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Authors: Patrick Dennis

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Around the World With Auntie Mame (8 page)

BOOK: Around the World With Auntie Mame
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Lady Gravell-Pitt, on the other hand, would just caw, “Oh, there's the Marquess of Something or the Duchess of Somethingelse,” and wave frenetically, only to receive the blankest of stares. But Auntie Mame was too pleased to be there, and too happy chatting with Vera's gay friends to notice.

Another hour went by and we were not much closer to our goal. However, the sun had disappeared behind a cloud and there was quite a breeze. “Thank God for a little relief from this heat,” Auntie Mame said. I agreed with her wholeheartedly, but I noticed that quite a few people began casting nervous glances toward the heavens.

Still the line moved on. But now the breeze became a wind. The long filmy skirts of the women's dresses fluttered nervously, and more than one picture hat was sent skimming across the lawn.

“Oh, dear,” Lady Gravell-Pitt began, “I do hope that it's not going to . . .” Her words were drowned out by a terrible clap of thunder. The wind mounted to gale velocity and I could feel the tails of my coat flapping out behind me. Lady Gravell-Pitt's dowdy flowered georgette skirts were caught in a gust that sent them flying up to her waist, thus affording all of smart London a grisly view of the largest feet and the thinnest shanks in the whole British Empire.

Then the rains came. Gently at first, in big, splattering drops, and then more wildly, whipped into a foam by the wind. Several men who had had the foresight to bring umbrellas chivalrously put them up to protect their ladies, but those that didn't turn inside out instantly were wrenched free of their owners' hands to go bouncing and bumping across the grass. The marquee above their Britannic Majesties flapped wildly and there was a definite feeling of exodus among the guests.

A procession of shrill debutantes ran shrieking past us, hair plastered to their skulls, their white lawn dresses clinging to them like winding sheets. The lawn was now a morass of hats and umbrellas with people dashing every which way, stumbling, slipping, falling, and bumping into one another. I let go of my own hat just long enough to have a minor monsoon sweep it into the air. It landed just under the foot of a bishop who was hell-bent on getting to shelter.

Then it happened. There was a long, low rumble, a flash, a crash, and a blinding something that hit the earth nearby with the force of a blockbuster. I heard somebody shout, “Oh, my God, it got Sir Hubert!” And then the crowd dispersed in real earnest. No British reserve about it. It was every man for himself and devil take the hindmost.

Hermione bolted like a steer. I called out, “Auntie Mame!” and reached forward to take her arm, but I was knocked flat by the Dowager Marchioness Somebody. I was joined on the ground by a woman in blue who assured me that this sort of thing never happened in Capetown. We wallowed helplessly in the muddy grass for a moment, and by the time we were back on our feet there was no sign of Auntie Mame. It was raining so hard that it was almost impossible to see anybody.

Auntie Mame's rakish Rolls-Royce town car usually stood out in any crowd, with its sleek black paint job, its polished rivets and silver wire wheels, the jaunty angles of its squared-away corners. But at a Royal Garden Party it was just one among hundreds of big black cars. The chauffeurs weren't having any too easy a time of it, either. Engines, thoroughly inundated from the cloudburst, refused to start; sodden
grandes dames
in soggy finery screamed like fishwives for their cars, but to little avail. The few cars that were operating sloshed and skidded on the pavement, sending up huge sprays of water. The collapse of the Axis was only narrowly averted when the German embassy's big Mercedes-Benz locked bumpers with the Italian embassy's Isotta-Frascini.

It simply was not Ito's element. In fact, Ito was nowhere to be seen. Lightning struck again, somewhere on the Palace grounds, and the panic reached a fever pitch. At that point I decided to trust to luck and public transportation. I raced out into the road and jumped onto the first bus that came along. It had gone several miles before I realized that it was headed straight for Putney.

SOME TWO HOUR SLATER I ARRIVED AT AUNTIE Mame's house via bus, tube, and taxicab. Although the rain had finally stopped, Grosvenor Square was under a foot of water. A sporty open car was parked in front of Auntie Mame's door.

I let myself into the house and slogged across the porphyry floor, my shoes squishing with every step. The vast marble rotunda was dark and empty, with none of Auntie Mame's rented footmen doing their usual sentry duty. Feeling that I was the only one who hadn't gone down with the Royal family, I called out, “Anybody home?” but without much hope.

