Collected Works of Booth Tarkington

by Booth Tarkington

  Arturo’s colour had heightened; but now he looked a little mystified: “You didn’t say if you would teach me.”

  She laughed gayly. “Oh, that! How to make people in this country understand not to take politics passionately? Well, I have an uncle at home that tried to be a senator, and he gave a dinner to the man that beat him — they said it was the funniest dinner ever given. Shall I ask Baron Bastoni to give you a dinner, Arturo? Do let me! We’d get that nice Mr. Rennie to be the toastmaster. He’s so benevolent and witty—”

  She went on chattering while Arturo, who had risen when she did, stood looking at her helplessly and rather plaintively. Within her, she was a little derisive of his dejection. “He’s really quite beautiful,” she thought; “but he does look almost foolish just now — wanting to go on with it and not knowing how to make me! But that other man—” As she stood with her back to the railing, the tail of her eye was taking ardent note of this magnetic other; and suddenly she decided upon a decisive step forward with him. Seeming to perceive for the first time the presence of Mr. Eugene Rennie, she gave him a surprised, sunny little nod; then let her kindled eyes rest for a slow moment upon the man in the long chair. She meant to exchange a first direct look with him — a look permitting him to guess that she hadn’t minded his changing his table in the refectory — but Orbison chose this most special of moments to light a cigarette and he was entirely preoccupied in that worthless action.

  “Good gracious!” Claire thought emotionally, “Just how slow are you intending to be? I’m not going to stay in Raona all my life! Aren’t you ever going to do anything about it?”

  X

  HER INDIGNATION WAS not lessened as days continued to pass and Mr. Charles Orbison still did nothing about it. Their first words and even their first glance remained yet to be exchanged, and under this strange provocation, Claire’s imagination began to be seriously affected. At night she dreamed of him; by day she found herself thinking of him almost unremittently; and presently she realized that she had never before been so continually conscious of any man. She had fantastic thoughts about him; but she had no fear that she was fantastic in her conviction that he, on his part, was still continually observant of her.

  Yet this perfectly sound conviction itself increased her fantasies: “Why don’t you let me alone?” she said to him, during one of the imaginary conversations she frequently had with him. “I could have a much better time in all this gorgeousness of Raona if you’d just let me alone. The trouble is I can’t quit thinking about you until you quit thinking about me! Don’t you see the thing is going too far?” And, indeed, by this time, she suspected that if the Englishman sat upon the bench with her and Arturo Liana looked on from a distance, she might be, for almost the first time in her life, more interested in the man at her side.

  In her musings upon his unexampled behaviour, she sometimes murmured her thoughts, or even spoke them aloud; and thus, one afternoon, as she sat with her mother in the ancient cell that had been made into a small salon for them, she said dreamily, “Why doesn’t he have Mr. Rennie ask us?”

  Mrs. Ambler looked up from her embroidery in surprise. “Why doesn’t who have Mr. Rennie ask us what?”

  “That Englishman — Mr. Orbison. Why doesn’t he have Mr. Rennie ask us to his villa to dine, or for tea, sometime when he’s going there himself. I should think he would, since he’s so anxious to meet us.”

  “Claire! What gives you the idea the poor man wants to know us?”

  “Poor man?” Claire said sharply. “Why do you call him that?”

  “Good gracious! He’s a hopeless invalid, isn’t he? He’s the most tragically shattered—”

  “What!” the daughter cried. “Haven’t you any eyes? He’s the most magnificent-looking human creature I’ve ever seen!”

  “What an idea! Why, he’s a walking wreck, child — not that one doesn’t feel awfully sorry for him. He just manages to get along with two canes, and he’s thin as a shadow. Our valet de chambre says there’s something the matter with his spine.”

  “Yes, there is.” The colour had heightened in Claire’s cheeks, and her eyes shone. “Do you know why? That’s from a hand grenade in Flanders. I asked Mr. Rennie and he told me.”

