Isabel Anderson

“ A girl! Guess if you can—Sybil! ! ! And she is the dearest girl in the world. Checkers is in kingdom come; he declares, “She’s as pretty as a pair of pink boots and as enticing as a glass of Kentucky moonshine. I can go to the races and lose; I can pick a horse with nothing but a mane and a tail; can’t pick a clown in a circus, but I can pick a blue-eyed doll all right!”
How did he ever do it? Why, those two scamps pretended, just to amuse each other and everybody else, to have a mock engagement—Checkers called it a “trial hitch.” ”

“ I treasure in my heart the memory of the rollicking fun of the escapade at the Carnival Ball, the Veglione, with its confidences, and the privilege, too, of that drive from the Duchess of Sermoneta’s, through the narrow streets, across the bridge, when I saw you home, and those afternoons and evenings in the little room in the roof garden, one after another. Each seemed more wonderful and more complete to me, till that last night before you went away to Sorrento, when I first spoke words of love. ”

“ Every day will bring me nearer to you, dear Polly, and twenty thousand times more happy. Dearest, a few weeks more, and we shall begin the first of our married life, and you—my wife!
A telegram was handed me on the train just now which quite takes my breath away, though its news does not surprise me as much as it will you. Peppi and his little divorcée, gray eyes, Mona Lisa smile, and all, were married today in Rome, with only Gonzaga, Pan, and Jonkheer Jan at the wedding! ”

“ The last day or two in Florence, whither Embassy affairs took me, brought thronging memories of our hours together there. This morning as the train crawled across the Campagna in the weird twilight of the moon just before dawn, I gazed out of the window and watched the ruins rise out of the uncanny plain like tombstones of a dead civilization,—spectres of decay and times long past. Think of all the lovers they have looked on since first the aqueducts went marching off to the hills in gigantic strides. ”

“ When I come, will you receive me kindly like the true friend who will always remain your obedient Boris?
POLLY TO A. D.
New York,
March.
Thank Heaven your clever old Ambassador has finally departed, but I am very cross that you didn’t come with him. Why wait for another Secretary? Can’t someone else turn over those ridiculous “affairs?” If you still linger in Rome, I shall complain to the Cruelty to Children Society, because your staying there is making me pine away. Besides, it may be months before your successor arrives. It isn’t by any chance Mona Lisa who is keeping you? ”

“ It has amused me to lead these foreigners all on, but it is dangerous to play with fire. Gonzaga remarked today, “My mother says me marry my cousin, a Spanish countess, but you, Miss Polly, you hear from me again.” As to foreigners in general and Prince Boris in particular, they certainly know how to flirt, but I wouldn’t trust them around the corner. They like to tell naughty stories and pretend they’re dead in love.
So the Roman season is over; the fun and the beaux and the parties and the drives on the Campagna are things of the past, things for me to remember when I’m old and gray. ”

“ Checkers was tickled to death with my anonymous letter signed “Brown Eyes.” He didn’t say a word, but has smiled ever since receiving it. All women, he declares, are devils. I notice, however, like the sailors, he discovers a pretty girl in every port. He’s as fickle, looking this way and that, as a blade of grass in a high wind. I just wrote some more nonsense, supposed to be from an Italian girl who had seen him on the street and had fallen in love with the handsome American boy. ”

“ Ah, the pleasure to have been with you in Paris! I think about it every night and wish to have you near.
You say to me once, write about my country,—Russia, oh my Russia, hail! You think only of bombs and Nihilists in la Russie, but we have many good things, museums best in the world, artistes most fine, ballet splendid, and Slavic music, ah, it make the blood stir. When I go to opera, and lover makes love to his lady, then [Pg 134] I think of—you. Do you think of Boris walking the streets of Moscow, where roofs are green as malachite and strange domes grow in the sky like vegetables? ”

“ I am sure your Aunt dropped some little bit of gossip, possibly something the Prince or Peppi may have written, though I feared he had quite forgotten her. He’s too deeply in love with Mona Lisa now to act like a sensible person, and whatever he says is colored by his insane jealousy of every other man in Rome who even looks on his divinity. But I’m coming home, Polly. I’ll do anything to get away. I know you want to live in America and so do I.
Last night was the ball at the Austrian Embassy to which came the King and Queen. ”

