This has been a much more exciting day than I expected under the circumstances. In the first place I got two long night letters, one from Walter and one from Gordon Flint. I don’t see how Walter ever had the nerve to send his, there was everything in it and it must have been horribly embarrassing for him while the telegraph operator was reading it over and counting the words to say nothing of embarrassing for the operator.
But the one from Gordon was a kind of a shock. He just got back from a trip around the world, left last December to go on it and got back yesterday and called up our house and Helga gave him my address, and his telegram, well it was nearly as bad as Walter’s. The trouble is that Gordon and I were engaged when he went away, or at least he thought so and he wrote to me right along all the time he was away and sent cables and things and for a while I answered his letters, but then I lost track of his itinery and couldn’t write to him anymore and when I got really engaged to Walter I couldn’t let Gordon know because I had no idea where he was besides not wanting to spoil his trip.
And now he still thinks we are engaged and he is going to call me up tomorrow from Chicago and how in the world can I explain things and get him to understand because he is really serious and I like him ever and ever so much and in lots of ways he is nicer than Walter, not really nicer but better looking and there is no comparison between their dancing. Walter simply can’t learn to dance, that is really dance. He says it is because he is flat footed, he says that as a joke, but it is true and I wish to heavens it wasn’t.
All forenoon I thought and thought and thought about what to say to Gordon when he calls up and finally I couldn’t stand thinking about it anymore and just made up my mind I wouldn’t think about it anymore. But I will tell the truth though it will kill me to hurt him.
I went down to lunch with Uncle Nat and Aunt Jule and they were going out to play golf this afternoon and were insisting that I go with them, but I told them I had a headache and then I had a terrible time getting them to go without me. I didn’t have a headache at all and just wanted to be alone to think about Walter and besides when you play with Uncle Nat he is always correcting your stance or your swing or something and always puts his hands on my arms or shoulders to show me the right way and I can’t stand it to have old men touch me, even if they are your uncle.
I finally got rid of them and I was sitting watching the tennis when that boy that I saw last night, the cute one, came and sat right next to me and of course I didn’t look at him and I was going to smoke a cigarette and found I had left my lighter upstairs and I started to get up and go after it when all of a sudden he was offering me his lighter and I couldn’t very well refuse it without being rude. So we got to talking and he is even cuter than he looks, the most original and wittiest person I believe I ever met and I haven’t laughed so much in I don’t know how long.
For one thing he asked me if I had heard Rockefeller’s song and I said no and he began singing “Oil alone.” Then he asked me if I knew the orange juice song and I told him no again and he said it was “Orange juice sorry you made me cry.” I was in hysterics before we had been together ten minutes.
His name is Frank Caswell and he has been out of Darthmouth a year and is 24 years old. That isn’t so terribly old, only two years older than Walter and three years older than Gordon. I hate the name Frank, but Caswell is all right and he is so cute.
He was out in California last winter and visited Hollywood and met everybody in the world and it is fascinating to listen to him. He met Norma Shearer and he said he thought she was the prettiest thing he had ever seen. What he said was “I did think she was the prettiest girl in the world, till today.” I was going to pretend I didn’t get it, but I finally told him to be sensible or I would never be able to believe anything he said.
Well, he wanted me to dance with him tonight after dinner and the next question was how to explain how we had met each other to Uncle Nat and Aunt Jule. Frank said he would fix that all right and sure enough he got himself introduced to Uncle Nat when Uncle Nat came in from golf and after dinner Uncle Nat introduced him to me and Aunt Jule too and we danced together all evening, that is not Aunt Jule. They went to bed, thank heavens.
He is a heavenly dancer, as good as Gordon. One dance we were dancing and for one of the encores the orchestra played “In a cottage small by a waterfall” and I simply couldn’t dance to it. I just stopped still and said “Listen, I can’t bear it, I can’t breathe” and poor Frank thought I was sick or something and I had to explain that that was the tune the orchestra played the night I sat at the next table to Jack Barrymore at Barney Gallant’s.
I made him sit out that encore and wouldn’t let him talk till they got through playing it.
