When Washington Was In Vogue

by Edward Christopher Williams

  She commenced to talk about the play at the Shubert-Belasco theater, and drawing Mrs. Morrow into the conversation, discussed the desirability of getting up a theater party for the following week. Of course that left Caroline with nothing to say, for in the nature of things, she could not be of that party. To a mere man the whole thing was an exhibition of cruelty—and shall I say cowardice—but how many nice women I have seen do things like that.

  Of course I was not going to leave any friend in such a defenseless position, so, apparently without observing what the others were talking about, I drew Caroline into a private conversation about Dr. Corey, and we left the rest to their own devices. But Miss Barton, once started, was not so easily stopped. She actually interrupted our conversation long enough to ask Caroline if she would not be one of their party at the Belasco the following week. I braced myself for the shock of the answer, but I need not have had any apprehension, for Caroline said, in the most nonchalant manner in the world, and without turning a hair, “No, thank you! I have two dances and a card party for next week, and five nights at school. That’s quite all I can manage, I guess. But there goes the music. Godfather, dear, let’s make the most of it!” And in another moment we were whirling away to the strains of “Three o’clock in the Morning.”

  The rest of the evening was uneventful. I had a nice time. Everyone was very gracious to me, and particularly my good friends. When we had our wraps on in the lower hallway, waiting to take our leave, I asked Caroline if I might see her home. She thanked me very prettily, but said she had company.

  “However,” she added, “I shall ask Will King if he will mind your coming with us, for I think you need someone to look after you, Godfather!”

  And she looked at me as saucily as the proverbial jaybird.

  So I walked home by myself, and mused more or less idly on the eccentricities of women. As Caroline’s friend Dr. King has a car, they beat me by a few minutes, and he was just driving off as I reached the house. I found Caroline warming herself— the night was quite bleak—before the remains of a grate fire in the back parlor. She removed her coat from the place beside her and made room for me. I thanked her, but declined the proffered seat, on the grounds that it was late, and I had better turn in.

  “You know you don’t go to sleep after a dance, and you know you are going to read some of your old books. You are not a good liar, Godfather!” She motioned me again to the seat beside her and I capitulated, after handing her, at her request, the last big box of bonbons recovered from Dr. Corey.

  It was two o’clock and the house was strangely still. Caroline held out the open box to me, and, after I had taken a piece, she selected one and commenced to nibble at it daintily. I sat back in the extreme corner of the davenport, and half-turned so that I could look at her. I don’t believe I ever realized what a beautiful girl she is. It’s queer how things strike one sometimes all in a heap, and produce a sensation which must be akin to that of a blind man suddenly endowed with sight. From the top of her shapely little head to the soles of her incomparably pretty feet, she had all the unmistakable bodily marks of aristocracy. Of course, we know that the best, as well as the worst, blood of the South, from the Lees, Washingtons, Pages, and Randolphs of Virginia, to the Simon Legrees of the Red River cotton country, flows in our veins. Surely no one who has noted carefully the types of manly and womanly beauty in our race group can doubt it for a moment. Nor were all the slaves brought from that terrible West Coast hewers of wood and drawers of water, but there were captive kings and chiefs and great warriors as well. As I watched the play of the firelight on the lovely girl at the other end of the big davenport, I could not help realizing that here was no descendant of a peasant people. Anyone with half an eye could discern race in every line of her face and figure. That clean-cut profile, with the masterful curve of that firm little chin, surely came from forebears out of a ruling class. Those slim but shapely fingers, and those dainty, high-arched feet, were not a heritage from ancestors who worked with their hands or walked barefoot over ploughed fields. In the yellow light of the fire, she might well be the proud lady of the “big house.” Only the dusky velvet of her skin and the warm richness of her pomegranate mouth, which to a discerning eye was the final and crowning touch of beauty, betrayed the presence of the more ardent blood of the tropics.

  Suddenly, she looked up, and caught me fairly in the very act of regarding her dreamily. Did she blush, or was it only the warm firelight playing over her cheek?

  “Whatever are you staring at, Godfather? Is there anything wrong with me?”

  “Not one blessed thing, dear lady,” I said. “I was just noting how many and how great are your physical perfections.”

  “Mercy on us, will you listen to the man rave! What was it, think you, the salad? Or was there too big a stick in the punch? Or could it be the candy? Have another piece!”

  And she held it so that I should either have to stretch the length of the davenport to reach it, or move nearer. I half arose from my place, reached over for the box, and resumed my former seat. When I had selected what I wanted, I placed the box midway between us. She looked at me quickly and gave a queer little laugh. Then I asked her when Dr. Corey was coming back, and she said either Thursday or Friday.

  “Are you going to accept him?” I asked.

  “What do you think I ought to do?” she queried, looking at me again rather intently.

  “I don’t believe a third person can answer a question like that,” I countered cautiously.

  “Do you think he is too old for me?”

  “Of course I do. But if you love him better than anyone else in the world, other considerations might not matter. In fact, in my humble opinion, your feeling toward him is about the only thing that does matter.”

