The Plutocrat (Tarkington)/Chapter 24
AS OGLE sat after dinner, finishing his coffee and beginning a cigar in the public room of the hotel, a long, orientalized apartment with a cosmopolitan population prevalently English, two ladies entered at a door and stood looking about them as if in search of a friend. More accurately, one of them wore the expression of a person looking for a missing friend, though apprehensively; while the other had the air of an aroused feudist trailing an enemy. Her dilated eyes swept fiercely over the room; her lips were bitterly compressed; her colour was that of war. She saw Ogle, who sat in profile to her, unaware of her; and after hurriedly conferring with her daughter, she departed swiftly by way of the door they had just entered.
Olivia came to a vacant chair beside Ogle and occupied it before he knew she was near.
"May I sit here a little while?" she said, and though she looked anxious, she smiled brightly upon him. "I've been instructed to find out something from you so tactfully that you won't think anything's gone wrong; but as you couldn't help knowing it anyhow I'm afraid my diplomacy may be thrown away. I'm going to obey my orders though, and I hope you'll admit afterwards that I've done it with tact."
"What is it I couldn't help knowing? I'm afraid there's not much I know;—I've come to that conclusion lately."
"Dear me!" Olivia laughed and shook her head ruefully. "What a very great deal you've changed! I suppose you think that's a spiteful thing to say, though, don't you?"
"No. From you I take it as the greatest flattery you're capable of. You've made it fairly clear that you'd regard any change whatever in me as an improvement."
"No. I shouldn't," she returned. "I know I've given you a right to think I'm that stupid, Mr. Ogle; but I'm really able to appreciate more things than you have any cause to guess I could. One of them was your smile when I spoke to you at dinner. It was heroic."
"You're a little severe," he said, and again produced the contortion.
But at this she made an outcry of protest. "Don't try to do it again! It's like Hamlet trying to smile in the scene with his mother. You poor thing, does it upset you as much as that whenever your fascinating lady dines somewhere else?"
"I've told you before that she isn't 'my' fascinating lady."
"Well, she's certainly fascinating," Olivia, explained; "and as you're travelling with her"
He interrupted her. "Do you mind not putting it just that way? I happen to be motoring with her and her son."
Olivia assented cheerfully. "Yes, indeed! I forgot that she's so much older than she looks. You're really not much more than the age of her son, of course, while Madame Momoro is—well, almost a contemporary of my father's, for instance."
He frowned. "I don't know that I'd"
"Will you make a bet?" she asked gayly. "My end of it is that she's at least five years nearer Papa's age than she is yours." Then without waiting for him to respond she went on: "That makes it all the more conventional for you to be motoring with them, of course. She's really a sort of motherly chaperone for you and her son."
"You're very kind to be so interested," he said with sharp annoyance; and the gayety went out of her expression at once.
"You owed me that," she said quietly, "and I certainly deserved it. I'm afraid I'll have to admit even more. From the first, I've said hardly a word to you that hasn't been terrifically personal, and I realize my atrociousness thoroughly, Mr. Ogle. It mortifies me all you'd wish, when I'm alone and think it over."
Something in her tone, something genuine, hinting of real emotion, compelled him then; and for a moment they looked at each other frankly and with an odd, grave, friendly curiosity. "I don't wish any such thing," he said. "And as for being mortified about anything concerned with me, I'm not worth anybody's bothering that much."
She may have been tempted to tell him again that he'd changed a great deal; but she restrained herself, and merely nodded, once more smiling.
"I was bothering about myself, not about you; though since you speak of worth, you're worth bothering about any amount more than I am." And as he made a sound of protest, she checked him. "Why, certainly you are! You've done something in the world—your best; and all I've done has been to make myself disagreeable—my worst. We can't argue that! What I really want you to tell me now is the meaning of a word. Our courier is away to-night, or I'd ask him."
"What word?"
