The Adventures of Augie March - Saul Bellow [153]
couldn't be envisioned as in the old days-- a Guicciardini arriving from Florence with his clever face, or a Russian coming to Venice, or an Adams--such grandeurs have sunk down as the imagination has been transferred from the bearer of his country's power walking on rugs to his blowing shellac through the waterpipes of Lima to stop the rust. Simon, when he put on his tails and walked from mirror to mirror, doubling back his fingers to tug down the white cuffs and pulling up his chin to make his strong neck freer in the band of the butterfly collar, had the vigor to make the place live up to him; more--the thought lay in the open--than the governors for whom it was reserved. And having gotten in without ever having been a candidate he could perhaps get far beyond them without running or going through the tiresome part of politics. He had come into a view of mutability, and I too could see that one is only ostensibly born to remain in specified limits. That's what you'll be told in the ranks. I don't say that I exactly shared his feelings, or spirits of the dauphin's horse, almost tearing down hangings and shouldering into mirrors with that bucking pride, but with him now I certainly felt less boxed than I ever before had, nothing that others did so inconceivable for me. However, people were waiting below and Simon was holding things up, taking his time. Charlotte came in herself, like a big bridal edifice in her veil and other lace, carrying long-stemmed flowers. With her there wasn't much hiding of the behind-the-scenes of life to keep a man in the bonds of love, as Lucretius advises when he tells you to make allowances for mortality. You only had to see her practical mouth to know everything about mortality was admitted in advance, though she did for form's sake all that other women do. Her frankness gave her a kind of nobility. But here when she came into the room was the visible means to governors' suites and ambassadorships, and the best that Simon could do brought him back to her. "Everybody else is ready. What are you doing?" She spoke to me, for she wouldn't blame him in any circumstances where she could blame me instead, his stand-in. "I've been dressing and shmoosing," said Simon. "There's plenty of ,._g_what's the big rush? Anyhow, you didn't have to come, you could have phoned. Now, honey, don't be nervous; you look beautiful and everything is going to be fine." "It will be if I see to it. Now will you go and talk to the guests?" she said in her bidding tone. She sat on the bed to call the caterer, the musicians, the florist, the management, the photographer, for she kept all under close control and had made every arrangement herself, relying on no one; and with her white shoes on a chair and a pad on her knees she made figures and dickered with the photographer, at the last moment still trying to beat down his price. "Listen, Schultz, if you try to hold me up you'll get no business out of any of the Magnuses ever again, and there're plenty of us." "Augie," said Simon when we went out, "you can have the car to take Lucy out. You'll probably need some dough, so here's ten bucks. I'll send Mama home in a cab. I want you at the office at eight though. Is she wearing those glasses I told you to get her?" Mama had obediently put on the glasses, but it displeased him to see that she carried her white cane. She was sitting with Anna Coblin in the lounge, the cane between her knees, and he tried to take it away from her, but she wouldn't yield it up. "Ma, give me that stick, for Chrissake! How will it look? They're going to take a picture." "No, Simon, people will bump into me." "They won't bump into you--you'll be with Cousin Anna." "Hear, let her keep it," said Anna. "Ma, give that cane to Augie and he'll check it for you." "I don't want to, Simon." "Mama, don't you want everything to look nice?" He tried to loosen her fingers. "Cut it out!" I said to him, and Cousin Anna with her burning morose face muttered something to him. "You shut up, you cow!" he said to her. He went, but left me instructions. "You get it away