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Beautiful Lady-Booth Tarkington · Maggie, A Girl of the Streets

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  Speaker 1: Chapter one of The Beautiful Lady. This is a LibriVox recording.
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  Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
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  Speaker 1: information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording
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  Speaker 1: by Rita Boutros. The Beautiful Lady by Booth Tarkington, Chapter one.
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  Speaker 1: Nothing could have been more painful to my sensitiveness than
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  Speaker 1: to occupy myself, confused with blushes at the center of
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  Speaker 1: the whole world, as a living advertisement of the least
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  Speaker 1: amusing ballet in Paris. To be the day's sensation of
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  Speaker 1: the boulevards, one must possess an eccentricity of appearance conceived
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  Speaker 1: by nothing short of genius, and my misfortunes had reduced
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  Speaker 1: me to present such to all eyes seeking mirth. It
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  Speaker 1: was not that I was one of those people in
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  Speaker 1: uniform who carry placards and strange figures upon their backs,
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  Speaker 1: nor that my coat was of rags. On the contrary,
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  Speaker 1: my whole costume was delicately rich and well chosen, of
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  Speaker 1: soft gray and fine linen, such as you see worn
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  Speaker 1: by a marquis at the passage at Autuille, according well
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  Speaker 1: with my usual air and countenance sometimes esteemed to resemble
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  Speaker 1: my father's, which were not wanting in distinction. To add
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  Speaker 1: to this, my duties were not exhausting to the body.
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  Speaker 1: I was required only to sit without a hat from
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  Speaker 1: ten of the morning to mid day, and from four
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  Speaker 1: until seven in the afternoon, at one of the small
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  Speaker 1: tables under the awning of the Cafe de la pei,
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  Speaker 1: at the corner of the place de l'aperis, that is
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  Speaker 1: to say, the center of the inhabited world. In the morning,
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  Speaker 1: I drank my coffee hot in the cup. In the
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  Speaker 1: afternoon I sipped it cold in the glass. I spoke
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  Speaker 1: to no one. Not a glance or a gesture of
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  Speaker 1: mine passed to attract notice. Yet I was the center
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  Speaker 1: of that center of the world. All day. The crowds
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  Speaker 1: surrounded me, laughing loudly, all the voyeus, making those jokes
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  Speaker 1: for which I found no repartee. The pavement was sometimes blocked.
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  Speaker 1: The passing coachmen stood up in their boxes to look
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  Speaker 1: over at me. Small infants were elevated on shoulders to
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  Speaker 1: behold me. Not the gravest or most sorrowful came by
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  Speaker 1: without stopping to gaze at me and go away with
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  Speaker 1: rejoicing faces. The boulevards rang to their laughter. All Paris laughed.
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  Speaker 1: For seven days. I sat there at the appointed times,
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  Speaker 1: meeting the eye of nobody, and lifting my coffee with
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  Speaker 1: fingers which trembled with embarrassment at this too great conspicuousity.
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  Speaker 1: Those mournful hours passed one by the year, while the
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  Speaker 1: idling bourgeois and the travelers made ridicule, and the rabble
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  Speaker 1: exhausted all effort to draw plays of wit from me.
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  Speaker 1: I have told do that I carried no placard, that
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  Speaker 1: my costume was elegant, my demeanor modest in all degree.
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  Speaker 1: How then this excitement would be your disposition to inquire
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  Speaker 1: why this sensation? It is very simple. My hair had
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  Speaker 1: been shaved off all over my ears, leaving only a
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  Speaker 1: little above the back of the neck, to give an
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  Speaker 1: appearance of far reaching baldness. And on my head was
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  Speaker 1: painted in ah so brilliant letters of distinctness tiat fallI
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  Speaker 1: rouge revue de partin to les sois such was the
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  Speaker 1: necessity to which I was at that time reduced. One
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  Speaker 1: has heard that the North Americans invent the most singular advertising,
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  Speaker 1: But I will not believe they surpassed the Parisian myself,
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  Speaker 1: I say, I cannot express my sufferings under the notation
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  Speaker 1: of the crowds that moved about the Cafe de l'a pei.
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  Speaker 1: The French are a terrible people. When they lie sincerely,
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  Speaker 1: it is not so much the amusing things which cause
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  Speaker 1: them amusement. It is often the strange, those contrasts which
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  Speaker 1: contain something horrible. And when they laugh, there is too
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  Speaker 1: frequently some person who is uncomfortable or wicked. I am
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  Speaker 1: glad that I was born not a Frenchman. I should
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  Speaker 1: regret to be native to a country where they invent
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  Speaker 1: such things as I was doing in the place de l'opres.
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  Speaker 1: For as I tell you, the idea was not mine.
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  Speaker 1: As I sat with my eyes drooping before the gaze
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  Speaker 1: of my terrible and applauding audiences, how I mentally formed
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  Speaker 1: cursing words against the day when my misfortunes led me
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  Speaker 1: to apply at the Teat Folirouge for work. I had
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  Speaker 1: expected an audition and a role of comedy in the review,
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  Speaker 1: for perhaps lacking any experience of the stage, I am
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  Speaker 1: a Neapolitan by birth, though a resident of the continent
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  Speaker 1: at large since the age of fifteen. All Neapolitans can act.
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  Speaker 1: All are actors comedians of the greatest, as every traveler
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  Speaker 1: is cognisant. There is a thing in the air of
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  Speaker 1: our beautiful slopes which makes the people of a great instinctive,
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  Speaker 1: musicalness and deceptiveness, with passions like those burning in the
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  Speaker 1: old mountain we have there. They are ready to play,
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  Speaker 1: to sing, or to explode, yet imitating that amusing vesuvio.
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  Speaker 1: They never do this last when you are in expectancy,
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  Speaker 1: or as a spectator hopeful of it. How could any
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  Speaker 1: person wonder then, that I, finding myself suddenly destitute in Paris,
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  Speaker 1: should apply at the theaters one after another. I saw
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  Speaker 1: myself no farther than the director's door, until, having had
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  Speaker 1: no more to eat the day preceding than three green almonds,
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  Speaker 1: which I took from a cart while the good female
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  Speaker 1: was not looking, I reached the folly rouge. Here I
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  Speaker 1: was astonished to find a polite reception from the director.
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  Speaker 1: It eventuated that they wished for a person appearing like myself,
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  Speaker 1: a person whom they would outfit with close up quality
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  Speaker 1: in all parts, whose external presented a gentleman of the
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  Speaker 1: great world, not merely of one the gallant Yuo mini,
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  Speaker 1: but who would impart an air to a table at
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  Speaker 1: a cafe where he might sit and partake. The contrast
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  Speaker 1: of this with the emplacement of the establishment on his
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  Speaker 1: bald headtop was to be the success of the idea.
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  Speaker 1: It was plain that I had no baldness, my hair
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  Speaker 1: being very thick, and I but twenty four years of age.
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  Speaker 1: When it was explained that my hair could be shaved,
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  Speaker 1: they asked me to accept alas not a part in
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  Speaker 1: the review, but a specialty as a sandwich man. Knowing
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  Speaker 1: the English tongue as I do, I may afford the
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  Speaker 1: venturesomeness to play upon it a little. I asked for bread,
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  Speaker 1: and they offered me not a roll, but a sandwich.
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  Speaker 1: It must be undoubted that I possessed not the disposition
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  Speaker 1: to make any fun with my accomplishments. During those days
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  Speaker 1: that I spent under the awning of the Cafe de
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  Speaker 1: la Pey. I had consented to be the advertisement in
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  Speaker 1: greatest desperation and not considering what the reality would be.
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  Speaker 1: Having consented, honor compelled that I fulfill to the ending. Also,
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  Speaker 1: the costume and outfittings I wore were part of my
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  Speaker 1: emuliument they had been constructed for me by the finest tailor.
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  Speaker 1: And though I had impulses often to leap up and
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  Speaker 1: fight through the noisy ones about me and run far
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  Speaker 1: to the open country, the very garments I wore were fetters,
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  Speaker 1: binding me to remain and suffer. It seemed to me
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  Speaker 1: that the hours were spent not in the center of
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  Speaker 1: a ring of human persons, but of unwell made pantaloons
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  Speaker 1: and ugly skirts. Yet all of these pantaloons and skirts
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  Speaker 1: had such scrutinous eyes and expressions of mirth, to laugh
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  Speaker 1: like demons at my conscious, burning painted head eyes which
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  Speaker 1: spread out astonished at the sight of me, and peered
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  Speaker 1: and winked and grinned from the big wrinkles above the
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  Speaker 1: gaiters of Zoave, from the red breeches of the gendarmes,
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  Speaker 1: the knickerbockers of the cyclists, the white ducks of Sargent
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  Speaker 1: de Ville, and the knees of the boulevardiers bagged with
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  Speaker 1: sitting cross legged at the little tables. I could not
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  Speaker 1: escape these eyes, how scornfully they twinkled at me from
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  Speaker 1: the spurred and glittering officer's boots, how with a maze
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  Speaker 1: from the American and English trousers, both turned up and
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  Speaker 1: creased like folded paper, both with some dislike for each other,
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  Speaker 1: but for all other traps More. It was only at
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  Speaker 1: such times, when the mortifications to appear so greatly embarrassed
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  Speaker 1: became stronger than the embarrassment itself, that I could, by
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  Speaker 1: will power, force my head to a straight construction and
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  Speaker 1: look out upon my spectators firmly. On the second day
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  Speaker 1: of my ordeal, so facing the laughers, I found myself
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  Speaker 1: facing straight into the monocle of my half brother and
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  Speaker 1: ill wisher, Prince Caravaccioli. At this my agitation was sudden
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  Speaker 1: and very great, for there was no one I wished
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  Speaker 1: to prevent perceiving my condition more than that old Antonio Caravicioli.
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  Speaker 1: I had not known that he was in Paris, but
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  Speaker 1: I could have no doubt it was himself. The monocle,
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  Speaker 1: the handsome nose, the two pay, the yellow skin, the
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  Speaker 1: dyed black mustache, the splendid height. It was indeed Caravicioli.
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  Speaker 1: He was customed for the automobile, and threw but one
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  Speaker 1: glance at me as he crossed the pavement to his car,
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  Speaker 1: which was in waiting there was no change, not of
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  Speaker 1: the faintest in that frosted, tragic mask of a countenance.
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  Speaker 1: And I was glad to think that he had not
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  Speaker 1: recognized me. And yet how strange that I should care,
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  Speaker 1: since all his life he had declined to recognize me
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  Speaker 1: as what I was. Ah, I should have been glad
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  Speaker 1: to shout his age, his dyes, his artificialities to all
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  Speaker 1: the crowd, so to touch him where it would most
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  Speaker 1: pain him. For was he not the vainest man in
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  Speaker 1: the whole world? How well I knew his vulnerable point,
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  Speaker 1: the monstrous depth of his vanity, in that pretense of youth,
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  Speaker 1: which he preserved through superhuman pains and a genius of
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  Speaker 1: a valet. Most excellently, I had much to pay Antonio
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  Speaker 1: for myself, more for my father, most for my mother.
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  Speaker 1: This was why that last of the world, I would
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  Speaker 1: have wished that old fortune hunter to know how far
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  Speaker 1: I had been reduced. Then I rejoiced about that change
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  Speaker 1: which my unreal baldness produced in me, giving me a
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  Speaker 1: look of forty years instead of twenty four, so that
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  Speaker 1: my oldest friend must take at least three stairs to
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  Speaker 1: know me. Also, my costume would disguise me from the
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  Speaker 1: few acquaintances I had in Paris, if they chanced to
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  Speaker 1: cross the Seine, as they had only seen me in
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  Speaker 1: the shabbiest while at my last meeting with Antonio, I
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  Speaker 1: had been as fine in the coat as now. Yet
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  Speaker 1: my encouragement was not so joyful that my gaze lifted often.
