The instant we saw the diligence momma declared that if she had to sit anywhere but in the middle of it she would remain in Chiavenna until next day. Mrs. Portheris was of the same mind. She said that even the intérieur would be dangerous enough going down hill, but if the Senator would sit there too she would try not to be nervous. The coupé was terrifying—one saw everything the poor dear horses did—and as to the banquette she could imagine herself flying out of it, if we so much as went over a stone. As a party we were strangers to the diligence; we had all the curiosity and hesitation about it, as Dicky remarked, of the animals when Noah introduced them to the Ark. I asked Dicky to describe the diligence for the purpose of this volume, thinking that it might, here and there, have a reader who had never seen one, and he said that, as soon as he had made up his mind whether it was most like a triumphal chariot in a circus procession or a boudoir car in an ambulance, he would; but then his eyes wandered to Isabel, who was pinker than ever in the mountain air, and his reasoning faculties left him. A small German with a very red nose, most incoherent in his apparel—he might have been a Baron or again a hair-dresser—already occupied one of the seats in the intérieur, so after our elders had been safely deposited beside him the banquette and the coupé were left, as Mrs. Portheris said, to the adventurous young people. Dicky and I had conspired, for the sustained effect on Mrs. Portheris, to sit in the banquette, while Isabel was to suffer Mr. Mafferton in the coupé—an arrangement which her mother viewed with entire complacency. "After all," said Mrs. Portheris to momma, "we\'re not in Hyde Park—and young people will be young people." We had not counted, however, with the Senator, who suddenly realised, as Dicky was handing me up, that it was his business, in the capacity of Doge, to interfere. It is to his credit that he found it embarrassing, on account of his natural, almost paternal, dislike to make things unpleasant for Dicky. He assumed a sternly impenetrable expression, thought about it for a moment, and then approached Mr. Mafferton.
"I\'d be obliged to you," he said, "if you could arrange, without putting yourself out any, to change places with young Dod, there, as far as St. Moritz. I have my reasons—but not necessarily for publication. See?"
Mr. Mafferton\'s eye glistened with appreciation of the confidence reposed in him. "I shall be most happy," he said, "if Dod doesn\'t mind." But Dicky, with indecent haste, was already in the coupé. "Don\'t mention it, Mafferton," he said out of the window. "I\'m delighted—at least—whatever the Senator says has got to be done, of course," and he made an attempt to look hurt that would not have imposed upon anybody but a self-constituted Doge with a guilty conscience. I took my bereavement in stony calm, with possibly just a suggestion about my eyebrows and under-lip that some day, on the far free shores of Lake Michigan, a downtrodden daughter would re-assert herself; poppa re-entered an intérieur darkened by a thunder-cloud on the brow of his Aunt Caroline; and we started.
It was some time before Mr. Mafferton interfered in the least with the Engadine. He seemed wrapped in a cloud of vain imaginings, sprung, obviously, from poppa\'s ill-considered request. I understood his emotions and carefully respected his silence. I was unwilling to be instructed about the Engadine either botanically or geologically—it was more agreeable not to know the names of the lovely little foreign flowers, and quite pleasant enough that every turn in the road showed us a white mountain or a purple one without having to understand what it was made of. Besides, I particularly did not wish to precipitate anything, and there are moments when a mere remark about the weather will do it. I had been suffering a good deal from my conscience since Mrs. Portheris had told me that poppa had written to Arthur—I didn\'t mind him enduring unnumbered pangs of hope deferred, but it was quite another thing that he should undergo the unnecessary martyrdom of imagining that he had been superseded by Dicky Dod. On reflection, I thought it would be safer to start Mr. Mafferton on the usual lines, and I nerved myself to ask him whether he could tell me anything about the prehistoric appearance of these lovely mountains.
"I am glad," he responded absently, "that you admire my favourite Alps." Nothing more. I tried to prick him to the consideration of the scenery by asking him which were his favourite Alps, but this also came to nothing. Having acknowledged his approval of the Alps, he seemed willing to let them go unadorned by either fact or fancy. I offered him sandwiches, but he seemed to prefer his moustache. Presently he roused himself.
"I\'m afraid you must think me very uninteresting, Miss Wick," he said.
"Dear me, no," I replied. "On the contrary, I think you are a lovely type."
"Type of an Englishman?" Mr. Mafferton was not displeased.
"Type of some Englishmen. You would not care to represent the—ah, commercial classes?"
"If I had been born in that station," replied Mr. Mafferton modestly, "I should be very glad to represent them. But I should not care to be a Labour candidate."
"It wouldn\'t be very appropriate, would it?" I suggested. "But do you ever mean to run for anything, really?"
"Certainly not," Mr. Mafferton replied, with slight resentment. "In our family we never run. But, of course, I will succeed my uncle in the Upper House."
"Dear me!" I exclaimed. "So you will! I should think it would be simply lovely to be born a legislator. In our country it is attained by such painful degrees." It flashed upon me in a moment why Mr. Mafferton was so industrious in collecting general information. He was storing it up against the day when he would be able to make speeches, which nobody could interrupt, in the House of Lords.
The conversation flagged again, and I was driven to comment upon the appearance of the little German down in the intérieur. It was quite remarkable, apart from the bloom on his nose, his pale-blue eyes wandered so irresponsibly in their sockets, and his scanty, flaxen beard made such an unsuccessful effort to disguise the amiability of his chin. He wore a braided cotton coat to keep cool, and a woollen comforter to keep wa............