“Not at all. I went of my own motion; in fact, suggested it to the ladies.”
“You don’t say so! Well, I see she is bringing you around. It is she that is destined to gain the supremacy.”
“Pshaw! Is my going to church such an indication of submission? It wouldn’t do you any harm to go to church once in a while, Fred.”
“Well, I don’t know about that,” he said, taking out his cigar, and stretching his feet to the top of the balustrade; “I don’t know about that. I am afraid it might be the ruin of me. I might become awfully pious, and then what a stick and a moping man of rags I should become. I tellyou, Charlie, my boy, there’s many a good fellow spoilt by too much church and Sunday school.”
“Perhaps,” I replied, “but you and I are beyond danger.”
“Well, yes, but you can’t be too careful of yourself, you know.”
There was no answering that, and we relapsed into commonplace, and finished our cigars.
“Where’s old Dives to-day, and his charming niece, the lively Van?” asked Fred, after an uncommon fit of silent contemplation.
“They went over to some town thirty or forty miles away, yesterday, and haven’t got back,” I replied.
“I tell you, that girl knows how to circumvent these stupid Sundays, don’t she, though? And she takes old Dives along wherever she wants to go. I believe she would take him where the other Dives went, if she was disposed to take a trip there herself. But, holy Jerusalem! what are we to do to get through the rest of the day. No company, no billiards, no fishing. Confound the prejudices of society. I tell you, it is just such women as that mother-in-law of yours thatkeep society intimidated, as it were, into artificial proprieties. Now where’s the harm of a pleasant game on a Sunday, more than sitting here and grumbling and cursing because there’s nothing to do?”
I made no reply, and Fred lighted another cigar. He was evidently thinking of something. “Look here, old fellow,” he said at length in an undertone, something very unusual with him, “come up to my room. You haven’t seen it. Lib won’t be back till teatime, and perhaps we can find something to amuse ourselves.”
He led the way and I followed, thinking no harm. His room was up stairs and on the back of the house, looking up the great hill that stretched back to the clouds. As we entered, I found he had brought a good many things with him, and given the room much the air of the quarters of a bachelor in the city. His sleeping-room was separate from that, and formed a sort of boudoir for his wife. He motioned me to an easy-chair, set a box of fine cigars on the table, and going to the closet brought out a decanter of sherry and some glasses.
“In these cursed places, you can get nothing todrink,” he said, “unless on the sly, and I hate that; so I bring along my own beverages, you see.”
I saw and tasted, and found it very good. He was still fumbling about the closet, with profane ejaculations, and finally emerged with something in his hand that I at first took for a small book. But he unblushingly put on the table that pasteboard volume sometimes called the Devil’s Bible. “Come,” he said, “where’s the harm? Let us have a quiet game of Casino or California Jack, or something else. It is better than perishing of stupidity.”
I demurred. I was not over-scrupulous, but I had sufficient of my early breeding left to have a qualm of conscience at the thought of playing cards on Sunday.
“Oh, nonsense!” said Fred, carelessly, as he proceeded to deal the cards for Casino. “There, you have an ace and little Casino right before you. Go ahead, old man!”
I made a feeble show of protesting, but took up my cards, and, finding that I could capture the ace and little Casino, took them. From that the play went on; I became quite absorbed, and dismissedmy scruples, when, as the sun was getting low, a shadow passed the window.
“Great Jupiter!” I exclaimed, looking up. “Does that second-story piazza go all the way round here?”
“To be sure,” answered Fred, whose back was to the window. “Why not? What did you see,—a spook?”
“My mother-in-law!”
“The devil!”
“No, Mrs. Pinkerton!”
“Well, what do you care? You are your own boss, I hope.”
“Yes, of course; but she will be terribly offended, and I think it would be pleasanter for all concerned to keep in her good graces.”
“Gammon! Assert your rights, be master of yourself, and teach the old woman her place. D—— me, if I would have a mother-in-law riding over me, or prying around to see what I was about!”
“Oh, I am sure she passed the window by accident. She would never pry around; it isn’t her style; she has a fine sense of propriety, has my mother-in-law!”
