quite true. Ahead of me I saw young Robert Babson, leaning over the rail and pointing out the sights of the docks below and of the city beyond to his pretty fiancée, Miss Theresa Mercer. I smiled and touched the brim of my hat as I passed them, but they had eyes only for each other, and so I went on my way.
A short distance after, I encountered another familiar face: Wilfred Smythe, the young assistant to Miss Mercer’s father. He was ambling slowly along the deck toward me, a pensive expression on his face. I was surprised—he had seemed an eminently cheerful fellow when his employer had introduced him to Mr. Clemens and me, a short while ago in the smoking room. Then I saw his gaze light on something behind me, and a frown came across his face; for a moment, I considered whether it would best to walk on by, pretending not to notice him. Then he saw me coming toward him, and he managed a little smile, and a quiet “Hello,” as we passed. I replied in kind, and went on my way, wondering at what could have caused his evident annoyance.
It was some time later when it occurred to me that he must have been looking at Robert Babson and Theresa Mercer, whom I had just passed as he came into my view. And it was later still that I understood what had caused him to frown so.
I returned with Mrs. Kipling to the cabin, where in the company of Mr. Clemens, Mr. Kipling, and Prinz Karl, we finished the magnum of champagne, laughing a good deal. I think the anticipation of our departure had as much to do with our high spirits as anything we drank. Certainly, between my employer and Prinz Karl, the quips flew fast and furious. I think Mrs. Kipling had never been so outrageously flattered in her life. Had her husband not been present, and making as many jokes as Mr. Clemens and the Prince, I think she would have been scandalized.
When the bottle was at last emptied, we strolled out on deck to observe the final preparations for casting off. Already I could feel from somewhere deep below the throbbing rhythm of the great steam engines—a feeling with which I had become familiar (though on a smaller scale) during my trip down the Mississippi with Mr. Clemens. A glance upward showed smoke gathering above the three tall smokestacks of our vessel. Alas, it also revealed a bank of dark clouds swarming over the New Jersey Palisades to our west; we would be lucky to get out of the harbor without a rainstorm.
But we were not about to let something as trivial as an impending storm spoil our jolly moods. Somewhere in the direction of the ship’s bow, a band was playing, and we let the music draw us toward it. On the foredeck we found many of the first-class passengers gathered to watch half a dozen smartly uniformed fellows, in blue jackets, peaked caps, and white trousers, playing a sprightly march on an assortment of wind instruments. A tall fellow with hawkish features and an iron-gray “Imperial” beard directed them with a slender white baton. While his erect posture and gold-braided uniform radiated authority, he was clearly enjoying the music as much as any of the listeners. It would have been difficult, in the foulest of moods, to resist tapping a foot and breaking into a smile.
Though mid-October was well past the prime season for ocean travel, the ship appeared to have attracted a goodly complement of passengers. I had already met many of those whom I saw watching the scene with the same evident enjoyment as I. The Babson family stood in a group along the starboard rail, the father nodding his head in time to the rhythm, and his wife and daughter—a pretty young woman in a black traveling dress that set off her blond hair to good effect—arm in arm beside him. Robert Babson and his fiancée, Theresa Mercer, stood slightly apart from them. Young Babson leaned back with one foot propped against a lower rung of the railing behind him, and a straw hat cocked at a rakish angle on his head; Miss Mercer whispered something to him and he nodded, smiling. Not far away stood Vincent Mercer, the banker, next to a severe-looking woman wearing a fur wrap, evidently his wife.
One young man waved to the Babsons and said, “Here, stand right where you are, against the rail and I’ll take your picture.” He was carrying a little black box in his hands, which on closer inspection I recognized as one of the Kodak portable cameras that had become such a fad the last few years. One of my uncles had bought one of the first models the year I went away to Yale, and had spent almost the entire summer lining people up and telling them to smile, then locking himself in a dark closet to mix up strange-smelling chemicals so as to develop his films. Despite everyone’s skepticism, the little camera actually made quite acceptable photographs. The Babsons dutifully posed, with artificial-looking smiles, and the young man pressed the button. He thanked them, then wandered off in search of other photographic subjects. I wondered how he was going to keep his chemicals from spilling on board the rolling ship.
Signor Rubbia looked at the amateur photographer with a condescending expression. The artist would have made a fine subject for a picture, himself—his cape catching the breeze and his scarf fluttering dramatically behind him. Indeed, it seemed to me that he was striking a pose rather than standing naturally: His feet were spread apart, and his chin was lifted as if to add an inch or two to his height. Under one arm he carried a stout walking stick, with an ivory handle carved in the shape of an eagle’s head.
Against the opposite rail stood Wilfred Smythe, flanked by an elderly couple who were unmistakably his parents: a tall, thin, scholarly looking gentleman in a clerical collar, wearing thick spectacles and a plain black hat, and a stout, gray-haired woman whose modestly cut dark dress was in stark contrast to her bright eyes and ready smile. Young Smythe seemed to have recovered from his bout of melancholy; he tapped his foot along with the band, and applauded enthusiastically when the tune came to an end.
The bandleader turned and bowed to the audience, then faced his men again and struck up a new tune, this one in waltz time: the sentimental “After the Ball.” Prinz Karl turned to Mr. Kipling and asked his permission to dance with his wife. “Why, certainly, if Carrie would like to,” said Mr. Kipling, and to my surprise the two of them began waltzing gracefully across the deck. Several other couples followed their example, and soon the deck resembled nothing so much as an open-air ballroom. The sense of fun was contagious, and I began to think that the whole voyage would be one continuous party.
But as I looked around, I realized that not everyone found the scene as charming as I did. Mrs. Mercer, the banker’s wife, curled her lip, as if she found the spontaneous outbreak of dancing somehow distasteful. Some of the other ladies seemed to share her feeling; I saw one or two of them give a sniff of displeasure. Nor was Signor Rubbia impressed; as soon as Prinz Karl had begun dancing with Mrs. Kipling, he rolled his eyes ostentatiously, turned his back, and strode away from the scene. I wondered briefly whether it was the dancing or the dancer he found so little to his liking. Then the band swung into another tune, “The Sidewalks of New York,” and I turned my attention back to the music.
Prinz Karl proved to be an excellent dancer. I could see that Mrs. Mercer’s reaction to the dancing was by no means the prevailing sentiment among the ladies. When the band had concluded its medley, the prince led Mrs. Kipling back to her husband, bowing as he handed her over. Then the musicians struck up “Daisy Bell,” and the next thing I knew, the prince was waltzing with another lady—evidently a perfect stranger!—while Mr. Kipling led his wife out on the floor and showed himself a very smooth and stylish dancer in his own right. I found myself a bit envious of Prinz Karl’s easy grace and continental manners, and wished for an introduction to some of the young ladies on board so I might find a dancing partner of my own. Perhaps the opportunity would present itself soon.
At last, the impromptu party was interrupted by a double blast of the ship’s whistle—loud enough to drown out the band for a moment. This was evidently a signal that we were about to cast off, for it was followed by a cry of “All ashore that’s going ashore” by an officer with a megaphone. This unambiguous (if not entirely grammatical) order led to a hasty exodus of those who had come aboard to bid their friends “bon voyage.” For the next few minutes, departing visitors crowded the gangplank, and the passengers moved to the rail to wave farewell to
