Leslie would have called “raved”
about Mr. Wake, and Miss Sheila listened and questioned and wanted more.
“His books,” she said, “are delightful. . . . Little phrases in them
make me think of some one I knew years ago. . . . And his kindness to
Jane has made me like him, too. Did you say his place is out this way?”
“I did,” Sam answered, “and mighty good luck it is, too,” he added,
“for it’s going to pour--come on--”
“We’re quite as near the convent,” I put in, in a manner that must have
been agonized.
“But that’s up hill--” said Miss Sheila, and then she and Sam began to
hurry so fast that it was all I could do to keep up with them, and I
hadn’t a chance to say a word.
“Sam,” I gasped as we neared Mr. Wake’s wall, and big, far-apart drops
of rain began to fall, “_Sam!_”
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Oh, everything!” I answered, “and you’re just acting like a _fool_,
Sam--we _can’t_ go in!”
But Miss Sheila had pulled the bell cord that hung outside of the gate,
and before it was opened the rain came down in such torrents that we
were drenched.
“Mr. Wake’s in town,” said Sam to me, in an aside.
“Why didn’t you _say_ so?” I snapped.
And then the gate opened.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
MISCHIEVOUS CUPID
The gate was opened by Mr. Wake--who had just come _back_ from
town--and was as wet as we were.
I felt my heart stop a beat and then treble its pace, and I swallowed
hard although there was no real necessity for it. And as for saying a
word! I couldn’t have gotten out a “Boo” so that any one would have
understood it!
“Hello,” said Sam, after he had sent a petitioning look at me, that
asked me as plainly as day, to introduce them, “Hello! Glad you’re
here! . . . Miss Parrish, may I present to you our patron saint, Mr.
Wake?”
_Then_ I think Sam began to see that something unusual was up, for they
stood looking at each other--those two he’d wanted to have meet--and
they didn’t say a word. It was a queer moment which seemed very long,
that moment when we all stood in the hard driving, swirling rain,
_waiting_.
Miss Sheila broke it, and she did it by holding out her hand, and
saying, “Well, Terry?” and there was a funny little twisted smile on
her pretty lips and the smile didn’t seem miles away from tears.
And then Mr. Wake put his hand out, in an uncertain, groping sort of
way, and then he said, “_Sheila!_” And I don’t think he knew he said
it, but she did, for the color came flooding back into her cheeks that
had been pale, and tears stood in her eyes.
There wasn’t very much to _tell_ about in that moment; you can’t _tell_
about a sunset very well. You can say that the clouds were pink and
gold, and that the sky was full of silver streaks, and a misty purple
haze, but you can’t make the other person see it. You don’t usually do
anything but bore him, and when you try to describe the thing that was
so beautiful, the listener usually says, “I love the outdoors. Nature
for me every time! Hear about the way Babe Ruth batted ’em out Thursday
in Brooklyn?” or something like that which shows you that you have
utterly failed to get your description across the plate. And because
of that I hesitate to try to make others see what I saw in Mr. Wake’s
garden that stormy day. I can only _report_ the pink and the gold, and
the misty purple and the silver streaks, and do that badly. But oh,
they were so very, very beautiful!
When Mr. Wake spoke he said, “You--haven’t changed--” and he did it
between two gulps and after a deep breath.
Miss Sheila, who covered her feelings more easily than Mr. Wake, said
“Nonsense, I have gray hair, and wrinkles--”
“No--” Mr. Wake shook his head. “No--” he said again.
She smiled at him, and her lips quivered.
“You,” she said, “can still say pretty things, can’t you?”
“To you, Sheila,” he answered, and then I thought that Sam and I ought
to move on. I said so in an aside to Sam, who was acting as if he were
sitting in an aisle seat and twisting his program into funny shapes
while he waited--in great suspense--for the hero to get the girl just
before the drop of the last curtain. I think men are much too natural
at times, and that was one of them.
After I had touched Sam’s arm, and frowned at him, and said, “_Come
on_,” in a sibilant whisper, we went up to the house, and into the big,
living hall and stood there to drain.
