We got into the car somehow, but Checkers didn’t come and so we went off without him. Aunt said someone must have cast an evil eye on us. Such an amusing account as Checkers gave us later of his experience in Brussels! It seems he had only three francs in his pocket, not enough for the cab. The driver was furious and couldn’t understand his French and thought he was trying to cheat him and demanded his arrest. A sympathetic Englishman offered to “change him a crown,” which, unfortunately, he didn’t possess. Finally he went to a banker’s and got things straightened out and came on the next train. It is only three-thirty now and I am wondering what will happen next. The excitement can’t keep up much longer. The “Sensation Captain,” as they now call me, has resigned.
Aunt sends her love but says the only thing she has against you so far is the fear that she may become a confirmed dipsomaniac through drinking your health so often. But it is really a silent toast to Peppi, I think. Of course, if she wants to cherish an absurd attachment for him it is none of my business, but she makes me just a little tired!
A. D. TO POLLY
Monte Catini,
August.
Dear, dear Sensation Captain, what a day that was, to be sure, that you wrote about. I have read and re-read your experiences and wish I might have been along to share the perils by cabmen and the perils by train! But you reached The Hague all the same while I was at this ineffective distance. Oh, please let me manage a trip some time for my pretty Polly.
Your little gondola is here in my pocket, for we are inseparable companions. Indeed I know of none more agreeable, since I cannot be with you, for while the little boat is always suggesting something pleasant, yet she permits me to do the talking; so we get on swimmingly, or rather floatingly, the gondola and I.
I often think, dear, how at the big receptions last spring, I found such delight in looking at you. Your manner toward all was so charming. And do you remember the dinner at the American Embassy when I didn’t sit next to the girl I wanted? But you didn’t seem to mind, and flirted with the Prince, though every now and then you did look at me just a little, didn’t you? And then afterwards, in the great corridor, when the Ambassador was talking to you more affably than I had ever seen him, I stood by and felt proud and didn’t know why—though I do now, indeed!
I saw the Spanish Marquis yesterday. He looked at me suspiciously, but perhaps it was just my imagination, because I knew you had refused him. No one has heard from Don Carlo, but I believe the gardener’s daughter has followed him to South Africa.