The Letters of her Mother to Elizabeth Part 3

As the _table d'hote_ courses were all consumed and time was pressing, she had to content herself with French rolls and honey.

{_The Tell Monument_}

Before we left Altdorf the two Englishmen whom we had seen scorching over the Axenstra.s.se arrived. I never saw such objects, they were fairly reeking with perspiration and covered in white dust. They looked positively filthy. I heard one asking the proprietor of the hotel if he could buy a valve in Altdorf, and they both abused the Swiss roads as if they had expected to find them like the Macadam in Hyde Park. The Tell monument was quite worth coming to see, but I think its situation in the tiny _platz_ of the picturesque village, which the immense mountains seem ready to crush, makes it more imposing than it really is. I am sure if it were in a city one would hardly notice it.

{_A Bunch of Edelweiss_}

Blanche was awfully "Cooky," and bought two post-cards with it on to send to Daisy and Mrs. Chevington. At Fluelen, too, she bought a bunch of edelweiss from a Swiss doll with goitre, and stuck it into the bow on her sailor-hat. We were quite tired when we got back to Lucerne, and had dinner in our rooms, for Therese had gone to bed with a _migraine_ and neglected to put out our frocks or have our baths ready. I expect to hear from you to-morrow, and that you are enjoying yourself at Croixmare.--Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER IX

HOTEL NATIONAL, LUCERNE 22nd August

DARLING ELIZABETH:

{_On the Quai_}

This morning between twelve and one, Blanche and I were strolling on the _quai_ when we met Sir Charles Bevon. He seemed glad to see us, and asked if we knew any of the people in society here, and when we told him we had only been in Lucerne four days and that he was the first person we had met that we knew, he invited us to dine with him at the Schweitzerhof to-night. It is from this dinner we have just come, and I must tell you about it before I go to bed.

{_Anglophobia_}

Sir Charles asked the Marquis and the Marquise de Pivart, the Vicomte de Narjac, and Mr. Vanduzen, an American naval officer _en retraite_, to meet us. I sat between the Marquis and Mr. Vanduzen. The Marquis looks like a little black monkey, with a beard _a Henri Deux_, but his manners are so elegant one never thinks of his looks. He knows the De Croixmares very well, and when I asked him what he thought of Heloise he turned so red and looked so uncomfortable that I at once felt that Jean's charming Comtesse had _brise son c[oe]ur_ at some period of their acquaintance. He dropped the subject as soon as possible, and quite rudely began to talk of the war, and said that England was the Jew among nations. I cooled his Anglophobia for him by remarking that I would much prefer to have him talk of the Comtesse de Croixmare than attack my country. He seemed positively afraid of me after that, so I am sure there must be something between him and Heloise that he doesn't want his wife to know. He got so moody and silent that I told him I thought him very rude, and devoted myself through the rest of dinner to Mr.

Vanduzen, who is elderly and "natty." Mr. Vanduzen is quite amusing, but I wish he wouldn't call people by their full names as if they were a species he was labelling for a museum, such as, "Really, Miss Blanche Blaine, you amaze me." "It was very warm to-day, was it not, Madame la Marquise de Pivart?" "Have you made the ascent of Pilatus, Sir Charles Bevon?" You know the style of man, Elizabeth, you must have met one or two like him at Nazeby or Hazeldene. If they are English they are called sn.o.bs, but when they come from the Land of Canaan on the other side of the pond they are put down quite likely as "so American."

{_The Marquise_}

The Marquise is a fascinating creature, she knows the full value of her figure as one of her attractions, and she clothes it accordingly. Her bust is like alabaster, the neck and shoulders are perfect; her eyes are rather wide apart, which gives her a nave expression; her smile is simplicity itself, and she talks with a tabloid voice. Sir Charles seemed to admire her, for he addressed nearly all his conversation to her, and he poked me so hard under the table once or twice that I was compelled to say, "The table leg is on the other side, Sir Charles," and he gave the Marquise such a reproachful glance.

Blanche had the Vicomte all to herself, and he seemed to like it. He has an automobile and talked of nothing else, and Sir Charles says he does nothing else in Paris. He is going to take Blanche and the Marquise in it to-morrow for a spin in the valley of the Reuss.

Everybody talked at once, as they always do on the Continent, and the effort to be general was quite fatiguing to me who am accustomed to the English method of monopolising one's neighbours. The foreign custom certainly gives more "go" to a dinner, but I think when I am not the hostess I prefer conversation _a deux_.

{_Don Carlos_}

After dinner we had coffee in the salon instead of outside on the verandah, for Sir Charles said we ought to see Don Carlos and suite go in to dinner. The suite were already in the salon, and they occupied the most comfortable chairs and looked rather sulky, which I suppose was from having to wait so long for their dinner. Don Carlos has thirty rooms on the first floor, but he will neither take his meals in private or at the usual hour with everybody else. He makes quite a point of dinner, and has it in the _salle-a-manger_ when the general public have finished. He must be a great advertis.e.m.e.nt for the Schweitzerhof, for crowds come nightly to see him and the d.u.c.h.ess go in to dinner. When they entered the salon there was as much etiquette among the suite as if they were at a _levee_. They formed themselves in a line in order of precedence; the men all kissed the d.u.c.h.ess's hand and the ladies curtseyed, then Don Carlos gave his arm to his wife and led the way to dinner. As the door of the _salle-a-manger_ was open we could see them eating; everybody talked at once, and the suite ate as if it was the only dinner they had had for a week. I am sure they were hungry.