  She was silent for a moment, and then heaved a deep sigh.

  “Nobody wants to be just friends—except you, Godfather— and it’s a dreadful nuisance!”

  Then she arose slowly, smothering a yawn with her hand.

  “It’s fearfully late, and I have to teach tomorrow. I’ll be a wrinkled old woman before I am thirty if I keep this up.”

  She picked up her coat and the box of candy, and came over close to me, enveloping me in the delicate aura of that exquisite perfume which seems to be part and parcel of her.

  “What is that wonderful sachet of yours called?” I asked, for the want of anything better to say.

  “Fleurs d’Amour,” she answered, looking at me with a bewitching smile.

  “Fleurs d’Amour!” I repeated the words after her, and to avoid looking at her, looked into the fire. She stood a moment, gazing down at me, and then turned with a low, “Good night, Godfather!” and went up to her room.

  I sat for a long time staring into the fire, and I must have fallen asleep, for the embers in the hearth were dying fast when I realized where I was again.

  Fleurs d’Amour—what a name, what an inspired name!

  I hope no one in the house knows at what an unholy hour I turned in.

  Dr. Corey came back Friday, and I gather that he must have received his dismissal. Happily, I did not see him while he was here. I was glad of that, for it would have pained me to see him suffer. But it seems in Caroline’s “affaires du coeur,” it is merely a case of “Le roi est mort, vive le roi!” She has been escorted somewhere practically every night for a week by this good-looking Dr. King, who, according to Tommie, is a former favorite of hers, in her high school days. His father is a very prominent man down home, and the son, who has recently graduated in medicine, has just opened up his office here, after a few months looking over the ground in other places. It’s a nice thing to have a wealthy father! The boy has a perfectly appointed office, they say, and a beautiful new car, a Cole Eight. If he does not succeed, it won’t be the fault of the old man. But they say the youngster is smart as fresh paint. He certainly looks it. He is a tall, well-built chap, with a ruddy brown complexion, a good face, and most engaging manners. Like numerous
other folks in this town, he is “dippy” about Caroline.

  They talk hereabouts of the paucity of men, and the methods to which the girls have to resort to keep a “steady,” but these observations do not, it seems, apply to Caroline Rhodes. I heard one of the young women commenting on her the other night. “Just to think,” she exclaimed, “of a girl having three doctors as suitors at one and the same time! It’s outrageous! There should be a law against it!”

  But I must close this long letter. It is nice to think that it won’t be long before I see you, Bob. Tell Marcia I am sorry she does not like this town enough to drop in now and then. I am so glad you like the Cole girls. I thought you would. Let me know as soon as possible just when you will come.

  The sample chapter and your observations thereon reached me yesterday, and you may be sure I have read very carefully all you say, and, indeed, more than once. On the purely literary side, I have always rated your taste above mine, so I am pleased accordingly that you are reasonably well satisfied with what I have done. If it really commends itself to you, I shall have no need to offer apologies for it. As concerns the general plan, I am not sure that I agree with your views as to the proper points to stress. I think that my original idea is best—to feature the Middle Passage and the slave station of Da Souza at Whydah. However, as I work up the material, I can tell more precisely just what points will lend themselves best to elaboration. In such matters I suppose the feeling of the writer must have some weight, for he is more than likely to do best what he best enjoys doing. That seems reasonable, don’t you think so?

  Davy

  EIGHT

  La donna e mobile! As others see us.

  Fair Lillian and the clever Caroline. Americans

  all—one hundred percent.

  Sunday, December 17

  Dear Bob:

  It is a cheering thought to know that within a week you will be here. While it looks now as if I shall not carry out my original plans exactly as I had hoped, still I am sure I shall be able to show you a good time. Once more it is borne in upon me that woman is an uncertain creature. And is it a compliment to man, noble man, to have to add that that is probably the secret of the fascination which she exerts over us? We had a lively discussion one evening last week as to the relative uncertainty of the two sexes, young Dr. King and I proposing the thesis that women are inordinately changeable and inconsistent, while Thomasine and Caroline stoutly defended their sex.

  The handsome doctor is here now practically every evening after his office hours, and his big car stands so often and so long in front of our house that Helen Clay pretended to believe that he had an office here. He is about as pertinacious a wooer as Dr. Corey, and he has, apparently, no handicaps to overcome, as had that hard-hit gentleman. Tommie says King fell in love with Caroline the first time he saw her some six or seven years ago, when he first came to Washington to enter school, and that he has been faithful ever since. It is difficult to say exactly how Caroline regards him, though she is evidently fond of him. He is a real gentleman, and one could hardly help liking him.

  On the particular evening in question, we four had a lively time. For some reason the whim seized the doctor to sing. He has a light tenor voice, not unpleasing, and he sang several recent hits fairly well, with Caroline accompanying him on the piano. While I have sung two or three times at the Bartons’, Hales’, and Wallaces’, I have never had occasion to do so elsewhere, and so neither Caroline nor Tommie knew that I made any pretensions in a musical way. King seemed to be holding the center of the stage so completely that I got impatient after a bit, and in a momentary lull in the concert I seated myself at the piano and began on my repertory. It did not take me many minutes to put the genial doctor out of the running completely. But I must admit that he is a real sport, a thoroughbred and “dead game.” If he felt a bit sore at me for taking the spotlight from him, he did not show it, for he was quite generous and apparently as sincere in his applause as were the others. Tommie and Caroline were very much surprised.