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  Speaker 1: On the very last day, in the afternoon, when my
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  Speaker 1: observances were most and noisiest, I lifted my eyes but
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  Speaker 1: once during the final half hour. But such a one
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  Speaker 1: that was the edge of that beautiful gray ponge skirt
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  Speaker 1: came upon the lid of my lowered eyelid, like a
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  Speaker 1: cool shadow over hot sand. A sergeant had just made
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  Speaker 1: many of the people move away, so there remained only
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  Speaker 1: a thin ring of the laughing pantaloons about me. When
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  Speaker 1: this divine skirt presented its apparition to me, A pair
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  Speaker 1: of North American trousers accompanied it, turned up to show
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  Speaker 1: the ankle bones of a rich pair of stockings. Neat, enthusiastic,
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  Speaker 1: and humorous. I judged them to be, for as one
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  Speaker 1: may discover my only amusement during my martyrdom. If this
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  Speaker 1: misery can be said to possess such alleviatings had been
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  Speaker 1: the study of feet, pantaloons, and skirts. The trousers, in
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  Speaker 1: this case detained my observation no time. They were but
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  Speaker 1: the darkest corner of the chiescuro of a Rembrandt. The
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  Speaker 1: mellow glow of gold was all across the gray skirt.
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  Speaker 1: How shall I explain myself? How make myself understood? Shall
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  Speaker 1: I be thought sentimentalistic or but mad? When I declare
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  Speaker 1: that my first sight of the gray pongee skirt caused
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  Speaker 1: me a thrill of excitation, of tenderness, and oh ay, me,
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  Speaker 1: of self consciousness more acute than all my former mortifications.
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  Speaker 1: It was so very different from all other skirts that
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  Speaker 1: had shown themselves to me those sad days. And you
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  Speaker 1: may understand that though the pantaloons far outnumbered the skirts,
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  Speaker 1: many hundreds of the latter had also been objects of
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  Speaker 1: my gloomy observation. This skirt, so unlike those which had passed,
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  Speaker 1: presented at once the qualifications of its superiority. It had
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  Speaker 1: been constructed by an artist, and it was worn by
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  Speaker 1: a lady. It did not pine, it did not droop.
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  Speaker 1: There was no more an atom of hanging too much
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  Speaker 1: than that was a portion in flat by flamboyancy. It
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  Speaker 1: did not assert itself, It bore notice without seeking it
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  Speaker 1: plain but exquisite. It was that great rarity, goodness made charming.
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  Speaker 1: The peregrination of the American trousers suddenly stopped as they
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  Speaker 1: caught sight of me, and that precious skirt paused precisely
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  Speaker 1: in opposition to my little table. I heard a voice
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  Speaker 1: that to which the skirt pertained. It spoke the English,
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  Speaker 1: but not in the manner of the inhabitants of London,
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  Speaker 1: who seemed to sing undistinguishably in their talking, although they
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  Speaker 1: are comprehensible to each other. To an Italian, it seems
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  Speaker 1: that many North Americans and English seek too often the
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  Speaker 1: assistance of the nose in talking, though in different manners,
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  Speaker 1: each equally unagreeable to our ears. The intelligent among our
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  Speaker 1: Lazzaroni of Naples, who beg from tourists, imitate this with
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  Speaker 1: the purpose of reminding the generous traveler of his home
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  Speaker 1: in such a way to soften his heart. But there
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  Speaker 1: is some difference. The Italian, the Frenchman or German who
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  Speaker 1: learns English, sometimes misunderstands the American the Englishman. He sometimes
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  Speaker 1: understands this voice that spoke, was North American. Ah, what
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  Speaker 1: a voice, sweet as the mandolins of Sorrento, clear as
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  Speaker 1: the bells of Capri to hear it was I coming
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  Speaker 1: upon sight of the almond blossoms of Sicily for the
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  Speaker 1: first time, or the tulip fields of Holland. Never before
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  Speaker 1: was such a voice. Why did you stop rufus? It said, Look,
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  Speaker 1: replied the American trousers, so that I knew the pongee
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  Speaker 1: lady had not observed me of herself. Instantaneously there was
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  Speaker 1: an exclamation, and a pretty gray parasol closed fell at
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  Speaker 1: my feet. It was not the pleasantest to be an
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  Speaker 1: object which causes people to be startled when they behold you.
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  Speaker 1: But I blessed the agitation of this lady, for what
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  Speaker 1: caused her parasol to fall from her hand was a
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  Speaker 1: start of pity. Ah, she cried the poor man. She
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  Speaker 1: had perceived that I was a gentleman. I bent myself
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  Speaker 1: forward and lifted the parasol. Though not my eyes I
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  Speaker 1: could not have looked up into the face above me
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  Speaker 1: to be Caesar. Two hands came down into the circle
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  Speaker 1: of my observation. One of these was that belonging to
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  Speaker 1: the trousers, thin, long and white. The other was the
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  Speaker 1: gray gloved hand of the lady, And never had I
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  Speaker 1: seen such a hand, the hand of an angel in
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  Speaker 1: a suede glove, as the gray skirt was the mantle
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  Speaker 1: of a saint made by Dusat. I speak of saints
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  Speaker 1: and angels, and to the large world these may sound
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  Speaker 1: like cold words. It is only in Italy where some
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  Speaker 1: people are found to adore them. Still, I lifted the
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  Speaker 1: peril saw toward that glove, as I would have moved
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  Speaker 1: to set a candle on an altar. Then at a
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  Speaker 1: thought I placed it not in the glove, but in
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  Speaker 1: the thin hand of the gentleman. At the same time,
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  Speaker 1: the voice of the lady spoke to me. I was
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  Speaker 1: to have the joy of remembering that this voice had
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  Speaker 1: spoken four words to me. Javu le meercy monsieur, it said,
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  Speaker 1: pas decois, I murmured the American trousers in a loud tone,
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: made reference in the idiom to my miserable head. Did
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  Speaker 1: you ever see anything to beat it? The beautiful voice answered,
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  Speaker 1: And by the gentleness of her sorrow for me, I
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  Speaker 1: knew she had no thought that I might understand. Come away,
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  Speaker 1: it is too pitiful. Then the gray skirt and the
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  Speaker 1: little round toed shoes beneath it passed from my sight,
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  Speaker 1: quickly hidden from me by the increasing crowd. Yet I
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  Speaker 1: heard the voice a moment more, but fragmentary. Don't you
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  Speaker 1: see how ashamed he is, how he must have been
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  Speaker 1: starving before he did that, or that someone dependent on
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  Speaker 1: him needed. I caught no more. But the sweetness that
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  Speaker 1: this beautiful lady understood and felt for the poor absurd
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  Speaker 1: wretch was so great that I could have wept. I
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  Speaker 1: had not seen her face, I had not looked up
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  Speaker 1: even when she went. Who is she cried a scoundrel voyeu,
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  Speaker 1: just as she turned Madam of the parasol, a friend
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  Speaker 1: of Monsieur of the ornamented head. No, it is the
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  Speaker 1: first lady in waiting to his wife. Madame la Duchesse,
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  Speaker 1: answered a second. She has been sent with an equerry
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  Speaker 1: to demand of monseigneur if he does not wish a
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: little sculpture upon his dome as well as the colored decorations.
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  Speaker 1: Tis true, my ancient. Another asked of me. I made
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  Speaker 1: no repartee, continuing to sit with my chin dependent upon
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  Speaker 1: my cravat, but with things not the same in my
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  Speaker 1: heart as formerly to the arrival of that gray pongee,
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  Speaker 1: the gray glove and the beautiful voice. Since King Charles
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  Speaker 1: the Mad in Paris, no one has been completely free
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  Speaker 1: from lunacy. While the springtime is happening, there is something
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  Speaker 1: in the sun and the banks of the Seine. The
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  Speaker 1: Parisians drink sweet and fruity champagne because the good wines
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  Speaker 1: are already in their veins. These Parisians are born intoxicated
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  Speaker 1: and remained so it is not fair play to require
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  Speaker 1: them to be like other human people. Their deepest feeling
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  Speaker 1: is for the arts, and as everyone had declared, they
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: are farseeurs in their tragedies, tragic in their comedies. They
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  Speaker 1: prepare the last epigram in the tumbril. They drown themselves
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  Speaker 1: with enthusiasm about the alliance with Russia. In death, they
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  Speaker 1: are witty. In war, they have poetic spasms. In love,
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  Speaker 1: they are mad. The strangest of all this is that
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  Speaker 1: it is not only the Parisians who are the insane ones.
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  Speaker 1: In Paris, the visitors are none of them in behavior.
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  Speaker 1: As elsewhere, you have only to go there to become
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  Speaker 1: as lunatic as the rest. Many travelers, when they have departed,
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  Speaker 1: remember the events they have caused there, as a person
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  Speaker 1: remembers in the morning what he has said in thought
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  Speaker 1: in the moonlight of the night. In Paris, it is
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  Speaker 1: moonlight even in the morning, and in Paris one falls
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  Speaker 1: in love even more strangely than by moonlight. It is
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  Speaker 1: a place of glimpses. A veil fluttering from a motor car,
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  Speaker 1: a little lace handkerchief fallen from a victoria, a figure
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  Speaker 1: crossing a lighted window, a black hat vanishing in the
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  Speaker 1: distance of the avenues of the Tuileries. A young man
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  Speaker 1: writes a ballad and dreams over a bit of lace.
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  Speaker 1: Was I not then one of the least extravagant of
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  Speaker 1: this mad people? Men have fallen in love with photographs,
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  Speaker 1: those greatest of liars. Was I so wild then to
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  Speaker 1: adore this gray skirt, this small shoe, this divine glove,
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  Speaker 1: the golden honey voice of all in Paris, the only
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  Speaker 1: one to pity and to understand, even to love the
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  Speaker 1: mystery of that lady, and to build my dreams upon it,
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: to love all the more because of the mystery. Mystery
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: is the last word and the completing charm to a
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: young man's passion. Few sonnets have been written to wives
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: whose matrimony is more than five years of age? Is
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: it not so? End of chapter one, Chapter two The
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: Beautiful Lady by Booth Tarkington read for LibriVox dot Org
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: by Rita Boutros, Chapter two. When my hour was finished,
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: and I in liberty to leave that horrible corner, I
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: pushed out of the crowd and walked down the boulevard,
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: my hat covering my sin, and went quickly to be
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: in love with my mystery. I thought that was a
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: strange happiness. It was enough, it was romance. To hear
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: a voice which speaks two sentences of pity and silver
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: is to have a chime of bells and the heart.
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: But to have a shaven head is to be a monk,
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: And to have a shaven head with a sign painted
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: upon it is to be a pariah. Alas I was
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: a person whom the Parisians laughed at, not with Now
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: that at last my martyrdom was concluded, I had some shuddering,
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: as when one places in his mouth a morsel of
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: unexpected flavor. I wondered where I had found the courage
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: to bear it, and how I had resisted hurling myself
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: into the river, though as is known, that is no
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: longer safe, for most of those who attempted are at
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: once rescued, arrested, fined, and imprisoned for throwing bodies into
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: the Seine, which is forbidden at the theater. The Frightful
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: badge was removed from my headtop, and I was given
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: three hundred francs the price of my shame refusing an
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: offer to repeat the performance during the following week. To
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: imagine such a thing made me a choking in my throat,
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: and I left the bureau in some sickness. This increased
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: so much as I approached the Madeleine, where I wished
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: to mount an omnibus, that I entered a restaurant and
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: drank a small glass of cognac. Then I called for
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: writing papers and wrote to the Good Mother's Superior and
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: my dear little nieces. At their convent, I enclosed two
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: hundred and fifty francs, which some I had fallen behind
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: in my payments for their education and sustenance, and I
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: felt a moment's happiness that at least for a while,
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: I need not fear that my poor brother's orphans might
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: become objects of charity, a fear which, accompanied by my
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: own hunger, had led me to become the joke of
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: the boulevards. Feeling rich with my remaining fifty francs, I
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: ordered the waiter to bring me a gulache and a
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: caraffe of blonde beer, after the consummation of which I
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: spent an hour in the reading of a newspaper. Can
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: it be credited that the journal of my perusement was
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: the one which may be called the North American paper
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: of the aristocracies of Europe. Also it contained some names
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: of the people of the United States at the hotels
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: and elsewhere. How eagerly I scanned those singular columns. Shall
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: I confess to what purpose? I read the long lists
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: of uncontinental names over and over. But I lingered not
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: all upon those like Muriel, Hermione, Violet and sybyl nor Over, Balthurst, Scuffington,
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: Sligo and Covering leg No. My search was for the
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: Sades and Mamie's, the Thompson's, Van Duzen's, and Brady's. In
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: that lies my preposterous secret. You will see to what
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: infatuation those words of pity, that sense of a beautiful
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: presence had led me to fall in love. Must one
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: behold a face? Yes, at thirty, At twenty, when one
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: is something of a poet, no, it is sufficient to
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: see a gray pongee skirt. At fifty, when one is
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: a philosopher, no, it is enough to perceive a soul.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: I had done both. I had seen the skirt, I
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: had perceived the soul. Therefore, while hungry, I neglected my
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: gulash to read these lists of names of the United
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: States again and again, only that I might have the thought,
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: though I knew not which might be this lady's, and
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: that in so infinitismal a degree I had been near her. Again,
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: will it be estimated extreme imbecility in me when I
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: ventured the additional confession that I felt a great warmth
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: and tenderness toward the possessors of all these names, as being,
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: if not herself, at least her compatriots. I am now
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: brought to the admission that before today I had experienced
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: some prejudices against the inhabitants of the North American Republic,
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: though not on account of great experience of my own.