“Gosh,” said Sam, after I had taken off my hat and was wiping poppy
stains from my face--my hat was ruined; the colors of my cheap flowers
had run from the rain. . . . “Gosh, wasn’t that simply _great_! My
gosh, did _you see his face_?”
“Naturally,” I said, because I was so worked up and excited that it
made me feel snappish.
“Well, you needn’t be cutting,” said Sam as he tiptoed over to a window
from which he could see Miss Sheila and Mr. Wake, who were about a
block away down by the garden gate. “My soul,” he commented, after he
had looked out, “I’ll say that’s quick work! Didn’t know he had it in
him--_great hat_!”
“You shouldn’t spy on them, it isn’t fair,” I stated as I joined him.
But we did look for a moment more, at those two people who stood
outdoors, under the savage assaults of that raging storm, but who
felt--I’m certain--as if they were favored by the happiest skies of a
clear June day.
“Come on, Sam,” I ordered and turned.
“Gosh ding it,” he asked as he followed me (“Gosh ding it” is his most
intense expression), “wasn’t it _wonderful_?”
“Um hum--” I murmured.
“Are you soaked, dear?”
“A little damp,” I admitted.
“I’ll get Maria to make us some tea,” said Sam, “and I’ll take you up
to Mr. Wake’s room, and you can shed that once-perky, now depressed
frock and put on one of his dressing gowns. And then come down, and
we’ll toast you up before the fire I make while you change--”
“All right,” I agreed.
“This way, dear--” he said then, and I went with him up a twisting
stairs that had a wrought-iron balustrade, over which was growing a
vine that had its feet in a brick colored jardiniere. . . . It was a
very, very pretty house, and more than that. It was built for comfort
too. There were soft, deep low chairs all around, and ash trays on tiny
tables, and magazines, and books--hundreds of books in every room--I
kept thinking of how Miss Sheila would like it.
After I had taken off my dress, and hung it over the only chair in
the room that wouldn’t be hurt by moisture, I put on the dark green
dressing gown that Sam had laid out for me, and went down stairs
again--holding the robe up around me, for of course it was miles long
for me, and it made me go carefully for fear I would trip.
Sam had two chairs before the big fireplace, and in this a few sticks
were burning. When he saw me, he laughed, and I laughed too, and then
we settled. Maria came in with a tray that had on it an orange china
tea set, that looked very pretty on that dull, gray day, and there were
yellow flowers tucked into each napkin, and she had orange cake, and
mayonnaise and egg sandwiches to eat with our tea, and so the color
scheme was quite perfect.
After I had eaten three sandwiches and was about to begin on another--I
wasn’t very hungry, it hadn’t been long since lunch--I spoke. “Sam,” I
said, “don’t you think some one ought to tell them it’s raining?”
“Not by a good deal!” he answered, as he poured himself some fresh tea.
“They’ll get on to it sometime, all by themselves--”
“Miss Sheila’s been sick,” I added. I was a little bit worried, but Sam
answered that he thought the soaking wouldn’t hurt her, and it didn’t,
and he added the statement that he didn’t _believe_ Mr. Wake would be
grateful for any interruption just then.
Then we were quiet a minute as we watched the spluttery little fire
leap and die down, and then leap all over again. I twisted my new ring
as I sat there, for it seemed strange--as well as nice--to wear it.
“Think,” I said, I was referring to Miss Sheila and Mr. Wake--“how long
it can last--”
Sam moved his chair closer.
“Yes--” he said, in an undertone, “think of it--”
Then one of the long, French windows opened, and the wettest person I
have ever seen came in, and she was followed by another one.
“Tea,” said Miss Sheila, “how very nice--” and her voice shook on every
single word.
And then Mr. Wake said, “Ah, yes, tea!” just as if he had recently
discovered the plant and the use for it.
“Have some,” I said, “and Miss Sheila, you’d better go put on one
of Mr. Wake’s dressing gowns; he has a lavender one that would be
beautiful on you--”
“What wouldn’t?” asked Mr. Wake.
