The Essential Elinor Glyn Collection. Glyn Elinor

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СКАЧАТЬ he was rather sorry he had let us go there because of that; but Octavia told him not to be ridiculous; experience is what we had come to America for, and this is one of the sights.

      After that we just had fun, going to a joss-house to have our fortunes told, where a quaint priest and acolyte went through all sorts of comic mysteries, and finally paired Octavia off with one of the detectives for her fate! (Tom was furious!) and me with Valerie's brother, and Gaston looked in despair at that! Then after buying curiosities at the curio shop, we returned to the automobiles and went to Delmonico's to supper. But the opium had got into our brains I think, for we could only tell gruesome stories, and all felt "afraid to go home in the dark!"

      And now, Mamma, in case you have been worrying over us going into awful places, I may as well tell you that at the end of supper our host informed us that the whole show of the opium den had been got up for our benefit, and was not the real thing at all!!! But whether this is true or no I can't say; if it was "got up" it was awfully well done, and I don't want to see any realler.

      We can't get enough "drawing-rooms" on the train for everybody to-morrow, so Octavia and I shall have one, and the senator and either Tom or the Vicomte the other, and whoever is left out will have to sleep in the general place. I believe it is too odd, but I will tell you all about it when I have seen it.--If Harry writes to you and asks about me, just say I am enjoying myself awfully, and say I am thinking of becoming a naturalised American! That ought to bring him back at once. I have been dying to cable and make it up with him, but of course as I have determined not to, I can't. I am sorry to hear Hurstbridge got under the piano and then banged the German Governess's head as she tried to pull him out; but what can you expect, Mamma? His temper is the image of Harry's.

      Kiss the angels for me, both of them!

      Your affectionate daughter,

      ELIZABETH.

      NIAGARA

      NIAGARA.

      DEAREST MAMMA,--We got here this morning after such a night!--The sleeping cars are too amusing. Picture to yourself the arrangement of seats I told you about going to the Spleists, with a piece put in between to make into a bed, and then another bed arranged on top, these going all down each side and just divided from the aisle by green curtains; so that if A. likes to take a top berth and B. an underneath one, they can bend over their edges, and chat together all night, and no one would know except for the bump in the curtains. But fancy having to crouch up and dress on one's bed! And when Octavia and I peeped out of our drawing-room this morning we saw heaps of unattractive looking arms and legs protruding, while the struggle to get into clothes was going on.

      A frightful thing happened to poor Agns. Tom's valet, who took our tickets, did not get enough, not understanding the ways, and Tom and the senator and the Vicomte had tossed up which two were to have the drawing-room, and Tom lost; so when Hopkins, who is a timid creature, found a berth did not mean a section, he of course gave up his without saying anything to Tom, and as the conductor told him there was not another on the train he wandered along and at last came to Agns's. She had a lower berth next our door, and was away undressing me. Hopkins says he thought it was an unoccupied one the conductor had overlooked, so he took it, and when Agns got back and crawled in in the dark she found him there!! There was a dreadful scene!! We heard Hopkins scream, and I believe he ran for his life, and no one knows where he slept.

      Agns said it was too ridiculous and "_trs mauvais gout_" on his part to make such a fuss over "_un petit accident de voyage." "Je puis assurer Madame la Marquise_," she said, "_que s'il tait rest c'eut t la mme chose. Son type ne me dit rien_!" At the same time she does not think these trains "_comme il faut_!"

      We were just in time for an early breakfast when we arrived at this hotel, and the quaintest coloured gentlemen waited on us; they were rather aged, and had a shambling way of dragging their feet, but the most sympathetic manners, just suited to the four honeymoon pairs who were seated at little tables round. That was a curious coincidence, wasn't it, Mamma, to find four pairs in one hotel in that state. None of the bridegrooms were over twenty-five, and the brides varied from about eighteen to twenty-eight; we got the senator to ask about them, and one lot had been married a week, and they each read a paper propped up against their cups, and did not speak much, and you would have thought they were quite indifferent; but from where I sat I could see their right and left hands clasped under the table! Another pair with a dour Scotch look ate an enormous meal in solemn silence, and then they went off and played tennis! Their wedding took place three days ago!! The third had been there a fortnight, and seemed very jaded and bored, while the last were mere children, and only married yesterday! She was too sweet, and got crimson when she poured out his tea, and asked him if he took sugar? I suppose up till now they had only been allowed nursery bread and milk.

      I don't believe I should like to have had my honeymoon breakfasts in public, would you, Mamma? Because I remember Harry always wanted--but I really must not let myself think of him or all my pride will vanish, and I shall not be able to resist cabling.

      I find the senator too attractive. He does not speak much generally, and never boasts of anything he has done. We have to drag stories out of him, but he must have had such a life, and I am sure there is some tragedy in his past connected with his wife. He has such a whimsical sense of humour, and yet underneath there is a ring of melancholy sometimes. I know he and I are going to be the greatest friends. Gaston is getting seriously in love, which is perfectly ridiculous; he almost threatened to throw himself into the falls when we went to look at them; but fortunately I said only the very curly-haired could look well when picked up drowned, so that put him off.

      I was not half so impressed with the falls as I ought to have been. They don't seem so high as in the pictures, and the terrible buildings on one side distract one so it seems as if even the water can't be natural, and must be just arranged by machinery. But it was fun going under them, and those oilskin coats and caps are most becoming. You go down in a lift and then walk along passages scooped out of the rock until you are underneath the volume of water, which pours over in front of you like a curtain. It was here Gaston suggested his suicide, and all because I had told the senator that he was to arrange for us to have a drive alone in the afternoon, and he overheard in the echo the place makes. I had never asked him to drive alone he said, and I said, certainly not, the senator and I would talk philosophy, whereas he would make love to me, I knew, and it would not be safe. That pacified him a good deal, and as I had been rather unsympathetic and horrid all the morning, I was lovely to him for the rest of the day; and he is really quite a dear, Mamma, as I have always told you.

      Octavia says she thinks it rather hard my grabbing everybody like this, and she had wanted the senator for herself on our trip, so we have agreed to share him, and Tom says it is mean no one has been asked for him. So the senator has wired to "Lola" to bring two cousins to meet us at Los Angeles. He says they are the sweetest girls in the world, and would keep anyone alive. I am rather longing to get there and begin our fun. After the falls we did the rapids, and they impressed me far more deeply; they are rushing, wicked-looking things if you like, Mamma, and how anyone ever swam them I can't imagine. The spring is all too beautiful, only just beginning, and some of the bends of the river and views are exquisite. I felt quite romantic on the way back, and allowed Gaston to repeat poetry to me. We are just starting to get on to Chicago, so good-bye, dear Mamma.

      Love from your affectionate daughter,

      ELIZABETH.

      P.S.--Octavia says she thinks I am leading Gaston on, but I don't, do you, Mamma? Considering I stop him every time he begins any long sentence about love--what more can I do, eh?

      CHICAGO.

      CHICAGO.

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