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: A year previously I had made a disastrous excursion to
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: Monte Carlo in the company of a young gentleman of
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: London who had been for several weeks in New York
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: and Washington and Boston, and appeared to know very much
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: of the country. He was never anything but tired in
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: speaking of it, and told me a great amount. He
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: said many times that in the hotels there was never
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: a concierge or portier to give you information where to
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: discover the best vaudeville. There was no concierge at all
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: in New York itself. My friend told me a faccino
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: or species of porter, or some such good, for nothing
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: had said to him, including a slap on the shoulder, Well, brother,
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: did you receive your delayed luggage correctly? In this instance,
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: my studies of the North American idiom led me to
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: believe that my friend was intentionally truthful in regard to
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: the principalities, but mistaken in his observation of detail. He
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: declared the recent willingness of the English to take some
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: interest in the United Statesians to be a mistake, for
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: there were noisy without real confidence in themselves. They were
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: restless and merely imitative instead of inventive. He told me
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: that he was not exceptional. All Englishmen had thought similarly
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: for fifty or sixty years. Therefore, naturally his opinion carried
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: great weight with me and myself. To my astonishment, I
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: had often seen parties of these Republicans become all ears
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: and whispers when somebody called a prince or a countess.
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: Passed by their reverence for age itself in anything but
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: a horse had often surprised me by its artlessness. And
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: of all strange things in the world, I have heard
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: them admire old customs and old families. It was strange
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: to me to listen, when I had believed that their
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: land was the only one where happily no person need
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: worry to remember who had been his great grandfather. The
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: greatest of my own had not saved me from the
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: decoration of the past week. Yet he was as much
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: mine as he was Antonio Caravacciolis. And Antonio, though impoverished,
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: had his motor car and dined well, since I happened
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: to in my perusal of the journal that he had
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: been to dinner the evening before at the English embassy
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: with a great company. Bravo, Antonio, find a rich foreign
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: wife if you can, since you cannot do well for
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: yourself at home, And I could say so honestly, without
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: spite for all his hatred of me, because until I
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: had paid my addition, I was still the possessor of
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: fifty francs. Fifty francs will continue life in the body
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: of a judicial person. A long time in Paris, and
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: combining that knowledge and the good Gulash, I sought diligently
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: for Maimi's and Sades with a revived spirit, I found
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: neither of those adorable names. In fact, only two such diminutives,
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: which are more charming than our Italian ones, a Miss
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: Genie Archibald's Zip and a Miss Fanny Suitor. None of
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: the names was harmonious with the gray pongee. In truth,
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: most of them were no prettier, however less processional than
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: royal names. I could not please myself that I had
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: come closer to the rare lady. I must be contented
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: that the same sky covered us, both, that the noise
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: of the same city rang in her ears as mine.
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: Yet that was a satisfaction, and to know that it
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: was true gave me mysterious breathlessness and made me hear
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: fragments of old songs during my walk that night I
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: walked very far under the trees of the bois, where
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: I stopped for a few moments to smoke a cigarette
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: at one of the tables outside at armiginan Ville. None
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: of the laughing women there could be the lady I sought,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: and as my refusing to command anything caused the waiter uneasiness,
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: in spite of my prosperous appearance, I remained but a
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: few moments, then trudged on all the long way to
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: the Cafe de Metelides, where also she was not How
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: did I assure myself of this? Since I had not
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: seen her face, I cannot tell you. Perhaps I should
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: not have known her, but that night I was sure
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: that I should, yes, as sure of that as I
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: was sure that she was beautiful. End of chapter two,
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: Chapter three of The Beautiful Lady by Booth Tarkenton, read
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: for LibriVox dot Org by Rita Boutros. Early the whole
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: of the next day, endeavoring to look preoccupied, I haunted
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: the lobbies and vicinity of the most expensive hotels, unable
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: to do any other thing, but ashamed of myself that
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: I had not returned to my former task of seeking employment.
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: Although still reassured by possession of two louis and some silver,
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: I dined well at a one franc coachman's restaurant. My
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: elegance created not the slightest surprise, and I felt that
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: I might live in this way indefinitely. However, dreams often
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: conclude abruptly, and two louis always do, as I found
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: several days later, when, after paying the rent for my
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: unspeakable lodging and lending twenty francs to a poor, bad
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: painter whom I knew and whose wife was ill, I
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: found myself with the choice of obtaining funds on my
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: finery or not eating, either of which I was very
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: loath to do. It is not essential for me to
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: tell any person that when you seek a position, it
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: is better that you appear not too greatly in need
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: of it. And my former garments had prejudiced many against me,
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: I fear, because they had been patched by a friendly concierge.
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: Pantaloons suffer as terribly as do antiques from two obvious restorations.
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: And while I was only grateful to the good woman's needle,
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: except upon one accoussi when she forgot to remove it,
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: my costume had reached at last great sympathies for the
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: shade of Praxateles, feeling the same melancholy over original intentions
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: so far misrepresented by renewals. Therefore, I determined to preserve
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: my fineries to the uttermost. And it was fortunate that
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: I did so, because, after dining for three nights upon
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: nothing but looking out of my window, the fourth morning
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: brought me a letter from my English friend. I had
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: written to him asking if he knew of any people
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: who wished to pay a salary to a young man
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: who knew how to do nothing. I place his reply
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: in direct annexation Henrietta Street, Cavendish Square, May fourteenth, My
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: dear aunt Selini, why haven't you made some of your
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: relatives do something? I understand that they do not like you,
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: neither do my own. But after our crupper at Monte Carlo,
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: what could mine do except provide if a few pounds
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: precious few, I fear be of any service to you.
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: Let me know in the meantime if you are serious
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: about a position, I may preposterously enough set you in
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: the way of it. There is an old thundering Yankee
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: here whom I met in the States, and who believed
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: me a god, because I am the nephew of my
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: awful uncle, for whose career he has ever had, it
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: appears a lifelong admiration, Sir. Now, by chance meeting this
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: person in the street, it developed that he had need
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: of a man precisely such a one as you are,
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: not a sober tutorish, middle aged, dissenting parson to trot
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: about the continent tied to a dancing bear. It is
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: the old gentleman's cub, who is a species of caliban
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: in fine linen, and who has taken a few too
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: many liberties in the land of the free. In fact,
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: I believe he is much a youth of my own kind,
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: with similar admiration for Baccarah and good sellers. His father
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: must return at once, and has decided the cub's native
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: heath and friends being too wild, to leave him in
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: charge of a proper guide, philosopher, courier, chaplain and friend,
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: if such can be found, the same required to travel
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: with the cub and keep him out of mischief. I
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: thought of your letter directly, and I have given you
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: the most tremendous recommendation. Part of it quite true, I suspect,
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: though I am not a judge of learning. I explained, however,
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: that you are a master of languages, of elegant those
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: subdued deportment, and I extolled at length your saintly habits. Altogether,
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: I fear there may have been too much of the
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: virtuoso in my interpretation of you. Few would have recognized
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: from it the gentleman who closed a table at Monte Carlo,
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: and afterwards was closed himself in the handsome and spectacular fashion.
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: I remember with both delight and regret. Briefly I lied
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: like a master. He almost had me. In the matter
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: of your age, it was important that you should be
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: middle aged. I swore that you were at least thirty eight,
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: but owing to exemplary habits, looked very much younger. The
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: Cub himself is twenty four. Hence, if you are really
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: serious and determined not to appeal to your people, call
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: at once upon mister Lampert r. Poor of the Hotel Dienna.
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: He is the father, and the Cub is with him.
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: The elder Yankee is primed with my praises of you,
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: and must engage someone at once. As he sails in
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: a day or two, go with my blessing an air
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: of piety and as much age as you can assume.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: When the father has departed, Throw the cub into the sin,
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: but preserve his pocket book, and we shall have another
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: go at those infernal tables. Valet j g. S. I
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: found myself smiling, I fear miserably over this kind letter,
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: especially at the wonder of my friend that I had
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: not appealed to my relatives. The only ones who would
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: have liked to help me if they had known I
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: needed something, were my two little nieces, who were in
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: my own care, because my father, being but a poet,
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: had no family, and my mother had lost hers, even
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: her eldest son, by marrying my father. After that, they
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: could have nothing to do with her. Nor were they
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: asked that rascally old Antonio was now the head of
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: all the Caravaccioli, as was I of my own outcast
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: branch of our house, that is, of my two little
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: nieces and myself. It was partly of these poor infants
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: I had thought when I took what was left of
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: my small inheritance to Monte Carlo, hoping since I seemed
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: to be incapable of increasing it in any other way,
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: that number seventeen and black would hand me over a
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: fortune as a waiter does whine. Alas, luck is not
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: always a fool's servant, and the kind of fortune she
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: handed me was of that species the waiter brings you
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: in the other bottle of champagne, the gold of a
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: bubbling brain, lasting an hour. After this, there was always
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: something evil to one's head, and mine, alas, was shaved
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: half an hour after I had read the letter. The
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: little paper flower makers in the attic window across from
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: mine may have seen me shaving it without pleasure. Again,
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: what else was I to do? I could not well
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: expect to be given the guardianship of an erring young man.
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: If I presented myself to his parent as a gentleman
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: who had been sitting at the Cafe de la Pee
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: with his head painted. I could not wear my hat
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: through the interview. I could not exhibit the thick five
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: days stubble to appear in contrast with the heavy fringe
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: that had been spared. I could not trim the fringe
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: to the shortness of the stubble. I should have looked
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: like pierrot. I had only then to remain bald, And
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: if I obtained the post to shaven secret a harmless
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: and mournful imposition. It was well for me that I
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: came to this determination. I believe it was the appearance
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: of maturity which my head and dining upon thoughts lent me,
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: as much as my friend's praises, which created my success.
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: With the amiable mister Lambert R. Poor, I witnessed that
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: my visit to him provided one of the most astonishing
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: interviews of my life. He was an instance of those
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: strange beings of the Western Republic, at whom we are
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: perhaps too prone to pass from one of ourselves to another,
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: the secret smile because of some little imperfections of manner.
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: It is a type which has grown more and more
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: familiar to us, yet never less strange. The man in
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: costly but severe costume, big with a necessary great waistcoat,
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: not noticing the loudness of his own voice, as ignorant
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: of the thousand tiny things which we observe and feel
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: as he would be careless of them, except for his wife,
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: if he knew. We laugh at him, sometimes even to
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: his face, and he does not perceive it. We are
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: a little afraid that he is too large to see it,
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: hence too large for us to comprehend and in spite
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: of our laughter, we are always conscious of a force, yes,
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: of a presence. We jeer slyly, but we respect fear
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: a little, and would trust. Such was my patron. He
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: met me with a kind greeting, looked at me very earnestly,
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: but smiling, as if he understood my good intentions, as
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: one understands the friendliness of a capering poodle, yet in
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: such a way that I could not feel resentment, for
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: I could see that he looked at almost everyone in
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: the same fashion. My friend had done wonders for me,
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: and I made the best account of myself that I could,
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: so that within half an hour it was arranged that
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: I should take charge of his son with an honorarium,
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: which gave me great rejoicing for my nieces and my
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: accumulated appetite. I think I can pick men, he said,
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: and I think that you are the man I want.
