Part Love Story, Part Travelogue Pt 7
Installment #7:
Having lingered in the lobby a few minutes, the party bade a temporary farewell to Mother Eckert and piled into Mr. Stewart’s auto. The Eckert girls with the Messrs. Jackson filled and overlapped the tonneau while you sat at the left of the driver and prepared to revel in your favorite pastime and the new sites. First the machine headed for the docks, threaded the busy water front and drew up at the pier of the Alaskan S.S. Company. There the boys took your baggage aboard the “Dolphin” and you assisted at their depositing it in your stateroom. You lingered ~ as usual ~ a little behind the others, and when you came back to the car, Anna Eckert was in the front seat with Mr. Stewart. Perhaps a shade of disappointment passed over your eyes but you laughed at the trick and climbed into the tonneau with the other three. For a very evident reason Anna evinced an immediate desire to resume the former arrangement so it was accomplished, much to your satisfaction because you liked the front seat. Then came an hour long to be remembered. Up the steep hills of Seattle climbed the auto ~ it seemed like a chariot to you. Upon the glory of the distant fair illuminations you gazed ~ they looked like Fairyland to you. Everything seemed wonderful. Mr. Stewart was very pleasant and you felt no strangeness with him from the first. Your conversation was mildly insane, consisting mainly of jokes and joking. When you drove by The College Inn he said, “If you are in the city for any length of time on your return from Alaska I should like to take you to dinner there.” “Thank you,” you replied, “that would be fine. And I’m a very economical guest at dinner. I never take anything but coffee and souvenir spoons.” Your listener’s mouth appeared to be shocked but his eyes were not similarly affected. So you laughed at him and he complimented you on your speedy acquisition of the Seattle spirit, with which you were destined to be better acquainted.
Soon you were all aboard the “Dolphin,” once more addresses were put down in little leather books, postal promises were exchanged, and the call of “All ashore” sent your boys scurrying onto the dock. Over the rail leaned three excited girls. Moving them into darkness were four black figures. Across the widening water came Mr. Stewart’s command, “Don’t get married up there in Alaska” which you refused to answer but did not fail to put down to the debit side of the account you had unconsciously made for him.
According to your promise you sent him a post card from Skagway, oh! conscientious Other Girl, but your thought of him ended there for Alaska’s wonders filled your mind and your heart was occupied with another image.
Dear Girl That Went Before, I want to hurry back to the events that conspired to send you away and bring the Supreme Night when this New Girl That Will Always Be came to fill your place. So you must remember for yourself wherever you are the beautiful ten days in Alaska. You have bequeathed to me a wonderful legacy of memories woven about glorious Alaskan sunsets on gleaming snow-peaks; about floating ice-bergs and distant glaciers; about the grandeur of nature and the companionship of pleasant people. The happy moments in Alaska were a beautiful prelude to the perfect symphony that played your life into mine when the Master Musician poured into my heart the “music of the spheres.”
All the good fairies in the world, I believe, rushed to Seattle on the 18th of July when the Dolphin tied up to her dock and you said goodbye to her from bow to stern, from captain to steward. You had made arrangements with “Brother Jack,” the purser, to leave your red coat and high shoes in your stateroom to give away to a needy Indian woman, but you had hard work to lose the shoes. As you were descending the gang plank, Anna Eckert rushed after you waving a lumpy bundle of newspaper, “Here’s something you left,” she gasped, “and you wouldn’t have had ‘em but for me.” Those shoes! You explained calmly and soothingly and at last returned them to the place of finding appointed by “Brother Jack.” That bit of excitement past, your quartette made its way up to the Hotel Perry and the day was spent in various ways. You joined a dear couple who had been very kind to you and visited the Fair coming back to the Hotel Clark where you were to stay with the Eckerts until their departure the next night. That evening you and the girls promenaded for awhile watching the golden sunset till you asked, “What shall we do tonight, write letters or read in the parlors?” Why, we are going to have callers. Hadn’t I told you that Mr. Stewart and two friends were coming?” Clara answered.
Now she hadn’t told you anything of the sort because she had telephoned him while you were away. Your private opinion was that she hoped you would be absent when the result obtained. So you decided to be very much of a background, in fact you so nearly determined not to claim any of the call for yourself that you took Mother Eckert for a walk, leaving the girls to greet and entertain the callers. But a walk could not be indulged in for an undue length of time and finally you found yourself entering the hotel lobby, going toward the parlor, peering at the Eckert girls gaily talking to the three dark figures ~ and oh! You funny Other Girl ~ running away without joining them. But Mr. Stewart had caught sight of you ~ how glad I am, weren’t you just the littlest at the time? Out he dashed with, “No! you don’t,” and once more you felt that homey feeling when you shook his hand and he led you to the group. After introductions had taken place you objected to staying indoors when the night outside was so beautiful. As a result with Mother Eckert’s permission, the six young people headed for the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Fair that was holding sway in the city on the shore of Lake Washington. Mr. Stewart calmly appropriated you while his two friends each piloted a Miss Eckert. That funny queer night, Other Girl! Do you remember it as well as I do? Do you remember how Mr. Stewart teased you by pretending that you were his wife and had made poor use of the quarter-a-week allowance he made you? How your nose went up at his attempted wit and you abandoned him to join one of the other couples, leaving him to join the not sorrowful companionship of himself. What sights you saw on the Pay Streak in The House Upside-Down where your escort ~ you had become temporarily reconciled ~ was the subject for a thrilling illusion! What a tired Other Girl you were when finally your steps were pointed homeward. Mr. Stewart made you glad you were with him until you had almost reached the Hotel when he aroused your ire. It seemed that his boarding house was just around the corner and as he came in sight of it, he grasped your arm and striding toward it called to the others, “Well, goodnight all, we’ll see you in the morning,” of course it was over in a minute. You made a stand, called him an uncomplimentary name and right-about faced. But if I remember your feelings correctly, Miss Runaway, and what disposition you made of Mr. Stewart when questioned by the girls as to your opinion of him you were anything but favorably impressed. For when you had donned your nightie, braided your hair and crept into bed, I think I can hear you murmuring, “He may be nice as you say, but he certainly needs to be taken down.” Even before you had vanished, Other Girl, you had learned to smile at that sincere dictum and also at the mental reservation which accompanied it.