Three Speeds Forward/Chapter 5
V
THE HOBGOBLINEST PLACE ON THE MAP
V
THE HOBGOBLINEST PLACE ON THE MAP
HE Lampmans lived in a castle about eighteen miles from Studdingham. They had found it in Lombardy—the castle, I mean—and reproduced it from kodak pictures they had taken over there. It was named Ydle Wyld, and was so big that, though they had lived in it comfortably for three years, it was only now actually getting finished, and the masquerade ball was to be the long-promised housewarming. Ydle Wyld was perched high up on a spur of Mt. Pacheco, and you had to follow twelve miles of private road to reach it. The Lampmans were very quiet people in spite of their castle, and would have stayed on very comfortably in the St. Francis Hotel had it not been for Sammy Lampman, their son. Sammy was a sickly boy of seventeen, very pale and imaginative, who was forced by the doctors to lead a very secluded life. So, when he demanded a castle, a castle there had to be, and the good old senator had to put in a big part of his day traveling from Ydle Wyld to State Street, and from State Street to Ydle Wyld. Their visit to Europe had been to see specialists, who were very doubtful whether poor Sammy would ever round out twenty-one.
The papers were always making fun of Ydle Wyld, especially those on the other political side; and it was called a menace to republican ideals, and was regarded as an insolent attempt to revive the feudal system. But the senator bore it uncomplainingly for his son's sake, and imported stacks of tapestry and armor and mediæval junk to give it the appropriate look. He told papa once, that if Sammy died, he intended making it over to the Baptists for a college; which shows how much menace there was, and how sad the motive that had inspired its building.
Well, the housewarming was to be a gigantic affair—eight hundred invitations—and a whole month to get ready in. And when I say that even papa was excited, you can imagine what the rest of Studdingham felt like. I guess poor Mr. Marsden was the only person in the place who wasn't having a fit about his costume—that isn't a pun—but because he wasn't asked. It may be that he was pretty busy, too, with his wonderful "plan," and needed less sympathy than I was giving him. He was a lot in my thoughts, anyhow, and sometimes I almost cried, and wondered if I'd ever see him again. It all seemed so hopeless and impossible, and I had got it into my head that his "plan" wasn't any good. You see, I sounded papa, and found him just as red-hot as ever—and, if anything, red-hotter—raging against Mr. Marsden, and bringing up the Vincents, as though it had happened yesterday. When papa once gets a grouch on, Time's healing hand doesn't count for anything; and mamma was hardly any better. In a small place, once a person's an outcast, they make a kind of rubbish heap of him, and pile on all the crimes of the calendar, from morphine to manslaughter—all the tin cans and broken bottles of slander and innuendo—till it grows to be a mountain!
I tried to put in a good word or two, but it wasn't of the faintest use, since mamma was now certain he was a vivisectionist, and papa said those morose, sullen fellows, who make hermits of themselves, invariably ended in homicidal mania. I hinted at electrical research, but papa said, "Oh, bosh!" and that it was more likely to be the whisky bottle. I didn't argue any further, because I was too afraid and too hurt—and what was the good? But I took a kind of morbid pleasure in thinking I had fought his battles and got licked, and hoped some day that I'd be able to tell him so. It is strange how liking a man grows and grows, till finally you can't think of anything else. It must have been because he was thinking of me, and breaking his poor, lonely heart. It's all very well to make fun of affinity, but I never felt like that about Charlie Lepperts, even when I used to believe I loved him.
I was to go as Mary Queen of Scots, and it seemed a good idea to tag papa along as Bothwell, and do up mamma for Queen Elizabeth. She was willing enough—mamma is a darling when my pleasure is at stake; but papa resisted and resisted, till finally it came out he wanted to be a bandit. He had been to three fancy-dress balls in his whole life, and each time as a bandit, and he seemed to think it was original and striking. He said that anybody could tell a bandit was a bandit a mile off, and that for an elderly man making a fool of himself, a bandit always seemed to him the least silly of the lot. But when I talked of a shining cuirass, and what a stunning group we'd make, and found that he had mixed up Bothwell with the man who had invented printing—and had teased and flattered and bullied him—he gave in about being a bandit, and said, "Oh, hell, have it your own way, my dear."
Well, there we were at nine o'clock that evening, papa smoking a cigar and gasping in his breastplate, mamma really beautiful as Queen Elizabeth, and I very pleased with myself as Mary Queen of Scots; and all of us tremendously excited and gay, and the Dauntless standing on the front gravel with its gas lights lit, and full of rugs for a long ride, when the butler came running to say that Albert had been taken with cramps. Of all times to choose for cramps, think of him picking out that night of the ball!
Papa went off to make short work of the cramps, and came back looking very depressed.
"Tell them to send for the doctor," he said. "I don't know what's the matter with him, but he's groaning horribly, and needs looking after quick."
While mamma went off to telephone, papa began to do fuss-cat about the Dauntless. Papa's a brave man in most things, and his courage was about the only capital he came West with; but it balked at running the touring car single-handed. There was never such an old woman on the bubble question. He can get more wear and tear out of one sooty spark plug, more nervous worry, desperation, and despair, than most men from a whole lifetime of crime or politics; and that's where Albert had this awful hold on him. He had quite got it into his head—helped by Albert, of course—that without this mechanical human wonder it was hopeless to expect the Dauntless to run a yard. If she snaps a wire, or sticks anywhere, papa always looks on at Albert as though he was watching Edison invent the first phonograph. I hate to say it about my own father, but he's afraid of an automobile, and spoils anything like a trip by his remarks. He's always saying, "We must remember that shed; Albert and I could easily push her in that shed"; or, "That's a very handy-looking little machine shop; I wonder if it's on the telephone? Setzer and Hoffman"—and then he keeps repeating Setzer and Hoffman for the next half hour for fear he might forget it. And when it comes to a choice of routes, he has a pathetic desire to follow the trolley! That's papa for you—as an automobilist! And, like all those people who borrow trouble, he has found it by the barrelful—and once had to sleep out all night in the woods.
