But I am going to try to keep the sadness out of my scribbles to you,
only now and then it will creep in, and you must forgive it, because
you see it isn't easy to think that we are all here who loved him, and
he, who loved so much to be with us, is somewhere--oh, where is he,
Roger Poole, in that vast infinity which stretches out and out, beyond
the sea, beyond the sky, into eternity?
All day I have been lying in my deck chair, and have let the world go
by. It is clear and cool, and the sea rises up like a wall of
sapphire. Last night we seemed to plough through a field of gold. The
world is really a lovely place, the big outside world, but it isn't the
outside world which makes our happiness, it is the world within us, and
when the heart is tired---But now I must talk of some one else besides my self.
Shall I tell you of Delilah? She attracts much attention, with her
gracious manner and her wonderful clothes. All the people are crazy
about her. They think she is English, and a duchess at least. Colin
is as pleased as Punch at the success he has made of her, and he just
stands aside and watches her, and flickers his pale lashes and smiles.
Last night she danced some of the new dances, and her tango is as
stately as a minuet. She and Porter danced together--and everybody
stopped to look at them. The gossip is going the rounds that they are
engaged. Oh, I wish they were--I wish they were! It would be good for
him to meet his match. Delilah could hold her own; she wouldn't let
him insist and manage until she was positively mesmerized, as I am.
Delilah has such a queenly way of ruling her world. All the men on
board trail after her. But she makes most of them worship from afar.
As for the women, she picks the best, instinctively, and the ice which
seems congealed around the heart of the average Britisher melts before
her charm, so that already she is playing bridge with the proper
people, and having tea with the inner circle. Even with these she
seems to assume an air of remoteness, which seems to set her apart--and
it is this air, Grace says, which conquers.
When people aren't coupling Porter's name with Delilah's, they are
coupling it with Grace's. You should see our "red-headed woodpeckers,"
as poor Barry used to call them. When they promenade, Grace wears a
bit of a black hat that shows all of her glorious hair, and Porter's
cap can't hide his crown of glory. At first people thought they were
brother and sister, but since it is known that they aren't I can see
that everybody is puzzled.