London (England) -- Fiction; Satire; Suffragists -- Fiction
She could hardly have been recognised as the Mrs. Rust of the
_Caribbeania_. You could see her pride oozing out in large drops upon
her brow. Her hat was on one side, and completely hid her sensational
hair, but for one flat wisp, like an interrogation mark inverted, which
reached damply to her eyebrow.
The buggy horse, which consisted of a few promiscuous bones, badly sewn
up in a second-hand skin, was more than willing to pause until the rest
of the party should be seated, and even then seemed desirous of waiting
on the chance of picking up yet another fare. It was, however, reminded
of its duty by its driver, and turned its drooping nose in the direction
of the King’s Garden Hotel.
When they reached that heavenly verandah, they felt for a moment as
though they were suffering from delusions. The _Caribbeania_ seemed to
have arrived on shore bodily. A long vista of familiar profiles rocked
cheek by jowl, nose beyond nose, from end to end of the verandah. There
was Theresa, who had made no secret of her intention of accompanying
Captain Walters “for a lark” on a visit to a Trinity Island Picture
Palace. There was the priest, who had expressed a determination (which
nobody had tried to alter) to explore the famous botanical gardens all
by himself all day. There was the fourth officer, who had left the
_Caribbeania_ inspired by a vision of a long walk to a sandy beach with
a bathe at the end of it. There was the captain, who had set out to buy
his wife a stuffed alligator as a silver-wedding present.
That cool strip of green rocking-chairs had acted on them all like a
spider’s web, with the manager of the King’s Garden sitting in the
middle of it, murmuring cool things concerning drinks in an iced voice.
Exquisite white linen suits of clothes, the only blot on whose
spotlessness was the nigger inside them, ambled up and down the line,
like field-marshals reviewing the household cavalry, armed humanely with
lemon squashes and whiskies and sodas.
The gardener, Mrs. Rust, the suffragette, and Courtesy enlisted in this
force, and sat in a state of torpor only partially dispelled by
luncheon, until Mrs. Rust began to look herself again. Her hat
straightened and elevated itself to its normal position, and perched
upon her hair like a nest of flowers on a ripe hay-field. The curls
dried up like parsley after rain.
Little by little the other tourists regained consciousness, and with
much show of energy set forth to the nearest buggy stand.
At about five, Courtesy, who was never happy unless she was moving with
the crowd, became restless.
“Let’s take a buggy and go back to the wharf,” she suggested.
“We will hire a four-wheeler and return to the pier,” said Mrs. Rust in
a contradictory voice.
Buggy or four-wheeler, there was only one sort of vehicle to be found in
Port of the West. They manned the nearest conveyance and quibbled not
over its title.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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