When Washington Was In Vogue

by Edward Christopher Williams

  To say that I was stunned by this note is to put it mildly, very mildly indeed. It was like a slap in the face. I had been hoping all along that Caroline’s attitude, so unnatural and so unlike her, would change, so to speak, overnight. This note bordered on discourtesy, to use no stronger word. What am I to infer from the dash inserted between the words “obligation to” and “anyone”? What, except that she meant to write “you,” and it sounded so insulting that she decided to substitute “anyone,” but wanted me without fail to realize that it was only a substitution for politeness’s sake. Under the existing circumstances there can be nothing between us but the fondest formalities of speech. It is embarrassing to be in her company, for, knowing we have been such good and familiar friends, everyone notices the change. Already several people have asked me what is the matter between us, and I have lied most glibly about it. Strange to say, neither Tommie, nor Mary Hale, nor Don Verney have said a word to show that they have noticed anything, but each one of the three has looked volumes. Tommie looks really puzzled. I would give my head almost to know what Caroline has said to her. However, as I have remarked before on the same subject, there is absolutely no forecasting with any accuracy just what Miss Caroline Rhodes will or will not do. She is no conventional doll baby, who cries or shuts her eyes on someone else’s motion. She has a mind of her own, originality, and courage. I don’t know anyone who could better carry out a fixed purpose, and keep her own counsel while doing it. This is not the first time in our acquaintance that I have felt this about her. Indeed, she is a type of whom Jane Austen never dreamed, for all her dainty feminine beauty. All of which only makes me feel just that much more certain that she is the one woman in the world for me. What I shall do without her, it frightens me to think.

  Thursday

  My boxes are filled, nailed up, and duly marked, and my trunk practically packed. I have decided to stay over for the party given by Les Oiseaux tomorrow night. As it bids fair to be the smartest affair of the year, everyone says I should not miss it, so I shall wind up my Washington sojourn in a blaze of glory, and pull out Saturday morning, early. As I want to examine certain records in the State Library at Richmond, I have bought my ticket for that place and will go through from there to Columbia, taking only hand baggage, and having my trunk expressed from here after I have decided what I shall do. I am restless as a lost soul. The big white bears in the zoo have nothing on me, Bob. I seem to be spending most of my hours marking time. At this moment I should pick up my bag and go, if it were not that I have to be Thomasine’s escort to the party. I have regretted a hundred times today that I decided to stay over. I suppose that, away in the back of my consciousness, there is a glimmering hope that some miracle may happen. As things look now nothing short of a miracle would be of any service to me, for I have about come to the conclusion, reluctantly, that whether or not Caroline despises me, at any rate, she does not love me.

  Don Verney is a queer chap. He knows there is something wrong, but, for all we are together quite often and are such good friends, he has never said a word. I have taken one or two walks with him lately, and he has spent most of the time smoking, with an occasional quick side glance at me, and now and then a queer throaty noise like a grunt. Yesterday I was in his room, waiting while he dressed to go to a Valentine dinner at the Dills’. He was all ready to go, with hat and topcoat on, when he stopped me at the door while he looked up a passage in the Bible, which it seemed would not wait. As Don does queer little things like that, I only smoked my cigarette and waited patiently. He found the place he wanted and read it attentively, puffing his cigarette violently and giving his characteristic little grunting sound. He was making a mark in the margin of the book when the telephone rang, and while he answered it, I strolled over to the table to see what it was in the Bible which could so interest him. It was open at the thirty-second chapter of Genesis, and there was a pencil mark opposite the last line of the twenty-sixth verse, which reads: “I will not let thee go except thou bless me!” Then I strolled back to the door and waited.

  In a moment Don hung up the receiver, and we went out together. He said not a word as we walked along. As we turned into the walk leading up to Dr. Dill’s door, he spoke suddenly.

  “Jacob was a most interesting character. He was the first ‘go-getter.’ He must have been an American. He was ‘strong even against God.’ No one beat him without a real fight. I like him.”

