The Potiphar Papers Part 8

"It's very warm," said he, in a gentlemanly manner.

"Dear me! yes, very warm," said Daisy.

"Been long in Newport?"

"No; only a few days. We always come, after, Saratoga for a couple of weeks. But isn't it delightful?"

"Quite so," said Timon, coolly, and smiling at the idea of anybody's being enthusiastic about anything. That elegant youth has pumped life dry; and now the pump only wheezes.

"Oh!" continued Daisy, "it's so pleasant to run away from the hot city, and breathe this cool air. And then Nature is so beautiful. Are you fond of Nature, Mr. Croesus?"

"Tolerably,"' returned Timon.

"Oh! but Mr. Croesus! to go to the glen and skip stones, and then walk on the cliff, and drive to Bateman's, and the fort, and to go to the beach by moonlight; and then the bowling-alley, and the archery, and the Germania. Oh! it's a splendid place. But perhaps, you don't like natural scenery, Mr. Croesus?"

"Perhaps not," said Mr. Croesus.

"Well, some people don't," said darling little Daisy, folding up her fan, as if quite ready for another turn.

"Come, now; there it is," said Timon, and, grasping her with his right arm, they glided away.

"Kurz Pacha," said I, "I wonder who sent Ada Aiguille that bouquet?"

"Sir John Franklin, I presume," returned he.

"What do you mean by that," asked I. -- Before he could answer, Boosey and Mrs. Potiphar stopped by us.

"No, no, Mr. Boosey," panted Mrs. P., "I will not have him introduced. They say his father actually sells dry goods by the yard in Buffalo."

"Well, but _he_ doesn't, Mrs. Potiphar.

"I know that, and it's all very well for you young men to know him, and to drink, and play billiards, and smoke, with him. And he is handsome to be sure, and gentlemanly, and I am told, very intelligent. But, you know, we can't be visiting our shoemakers and shopmen. That's the great difficulty of a watering-place, one doesn't know who's who. Why Mrs. Gnu was here three summers ago, and there sat next to her, at table, a middle-aged foreign gentleman, who had only a slight accent, and who was so affable and agreeable, so intelligent and modest, and so perfectly familiar with all kinds of little ways, you know, that she supposed he was the Russian Minister, who, she heard, was at Newport incognito for his health. She used to talk with him in the parlor, and allowed him to join her upon the piazza.

n.o.body could find out who he was. There were suspicions, of course. But he paid his bills, drove his horses, and was universally liked. Dear me! appearances are so deceitful! who do you think he was?"

"I'm sure I can't imagine."

"Well, the next spring she went to a music store in Philadelphia, to buy some guitar strings for Claribel, and who should advance to sell them but the Russian Minister! Mrs. Gnu said she colored--"

"So I've always understood," said Gauche, laughing.

"Fie! Mr. Boosey," continued Mrs. P. smiling. "But the music-seller didn't betray the slightest consciousness. He sold her the strings, received the money, and said nothing, and looked nothing. Just think of it! She supposed him to be a gentleman, and he was really a music-dealer. You see that's the sort of thing one is exposed to here, and though your friend may be very nice, it isn't safe for me to know him. In a country where there's no aristocracy one can't be too exclusive. Mrs. Peony says she thinks that in future she shall really pa.s.s the summer in a farm-house or if she goes to a watering-place, confine herself to her own rooms and her carriage, and look at the people through the blinds. I'm afraid, myself, it's coming to that. Everybody goes to Saratoga now, and you see how Newport is crowded. For my part I agree with the Rev. Cream Cheese, that there are serious evils in a republican form of government. What a hideous head-dress that is of Mrs. Settum Downe's! What a lovely polka-redowa!"

"So it is, by Jove! Come on," replied the gentlemanly Boosey, and they swept down the hall.

"_Ah! ciel!_" exclaimed a voice close by us--Kurz Pacha and I turned at the same moment. We beheld a gentleman twirling his moustache and a lady fanning. They were smiling intelligently at each other, and upon his whispering something that I could not hear, she said, "_Fi! donc_" and folding her fan and laying her arm upon his shoulder, they slid along again in the dance.

"Who is that?" inquired the Pacha.

"Don't you know Mrs. Vite?" said I, glad of my chance. "Why, my dear sir, she is our great social success. She shows what America can do under a French _regime_. She performs for society the inestimable service of giving some reality to the pictures of Balzac and George Sand, by the quality of her life and manners. She is just what you would expect a weak American girl to be who was poisoned by Paris,--who mistook what was most obvious for what was most characteristic,--whose ideas of foreign society and female habits were based upon an experience of resorts, more renowned for ease than elegance,--who has no instinct fine enough to tell her that a _lionne_ cannot be a lady,--who imitates the worst manners of foreign society, without the ability or opportunity of perceiving the best,--who prefers a _double entendre_ to a _bon-mot_,--who courts the applause of men whose acquaintance gentlemen are careless of acknowledging,--who likes fast driving and dancing, low jokes, and low dresses, who is, therefore, bold without wit, noisy without mirth, and notorious without a desirable reputation. That is Mrs. Vite."