Then I heard Auntie Mame, sounding unusually chipper. “Is that you, my little love? I'm in the garden room.”

I sloshed back to the garden room and, through the gloom, made out Auntie Mame's silhouette. She was curled up on the floor in front of the fireplace with a drink in her hand.

“Some picnic,” I said.

“Wasn't it just, darling?” she said. “I can't remember
when
I've had more fun.”


Fun?
” I said.

“Oh, and darling, I'd like you to meet Captain Fitz-Hugh. Basil, this is Patrick Dennis, my nephew, my ward, my life. Patrick, this is Captain Fitz-Hugh.”

“Is there somebody else in here?” I asked. “The place is as black as . . .”

“Oh, of course, my little love. I hadn't even noticed. Do turn on a light.”

I switched on a lamp and there, looming above me, was about seven feet of Coldstream Guardsman. “Hahjudu?” he said, grasping my hand firmly.

As I said, Captain Fitz-Hugh was very tall. He had red-brown skin, red-brown hair, red-brown eyes, and a red-brown mustache. That he was extremely well built was abundantly evident, for he was wearing only my old blue dressing gown, with “St. Boniface Academy, Apathy, Mass.” embroidered over the heart. The robe was too small even for me, and from it several yards of Captain Fitz-Hugh's well-turned legs, splendid forearms, and muscular chest were shown off to almost too much advantage. Except for his English accent and the mustache, Captain Fitz-Hugh reminded me of Auntie Mame's late husband, Beauregard Burnside, and in a rare flash of intuition, I sensed Something was Afoot.

“Captain Fitz-Hugh valiantly rescued me from the Garden Party this afternoon. I couldn't find you or Vera or Hermione or Ito or the car. Indeed,” she said, with a silvery little laugh, “if it hadn't been for the captain and his adorable little car, I should probably still be treading water at Buckingham Palace.” She gathered her skirts demurely around her and for the first time I noticed that she was wearing a very special velvet negligee Molyneux had designed for her. Auntie Mame had always said that it had more pizazz than
anything
she owned.

Auntie Mame got to her feet and executed a little whirl to show off even better her trim ankles and the glory of Captain Molyneux. Captain Fitz-Hugh was most appreciative. “Now, my little love, you must run upstairs and get into some dry things. You'll find Captain Fitz-Hugh's clothes drying in front of the fire in your bedroom. I knew you wouldn't mind. Oh, and would you just stick your head in the kitchen and ask for some more boiling water. Captain Fitz-Hugh and I are warding off pneumonia with hot toddies and I suggest you do the same. Don't be long, dear.” As I made for the service hall, I could hear Auntie Mame's tinkling laugh and Captain Fitz-Hugh's genial chuckle and I received the distinct impression that Auntie Mame's Season was beginning to look a lot brighter.

WHEN I WENT BACK DOWN TO THE GARDEN ROOM I found Auntie Mame curled up on the sofa, a full glass in her hand, regaling the captain with carefully chosen anecdotes from her colorful past, while the captain chuckled intimately from close, but discreet, range. Captain Fitz-Hugh had been to America, which he described as “ripping,” knew some of the people Auntie Mame knew, whom he called “smashing,” and admired her negligee by labeling it a “bit of all right.” It looked like one of those situations where three can be a crowd and I was about to tiptoe out when the crowd was increased by the entrance of Lady Gravell-Pitt.

If Hermione had looked awful before the Garden Party, she was beyond adjectives now. Her dress was soaked, the colors running hideously into one another. It was also torn and splattered with mud and had shrunk so that the hem line barely covered her bony knees. Her fusty ostrich boa hung like wet seaweed. Her hat was missing entirely and the tarnished gold of her dyed hair dangled in long, soggy ropes to her shoulders.


Well!
” Hermione roared, charging in, her teeth in a chatter. “I see that
you
managed to get home safe and . . .”

“Hermie!” Auntie Mame said genially. “I do hope that you were able to find Ito and the car. Lady Gravell-Pitt, Captain Fitz-Hugh.”

The captain bowed to Hermione although she barely nodded in his direction. Then, looking down at his bare legs, he said he'd chance getting back into his clothes if I'd show him the way to my room.

When I returned, Lady Gravell-Pitt was haranguing Auntie Mame for all she was worth.

“. . . bad enough,” Hermione was shouting, “to desert me at an important Royal function. But to come back with a totally strange man . . .”

