“You ain’t a newspaper girl, I’ll say?” Mame opened cautiously.
“Yes.” The new acquaintance replenished casually the meerschaum holder.
She wrote for the papers. It was by way of being a solution of the
mystery. What these Britishers called a journalist. But a four-flusher
all the same. Yet Mame could not help liking her. There was something
so forthcoming, something so unstudied. She was so much more natural
than Paula Ling. You felt with Paula that if you knew her a hundred
years she would never let you catch her with her hair down or without
her pinko. But this girl was different.
“What journals you write for?”
“For a syndicate mostly.”
“A syndicate.” Mame blinked. Her strong financial instinct
automatically got busy. “Then you pull the big stuff, I guess?”
“Bread and butter.” As the bloated pluralist spoke she took a piece
from the plate in front of her and offered it delicately to Fu Ching
Wei.
The haughty animal suspiciously curled a lip and then condescended to
eat. “Nice, isn’t he?” His mistress tickled gently the top of his head.
“Describe coronations for Reuter’s Agency?” Mame threw out a feeler.
The subject fascinated her. And though the mistress of Fu Ching Wei
might be a palpable bluffer, there was still a chance that she was one
of the mandarins of the profession into which Mame herself was dying to
force an entrance.
Awe was in Mame’s voice as she asked the question. Awe there was none
in the careless voice that answered it. “Describe any old toomarsh from
a dog fight to a royal marriage. Not that one does those stunts often,
although one gets about the world sometimes.”
“What’s your line, then?” Mame tried hard to mask her curiosity. But
rather conspicuously she failed.
“As a rule I write up the tea shops and hat shops and the restaurants
and the big stores. And I do the books and plays for the women’s
illustrateds.”
“But you do the big marriages too, I guess?” Mame’s voice throbbed.
“Not often. All marriages are so much alike they bore one.”
Mame’s expressive countenance showed that she could not imagine herself
being bored by doing marriages. “I’d just love that.”
“Love what?” The girl tickled the ear of Fu Ching Wei with the
meerschaum holder.
“I’d love to do the real class marriages for real class papers.”
The girl gave a shrug that Paula Wyse Ling would never have permitted
herself. But natural elegance carried it off.
Was she still putting it over on her? Or was she just trying to cheek
her? Not that it mattered. Even if she was a regular queen of bluffers,
she was also by a long sight the most interesting creature Mame had yet
found in London.
So far the girl had left to Mame the business of asking questions. But
in spite of an air of nonchalance, which Mame rather admired, she was
not above putting one or two questions of her own.
“Are you a writing person?” she said, offering Fu Ching Wei a little
milk in a saucer.
“You said it.” Of all the reams Mame had written since trekking east
hardly a line had found its way into print; but that did not prevent
her taking pride in the fact that the pen was her vocation. She
hesitated a moment. Then she opened her bag and produced a card.
By now she knew enough of the newspaper walks of Britain to doubt
the worth of this bit of pasteboard. At first it had given her real
pleasure to display it. But she had now reached the phase when she was
not sure that her card was not where she got off.
Still, there was nothing to lose by shooting it upon this girl. It
would be trying it, as it were, upon the dog. This smart skirt was the
top of her class. No matter what she might be, she was just as full of
style as she could hold. It would be worth while to note the effect of
a rather doubtful talisman upon her.
She did not say so, nor did her manner betray the fact, but it was
a sure thing that she had never heard of Cowbarn or its leading
newspaper. But Mame liked the kind and friendly way she handed back the
card with the remark: “You’re in journalism too, I see.”
No lugs. No frills. By her own account she was a he-one at the game.
It had been Mame’s instinct to doubt that, but this tone of pleasant
quietness, this we’re-all-friends-round-the-darned-old-inkpot style was
something new. This bird who was dressed to the nines, and who behaved
as if she just naturally owned London, seemed to be quite disarmed by
the European Correspondent of the Cowbarn _Independent_.
Without getting gay or in any wise familiar, she became as chatty as if
she and Mame had begun their young lives together at the same convent
school. It was clear that Mame had aroused her interest. The questions
she put were shrewd and the answers she received amused her.
Mame asked if she knew the States.
She got over there sometimes. “Great fun, the U. S., I always think.
Don’t you?”
Mame had never found the land of her fathers great fun, but she had far
too much pride in it to say so.
“The U. S. is so progressive.”
“You said it.”
The girl had a lot to say of America. And every word was well disposed,
without any touch of condescension.
“Stay, I guess, with the Vanderbilts and the Astors when you visit New
York?” Mame threw a plummet to bring her down to cases.
“The MacFarlanes are my particular friends.” She spoke off-handedly.
“And they always give one such a good time.”
“I’ll say, yes,” Mame remarked drily. She was not quite clear in her
mind whether the madam could be allowed to get away with that. She
would be saying next that in London her headquarters were Buckingham
Palace.