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: You're old enough, and you've seen enough, and you know
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: enough to keep one fool boy in order for six months.
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: So frankly he spoke of his son, yet not without
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: affection and confidence. Before I left, he sent for the
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: youth himself, Lambert, our poor junior, not at all a caliban,
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: but a most excellent, appearing, tall gentleman of astonishingly meek countenance.
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: He gave me a sad, slow look from his blue
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: eyes at first, then with a bright smile, he gently
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: shook my hand, murmuring that he was very glad in
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: the prospect of knowing me better. After which the parent
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: defined before him with singular elaboration my duties. I was
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: to correct all things in his behavior which I considered
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: improper or absurd. I was to dictate the line of travel,
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: to have a restraining influence upon expenditures. In brief, to
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: control the young man as a governess does a child.
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: To all of his parents instructions, poor Junior returned a
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: dutiful nod and expressed perfect acquiescence. The following day, the
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: elder sailed from Cherbourg, and I took up my quarters
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: with the sun. End of chapter three, Chapter four The
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: Beautiful Lady by Booth Tarkington read for LibriVox dot Org
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: by Rita Boutro's Chapter four. It is with the most
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: extreme mortification that I record my ensuing experiences, for I
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: felt that I could not honorably accept my salary without
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: earning it by carrying out the parent poor's wishes. That
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: first morning, I endeavored to direct my pupils steps towards
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: the Musee de Cluny, with the purpose of inciting him
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: to instructive study. But in the mildest yet most immovable manner,
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: he proposed lanchamp and the races as a substitute, to
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: conclude with dinner at La Cascade and supper at Maxims
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: or the Cafe Blanche. In case we should meet engaging company.
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: I ventured the vainest efforts to reason with him, making
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: for myself a very uncomfortable breakfast, though without effect upon
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: him of any visibility. His heir was uninterruptedly mild and modest.
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: He rarely lifted his eyes, but to my most earnest argument,
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: replied only by ordering more eggs and saying, in a
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: chastened voice, Oh, no, it is always best to begin
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: school with a vacation to Lanchampui. I should say at
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: once that through this young man, I soon became an
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: amateur of the remarkable North American idioms of humor and
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: incomparable brevities, often more interesting than those evolved by the
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: thirteen or more dialects of my own naples. Even at
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: our first breakfast, I began to catch lucid glimpses of
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: the intention in many of his almost incomprehensible statements. I
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: was able even to penetrate his meaning when he said
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: that although he was strong for aged parent, he himself
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: had suffered much anguish from overwork of the earnest youth
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: Raquet in his late travels, and now desired to create
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: considerable trouble for Paris. Naturally, I did not wish to
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: begin by antagonizing my pupil. An estrangement at the commencement
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: would only lead to his deceiving me, or a continued quarrel,
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: in which case I should be of no service to
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: my kind patron. So that after a strained interval, I
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: considered it best to surrender. We went to Longchamp. That
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: was my first mistake. The second was to yield to
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: him concerning the latter part of his program. But opposition
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: to mister poor Junior had a curious effect of inutility.
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: He had not in the least the air of obstinacy.
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: Nothing could have been less like rudeness. He neither frowned
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: nor smiled. No, he did not seem even to be
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: insisting on the contrary. Never have I beheld a milder
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: countenance nor heard a pleasanter voice. Yet the young man
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: was so completely baffling in his misasterious way that I
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: considered him unique to my experience. Thus, when I urged
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: him not to place large wagers in the pissage, his
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: whispered reply was strange and simple. Watch me, this, he
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: conclusively said, as he deposited another thousand franc note, which
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: within a few moments accrued to the French government. Longchamp
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: was but the beginning of a series of days and
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: nights which wore upon my constitution, not indeed with the
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: intensity of mortification which my former conspicuousity had engendered. Yet
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: my sorrows were stringent. It is true that I had been,
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: since the age of seventeen no stranger to the gaieties
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: and dissipations afforded by the capitals of Europe. I may
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: say I had exhausted these, yet always with some degree
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: of quiet, including intervals of repose. I was tired of
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: all the great foolishness of youth, and had thought myself
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: done with them. Now I found myself plunged into more
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: uproarious waters. Than I had ever known. I, who had
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: hoped to begin a life of usefulness and peace, was
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: forced to dwell in the midst of a riot pursuing
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: my extraordinary charge. There is no need that I should
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: describe those days and nights. They remain in my memory
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: as a confusion of bad music, crowds, motor cars, and champagne,
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: of which poor Junior was a distributing center. He could
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: never be persuaded to the Louver, the Carnivalets or the Luxembourg.
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: In truth, he seldom rose in time to reach the museums,
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: for they usually close at four in the afternoon, Always
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: with the same inscrutable meekness of countenance. Each night he
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: methodically danced the cake walk at Maxim's or one of
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: the Momont restaurants, to the cheers of acquaintances of many nationals,
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: to whom he offered libations. With prodigal enormity. He carried
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: with him about the boulevards at night in the highly
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: powerful car he had hired large parties of strange people
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: who would loudly sing airs from their folly rouge to
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: my unhappy shudderings all the way from the fatiguing Balboulie
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: to the Cafe du Peris, where the waiters soon became affluent.
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: And how many of those gaily dressed and smiling ladies
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: whose bright eyes meet yours on the veranda of the
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: Tiat Madigni, were provided with excessive suppers and souvenir fans
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: by the inexhaustible poor junior. He left a trail of
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: pink hundred franc notes behind him, like a running boy
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: dropping paper in the English game. And he kept showers
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: of gold louise dancing in the air about him, so
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: that when we entered the various cafes or American bars,
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: a cheer not vocal, but to me of perfect audibility
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: went up from the hungry and thirsty and borrowing and
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: from the attendants. Ah, how tired I was of it,
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: and how I endeavored to discover a means to draw
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: him to the museums and to Notre Dame and the Pantheon.
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: And how many times did I unwillingly find myself in
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: the too enlivening company of those pretty supper girls. And
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: what jokings upon his headtop did the poor ball gentleman
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: not undergo from those same demoiselles with the bright eyes,
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: the wonderful hats, and the fluffy dresses. How often among
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: those gay people did I find myself sadly dreaming of
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: that gray pongee skirt and the beautiful heart that had understood.
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: Should I ever see that lady? Not I knew a
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: lass in the world about poor Junior. As soon look
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: for a nun at the Cafe Blanche. For some reason
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: I came to be persuaded that she had left Paris,
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: that she had gone away, and I pictured her a
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: little despairingly on the borders of Lucerne, with the white
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: Alps in the sky above her, or perhaps listening to
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: the evening songs on the Grand Canal, and I would
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: try to feel the little rocking of her gondola, making
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: myself dream that I sat at her feet, or I
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: could see the gray flicker of the pongee's skirt in
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: the twilight distance of Cathedral Aisles, with a chant sounding
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: from a chapel, and so dreaming I would start spasmodically
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: to hear the red coated orchestra of a cafe blare
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: out into Bedelia, and awake to the laughter and rouge
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: and blug which that dear pongee had helped me for
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: a moment to forget to all places. Poor Junior, though
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: never unkindly dragged me with him, even to make the
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: balloon ascent at the Portmaillo on a windy evening without embarrassment.
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: I confess that I was terrible that I clung to
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: the ropes with a clutch, which frayed my gloves, while
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: poor Junior leaned back against the side of the basket
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: and gazed upward at the great swaying ball with his
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: hands in his pockets, humming the strange ballad that was
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: his favorite musical composition. The prettiest girl I ever saw
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: was sipping cider through a straw Awha in that horrifying basket,
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: scrambling for a foothold while it swung through arcs that
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: were gulfs. I believed that my sorrows approached a sudden conclusion.
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: But finding myself again upon the secure earth, I decided
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: to come to an understanding with the young man. Accordingly,
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: on the following morning, I entered his apartment and addressed
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: myself to poor Junior as severely as I could, for truthfully,
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: in all his follies, I had found no ugliness in
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: his spirit. Only a good natured and inscrutable desire of
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: wild amusement, reminding him of the authority his father had
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: deputed to me, and having the venturesomeness to hint that
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: the son should show some respect to my superior age.
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: To my consternation, he replied by inquiring if I had
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: shaved my head as yet that morning, I could only
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: drop in a chair, stammering to know what he meant.
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: Didn't you suppose I knew, he asked, elevating himself slightly
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: on his elbow from the pillow. Three weeks ago, I
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: left my aged parent in London and ran over here
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: for a day. I saw you at the Cafe de
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: la Peye, and even then I knew that it was shaved,
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: not naturally bald. When you came here, I recognized you
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: like a shot, and that was why I was glad
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: to accept you as a guardian. I've enjoyed myself considerably
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: of late, and you've been the best part of it.
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: I think you are a wonderation. I wouldn't have had
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: any other governess for the world, but you surpassed the
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: orchestra when you begged me to respect your years. I
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: will bet you four dollars to a lead frank piece.
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: That you are younger than I am. Imagine the completeness
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: of my dismay. Although he spoke in tones the most
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: genial and without unkindness, I felt myself a man of
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: chatters before him, ashamed to have him know my sorry secret,
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: hopeless to see all chance of authority over him gone
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: at once, and with it my opportunity to earn a
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: salary so generous. For if I could continue to be
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: but an amusement to him, and only part of his
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: deception of Lambert are poor, my sense of honor must
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: be fit for the guillotine. Indeed, I had a little
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: struggle with myself, and I think I must have wiped
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: some amounts of the cold perspiration from my absurd head
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: before I was able to make an answer. It may
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: be seen what a coward I was, and how I
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: feared to begin again that search for employment. At last, however,
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: I was in self control so that I might speak
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: without being afraid that my voice would shake. I am sorry,
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: I said. It seemed to me that my deception would
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: not cause any harm, and that I might be useful
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: in spite of it, enough to earn my living it
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: was on account of my being very poor, and there
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: are two little children I must take care of. Well.
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: At least it is over now. I have had great shame,
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: but I must not have greater What do you mean,
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: he asked me, rather sharply. I will leave immediately, I said,
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: going to the door. Since I am no more than
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: a joke, I can be of no service to your
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: father or to you. But you must not think that
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: I am so unreasonable as to be angry with you.
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: A man whom you have beheld reduced to what I
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: was at the cafe du la Pey is surely a
• 54:53
  Speaker 1: joke to the whole world. I will write to your
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: father before I leave the hotel and explain that that
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: I feel myself unqualified. You going to write to him?
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: Why you give it up? He exclaimed. I shall make
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: no report of espionage, I answered, with perhaps some bitterness,
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: and I will leave the letter for you to read
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: and to send of yourself. It shall only tell him
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: that as a man of honor, I cannot keep a
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: position for which I have no qualification. I was going
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: to open the door, bidding him adieu, when he called
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: out to me. Look here, he said, and he jumped
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: out of bed in his pajamas and came quickly and
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: held out his hand. Look here, and CELINI don't take
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: it that way. I know you've had pretty hard times.
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: And if you'll stay, I'll get good. I'll go to
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: Louver with you this afternoon. We'll dine at one of
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: the Duval restaurants and go to that new religious tragedy afterwards.
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: If you like, we'll leave Paris tomorrow. There's a little
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: too much movement here. Maybe for God's sake, let your
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: hair grow, and we'll go down to Italy and study
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: bones and ruins and delight the aged parent. It's all right,
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: isn't it. I shook the hand of that kind poor
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: junior with a feeling in my heart that kept me
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: from saying how greatly I thanked him, and I was
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: sure that I could do anything for him in the world.
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: End of chapter four. Chapter five of The Beautiful Lady
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: by Booth Tarkington read for LibriVox dot Org by Rita Boutros.
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: Three days later, saw us on the pretty waters of
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: Lake Leman in the bright weather, when mont Blanc heaves
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: his great bare shoulders of ice miles into the blue
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: sky with no mist cloak about him, sailing that lake
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: in the cool morning. What a contrast to the Champagne
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: hoopla knights of Paris. And how docile was my pupil.