Kurz Pacha rolled up his eyes.

"Good Jupiter! Miss Minerva," cried he, "is this you that I hear? Why you are warmer in your denunciation of this little wisp of a woman than you ever were of fat old Madame Gorgon, with her prodigious paste diamonds. Really, you take it too hard. And you, too, who used to skate so nimbly over the glib surface of society, and cut such coquettish figures of eight upon the characters of your friends. You must excuse me, but it seems to me odd that Miss Minerva Tattle, who used to treat serious things so lightly, should now be treating light things so seriously. You ought to frequent the comic opera more, and dine with Mrs. Potiphar once a week. If your good humor can't digest such a _hors d'oeuvre_ as little Mrs. Vite, what will you do with such a _piece de resistance_ as Madame Gorgon?"

Odious plain speaker! Yet I like the man. But, before I could reply, up came another couple--Caroline Pett.i.toes and Norman de Famille.

"You were at the bowling-alley?" said he.

"Yes," answered Caroline.

"You saw them together?"

"Yes."

"Well, what do you think?"

"Why, of course, that if he is not engaged to her he ought to be. He has taken her out in his wagon three times, he has sent her four bouquets, he waltzes with her every night, he bowls with her party every morning, and if that does not mean that he wants to marry her, I should like to know what it does mean," replied Caroline, tossing her head.

Norman de Famille smiled, and Caroline continued with rather a flushed face, because Norman had been doing very much the same thing with her:

"What is a girl to understand by such attentions?"

"Why, that the gentleman finds it an amusing game, and hopes she is equally pleased," returned De Famille.

"_Merci_, M. de Famille," said Caroline, with an energy I never suspected in her, "and at the end of the game she may go break her heart, I suppose."

"Hearts are not so brittle, Miss Pett.i.toes," replied Norman. "Besides, why should you girls always play for such high stakes?"

They were just about beginning the waltz again, when the music stopped, and they walked away. But I saw the tears in Caroline's eyes. I don't know whether they were tears of vexation, or of disappointment. The men have the advantage of us because they can control their emotions so much better. I suppose Caroline blushed and cried, because she found herself blushing and crying, quite as much as because she fancied her partner didn't care for her.

I turned to Kurz Pacha, who stood by my side, smiling, and rubbing his hands.

"A charming evening we have had of it, Miss Minerva," said he, "an epitome of life--a kind of last-new-novel effect. The things that we have heard and seen here, multiplied and varied by a thousand or so, produce the net result of Newport. Given, a large house, music, piazzas, beaches, cliff, port, griddle-cakes, fast horses, sherry-cobblers, ten-pins, dust, artificial flowers, innocence, worn-out hearts, loveliness, black-legs, bank-bills, small men, large coat-sleeves, little boots, jewelry, and polka-redowas _ad libitum_, to produce August in Newport. For my part, Miss Minerva, I like it. But it is a dizzy and perilous game. I profess to seek and enjoy emotions, so I go to watering-places. Ada Aiguille says she doesn't like it. She declares that she thinks less of her fellow-creatures after she has been here a little while. She goes to the city afterward to refit her faith, probably. Daisy Clover thinks it's heavenly. Darling little Daisy! life is an endless German cotillion to her. She thinks the world is gay but well-meaning, is sure that it goes to church on Sundays and never tells lies. Cerulea Ba.s.s looks at it for a moment with her hard, round, ebony eyes, and calmly wonders that people will make such fools of themselves. And you, Miss Minerva, pardon me,--you come because you are in the habit of coming--because you are not happy out of such society, and have a tantalizing sadness in it. Your system craves only the piquant sources of scandal and sarcasm, which can never satisfy it. You wish that you liked tranquil pleasures and believed in men and women. But you get no nearer than a wish. You remember when you did believe, but you remember with a shudder and a sigh. You pa.s.s for a brilliant woman. You go out to dinners and b.a.l.l.s; and men are, what is called, 'afraid of you.' You scorn most of us. You are not a favorite, but your pride is flattered by the very fear on the part of others which prevents your being loved. Time and yourself are your only enemies, and they are in league, for you betray yourself to him. You have found youth the most fascinating and fatal of flirts, but he, although your heart and hope clung to him despairingly, has jilted you and thrown you by. Let him go, if you can, and throw after him the white muslin and the baby-waist. Give up milk and the pastoral poets. Sail, at least, under your own colors; even pirates hoist a black flag. An old belle who endeavors to retain by sharp wit and spicy scandal the place she held only in virtue of youth and spirited beauty is, in a new circle of youth and beauty, like an enemy firing at you from the windows of your own house. The difficulty of your position, dear Miss Minerva, is, that you can never deceive those who alone are worth deceiving. Daisy Clover and Young America, of course, consider you a talented, tremendous kind of woman. Daisy Clover wonders all the men are not in love with you. Young America sniffs and shakes its little head, and says disapprovingly, 'Strong-minded woman!' But you fail, you know, notwithstanding. You couldn't bring old Potiphar to his knees when he first came home from China, and he must needs plunge in love with Miss Polly, whom you despised, but who has certainly profited by her intimacy with Mrs. Gnu, Mrs. Croesus, and Mrs. Settum Downe, as you saw by her conversation with you this evening.

