The ship was not luxurious except for the
food and wine. Our floating world contained about 200 passengers, mostly
Americans with some seasoning of wealthy and well-dressed Europeans. Aside from
the countess and an English lord living in South Africa who always dominated
the scene whenever he appeared at 11:00 a.m. at an outdoor bar to sip his
bouillon, the Europeans weren’t at all interesting except for their ritzy
clothes. Every evening they dressed in “smokings,” tuxedos to us, and beautiful
cocktail dresses in contrast to our dresswear mostly bought at Macys. We felt
distinctly lower class, which in their eyes we no doubt were. One dress-up
night, however, Glenn felt a lot better about the European competition. He had
reluctantly brought his own Italian tuxedo along. We were on the dance floor
when he felt someone tugging at his jacket. A German was fingering the fabric.
“Nice,” the man said.
Judith
Works (to be continued)