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: He suffered me to lead him through the castle of
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: Chillon like a new born lamb, and even would not
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: play the little horses in the coursal at Geneva, although
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: perhaps that was because the stakes were not high enough
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: to interest him. He was nearly always silent, and from
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: the moment of our departure from Paris had fallen into
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: dreamfulness such as would come over myself at the thought
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: of the beautiful lady. It touched my heart to find
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: how he was ready with acquiescence to the slightest suggestion
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: of mine. And if it had been the season, I
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: am almost credulous that I could have conducted him to
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: Bayreuth to hear Parsifal. There were times when his mood
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: of gentle sorrow was so like mine that I wondered
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: if he too knew a gray ponge's skirt. I wondered
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: over this so much, and so marvelingly also because of
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: the change in him, that at last I asked him
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: we had gone to Lucerne. It was clear moonlight, and
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: we smoked on our little balcony at the sh Whitzerhoff,
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: puffing our small clouds in the enormous face of the
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: strangest panorama of the world, that August disturbation of the
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: earth by gods in battle left to be a land
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: of tragic fables since before Pilot was there, and remaining
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: the same after William Tell was not. I sat looking
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: up at the mountains, and he leaned on the rail,
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: looking down at the lake. Somewhere a woman was singing
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: from Pagliachi, and I slowly arrived at a consciousness that
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: I had sighed aloud once or twice, not so much
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: sadly as of longing to see that lady, and that
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: my companion had permitted similar sounds to escape him, but
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: more mournfully. It was then that I asked him, in earnestness,
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: yet with the manner of making a joke, if he
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: did not think often of someone in North America, do
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: you believe that could be and I making the disturbance
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: I did in Paris? He returned, yes. I told him,
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: if you were to trying to forget her, I should
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: think it might look more as if I were trying
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: to forget that I wasn't good enough for her, and
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: that she knew it. He spoke in a voice which
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: he would have made full of ease off hand, as
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: they say, but he failed to do so. That was
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: the case. I pressed him, you see, but smilingly looks
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: a good deal like it, he replied, smoking much at once.
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: So but that is good for you, my friend, probably.
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: He paused, smoking still more, and then said it's a
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: benefit I could get on just as well without. She
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: is in North America. Now over here, Ah, then we
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: will go where she is. That will be even better
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: for you. Where is she, I don't know. She asked
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: me not to follow her. Somebody else is doing that.
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: The young man's voice was steady, and his face, as usual,
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: showed no emotion. But I should have been in Italian
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: for nothing, had I not understood quickly. So I waited
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: for a little while, then spoke of old Pilatas out
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: there in the sky. And we went to bed very late,
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: for it was our last night in Lucerne. Two days
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: later we roared our way out of the gloomy Saint
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: Gotthard and wound down the pass out into the sunshine
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: of Italy into that broad plain of mulberries, where the
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: silkworms weave to enrich the proud Milanese. Ah, those Milanese,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: they are like the people of Turin and look down
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: upon us of Naples. They find us only amusing because
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: our minds and movements are too quick for them to understand.
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: I have no respect for the Milanese except for three things.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: They have a cathedral, a picture, and a dead man.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: We came to our hotel in the soft twilight, with
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: the air so balmy one wished to rise and float
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: in it. This was the hour for the cathedral. Therefore,
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: leaving Leonardo and his fresco for the tomorrow, I conducted
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: my uncomplaining ward forth and through that big arcade of
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: which the people are so proud, to the Duomo. Poor
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: Junior showed few signs of life. As we stood before
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: that immenseness. He said patiently that it resembled the postals,
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: and followed me inside the portals with languor. It was
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: all gray hollowness in the vast place. The windows showed
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: not any color nor light. The splendid pillars soared up
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: into the air and disappeared as if they mounted to
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: heights of invisibility in the sky at night. Very far away,
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: at the other end of the church, it seemed one
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: lamp was burning high over the transept. One could not
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: see the chains of support nor the roof above it.
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: It seemed a great star, but so much all alone.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: We walked down the long aisle to stand nearer to it,
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: the darkness growing deeper as we advanced. When we came
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: almost beneath, both of us gave zing upward. My companion
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: unwittingly stumbled against a lady who was standing silently looking
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: up at this light, and who had failed to notice
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: our approach. The contact was severe enough to dislodge from
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: her hand her folded parasol, for which I began to grope.
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: There was a hurried sentence of excusation from poor Junior,
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: followed by moments of silence before she replied. Then I
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: heard her voice in startled exclamation. Rufus, it is never you,
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: he called out, almost loudly, Alice. Then I knew that
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: it was the second time I had lifted a parasol
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: from the ground for the lady of the gray pongee
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: and did not see her face. But this time I
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: placed it in her own hand, for my head bore
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: no shame upon it. Now, in the surprise of encountering
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: poor Junior, I do not think she noticed that she
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: took the parasol, or was conscious of my presence. And
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: it was but too secure that my young friend had
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: forgotten that I lived. I think, in truth, I should
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: have forgotten it myself, if it had not been for
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: the leaping of my heart. Ah, that foolish dream of
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: mine had proven true. I knew her, I knew her unmistaking,
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: without doubt or hesitancy. And in the dark, how should
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: I know it? The mere sound of her voice, I
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: think I knew before she spoke, poor Junior had taken
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: a step toward her. As she fell back, I could
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: only see the two figures as two shadows upon shadow,
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: while for them I had melted altogether and was forgotten.
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: You think I have followed you, he cried, But you
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: have no right to think it. It was an accident,
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: and you've got to believe me. I believe you, she
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: answered gently, Why should I not. I suppose you want
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: me to clear out again, he went on, And I will,
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: But I don't see why, her voice answered him. Out
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: of the shadow. It is only you who make a reason.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: And why I'd give anything to be friends with you.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: You've always known that. Why can't we be? He said,
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: sharply and loudly. I've changed a great deal. I'm very sensible,
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: and I'll never bother you again that other way. Why
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: shouldn't I see a little of you? I heard her
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: laugh then, happily it seemed to me, and I thought
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: I perceived her to extend her hand to him, and
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: that he shook it briefly in his fashion, as if
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: it had been the hand of a man and not
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: that of a beautiful lady. You know, I should like
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: nothing better in the world. Since you tell me what
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: you do, she answered, and the other man, he asked her,
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: with the same hinting of sharpness in his tone, Is
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: that all settled? Almost? Would you like me to tell
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: you only a little? Please? His voice had dropped, and
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: he spoke very quietly, which startlingly caused me to realize
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: what I was doing. I went out of hearing then
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: very softly. Is it credible that I found myself try
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: trembling when I reached the twilet piazza? It is true,
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: and I knew that never for one moment since that
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: tragic divine day of her pity, had I wholly despaired
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: of beholding her again. That in my most sorrowful time,
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: there had always been a little little morsel of certain
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: knowledge that I should some day be near her once more.
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: And now so much was easily revealed to me. It
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: was to see her that the good Lambert or poor
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: Junior had come to Paris, preceding my patron. It was
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 1: he who had passed with her on the last day
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: of my shame, and whom she had addressed by his
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: central name of Rufus. And it was to his hand
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: that I had restored her parasol. I was to look
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: upon her face at last, I knew it, and to
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: speak with her. Ah, Yes, I did tremble. It was
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: not because I feared she might recognize her, poor slave
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: of the painted headtop, nor that poor Junior would tell her.
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: I knew him now too well to think he would
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 1: do that had I been even that other of whom
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: he had spoken for. He was a brave, good boy,
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: that poor Junior. No, it was a trembling of another kind,
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: something I do not know how to explain to those
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: who have not trembled in the same way, and I
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: came alone to my room in the hotel, still trembling
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: a little, and having strange quickness of breathing in my chest.
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: I did not make any light. I did not wish it,
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: for the precious darkness of the cathedral remained with me,
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: magic darkness in which I beheld floating clouds made of
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: the dust of gold and vanishing melodies. Any person who
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: knows of these singular things comprehends how little of them
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 1: can be told. But to those people who do not
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: know of them, it may appear all great foolishness. Such
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: people are either too young and they must wait, or
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: too old they have forgotten. It was an hour afterward,
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: and poor Junior had knocked twice at my door. When
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: I lighted the room and opened it to him. He
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: came in excitedly, flushed, and instead of taking a chair,
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: began to walk quickly up and down the floor. I'm
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: afraid I forgot all about you, Aunt Seline, he said.
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: But that girl I ran into is a Miss Landry,
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: whom I have known a long I put my hand
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: on his shoulder for a moment and said, I think
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: I am not so dull my friend. He made a
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: blue flash at me with his eyes, then smiled and
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: shook his head. Yes, you are right, he answered, rebeginning
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: his fast pace over the carpet. It was she that
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: I meant in Lucerne. I don't see why I should
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: not tell you in Paris, she said. She didn't want
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: me to see her again until I could be friendly
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: the old way instead of something considerably different, which i'd
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: grown to be. Well, I've just told her not only
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: that i'd behave like a friend, but that i'd changed
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: and felt like one. Pretty much of a lie was
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: he laughed, without any amusement. But it was successful, and
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: I suppose I can keep it up at any rate.
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 1: We're going over to Venice with her and her mother tomorrow.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: Afterwards we'll see them in Naples. Just before they sail
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: to Venice with them, I could not repress crying out. Yes,
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: we joined parties for two days, he said, and stopped
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: at a window and looked out attentively at nothing, before
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: he went on, It won't be very long, and I
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: don't suppose it will ever happen again. The other man
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: is to meet them in Rome. He's a countryman of yours,
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: and I believe, I believe it's about settled. He pronounced
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 1: these last words in an even voice, but how slowly,
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: not more slowly than the construction of my own response,
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: which I heard myself, making this countryman of mine? Who
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: is he one of your kind of Kentucky colonels, Poor
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 1: Junior laughed mournfully. At first I did not understand. Then
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: it came to me that he had sometimes previously spoken
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: in that idiom of the nobles, and that it had
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: been his custom to address one of his Parisian followers,
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: a vicomte as colonel. What is his name? I can't
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 1: pronounce it, and I don't know how to spell it,
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: he answered, And that doesn't bring me to the verge
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: of the grave. I can bear to forget it, at
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: least until we get to Naples. He turned and went
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 1: to the door, saying, cheerfully, well, old horse thief. Such
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: had come to be his name for me sometimes, and
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: it was pleasant to hear. We must be dressing there
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: at this hotel, and we dine with them to night.
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 1: End of chapter five Chapter six of The Beautiful Lady
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: by Booth Tarkington read for LibriVox dot Org by Rita Boutros.
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: How can I tell of the lady of the Pongee,
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: now that I beheld her? Do you think that when
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: she came that night to the salon where we were
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: awaiting her, I hesitated to lift my eyes to her
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: face because of a fear that it would not be
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: so beautiful as the misty, sweet face I had dreamed
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: would be hers. Ah. No, it was the beauty which
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: was in her heart that had made me hers. Yet
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: I knew that she was beautiful. She was fair, That
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: is all I can tell. I cannot tell of her eyes,
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: her height, her mouth. I saw her through those clouds
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: of the dust of gold. She was all glamor and light.
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: It was to be seen that everyone fell in love
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 1: with her at once. That the chef Dorkistra came and
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: played to her, and the waiters you should have observed
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: them made silly, tender faces through the great groves of
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: flowers with which poor Junior had covered the table. It
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: was most difficult for me to address her, to call
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: her miss Landry. It seemed impossible that she should have
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: a name, or that I should speak to her, Except
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: as you, even I cannot tell very much of her
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 1: mother except that she was adorable because of her adorable relationship.
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: She was florid, perhaps, and her conversation was of commonplaces
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 1: and echoes like my own. For I could not talk.
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: It was poor Junior who made the talking. And in
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 1: spite of the spell that was on me, I found
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: myself full of admiration and sorrow for that brave fellow.
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: He was all gaieties and little stories in a way
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: I had never heard before. He kept us in quiet laughter.
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: In a word, he was charming. The beautiful lady seemed
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: content to listen with the greatest pleasure. She talked very little,
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: except to encourage the young man to continue. I do
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: not think she was brilliant, as they call it, or witty.
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: She was much more than that in her comprehension, in
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: her kindness, her beautiful kindness. She spoke only once directly
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: to me, except for the little things one must say.