“If you think she’s pretty _now_,” I said, “You just wait until she has
dried off!”
“Dear, foolish child,” murmured Miss Sheila as she took off her
entirely limp hat and ran her fingers through her hair which was
kinking up in funny little curls all over her head.
Then she sat down on a lounge that stood to one side of the fire, and
Mr. Wake sat down by her, and kept looking at her, and looking at her,
and looking at her.
“Children,” said Miss Sheila, “I have a long story for you. . . .
Once upon a time there were two foolish young people who were proud
and stubborn, and who trusted the mails of Uncle Sam. . . . And they
quarreled badly; and the man wrote but the young lady never got the
letter, and the young lady--after long months that were filled with
chastening and pride-shattering heartbreak--wrote the young man, but,
ah, me, he had changed his name--”
“Just as you are going to change yours,” said Mr. Wake, and Miss Sheila
laughed and nodded.
“And so,” said Miss Sheila, “the fates kept them apart, and her hair
turned gray--”
“And he grew a tummy,” I put in, and Miss Sheila laughed again.
“And they were both lonely,” said Mr. Wake, “so miserably lonely; you
_were_, Sheila?”
And she said, “Oh, Terry, I--” and then she remembered Sam and me, and
stopped.
“Well?” I questioned.
“Well,” said Miss Sheila, “one fine day the lonely lady who had once
been a happy girl grew so very lonely that she could not stand still,
and so she met two nice children at a convent gate, and she said,
‘Let’s walk--’ and they looked at each other and smiled--and the way
they smiled made her more lonely than ever--and they said ‘Yes,’ and so
they all started down a hill--”
“And then,” said Mr. Wake, “an old chap who had been down to Florence,
and had gotten his favorite gray suit so wet that he didn’t think that
it would ever come back to shape, heard the tinkle of the bell of his
gate and said, ‘The devil,’ because he was half way up to the house and
everything had tried him that day anyway. But he turned back, and he
opened the gate, and he found--heaven!”
Then I _knew_ that Sam and I should move!
“Sam,” I said, “may I see the picture that you’re working on now?”
“Yes,” Sam answered, and we stood up.
It made us both very happy to leave those two dear people whom we loved
so well, and who had been lonely, there together.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
HOMEWARD BOUND!
The end of May! And all over again I felt the excitement that comes
with a journey, for I was started for Genoa on the twenty-fifth with
Miss Meek to see that I got aboard the White Star ship safely, and Sam
to see that Miss Meek and I weren’t bored.
Miss Bannister had gone to England, and Leslie had gone to join her
Mother in Paris where they were to buy a trousseau that would be worn
on a ranch for the benefit of one man and a one-eyed Chinese cook
who could spit eight feet! And Viola had started out with her Madame
Heilbig, who had suddenly decided to tour Switzerland and some of
the Italian cities that are popular in summer--the lake and seashore
points. _Mr. and Mrs. Wake_ had started out in a smart tan motor one
morning, after a little wedding in the American Church--and we didn’t
know where they were, and Mr. Hemmingway had taken up residence in Mr.
Wake’s villa.
In spite of the scattering, however, I had a few people to see me off,
and to wish me everything good.
Miss Julianna, who cried, stood by me in the station saying that she
knew that God and the Virgin would see that I was happy because I
should be, which I thought _so_ kind; and Mr. Hemmingway, who had come
all the way to town, stood near with a bouquet that he had picked for
me, trying _so_ hard to remember when he had first seen Genoa--but he
_couldn’t_ fasten it. Miss Meek, who was to join her Italian family in
June, stood close with Sam saying, “My eye, how I’ll miss the jolly
flapper!” And altogether it was warming, but it made my throat lump
too, the way that things that are too warming sometimes do.