“Isn't he divine looking, Hermione?” Auntie Mame said. “And that heavenly voice.”

“He's probably some little nobody from some Colonial regiment,” Hermione stormed.

“No, he's with the Coldstream Guards,” Auntie Mame said dreamily. “But he's been released or set free or on a sabbatical or whatever they call it. And marvelous shoulders.”

That stopped Hermione for a moment, but she took a deep breath and started in again. “Well, do get rid of him before any of
my
people come to dinner. In Court circles it does not pay to . . .”

“Oh, Hermie, I'm so sorry. But I've called off the dinner party, owing to the bad weather. In fact, Captain Fitz-Hugh has asked me to dine with
him
—just the two of us.”

“Mame! Do you mean to say that you're leaving us for some nobody who . . .”

Hermione's speech was cut short by the reappearance of Captain Fitz-Hugh, looking very much like Somebody. And she was further put to flight when Vera came in with yet another duke, who fell upon Captain Fitz-Hugh as though they were long-lost brothers. It was simply not Lady Gravell-Pitt's day.

Auntie Mame was out awfully late with Captain Fitz-Hugh. I know, because I heard a terrible crash out in the street at half past three that morning and looked out to see that Ito had run into the captain's water-logged sports car as he brought Auntie Mame home. But I heard her say, “That's all right, Ito,” and watched her bidding a long farewell to the captain.

The next morning there was almost a scene in the big marble rotunda. It was about eleven o'clock and I was up in my room sending post cards of the Houses of Parliament and the Changing of the Guard back to America when I heard the doorbell ring. Looking down from my window I saw Captain Fitz-Hugh, done up to the nines in his Guards uniform and carrying what must have been twelve dozen white roses. Since Auntie Mame was still asleep, naturally, I started down the stairs to make the captain feel at home, if such a thing were possible in that tomb of a house. But Lady Gravell-Pitt got there first.

I hadn't even rounded the bend in the stairway when I heard her nastiest tone of voice echoing in the rotunda. “Gud mawning, Leff-tenant,” she said horridly. “I'm so soddy to say that Mrs. Burnside is
not
at home.”

“Oh?” Captain Fitz-Hugh said dismally. “She said that I might call . . .”

“Of cawss,” Lady Gravell-Pitt said. I peered down the stair well and saw her standing there, flanked with footmen so that she looked like the Notre Dame backfield. “Mrs. Burnside was called away, to Colchester in fact. And I'm teddibly afraid that she won't be back until late this . . .”

I knew that Auntie Mame saw something very special in the captain and I was just about to go down and say that Lady Gravell-Pitt was lying in her teeth. Happily, Ito did it for me.

“Oh, no, major,” Ito said, “you come in. You sit. Missy Burnside back already. I drive velly fast.”

“Capital!” the captain said.

I didn't hang around to see or hear any more of Hermione. Instead, I raced into Auntie Mame's room and snatched the sleep mask from her eyes.

“Wake up, Auntie Mame,” I said. “Wake up. He's here.”

“Wh-who's here?” she said, blinking owlishly in the morning sunlight.”

“He,” I said. “Hhhhhhhim!”

“You make it sound like the second coming,” she snapped. “And what's more, I don't care if it is. How
dare
you come pounding into my room in the middle of the night, waking me out of a sound . . .”

“But it's Captain Fitz-Hugh!”

“For God's sake, why didn't you
tell
me, child?” she said, bounding out of bed. “Now go down and keep him company while I get dressed.”

Sitting in the gloomiest of the Chippendale rooms under the beady eye of Lady Gravell-Pitt, the captain seemed almost overjoyed to see me.

“Mrs. Burnside will be right down,” I said in my best manner. “Cigarette, sir?” I added, showing him how worldly I was.

Captain Fitz-Hugh and I then had a conversation suitable to a growing boy. We discussed boarding schools (he had gone to Eton) and colleges (Oxford). Hermione didn't seem very pleased to hear any of this. Then Auntie Mame, who could change her clothes faster than a fireman when pressed for time, swept into the room in a cumulus cloud of chiffon. “Basil, my dear,” she said, “how good of you to come for elevenses. Patrick, be a love and ring for Ito.”

“I do hope you'll be able to have lunch with me,” the captain said.

“Oh, but I'd adore . . .”

“What a pity, Mame dear,” Hermione said, “but of cawss you're having luncheon here today for . . .”

BOOK: Around the World With Auntie Mame
2.63Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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