The girl produced a cigarette case. It was a wonderful piece of
chinoiserie in flowered purple silk. “Have a gasper?”
Mame had yet to acquire the habit of smoking gaspers. She declined with
thanks. But the girl fitted an amber-scented one to the meerschaum
holder so elegantly, that Mame decided to practise the art at the first
opportunity. Paula Ling had said that it was even more chic in Europe
than it was on Long Island. As usual Paula Ling was right.
While Mame, out of the corners of a pair of very seeing eyes, marked
all that the smart piece did, she took a resolve to start in at once to
develop her own personality. Here was terrific personality. It did not
in any sense obtrude; it did not sort of hit you right in the middle
of the eye, as Paula’s did, but it was there all the time. Moreover,
it was earning dividends for its owner. This skirt was not in the true
sense of the word a looker, but there was jazz in her talk, in her
actions, in all her ways. She did not paint her face, use lip-stick
or bead her eyes; in clothes, although Mame guessed they were as good
as could be got for money, she was quiet; but her general effect was
as salt as a breeze from the sea. Mame could but envy and admire and
wonder how the trick was done.
“Staying long in England?”
“I’ll have to get off this side of the world pretty soon now.” Mame
spoke a little wistfully.
Without seeming to look at Mame, the girl, from behind the rampart
of the meerschaum holder, must somehow have read the true index to
her feelings. That index was Mame’s eyes. Very good eyes they were;
and, unknown to their owner, singularly expressive. Grey eyes, large,
serious, open, full of trouble. For all the orbs behind the meerschaum
holder were so impersonal, when as now they were three-quarters lidded,
they had a power of seeing into things that might have astonished Mame
considerably had she known the full extent of their faculty.
“Anything I can do for you?”
It was one British journalist to one American or _vice versa_: a bit of
international courtesy. But to Mame it was more. There was a genuine
ring of kindness, as pure a note of music as Mame had yet heard.
Her practical mind at once got busy. This might be a chance. Bluffer as
this girl most likely was, there could yet be no harm in trying her out.
“Before I go back home,” said Mame, tentative as a kitten treading on
ice; “I’d like an invite to some mansion of real class. I’d like to do
a big wedding for my paper.”
“Do you mean this function next week at Clanborough House?” The girl
was journalist enough to own a mind which could move with uncommon
nimbleness.
“You’ve made it in one.” Quick in the uptake, this bird. Mame was moved
to say so.
“My dear Watson, really quite simple.” The meerschaum holder received a
Sherlock Holmes tilt. “George Rex and Consort are going to honour the
occasion. You saw it in the _Times_ this morning.”
Mame breathed hard. This girl was no slouch. A four-flusher, yet she
might have strings to pull. And it would be one over on Paula Ling if a
little hick from Cowbarn, Iowa, got playing around among the royalties;
not to mention the Fleet Street gentleman who had said the only way she
would get to Clanborough House would be as a hired girl. The insult
still rankled.
“A dull affair!” The new friend butted pleasantly into a rather tense
pause. “But I ought to have a card somewhere that may get you in, if
you care to come.”
Mame’s heart seemed to miss a beat when the girl began a search for an
invitation to the terribly beparagraphed wedding the following week at
Clanborough House.
“Should be one here.” Calmly she produced the beautiful cigarette
case. Something leapt in Mame’s throat as the entire contents of the
case were toppled out on to the tablecloth. There were half a dozen
cigarettes and twice that number of cards of various shapes and sizes.
“Private view Black-and-white Exhibition, Burlington House.” Mame was
seething with suspense, but the girl went calmly and leisurely through
the cards. “Arts and Handicrafts Exhibition. Admit Bearer. British and
Foreign Bible Society. Randal Cantuar in the Chair. Opening of Royal
School of Cookery, New Wandsworth. Annual Meeting Dumb Friends’ League.
Reception for Dr. Hyam Baines Pennefather, Baltimore Third Church,
Hotel Cecil. No--yes--no. It almost looks as if we’ve drawn zero.”
Mame’s heart sank. It was no more than was to be expected of a tinhorn,
but it would have been cracker-jack to have sailed into Clanborough
House by the main entrance, along with the King and Queen and half the
real doughnuts in the island.
She bit her lip with disappointment, yet at the back of her mind was
the knowledge that these things did not happen. They were too good to
be true. But the melancholy privilege still remained to one who aspired
to close and accurate observation of the human comedy of seeing what
the four-flusher would do next.
The girl coolly returned the contents to the lovely silk case. And then
she said in that casual tone which Mame was now beginning to resent
rather more than she admired: “Give me your address.”
Part of her bluff, of course. Still Mame saw no reason why her address
should not be given. Truth to tell, she was just a little proud of it.
