The Complete Writings of Charles Dudley Warner Part 220

"I haven't the faculty of seeing things in the dark, Mrs. Cortlandt. Oh, there's the mother!" And the shrill voice of Mrs. Benson was heard, "We was getting uneasy about you. Pa says a storm's coming, and that you'd be as sick as sick."

The weather was changing. But that evening the s.p.a.cious hotel, luxurious, perfectly warmed, and well lighted, crowded with an agreeable if not a brilliant company--for Mr. King noted the fact that none of the gentlemen dressed for dinner--seemed all the more pleasant for the contrast with the weather outside. Thus housed, it was pleasant to hear the waves dashing against the breakwater. Just by chance, in the ballroom, Mr. King found himself seated by Mrs. Benson and a group of elderly ladies, who had the perfunctory air of liking the mild gayety of the place. To one of them Mr. King was presented, Mrs. Stimpson--a stout woman with a broad red face and fishy eyes, wearing an elaborate head-dress with purple flowers, and attired as if she were expecting to take a prize. Mrs. Stimpson was loftily condescending, and asked Mr.

King if this was his first visit. She'd been coming here years and years; never could get through the spring without a few weeks at the Hygeia. Mr. King saw a good many people at this hotel who seemed to regard it as a home.

"I hope your daughter, Mrs. Benson, was not tired out with the rather long voyage today."

"Not a mite. I guess she enjoyed it. She don't seem to enjoy most things. She's got everything heart can wish at home. I don't know how it is. I was tellin' pa, Mr. Benson, today that girls ain't what they used to be in my time. Takes more to satisfy 'em. Now my daughter, if I say it as shouldn't, Mr. King, there ain't a better appearin,' nor smarter, nor more dutiful girl anywhere--well, I just couldn't live without her; and she's had the best schools in the East and Europe; done all Europe and Rome and Italy; and after all, somehow, she don't seem contented in Cyrusville--that's where we live in Ohio--one of the smartest places in the state; grown right up to be a city since we was married. She never says anything, but I can see. And we haven't spared anything on our house. And society--there's a great deal more society than I ever had."

Mr. King might have been astonished at this outpouring if he had not observed that it is precisely in hotels and to entire strangers that some people are apt to talk with less reserve than to intimate friends.

"I've no doubt," he said, "you have a lovely home in Cyrusville."

"Well, I guess it's got all the improvements. Pa, Mr. Benson, said that he didn't know of anything that had been left out, and we had a man up from Cincinnati, who did all the furnishing before Irene came home."

"Perhaps your daughter would have preferred to furnish it herself?"

"Mebbe so. She said it was splendid, but it looked like somebody else's house. She says the queerest things sometimes. I told Mr. Benson that I thought it would be a good thing to go away from home a little while and travel round. I've never been away much except in New York, where Mr.

Benson has business a good deal. We've been in Washington this winter."

"Are you going farther south?"

"Yes; we calculate to go down to the New Orleans Centennial. Pa wants to see the Exposition, and Irene wants to see what the South looks like, and so do I. I suppose it's perfectly safe now, so long after the war?"

"Oh, I should say so."

"That's what Mr. Benson says. He says it's all nonsense the talk about what the South 'll do now the Democrats are in. He says the South wants to make money, and wants the country prosperous as much as anybody. Yes, we are going to take a regular tour all summer round to the different places where people go. Irene calls it a pilgrimage to the holy places of America. Pa thinks we'll get enough of it, and he's determined we shall have enough of it for once. I suppose we shall. I like to travel, but I haven't seen any place better than Cyrusville yet."

As Irene did not make her appearance, Mr. King tore himself away from this interesting conversation and strolled about the parlors, made engagements to take early coffee at the fort, to go to church with Mrs.

Cortlandt and her friends, and afterwards to drive over to Hampton and see the copper and other colored schools, talked a little politics over a late cigar, and then went to bed, rather curious to see if the eyes that Mrs. Cortlandt regarded as so dangerous would appear to him in the darkness.

When he awoke, his first faint impressions were that the Hygeia had drifted out to sea, and then that a dense fog had drifted in and enveloped it. But this illusion was speedily dispelled. The window-ledge was piled high with snow. Snow filled the air, whirled about by a gale that was banging the window-shutters and raging exactly like a Northern tempest.

It swirled the snow about in waves and dark ma.s.ses interspersed with rifts of light, dark here and luminous there. The Rip-Raps were lost to view. Out at sea black clouds hung in the horizon, heavy reinforcements for the attacking storm. The ground was heaped with the still fast-falling snow--ten inches deep he heard it said when he descended.