"I've heard it before, and I think it's Arabic; I'll show it to you in a moment, in writing—Papa's writing! This is the end of my tactful approach to the subject I'm to question you about. If you think I've led up to it properly, will you tell me where your fascinating friend is dining to-night?"
He was surprised. "I think she's at another hotel with the two old French ladies who were with her on the steamer."
"Do you?" Olivia said; and she seemed skeptical. "Did she tell you so—or did her son?"
"No. I had a note from her saying she wouldn't be joining him and me at table. She didn't say where she was going; but I have good reason to believe that she went to wherever those Frenchwomen are staying. She must have gone there very soon after we saw her come into the hotel with your father, before dinner."
Olivia shook her head. "She and Papa didn't come into the hotel."
"What?"
"No," she said. "My mother hurried down to meet him then; but the concierge said they had only stopped in the doorway a moment and then gone on."
"They did?"
"Madame Momoro left that note for you then. I heard the concierge telling my mother so when I got there."
"He was telling your mother"
"Yes," Olivia said, and she looked at him gravely. "Mr. Ogle, would you be willing to give me a little help?"
"Of course."
"I thought you would," she said. "I'm afraid you do seem to be mixed up in it a little, besides, through being here with Madame Momoro. You see my mother got a note, too. It was from Papa, and it's really for Papa I'm asking your help."
"You want me to"
"Wait," she said. "I'd better show you what he wrote to Mamma, if you don't mind, and after you've read it I think you'll agree with me that Papa's going to need help."
She had the note in her hand and gave it to him. He read it. Dear Hon: I'll be in early but some parties I've got acquainted with in the hotel are waiting for me in quite a hurry and anyhow I don't want to wake you up if you're lying down. They want me to go eat dinner with them at a place where they have this celebrated Arab Koos Koos. So just as soon as this Koos Koos dinner is over I'll be back. You and Baby go right ahead and have your own dinner. Lovingly, Earl.
P. S. We may sit around and talk awhile after the Koos Koos, but anyhow I'll be in early.
When he had read this missive Ogle sat staring at it as he held it in his hand; then he asked her, "Is that the word you meant?"
"Yes. What he calls 'Koos Koos.' What in the world could he have meant?"
Ogle frowned as he explained. "Cous-cous is a dish of chopped meats and rice sprinkled with a kind of powder. I think the powder itself is called cous-cous. The Arabs are said to be fond of it—I loathe it myself." But there he spoke ungratefully, for when Mme. Momoro had taken him to eat cous-cous in Algiers just before their departure, he had praised the dish with honest fervour.
Olivia looked at him anxiously. "You see why his note might make my mother feel rather upset, don't you, Mr. Ogle?"
"I do," he said. "I do, indeed—under the circumstances."
"And since your—since Madame Momoro"
He looked up at her grimly. "No; I don't think Madame Momoro is dining with her French friends. Not after reading this!"
"But you mustn't" she began quickly, and stopped as abruptly.
"I mustn't what?"
"You mustn't misunderstand Papa, Mr. Ogle," she said earnestly. "I'm afraid you might. It's easy to see how long it would take a man like you to understand a man like him. I don't know if you ever could."
"Perhaps not."
"You see in the first place" She stopped again; then she said impulsively: "You see you live in New York and that would make it almost impossible for you to understand how really good Papa is."
She was right about that, for Ogle's skepticism appeared to be elaborate, although he limited his comment to two words and spoke them quietly. "Is he?"
"Is he?" she cried. "He's more than good, he's innocent! He's childlike! The poor goose tells stories to my mother that an eight-year-old boy would know better than to tell in getting out of mischief he'd been up to. And the mischief Papa gets into is just as childlike. He's worked all his life like a galley-slave, and of course he has to be up to a little mischief now and then, just for a rest; but it's the most infantile mischief in the world. He wouldn't know how not to be innocent, and he absolutely adores Mamma. And Mamma" She stopped again, and shook her head ruefully. "Well, Mamma"
"Yes?"