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: I am almost sure I have met you, signor ENCELINI.
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 1: I felt myself burning up and knew that the conflagration
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: was visible, so frightful. A blush cannot be prevented by willpower,
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 1: and I felt it continuing in hot waves long after
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 1: poor Junior had effected salvation for me by a small
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 1: joke upon my cosmopolitanism. Little sleep visited me that night.
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: The darkness of my room was luminous, and my closed
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: eyes became painters painting so radiantly with divine colors, painters
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: of wonderful portraits of this lady. Gallery after gallery swam
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: before me, and the morning brought only more. What a
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: ride it was to Venice that day, what magical airs
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: we rode through, And what a thieving old trickster was time,
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: as he always becomes when one wishes ours to be long.
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 1: I think poor Junior had made himself forget everything except
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: that he was with her, and that he must be
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: a friend. He committed a thousand ridiculousnesses at the stations.
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: He filled one side of the compartment with the pretty
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 1: Chianti bottles, with terrible cakes, and with fruits and flowers.
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 1: He never ceased his joking, which had no tiresomeness in it,
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 1: and he made the little journey one of continuing happy laughter.
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: And that evening, another of my foolish dreams came true.
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: I sat in a gondola with the lady of the
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 1: Gray Pongee to hear the singing on the Grand canal, not,
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: it is true, at her feet, but upon a little
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: chair beside her mother. It was my place to be,
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 1: as I had been all day, escort to the mother
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 1: and guide in courier for that small party. Contented enough
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: was I to accept it. How could I have hoped
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 1: that the most blessed mother would grant me so much
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 1: nearness as that. It was not happiness that I felt,
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: but something so much more precious, as though my heart
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: strings were the strings of a harp, and sad, beautiful
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 1: arpeggios ran over them. I could not speak very much
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 1: that evening, nor could poor Junior. We were very silent
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: and listened to the singing our gondola, just touching the
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 1: others on each side, those in turn touching others, so
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: that a musician from the barge could cross from one
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: to another, presenting the hat for contributions. In spite of
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: this extreme propinquity, I feared the collector would fall into
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: the water when he received the offering of poor Junior.
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 1: It was Gotzi milor gratzi a hundred times with boughs
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 1: and grateful smiles. Indeed, it is the one place in
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: the world where you listened to a bad voice with pleasure,
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 1: and of the voices are good, they are harsh and
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: worn with the night singing, yet all are beautiful because
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 1: they are enchanted. They sang some of our own Neapolitan
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 1: songs that night, and last of all, the loveliest of all,
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: La Luna nova. It was to the cadence of it
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: that our gondoliers moved us out of the throng, and
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 1: it still drifted on the water as we swung far
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: down into sight of the lights of the Lido. Luna dargento,
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 1: falo sognar, baccilo, and frante non lo de star. Not
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: so sweetly came those measures, as the low voice of
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 1: the beautiful ladies speaking them. One could never forget it, never,
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 1: she said. I might hear it a thousand other times
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 1: and forget them, but never this first time. I perceived
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 1: that poor Junior turned his face abruptly towards hers at this,
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 1: But he said nothing, by which I understood not only
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: his wisdom but his forbearance. Strangely enough, she went on slowly.
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: That song reminded me of something in Paris. Do you
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: remember she turned to poor Junior, that poor man we
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: saw in front of the Cafe de la Peye with
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: the sign painted upon his head. Ah, the good knight
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: with its friendly cloak, the good kind knight, I remember,
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 1: he answered, with some shortness, A little faster boatman. I
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: don't know what made it, she said, I can't account
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: for it. But I've been thinking of him all through
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: that last song. Perhaps not so strange, since one may
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 1: know how wildly that poor devil had been thinking of her.
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: I've thought of him so often, the gentle voice went on.
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 1: I felt so sorry for him. I never felt sorrier
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 1: for any one in my life. I was sorry for
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: the poor thin cab horses in Paris, but I was
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 1: sorrier for him. I think it was the saddest sight
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: I ever saw. Do you suppose he still has to
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 1: do that? Rufus, No, no, he answered, in haste. He'd
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 1: stopped before I left. He's all right. I imagine. Here's the Daniellie.
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 1: She fastened a shawl more closely about her mother, whom I,
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 1: with a ringing in my ears, was trying to help
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 1: up the stone steps. Rufus, I hope, the sweet voice
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 1: continued so gently. I hope he's found something to do
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 1: that's very grand. Don't you something to make up to
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 1: him for doing that? She had not the faintest dream
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 1: that it was I. It was just her beautiful heart.
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 1: The next afternoon, Venice was a bleak and empty setting,
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 1: the jewel gone. How vacant it looked, how vacant it was.
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: We made not any effort to penetrate the galleries. I
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: had no heart to urge my friend. For us. The
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: whole of Venice had become one bridge of size, and
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 1: we sat in the shade of the Pierre, not watching
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 1: the pigeons, and listening very little to the music. There
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 1: are times when Saint Mark's seems to glare at you
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 1: with Byzantine cruelty, and Venice is too hot and too cold.
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 1: So it was then evening found us staring out at
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 1: the Adriatic from the terrace of a cafe on the Lido,
• 1:18:22
  Speaker 1: our coffee cold before us. Never was a greater difference
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 1: than that in my companion from the previous day. Yet
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: he was not silent. He talked of her continually, having
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: found that he could talk of her to me, though
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: certainly he did not know why it was or how.
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 1: He told me, as we sat by the gray growing
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 1: sea that she had spoken of me. She liked you.
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: She liked you very much, he said. She told me
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 1: she liked you because you are quiet and melancholy. Oh Lord,
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 1: though she likes everyone. I suppose. I believe I'd have
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 1: a better chance with her if I hadn't always known her.
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 1: I'm afraid that this damn Italian. I beg your pardon,
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 1: Aunt Selini. Ah No, I answered, it is sometimes, well said,
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 1: I'm afraid his picturesqueness as a Kentucky colonel appeals to
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: her too much. And then he is new to her,
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 1: a new type. She only met him in Paris, and
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 1: he had done some things in the Abyssinian War. What
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 1: is his rank? I asked, He's a prince cheap down
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 1: this way, aren't they? I only hope, and poor Junior
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 1: made a groan it isn't going to be the old story,
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 1: and that he'll be good to her if he gets her.
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 1: Then it is not yet a betrothal, not yet. Missus
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 1: Landry told me that Alice had liked him well enough
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 1: to promise she'd give him her answer before she sailed,
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: and that it was going to be yes. She herself
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 1: said it was almost settled. That was just her way.
• 1:19:55
  Speaker 1: Of breaking it to me. I fear you have given
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: up my friend. What else can I do? I can't
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 1: go on following her, keeping up this play at second cousin,
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 1: and she won't have anything else. Ever since I grew up,
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 1: she's been rather sorrowful over me because I didn't do
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 1: anything but try to amuse myself. That was one of
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 1: the reasons she couldn't care for me, she said when
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: I asked her. Now, this fellow wins who hasn't done
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 1: anything either except his one campaign. It's not that I
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 1: ought to have her. But while I suppose it's a
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: real fascination, I'm afraid there's a little glitter about being
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 1: a princess. Even the best of our girls haven't got
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: over that yet. Ah. Well, about me, She's right, I've
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 1: been a pretty worthless sort. She's right. I've thought it
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 1: all over. Three days before they sail, we'll go down
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 1: to Naples and hear the last word, and whatever it is.
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 1: We'll see them off on the Princess Irene. Then you
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 1: and i'll come north and sail by the first boat
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 1: from Scherbourg. I I, I stammered, yes, he said, I'm
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 1: going to make the aged parent shout with unmanly glee.
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: I'm going to ask him to take me on as
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 1: a hand. He'll take you too. He uses something like
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 1: a thousand Italians and a man to manage them who
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: could talk to them like a Dutch uncle is what
• 1:21:20
  Speaker 1: he has always needed. He liked you, and he'll be
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 1: glad to get you. He was a good friend, that
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 1: poor junior, you see. And I shook the hand that
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 1: he offered me very hard, knowing how great would have
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 1: been his embarrassment had I embraced him in our own fashion.
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 1: And perhaps you will sail on the Princess Irene after all.
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: I cried no. He shook his head sadly. It will
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: not happen. I have not been worth it. End of
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: chapter six Chapter seven of The Beautiful Lady by Booth
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 1: Tarkington read for LibriVox dot Org by Rita Boutro's that
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: Naples of Mine is like a soiled coronet of white gems,
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 1: sparkling only from far away. But I love it altogether,
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: near or far, and my heart would have leaped to
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 1: return to it for its own sake. But to come
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: to it as we did, knowing that the only lady
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 1: in the world was there again This is one of
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 1: those things I possessed no knowledge how to tell, and
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 1: that those who know do know. How I had longed
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 1: for the time to come, how I had feared it,
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 1: how I had made pictures of it. Yet I feared
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 1: not so much as my friend, For he had a dim,
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 1: small hope, and I had none. How could I have
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: I a man whose head had been painted I for
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 1: whom her great heart, as for the thin beaten cab
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: horses of Paris hope. All I could hope was that
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 1: she might never know, and I be left with some
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 1: little shred of dignity in her eyes? Who cannot see
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 1: that it was for my friend to fear? At times
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: with him it was despair, but of that brave kind
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 1: one loves to see, never a quiver of the lip,
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 1: no winking of the eyes to keep tears back. And I,
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: although of a people who express everything in every way,
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 1: I understood what passed within him, and found time to
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: sorrow for him. Most of all I sorrowed for him
• 1:23:36
  Speaker 1: as we waited for her on the terrace of the Bertolini,
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 1: that perch on the cliff so high that even the
• 1:23:42
  Speaker 1: noises of the town are dulled and mingle with the
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: sound of the thick surf far below. Across the city
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 1: and beyond we saw from the terrace the old mountain
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 1: of the Warm Heart, smoking amiably, and the lights of
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 1: Torre del Greco at its feet, And they are across
• 1:24:01
  Speaker 1: the bay. I beheld, as I had nightly so long ago,
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 1: the lamps of Castellamar of Sorrento, then, after a stretch
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 1: of water, a twinkling which was Capri. How good it
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 1: was to know that all these had not taken advantage
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: of my long absence to run away and vanish, as
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: I had half feared they would. Those who had lived
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 1: here loved them well, and it was a happy thought
• 1:24:27
  Speaker 1: that the beautiful lady knew them now and shared them.
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 1: I had never known quite all their loveliness until I
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 1: felt that she knew it too. This was something that
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 1: I must never tell her, yet what happiness there was
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 1: in it. I stood close to the railing with a
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 1: rambling gaze over this enchanted earth and sea and sky,
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 1: while my friend walked nervously up and down behind me.
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 1: We had come to Naples in the late afternoon and
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 1: had found a note for missus Landry at our hotel,
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 1: asking us for dinner Poor Junior had not spoken more
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 1: than twice since he had read me this kind invitation.
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 1: But now I heard a low exclamation from him, which
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 1: let me know who was approaching, and that foolish trembling
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: got hold of me again. As I turned, missus Landry
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 1: came first with outstretched hand, making some talk excusing delay,
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 1: and after a few paces followed the loveliest of all
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 1: the world behind her. In silhouette against the white window
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: lights of the hotel, I saw the very long, thin
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 1: figure of a man, which, even before I recognized it,
• 1:25:40
  Speaker 1: carried a certain ominousness to my mind. Missus Landry, in
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 1: spite of her florid contentedness, had sometimes a fluttering appearance
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: of trivial agitations. The Prince came down from Rome this morning,
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 1: she said nervously, and I saw my friend throw back
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 1: his head like a man who declines the eye bandage
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 1: when they are going to shoot him. He is dining
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 1: with us. I know you will be glad to meet him.
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: The beautiful lady took poor Junior's hand more than he hers,
• 1:26:11
  Speaker 1: for he seemed dazed in spite of the straight way
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: he stood, and it was easy to behold how white
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 1: his face was she made the presentation of us both
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 1: at the same time, and as the other man came
• 1:26:23
  Speaker 1: into the light. My mouth dropped open with wonder at
• 1:26:27
  Speaker 1: the singular chances which the littleness of our world brings about.
