"Southern fruit ripens quickly."
"It doesn't seem fair," I said, rebelliously, thinking of Annunciata and her slow, indolent grace. At sixteen I—but perhaps I was not a good example.
"Our girls are children at sixteen," I told him.
"You are a child at—what is it—twenty-two," he answered.
I did not pursue the personal application further. But it was not right that this young thing should be a woman so soon, and so shortly destined to be old. Youth—and Age. There are no timid blossomings, no gracious gradations in the South.
We were, very quietly, rather gay those days. I had been several times to luncheon at the Country Club and had met a number of delightful Americans there. It was all very new and exciting. And so invariably beautiful! And I was absurdly glad that Bill ranked very high in the estimation of the other men, as a golfer. Watching remnants of the game from the long, wide Club-porch, I was astounded by the seriousness with which grown men pursued an innocuous white ball for miles and miles of green turf. Once, in the late afternoon, together with a party of several women including Mercedes Howell, I followed a match game for a time. The exotic view, the stunted palms, the small lizards that ran almost from under our feet, animate emeralds, the glimpse of blue water from a hill, enthralled me. But I think that the small, black or tan boys who carried the clubs and who bet their prospective fees with whole-hearted enthusiasm on the respective merits of their employers amused me more than anything I had ever seen. And it was of course solely from sympathy with my husband's ebony attendant that I knew a certain triumph, when, long after we women had tired and returned to the club-house, the men came in, hot and shrieking for cool drinks, proclaiming Bill as victor. He had "saved the game by supernatural putting" his partner, the fair haired boy I had met in the Havana restaurant, announced enviously.
"You should be proud of him," he added, sitting down beside me.
"I am," I said dutifully.
Bill, en route to a mysterious thing called a locker, paused to cast a mirthful look at me, and quite against my will I laughed. I am certain that the blond one, who answered to the name of Bobby Willard, thought me demented.
A number of people called upon us almost every day, motoring out for luncheon or tea. Our little household ran smoothly, and happily. Sarah and Nora gradually became excellent friends, and, evenings, I would often hear Silas's low voice in the kitchen, and going in to consult Nora, would surprise his lean form, sprawled in a kitchen chair, two legs of it off the floor, smoking his inevitable cigar, a coffee-cup at his elbow. To Wing and Fong, Sarah, to my astonishment, perceptibly unbent. It was apparent that the two silent little Asiatics regarded her with admiration and awe. Bill suggested that she was doubtless trying to convert them. But I could not believe that!