by Mark Twain
KENILWORTH KEEP, REDGAUNTLET HALL, ROWENA-IVANHOE COLLEGE, THURSDAY.
DEAR PRECIOUS MAMMA ROSSMORE:
Oh, the joy of it!--you can't think. They had always turned up theirnoses at our pretentions, you know; and I had fought back as well as Icould by turning up mine at theirs. They always said it might besomething great and fine to be the rightful Shadow of an earldom, but tomerely be shadow of a shadow, and two or three times removed at that--pooh-pooh! And I always retorted that not to be able to show fourgenerations of American-Colonial-Dutch Peddler-and-Salt-Cod-McAllister-Nobility might be endurable, but to have to confess such an origin--pfew-few! Well, the telegram, it was just a cyclone! The messenger cameright into the great Rob Roy Hall of Audience, as excited as he couldbe, singing out, "Dispatch for Lady Gwendolen Sellers!" and you ought tohave seen that simpering chattering assemblage of pinchbeck aristocrats,turn to stone! I was off in the corner, of course, by myself--it's whereCinderella belongs. I took the telegram and read it, and tried to faint--and I could have done it if I had had any preparation, but it was allso sudden, you know--but no matter, I did the next best thing: I put myhandkerchief to my eyes and fled sobbing to my room, dropping thetelegram as I started. I released one corner of my eye a moment--justenough to see the herd swarm for the telegram--and then continued mybroken-hearted flight just as happy as a bird.
Then the visits of condolence began, and I had to accept the loan ofMiss Augusta-Templeton-Ashmore Hamilton's quarters because the press wasso great and there isn't room for three and a cat in mine. And I've beenholding a Lodge of Sorrow ever since and defending myself againstpeople's attempts to claim kin. And do you know, the very first girl tofetch her tears and sympathy to my market was that foolish Skimpertongirl who has always snubbed me so shamefully and claimed lordship andprecedence of the whole college because some ancestor of hers, some timeor other, was a McAllister. Why it was like the bottom bird in themenagerie putting on airs because its head ancestor was a pterodactyl.
But the ger-reatest triumph of all was--guess. But you'll never. This isit. That little fool and two others have always been fussing andfretting over which was entitled to precedence--by rank, you know.They've nearly starved themselves at it; for each claimed the right totake precedence of all the college in leaving the table, and so neitherof them ever finished her dinner, but broke off in the middle and triedto get out ahead of the others. Well, after my first day's grief andseclusion--I was fixing up a mourning dress you see--I appeared at thepublic table again, and then--what do you think? Those three fluffygoslings sat there contentedly, and squared up the long famine--lappedand lapped, munched and munched, ate and ate, till the gravy appeared intheir eyes--humbly waiting for the Lady Gwendolen to take precedence andmove out first, you see!
Oh, yes, I've been having a darling good time. And do you know, not oneof these collegians has had the cruelty to ask me how I came by my newname. With some, this is due to charity, but with the others it isn't.They refrain, not from native kindness but from educated discretion. Ieducated them.
Well, as soon as I shall have settled up what's left of the old scoresand snuffed up a few more of those pleasantly intoxicating clouds ofincense, I shall pack and depart homeward. Tell papa I am as fond of himas I am of my new name. I couldn't put it stronger than that. What aninspiration it was! But inspirations come easy to him.
These, from your loving daughter, GWENDOLEN.
Hawkins reached for the letter and glanced over it.
"Good hand," he said, "and full of confidence and animation, and goesracing right along. She's bright--that's plain."
"Oh, they're all bright--the Sellerses. Anyway, they would be, if therewere any. Even those poor Latherses would have been bright if they hadbeen Sellerses; I mean full blood. Of course they had a Sellers strainin them--a big strain of it, too--but being a Bland dollar don't make ita dollar just the same."
The seventh day after the date of the telegram Washington came dreamingdown to breakfast and was set wide awake by an electrical spasm ofpleasure.
Here was the most beautiful young creature he had ever seen in his life.It was Sally Sellers Lady Gwendolen; she had come in the night. And itseemed to him that her clothes were the prettiest and the daintiest hehad ever looked upon, and the most exquisitely contrived and fashionedand combined, as to decorative trimmings, and fixings, and meltingharmonies of color. It was only a morning dress, and inexpensive, but heconfessed to himself, in the English common to Cherokee Strip, that itwas a "corker." And now, as he perceived, the reason why the Sellershousehold poverties and sterilities had been made to blossom like therose, and charm the eye and satisfy the spirit, stood explained; herewas the magician; here in the midst of her works, and furnishing in herown person the proper accent and climaxing finish of the whole.
"My daughter, Major Hawkins--come home to mourn; flown home at thecall of affliction to help the authors of her being bear the burdenof bereavement. She was very fond of the late earl--idolized him, sir,idolized him--"
"Why, father, I've never seen him."