“Oh, yes, old Pink is the pink of propriety, no doubt about that!” said the rascal, laughing heartily at his heartless pun.
But I couldn’t laugh. I saw plainly enough that I had lost more than all the ground that I had gained in my mother-in-law’s favor, and my task would be harder than ever. I had no more desire to play cards, and sauntered down stairs and out of doors as if nothing had happened. At the tea-table Mrs. Pinkerton was very impressive in her manner, but showed no direct consciousness of anything new. On the piazza, after tea, she was uncommonly affable to her daughter, and, I thought, a little disposed to keep Bessie from talking to me. The latter appeared troubled somewhat, and looked at me in an anxious way, as if longing to rush into my arms and ask me all about it and say how willingly she forgave me; but her mother kept her within the circle of her influence, and I sat apart, harboring unutterable thoughts and saying nothing. At last Mrs. Pinkerton arose, and said sweetly, “I wouldn’t stay out any later, dear, it is rather damp.”
“Stay with me, Bessie,” I said, “I want tospeak to you. Your mother is at liberty to go in whenever she pleases.” It was then she gave me a disdainful look and swept in, and I muttered the wish regarding her transportation to a distant clime, which brought out the gentle rebuke with which this story opens.
I saw no prospect of enjoying a longer stay at the Fairview, unless some burglary or terrible accident should occur to give me chance for a new display of my heroic qualities, and even then, I thought, it would be of no use, for I should spoil it all next day. So we determined to go home a week earlier than we had intended. The Marstons were going to Canada and Lake George, and wouldn’t reach home till October. Mr. Desmond and his niece stayed a month longer where they were, and that would bring them home about the same time. Bessie and I went home with a lack of that buoyant bliss with which we had travelled to the mountains and spent those first two weeks. There was no change in us, but it was all due to my mother-in-law.
Home!We were back from the mountains, and our brief wedding-journey had become a thing of the past. Mrs. Pinkerton’s iron-bound trunk had been reluctantly deposited in her bed-chamber by a puffing and surly hack-driver; and here was I, installed in the little cottage as head of the household, for weal or for woe. It was Mrs. Pinkerton’s cottage, to be sure, but I entered it with the determination not to live there as a boarder or as a guest subject to the proprietor’s condescending hospitality. I was able and not unwilling to establish a home of my own, and inasmuch as I refrained from doing so because of Mrs. Pinkerton’s desire to keep her daughter with her, I had the right to consider myself under no obligation to my mother-in-law.
The cottage was far from being a disagreeableplace in itself. It was small, but extremely neat and pleasant. The rooms were furnished with a degree of quiet taste that defied criticism. The hand of an accomplished housekeeper was everywhere made manifest, and everything had an air of refinement and comfort. There was no ostentatious furniture; the chairs were made to sit in, but not to put one’s boots on. The cleanliness of the house was terrible. One could see that no man had lived there since the death of the late Pinkerton.
Our room was the same that had been occupied by Bessie since she was a school-girl in short frocks. It was full of Bessie’s “things,” and it was lucky that my effects occupied but very little space.
“This is jolly,” I said, as I sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled a cigar from my pocket. “How soon will supper be ready, I wonder?”
There was no response. Bessie was unpacking,—and such an unpacking!
I lighted my cigar and threw myself back on the bed, wondering how they had got on withoutme at the bank. Presently in came mother-in-law to lend a hand at the unpacking. She did not see me at first, but the fragrance of my Manila soon reached her nostrils, and she turned.
Such a look as she cast upon me! It almost took my breath away. But she did not say a word. “The subject is beyond her powers of speech,” I said to myself. “Let us hope it will be so as a general thing.”
However, it made me feel uncomfortable, so by and by I got off the bed and went down stairs.
At the supper-table I tried to make myself as agreeable as possible. I talked over the trip, and spoke of the people we had met at the mountains; but I had most of the conversation to myself. Bessie did not seem to be in a mood to chat; Mrs. Pinkerton devoted herself to impaling me with her eyes once in a while; in a word, the mental atmosphere was muggy.
“Desmond has travelled a great deal,” I said. “I was speaking of French politics the other day, and he gave me a long harangue on the situation. He was in Paris several years, when he was a good deal younger than he is now.”