"Ah, Miss Minerva, I am only a benighted diplomat from Sennaar, but when I reflect upon all I see around me in your country; when I take my place with terror in a railroad car, because the certainty of frightful accidents fills all minds with the same vague apprehensions as if a war were raging in the land; when I see the universal rush and fury--young men who never smile, and who fall victims to paralysis; old men who are tired of life and dread death; young women pretty and incapable; old women listless and useless; and both young and old, if women of sense, perishing of ennui, and longing for some kind of a career;--why, I don't say that it is better anywhere else,--perhaps it isn't,--in most ways it certainly is not. I don't say certainly, that there's a higher tone of life in London or Paris than in New York, but only that, whatever it may be there, this, at least, is rather a miserable business."

"What is your theory of life, then?" asked I. "What do you propose?"

Kurz Pacha smiled again.

{Ill.u.s.tration}

"Suppose, Miss Minerva, I say the Golden Rule is my _theory_ of life. You think it vague; but it is in that like most theories. Then I propose that we shall all be good. Don't you think it a feasible proposition? I see that you think you have effectually disposed of all complaint by challenging the complainer to suggest a remedy. But it is clear to me that a man in the water has a right to cry out, although he may not distinctly state how he proposes to avoid drowning. Your reasoning is that of those excellent Americans who declare that foreign nations ought not to strike for a republic until they are fit for a republic--as if empires and monarchies founded colleges to propagate democracy. Probably you think it wiser that men shouldn't go into the water until they can swim. Mr. Carlyle, I remember, was bitterly reproached for grumbling in his "Chartism," and other works, as if a man had no moral right to complain of hunger until he had grasped a piece of bread. 'What do you propose to do, Mr. Carlyle?'

said they, 'what with the Irish, for instance?' Mr. C. said that he would compel every Irishman to work, or he would sink the island in the sea. 'Barbarous man, this is your boasted reform!' cried they in indignant chorus, unsuited either way, and permitting the Irish to go to the dogs in the meanwhile. So suffer me, dearest Miss Minerva, to regret a state of things which no sensible man can approve. Even if it seems to you light, allow me, at least, to treat it seriously, nor suppose I love anything less, because I would see it better. You are the natural fruit of this state of things, O Minerva Tattle! By thy fruits ye shall know them."

After a few moments, he added in the old way:

"Don't think I am going to break my heart about it, nor lose my appet.i.te. Look at the absurdity of the whole thing. I am preaching to you in your baby-waist, here in a Newport ball-room at midnight. I humbly beg your pardon. There are more potent preachers here than I. Besides, I'm engaged to Mrs. Potiphar's supper at 12. Take things more gently, dear Miss Minerva. Don't make faces at Mrs. Vite, nor growl at your darling Polly. Women as smart as you are, will say precisely as smart thing of you as you say of them. We shall all laugh, first with you, and then at you. But don't deny yourself the pleasure of saying the smart things in hope that they will also refrain. That's vanity, not virtue. People are much better than you think, but they are also much worse. I might have been king of Sennaar, but I am only his amba.s.sador. You might have been only a chambermaid, but you are the brilliant and accomplished Miss Tattle. Tum, tum, tum, ti, ti, ti,--what a pretty waltz! Here come Daisy and Timon Croesus, and now Mrs. Potiphar and Gauche Boosey, and now again Caroline Pett.i.toes and De Famille. She is smiling again, you see. She darts through the dance like a sunbeam as she is. Caroline is a philosopher. Just now, you remember, it was down, down, down,--now it is up, up, up. It is a good world, if you don't rub it the wrong way. Sit in the sun as much as possible. One preserves one's complexion, but gets so cold in the shade. Ah! there comes Mrs. Potiphar. Why, she is radiant! She shakes her fan at me. Adieu, Miss Minerva. Sweet dreams. To-morrow morning at the Bowling Alley at eleven, you know, and the drive at six. _Au revoir_."