Don Carlos is a splendid-looking Spaniard, with exile written all over him; whether natural or cultivated, the pose was perfect--the sadness and abstraction, the forced amus.e.m.e.nt, the far-away look in the eyes--but it wasn't melodramatic, and you didn't feel like laughing. The d.u.c.h.ess of Madrid was _reine aux bouts des ongles_ and an ideal consort for a banished monarch. She must have been very beautiful at one period of her life, and is still strikingly fine-looking. She was dressed as the great ladies on the Continent know how to dress, and wore some lovely diamonds. She had the same melancholy far-away expression as Don Carlos, and they both seemed rather bored, as if they had had too much of the suite, who are really nothing but pensioners. Sir Charles says they have not a peseta to bless themselves with, and live entirely on the bounty of Don Carlos. They follow him wherever he goes and form a sort of court for him; they are nothing but a pack of conspirators and professional revolutionists who dare not go back to Spain, and as they have all been broken in the Carlist cause, and still continue to intrigue and make themselves useful, Don Carlos has to put up with them.

And I must say I think he does it right royally, keeping up a fine old Bourbon custom, for these people can still say, like the needy n.o.blesse in Louis XIV.'s time, that they "bank with the king."

{_The Kursaal_}

When we had "done" Don Carlos and his dinner-party, Sir Charles suggested that we should go to the Kursaal and try our luck at Pet.i.ts Chevaux. We found the room crowded, and most of the people looked like those I saw at the Monico in London the night Algy Chevington took me there for supper, when he couldn't get a table at the Trocadero. At first we couldn't get near the tables, but the Marquise went and stood behind the croupier, and got him a place for her. Then a man, who I am sure was a High Church curate, for he had cut off his coat collar and let his hair grow long like a French abbe, offered me his seat if I would touch his money for him. But he gave me bad luck till he was cleared out, and then I began to win. It was such fun, and I raked in quant.i.ties of gold and some five-franc pieces made of lead. The Marquise and I won, but the others had no luck, and I saw the Marquis somewhere in the back drinking beer with an impossible female, and I told him so afterwards, and that I thought it was very rude to the ladies in his party, and he looked as if he would like to choke me. The Vicomte told Blanche that he believed the croupier tampered with the machinery and could make any horse win he liked, and the croupier heard. For an instant I thought there was going to be a "scene," but the Marquise said such a _cochon_ as the croupier wouldn't dare to strike the Vicomte, who it seems spends the time he can spare from automobiling in Paris in duelling. "Mais, comme il est sale, ce croupier," the Marquise said to me, and then added that the croupiers at Monte Carlo were as beautiful as Lucifer, and that a friend of hers, a Comtesse Jean d'Outremer, had eloped with one. A _betise_ she called it. I told Sir Charles after that that I thought we had better go, and they all walked with us as far as the National. The Marquis and the Vicomte kissed my hand, and Sir Charles told me to call on the Marquise to-morrow, as she expected it.

My kindest regard to Madame de Croixmare and the family at the chateau.--Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER X

HOTEL NATIONAL, LUCERNE 24th August

DARLING ELIZABETH:

{_Smart People_}

This morning Blanche and I were sitting in the wicker chairs under the chestnuts on the _quai_ in front of the National, when Sir Charles and the Vicomte pa.s.sed. They both stopped and chatted for a while, then the Vicomte saw some very smart people who were sitting near and introduced us to them. They were the d.u.c.h.esse de Vaudricourt and Mrs. Wertzelmann, the wife of the American Minister. The d.u.c.h.esse is Empire and the Wertzelmanns are _nouveaux riches_, but they are at the very top of all the society here. A great many other people came up to speak to them; Blanche and I were introduced, and, as Sir Charles said, before you could say "Jack Robinson" we were _range_. As we both had on Paquin we felt quite as well turned out as the other women, who were beautifully dressed. You should have seen the people on the _quai_ stare as they pa.s.sed.

{_Telling Fortunes_}

Blanche made quite a sensation by telling fortunes, and everybody wanted their hands read. She did it awfully well, and told the right things to the right people. She told the d.u.c.h.esse de Vaudricourt, who is fifty if she is a day, but makes up twenty-five, that the only tragedy in her life would be her death, and to beware of a _beau sabreur_ who carried her photograph in a locket on his watch chain. When pressed as to the reason she should be cautious of this unknown, Blanche told her that he was destined to perish in a duel over her. The d.u.c.h.esse was delighted, for it is said that she longs for the _eclat_ of men killing themselves over her, but that up to the present no one has ever even fought about her. Mrs. Wertzelmann was to have her portrait, which has been painted by Constant, hung in the Luxembourg, and to marry her daughter to a Serene Highness, both of which Sir Charles had told us were her supreme desires. The Vicomte had a very interesting personality, and was irresistible with women and greatly respected by men, and was to die in a collision of automobiles, which made him turn rather green. Mr.

