Old Friends, Epistolary Parody | Page 9

we say, Hesterna Margaritae? Yesterday's Daisy,
yesterday's Rose, were it of Paestum, who values it to-day? Mais ou
sont les neiges d'automne? However, yesterday--the day before
yesterday, rather--Miss Annie P. Miller was well enough.
We were smoking at the club windows on the Ponte Vecchio;
Marmalada, Giovanelli of the Bersaglieri, young Ponto of the K.O.B.'s,
and myself--men who never give a thought save to the gold embroidery
of their pantoufles or the exquisite ebon laquer of their Russia leather

cricket-shoes. Suddenly we heard a clatter in the streets. The riderless
chargers of the Bersaglieri were racing down the Santo Croce, and just
turning, with a swing and shriek of clattering spurs, into the Maremma.
In the midst of the street, under our very window, was a little thing like
a butterfly, with yeux de pervenche. You remember, Camarada,
Voltaire's love of the pervenche; we have plucked it, have we not? in
his garden of Les Charmettes. Nous n'irons plus aux bois! Basta!
But to return. There she stood, terror-stricken, petrified, like her who of
old turned her back on Zoar and beheld the incandescent hurricane of
hail smite the City of the Plain! She was dressed in white muslin, joli
comme un coeur, with a myriad frills and flounces and knots of
pale-coloured ribbon. Open-eyed, open- mouthed, she stared at the tide
of foaming steeds, like a maiden martyr gazing at the on-rushing waves
of ocean! "Caramba!" said Marmalada, "voila une jeune fille pas trop
bien gardee!" Giovanelli turned pale, and, muttering Corpo di Bacco,
quaffed a carafon of green Chartreuse, holding at least a quart, which
stood by him in its native pewter. Young Ponto merely muttered,
"Egad!" I leaped through the open window and landed at her feet.
The racing steeds were within ten yards of us. Calmly I cast my eye
over their points. Far the fleetest, though he did not hold the lead, was
Marmalada's charger, the Atys gelding, by Celerima out of Sac de Nuit.
With one wave of my arm I had placed her on his crupper, and, with the
same action, swung myself into the saddle. Then, in a flash and thunder
of flying horses, we swept like tawny lightning down the Pincian. The
last words I heard from the club window, through the
heliotrope-scented air, were "Thirty to one on Atys, half only if
declared." They were wagering on our lives; the slang of the paddock
was on their lips.
Onward, downward, we sped, the fair stranger lifeless in my arms. Past
scarlet cardinals in mufti, past brilliant [Greek text] like those who
swayed the City of the Violet Crown; past pifferari dancing in front of
many an albergo; through the Ghetto with its marmorine palaces, over
the Fountain of Trevi, across the Cascine, down the streets of the
Vatican we flew among yells of "Owner's up," "The gelding wins, hard
held," from the excited bourgeoisie. Heaven and earth swam before my
eyes as we reached the Pons Sublicia, and heard the tawny waters of
Tiber swaying to the sea.

THE PONS SUBLICIA WAS UP!
With an oath of despair, for life is sweet, I rammed my persuaders into
Atys, caught him by the head, and sent him straight at the flooded
Tiber!
"Va-t-en donc, espece de type!" said the girl on my saddle-bow, finding
her tongue at last. Fear, or girlish modesty, had hitherto kept her silent.
Then Atys rose on his fetlocks! Despite his double burden, the good
steed meant to have it. He deemed, perchance, he was with the Quorn
or the Baron's. He rose; he sprang. The deep yellow water, cold in the
moon's rays, with the farthest bank but a chill grey line in the mist, lay
beneath us! A moment that seemed an eternity! Then we landed on the
far-off further bank, and for the first time I could take a pull at his head.
I turned him on the river's brim, and leaped him back again.
The runaway was now as tame as a driven deer in Richmond Park.
Well, Camarada, the adventure is over. She was grateful, of course.
These pervenche eyes were suffused with a dewy radiance.
"You can't call," she said, "for you haven't been introduced, and Mrs.
Walker says we must be more exclusive. I'm dying to be exclusive; but
I'm very much obliged to you, and so will mother be. Let's see. I'll be at
the Colosseum to-morrow night, about ten. I'm bound to see the
Colosseum, by moonlight. Good-bye;" and she shook her pale parasol
at me, and fluttered away.
Ah, Camarada, shall I be there? Que scais-je? Well, 'tis time to go to
the dance at the Holy Father's. Adieu, Carissima.--Tout a vous,
CIS.

LETTER: Barry Lyndon

Mr. Redmond Barry (better known as Barry Lyndon) tells his uncle