  Friday evening

  Well, there is nothing more for me to do in this town, except escort Thomasine to Les Oiseaux. Under normal circumstances I should look forward to it with such pleasure, but I assure you that under existing conditions it is sheer misery—at any rate, in anticipation. I don’t know whether or not I have done the wise thing, but I have not told a soul that I am actually going tomorrow morning. Most of my friends think that I shall go in a few days. On Wednesday, the Morrows invited me to dinner for Sunday, but I begged off on some pretext or other, and said nothing about leaving before that date. So they said they would see me at Lillian Barton’s Sunday evening, and I let it go at that. I dislike good-byes intensely anyway, and in the present state of my feelings, they would be nothing but torture to me. How I am going to leave without saying good-bye to Caroline, I have not yet figured out. But the bare thought of a cold look such as she has given me more than once in these latter days is more than I can endure. So I think I shall go without saying anything, and then write her what I have to say. I am counting on seeing Mrs. Rhodes and Genevieve in the morning. They will be early astir, since it is Saturday, and Caroline will be sleeping late, after the party. As for Tommie, I have made up my mind to tell her, and put her on oath not to divulge my secret. If she says she won’t tell, she won’t.

  As I write, Tommie has just come in. I can hear her voice from below stairs. She promised to come and give Caroline the “once-over” in her new party gown. I know there are going to be some beautifully dressed women there tonight. I wish you might be here, for more than one reason.

  Tommie interrupted me just as I finished the preceding sentence, to say that she would be ready to go in a half hour, and that Caroline is going to be the belle of the ball, unless, to use Tommie’s own words, “the men are stone blind.” Then, when I said I was writing to you, she added, “Give all my love to Bob, and tell him I am going to miss him a whole lot tonight.” She started to leave the room, then stopped suddenly, and came over to me, and sat on the arm of my big chair, just as Caroline used to do. She put her right arm over my shoulder and with her left hand tilted up my chin and looked me hard in the eyes. It took all my willpower to return her gaze without flinching.

  “What’s the matter, Davy dear? Something has been worrying you for days, and it is beginning to worry me, too. Can’t you tell me?”

  I had a dreadful temptation to tell her everything. But that innate quality of stubbornness, which seems a permanent attribute of the Carr family, whispered to me to hold on a while longer. So I forced a smile, and shook my head.

  “Not even me, Davy?”

  When Tommie said that, I almost succumbed, for she so seldom uses the power of her personal charm that when she does, the effect is well nigh irresistible.

  “No, Tommie, not even you, and when I say that, I am saying about all there is to be said. But it is sweet in you to be interested, and to ask.”

  “It is nothing more than natural. I am very fond of you, Davy—for three reasons.”

  “Thanks! Three is a lot, Tommie! Name the first one.”

  “You!” she responded, smiling. I sketched a bow as gracefully as I could from a sitting posture.

  “Thank you kindly, dear lady! Name the second.”

  “Bob Fletcher.”

  “The third.”

  Tommie smiled and shook her head. “I can’t tell you that,” she said. Nor could I budge her from her determination. She sat for a moment looking at me, with her pretty forehead in a pucker. Then she ran her fingers caressingly through my hair.

  �
��Davy, Bob says you beat the original army mule for stubbornness, and sometimes I think he is right. What a hard, unyielding jaw you have, my friend.” And as she spoke, she rapped playfully with her velvety little fist on what Dr. Morrow would call my inferior maxillary, and leaving her perch on the arm of my chair, hastened downstairs to Caroline.

  So Caroline is to be the belle of the ball. God knows I know that without being told, and I might be happier tonight if I were stone blind. For it’s going to be torture to see her swinging on another man’s arm, and dancing with other men, and receiving their admiring glances, and laughing at their flattering speeches, while I have to sit like an owl—it was an owl, was it not, to which she compared me?—and eat my heart out without even one of the easy smiles she lavishes upon all comers! Feel sorry for me, Bob! I feel sorry for myself!