“ Later the façade of the cathedral became outlined in lights, although the dome was left in blackness, and all the Borgo was hung with paper lanterns and was very gay and bright. But I felt lonely without you.
D. V., it will not be long before I reach home! Already I can see the beautiful bay, the boats passing and repassing, and the arrival of Quarantine and Custom officials. The great city—greater New York—faintly appearing through the morning mist, and the huge buildings towering above the fog, like a city in the clouds. ”

“ 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. ”

“ I like him even if he is calm and reserved beside the others. But he’s an American!
The dinner went on and on in numberless courses with plenty of wine. There were quantities of flowers with electric lights under them and not only was all Rome present, but they say people were there who didn’t even know their host by sight! Pittsburgo, as everybody calls him, who certainly does love big and costly [Pg 17] festivities, had hired an orchestra. Then two other dinner parties joined his and we had a dance, the liveliest I ever went to, though it made me think of some jolly ones at home. ”

“ Pan, dear Pan who never has a hard word for anyone, much less for one [Pg 177] of his own colleagues, tells me he is the most malicious man he knows, that he likes trouble and does the most abominable things. Even the Russians at his own Embassy seem to be watching him closely. He couldn’t do much to trouble us, could he, dear? Has he been writing, to you often, I wonder? And what about? Tell me.
Polly, I write you everything! The other night, just Turkish Pan and artist Peppi and Madame Mona Lisa came to a little dinner in my rooms. ”

“ It will seem odd to hear about Rome now that you are in America, about the streets yellow with flooding sunshine, and crowded with carts from the Campagna, and cabbies on their rattletrap carriages cracking their whips and crying “ah!” in deep guttural tones at their horses, [Pg 128] instead of saying “Whoa!” or “Gee up!” in the proper American way.
Early one afternoon Charlton and I started out in an ancient cab and a decrepit horse to go to the Piazza San Pietro, or perish in the attempt. ”

“ A. D. TO POLLY
Rome,
December 31.
Tell your Aunt that Peppi is looking better but still far from well. He will not stay in bed and take care of himself, but keeps on painting and painting behind locked doors. The endless rains this autumn have been bad for him, though he seems gay and talks a lot—calls me the birdcage, because I have caught the Hummingbird. For me the place is full of memories of you— [Pg 144] the terrace, the sitting-room with the corner where you used to make tea, and where I would sit, falling deeper and deeper in love, hour by hour. ”

“ Although life as the wife of a Spanish Diplomat spent in the different capitals of Europe would be interesting, still I know G. would not remain true to me for more than a few months, at most.
If I married Captain Carlo, well! I would hunt on the Campagna, join the gayest set in Rome, and continue my flirtations. I would wear the family jewels and keep the tapestries [Pg 79] (unless we got hard up) and be tolerated if I presented my lord and master with a son and heir. But then he is far away in South Africa by now.
If I should marry Prince Boris, what would my life be? Ah! that is a question. ”

“ Some people thought he was in love with me because he came so often to our apartment, and just to make some fun, I wore his ring for a time. All Rome is talking. Poor old Pittsburgo!
This evening I went to the American Embassy—a large dinner of thirty or more people in a lovely big dining room, and with beautiful silver plates and then gold plates—the first time in my life I ever ate from gold plates. The Ambassador was specially nice to me. I tried to pump him about Mona Lisa but didn’t get much. I wish she would leave Rome. Our Dip is rather a puzzler—he just keeps me guessing. ”

“ Last night Jan and I went again to Peppi’s studio. It seemed as if you were really in the terrace room—you seemed to pervade the place with its old tapestries and sketches, its rugs and easels and paints and books of photographs, and the northern window letting in a flood of moonlight. And there your shadow sat, while Jan played the piano delightfully, gavottes, mazurkas, ballets.
I have adopted a plan which makes me the happiest of men. ”

