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VIII
She was lying on the bed when a relay of servants staggered in bearinggaudy piles of the most recent and popular novels, and placed them intottering profusion upon the adjacent furniture.
The Lady Alene turned her head where it lay lazily pillowed on her leftarm, and glanced indifferently at the multi-coloured battlement ofbooks. The majority of the covers were embellished with the heads ofyoung women, all endowed with vaudeville-like beauty--it having beendiscovered by intelligent publishers that a girl's head on any booksells it.
On some covers were displayed coloured pictures of handsome and athleticAmerican young men, usually kissing beautiful young ladies who worecrowns, ermines, and foreign orders over dinner dresses. Sometimes,however, they were kicking Kings. That seemed rather odd to the LadyAlene, and she sat up on the bed and reached out her hand. Itencountered a book on which rested a small, oblong package. She tookbook and package. On the pink wrapper of the latter she read this verse:
Why are my teeth so white and bright? Because I chew with all my might The gum that fills me with delight And keeps me healthy day and night. Five cents.
The Lady Alene's unaccustomed fingers became occupied with the pinkwrapper. Presently she withdrew from it a thin and brittle object,examined it, and gravely placed it in her mouth.
For a while the perplexed and apprehensive expression remained upon herface, but it faded gradually, and after a few minutes her lovelyfeatures settled into an expression resembling contentment. And,delicately, discreetly, at leisurely intervals, her fresh, sweet lipsmoved as though she were murmuring a prayer.
All that afternoon she perused the first American novel she had everread. And the cumulative effect of the fiction upon her literal mind wasamazing as she turned page after page, and, gradually gathering mentaland nervous speed, dashed from one chapter, bang! into another, only tobe occultly adjured to "take the car ahead"--which she now did quitenaturally, and on the run.
Never, never had she imagined such things could be! Always heretofore,to her, fiction had been a strict reflection of actuality in which adull imagination was licensed to walk about if it kept off the grass.And it always did in the only novels to which she had been accustomed.
But good heavens! Here was a realism at work in these pages soastonishing yet so convincing, so subtle yet so natural, so matter offact yet so astoundingly new to her that the book she was reading wasalready changing the entire complexion of the Yankee continent for her.
It had to do with a young, penniless, and athletic American who went toEurope, tipped a king off his throne, pushed a few dukes, counts, andbarons out of the way, reorganized the army, and went home taking withhim a beautiful and exclusive princess with honest intentions.
The inhabitants of several villages wept at his departure; the abashednobility made unsuccessful attempts to shoot him; otherwise the trip tothe Cunard Line pier was uneventful, and diplomatic circles paid noattention to the incident.
When the Lady Alene finished the story her oval face ached; but this wasno time to consider aches. So with a charming abandon she relieved herpretty teeth of the morceau, replaced it with another, helped herself toa second novel, settled back on her pillow, and opened the enchantedpages.
And zip! Instantly she became acquainted with another athletic andpenniless American who was raising the devil in the Balkans.
Never in her life had she dreamed that any nation contained suchfearless, fascinating, resourceful, epigrammatic, and desirable youngmen! And here she was in the very midst of them, and never had realisedit until now.
Where were they? All around her, no doubt. When, a few days later, shehad read some baker's dozen novels, and in each one of them haddiscovered similar athletic, penniless, and omniscient American youngmen, her opinion was confirmed, and she could no longer doubt that, likethe fiction of her own country, the romances of American novelists musthave a substantial foundation in solid fact.
There could be no use in quibbling. The situation had become exciting.Her youthful imagination was now fired; her Saxon blood thoroughlystirred. She knew perfectly well that there were in her own country noyoung men like these she had read about--not a man-jack among them whowould ever dream of dashing about the world cuffing the ears ofreprehensible monarchs, meting out condign punishment to refractorynobility, reconstructing governments and states and armies, and escapingwith a princess every time.
Not that she actually believed that such episodes were of commonoccurrence. Young as she was she knew better. But somehow it seemed veryclear to her that a race of writers who were so unanimous on the subjectand a nation which so complacently read of these events without denyingtheir plausibility, must within itself harbour germs and seeds ofromance and reckless deeds which no doubt had produced a number of youngmen thoroughly capable of doing a few of the exciting things she hadread about.
Now she regretted she had not noticed the men she had met; now she wasindeed sorry she had not at least taken pains to learn to distinguishthem one from the other. She wished that she had investigated thisreckless, chivalrous, energetic, and distinguishing trait of theAmerican young man.
It seemed odd, too, that Pa-_pa_ had never investigated it; thatMa-_ma_ had never appeared to notice it.
She mentioned it at dinner carelessly, in the midst of a natural andBritish silence. Neither parent enlightened her. One said, "Fancy!" Andthe other said, "Ow."
And so, as both parents departed the following morning to investigatethe tarpon fishing at Miami, the little Lady Alene made privatepreparations to investigate and closely observe the astonishing,reckless, and romantic tendencies of the American young man. Her tour ofdiscovery she scheduled for five o'clock that afternoon.
Just how these investigations were to be accomplished she did not seevery clearly. She had carefully refrained from knowing anybody in thehotel. So how to go about it she did not know; but she knew enough afterluncheon to have her hair done by somebody besides her maid, selectedthe most American gown in her repertoire, took a sunshade hithertodisdained, and glanced in the mirror at a picture in white, with goldhair, violet eyes, and a skin of snow and roses.
Further she did not know how to equip herself, except by going out doorsat five o'clock. And at five o'clock she went.
From the tennis courts young men and girls looked at her. On the golflinks youth turned to observe her slim and dainty progress. She wasstared at from porch and veranda, from dock and deck, from garden andwalk and orange grove and hedge of scarlet hibiscus.
From every shop window in the village, folk looked out at her; fromautomobile, wheeled chair, bicycle, and horse-drawn vehicle she wasinspected. But she knew nobody; not one bright nod greeted her; not onestraw hat was lifted; not one nigger grinned. She knew nobody. And,alas! everybody knew her. A cold wave seemed to have settled overVerbena Inlet.
Yet her father was not unpopular, nor was her mother either; andalthough they asked too many questions, their perfectly impersonal andscientific mission in Verbena Inlet was understood.
But the Lady Alene Innesly was not understood, although her indifferencewas noted and her exclusiveness amusedly resented. However, nobodyinterfered with her or her seclusion. The fact that she desired to knownobody had been very quickly accepted. Youth and the world at VerbenaInlet went on without her; the sun continued to rise and set as usual;and the nigger waiters played baseball.
She stood watching them now for a few minutes, her parasol tilted overher lovely shoulders. Tiring of this, she sauntered on, having not theslightest idea where she was going, but very calmly she made up her mindto speak to the first agreeable looking young man she encountered, asnone of them seemed at all inclined to speak to her.
Under her arm she had tucked a novel written by one Smith. She had readit half through. The story concerned a young and athletic and pennilessman from Michigan and a Balkan Princess. She had read as far as thefirst love scene. The young man from Michigan was still kissing thePrincess when she lef
t off reading. And her imagination was still onfire.
She had wandered down to the lagoon without finding anybody sufficientlyattractive to speak to. The water was blue and pretty and very inviting.So she hired a motor-boat, seated herself in the stern, and dabbled herfingers in the water as the engineer took her whizzing across the lagoonand out into the azure waste, headed straight for the distant silveryinlet.