The Travelling Companions Part 14

THE IT. G. Goodaby, dear frens, a riverderla! I success at your chairs.

I vish you a pleasure's delay!

PODB. But I say, look here, Sir, we're going on, and you've got our place!

THE IT. G. Sank you verri moch. I 'ope so.

[_He blows_ PODBURY _a kiss._

PODB. (_with intense disgust_). How on earth are we going to get that beggar out? Set the Conductor at him, Culchard, do--you can talk the lingo best!

CULCH. (_who has had enough of_ PODBURY _for the present_). Talk to him yourself, my dear fellow, _I_'m not going to make a row. [_He gets in._

PODB. (_to_ CONDUCTOR). Hi! sprechen sie Franzosisch, oder was? _il-y-a quelque chose dans mon siege, dites-lui de_--what the deuce is the French for "clear out"?

COND. _Montez, Monsieur, nous bartons, montez vite alors!_

[_He thrusts_ PODBURY, _protesting vainly, into the interieur, with two peasants, a priest, and the elderly Englishwoman. The diligence starts again._

CHAPTER XIII.

On revient Toujours!

SCENE--_A hundred yards or so from the top of Monte Generoso, above Lake Lugano._ CULCHARD, _who, with a crowd of other excursionists, has made the ascent by rail, is toiling up the steep and very slippery slope to the summit._

CULCH. (_to himself, as he stops to pant_). _More_ climbing! I thought this line was supposed to go to the top! But that's Italian all over--hem--as Podbury would say! Wonder, by the way, if he expected to be asked to come with me. I've no reason for sacrificing myself like that any longer! (_He sighs._) Ah, Hypatia, if you could know what a dreary disenchanted blank you have made of my life! And I who believed you capable of appreciating such devotion as mine!

A VOICE BEHIND. My! If I don't know that back I'll just give up! How've _you_ been getting along all this time, Mr. Culchard?

CULCH. (_turning_). Miss Trotter! A most delightful and--er--unexpected meeting, indeed!

MISS TROTTER. Well, we came up on the cars in front of yours. We've taken rooms at the hotel up here. Poppa reckoned the air would be kind of fresher on the top of this mountain, and I don't believe but what he's right either. I guess I shall want another hairpin through _my_ hat. And are you still going around with Mr. Podbury? As inseparable as ever, I presume?

CULCH. Er--_about_ as inseparable. That is, we are still travelling together--only, on this particular afternoon----

MISS T. He went and got mislaid? I see. He used to stray considerable over in Germany, didn't he? Well, I'm real pleased to see _you_ anyway.

And how's the poetry been panning out? I hope you've had a pretty good yield of sonnets?

CULCH. (_to himself_). She's really grown distinctly prettier. She might show a little more _feeling_, though, considering we were almost, if not quite----(_Aloud._) So you remember my poor poems? I'm afraid I have not been very--er--prolific of late.

MISS T. You don't say! I should think you'd have had one to show for every day, with the date to it, like a new-laid egg.

CULCH. Birds don't lay--er--I mean they don't _sing_, in the dark. My light has been--er--lacking of late.

MISS T. If that's intended for me, you ought to begin chirping right away. But you're not going to tell me you've been "lounjun round en sufferin'" like--wasn't it _Uncle Remus's_ Brer Terrapin? (_Catching_ C.'S _look of bewilderment._) What, don't you know _Uncle Remus?_

CULCH. (_politely_). Mr. Trotter is the only relation of yours I have had the pleasure of meeting, as yet.

MISS T. Why, I reckoned _Uncle Remus_ was pretty most everybody's relation by now. He's a book. But likely you've no use for our national humorous literature?

CULCH. I--er--must confess I seldom waste time over the humorous literature of _any_ nation.

MISS T. I guess that accounts for your gaiety! There, don't you mind _me_, Mr. Culchard. But suppose we hurry along and inspect this panorama they talk so much of; it isn't going to be any side-show. It's just a real representative ma.s.s-meeting of Swiss mountains, with every prominent peak in the country on the platform, and a deputation down below from the leading Italian lakes. It's ever so elegant,--and there's Poppa around on the top too.

_On the top. Tourists discovered making more or less appropriate remarks._

[Ill.u.s.tration: STRUGGLING WITH A LONG PRINTED PANORAMA.]

FIRST TOURIST (_struggling with a long printed panorama, which flaps like a sail_). Grand view, Sir, get 'em all from here, you see! Monte Rosa, Matterhorn, Breithorn----

[_Works through them all conscientiously, until, much to everybody's relief, his panorama escapes into s.p.a.ce._

SECOND T. (_a lady, with the air of a person making a discovery_). How wonderfully small everything looks down below!

