"Cather, Willa - Alexander's Bridge" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cather Willa Sibert)

She liked men of action, and disliked young
men who were careful of themselves and
who, as she put it, were always trimming
their wick as if they were afraid of their oil's
giving out. MacKeller, Bartley's first chief,
was an old friend of my aunt, and he told her
that Bartley was a wild, ill-governed youth,
which really pleased her very much.
I remember we were sitting alone in the dusk
after Bartley had been there for the first time.
I knew that Aunt Eleanor had found him much
to her taste, but she hadn't said anything.
Presently she came out, with a chuckle:
`MacKeller found him sowing wild oats in
London, I believe. I hope he didn't stop him
too soon. Life coquets with dashing fellows.
The coming men are always like that.
We must have him to dinner, my dear.'
And we did. She grew much fonder of Bartley
than she was of me. I had been studying in
Vienna, and she thought that absurd.
She was interested in the army and in politics,
and she had a great contempt for music and
art and philosophy. She used to declare that
the Prince Consort had brought all that stuff
over out of Germany. She always sniffed
when Bartley asked me to play for him. She
considered that a newfangled way of making
a match of it."

When Alexander came in a few moments later,
he found Wilson and his wife still
confronting the photograph. "Oh, let us
get that out of the way," he said, laughing.
"Winifred, Thomas can bring my trunk down.
I've decided to go over to New York
to-morrow night and take a fast boat.
I shall save two days."



CHAPTER II


On the night of his arrival in London,
Alexander went immediately to the hotel on the
Embankment at which he always stopped,
and in the lobby he was accosted by an old
acquaintance, Maurice Mainhall, who fell
upon him with effusive cordiality and