Read Online The Masters of Atlantis by Charles Portis - Free Book Online Page A

Knowing and with some black gloves of the kind worn by the Templar Masons, and sent them on their way, staggering across Babette’s courtyard. Any lingering, as of graduation day fellowship, was discouraged. Kinlow herded them to the door, saw them clear of it and closed it sharply behind them.
    This Noel Kinlow was Hen’s current male companion, a young Englishman who had been an elevator boy at the apartment house in Toronto when Hen picked him up. Babette did not approve of the arrangement but was comfortably resigned to it. As a woman of the world she knew this was the price she must pay for being Lady Hen, consort to the Master of Gnomons (Amended Order), and she found the price acceptable.
    They made a striking group. Hen, of course, was always distinctive in his black cape and red Poma. Babette, who was buxom to say the least of it, wore bright yellow caftans and other loose garments that trailed the floor, so that one could only guess at the contours of her body, though one could make a pretty good guess. She was also fond of pendulous ear ornaments. The reedy Kinlow, in contrast to Babette, liked tight clothes, the tighter the better, and he usually came forth in a pinch-waist lounge suit made of some mottled, speckled, yellowish-green material. It was a hue not met with in nature and not often seen outside the British Isles, where it has always been a great favorite with tailors. The little yapping terrier, when traveling, sported a starched white ruff.
    All through the war years this colorful family—Sir Sydney, Lady Hen, the little dog and the light-stepping Kinlow—could be found bowling up and down the continent between Toronto and Cuernavaca, sometimes in a Pullman compartment and sometimes in a white Bentley sports saloon, chatting merrily, sipping Madeira and snacking on pâté and Stilton cheese, there being no rule of silence or forbidden food at Hen’s antinomian level.
    Mr. Jimmerson was saddened to see his old friend now so completely estranged and sinking ever deeper into the murk of self.
    He said, “I don’t understand what he means by going beyond Mastery. What’s next, do you think, Austin?”
    â€œIt’s hard to say with Hen, sir. Nothing would surprise me. Astral traveling. Tarot cards. At this moment he may be prancing through the woods playing a flute. The man’s an enigma to me.”
    They were sitting in the Red Room before a fire. Mr. Jimmerson was turning over the pages of Hen’s latest book, Approach to Growing , a sequel to Knowing . Popper was reading an encyclopedia article about California. On the table between them, under the fruitcake and coffee cups, there was a mud-stained letter from Sergeant Mapes in Italy, which neither of them had gotten around to opening. Above the fire-place there was a color portrait of the Master in full regalia, and from the mantel there hung Jerome’s Christmas stocking, lumpy with tangerines and Brazil nuts, though he had no teeth. Jerome was asleep. Fanny was out with church friends distributing Christmas baskets to the poor.
    Popper fed a glazed cherry to Squanto. The jaybird was getting old. One wing drooped and he no longer talked much in an outright way. During the night he muttered. Mr. Jimmerson leaned forward and jostled the burning logs about.
    â€œBut why should Sydney be so bitter?” he said. “All these ugly personal remarks about you and me.”
    â€œAh now, that’s something else. That’s quickly explained. First there’s his nasty disposition. Then there’s his envy of your precedence in the Society. Then there’s this. Hen is English. We, happily, are Americans. In the brief space of his lifetime he has seen his country eclipsed by ours as a great power. Hen very naturally resents it.”
    â€œI never thought of Sydney in that way, as a patriot.”
    â€œListen to this, sir. The motto of California is ‘Eureka!’ Isn’t that