  Mrs. Ambler nodded sympathetically. “Of course that does help to make him look magnificent, as you say; especially since anyone can see he’s probably suffered terribly — and still does, I’m afraid. Yet he seems very much alive — that is, his head does. He has a kind of haggard eagerness very appealing; it’s as if he knew he couldn’t get much out of life, but did hope to get that little. I didn’t realize you were interested in him; it’s rather surprising in a girl of your age, especially with such a remarkable young man as Don Arturo hovering about.”

  “What’s my age got to do with it, Mother? Arturo’s wonderful, but I’ve seen others like him.”

  “Where? Indeed you haven’t! He’s the most charming young man I ever knew; and I’ve known more than you have, my dear! Mr. Rennie says he’s the finest young man in Italy. His mother is lovely too.”

  “Yes,” Claire said thoughtfully. “But I think she manœuvres a little.”

  “To make you like him? Well, that’s natural, and a great compliment to you too. I think she’s far from being mercenary; and her son hasn’t a bit of that. No one could look at him for a moment and believe such a thing.”

  “No,” Claire admitted. “It’s true. He isn’t that sort in the least, and I think he’s splendid of course. I only meant I’ve seen others more like him than I have like Mr. Orbison. I’ve never seen anybody at all like Mr. Orbison. He’s older, too, and that’s rather fascinating — particularly when a girl’s seen so terribly many fledglings of about her own age.”

  Mrs. Ambler sighed. “Oh, dear! What makes you think the poor man wants to meet — us? I haven’t seen him show the slightest symptom.”

  “He had his table changed to the one next to ours, didn’t he?”

  “It’s nearer the door and he doesn’t have to hobble so far with his two sticks.”

  “Mother!” Claire exclaimed, and she uttered a sound of pity. “He doesn’t mind! He goes on fairly long walks with that dowdy sister of his, in spite of his two sticks. I’ve about made up my mind to ask Mr. Rennie to—”

  “You mustn’t,” her mother interrupted in alarm. “Claire, please! We don’t know Mr. Rennie well enough, and I’m sure he’d understand what you’re up to.”

  “‘Up to’?” the girl repeated, with an almost perfect air of wondering incredulity. “Mr. Rennie would understand what I’m ‘up to’? What in the world are you talking about?”

  “Oh, dear! Whenever you begin to be hypocritical with me, I know there’s no chance of doing anything with you.”

  “Why, yes, there is,” Claire said surprisingly. “I won’t ask Mr. Rennie; I’ve just decided not to.”

  “Then it’s because you’ve decided on something worse. What that poor man and his sister desire is rest and seclusion, and heaven knows he needs it! I think you ought to let him alone.”

  “Good heavens!” Claire cried, and she laughed a little excitedly. “What on earth do you think I intend to do, Mother?”

  Mrs. Ambler’s reply was almost too frank. “I think you’ve just decided on a more picturesque way of meeting poor Mr. Orbison than by asking Mr. Rennie.”

  “What nonsense!” the daughter exclaimed, as she rose from her chair by a window overlooking the garden. “All I’ve decided to do is to go up to the Salone for the afternoon tea dance. Arturo hates the place and made a fuss about my going there; but it’s perfectly all right. Giuseppe Bastoni will be waiting to take me by the time I get my hat on; the baron’s going to meet us there, and they both do dance beautifully. Don’t worry about my disturbing poor Mr. Orbison!”

  “I might as well not, I suppose,” her mother sighed. “Especially since I know now what you’ve decided to do at the first opportunity — and that you’ll probably make the opportunity, yourself!�
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  Claire was already in the adjoining room, engaged before a mirror. “You wicked person!” she called through the open doorway. “You mean I’ll make the opportunity to meet Mr. Orbison in a more picturesque way, don’t you? I should think you’d be afraid to put such ideas into my head, especially in the most picturesque place in the world, where one really ought to do picturesque things! Of course you understand that if I did anything like that now, after your suggesting it, the whole affair would be absolutely all your fault.” And a few moments later, as her mother remained persistently silent, Claire added gayly, speaking loudly in order to be sure that her impudence was understood: “Did you hear what I said? I said ‘the whole affair,’ Mother. Once you put such things into my head, you never can tell where they’ll end!”

