Havana was slowly rousing, and as the “Santiago” covered the last miles of ocean to the harbor, Henry Mayo could see a movement of boats across it, and a forest of the spars of small sailing-vessels beyond. The sight of the great colorful city had now a different meaning for him than the one it had borne when he had previously returned, and seen it as now flame out across the sea. He went back to the time when for eleven years it had been his home. His family had moved to Cuba when Mayo was three months old, and almost every summer thereafter in his memory had witnessed a trip back to the United States. He had in those years always felt an eager anticipation on returning to Havana through the wonder of the dawn, and some of his youthful breathlessness returned to his mind now. Then it had seemed a city of promise, a vision of great vividness, full of possibilities for childhood romance; a city where he could ride through the kind mystery of a tropic night in an open coach, while his father and his mother told him tales of the things they passed.
But now, due partly to the inevitable disillusion of growth combined with absence, and partly to the perspective in which history and accumulated impressions had since made him see the city, Havana seemed to him too gaudy to be really beautiful, while the dead hand of decay that strikes all tropical countries seemed palpably hanging over the city. From this standpoint, the flaunted beauty of the Malecon, the riot of color over the whole far-flung city, appeared empty and artificial and pitiful. What a contrast to that girl whom every thought of Cuba brought to him, and of whom the promise of the day, and all the fulsome glory before him, spoke so mockingly.
Yzlita-Audrey! He drew from his wallet with reverence a worn visiting-card, on which in old English type was engraved, “Mrs. Eduardo Carlos Poëy, Arroyo Apolo, Havana, Cuba”. But Henry Mayo was gazing at a line of writing above the engraving, where in a fine, dainty hand was “Yzlita-Audrey Poëy”. He considered it for a moment, with a feeling akin to awe, and then, just before the “Santiago” passed into the harbor, raised his eyes to the suggestion of hills and palms in the distance. Beyond those hills was “San Juan” de Poëy, where Yzlita-Audrey had once lived, and where Mrs. Poëy would presently give him word of her.
Inland from Havana runs the great white highway to Guïnes. It is one of the most magnificent roads in the island. Smooth as macadam can make it, the way yet gathers, from the over-arching rows of trees that line its entire course, a secluded vastness and solemnity. Of late years its quiet has been more and more invaded by the raucous klaxons and open cut-outs of a swelling stream of tourists. Whereas once great ox-carts lumbered slowly, picturesquely over it, the road is now the slave of the visitor and his forbidding chauffeur. One of the first things a child in the neighborhood learns to say is, “Gee me wan pen-nee!” On the way to Guïnes, the highway runs through the little town of Arroyo Apolo. Some miles beyond, the passing visitor can gaze to his right down a long lane of trees to the distant white façade of “San Juan” de Poëy.
As Henry Mayo stepped into an open carriage at Arroyo Apolo, the drowsiness of a Cuban afternoon was over everything. It was such a day as encouraged reflection, which in Mayo’s case was tinged with much melancholy. His thoughts were of Yzlita-Audrey, that vivacious youthful figure who had stepped from his life, and left it (as Mayo sadly assured himself) empty. The years of his childhood came back vividly. How often, on the way from Havana to see her, had he travelled over this same road! And how often, in the house that was his destination, had he and Yzlita-Audrey studied and played together, or vigorously pulled each other’s hair in youthful quarrels.
But Henry Mayo was frank enough with himself to realize that this youthful companionship, romantic and appealing as it was, nevertheless gained vitality only from his view of Yzlita-Audrey the autumn before, after he had been nine years absent from Cuba. During that time he had carried with him the affectionate memory of those far-off childhood days, epitomized in the flying golden hair and the dancing eyes of this girl. Yet he had never stopped to consider that she must in the interval have grown, and changed. Unconsciously, he had pictured her as always a child, always the same. His trip to New York in September had made him realize the impossibility of such a notion.
Passing through the city, he had gone to dine with some old Cuban friends at a downtown hotel which is the favorite resort of Cuban visitors to “the States”. As they sat at dinner, into the room had swept Mrs. Poëy and Yzlita-Audrey, fresh from Cuba. There had been a moment of excited recognitions, while Henry Mayo felt unsteady at the vision of this older, different girl. The Poëys had joined them at dinner, and he had sat beside her. With the reaction of his spirits to flood tide, he had buoyantly set out to renew the old friendship, while his eyes frankly appraised her. In one moment, the years of intimacy had come warmly nearer, and he felt the one-time comradeship strengthened.
Yzlita-Audrey, however, was not as eager as he, though there was a slight embarrassed flush on her face. She talked often. Her conversation, after the first glad recognition, was carefully general, and she glanced at him rather less than at the older people. But Mayo’s ardor was not so easily quenched, and he shamelessly heaped on her compliments and innuendos, and smiles playfully possessive. Her hair had been civilized to a simple coiffure, but retained its old glory of color. Her eyes danced with a suppressed excitement. Her face contained too much character to be really pretty, and too much vivacity to be anything but attractive. Mayo’s admiration had made her somehow thoughtful, until at last she had turned to him and said, “I want you to see the picture of my fiancé.” Then she had drily added, as though to temper the first effect, “You’ll be so interested in his medals!”
When she returned, they all went to the parlor. Silently he had looked at the picture, and then tried to hide the weariness of his tone as he praised the man’s handsomeness. He was Count Nini Something, an Italian naval officer, and with eager eyes Yzlita-Audrey had told of him. As she talked, her manner had returned to one of confidential intimacy. The love affair she sketched was one of dances on shore and on the count’s vessel, which came to Havana at frequent intervals; of an intrigued girl, and a loving but fiercely jealous man. As the tale unfolded, Mayo numbly imagined how different matters might have been if he had seen Yzlita-Audrey a year earlier, and realized sooner that she was, by history, and destiny, for himself. As things stood, she was to be married in January, and go to Italy—forever.