Those delightful Americans

Front matter

BOOKS BY MRS. EVERARD COTES

(SARA JEANNETTE DUNCAN).

UNIFORM EDITION.

Chapter I

My mother-in-law was sitting on the lawn as we came np the drive. She sat beneath the pink horse-chestnut with a rug under her feet and the last Kashmir chuddar Monty and Keith between them had presented her with; the rest were put away in camphor in a wardrobe in the blue room. We often told my mother-in-law that she was like Queen Victoria in her accumulations of Indian shawls ; it would draw a smile from any mood. There was an old grey, too, with a small hole burnt in it and the fringe slightly motheaten; that, I think, had been given to her grandfather by a Rajah, but she wore it now in the mornings, reading prayers or giving orders, or if anything took her to the larder. The new one betokened tea-time; the yew bush behind her chair threw it out, white and square, and agreeably suggestive. Frances was there too, with a book from Mudie's — one could see the label. It was plain, even at that distance, that the book was a novel, and that Frances didn't think much of it. She held it as far away from her as possible, and the angle of her head was hostile. Fry was doddering across the lawn under the weight of the tray. It was plainly too much for him, and Parsons, following with the muffin-dish and the urn, voiced a general opinion in the look she cast upon his round back and shaky legs. It was not in the least as if Fry had grown old in the use of the family. He had applied for the situation, with his dyed whiskers and stuffed calves, only two months before, and to criticism of his suitability on the score of age my mother-in-law would only reply that he came with an excellent character and had more than one dependent on him. Between the trees on the far side of the glebe meadows one could see the church spire; it is the view from Burroughs — my mother-in-law is immensely proud of it. It is another little joke to tell her that she is content with the view, since she has driven all the way to Cobbhampton on Sundays ever since the day when she and Frances walked out of church for reasons connected with the vicar's sermon. Some rooks were talking in the elms behind the stables — Frances says the rooks make life in the country unbearable with their noise — and the roof of the carter's van moved along the top of the red-brick wall between the rose garden and the road.

Should you like to tell herl Kaye said to me.

* ^ No, indeed, thank you, ' ' I said, and we both laughed.

My mother-in-law greeted us without putting down her knitting. She looked very pink and very placid, as if she had spent the whole morning in the village doing good, very unsuspicious. Frances had more flairs as usual.

^' Whatever you've got to say you might as well say at once, ' ' she remarked. Frances is my mother-in-law's niece and the daughter of a bishop. The bishop is dead, but he lives again in Frances. He could never have received his diocese for his suavity.

* ' We have a bit of news, ' ' said Kaye, with a note of apology.

We are likely to be obliged to go to America," I forestalled him after all.

' * Go to America ! ' ' exclaimed both ladies at once. My mother-in-law's expression was one of simple bewilderment. Frances looked ironical. What, under the sun, for? " said she.

Not for pleasure," Kaye observed, gloomily. You may happen to remember " —he addressed his mother — that part of your income is derived from shares in the Manhattan Electric Belt Company! "

Has it failed? " demanded Mrs. KembalL If so, tell me at once, Kaye. You know how I dislike being prepared for things. Dear me, that^s the loss of a clear "

It has not failed," interposed Kaye, with that superior correcting air which Englishmen use towards their female relatives. If it had "

I should have been obliged to put down the brougham and reduce the kitchen very considerably."

a There would be no occasion for me to go to the States," Kaye finished.

^ ^ What is the occasion 1 ' ' asked Frances, precisely.

'VTheyVe taken up a project of amalgamation— there's no use going into it, you wouldn't understand — and Travers and I think it had better be looked into. Travers can't go, and he says I must. As a co-trustee, with power from him, one's vote would make a difference. You see, one way or the other, mother holds such a confounded lot of shares."

Then you go — if you go — with my consent as my representative/' said my mother-in-law.

Certainly!

It must be considered " — Mrs. Kemball put down her knitting — " but not before the servants, please.'' Fry had tottered away rubbing his hands, but Parsons was again approaching with the dough cake. It was a particularly doughy dough cake, but the best the village baker could do, and we had to eat it on account of the village baker's young family and threatened insolvency. All but Frances, who declared that her digestion was of more consequence to her than anything that could happen to the baker. It was not everybody, however, who had the independence of Frances. Kaye at once took a large propitiatory slice.

We talked about the weather and the way the annuals were coming on until Parsons went away. It was rather a strain, but my mother-in-law would simply have ignored any other reference. Then there was a moment's silence, while we waited for her to re-introduce the subject. Kaye had asked for a second cup before she did, but we always find it best to let her take her time.