  XI

  THE SALONE IS one thing not beautiful in Raona, though the gay little modern building is inconspicuous and may be pleasantly approached through a cypress-bordered garden. What should not be in Raona is the interior of the Salone; the manufactured throbbings of a “night club” are misplaced upon the majestic cliff that looked down upon the passing of Odysseus.

  Arturo Liana hated the Salone, yet he was there, this afternoon, at a table near the door, and alone. At the opposite end of the room an orchestra of red-coated men produced adroitly suggestive tango music, to which the silent dancers moved with what seemed to Arturo a snaky accuracy. Most of the women were pale under heavily applied artificial complexions that the red lamps failed to make plausible; the men were pale, too, and there was no merriment in this sleek dancing, but, on the contrary, a trancelike gravity — a gravity as of pallid masks covering intricate and sly emotions. Slyness seemed the very air of the place; it was the key of the music; it was in the curiously revealing dresses of some of the women as well as in their eyes; most of all, Arturo thought, it was in the eyes of that sly enemy of his, Giuseppe Bastoni, with whom Claire Ambler was dancing.

  Alone, of all the dancers, the young American girl seemed to be dancing merely to dance and not for the sake of something covert. She laughed and chattered to her partner; her blue eyes, under her silver-gray helmet of silk, were bright with pleasure in the rhythms measured by her feet that moved so lightly in their twinkling slim black slippers. She was gay as a child is gay; and in all this vulpine slyness, she was the only frank and natural young creature. It hurt Arturo to see her there — as he knew she knew it did, which made his hurt the keener; and yet he saw that she could go anywhere and everywhere untouched by what was about her. It was probably an American quality, he thought; but he nevertheless wished that she were not so willing to go anywhere and everywhere, or at least, would be kinder to one adviser in such matters. She had been a little brusque when he advised her, that morning, not to go to the Salone.

  However, she unexpectedly atoned for her brusqueness now. She had not seen him when he came in, nor while she danced; but with the stopping of the music, she and her partner were left just before Arturo’s table. She turned and uttered a little cry of pleased surprise.

  “Arturo! I didn’t dream you’d deign to come here after what you — How lovely! Wouldn’t you like to offer Giuseppe and me some tea at your table?”

  Arturo had risen, and he bowed rather ceremoniously. “I should be very glad.”

  Claire sat down at once; but Bastoni, with a bow more ceremonious than the young Liano’s, begged to decline. “I mus’ speak wit’ my brozzer,” he said; and through his monocle there flickered at Arturo a cold glance oddly contemplative. For a moment Claire was puzzled to find herself feeling uncomfortable. There seemed to be, somewhere about her, a tensity that might have consequences; but Arturo stood imperturbable, looking straight before him and not at Bastoni; then he sat down and Bastoni went quietly away.

  “I’m afraid he doesn’t like it very much,” Claire said thoughtfully. “I told him and the baron I didn’t want any tea. Well, it won’t matter; I’ll be nice to them later. Why in the world did you scold me for wanting to come to this interesting place? The music’s really great, and these extraordinary foreign types — I wouldn’t have missed it for anything! What’s the matter with it?”

  “Nothing, as you see it. You only see it as interestingly foreign. There are undercurrents — undercurrents that I know.”

  “Are there?” Claire laughed as she cast a lively glance about the room. “There’s one that I see. Every woman in the place is covertly looking at you and hoping you’ll dance with her. Do you see that?”

  “No,” he said. “But a few of the men are looking at me by no means so flatteringly.”

  “Are they? Arturo, at your age I should think it would be much more fun to drop politics and just have a great time. You’re so serious!”

  “I fear so,” he said, and shook his head ruefully. “How can I be anything but serious when you behave to me in such a manner that you do?”

  “I? Why, I think I’m perfectly heavenly to you!”

  “Too much so, indeed! But that is in my own appreciation of you. I spoke of how you behave toward me. You snub me for my advice and you come to this absurd and unworthy place with such people as the Bastoni. Then you immediately drop them when you see me sitting alone here and unhappy — and I am glad to say that fellow will now be twice as much my enemy as before — and you come to sit with me. But pretty soon you will go and dance with one of those fellows again; so it is all too much up and down!”