"Well, Mamma is a little strict with him," Olivia admitted. "She didn't know what on earth this 'Koos Koos' meant, of course, in his note; and it's upset her terribly. She's nervous anyhow in this rather wild place, and Le Seyeux warned us not to go about much without him, especially after dark. So she's nervous about Papa's wandering around on that account; but a thing she just couldn't possibly understand would be his going out to dine with another woman, especially a woman she doesn't know, and above all a beautiful exotic person like this one. She couldn't understand that he'd be just flattered and interested by Madame Momoro's seeming a little flirtatious with him"
"A little?" Ogle interrupted.
"Oh, dear!" Olivia exclaimed; and she uttered a laugh of lamentation. "That patting she gave the poor old goose on the shoulder! And he so blandly pleased by it—with Mamma looking straight at him and almost close enough to him to push a chimney over on him!" She laughed brokenly again, put her hand to her head, then let it fall helplessly in her lap, and became serious. "Mr. Ogle, I had the impression you meant to stay in Algiers. Would you mind my asking you if"
"Ask what you wish to."
"Well, was it your idea—this motor trip you've taken that's brought her here?"
"No; it was hers."
"Then of course it's on Papa's account that she came."
"Yes," he said in a low voice, "I think so."
And upon this she looked at him compassionately. "I'm afraid that must have been a painful conclusion for you to come to."
"Well, a little," he said; and Olivia seemed to appreciate his honesty.
"We do get over these things—in time," she informed him gently. "I'm an example to you, though on the steamer and in Algiers I was a bad one. However, I don't suppose you care to talk much on the subject, and anyhow we haven't time, if you're going to help me try to be of some use to Papa. Of course Madame Momoro has a special motive. Anyone could see at a glance that she's intelligent, and she wouldn't be absurd enough to think she could supplant my mother. She merely wants to get something out of him, as everybody else does."
"Everybody?"
"You'd think so," Olivia said emphatically, "if you lived with him. At home it's all day long, letters and telephoning; trustees after endowments; charities after him incessantly; old friends coming to him for 'help' and strangers coming to town to get him to go into 'movements' and businesses—it never lets up! Heaven knows what it costs him; he certainly doesn't! And over here—well, he's been like a sack of sugar spilled in the sun for the bees and ants. Even this Mr. Shuler wants him to put money into a coffee business he owns in Detroit! Everybody wants something, and why has this very finished and distinguished-looking Parisian lady followed him to Biskra if she doesn't"
"Oh, certainly," Ogle interrupted gruffly. "You needn't elaborate it. It's conceded."
He did not look at her as he spoke, but sat staring under darkling brows at the wall before him, and Olivia, naturally resentful of the roughness with which he had spoken, drew herself up stiffly in her chair; then understanding better, she leaned a little toward him, and in a small and gentle voice said: "I'm sorry."
He did not respond to this Christian overture at once; and there was a silence between them.
They were the only occupants of the room now, except for a party of three Russian ladies, who were just rising from their after-dinner coffee and preparing to go forth. From the roadway outside there came the beating and squealing of tom-toms and oboes and a barbaric revelry of yelling: the dancing girls were passing in a torch-lit procession, headed by the negro conjuror, on their way to execute their contortions. Stirred by these sounds, suggestive of erotic and iridescent deviltries, the Russian ladies threw their wraps round them, and, laughing, hurried out, eager to miss nothing. Olivia and the sombre gentleman with her were left alone in the room.
"Yes," he said, when the Russians had closed the door, "I think I'm rather a fit subject for your contemptuous pity. I'm here in the position of a man who's escorted a lady to make an attempt to 'get something' out of your father."
