The Magnificent Ambersons Booth Tarkington (reading like a writer txt) đ
- Author: Booth Tarkington
Book online «The Magnificent Ambersons Booth Tarkington (reading like a writer txt) đ». Author Booth Tarkington
One citizen, having thus discoursed to a visitor, came to a thoughtful pause, and then added, âDoes seem pretty much like squandering, yet when you see that dog out walking with this Miss Isabel, he seems worth the money.â
âWhatâs she look like?â
âWell, sir,â said the citizen, âsheâs not more than just about eighteen or maybe nineteen years old, and I donât know as I know just how to put itâ âbut sheâs kind of a delightful lookinâ young lady!â
IIAnother citizen said an eloquent thing about Miss Isabel Ambersonâs looks. This was Mrs. Henry Franklin Foster, the foremost literary authority and intellectual leader of the communityâ âfor both the daily newspapers thus described Mrs. Foster when she founded the Womenâs Tennyson Club; and her word upon art, letters, and the drama was accepted more as law than as opinion. Naturally, when Hazel Kirke finally reached the town, after its long triumph in larger places, many people waited to hear what Mrs. Henry Franklin Foster thought of it before they felt warranted in expressing any estimate of the play. In fact, some of them waited in the lobby of the theatre, as they came out, and formed an inquiring group about her.
âI didnât see the play,â she informed them.
âWhat! Why, we saw you, right in the middle of the fourth row!â
âYes,â she said, smiling, âbut I was sitting just behind Isabelle Amberson. I couldnât look at anything except her wavy brown hair and the wonderful back of her neck.â
The ineligible young men of the town (they were all ineligible) were unable to content themselves with the view that had so charmed Mrs. Henry Franklin Foster: they spent their time struggling to keep Miss Ambersonâs face turned toward them. She turned it most often, observers said, toward two: one excelling in the general struggle by his sparkle, and the other by that winning if not winsome old trait, persistence. The sparkling gentleman âled germansâ with her, and sent sonnets to her with his bouquetsâ âsonnets lacking neither music nor wit. He was generous, poor, well-dressed, and his amazing persuasiveness was one reason why he was always in debt. No one doubted that he would be able to persuade Isabel, but he unfortunately joined too merry a party one night, and, during a moonlight serenade upon the lawn before the Amberson Mansion, was easily identified from the windows as the person who stepped through the bass viol and had to be assisted to a waiting carriage. One of Miss Ambersonâs brothers was among the serenaders, and, when the party had dispersed, remained propped against the front door in a state of helpless liveliness; the Major going down in a dressing-gown and slippers to bring him in, and scolding mildly, while imperfectly concealing strong impulses to laughter. Miss Amberson also laughed at this brother, the next day, but for the suitor it was a different matter: she refused to see him when he called to apologize. âYou seem to care a great deal about bass viols!â he wrote her. âI promise never to break another.â She made no response to the note, unless it was an answer, two weeks later, when her engagement was announced. She took the persistent one, Wilbur Minafer, no breaker of bass viols or of hearts, no serenader at all.
A few people, who always foresaw everything, claimed that they were not surprised, because though Wilbur Minafer âmight not be an Apollo, as it were,â he was âa steady young business man, and a good churchgoer,â and Isabel Amberson was âpretty sensibleâ âfor such a showy girl.â But the engagement astounded the young people, and most of their fathers and mothers, too; and as a topic it supplanted literature at the next meeting of the Womenâs Tennyson Club.
âWilbur Minafer!â a member cried, her inflection seeming to imply that Wilburâs crime was explained by his surname. âWilbur Minafer! Itâs the queerest thing I ever heard! To think of her taking Wilbur Minafer, just because a man any woman would like a thousand times better was a little wild one night at a serenade!â
âNo,â said Mrs. Henry Franklin Foster. âIt isnât that. It isnât even because sheâs afraid heâd be a dissipated husband and she wants to be safe. It isnât because sheâs religious or hates wildness; it isnât even because she hates wildness in him.â
âWell, but look how sheâs thrown him over for it.â
âNo, that wasnât her reason,â said the wise Mrs. Henry Franklin Foster. âIf men only knew itâ âand itâs a good thing they donâtâ âa woman doesnât really care much about whether a manâs wild or not, if it doesnât affect herself, and Isabel Amberson doesnât care a thing!â
âMrs. Foster!â
âNo, she doesnât. What she minds is his making a clown of himself in her front yard! It made her think he didnât care much about her. Sheâs probably mistaken, but thatâs what she thinks, and itâs too late for her to think anything else now, because sheâs going to be married right awayâ âthe invitations will be out next week. Itâll be a big Amberson-style thing, raw oysters floating in scooped-out blocks of ice and a band from out-of-townâ âchampagne, showy presents; a colossal present from the Major. Then Wilbur will take Isabel on the carefulest little wedding trip he can manage, and sheâll be a good wife to him, but theyâll have the worst spoiled lot of children this town will ever see.â
âHow on earth do you make that
Comments (0)