A Cathedral Courtship | Page 7

I heard a distressed voice saying, "Oh,
aunt Celia, I've lost my smart little London shoe. I was sitting in a tree,
taking a pebble out of the heel, when I saw a caterpillar, and I dropped
it into the river, the shoe, you know, not the caterpillar." Hereupon she
came in sight, and I witnessed the somewhat unusual spectacle of my
nut-brown mayde hopping on one foot, like a divine stork, and ever and
anon emitting a feminine shriek as her off foot, clad in a delicate silk
stocking, came in contact with the ground. I rose quickly, and,
polishing the patent leather ostentatiously, inside and out, with my
handkerchief, I offered it to her with distinguished grace. She swayed
on her one foot with as much dignity as possible, and then recognizing
me as the person who picked up the contents of aunt Celia's bag, she
said, dimpling in the most distracting manner (that's another thing there
ought to be a law against), "Thank you again; you seem to be a sort of
knight- errant!"
"Shall I--assist you?" I asked. (I might have known that this was going
too far.)
"No, thank you," she said, with polar frigidity. "Good-afternoon." And
she hopped back to her aunt Celia without another word.
I don't know how to approach aunt Celia. She is formidable. By a
curious accident of feature, for which she is not in the least responsible,
she always wears an unfortunate expression as of one perceiving some

offensive odor in the immediate vicinity. This may be a mere accident
of high birth. It is the kind of nose often seen in the "first families," and
her name betrays the fact that she is of good old Knickerbocker origin.
We go to Wells to-morrow. At least I think we do.

SHE

GLOUCESTER, June 9 The Spread Eagle.
I met him at Wells, and again at Bath. We are always being ridiculous,
and he is always rescuing us. Aunt Celia never really sees him, and
thus never recognizes him when he appears again, always as the flower
of chivalry and guardian of ladies in distress. I will never again travel
abroad without a man, even if I have to hire one from a Feeble-Minded
Asylum. We work like galley slaves, aunt Celia and I, finding out about
trains and things. Neither of us can understand Bradshaw, and I can't
even grapple with the lesser intricacies of the A B C railway guide. The
trains, so far as I can see, always arrive before they go out, and I can
never tell whether to read up the page or down. It is certainly very
queer that the stupidest man that breathes, one that barely escapes
idiocy, can disentangle a railway guide, when the brightest woman fails.
Even the Boots at the inn in Wells took my book, and, rubbing his
frightfully dirty finger down the row of puzzling figures, found the
place in a minute, and said, "There ye are, miss." It is very humiliating.
All the time I have left from the study of routes and hotels I spend on
guide-books. Now I'm sure that if any one of the men I know were here,
he could tell me all that is necessary as we walk along the streets. I
don't say it in a frivolous or sentimental spirit in the least, but I do
affirm that there is hardly any juncture in life where one isn't better off
for having a man about. I should never dare divulge this to aunt Celia,
for she doesn't think men very nice. She excludes them from
conversation as if they were indelicate subjects.
But, to go on, we were standing at the door of Ye Olde Bell and Horns,
at Bath, waiting for the fly which we had ordered to take us to the
station, when who should drive up in a four-wheeler but the flower of
chivalry. Aunt Celia was saying very audibly, "We shall certainly miss
the train if the man doesn't come at once."
"Pray take this fly," said the flower of chivalry. "I am not leaving till

the next train."
Aunt Celia got in without a murmur; I sneaked in after her. I don't think
she looked at him, though she did vouchsafe the remark that he seemed
to be a civil sort of person.
At Bristol, I was walking about by myself, and I espied a sign, "Martha
Huggins, Licensed Victualer." It was a nice, tidy little shop, with a fire
on the hearth and flowers in the window, and, as it was raining smartly,
I thought no one would catch me if I stepped inside to chat with Martha.
I fancied it would be so delightful and Dickensy to talk quietly with a
licensed victualer by