  I am going to smoke now until Tommie calls me. I would give half of my kingdom for a drink, but I have a particular dislike for a man who drinks before going to a dance with nice women, so I shall have to buck up without using any stimulant. Thank goodness, in a few hours it will be over! After that—quien sabe, amigo? I feel, somehow, like a man with his foot on the lower step of the gallows, or like the gladiators entering the arena and saluting the emperor: “Nos morituri vos salutamus!” It is nine forty-five, and Tommie will be calling me in a few minutes, I know. So I shall stop here.

  I had planned to hold this letter open until I return from the party, but on second thought I guess I shall close it now, and mail it to you as I go out, so that it will reach you tomorrow. If there is anything of particular interest to add, I shall send you a few lines by special delivery in the morning.

  Wish me good luck, Old Pal! The zero hour held nothing compared to my feelings as I write these lines. I can easily imagine the sensations of a poor devil when the sheriff, accompanied by the gallows party, comes to read the death warrant. Well, you see I can joke, anyway. So here goes with a smile!

  Your unfortunate friend,

  Davy

  FIFTEEN

  All’s well that ends well.

  An extract from Davy’s private diary.

  Feb. 16-17 (Friday and Saturday)

  I am too excited and elated to sleep, and nothing seems more reasonable than for me to put down a detailed statement of the events leading up to the happiest hour of my life. I sincerely doubt if I shall ever experience a happier one. Indeed, if I thought I might, I should be almost afraid to face it, for I honestly believe that I have been through moments since leaving the party shortly after one o’clock this morning when the slightest acceleration of my pulse beat would have resulted fatally. No one can make me believe, henceforth, that a human being cannot die of joy. The shock caused by my sudden rebound from the misery and unhappiness of these latter days was terrific, and I still feel the strain.

  It is now nearly five o’clock Saturday morning, and all the world, except the milkman, is asleep. After I left Caroline at her door an hour and a half ago, I lay down and tried to sleep, but I just could not make it, for my brain was whirling like a merry-go-round.

  Yesterday, Friday, I believe I touched the lowest depths of misery possible for a human creature. Most of the day was spent putting the final touches on my boxes and trunk, returning books to the Library of Congress, buying my ticket for Richmond, and doing errands preparatory to my departure this morning. How I got through the afternoon I really don’t know, for it all seems now like a horrible dream, or like something which happened to me in another world, or a thousand years ago. After a dinner at which I went through the mechanical processes of eating, I came home, and kept myself from going mad by finishing a letter to Bob, though I have not the slightest idea now what I said in that letter. While I was writing I could hear Caroline whistling and singing in her room. This is a practice in which she has indulged a great deal in the last two or three days, and for some reason, the exact nature of which is not clear to me even yet, this seemed to add a touch to my madness. Once I got up and shut my door. Then I got up again and opened it. As to a man with a toothache, one situation was about as uncomfortable as another.

  While I was writing Tommie came up to say that she would be ready to go at ten o’clock. Tommie knew that I was unhappy about something, and she tried to pump me, even going so far as to sit on the arm of my chair and run her fingers through my hair, something the like of which she has never done before. “I surely must look badly,” I thought. When she had gone I took a peep in my shaving glass, and sure enough, I looked like an extra edition of the morning after the night before. I finished, sealed and stamped Bob’s letter, which I decided to mail last night instead of this morning as I had first planned. Then I smoked cigarettes until I felt dopey, and idly tried to recall the author of the The Last Day of a Condemned Man, a book I have not read. Finally, it came to me that it was Hugo, and I resolved at the earliest moment possible to get a copy, and see how accurately he had done the job. Then Tommie called me. I had wanted to take a taxi, but Dr. King had invited us to go in his car, and Tommie insisted that we accept his invitation. So I picked up my wraps and went down to the back parlor where I found Dr. King. Even absorbed as I was with my own troubles, I was struck by his evident preoccupation, for he is usually very cordial to me. But on this occasion he spoke rather absentmindedly, and sat looking into the fire, puffing slowly at a cigarette. As the girls came down in a moment, I had no time to notice him further. Thomasine was beautiful, as she always is, for with her handsome face, perfect figure, and her exquisite taste in dress, the result is a foregone conclusion. But Caroline—I have no words to describe her! I have seen her many times when her beauty was almost overpowering, but on this night of all nights in the world—whether or not it was due partly to my own overwrought nerves, I cannot say—the shock of her beauty was like a blow in the face. Her color was unusually high, even making allowance for the rouge, her eyes were big and brilliant, and from her becoming coiffure to the soles of her little slippers she was perfect, in face, figure, coloring, and dress. I have never in my life seen anything so lovely—never! And my lover’s estimate is approved by the verdict of the other men at the party, as appeared later. As far as I was concerned, indeed, the impression she made on me was so overwhelming that after that first glance, I would not look at her again. Dr. King jumped up when the ladies entered, and said something or other complimentary, but, as far as any outward expression was concerned, I might have been the proverbial “bump on a log.” As I am usually ready enough with the small change of social conversation, the girls seemed to notice it, but I was in such a state of dejection that I did not care about anything. This last evidence of the exquisite beauty and consequent desirability of the one woman seemed to finish me.