So there was papa, looking perfectly superb in his brass cuirass and theater boots, marching up and down, jingling like the fire irons, and trying to find a million reasons why we shouldn't take the Dauntless. He wanted to get the horses out, and drive, and grew crosser and crosser as I told him he was a great big coward, and the disgrace of the family. What was the good of a four-thousand-dollar car, in tiptop shape, if it couldn't be trusted for an eighteen-mile run? Papa said that was all very well, but a pretty figure he'd cut trying to push it in shining armor, and stumbling over his broadsword in the dark. In fact, he was so morbid and apprehensive and harrowing that it was about as easy as persuading a French aristocrat in the Revolution to get aboard the tumbril that was to land him at the guillotine. Then, after he had been reduced to pulp, he said weakly that he would leave it to mamma to decide, and threw himself on a hall chair and waited—to think up fresh reasons why it was impossible to take the Dauntless without Albert.
I fully thought she'd join with him and insist on the horses, but for once, in a family disagreement, she came out splendidly on the right side—my side—and said, "Oh, my dear, it would be perfectly crazy not to take the car, when it is standing there all ready." So there was nothing left for papa to do but sigh, and say, "Oh, all right, only don't blame me if anything happens." And we both cheered him up by saying how handsome he looked, and what a pity it was he couldn't dress like that every day, and how he was sure to be the hit of the evening. Indeed, it wasn't his fault that he was such an automobile fraidy-calf, but more that wily Albert's, who had deliberately discouraged him from the beginning so as to boom his own importance. And that night in the woods had cost papa all the little assurance he ever had had, and had inclined him to take a dark view of his own capacity, and what the Dauntless was likely to do if Albert wasn't there to over-awe it.
We started off so nicely that papa began to chirp up, and after a mile or two even bragged a little, and spun around corners in grand style; and when we caught up with the Lepperts and passed them, papa was as pleased as he could be, and never said Albert once, except to ask about the doctor, and how he hoped it wasn't serious. We made Ydle Wyld in rattling time, and even papa was thankful we hadn't brought the horses as we broke into the crowd of cars and carriages and four-in-hands that were seething in the place that had been set apart for them. It was said the Lampmans had invited eight hundred, but it looked more like eight thousand, when we struck that circus and bored our way through the crush to where we were told to park.
Of course, the ball itself was too wonderful for anything, and I never fully realized before what clothes could do for people. The change from business suits to cloth of gold and armor and velvet and lace and white satin, was astonishing; and as for the women, it only seemed to need powder and patches to make everyone of them a raving beauty. It made me feel badly, at first, just to find myself one of a crowd, for I had expected—Oh, well—thought that they'd fall dead at the sight of me; and it cost me a pang when they didn't. But after a while a few got excited about me, and the few swelled and swelled, and it all came out right. A ball is an awful ruthless affair, and a girl's pride is at stake, you know, to have a little court around her and attract attention. Besides, I had to show Charlie Lepperts what a good thing he had lost, and just had to be a success. Well, I was, though I do say it myself, and you didn't have to look very far to see which was the most popular girl in that Gothic hall. Why shouldn't I say it? The old soldier brags of his battles, and balls are ours, you know, and why shouldn't we brag, too? And everybody fell over everybody, and shoved and pushed to get in a dance with darling little me.
Occasionally I'd remember Mr. Marsden, and my Cinderella date at two o'clock, and tingle all over with the most delicious thrills. I didn't know what he meant to do, but I felt sure it was something tremendous, and hoped from the bottom of my heart it wouldn't all go wrong. It was exhilarating to be a heroine of wild romance, and to feel that out there in the dark was a mysterious stranger mysteriously plotting, and whispering my name to the stars, you know. At least I hope he did! At any rate, I felt sure he was pretty busy doing something, and even in the maddest whirl I kept a sharp eye on my watch.
At a quarter of two, just as I had finished an extra with a delightful young troubadour named Edgar Smith, I decided it was time to draw out and find papa. So, chasing up mamma, and accepting the troubadour's escort, we three made a course for one of the supper rooms, where a passing brigand told us he was playing poker. Sure enough he was, snugged cozily in a corner with a policeman, Alfred the Great, and Captain Kidd; and mighty hard work it was, too, to drag him out. Papa's like the pig that you had to pull his head off to get to a party, and his tail off to get him away. He didn't want to come a bit, and said, "Oh, bother! What's the hurry?"
I let him play out his game and lose eight dollars, and then yanked him off, saying I was a little faint and wanted to leave. There was more delay in saying good night to our host and hostess, and it was all of two when we packed into the Dauntless and choo-chooed away. It was the nicest part of the ball to lie back in the cushions and feel that the Marsden moment had arrived. If men get a lot of pleasure in doing things and taking the lead, I guess there's something to be said for the girl's side of it, too—being the lovely prize, you know, and just waiting for the Beautiful Prince to hatchet his way to her. So I rubbed on a little powder in the dark, shut my lovely eyes, and waited and wondered. I didn't know what was coming, of course, and was almost as much bluffed as anybody when the silly engine began to miss—yes, slowed down, and finally stopped in the pitchiest, inkiest, hobgoblinest place on the map, about seven miles from Ydle Wyld and ten from anywhere else!