“Mr. Desmond is not a very old man,” said Mrs. Pinkerton, “but he has passed that age when men think they know all there is to be known.”
I accepted this shot good-naturedly, and laughed.
“His niece is a remarkably bright girl,” I continued. “Don’t you think so?”
“I cannot say I think it either bright or proper for a young lady to go off alone on mountain excursions for half a day, and return with her dress torn and her hands all scratched.”
“Well, it was rather imprudent, but you know she said she had no intention of going so far when she started, and she missed her way.”
“I did not hear her excuses. She appeared to be a spoiled child, and her manners were insufferably offensive. I should have known she came from New York, even if I had not been told.”
“Do you think all New-Yorkers are loud?”
“I said no such thing. There is a class of New York young people who are so ‘loud’ that respectable people cannot have anything to do with them without lowering themselves. Miss Van Duzen belongs to that class.”
“You are rough on her, upon my word. I don’t think she’s half so bad, do you, Bessie?”
“I liked her very much,” said Bessie. “She may not be our style exactly, but I think at heart she is a good, true girl.”
“I wonder if she will call,” I said. “By the way, Fred Marston is coming out to see us as soon as he gets back to the city.”
“As to that young man,” Mrs. Pinkerton remarked, with some show of vivacity, “he impressed me as being little less than disreputable.”
“Disreputable! I would have you understand that Fred Marston is one of my friends,” I exclaimed, growing angry, “and he is as respectable as the rector of St. Thomas’s Church!”
Phew! Now I had done it. Mrs. Pinkerton was thoroughly scandalized and offended. She got up, and we left the table, Bessie looking troubled. I went into the library, and after lighting a cigar, sat down to read the papers. Bessie, who had followed me, brushed the journal out of my hand and seated herself on my knee.
“Charlie,” she said, kissing me, and smoothingthe hair away from my brow, “can’t you and mamma ever get along any better than this?”
“A conundrum! I never guessed one, so I shall have to give this up. But don’t you see how it is, dearest? I try to be good to her, and she won’t meet me half-way. On the contrary, she tries to nag me, I think. It wasn’t my fault to-night. What right has she to run down my friends? If she don’t like them, she might leave them alone, and be precious sure they’d leave her alone. She don’t like smoking; I tried to swear off, tried mighty hard, but it was no use. You see—”
“It wasn’t quite necessary for you to make that remark about the Rev. Dr. McCanon, was it, Charlie?”
“Well, no; I’m sorry, but she provoked me to it. I’ll apologize.”
“And then, Charlie, you will try to be a little more patient with mamma, won’t you?”
“Yes, I do try, but the trouble is that she don’t like me. Must I keep my mouth shut, throw away my cigars, bounce all my friends, and sit up with my arms folded?”
“Oh, no, dear. Be good to her, and be patient; it will all come around right in time.”
That was Bessie’s way of lightening present troubles,—“It will all come around right in time.” Blessed hope! “Man never is, but always to be blest.”
My duties now kept me at the bank nearly all day, and for a few weeks affairs went on at home very smoothly. At table Mrs. Pinkerton maintained a sphinx-like silence, and I directed my conversation to Bessie. When the old lady opened her mouth, it was to snub me. The snub direct, the snub indirect, the snub implied, and the snub far-fetched,—I submitted to all with a cheerful spirit, and not a hasty retort escaped me.
At Bessie’s request, I now smoked only in the library, or in our own room. I bought a highly ornamental Japanese affair, of curious workmanship, as a receptacle for cigar-ashes. Altogether, I behaved like a good boy.
One evening Marston dropped in. When his card was brought up stairs, I handed it over to Bessie, and hurried to the library.
“How are you, old man?” he said, or, rather,shouted. “How do you like it, as far as you’ve got?”
“Tip-top. I’m glad to see you. When did you get back?”
“Last Saturday, and mighty glad to get back to a live place, too. Smoke?”
“Thank you. Bessie will be down in a minute.”
“How’s old Pink?”
“S-s-h! She’s all right. Don’t speak so confoundedly loud.”