Wertzelmann, the American Minister, who had joined us, held out a hand like a working-man's, and asked Blanche what was going to happen to him.

She said she saw great things in the lines, and something else which she thought could only be confided to his ear in private.

He was so excited, and Blanche wrinkled her eyes at him in the prettiest way, that he insisted on taking her to the verandah of the National, and hearing the rest of his fortune in private. I don't know what Blanche told him, but he ordered champagne frappe, and when they came back his face fairly beamed.

Mrs. Wertzelmann was very gracious, and said that though we hadn't called she wanted us to come out to-morrow afternoon to her villa to a garden-party; that she hated ceremony and etiquette and calling, and we might leave our cards when we came. For it seems it is the custom here for strangers to make the first call, but it is really very silly calling at all, for n.o.body ever seems to be at home, and one meets the same people half-a-dozen times a day at the National, which is the rendezvous of the smart set.

{_Comte Belladonna_}

{_Advertising Custom_}

It is the thing to have tea in the garden of the National, where the Hungarian band plays from four to six. It is very _recherche_, and the prices are so high that the _canaille_, as the Marquise de Pivart calls the tourists, don't come. So this afternoon we met the same set again, and also a dear little old man, over eighty, who had the most perfect manners, and was dressed faultlessly. In fact the Marquise told me that his only occupation was dressing and paying compliments. His name is Comte Belladonna, and he has a face like the carving on a cameo. He is the most _distingue_ person here, and was something to Victor Emanuel, and has seen only the best society all his life. He is quite poor, and has a pension which just about pays for his gloves and handkerchiefs, but everybody adores him; he gives tone to everything, and nothing is complete without his presence. He is like the old beaux we used to see at Cannes and Biarritz, and it is a wonder how at his age he manages to keep pace with his invitations. Sir Charles says he has a room on the top floor of the National which he gets for nothing, for his name is always put first on the list of the hotel guests in the papers as an advertis.e.m.e.nt.

There is an Austrian n.o.bleman at the Schweitzerhof who is accommodated there in the same way for the use of his name in the visitors' list, and I think it is very convenient, for it saves all the worry of trying to make ends meet, and one is actually paid for existing, and supported in the best style. I am sure if the Irish peers knew that there was such a custom in vogue they would move it should be adopted at Scarborough and Harrogate, and the other places, only, of course, we haven't any _villes de luxe_ at home as they have on the Continent.

Comte Belladonna spends his summers at the National and his winters in Rome, where the Marquise says the Government, in consideration for his past services to the State, have given him a post in a _bureau_, where all that he has to do is to occasionally sign his name to doc.u.ments of which he never reads the contents. He is quite the most youthful old boy I have ever met; he doesn't rise at six and walk ten miles before breakfast like old Lord Merriman, who hunts with the West Somerset Harriers in all weathers and golfs on the Quantocks. Comte Belladonna rises at eleven like a gilded youth, clothes himself in the most faultless flannels, and descends to the wicker chairs under the chestnuts on the _quai_, where he reads the "Osservatore Romano," and chats with the _beau monde_ of Lucerne who gather there; at one he lunches like an epicure, after which he is ready for any social amus.e.m.e.nt. He is a charming polished beau, a master of ceremonies, a courtier, and he at present affects an American girl of nineteen, who is quite ready to play May to his January. But Comte Belladonna belongs to the country of Machiavelli, and _la belle Americaine_ has only her face for her fortune.

{_Dinner at a Cafe_}

To-night we dined at a cafe with the Vicomte de Narjac; Sir Charles and the Wertzelmanns were the only others of the party. A troupe of Swedish singers sang and danced and pa.s.sed round a tambourine, and after dinner we went to the Kursaal theatre to see "Puppenfee."--Your dearest Mamma.

LETTER XI

HOTEL NATIONAL, LUCERNE 26th August

DARLING ELIZABETH:

{_The De Pivarts' Villa_}

Such a jolly time as we had yesterday! In the morning before lunch Blanche and I clambered up the hill behind the National to call on the De Pivarts. They live in a mite of a box of a villa. It is at the end of a street so steep that you feel as if you were going to pitch head-first down it when you begin to descend. The De Pivarts were not at home, according to a man-servant who came to the door in his s.h.i.+rt sleeves and without a collar, and took our cards in fingers that I am sure had previously been engaged in blacking the Marquis's boots or lighting the kitchen fire. But as we came up the hill we saw a man like the Marquis _en deshabille_ leaning out of the tiny balcony, and we distinctly heard a female exclaim: "Mon Dieu, je suis perdu! Il n'y a pas des Geraudels!