If it is only a process of amalgamation,*' 5 she said, at last, I don't see why I should not make up my mind about it myself."

Project," corrected Kaye. Then will you go to America? "

He intended the finest irony, but Mrs. Kemball replied: I could not possibly be spared. ' '

Ask me," said Frances; I should like above all things a wild adventure. ' '

My mother-in-law saw humour in this suggestion, and smiled. Fancy Frances," she said, careering about, in what do you call them, the cars? No, I couldn't spare Frances. And I fail to see the necessity for anyone 's going. ' '

Kaye stirred his tea.

^ ^ Amalgamation, ' ' pursued Mrs. Kemball, means, I suppose, the introduction of new metals. It would be perfectly easy to get advice about that in England."

I knew better than that, but I also knew better than to say I did. A snail had crawled across from the rose garden. I turned him over with the point of my parasol, hoping Frances would not see him, and kept silence. So did Kaye.

Doesn't it! " demanded Mrs. Kemball. No," said my husband. Frances, you Ve given me sugar ! ' '

^* I daresay I have,'' his cousin replied. * * How is one to remember which of yon takes sugar and which of you takes milk? Just drink it up and say no more about it. ' '

Amalgamation implies the introduction of something. Fry ! ' ' — we waited while Fry approached — bring me the dictionary — the large Webster — from the shelf nearest the fireplace in the morning-room. Amalgamate — of course, it is the merest common sense. If not a new metal, what is it they propose to introduce? "

" A new company," said Kaye.

I knew I couldn't be wrong about such a perfectly simple word. Why will you always dispute things, dear boy ? Now, will you explain why they want to introduce a new company? "

I'm sorry, but I can't. I haven't a notion, mum. Thanks for the bread and butter, Frances. ' '

Then you must find out by correspondence. Write to New York."

Shall you be inclined," put in Frances, to believe everything they in New York? "

Why in the world," cried Mrs. Kemball, should you want them to go to America, Frances? "

t

Oh, I'm tired of them," Frances said, with good humour. They're so dreadfully honey-moony. When they come back perhaps they'll be more endurable."

This was ridiculous. We had been married four months.

But I don't think," she continued, addressing us both, that you have any business to come walking in at tea-time and say you are going to America. ' '

' ' Certainly not. Travers should have written— I should have been prepared," said Mrs. Kemball.

" You should have said it when you went walking out," I added my reproach, after having led gently up to it. ' '

^ ^ It 's a perfect thunderbolt ! ' ' my mother-in-law summed up, looking with immense seriousness at the tea-table as if she saw it there. * * Kaye is exactly like papa in that. I remember your father once, shortly after we were married, telling me at breakfast that he intended to go to Edinburgh on the following day. There was hardly time to order the fly for the luggage. ' '

a There is a meeting of the shareholders," Kaye observed, to-morrow fortnight."

^' Are you expected? " Frances asked, with sarcasm.

I don't know. Perhaps I shall be a surprise. ' '

Oh, well, that is out of the question," Mrs. Kemball said, with a glance of slight anxiety at Kaye.

The Majestic on Thursday, or the Campania on Saturday, would get us there in plenty of time, ' ' replied the son who was like his father.

The Majestic on Thursday! " The name of the ship seemed to destroy in my mother-in-law the spirit of opposition. She put down her knitting, which was the same as lowering her flag.

Pray don't take a record-breaker," Frances remarked. ^' Those Atlantic liners are always breaking each other's records. Most immoral and most dangerous I call it."

We'll take one that has only broken her own record, if you think it would be safer," Kaye returned, humorously; and his mother said, ' ' Do, by all means, if it is to be found. ' '

If it had been India," said Prances, meditatively, one would have thought nothing of it. But America is so remote."

She was leaning forward sturdily in her chair with her knees well apart, her elbows planted just above them on her short legs, and her hands joined at the finger ends, dropped in the space which is usually indicated as a lady's lap. As she lifted a judicial chin and looked at us from under shaggy eyebrows with her head a little on one side, I felt that the attitude was an inheritance from the bishop.

It's only half the distance," said Kaye, who is also a little like his mother.

If they are going to America they must have some introductions," said Mrs. Kemball ; ' ' who is there we know with friends in the States! "

" Cook," said Frances, genially; ^' cook has a married sister in New York, and would be pleased to oblige. ' '

* ^ If it happened to be our cook, ' ' I put in, she might give me a character, mightn't she? "

" It's all very well," returned Frances, but Norah's sister's husband is an alderman. Norah says they use nothing but solid silver and have their own phonograph. You may meet them in society. ' '

Fancy Kaye taking cook's sister in to dinner ! " I exclaimed, for something to say.