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 1: Prince Ekavaccioli, mister Poor, and this is Signor and Selini.
• 1:26:37
  Speaker 1: It was my half brother, that old Antonio. End of
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 1: chapter seven Chapter eight of The Beautiful Lady by Booth
• 1:26:53
  Speaker 1: Tarkington read for LibriVox dot org by Rita Boutro's never
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 1: lived any person with more possession of himself than Antonio.
• 1:27:05
  Speaker 1: He bowed to each of us with the utmost amiability,
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 1: and for expression, all one saw of it was a
• 1:27:12
  Speaker 1: little streak of light in his eyeglass. It is yourself, Raphael,
• 1:27:16
  Speaker 1: he said to me, in the politest manner, in our
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 1: own tongue, the others thinking it some commonplace. And I
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 1: knew by his voice that the meeting was as surprising
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 1: and as exasperating to him as to me. Sometimes dazzling
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 1: flashes of light explode across the eyes of blind people.
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 1: Such a thing happened to my own now in the darkness,
• 1:27:40
  Speaker 1: I found myself hot all over, with a certain rashness
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 1: that came to me. I felt that anything was possible
• 1:27:47
  Speaker 1: if I would, But dare enough I am able to
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 1: see that it is the same yourself, I answered, and
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 1: made the faintest eye turn toward Miss Landry, simultaneously bowing,
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 1: I let my hand fall upon my pocket, a language
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: which he understood, and for which the blessed mother be thanked.
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 1: He perceived that I meant to offer battle immediately, though
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 1: at that moment he offered me an open smile of benevolence.
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 1: He knew nothing of my new cause for war. There
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 1: was enough of the old. The others were observing us.
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 1: You have met, asked the gentle voice of Miss Landry.
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 1: You know each other exceedingly, I answered, bowing low to her.
• 1:28:30
  Speaker 1: The dinner is waiting in our own salon, said missus Landry, interrupting.
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 1: She led the way with Antonio to an open door
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 1: on the terrace, where servants were attending, and such a
• 1:28:42
  Speaker 1: forest of flowers on the table and about the room
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 1: as almost to cause her escort to stagger. For I knew,
• 1:28:49
  Speaker 1: when I caught sight of them, that he had never
• 1:28:52
  Speaker 1: been wise enough to send them. Neither had poor Junior
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: done it out of wisdom, but because of his large
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 1: way of performing everything, and his wish that loveliest things
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 1: should be a background for that lady. Alas for him,
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 1: those great jars of perfume, orchids and hyacinths and roses
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 1: almost shut her away from his vision. We were at
• 1:29:15
  Speaker 1: a small round table, and she directly in opposition to him.
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 1: Upon her right was Antonio, and my heart grew cold
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 1: to see how she listened to him. For Antonio could talk.
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: At that time he spoke English even better than I,
• 1:29:31
  Speaker 1: though without some knowledge of the North American idiom which
• 1:29:35
  Speaker 1: my travels with poor Junior had given me. He was
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 1: one of those splendid egoists who seemed to talk in
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 1: modesty to keep themselves behind scenes, yet who when the
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 1: curtain falls, are discovered to be the heroes after all,
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 1: though shown in so delicate a fashion that the audience
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 1: flatters itself in the discovery. And how practical was this fellow,
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: how many years he had had been developing his fascinations.
• 1:30:02
  Speaker 1: I was the only person of that small company who
• 1:30:05
  Speaker 1: could have a suspicion that his mustache was dyed, that
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: his hair was to pay, or that hints of his
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: real age were scorpions and adders to him. I should
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: not have thought it if I had not known it.
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 1: Here was my advantage. I had known his monstrous vanity
• 1:30:24
  Speaker 1: all my life. So he talked of himself in his
• 1:30:28
  Speaker 1: various surreptitious ways until coffee came. Miss Landry listening eagerly,
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 1: and my poor friend making no effort for what were
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 1: his quiet United States absurdities compared to the whole world
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 1: gaieties and Abyssinian adventures of this Othello, particularly for a
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 1: young girl to whom Antonio's type was unfamiliar. For the
• 1:30:51
  Speaker 1: first time, I saw my young man's brave front desert him.
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: His mouth drooped and his eyes had an appearance of
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 1: having gazed long at a bright light. I saw that
• 1:31:02
  Speaker 1: he unhappy. One was at last too sure what her
• 1:31:06
  Speaker 1: answer would be. For myself, I said very little. I waited.
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: I hoped and believed Antonio would attack me in his clever,
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 1: disguised way, for he had always hated me and my
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 1: dead brother, and he had never failed to prove himself
• 1:31:22
  Speaker 1: too skillful for us. In my expectancy of his assault,
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 1: there was no mistake. I comprehended Antonio very well, and
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 1: I knew that he feared I might seek to do
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 1: him an injury, particularly after my inspired speech and gesture
• 1:31:38
  Speaker 1: upon the terrace. Also, I felt that he would, if possible,
• 1:31:42
  Speaker 1: anticipate my attempt and strike first. I was willing for,
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: I thought myself in possession of his vulnerable point, never
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: dreaming that he might know my own. At last, when he,
• 1:31:56
  Speaker 1: with the coffee and cigarettes, took the knife in his hand,
• 1:31:59
  Speaker 1: he played a veil over the point. He began laughingly
• 1:32:03
  Speaker 1: with the picture of a pickpocket he had helped to
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 1: catch in London. London was greatly inhabited by pickpockets, according
• 1:32:10
  Speaker 1: to Antonio's declaration, Yet he continued, it was nothing in
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 1: comparison to Paris. Paris was the rendezvous, the world's home
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 1: for the criminals, adventurers, and rascals of the world, English, Spanish,
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 1: South Americans, North Americans, and even Italians. One must beware
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 1: of people one had met in Paris. Of course, he concluded,
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 1: with a most amiable smile. There are many good people
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 1: there also, that is not to be forgotten. If I
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 1: should dare to make a risk on such a trifle,
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 1: for instance, I would lay wager that you, he nodded
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 1: toward poor Junior, made the acquaintance of Ansolini in Paris.
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 1: This was of the greatest ugliness in its underneath significance.
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 1: Though the manner was disarming, Antonio's smile was so cheerful,
• 1:33:03
  Speaker 1: his eye glass so twinkling, that none of them could
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 1: have been sure he truly meant anything harmful of me,
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 1: though poor Junior looked up, puzzled and frowning before he
• 1:33:14
  Speaker 1: could answer. I pulled myself altogether, as they say, and
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: leaned forward, resting my elbows upon the table. It is true,
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 1: and I tried to smile as amiably as Antonio. These
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 1: coincidences occur. You meet all the great frauds of the
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 1: world in Paris, was it not there? I turned to
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 1: Missus Landry, that you met the young prince here? At
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 1: this there was no mistaking that the others perceived the
• 1:33:42
  Speaker 1: secret battle had begun and was not secret. I saw
• 1:33:46
  Speaker 1: a wild gleam in poor Junior's eyes, as if he
• 1:33:49
  Speaker 1: comprehended that strange things were to come. But Ah, the
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 1: face of distress and wonder upon Missus Landry, who beheld
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 1: the peace of both a prince and dinner assailed and
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 1: alas the strange and hurt surprise that came from the
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 1: lady of the Pongee let me not be a boastful fellow.
• 1:34:09
  Speaker 1: But I had borne her pity and had adored it.
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 1: I could face her wonder, even her scorn. It was
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 1: in the flash of her look that I saw my
• 1:34:19
  Speaker 1: great chance and what I must try to do. Knowing Antonio,
• 1:34:24
  Speaker 1: it was as if I saw her falling into the
• 1:34:26
  Speaker 1: deep water and caught just one contemptuous glance from her
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: before the waves hid her. But how much jester should
• 1:34:34
  Speaker 1: that contempt have been if I had not tried to
• 1:34:37
  Speaker 1: save her. As for that old Antonio, he might have
• 1:34:41
  Speaker 1: known enough to beware. I had been timid with him always,
• 1:34:45
  Speaker 1: and he counted on it now. But a man who
• 1:34:48
  Speaker 1: has shown a painted headtop to the people of Paris
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: will dare a great deal. As the Prince says, replied
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 1: Missus Landry, with many flutters, one meets only the most
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: agreeable people in Paris. Paris, I exclaimed, ah, that home
• 1:35:04
  Speaker 1: of ingenuity. How they paint there, how they live, and
• 1:35:08
  Speaker 1: how they die their beards. You see how the poor
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 1: an Selini played the buffoon. I knew they feared it
• 1:35:16
  Speaker 1: was wine. I had been so silent until now, but
• 1:35:20
  Speaker 1: I did not care. I was beyond care. Our young
• 1:35:24
  Speaker 1: prince speaks truly, I cried, raising my voice. He is
• 1:35:28
  Speaker 1: wise beyond his years. This youth he will be great
• 1:35:31
  Speaker 1: when he reaches middle age, for he knows Paris and
• 1:35:34
  Speaker 1: understands North America like myself. He is grateful that the
• 1:35:39
  Speaker 1: people of your continent enrich our own. We need all
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 1: that you can give us. Where should we be any
• 1:35:46
  Speaker 1: of us? I raised my voice still louder, and waved
• 1:35:49
  Speaker 1: my hand to Antonio. Where should we be either of us?
• 1:35:53
  Speaker 1: And I bowed to the others without you missus. Landry
• 1:35:58
  Speaker 1: rose with precipitousness, and the Beautiful Lady, very red, followed. Antonio,
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 1: unmistakably stung with the scorpions I had set upon him,
• 1:36:08
  Speaker 1: sprang to the door, the palest yellow man I have
• 1:36:12
  Speaker 1: ever beheld, and let the ladies pass before him. The
• 1:36:16
  Speaker 1: next moment, I was left alone with poor Junior and
• 1:36:20
  Speaker 1: his hyacinthe trees. End of chapter eight. Chapter nine of
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 1: The Beautiful Lady by Booth. Tarkington read for LibriVox dot
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 1: Org by Rita Boutros. For several minutes neither of us spoke.
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 1: Then I looked up to meet my friend's gaze of perturbation.
• 1:36:49
  Speaker 1: A waiter was proffering cigars. I took one and waved
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 1: poor Junior's hand away from the box of which the
• 1:36:56
  Speaker 1: waiter made offering. Do not remain, I whispered, and I
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 1: saw his sad perplexity. I know her answer has not
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 1: been given. Will you present him his chance to receive it?
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 1: Just when her sympathy must be stronger for him, since
• 1:37:12
  Speaker 1: she will think he has had to bear rudeness. He
• 1:37:15
  Speaker 1: went out of the door quickly. I did not smoke,
• 1:37:19
  Speaker 1: I pretended to while the waiters made the arrangements of
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 1: the table and took themselves off. I sat there a
• 1:37:26
  Speaker 1: long long time, waiting for Antonio to do what I
• 1:37:29
  Speaker 1: hoped I had betrayed him to do it, befell. At last,
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 1: Poor Junior came to the door and spoke in his
• 1:37:37
  Speaker 1: steady voice, and CELINI will you come out here? A
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 1: moment then I knew that I had succeeded, had made
• 1:37:44
  Speaker 1: Antonio afraid that I would do the thing he himself,
• 1:37:47
  Speaker 1: in a panic, had already done speak evil of another privately.
• 1:37:53
  Speaker 1: As I reached the door, I heard him call out foolishly,
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: But mister poor, I beg you, Poor Junior, put his
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 1: hand on my shoulder, and we walked out into the
• 1:38:04
  Speaker 1: dark of the terrace. Antonio was leaning against the railing,
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 1: the beautiful lady standing near. Missus Landry had sunk into
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 1: a chair beside her daughter. No other people were upon
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 1: the terrace. Prince Cadroviacchioli has been speaking of you, said
• 1:38:20
  Speaker 1: poor Junior, very quietly. AH said I I listened to
• 1:38:26
  Speaker 1: what he said. Then I told him that you were
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 1: my friend, and that I considered it fair that you
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 1: should hear what he had to say. I will repeat
• 1:38:34
  Speaker 1: what he said, Aunt Selini. If I mistake anything, he
• 1:38:37
  Speaker 1: can interrupt me. Antonio laughed, and in such a way
• 1:38:42
  Speaker 1: so sincerely, so gaily, that I was frightened. Very good,
• 1:38:47
  Speaker 1: he cried, I am content repeat all he began. Poor
• 1:38:53
  Speaker 1: Junior went on quietly, though his hand gripped my shoulder
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 1: to almost painfulness. He began by saying to these lady
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 1: in my presence that we should be careful not to
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 1: pick up chance strangers to dine in Italy, And and
• 1:39:08
  Speaker 1: he went on to give me a repetition of his
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 1: friendly warning about Paris. He hinted things for a while
• 1:39:15
  Speaker 1: until I asked him to say what he knew of you?