The Baltimore boat had not arrived, and could not get in. The waves at the wharf rolled in, black and heavy, with a sullen beat, and the sky shut down close to the water, except when a sudden stronger gust of wind cleared a luminous s.p.a.ce for an instant. Stormbound: that is what the Hygeia was--a winter resort without any doubt.

The hotel was put to a test of its qualities. There was no getting abroad in such a storm. But the Hygeia appeared at its best in this emergency. The long gla.s.s corridors, where no one could venture in the arctic temperature, gave, nevertheless, an air of brightness and cheerfulness to the interior, where big fires blazed, and the company were exalted into good-fellowship and gayety--a decorous Sunday gayety --by the elemental war from which they were securely housed.

If the defenders of their country in the fortress mounted guard that morning, the guests at the Hygeia did not see them, but a good many of them mounted guard later at the hotel, and offered to the young ladies there that protection which the brave like to give the fair.

Notwithstanding this, Mr. Stanhope King could not say the day was dull.

After a morning presumably spent over works of a religious character, some of the young ladies, who had been the life of the excursion the day before, showed their versatility by devising serious amus.e.m.e.nts befitting the day, such as twenty questions on Scriptural subjects, palmistry, which on another day is an aid to mild flirtation, and an exhibition of mind-reading, not public--oh, dear, no--but with a favored group in a private parlor. In none of these groups, however, did Mr. King find Miss Benson, and when he encountered her after dinner in the reading-room, she confessed that she had declined an invitation to a.s.sist at the mind-reading, partly from a lack of interest, and partly from a reluctance to dabble in such things.

"Surely you are not uninterested in what is now called psychical research?" he asked.

"That depends," said Irene. "If I were a physician, I should like to watch the operation of the minds of 'sensitives' as a pathological study.

But the experiments I have seen are merely exciting and unsettling, without the least good result, with a haunting notion that you are being tricked or deluded. It is as much as I can do to try and know my own mind, without reading the minds of others."

"But you cannot help the endeavor to read the mind of a person with whom you are talking."

"Oh, that is different. That is really an encounter of wits, for you know that the best part of a conversation is the things not said. What they call mindreading is a vulgar business compared to this. Don't you think so, Mr. King?"

What Mr. King was actually thinking was that Irene's eyes were the most unfathomable blue he ever looked into, as they met his with perfect frankness, and he was wondering if she were reading his present state of mind; but what he said was, "I think your sort of mind-reading is a good deal more interesting than the other," and he might have added, dangerous. For a man cannot attempt to find out what is in a woman's heart without a certain disturbance of his own. He added, "So you think our society is getting too sensitive and nervous, and inclined to make dangerous mental excursions?"

"I'm afraid I do not think much about such things," Irene replied, looking out of the window into the storm. "I'm content with a very simple faith, even if it is called ignorance."

Mr. King was thinking, as he watched the clear, spirited profile of the girl shown against the white tumult in the air, that he should like to belong to the party of ignorance himself, and he thought so long about it that the subject dropped, and the conversation fell into ordinary channels, and Mrs. Benson appeared. She thought they would move on as soon as the storm was over. Mr. King himself was going south in the morning, if travel were possible. When he said good-by, Mrs. Benson expressed the pleasure his acquaintance had given them, and hoped they should see him in Cyrusville. Mr. King looked to see if this invitation was seconded in Irene's eyes; but they made no sign, although she gave him her hand frankly, and wished him a good journey.

The next morning he crossed to Norfolk, was transported through the snow-covered streets on a sledge, and took his seat in the cars for the most monotonous ride in the country, that down the coast-line.

When next Stanhope King saw Fortress Monroe it was in the first days of June. The summer which he had left in the interior of the Hygeia was now out-of-doors. The winter birds had gone north; the summer birds had not yet come. It was the interregnum, for the Hygeia, like Venice, has two seasons, one for the inhabitants of colder climes, and the other for natives of the country. No spot, thought our traveler, could be more lovely. Perhaps certain memories gave it a charm, not well defined, but still gracious. If the house had been empty, which it was far from being, it would still have been peopled for him. Were they all such agreeable people whom he had seen there in March, or has one girl the power to throw a charm over a whole watering-place? At any rate, the place was full of delightful repose. There was movement enough upon the water to satisfy one's lazy longing for life, the waves lapped soothingly along the sh.o.r.e, and the broad bay, sparkling in the sun, was animated with boats, which all had a holiday air. Was it not enough to come down to breakfast and sit at the low, broad windows and watch the shifting panorama? All about the harbor slanted the white sails; at intervals a steamer was landing at the wharf or backing away from it; on the wharf itself there was always a little bustle, but no noise, some pretense of business, and much actual transaction in the way of idle att.i.tudinizing, the colored man in castoff clothes, and the colored sister in sun-bonnet or turban, lending themselves readily to the picturesque; the scene changed every minute, the sail of a tiny boat was hoisted or lowered under the window, a dashing cutter with its uniformed crew was pulling off to the German man-of-war, a puffing little tug dragged along a line of barges in the distance, and on the horizon a fleet of coasters was working out between the capes to sea. In the open window came the fresh morning breeze, and only the softened sounds of the life outside. The ladies came down in cool muslin dresses, and added the needed grace to the picture as they sat breakfasting by the windows, their figures in silhouette against the blue water.

