And so on. It would doubtless spoil one in time, but I have only had two weeks of it, all put together.
The hall of the hotel at Exeter was like all other English hotel halls; so damp, dismal, dull, and dreary, that it is a wonder English travellers are not all sleeping in suicides' graves. Were my eyes deceiving me or was there a motor at the door, and still more wonderful, was there a young, good-looking man directly in my path,—a healthy young man with no symptoms, a well-to-do young man with a perfectly appointed motor, a well-bred, presentable young man with an air of the world about him? How my heart, starving for amusement, rushed out to him after these last weary months of nursing at Leamington! I didn't want to marry him, of course, but I wanted to talk to him, to ride in his motor, to have him, in short, for a masculine safety valve. He showed no symptom of requiring me for any purpose whatever. That is the trouble with the men over here,—so oblivious, so rigid, so frigid, so conventional; so afraid of being chloroformed and led unconscious to the altar! He was smoking a pipe, and he looked at me in a vague sort of way. I confess I don't like to be looked at vaguely, and I am not accustomed to it. He couldn't know that, of course, but I should like to teach him if only I had the chance and time. I don't suppose he knew that I was wearing a Redfern gown and hat, but the consciousness supported me in the casual encounter. Naturally he could not seek an introduction to me in a hotel hall, nor could we speak to each other without one.
His chauffeur went up to him presently, touched his hat, and I thought he said, 'Quite ready, Sir—Something'; I didn't catch the name.
Well, he bowled off, and I comforted myself with the thought that mamma and I were at least on our way to pastures new, if they were only Dawlish or Torquay pastures; or perhaps something bracing in the shape of Dartmoor forests, if mamma listens to Mrs. MacGill.
The owner of the motor appeared again at our dinner-table, a long affair set in the middle of the room, all the small tables being occupied by uninteresting nobodies who ate and drank as much, and took up as much room, as if they had been somebodies.
It is needless to say that the young Britisher did not, like the busy bee, improve the shining hour—that sort of bee doesn't know honey when he sees it. He didn't even pass me the salt, which in a Christian country is not considered a compromising attention. I think that too many of Great Britain's young men must have been killed off in South Africa, and those remaining have risen to an altogether fictitious value. I suppose this Sir Somebody thinks my eyes are fixed on his coronet, if he has one rusting in his upper drawer awaiting its supreme moment of presentation. He is mistaken; I am thinking only of his motor. Heigh ho! If marriage as an institution could be retained, and all thought of marriage banished from the minds of the young of both sexes, how delightful society could be made for all parties! I can see that such a state of things would be quite impossible, but it presents many advantages.
MRS. MACGILL
Exeter, Devonshire,
Rougemont Castle Hotel,
Sunday, May 16th, 19—
I have made out my journey from Tunbridge wells in safety, although there has been a breakdown upon the Scotch Express, which is a cause of thankfulness. There were two American women in the same carriage part of the time. The mother was, like myself, an invalid, and the daughter I suppose would be considered pretty. She was not exactly painted, but must have done something to her skin, I think, probably prejudicial like the advertisements; it was really waxen, and her hair decidedly dark—and such a veil! It reminded me of the expression about 'power on the head' in Corinthians—not that she seemed to require it, for she rang no less than eight times for the guard, each time about some different whimsey. The boy only grinned, yet he was quite rude to me when I asked him, only for the second time, where we changed carriages next. Cecilia spoke a good deal to the girl, who made her laugh constantly, in spite of her neuralgia, which was very inconsistent and provoking to me, as she had not uttered a word for hours after we left Tunbridge Wells. The mother seemed a very delicate, sensible person, suffering from exactly the same form of influenza as myself—indeed many of our symptoms are identical. They happened to be going to this hotel, too, so we met again in the afternoon. I had a bad night. Exeter is small, but the Cathedral chimes are very tiresome; they kept me awake as if on purpose; Cecilia slept, as neuralgic people seem often able to do.