Then the horn sounded, and every one said good-by to me, and I kissed
them all, including Mr. Hemmingway, who wiped his eyes and blew his
nose as he said good-by. Then Miss Meek, and Sam and I followed our
facchino down the platform and went through the gates that took us to
our train. We got a compartment that was rather crowded because it had
one Englishman in it, and they travel with enough scenery for an Uncle
Tom’s Cabin Company; but, after he had moved his portable bath and his
camp stool and his tea basket, there was enough room for us, and we all
settled and began to have a very nice time.
My heart ached as we went out of Florence, and I couldn’t look back. I
loved it so.
“You’ll be coming back on the run one of these fine days,” said Miss
Meek, who seemed to feel all I felt.
“I _hope_ so,” I said.
“And how could you help it, with your friends up the Fiesole way? Mr.
Wake told me that you were going to visit them out there within a year
or so. Told me so when he arranged for me to take you to Genoa and put
you on the boat, don’t you know--”
“Well, that’s awfully nice,” I said, and Sam said he thought so too.
Then--the flying landscape.
White oxen dragging creaking carts. . . . Little clusters of houses in
pastel tones. . . . White roads that circled terraced hills and groves
of olive trees.
“Of course,” I said, “I want to see my people--” and I did want to, so
much that my eyes filled as I thought of it.
“Of course,” said Miss Meek.
“But it is hard to leave friends, isn’t it?” I added.
And Miss Meek nodded. Sam put his hand over mine then, and then Miss
Meek seemed to drowse.
The journey was very short. I cannot remember a shorter seeming one,
though it does take over five hours. Baedecker says “The view of the
Mediterranean beyond Pisa is sadly marred by the frequent tunnels.”
There are over ninety of them; Sam helped me count them. Before I knew
it we had had our lunch and had settled back again, and then we were in
the city that is proud of Columbus, whose statue stands in one of the
public squares on the hillsides, and is surrounded with tall, spikey,
sharp palm trees.
Out in the bay my ship was moored, and I was to go on it that night so
that Miss Meek and Sam might go back to Florence. I didn’t want to.
I had to think of mother very hard to keep from crying. It is really
complicated to love several countries and many friends, for it makes so
much tugging and not a little hurt.
I said that just before I said good-by.
Then Sam, who had been coughing quite a little, and always before he
spoke, asked me if I had my tickets, and I said--for the fortieth time
anyway--that I had, and Miss Meek said, “Look at the birds circling
around the ship. Jolly, what?”
“They follow it,” I said.
“A lot will follow that ship,” said Sam.
And then Miss Meek kissed me, and Sam said, “Look here, dear, if you
can kiss Mr. Hemmingway, I guess you might take a chance on me?”
And I said I guessed so, and I kissed him. And Miss Meek wiped her
eyes, and kept saying, “No end jolly, a sea trip, don’t you know?”
And I said, “Yes,” and I kept my hand in Sam’s, and Sam didn’t say
anything. But he did _look_ quite a lot of things.
And then somehow, I was on board, and alone, and at last in my
stateroom which I was to share with an American woman from Florence who
was going home to visit her mother.
It was honestly a relief to have the good-bys over. And after I took
off my hat and coat, and had hung up the things from my suitcase in a
half of the small cupboard, I got out the book that the choir had given
me before I left. It is a very nice book made of puffy leather, and it
has “My Trip Abroad” written across it in gold letters, and of course I
had written in it, because that was what was expected.
I opened it and read:
“The Madonna of the Chair is in the Pitti Gallery, and it is by
Raphael. The Gallery is very big. It took Sam and me four hours
to go through it.”
Below this:
“Sam and I walked to-day, up near Fiesole, and we saw the Villa
Medici where the Princess Mary and Viscount Lascelles visited
Lady Sybil Scott, at the end of their honeymoon. It is a lovely
place. It seems to be so nice that they could be there.”
Then--over the page--I found a note about the Riccardi Palace.
“There is a picture in the chapel of the Riccardi Palace,” I
had written, “that was painted by candle light by a man named
Gozzoli, who has been dead for several years. It is a fine
picture and has lots of gold in it and the portraits of the
Medicis who lived in the palace. Sam and I went down near the
Arno and bought buns after seeing it, which was very inspiring.”