The Mayor of Warwick Part 20

The genial banter of his tone softened her resentment to curiosity.

"Where in Heaven's name were you brought up?" she asked.

"Let me see. An account of my peregrinations would read like a list of most of the States of the Union. One gets an idea of the country by such a nomadic existence, and does n't make the mistake of supposing that the tail wags the dog, instead of the dog wagging the tail."

"I suppose you mean to imply that New England is the tail," she said with trembling intensity, "when every one knows it's the head and brains of the country. I've never been west of Niagara Falls, and I 'm proud of it."

"You have reason to be," he replied with gravity. "I was only testing your loyalty. Where is our Mecca of patriotism and literature, if it is n't New England? My remark about the New England Christmas was suggested by a memory of 'Snow-Bound,' which was one of the cla.s.sics of my youth, when I used to look out discontentedly upon our inferior Western brand of snow."

"I can't make you out," she said.

When they entered the house, she laid aside her wraps and gave him a cup of tea, supplemented by the thinnest of thin wafers, after which she conducted him from room to room on a tour of inspection.

"Are you interested in Colonial furniture?" she questioned.

"I 'm anxious to learn enough about it to get interested," he a.s.sured her. "I see you have a great deal of it here."

"A great many people have," she answered. "It's easy enough to pick up imitations in the second-hand shops, or to ransack country houses; but these pieces are all genuine and have been in the family for generations. There are three Chippendales that belonged to my grandfather on my mother's side, Colonel Styles, and this is a Sheraton. That mahogany table with the low-hanging leaves is a genuine Pembroke. Do you see that newel-post? It's the only thing in the house we did n't inherit. We got it from the old Putney mansion when they were tearing it down to make room for the library. When I heard they were destroying the house, I sent Mr. Parr there to see what he could pick up, and he found this beautiful thing thrown in the corner, as if it had no value at all. Think of it!"

Leigh owned that it was a prize of no small value.

"You may say so," she went on, warming to the subject, "and it cost us twenty-five dollars. When they found out we wanted it, they put up the price. Mrs. Bradford has never gotten over it that we stole a march on her, for she meant to get it herself. Do you know Mrs. Bradford?"

"Miss Wycliffe made me acquainted with her at Littleford's. I remember hearing that she was prominent in the First Church and very much interested in historical relics."

"Her husband is one of the Bradfords," with an emphasis on the definite article, "descended from Governor Bradford, and she is president of the Society for the Preservation of Colonial Landmarks, and also of the Daughters."

"The Daughters of the King?" he inquired maliciously.

"The Daughters of the American Revolution," she corrected.

"I did n't know," he explained; "I used to hear of the other 'daughters' from an aunt of mine; but her chief hobby was bishops."

"The Episcopalians are in a small minority here," she informed him.

"Most of the old families go to the First Church. I was brought up there, but Miss Wycliffe has made me a kind of half Episcopalian, so that I go to St. George's sometimes with her. But speaking of the Bradfords, you have no idea how many obscure people claim to be descended from Governor Bradford. Now, I am a genuine Bradford on my father's side."

"The old governor must have been the Adam of these parts," he commented.

She picked up a volume from a near-by table. "This is the real Bradford genealogy," she announced.

They continued their progress through the house, viewing hautboys, and clocks, and tables, and tapestries, and chairs. Leigh had extracted all the amus.e.m.e.nt for himself that the subject and the a narrator could offer, and he began to grow inattentive. The long roll of names and of styles of furniture, hitherto unfamiliar, confused him, and the constant reiteration of the local point of view seemed an almost incredible provincialism. When they returned at last to the drawing-room, Mr. Parr, just returned from his office, rose to greet him.

"And how do you like Warwick?" he demanded. "You show your good taste," he approved, when Leigh had complimented the beauty of the city, "and Warwick is a very cultivated place as well. Have n't you found it so? There are a great many rich people here, but you see no display of wealth, as in New York."

"I hate New York," his wife put in. "It's so frightfully commercial."

Mr. Parr, having delivered himself of the articles of his belief, resumed his role as the silent partner of the house. He was a large, slow man, whose history seemed to be the history of the dinners he had eaten. In his eyes smouldered a dull glow, as of resentment at the limits of the human stomach and the volubility of wives. He woke up as his visitor prepared to depart, to inform him that the thermometer had registered twenty degrees of frost that morning, and to express the conviction that Warwick would spoil him for residence hereafter in any other city. Leigh a.s.sured him that there was no doubt of it, and went out into the winter twilight, homesick for the full, crude life of the Middle West, for the picturesque civilisation of California, for the smoke and splendour and roar of New York.