Like many things in this queer city, it sounded better than it was. She
promptly took from her bag a decidedly professional-looking reporter’s
note-book, tore out a leaf, and then wrote carefully with an equally
professional-looking fountain pen: Miss Amethyst Du Rance, Fotheringay
House, Montacute Square, Bloomsbury.
“Thanks,” said the smart skirt. Then she gave a glance, cool and
impassive, at what Mame had written; and, then, with a lurking smile,
which Mame was quick to detect, she added this memento to the others
which adorned her case.
“I’ll be glad of an invite for Clanborough House,” said Mame with irony.
“Right-o. You shall have one in the course of post.”
“I don’t think,” Mame confided mutely to the dregs of her teacup. And
then she said with a demure mockery that was rooted in the heart’s
bitterness, “I reckon you’ll be there.”
The answer was “Sure” in the way it is given in New York. Perhaps the
high-flyer guessed that Mame was trying to call her bluff. Yet beyond a
doubt she carried it off royally. “I suppose I’ll have to be.”
“To write a report for your syndicate.” Mame’s voice had something
terribly like a sneer in it.
The girl laughed and shook her head. “This binge is a bit too much of a
family affair.”
“Oh!” said Mame inadequately. It was not easy to call the bluff of this
girl.
While Mame, who had now begun to feel vindictive, was seriously
considering the best means of letting this short-sport know that she
was not quite such a sucker as she seemed, a young man who had just
risen from an adjacent table came stalking her stealthily from behind.
He patted her on the shoulder.
“Hulloa, Bill!” The tone was very light and whimsical. “I didn’t see
the cat bring you in.”
Mame listened keenly for Bill’s answer. But it amounted to nothing
beyond a cheery laugh. All the same, she was mightily interested in
Bill.
He was dressed to beat the band: braided morning coat, white spats,
the last word in neckties. Evidently a regular fellow. He was one of
those upstanding, handsome boys in which the West End of London seems
to abound. Perhaps he was twenty-seven, or a little less, with a skin
naturally fair burnt to a most attractive shade of copper by the suns
of foreign climes. There was something so wholesome and clean, so manly
and trim about Bill, that even a girl of sense might be expected to
fall in love with him on sight. Mame was not in a position to think of
love. But he looked such a white man, and so faultless in his grace
that even as it was she could not repress a little sigh of envy. Some
girls didn’t appreciate their luck in having boys of that sort feeding
from the hand.
“Going?” Mame heard him say.
The queen of the four-flushers answered with an unmistakable “Yep”
which might have come from the Bowery. She went on to discard her
cigarette, to put away her meerschaum holder and then to examine the
inside of her purse. “Dammitall!” she said. “No change and I must leave
a shilling under the plate for the waiter. Have you one about you,
Bill?”
Bill obliged. The girl laid the shilling under her plate and got up
from the table. As she did so she turned abruptly to Mame and held out
her hand in a most winning manner. “A-rivederci. I have your address. I
won’t forget that card. So glad to have met you.”
While Mame returned doubtful thanks for a favour she did not expect to
receive, the girl and her escort were already under way. With mingled
feelings Mame watched them pass along the line of tables. She saw the
girl blow a kiss to the old woman with the Roman nose, who in return
offered a most truculent scowl. But this was effaced by the homage of
the _maître d’hôtel_, who bestowed upon the girl an exaggerated bow.
Moreover, as she made a smiling progress down the long room, many eyes
seemed to follow her; or, as Mame was inclined to think, the eyes of
the feminine section of the tea-drinking public were drawn by the
escort Bill.
Indeed, as a pair they were distinctly “it” as they went along to the
door. The girl stopped at several tables just to pass the time of day,
while Bill stood by like a big and amiable Newfoundland dog.
Mame sighed again. Yes, some skirts had luck! Up till that moment
she had not realised the possibilities in writing for the newspapers.
She would get no card, of course, for Clanborough House. But she
was already resigned to that. Birds of that sort were much too busy
paddling their private canoes. And why not? You simply got nowhere if
you didn’t.
When the girl finally went out through the doors at the end of the
room Mame was sure that she had seen and heard the last of her. That
was the way of the world as already she had come to understand it. The
big cities were chock-full of interesting folks, but unless you were
just-so it was not worth while to take you up.
To be worth while, that was the open sesame to New York and London.
Paula Ling had grasped that truth. That was why she was a mass of paint
and powder and patchouli; that was why she screwed herself like a
manikin, into tight smart clothes. But this skirt left Paula standing.
The Paulas of life, for all their brains and their will-power, could
not live five minutes with this sort of girl, who had every new trick,
and who, like Cinquevalli the famous conjurer, was so expert she could
almost do them shut-eye.
So much was Mame occupied with these thoughts that it was not until she
had paid her bill and was out once more upon the cold pavement of Pall
Mall that she gave herself a mental shake. She was a fool. Had she kept
her wits about her she would at least have asked the waiter the name of
this queen among four-flushers.