My Friend the Chauffeur | Page 7

We're touring Europe, and we want to take a trip with you in your automobile, if--"
"Unfortunately, ladies," said I, "the services of--er--my car are already engaged to Mrs. Kidder, of Colorado, and her party. Isn't it so, Barrymore?"
"Yes," replied Terry stoutly. And that "yes" even if inadvertent, was equivalent I considered, to sign and seal.
Mrs. Kidder beamed like an understudy for The Riviera Sun. Beechy twinkled demurely, and tossed her plaits over her shoulder. Even Miss Destrey, the white goddess, deigned to smile, straight at Terry and no other.
At this moment F��licit�� appeared with a tray. Whipped cream frothed over the brow of a brown jug like a white wig on the forehead of a judge; lettuce showed pale green through filmy sandwiches; small round cakes were piled, crisp and appetizing, on a cracked S��vres dish; early strawberries glowed red among their own leaves. Talk of the marengo trick! It was nothing to this. The miracle had been duly performed; but--there were only five cups.
Mrs. Fox-Porston and her daughters, Miss Carrie Hood Woodall and her chaperone, took the hint and their leave; and the companions of the future were left alone together to talk over their plans.
"Lock the gate, F��licit��," said I. "Do make haste!" And she did. Dear F��licit��!

II
A CHAPTER OF PLANS
So it is that Fate calmly arranges our lives in spite of us. Although no details of the coming trip were settled during what remained of our new employers' visit, that was their fault and the fault of a singularly premature sunset, rather than mine, or even Terry's; and we both felt that it came to the same thing. We were in honour bound to "personally conduct" Mrs. Kidder, Miss Beechy Kidder, and Miss Destrey towards whatever point of the compass a guiding finger of theirs should signify.
It has always been my motto to take Father Time by the fore-lock, for fear he should cut it off, or get away, or play some other trick upon me, which the cantankerous old chap (no parent of mine!) is fond of doing. Therefore, if I could, I would have had terms, destination, day and hour of starting definitely arranged before that miraculously-produced tea of F��licit��'s had turned to tannin. But man may not walk through a solid wall, or strive against such conversational gifts as those of Mrs. Kidder.
She could and would keep to anything except the point. That, whatever its nature, she avoided as she would an indelicacy.
"Well, now, Mrs. Kidder," I began, "if you really want us to organize this tour, don't you think we'd better discuss--"
"Of course we want you to!" she broke in. "We all think it's just awfully good of you to bother with us when you must have so many friends who want you to take them--English people in your own set. By the way, do you know the Duchess of Carborough?"
"I know very few duchesses or other Americans," I replied. Whereupon Miss Kidder's imp laughed, though her mother remained grave, and even looked mildly disappointed.
"That's a funny way of putting it," said Beechy. "One would think it was quite an American habit, being a Duchess."
"So it is, isn't it?" I asked. "The only reason we needn't fear its growing like the Yellow Peril is because there aren't enough dukes. I've always thought the American nation the most favoured in the world. Aren't all your girls brought up to expect to be duchesses, and your men presidents?"
"I wasn't," snapped Beechy. "If there was a duke anywhere around, Mamma would take him, if she had to snatch him out of my mouth. What are English girls brought up to expect?"
"Hope for, not expect," I corrected her. "Any leavings there are in the way of marquesses or earls; or if none, a mere bishop or a C. B."
"What's a C. B.?" asked Mrs. Kidder anxiously.
"A Companion of the Bath."
"My goodness! Whose bath?"
"The Bath of Royalty. We say it with a capital B."
"My! How awkward for your King. And what was done about it when you had only a Queen on the throne?"
"You must inquire of the chamberlains," I replied. "But about that trip of ours. The--er--my car is in a garage not far away, and it can be ready when--"
"Oh, I hope it's a red car, with your coat of arms on it. I do so admire red for an automobile. We could all fix ourselves up in red cloaks and hats to match, and make ourselves look awfully swell--"
"Everybody'd call us 'The Crimson Ramblers,' or 'The Scarlet Runners,' or something else horrid," tittered that precocious child Beechy.
"It isn't red, it's grey," Terry managed hastily to interpolate; which settled one burning question, the first which had been settled or seemed likely to be settled at our present rate of progress.
"If you are keen on starting--" I