  “Arturo!” she cried; and she added disingenuously: “I haven’t an idea what you’re talking about!”

  He smiled sadly. “I was so flatter’ that you call me ‘Arturo’ — until I found you call the Bastoni, also, by their firs’ names.”

  “But that’s nothing! At home we all do that — with everybody.”

  “Yes, I understand,” he said. “That was what remove’ my happiness in it. It was only one of the downs that come between the ups. You will let me explain what I mean by the ups and downs? I think you know very well what thoughts I have about you; but I cannot speak clearly of them to you until you let me see they would be agreeable to you. Well, you will not let me find that out. One hour you lif’ me up to where I begin to think you will be not displeased if I speak of what I feel; and the next hour, you send me down to where I find nothing but a confusion in my mind. You see, I am a little baffle’ and not very happy; it seems to me I have no advantage over even the Bastoni. So far as I can tell you have this same treatment for any man whatever.”

  “Good gracious!” Claire exclaimed. “You are a serious boy! And you must think I’m a very uninventive sort of person, if I have only the one trick to show all gentlemen! Indeed, I’m not the same to the Bastoni that I am to you! They’re only fun for me, don’t you see? They amuse me because they’re so foreign and different — I really let ’em hang around partly to listen to their funny accent. Mother and I scream over them when we’re alone! They haven’t had the advantage of a year in London that you had, Arturo. I don’t think they’ve ever been out of Raona.”

  “Oh, yes,” he said dryly. “They go to Naples sometime’.”

  “Well, that doesn’t help their English accent much!” Claire laughed. “You don’t think I really care anything about them, do you?”

  “You came here with them when I begged you not to do it.”

  “Just for fun, yes,” she said, and then, seeming to become serious, she leaned toward him across the small table. “You don’t really mind, do you?”

  He looked at her steadily. “Will you let me take you back to your hotel now?”

  “I couldn’t be that rude to them, I’m afraid,” she said, and then, as he laughed shortly, and with some bitterness, she said quickly, “Why don’t you stay and dance with me too?”

  “No,” he answered. “I will not dance here, even with you. Later, I think I could offer you something better. There is another orchestra in Raona; it is just of mandolins and violins and guitars, and I am afraid they play rather sentimental music; but they know how, and the senti
ment is pure. They are giving a moonlight concert in the Greek theatre to-night. Will you come with me?”

  “It sounds lovely,” she said; then she thought that if she went with him she would not be where Orbison could watch her in the corridor after dinner. Therefore she began to look conscientious. “I’m afraid my mother expects me not to go out this evening. I’m afraid I really ought to spend it with her; but you could dine with us, couldn’t you? Won’t you, Arturo? You will, won’t you?”

  She entreated him in a pretty and coaxing voice; Arturo was pleased to forget the concert, and accept. “You are very kind,” he said. “I can hope that tonight will be one of the ups; so I will go now and dream of it. You are about to be ask’ to dance again.”

  The older Bastoni, in fact, was already bowing before her as Arturo spoke; and Claire jumped up gayly; but gave her table companion a soft glance and a little nod, for au revoir, over the baron’s shoulder. Arturo, standing, responded formally, and summoned a waiter to bring his account.

  “Liana not stay long,” the baron remarked. “I did not ever see ’im in our Salone before.’E iss very — how you say? Severe? Yes.’E iss severe young mans.”

  “Oh, no,” Claire laughed. “He isn’t severe.”

  “Not?”

  “No; he just looked so to-day,” she said, and she added thoughtlessly, “It was only because he didn’t want me to come here and he was a little cross.”

  “’E advice you not to come?” Bastoni asked in a casual and commonplace tone. “Wit’ my brozzer?” His voice was so well modulated to the note of a mild and indifferent inquiry, made merely for the sake of saying something, that she failed to perceive a particular significance in his question. Dance music always made her as light-headed as she was light-footed, her mother sometimes told her with no great exaggeration. “Arturo says this is a terrible joint,” she laughed. “I think it’s huge fun, myself. There aren’t any places like this in Naples, are there?”