It would do him good," pronounced Frances, who has socialistic sympathies which the family unite in deploring. As she has read up the subject, however, and nobody else has, we find it more dignified to ignore the things she says, or to indulge them with a smile.

My mother-in-law had been thinking. There are the Fordyce-Pattersons, ' ' she said. ^' They have cousins in Florida, growing oranges, who might put you up for a weekend. And I know some people — Beresf ords — belonging to the Dorset Beresfords — who went out to a ranche — or was it a sheep farm ? — in Texas. But they have never been heard of since. I have oft6n noticed that people who go to America simply disappear."

^ ^ We '11 take return tickets, ' ' said Kaye. I believe there is a great deal of grass land in Texas, hundreds and thousands of square miles of it,'' observed Frances; I suppose an occasional Englishman dropped about on it wouldn't make much of a figure. He would be swallowed up. ' '

6( There is an advantage, isn't there, in return tickets — they allow you something," said Mrs. Kemball. You had better economize where you can. I understand the expense of living over there is scandalous. People simply throw away money. A shilling goes nowhere, and the hotel waiters expect gold, like private servants."

Do they expect it every day? " asked 11

Francos; because, iu that eas(i, it might be cheai^er to let the amalgamation proceed.'*

They may expect, said Kaye, with firmness.

You will have to black your own boots, Frances remarked, as if she enjoyed the idea. Everybody does.''

What an extraordinary country! " ejaculated Mrs. Kemball. ^ ' In that case you must have a new blacking-brusli and several tins of Day and Martin. I will write to the stores for it at once. He couldn't take the things John has been using " — Mrs. Kemball addressed Frances — ^' John wouldn't understand it."

^' You will see the inner workings of a great democracy. I wish I had your chance, ' ' said Frances.

I wish you had. And I don't know about the inner workings. I expect I shall be quite satisfied with the outside, ' ' my husband replied, without enthusiasm.

^' I shall expect full accounts of it by letter, ' ' Frances said.

Oh, my goodness! Carrie, you'll have to write them."

What shall we bring you? " I enquired, diplomatically.

' ' I think I should like something made by 12 the Indians." I had addressed Frances, but it was my mother-in-law who spoke. And you might find out how many of them have become converts to our religion, and whether they still live in wigwams. It would interest me very much to hear that.''

I'll ask," said Kaye, ^' but I'm not sure whether they would know in New York."

The squaws are very civilized indeed," I said, ^ ' judging by the pictures. ' '

Ah, well," said Frances, over there the ladies always lead. Have they adopted visiting cards? "

^ ^ No, ' ' I said, ' * but they wear three petticoats; " and I glanced at Frances's limbs, which, since they were not really entitled to gaiters, were much too well defined. She may or may not have seen the glance. All she said was, Then they don't bicycle."

You may bring me," she continued, a piece of chewing-gum. That is a thing I have a great curiosity to see. All Americans, I'm told, chew gum, so they call it chewing-gum, though of course it is the people who chew, not the gum. It is extracted from a tree and it steadies their nerves. If it were not for chewing-gum they would have been at war with us long ago."

That will be expensive," said Kaye« 3 13

They've put a tax on it to help them pay for Cuba. Millions, they say, are rolling in as the result. ' '

Then don't be tempted," Mrs. Kemball said, to consume much of it. Leave it to those who can afford it."

You may be thankful they don't put a war-tax on people entering the country," Frances said. I notice they do on people leaving it. Five dollars — that's a sovereign, isn't it!— each."

That's very intelligent of them," said Kaye. ^^You don't often feel that you're getting value for the money you spend in taxes. ' '

Do you think there is nothing good outside of England! " Frances demanded.

I think there is quite enough inside

it."

America will be thrown away on you."

On the contrary, I will be thrown away on America, ' ' Kaye retorted, and with that we got up to go. "With much care and caution I put my snail again on a friendly footing; but Parsons, collecting the tea things, and eager in that which did not concern her, discovered him. Oh, ma'am, there's a snail," she said.

Another! " exclaimed Mrs. Kemball; 14 that makes the seventeenth to-day. Kill it on the gravel, Kaye. ' '

Not I,'' said Kaye, hurriedly; I — I haven't time. We really ought to be off, Carrie. ' '

Parsons."

Oh, don't ask me, ma'am, please. It's such a messy death, ma'am; a snail."

