I took a ride on my chestnut horse this afternoon—yes, the one Peppi dubbed Mona Lisa. But don’t you worry about the real lady Lisa—she—well, she just helps to pass the time away. Today as we started out, great banks of clouds toward the East had gathered, casting shadows on the hills, and these advanced till a glorious double rainbow arched across the Campagna. It was all so beautiful that we innocently rode right into the storm and were drenched in a pelting rain.
The Embassy is humming with people calling, making inquiries, asking for passports, demanding everything from a room in the best hotel to a good store where an American can buy a pair of suspenders, and a thousand and one other requests. Then the Ambassador is getting ready to go away, so all is topsy-turvey. As soon as he goes, I shall begin to pack my boxes—a few books and pictures; and then some evening when the new secretary gets here, I shall quietly go to the station, take the train, and ride rattling across the uncanny old Campagna for the last time, and say goodbye to old Rome, goodbye! I follow your pesky Prince!
POLLY TO A. D.
New York,
March.
Here I am, twenty-one years old and everything to make me happy except two little things. One is I don’t like to have that grass-widow with her gray cat’s eyes again in Rome. She’s much too smartly dressed, and calculating, too, yes, she is, A. D. She just goes after what she wants, then if it’s not obtainable, takes whatever else is handy. She may be amusing, but even if you and Peppi do rave about her looks, I don’t think she’s a bit pretty.
And this is the other thing. Aunt has inserted a denial of our engagement, after the nice announcement I had put in the paper. That’s why we darted up to the Black Horse Farm last week. To get me away so I shouldn’t see it contradicted in the Sunday papers. But Sybil did and sent it to me. What shall I do next?
I’m grateful anyway for the dearest sweetheart in the world; that’s more than anyone else has! This morning the sun shining brightly into my room awoke me, and the day has turned out glorious, not a cloud in the sky. Don’t you hope our wedding-day will be like this? Louisa decorated the breakfast table and on it were some birthday gifts—a pair of pretty bedroom slippers, a work-bag from Grandmother (Ahem, I sew so much!) and a pretty cardcase from Aunt, and a little silver coffee pot, just big enough for two, from Checkers. Aunt sniffed when Checkers explained elaborately the two it was meant for. I believe she is still actually set on my becoming a Princess.