Sincerely, Willis Wayde (1955) by John P. Marquand

Author:John P. Marquand [Marquand, John P.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Literary, Psychological
ISBN: 9781504015769
Google: 2nqrCQAAQBAJ
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2015-01-01T22:00:00+00:00

XVII

Willis always liked to think that Sylvia’s and his honeymoon had been a very happy one, and certainly before it was completed they had learned a lot about each other in little ways. He had learned, for instance, that Sylvia liked to smoke a cigarette in bed before she went to sleep, a habit which always alarmed him, and that she left shoes and slippers on odd parts of the floor, which one had to be careful not to step on. In fact Willis had almost dislocated his toe on a sharp heel of one of Sylvia’s mules the third night of their marriage, and Sylvia had told him that it was his fault because he had insisted on walking around barefoot. Sylvia on her side had learned that he did setting-up exercises for ten minutes every morning and never left the top off his toothpaste tube or his shaving cream. Things like this meant more than you thought, and a honeymoon was surely a period of learning both to give and forgive. He had never known, for instance, that Sylvia wore pajamas instead of nightgowns.

He had heard that the most important recipe for a happy honeymoon was complete physical comfort, and he was glad he had taken this point seriously in spite of what Sylvia had said about economy. He had the good sense not to worry about costs, since, as he told Sylvia, you only had a honeymoon once. He had not told Sylvia where they were going because he had wanted it to be a surprise, and as a matter of fact it had been, very definitely. All he would tell Sylvia was that he had reservations at a place in the Adirondack Mountains and that they would have to hurry through New Hampshire and Vermont in order to reach there on time.

The name of the place was Chieftain Manor, which Willis had once heard Mr. Beakney say was one of the finest rest and recreation hotels that he had ever seen, and Mr. Beakney certainly had been right. Willis had never been to a hotel like Chieftain Manor, and he often said sadly to Sylvia in later years that he wished they might go there now—which was unhappily impossible, because Chieftain Manor closed its doors shortly after Pearl Harbor, never to open them again. It lay back in the past now, as something unique to remember, something never to be spoiled by revisiting later when one’s tastes were better formed by wider travel.

Chieftain Manor was gone, and heaven only knew what had finally happened to the immense shingled building or the eighteen-hole golf course, the indoor and outdoor swimming pools, the bungalows and service quarters, the mountain trails and boathouses. Had the hotel burned down, or was it the property now of some real-estate development with ranch-type houses and imitation log cabins, or had the forest that surrounded it rolled back over it again? Willis did not know, nor did he want to know. He preferred to think of it as it had been—as beautiful as a dream of wish fulfillment.

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