Bring me two flat stones. Parsons, and don't be a goose," said Frances. As we made our farewells I dropped my parasol, and in picking it up contrived to slip the snail inside. From the drive, as we looked back, I saw Parsons standing with a look of horror and the two flat stones, while the executioner on her knees looked in the grass for her victim. My mother-in-law had risen from her chair and was rolling up her knitting. i c Yyj, ' ' I heard her say, * ' you may take back the dictionary."

On our way home to Whitewood — it is only three miles, and we were walking — we overtook the postman, who handed us our letters. Among them was a hasty postcard from Laura Deane begging us to come to them on Wednesday for some scratch tennis. As he gave it to me the postman touched his cap.

If you like to write it, ma'am, I could take the answer to that 'un on my round to-morrow mornin'. You'll have to send it by hand else,

as the party's on Wednesday.''

We wondered, as we accepted Iliggins's kind offer, whether they would do as much for us in America.

Chapter II

Perhaps it may have been evident that my husband was not particularly ^ ' keen, ' ' as he would have said, about going to America. The only explanation he seemed able to give was that he was very well pleased to stay where he was, unless I deign to add his statement that we should miss our own early peas, and that he didn't like depending on John to exercise the horses. These reasons, of course, merely show how non-reasonable his disinclination was — how purely based on temperament and flavoured with insularity. That seems a severe word to use about one's husband, but if one interprets it as attachment to one's island, it is only a virtue somewhat over-developed. I, too, am attached to my island, but not so far as to deny that there may be special attractions in a continent, or to be unenterprising about going to look for them — especially in the continent of America. One has always heard such piquant things about America. Also, I had a fancy that life in an island, even in the island of England, was apt to be too condensed, that there was not space for the accumulation of centuries to diffuse themselves properly, and that we lived in a kind of moral puree. In America I knew the air would not be so thick ; one could see people better. This is simply to explain that Kaye, in representing to his mother that he was crossing the Atlantic from a sense of duty to her, acted with sincerity, while I, in allowing her to think, from all I left unsaid, that I accompanied from a sense of duty to Kaye, dissimulated. I don't know whether I was justified, but it is never expedient to let one's mother-in-law think one enthusiastic about going very far away from her ; she imagines things.

The ship being a British one I had no more idea that our American experiences would begin on board than that they would begin in Liverpool, but there I was mistaken. There is a vague and formless American element to be perceived in Liverpool in the summer months — an unknown word on the hotel staircase, a petticoat like a bird of strange plumage flitting in and out among the Liverpudlians— but in the tender it suddenly thickens, and on the ship it crystallizes into the predominating fact. Here and there on deck one could descry the form of a Briton, half 18 submerged under his own flag, but there seemed to be vastly more Americans returning to their native land than English people making our voyage of discovery. I refrained from pointing this out to Kaye, because it seemed to support his prejudice; but otherwise it was to me satisfactory. In my eager and hospitable state of mind I could not see Americans too many or Americans too diverse, I wanted to begin at once. Kaye was neither pleased nor displeased at their preponderance, he was so entirely taken up with the ship. It was certainly a large ship, and doubtless very wonderfully steered, with several comfortable floors and an attic most luxuriously upholstered and used as a library, but to me it was simply temporary quarters on the Atlantic for ourselves and the Americans, and I would no more have thought of looking at its engines than I would have gone poking about the axles of my carriage. Kaye, however, was perpetually down " somewhere; do what I would I could not keep him out of the stoke-hole. He seemed to want to know as much about the funnels and boilers and things of a ship as Rudyard Kipling does, which, considering he has no means of showing it, I thought a waste of time. He would establish me in a corner of the deck, as near to a group of Americans as I dared to direct him, and then he would disappear. I thought at first that they would speak to me in my abandonment, as I saw them address other lonely ladies in different parts of the deck, but none of them did; and then I noticed that those to whom this kindness was extended received it on other and more pathetic grounds. It seems shocking to have to confess to masking one's intentions twice in one chapter, but I was obliged in the end to close my eyes and smell my salts, otherwise not one of them would have said a word to me. On that first occasion I lay very still, and presently I heard a tentative voice quite close, ^ ' Do you still feel the motion of the vessel? " I looked up, feeling rather as if I had caught a squirrel. There the little thing stood in her brand-new golfing cape from Redfern's, and her smart plaid skirt — plaids were immensely worn that season— with her head on one side, pausing and poising as if the least thing would frighten her away, and yet in immediate personal relation with me. I was so pleased.