As he pa.s.sed the bishop's darkened house, he felt that it was out of the question for him to spend the Christmas recess in the deserted college on the hill. He resolved to run away from himself, to seek distraction from the riddle of his existence by a visit to the metropolis, to change his sky in the hope of changing his mind. The increasing cold, and the dun canopy of cloud that had overspread the sky for days, convinced him of the futility of attempting to continue his observations at present. Tomorrow he would join in the general hegira from the Hall.

He walked back to the college, and seeing a light in Cardington's room, he knocked at the door. His friend was seated in the chair he never seemed to leave.

"Ah," he said, observing his visitor's bundles, "you come in like a Santa Claus coadjutor, a youthful Santa Claus, not yet dignified by that hirsute appendage to the chin without which no Santa Claus is complete."

Leigh admitted that he was a feeble imitation, and produced the briar-wood pipe from his pocket. Cardington was greatly pleased.

"Thank you," he said; "thank you. I shall break the amber stem, sooner or later, but I shall have it replaced by one of vulcanised rubber, and shall continue to cherish the gift though _mutatus ab illo_. If you don't mind, I 'll initiate it now, without waiting for Christmas day." He suited the action to the words and leaned back in his chair, puffing. "A new pipe is like--a new pair of shoes--necessary--inevitable--but it must be broken in. I see promise already of sweetness--great sweetness--in this briar."

"Mrs. Parr picked me up and took me home for a cup of tea," Leigh said.

"And there I met Mr. Parr."

"Well, and how did you enjoy our excellent friends, the Parrs?"

Cardington queried, leaning back in his chair with an expectant twinkle in his eyes.

"I felt that I was visiting a storage warehouse filled with old furniture, in the midst of which stood Parr like a wax figure escaped from the Eden Musee."

"I can well understand that," Cardington commented, with a chuckle.

"And you learned something, doubtless, about the old newel-post that was taken from the Putney mansion, which I hope you admired adequately, about the old clock, the tables, and the chairs. You heard the respectable names also of the respectable Parrs' ancestors, and Mr.

Parr asked you how you liked Warwick, after which he told you how he liked it himself."

"Your astral body must have accompanied me," Leigh suggested.

"I could report the conversation verbatim," Cardington declared. "She told you, among other things, that she was a genuine Bradford on her father's side, and uttered bulls of excommunication against pretenders to the honour. It would n't do, you know, to admit that the Bradford progeny is as numerous as the stars for mult.i.tude, and as the sands upon the seash.o.r.e. It is advisable to restrict the genuine Bradfords to those of wealth and position. Now, this genealogical mania is a kind of midsummer madness that lasts in Warwick the year through, a lineal descendant, so to speak, of the witchcraft delusion; but it offers a certain kind of mental pemmican to impoverished minds. Those much vaunted ancestors were very worthy people, but, bless you! there was n't a social swell in the whole lot."

"Out West one never hears of such things," said Leigh.

"Out West," Cardington returned, "they are still grappling with the realities of life. Ancestor worship has not yet set in as a canker in the fruit; that will come with the dead ripeness. Here you see the New Englander as he is to-day, not as he was in a glorified past; not landing at Plymouth Rock, not hanging witches, or beating Quakers, or persecuting Episcopalians, not throwing tea into Boston Harbour, or writing philosophy at Concord, but spending his days in watching the gradual accretion of his already substantial fortune.

"A New Englander is the only jewel that appears to better advantage out of its proper setting than in it. To ill.u.s.trate. In the West, the New Englander is thawed without being melted to such an extent as to lose his backbone; he becomes genial without undue compromise; he carries the torch of civilisation without a flourish. It was the chosen spirits of New England, men and women, that went West in their great waggons with the pots and pans hanging from the axle, and salted that crude country with their quality.

"But the conversation has become very oracular," he continued. "What are you going to do during the recess?"

"I 'm going home, and shall stop over in New York for a visit on my way back. But where are you going?"

"Well, I may take a little run down to Bermuda and see the bishop and Miss Felicity. Just think of leaving all this ice and snow, and about the second day out beginning to shed your superfluous outer garments, until you arrive at your destination in white duck trousers and a Panama hat! Think of the odour of lilies, not to mention the onions!

And there I shall find Miss Felicity, looking like the G.o.ddess Flora, wandering in those beautiful lily-fields that command a wide sweep of the purple sea. It's enough to stir one to poetry, is n't it?"

"I wish I might go with you," Leigh remarked.

A film seemed to come over Cardington's blue eyes, just the suggestion of a veil of secrecy.

"Yes--yes--if you hadn't made other plans, you know. But you must go down there some winter, you must indeed. It's really a most charming place."

"Well," Leigh said, rising and taking up his bundles, "give the bishop and Miss Wycliffe my regards."

"I will," Cardington promised. "Perhaps they will return with me. I 'll take your excellent pipe along to smoke on the Gulf Stream and among the lilies. Good-bye!"