• 1:39:18
  Speaker 1: Then he said, he knew all about you, that you
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 1: were an outcast, a left handed member of his own family,
• 1:39:26
  Speaker 1: an adventurer. It has finished, my friend, I said, interrupting him,
• 1:39:31
  Speaker 1: and gazed with all my soul upon the beautiful lady.
• 1:39:34
  Speaker 1: Her face was as white as Antonio's, or that of
• 1:39:37
  Speaker 1: my friend, or as my own must have been. She
• 1:39:41
  Speaker 1: strained her eyes at me fixedly. I saw the tears
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 1: standing still in them, and I knew the moment had come.
• 1:39:49
  Speaker 1: This Caravaccioli is my half brother, I said. Antonio laughed again.
• 1:39:54
  Speaker 1: Of what kind? Oh? He went on so easily to
• 1:39:58
  Speaker 1: his betrayal, not knowing the United Statesians and their sentiment
• 1:40:02
  Speaker 1: as I did. We had the same mother, I continued,
• 1:40:06
  Speaker 1: as quietly as I could. Twenty years after this young,
• 1:40:10
  Speaker 1: this somewhat young prince was born, she divorced his father Caravaccioli,
• 1:40:15
  Speaker 1: and married a poor poet whose best you can see
• 1:40:18
  Speaker 1: on the Pincian in Rome, though he died in the
• 1:40:21
  Speaker 1: cheapest hotel in Siena. When my true brother and I
• 1:40:25
  Speaker 1: were children, This young prince would have nothing to do
• 1:40:28
  Speaker 1: with my mother. After her second marriage and marriage, Antonio
• 1:40:33
  Speaker 1: left pleasantly again he was admirable. This is an old
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 1: tale which the hastiness of our American friend has forced
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 1: us to rehearse. The marriage was never recognized by the Vatican,
• 1:40:46
  Speaker 1: and there was not twenty years Antonio. It is the
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 1: age which troubles you. After all, I said, and laughed heartily, loudly,
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 1: and a long time, in the most good natured way,
• 1:40:58
  Speaker 1: not to be undone as an actor. Twenty years, I repeated,
• 1:41:02
  Speaker 1: But what of it? Some of the best men in
• 1:41:05
  Speaker 1: the world used eyes and false At this, his temper
• 1:41:08
  Speaker 1: went away from him suddenly and completely. I had struck
• 1:41:12
  Speaker 1: the right point. Indeed, you Camorrista, he cried, and became
• 1:41:17
  Speaker 1: only himself, his hands gesturing and flying. All his pleasant
• 1:41:22
  Speaker 1: manner gone. Why should we listen one second more to
• 1:41:25
  Speaker 1: such a fisherman. The very centers of the bay, who
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 1: sell dried sea horses to the tourists are better gentlemen
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: than you. You can shrug your shoulders. I saw you
• 1:41:36
  Speaker 1: in Paris, though you thought I did not. Oh, I
• 1:41:40
  Speaker 1: saw you well, ah, at the Cafe de la Pei.
• 1:41:44
  Speaker 1: At this, I cried out suddenly. The sting and surprise
• 1:41:48
  Speaker 1: of it were more than I could bear in my shame.
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 1: I would even have tried to drown his voice with babblings.
• 1:41:55
  Speaker 1: But after this one cry, I could not speak for
• 1:41:57
  Speaker 1: a while. He went on triumphantly. This rascal, my dear ladies,
• 1:42:03
  Speaker 1: who has persuaded you to ask him to dinner, This
• 1:42:06
  Speaker 1: camel who claims to be my excellent brother. He for
• 1:42:10
  Speaker 1: a few francs in Paris, shaved his head and showed
• 1:42:14
  Speaker 1: it for a week to the people, with an advertisement
• 1:42:17
  Speaker 1: painted upon it of the worst ballet in Paris. This
• 1:42:21
  Speaker 1: is the gentleman with whom you ask Caravaccioli to dine.
• 1:42:25
  Speaker 1: It was beyond my expectation, so astonishing and so cruel,
• 1:42:30
  Speaker 1: that I could only look at him for a moment
• 1:42:32
  Speaker 1: or two. I felt as one who dreams himself falling forever.
• 1:42:37
  Speaker 1: Then I stepped forward and spoke in thickness of voice,
• 1:42:41
  Speaker 1: being unable to lift my head again. It is true
• 1:42:45
  Speaker 1: what he says. I was that man of the painted head.
• 1:42:48
  Speaker 1: I had my true brother's little daughters to care for.
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 1: They were at the convent, and I owed for them.
• 1:42:55
  Speaker 1: It was also partly for myself, because I was hungry.
• 1:42:59
  Speaker 1: I could not find any other way, and so but
• 1:43:03
  Speaker 1: that is all I turned and went stumblingly away from them.
• 1:43:08
  Speaker 1: In my agony that she should know I could do
• 1:43:11
  Speaker 1: nothing but seek greater darkness. I felt myself beaten, dizzy
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 1: with beatings. That thing which I had done in Paris
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 1: discredited me, a man whose head top had borne an
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 1: advertisement of the folly rouge, to think he could be
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 1: making a combat with the Prince Caravaccioli. Leaning over the
• 1:43:31
  Speaker 1: railing in the darkest corner of the terrace, I felt
• 1:43:34
  Speaker 1: my hand grasped, secondarily by that good friend of mine.
• 1:43:38
  Speaker 1: God bless you, whispered poor Junior. On my soul. I
• 1:43:42
  Speaker 1: believe he's done himself. Listen, I turned. That beautiful lady
• 1:43:47
  Speaker 1: had stepped out into the light from the salon door.
• 1:43:50
  Speaker 1: I could see her face shining, and her eyes, ah me,
• 1:43:54
  Speaker 1: how glorious they were. Antonio followed her, But wait, he
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 1: cried pitifully. Not for you, she answered, and that voice
• 1:44:03
  Speaker 1: of hers, always before so gentle, rang out as the
• 1:44:07
  Speaker 1: Roman trumpets once rang from this same cliff. Not for you.
• 1:44:12
  Speaker 1: I saw him there with his painted head, and I
• 1:44:14
  Speaker 1: understood you saw him there, and you did nothing to
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 1: help him, and the two little children, your nieces too,
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 1: and he your brother. Then my heart melted, and I
• 1:44:26
  Speaker 1: found myself choking, for the beautiful Lady was weeping. Not
• 1:44:31
  Speaker 1: for you, Prince Kravacuoli. She cried through her tears, not
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 1: for you. End of chapter nine. Chapter ten of The
• 1:44:47
  Speaker 1: Beautiful Lady by Booth Tarkington read for LibriVox dot Org
• 1:44:52
  Speaker 1: by Rita Boutros. All of the beggars in Naples, I think,
• 1:44:58
  Speaker 1: all of the flower girls, and boy, I am sure,
• 1:45:01
  Speaker 1: and all the wandering serenaders, I will swear, were under
• 1:45:05
  Speaker 1: our windows at the Veseuve from six o'clock in the morning.
• 1:45:09
  Speaker 1: The Princess Irene sailed. And there need be no wonder
• 1:45:13
  Speaker 1: when it is known that poor Junior had thrown handfuls
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 1: of silver and five lire notes from our balcony to
• 1:45:20
  Speaker 1: strolling orchestras and singers for two nights before they wakened
• 1:45:26
  Speaker 1: us with Adio la Bella Napolis. Adio Adio sung to
• 1:45:31
  Speaker 1: the departing benefactor. When he had completed his toilet and
• 1:45:36
  Speaker 1: his coffee, he showed himself on the balcony to them
• 1:45:39
  Speaker 1: for a moment. Ah, What a resounding cheer for the Signore,
• 1:45:44
  Speaker 1: the great North American nobleman, And how it swelled to
• 1:45:48
  Speaker 1: a magnificent thundering when another largesse of his came flying
• 1:45:53
  Speaker 1: down among them. Who could have reproved him not Raphael Enzolini,
• 1:45:58
  Speaker 1: who was on his knee over the bags and rugs.
• 1:46:02
  Speaker 1: I think I even made some prolongation of that position,
• 1:46:05
  Speaker 1: for I was far from assured of my countenance that
• 1:46:08
  Speaker 1: bright morning. I was not to sail in the Princess
• 1:46:12
  Speaker 1: Irene with those dear friends. Ah No. I had told
• 1:46:15
  Speaker 1: them that I must go back to Paris to say
• 1:46:18
  Speaker 1: good bye to my little nieces and sail from Boulogne,
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 1: and I am sure they believed that was my reason.
• 1:46:25
  Speaker 1: I had even arranged to go away upon a train,
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 1: which would make it not possible for me to drive
• 1:46:30
  Speaker 1: to the dock with them. I did not wish to
• 1:46:33
  Speaker 1: see the boat carry them away from me, and so
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 1: the farewells were set in the street. In all that crowd.
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 1: Poor Junior and I were waiting at the door when
• 1:46:43
  Speaker 1: the carriage galloped up. How the crowd rushed to see
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 1: that lady, whom it bore to us, blushing and laughing,
• 1:46:51
  Speaker 1: clouds of gold dust came before my eyes again. She
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 1: wore once more, that ineffable gray pongee servants ran forward
• 1:46:59
  Speaker 1: with the effects of poor Junior, and we both sprang
• 1:47:03
  Speaker 1: toward the carriage. A flower girl was offering a great
• 1:47:07
  Speaker 1: basket of loose violets. Poor Junior seized it and threw
• 1:47:11
  Speaker 1: them like a blue rain over the two ladies. Bravo, bravo.
• 1:47:16
  Speaker 1: A hundred bouquets showered into the carriage, and my friend's
• 1:47:20
  Speaker 1: silver went out in another shower to meet them. Adio,
• 1:47:24
  Speaker 1: La bella Napolis came from the singers and the violins,
• 1:47:27
  Speaker 1: and I cried to them for la luna nova, good
• 1:47:31
  Speaker 1: bye for a little while, good bye. I knew how
• 1:47:35
  Speaker 1: well my friend liked me, because he shook my hand
• 1:47:38
  Speaker 1: with his head turned away. Then the gray glove of
• 1:47:41
  Speaker 1: the beautiful lady touched my shoulder, the lightest touch in
• 1:47:45
  Speaker 1: all the world. As I stood close to the carriage,
• 1:47:48
  Speaker 1: while poor Junior climbed in. Good Bye, thank you, and
• 1:47:53
  Speaker 1: God bless you. She said in a low voice, and
• 1:47:56
  Speaker 1: I knew for what she thanked me. The driver cracked
• 1:47:59
  Speaker 1: his whip like an honest Neapolitan. The horses sprang forward. Adio, Adio.
• 1:48:06
  Speaker 1: I sang with the musicians, waving and waving and waving
• 1:48:10
  Speaker 1: my handkerchief to the departing carriage. Now I saw my
• 1:48:14
  Speaker 1: friend lean over and take the beautiful lady by the hand,
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 1: and together they stood up in the carriage and waved
• 1:48:21
  Speaker 1: their handkerchiefs to me. Then, but not because they had
• 1:48:25
  Speaker 1: passed out of sight, I could see them not any longer.
• 1:48:29
  Speaker 1: They were so good, that kind poor junior and the
• 1:48:32
  Speaker 1: beautiful lady. They seemed like dear children, as if they
• 1:48:37
  Speaker 1: had been my own dear children. End of Chapter ten
• 1:48:43
  Speaker 1: recording by Rita Boutros and of the Beautiful Lady by
• 1:48:48
  Speaker 1: Booth Tarkington