"Poor Mr. Ogle," she said softly. "You do mix yourself a bitter drink to swallow, don't you? You'll have to exonerate me from feeling 'contemptuous pity' though; you know perfectly well it isn't contemptuous. The women in your play were the best things in it, I thought; and that makes me wonder what couldn't she do to Papa, if she can do all this to you! I'm afraid you're wasting time feeling sorry for yourself, because there's somebody to feel a great deal sorrier for than for you; and that's Papa. You don't know my mother, Mr. Ogle."
"I seem to be too busy getting to know myself a little!" Then, improving somewhat upon the tragic smile she had asked him to forego, he turned to her with an air as nearly brisk as he could make it. "You thought I could be of use to you. What do you want me to do?"
"You are kind," she said; and she nodded as if confirming to herself an impression there had once been some doubt about. Then she looked at him half humorously, half solicitously, and was reluctant. "I hate to ask you to do it. I'm afraid it would be—well, at the best, embarrassing for you, and at the worst"
"Don't mind what it might be at the worst. Either at its best or its worst, if you ask me to do it, I'll do it."
"Oh, dear!" she said; and so unexpected was the effect upon her of this impulsive statement of his that a quick high colour rushed in her cheeks;—for a moment her eyes were startled and almost tearful. "Did you really mean that?" She recovered herself, and laughed. "For two such unkind-mannered people, we do seem to be paying each other strange compliments! But I'll take you at your word and ask you to do it."
"What is it?"
Olivia glanced over her shoulder at the closed door of rose-coloured glass behind her, and she shivered. "Mother's waiting for me, and I've got to go and tell her what he meant by 'Koos Koos'; and you told me Madame Momoro was dining with those two old French ladies who were on the boat with her, and that's what I'll tell Mother you said. In the meantime, Papa's likely to walk in before very long with an account of his doings that will merely ruin him. Of course the poor thing hasn't the faintest dream we saw him with Madame Momoro—and that shoulder patting—or that we know they didn't come into the hotel except to leave those two notes. He's got to say that he just walked over to the French ladies' hotel with her and then went on to his 'Koos Koos' party." She choked, laughed, and seemed inclined to sob in the midst of her laughter. "When you think of him—coming back as he will, pleased to death with himself for being a dashing diner-out with a pretty lady and thinking that note of his has made everything all right for him—oh!" she cried, "doesn't it make you shudder for him? Do you think you could find them?"
"I don't know."
"I do hate to ask you," she said. "It's treating you rather awfully, I'm afraid—under the circumstances—to ask you to go out and break up Madame Momoro's little dinner-party. It might put you in a queer light with her, of course."
"I know. It doesn't matter."
Olivia gave him an appreciative smile for that, and her hand with it, as they both rose. "You'll never know how grateful I am! There aren't many hotels here, and I think you'll have to take one of those dragomen at the door. Just tell Papa you've come on an urgent message from me, and get him aside and tell him for heaven's sake not to deny he was walking with her before dinner. And tell him"
She stopped abruptly. Before her there was a second door of rose-coloured glass, giving admission from the ground-floor corridors; and what checked her instructions was the opening of this door. The person who opened it was Tinker, a little flushed with his consumption of cous-cous, accompanied by Burgundy; in high fettle over his skittish performance, as Olivia had predicted; and also pleased, it might have been guessed, because of some charming things he had been hearing about himself. His comely broad face, pleasantly pink and smiling, brightened even more at the sight of his former table companion of the "Duumvir," and he advanced with a cordial hand extended. "Well, well, well, Mr. Ogle!" he exclaimed. "I'm mighty glad to see you again. I just been out to try some o' this celebrated Arab Koos Koos, and I certainly been havin' a grand"
"Papa!" Olivia cried. "Go away from here. Go quickly!"
"What? What do you want me to go 'way for? What's the"
Olivia turned quickly to Ogle. "Take him out in the street and tell him. Hurry!"
Ogle took a step to obey her.
But it was too late. The other rose-coloured door had opened and Mrs. Tinker was already in the room. "Earl Tinker!"
"Well, Mamma," he said fondly. "You got my note all right, didn't you, Hon?"