“ We are having a ripping time. The Honorable Violet somebody or other is here, among others. She is lady-in-waiting to the Queen, and a very charming person. But I don’t know nearly so many Lords and Dukes and things as you do. [Pg 105] I used to detest such people, being an American, but I find I have changed my mind. What few I have seen have been perfectly delightful.
Well, the meet yesterday was just like some hunting-pictures we have at home, with maybe two hundred people, the women and children mostly on ponies, or driving two-wheeled carts. ”

“ Why, riding horseback like a little man! It took me days to find a respectable (looking) horse, but at last I found at Ferini’s, near the Borghese villa, a nice chestnut with two white stockings and a good deal of style when she frisks about. Peppi calls her Mona Lisa. So, in the afternoons, early or late, according to the amount of work I have to do, I may be seen sallying forth, and an hour later, returning, the horse fresh and without a hair unturned, but the rider pretty well done up.
But oh how I want to leave it all and come flying to you! Remember me courteously to your Aunt. ”

“ It is wonderful way up there, in the sunshine, and still lovelier at night when the great moon is sailing in the sky. I hope everybody down in the street has a [Pg 7] terrace to go to and be happy on, sometime in their lives.
There’s a little room off the roof garden where we go when the chill of late afternoon creeps over Rome and drives us indoors. After the sun has set behind the clouds, we start an open fire and make tea by candle-light. It’s an artistic little nook, with old carved furniture and brocades and sketches by well-known painters. ”

“ When not with me, he spends much time with Peppi and Madame Mona Lisa. I often see them prowling about among the old paintings in the galleries.
PRINCE BORIS TO POLLY
Rome,
February.
Oh, Cleopatra child, present in my mind and heart is ever strange emotion I felt on meeting enigmatic girl, the first time and all times. But I have not progressed in detection of enigma, and it may be I shall die without solving it. The more I think, the dearer she becomes to me. ”

“ American women have too much freedom and know too well how to flirt, and too pretty they are for the heart of a man. Most of the men are uneducate in art and languages and such things; they only know business and politics.
Many buildings are handsome like in Paris and Berlin, but the cities rising into the sky are astounding, abominable. The country and the mountains so very beautiful, they are create to be a home for you, my little wild bird. ”

“ In her game she plays the New World against the Old, and the Old World against the New, in the spirit of comedy, not without its tragic points. She uses her hemispheres like cymbals, for resonance and clash, for emotion and conflict, and also for joy, for wonder, for laughter, and for the leaping of the heart. ”

“ Think it over carefully. Oh, I love you, Polly, with my whole soul! But I can’t come home at once; my friend Charlton is now seriously ill and Embassy matters are tied up. Under the circumstances, I am glad you left Paris when you did. Did Boris see you off?
How bustling and busy your getting away from the hotel must have been,—the drive to the station through the gay streets, the excitement at the train, the helter-skelter of passengers and porters with their bags, baggage, boxes, baskets, and rugs. ”

“ Mutual attraction between individuals will sometimes overleap racial differences in point of view; and yet racial differences in point of view will always be at war with mutual attraction between individuals. All contrasts, all complexities, are focussed on this single stage, while one gets as nowhere else the conflict which each new-born generation cannot but wage against the dictation of the ages. On this crowded scene bring in that American element to which the dictation of the ages means relatively nothing and the wealth of the dramatic field becomes obvious. ”

“ Here, we are smothered in flowers, great baskets full on the streets for sale, crimson and gold-colored, and the Campagna outside the wall has its patches of poppies and cornflowers. Spring is very lovely in Rome, but the season is fast coming to an end.
The garden party late this afternoon at the Spanish Embassy in the Palazzo Barberini was quite fine,—the Palazzo itself is so glorious! [Pg 48] And the approach up the great staircase through the vast antecamera, through the salons, and across the bridge into the gardens is splendidly impressive! ”

“ Diplomatic life has the special advantage that it establishes close relations as a matter of course. It admits one to the palace of which the chance traveller sees only the windows and walls. It knows no slow approaches or apprenticeships. Not only are the barred doors thrown open, but to the most sealed society the foreigner in diplomacy is given the key. ”