"True--she's right, I was thinking of another--er--of her mother--"
"I idolized that smoked haddock?--that sentimental, spiritless--"
"I was thinking of myself! Poor noble fellow, we were inseparable com--"
"Hear the man! Mulberry Sel--Mul--Rossmore--hang the troublesome nameI can never--if I've heard you say once, I've heard you say a thousandtimes that if that poor sheep--"
"I was thinking of--of--I don't know who I was thinking of, and itdoesn't make any difference anyway; somebody idolized him, I recollectit as if it were yesterday; and--"
"Father, I am going to shake hands with Major Hawkins, and let theintroduction work along and catch up at its leisure. I remember you verywell in deed, Major Hawkins, although I was a little child when I sawyou last; and I am very, very glad indeed to see you again and have youin our house as one of us;" and beaming in his face she finished hercordial shake with the hope that he had not forgotten her.
He was prodigiously pleased by her outspoken heartiness, and wanted torepay her by assuring her that he remembered her, and not only that butbetter even than he remembered his own children, but the facts would notquite warrant this; still, he stumbled through a tangled sentencewhich answered just as well, since the purport of it was an awkward andunintentional confession that her extraordinary beauty had so stupefiedhim that he hadn't got back to his bearings, yet, and therefore couldn'tbe certain as to whether he remembered her at all or not. The speechmade him her friend; it couldn't well help it.
In truth the beauty of this fair creature was of a rare type, and maywell excuse a moment of our time spent in its consideration. It did notconsist in the fact that she had eyes, nose, mouth, chin, hair, ears, itconsisted in their arrangement. In true beauty, more depends upon rightlocation and judicious distribution of feature than upon multiplicity ofthem. So also as regards color. The very combination of colors whichin a volcanic irruption would add beauty to a landscape might detach itfrom a girl. Such was Gwendolen Sellers.
The family circle being completed by Gwendolen's arrival, it was decreedthat the official mourning should now begin; that it should begin at sixo'clock every evening, (the dinner hour,) and end with the dinner.
"It's a grand old line, major, a sublime old line, and deserves to bemourned for, almost royally; almost imperially, I may say. Er--LadyGwendolen--but she's gone; never mind; I wanted my Peerage; I'll fetchit myself, presently, and show you a thing or two that will give you arealizing idea of what our house is. I've been glancing through Burke,and I find that of William the Conqueror's sixty-four natural ch--mydear, would you mind getting me that book? It's on the escritoire in ourboudoir. Yes, as I was saying, there's only St. Albans, Buccleugh andGrafton ahead of us on the list--all the rest of the British nobilityare in procession behind us. Ah, thanks, my lady. Now then, we turn toWilliam, and we find--letter for XYZ? Oh, splendid--when'd you get it?"
"Last night; but I
was asleep before you came, you were out so late; andwhen I came to breakfast Miss Gwendolen--well, she knocked everythingout of me, you know--"
"Wonderful girl, wonderful; her great origin is detectable in herstep, her carriage, her features--but what does he say? Come, this isexciting."
"I haven't read it--er--Rossm--Mr. Rossm--er--"
"M'lord! Just cut it short like that. It's the English way. I'll openit. Ah, now let's see."
A. TO YOU KNOW WHO. Think I know you. Wait ten days. Coming toWashington.
The excitement died out of both men's faces. There was a broodingsilence for a while, then the younger one said with a sigh:
"Why, we can't wait ten days for the money."
"No--the man's unreasonable; we are down to the bed rock, financiallyspeaking."
"If we could explain to him in some way, that we are so situated thattime is of the utmost importance to us--"
"Yes--yes, that's it--and so if it would be as convenient for him tocome at once it would be a great accommodation to us, and onewhich we--which we--which we--wh--well, which we should sincerelyappreciate--"
"That's it--and most gladly reciprocate--"
"Certainly--that'll fetch him. Worded right, if he's a man--got any ofthe feelings of a man, sympathies and all that, he'll be here inside oftwenty-four hours. Pen and paper--come, we'll get right at it."
Between them they framed twenty-two different advertisements, but nonewas satisfactory. A main fault in all of them was urgency. That featurewas very troublesome: if made prominent, it was calculated to excitePete's suspicion; if modified below the suspicion-point it was flat andmeaningless. Finally the Colonel resigned, and said:
"I have noticed, in such literary experiences as I have had, that oneof the most taking things to do is to conceal your meaning when youare trying to conceal it. Whereas, if you go at literature with a freeconscience and nothing to conceal, you can turn out a book, every time,that the very elect can't understand. They all do."
Then Hawkins resigned also, and the two agreed that they must manage towait the ten days some how or other. Next, they caught a ray of cheer:since they had something definite to go upon, now, they could probablyborrow money on the reward--enough, at any rate, to tide them over tillthey got it; and meantime the materializing recipe would be perfected,and then good bye to trouble for good and all.
The next day, May the tenth, a couple of things happened--among others.The remains of the noble Arkansas twins left our shores for England,consigned to Lord Rossmore, and Lord Rossmore's son, KirkcudbrightLlanover Marjoribanks Sellers Viscount Berkeley, sailed from Liverpoolfor America to place the reversion of the earldom in the hands of therightful peer, Mulberry Sellers, of Rossmore Towers in the District ofColumbia, U. S. A.
These two impressive shipments would meet and part in mid-Atlantic, fivedays later, and give no sign.