  With all her social experience, Tommie is not a bit good at pretending, especially when she is with her close friends. Dr. King seemed to be in a semi-comatose state, and Caroline’s mood, though quite evidently not a normal one, was beyond my power of diagnosis. It was a silent party that climbed into Dr. King’s car. One might have thought we were going to the funeral of a dear friend. Certainly no one would have guessed we were on our way to what promised to be the most elaborate party of the season. Dr. King had some trouble with his ignition, which delayed us a moment. Then we got under way, but stopped for a second at the corner while I mailed my letter to Bob. Caroline has a peculiar wit, which would assert itself, I verily believe, in the very face of death. We were proceeding more slowly than usual, because of a momentary obstruction to traffic, and in the midst of an unbroken silence, when Caroline piped up.

  “Just when do they spring the trap?” she asked, in the driest voice imaginable.

  Dr. King started and almost lost control of the car, and Tommie laughed. But for once my sense of humor had deserted me entirely. On the whole the sally fell rather flat, and we entered the hall as silently as we had left the house. While we were waiting at the door of our dressing room for the ladies, Dr. King again relapsed into his state of semi-coma, and as
I was not in a loquacious mood, we stood side by side, each thinking his own thoughts. Mine, I can testify, were not the best of company.

  Our entrance into the dance hall, between two dances, was made with all the eclat which anyone could desire. The men flocked about the two girls, and Caroline was swallowed up, so to speak, in the crowd of her admirers. One young chap who is a newcomer, I believe, exclaimed to a couple of his friends, “That little Rhodes girl is the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen on two feet!” Don pushed his way out of the throng and came toward me.

  “Hello, Davy,” he said. “You asked me once if I thought Caroline Rhodes could be called beautiful. I believe I hesitated somewhat over my answer. I was wrong to hesitate.”

  “I knew it at the time,” I said, laughing. Then I realized my duty toward my twelve hostesses, and hastened to pay my respects as best I could between dances, for the formal receiving line had been broken. I danced with Tommie, Lillian Barton, Mary Hale, Billie Riddick, Sophie Burt, and I should have had a delightful time if I had not been so miserable. The hall itself was beautiful. The floral decorations were lavish and in good taste, and from the center of the ceiling was a huge birdcage containing birds of various colors. The favors of the ladies were unique —winged silver crowns, and altogether the affair was an unusually brilliant one. I regret now that my state of mind was such that much of the charm of this most auspicious occasion was lost on me. I heard Don say that it was one of the prettiest parties he had ever attended, and I am willing to take his judgment on it.

  As Tommie predicted, even in that crowd of handsome women, Caroline was the acknowledged belle. Her every movement between dances was followed by a host of young men. As I was taking no more chances on being rebuffed, her popularity was the source of no inconvenience to me, but Dr. King seemed to be having his troubles. As on other occasions in recent weeks, there were strong undercurrents moving below the surface of things. Lillian Barton, queenly in a gown of black velvet, was quiet, for her, and as I was winning no medals for airy persiflage, our first dance was rather tame—for us. Tommie, too, was very serious in her manner. Not content to let well enough alone, as I should by all means have done, I had to stir up things by a question.