  “To think, Mr. Carr, that you have never let us know until now that you had such a voice. Is it selfishness, excessive modesty, or just natural secretiveness?” asked Tommie.

  “Tommie, dear, what have I always told you about Godfather? He is, as I verily believe, a perfect monument of duplicity,” was Caroline’s rejoinder.

  As I look back over what I have written, I note that I started this letter with the observation that it looked as if I might not be able to carry out my holiday plans as originally conceived and that la donna e mobile! This latter reflection is apropos of the very erratic conduct of Caroline Rhodes. What has gotten into her lately, I cannot for the life of me determine. The word “erratic” as used in this paragraph is absolutely in place— absolutely. You crave details, I suppose. They are easy to supply, so I append a few.

  First of all, Caroline has stopped smoking, mirabile dictu! I discovered this first in this wise. There was a committee meeting of some woman’s organization or other at Lillian Barton’s the other night, and Don Verney and I, intent upon paying a call, happened in on the fag end of it about eight-thirty. As we went in, two or three of the ladies were standing in the hallway exchanging a few parting words with Miss Barton. When we entered the parlor, there sat Caroline and Sophie Burt, almost the two sauciest women in the District of Columbia, so we had a lively few minutes until Lillian came in after having taken leave of the others. She passed around the cigarettes, and you can imagine the shock when Caroline was the only one who reneged. I have a notion that my surprise was evident, for it seemed to me that for all she is so rosy under her dusky skin, her color heightened visibly when her eye caught mine.

  “I’m off smoking,” she said simply.

  “What ails you, Caroline? Has your doctor given you orders?” asked Sophie Burt, a trifle maliciously, knowing full well that the double meaning of the word “doctor” would not be lost on a single person present.

  “No,” answered Caroline coolly. “I’m just off, that’s all. I never cared much for it anyway, you know.”

  The subject was dropped, ostensibly, but I can answer for myself that I, at least, pondered over it for quite a few minutes.

  Secondly, Caroline no longer believes in young ladies indulging in alcoholic beverages. It was by pure accident that I discovered this. We were at one of the club dances at Sophie Burt’s, and Will Burt had concocted a punch which had a kick like an old Springfield rifle. Several of the men, of course, sampled it freely, and while many of the ladies were wary, knowing Burt’s proneness to make the “stick” very large, a few of them seemed to find the punch bowl rather alluring. Two of the very young girls present were offered glasses by their escorts. Caroline was standing near, and protested.

  “Put that glass down, Madeleine!” she said to the youngest Clements girl, a cute little bob-haired flyaway who is just beginning to go to grown-up-parties. “You’re silly enough now, Heaven knows! Bobby, what do you mean by giving her that stuff? You ought to know better!”

  While Bobby laughed and emptied the glass himself, Miss Rhodes proceeded to give the two “debs” a lecture which would have done credit to Genevieve. I could only look on with amazement.

  Last of all, Caroline has developed a temper. The temper itself, to be sure, is nothing new, but it is the constant showing of it to me that strikes me as queer. The little lady has suddenly become very sensitive, and seems to take special delight in using me as the shock absorber, or whatever else one might like to call it.

  So I say again, women are most uncertain creatures. It is impossible to place them with any certainty. What this capriciousness and inconsistency mean, in Caroline’s case, I have no very definite notion. Is she trying to impress young Dr. King? I wonder. At any rate, it is a fact that he is the only new personality which has come into her circle within the past month. It is certainly a case of post hoc. Is it a case of propter hoc as well? When you come this way, you can judge for yourself.

  For two or three
of the holiday parties, I have been lucky enough to secure as our company Thomasine Dawson and Lillian Barton. In the case of the former, I forestalled my friend Scott Green, who has the disadvantage of living in Baltimore. In the case of the latter, also luck was with us, for Reese is going to be away on business in the far South during practically the whole of Christmas week. Mary Hale told me that two weeks ago. It is through her kindness, too, that I got an invitation for you for the Benedicts’ ball, so you must be nice to her. I imagine, somehow, that you won’t find that duty a very irksome one. Caroline and Tommie, too, have done their share in helping me get our social calendar filled up properly. I am sorry I could not get Caroline’s company for at least one of the parties, but Dr. King is the most forehanded man I know. He takes nothing for granted, and he is the real early bird. However, I am sure you will find opportunities enough to see Miss Rhodes, or any other of my friends, for they will be, all of them, at the same affairs. So that leaves it up to you, young man, to get busy. But I warn you beforehand that you will have to move fast, and keep moving if you want to avoid being snowed under in this burg. This is just a word to the wise, as Mary Hale said to me when she told me about Reese’s trip South.