No wonder our traveler lingered there a little! Humanity called him, for one thing, to drive often with humanely disposed young ladies round the beautiful sh.o.r.e curve to visit the schools for various colors at Hampton.

Then there was the evening promenading on the broad verandas and out upon the miniature pier, or at sunset by the water-batteries of the old fort --such a peaceful old fortress as it is. All the morning there were "inspections" to be attended, and nowhere could there be seen a more agreeable mingling of war and love than the s.p.a.cious, tree-planted interior of the fort presented on such occasions. The shifting figures of the troops on parade; the martial and daring manoeuvres of the regimental band; the groups of ladies seated on benches under the trees, attended by gallants in uniform, momentarily off duty and full of information, and by gallants not in uniform and never off duty and desirous to learn; the ancient guns with French arms and English arms, reminiscences of Yorktown, on one of which a pretty girl was apt to be perched in the act of being photographed--all this was enough to inspire any man to be a countryman and a lover. It is beautiful to see how fearless the gentle s.e.x is in the presence of actual war; the prettiest girls occupied the front and most exposed seats; and never flinched when the determined columns marched down on them with drums beating and colors flying, nor showed much relief when they suddenly wheeled and marched to another part of the parade in search of glory. And the officers'

quarters in the casemates--what will not women endure to serve their country! These quarters are mere tunnels under a dozen feet of earth, with a door on the parade side and a cas.e.m.e.nt window on the outside--a damp cellar, said to be cool in the height of summer. The only excuse for such quarters is that the women and children will be comparatively safe in case the fortress is bombarded.

The hotel and the fortress at this enchanting season, to say nothing of other attractions, with laughing eyes and slender figures, might well have detained Mr. Stanhope King, but he had determined upon a sort of roving summer among the resorts of fashion and pleasure. After a long sojourn abroad, it seemed becoming that he should know something of the floating life of his own country. His determination may have been strengthened by the confession of Mrs. Benson that her family were intending an extensive summer tour. It gives a zest to pleasure to have even an indefinite object, and though the prospect of meeting Irene again was not definite, it was nevertheless alluring. There was something about her, he could not tell what, different from the women he had met in France. Indeed, he went so far as to make a general formula as to the impression the American women made on him at Fortress Monroe--they all appeared to be innocent.

II

CAPE MAY, ATLANTIC CITY

"Of course you will not go to Cape May till the season opens. You might as well go to a race-track the day there is no race." It was Mrs.

Cortlandt who was speaking, and the remonstrance was addressed to Mr.

Stanhope King, and a young gentleman, Mr. Graham Forbes, who had just been presented to her as an artist, in the railway station at Philadelphia, that comfortable home of the tired and bewildered traveler.

Mr. Forbes, with his fresh complexion, closely cropped hair, and London clothes, did not look at all like the traditional artist, although the sharp eyes of Mrs. Cortlandt detected a small sketch-book peeping out of his side pocket.

"On the contrary, that is why we go," said Mr. King. "I've a fancy that I should like to open a season once myself."

"Besides," added Mr. Forbes, "we want to see nature unadorned. You know, Mrs. Cortlandt, how people sometimes spoil a place."

"I'm not sure," answered the lady, laughing, "that people have not spoiled you two and you need a rest. Where else do you go?"

"Well, I thought," replied Mr. King, "from what I heard, that Atlantic City might appear best with n.o.body there."

"Oh, there's always some one there. You know, it is a winter resort now.

And, by the way--But there's my train, and the young ladies are beckoning to me." (Mrs. Cortlandt was never seen anywhere without a party of young ladies.) "Yes, the Bensons pa.s.sed through Washington the other day from the South, and spoke of going to Atlantic City to tone up a little before the season, and perhaps you know that Mrs. Benson took a great fancy to you, Mr. King. Good-by, au revoir," and the lady was gone with her bevy of girls, struggling in the stream that poured towards one of the wicket-gates.

"Atlantic City? Why, Stanhope, you don't think of going there also?"

"I didn't think of it, but, hang it all, my dear fellow, duty is duty.

There are some places you must see in order to be well informed. Atlantic City is an important place; a great many of its inhabitants spend their winters in Philadelphia."

"And this Mrs. Benson?"

"No, I'm not going down there to see Mrs. Benson."