THIRD T. (_a British Matron, with a talent for incongruity_). Yes, dear, very--_quite_ worth coming all this way for; but as I was telling you, we've always been accustomed to such an evangelical service, so that our new Rector is really _rather_--but we're quite _friendly_ of course; go there for tennis, and he dines with us, and all that. Still, I _do_ think, when it comes to having lighted candles in broad _daylight_----(_&c., &c._)

FOURTH T. (_an equally incongruous American_). Wa'al, yes, they show up well, cert'nly, those peaks do. But I was about to remark, Sir, I went to that particular establishment on Fleet Street. I called for a chop.

And when it came, I don't deny I felt disappointed, for the plate all around was just as _dry_--! But the moment I struck a fork into that chop, Sir,--well, the way the gravy just came _gus.h.i.+ng_ out was--there, it ain't no use me trying to put it in words! But from that instant, Sir, I kinder realized the peculiar charm of your British chop.

FIFTH T. (_a discontented Teuton_). I exbected more as zis. It is nod glear enough--nod at all. Zey dolt me from ze dop you see Milan. I look all aroundt. Novere I see Milan! And I lief my obera-gla.s.s behint me in ze drain, and I slib on ze gra.s.s and sbrain my mittle finger, and altogedder I do not vish I had com.

MISS T. (_presenting_ CULCHARD _to_ MR. CYRUS K. T.). I guess you've met _this_ gentleman before!

MR. T. Well now, that's _so_. I didn't just reckon I'd meet him again all this way above the sea-level though, but I'm just as pleased to see him. Rode up on the cars, I presume, Sir? Tolerable hilly road all the way, _ain't_ it now? There cann't anybody say we hain't made the most of _our_ time since you left us. Took a run over to Berlin; had two hours and a haff in that city, and I dunno as I keered about making a more pro-tracted visit. Went right through to Vi-enna, saw round Vi-enna. I did want, being so near, to just waltz into Turkey and see that. But I guess Turkey 'll have to keep till next time. Then back again into Switzerland, for I do seem to have kinder taken a fancy to Switzerland.

I'd like to have put in more time there, and we stayed best part of a week too! But Italy's an interesting place. Yes, I'm getting considerable interested in Italy, so far as I've got. There's Geneva now----

MISS T. You do beat anything for mixing up places, Father. And you don't want to be letting yourself loose on Mr. Culchard this way. You'd better go and bring Mr. Van Boodeler along; he's round somewhere.

MR. T. I do like slinging off when I meet a friend; but I'll shut down, Maud, I'll shut down.

MISS T. Oh, there you are, Charley! Come right here, and be introduced to Mr. Culchard. He's a vurry intelligent man. My cousin, Mr. Charles Van Boodeler,--Mr. Culchard. Mr. Van Boodeler's intelligent too. He's going to write our great National Amurrcan novel, soon as ever he has time for it. That's so, isn't it?

MR. V. B. (_a slim, pale young man, with a cosmopolitan air and a languid drawl_). It's our most pressing national need, Sir, and I have long cherished the intention of supplying it. I am collecting material, and, when the psychological moment arrives, I shall write that novel.

And I believe it will be a big thing, a very big thing; I mean to make it a complete compendium of every phase of our great and complicated civilization from State to State and from sh.o.r.e to sh.o.r.e. [CULCHARD _bows vaguely_.

MISS T. Yes, and the great Amurrcan public are going to rise up in their millions and boom it. Only I don't believe they'd better start booming just yet, till there's something more than covers to that novel. And how you're going to collect material for an Amurrcan novel, flying round Europe, just beats _me_!

MR. V. B. (_with superiority_). Because you don't realize that it's precisely in Europe that I find my best American types. Our citizens show up better against a European background,--it excites and stimulates their nationality, so to speak. And again, with a big subject like mine, you want to step back to get the proper focus. Now I'm _stepping_ back.

MISS T. I guess it's more like skipping, Charley. But so long as you're having a good time! And here's Mr. Culchard will fix you up some sonnets for headings to the chapters. You needn't begin _right_ away, Mr.

Culchard; I guess there's no hurry. But we get talking and _talking_, and never look at anything. I don't call it encouraging the scenery, and that's a fact!

MR. T. (_later, to_ CULCHARD). And you're pretty comfortable at your hotel? Well, I dunno, after all, what there is to keep _us_ here. I guess we'll go down again and stop at Lugano, eh, Maud?

[CULCHARD _eagerly awaits her reply_.