I have not suffered so much on this voyage as on others," I said; thank you very much; '' and then, seeing the sympathetic interest fade in her eyes, I added, hastily: Not that I have ever crossed the 20

Atlantic before. This will be my first visit to America.

It was fascinating to hear her say ^ * Is that so! And I had an anxious moment while she decided whether she wonld smile and resume her walk, or sit down beside me. Fortunately, the next chair happened to be hers, and she sank into it. I at once resolved, as soon as she had gone away to look at the name on the back.

Well," she said, crossing her beautiful little feet, I hope you will have as good a time as I have had in England. Our country is different, of course

^ ^ I 'm sure it 's lovely, ' ' I interrupted.

I said this from conviction and not with any special wish to please, but she looked flattered and gratified.

It's nice of you to say that," she said; <^ very nice." She pronounced it vurry," precisely as they do in Mr. Anstey's Travelling Companions, and we were travelling companions, so there was nothing lacking. I longed to ask her to go on about her country, but one could hardly do it when she took it so personally. ' ' But you couldn 't like America better than I like England, ' ' she continued, with a breadth of concession that was almost generous. I think you ought to be proud of England. I suppose you are.'' She laughed a little, as if we were on disputable ground, and she had given me an advantage. I suppose so,'' I said; I don't know."

* * Well, I would know, ' ' she returned, and put me on the defensive.

' ' Perhaps, ' ' I said, ' ' we have got used to the feeling and forget about it. As one forgets about all sorts of things."

She looked at me as if I had made the most of my advantage. I call that being pretty proud of it ' ' — I thought I detected a faint indignation in the way she said this — and I can't say I admire all your customs. Taking otf your hats to ' God Save the King,' for instance. Why do you do that? "

I don't," I said. In my astonishment I could think of nothing else to say. Fancy objecting to capping the King!

Kaye told me afterwards that I should have explained that it was done as a mark of self-respect, but no one could think of a thing like that off-hand.

^ ^ It 's subservient, ' ' she went on, ' ^ and unworthy of a population of forty millions."

^ ^ Are there as many of us as that ? " I exclaimed. " I used to know, but "

That's your figure. Our population is seventy millions, ' ' she added, and comparison was so plainly implied that I felt suddenly inclined to challenge it.

Do the forty millions include the Colonies and India ! " I asked.

Oh, do you count the Hindus and Mohammedans?

Why not! They are human beings." ^ ' But so low down in the scale of civilization."

They built the Taj. I wonder how they would compare with your negroes, ' ^ I said.

* ^ Our negroes vote ! ' ' she exclaimed, as if that were conclusive, and I suddenly found that I was discussing something with a perfect stranger. One couldn't go on with that. I smelled my salts, and the American lady, reading defeat in the bottle, was generous again.

Well," she said, anyway I would like to take England and put it right down in the middle of our country. Somewhere on the line of the Empire State Express."

" May I ask what that is? " I said.

Oh, you'll find out soon enough. Besides, I couldn't describe it. Nobody could. There! " she said, laughing. Thank goodness, that ticket has turned over at last. I thought it never would. ' ' She was looking at the luggage label attached to my chair, which had been flapping about in the wind. I was dying to see what your name was. Mine isn't on my chair, so I'll have to give you my card.'^

Thanks," I said, I should be very glad — any time "

Oh, I've got it here/' and she had. She took it from one of those dainty woven cardcases they make on the Jeweller's Bridge at Florence. It had a design of pearls and rubies, and she kept it in her bag. I felt awfully awkward about looking at the card, it seemed the sort of thing one ought to do in private. It was a great relief that she had a simple, plain name — Mrs. Horace Moss." Anything quaint or difficult would have put one out so much more. Going to America for the first time one is ignorant in many ways, and I am ashamed to say that I had no savoir faire whatever with regard to Mrs. Moss 's card. I glanced at it surreptitiously, but I could not sit there holding it in her presence for ever — it would have looked as if she were a professional person, a manicurist, or something, and I wished her to go away. I know now that in American society one is expected to have a pocket-book or receptacle of some kind always at hand for this purpose, as anyone may present anyone else with a card at any time ; and indeed that is the only way to save one from the misery, for lack of somewhere to put it, with which for two or three minutes I regarded Mrs. Moss's card. I finally laid it down on an adjoining chair, whence, to my great comfort, as Mrs. Moss was fortunately not looking, the wind blew it into the sea.

I was doing my best to think of something else to say — I wanted above all things to prolong the conversation — when Mrs. Moss gave me a look of scrutiny and said she thought my colour was coming back. You're nothing like as green as you were," she said.