“Ha, ha! I see how it is. By and by you won’t dare say your soul’s your own. I pity you, Charlie, upon my word I do. Ned Tupney was married a few days ago, did you know it? and he’s got a devil of a mother-in-law on his hands, a regular roarer—”
“Here comes my wife,” I broke in. “For Heaven’s sake, change the subject. Talk about roses!”
Bessie entered and exchanged a friendly greeting with Fred.
“I was telling Charlie about some wonderful roses I saw at Primton’s green-house,” said theunabashed visitor, and he forthwith laid aside his cigar—on the tablecloth!—and launched into a glowing description of the imaginary flowers.
Before he had finished, Mrs. Pinkerton entered much to my surprise. She bowed in a stately manner, inquired formally as to the state of Fred’s health, and as she took a seat I saw her glance take in that cigar.
Fred could talk exceedingly well when he was so disposed, and he entertained us excellently, I thought. He had seen a good deal of the world, was a close observer, and had the faculty of chatting in a fascinating way about subjects that would usually be called commonplace. He was pleased with the aspect of the cottage, and complimented it gracefully.
“Love in a cottage,” he sighed, casting a quick glance around the room,—“well, it isn’t so bad after all, with plenty of books, a pleasant garden, sunny rooms, a pretty view, and a mother-in-law to look after a fellow and keep him straight.” And the wretch looked at Mrs. Pinkerton, and laughed in a sociable way.
I promptly called his attention to a beautifuledition of Thackeray’s works in the bookcase, a recent purchase.
In the course of a half-hour’s call, Fred managed to introduce the dangerous topic at least a half-dozen times, and each time I was compelled to choke him off by ramming some other subject down his throat willy-nilly.
Finally he rose to go. I accompanied him to the front door.
“Sociable creature, old Pink, eh?” he said. “Doesn’t love me too well. Is she always as festive and amusing as to-night?”
“Hold on a minute,” was my reply. I ran back and got my hat and cane, and accompanied him toward the railroad station.
“See here, Fred,” I said, “your intentions are good, but I wish you would quit talking about Mrs. Pinkerton. I am doing my best to live peaceably and comfortably in the same house with her, and you don’t help me a bit with your gabble. She is a very worthy woman, and not half so stupid as you imagine. I admit that we don’t get along together quite as I could wish, but I’m trying to please my wife by being as good a sonas I can be to her mother. What’s the use of trying to rile up our little puddle?”
“Oh, all right!” he rejoined. “If you prefer your puddle should be stagnant—admirable metaphor, by the way—it shall be as you wish. Only I hate to see the way things are going with you, and I’m bound to tell you so. You are losing your spirit, tying your hands, and throwing all your manly independence to the winds. If you live two years with that irreproachable mummy, you won’t be worth knowing. Do you dare go into town with me and have a game of billiards?”
I went. We had several games. I got home about midnight. The next morning, at the breakfast-table, Mrs. Pinkerton said dryly,—
“Your friend Marston pities you, doesn’t he?”
“I don’t know; if he does, he wastes his emotions,” I replied.
“I am glad you think so. He takes a good deal of interest in your welfare, and I suppose he could be prevailed upon to give you wise advice in case of need.”
“I dare say. Fred is a good fellow, and advice is as cheap as dirt.”
“And pity?”
“Pity! Why do you think Fred pities me? Why should he pity me?”
“Your question is hypocritical, because you know very well that he thinks you are a victim,—a victim of a terrible mother-in-law.”
It was the first time she had ever spoken out so openly. I said,—
“We will leave it to Bessie. Bessie, do I look like a victim?”
“No,” said Bessie, “but you are both the queerest puzzles! Mamma is always her dearest self when you are away, Charlie. You don’t know each other at all yet. When you are together you are both horrid, and when you are apart you are both lovely. And yet I don’t know why it should be so; there is no quarrel between you—and—and—”
And Bessie began to cry. I got up.
“No, there’s no quarrel between us,” I said; “but perhaps a straight-out row would be better than forever to be eating our own vitals with suppressed rancor.”
Mrs. Pinkerton made as if she would go around to where Bessie sat, to condole with her, without noticing my remark.
“No, don’t trouble yourself,” I cried. “It’s my place to comfort my wife.” And I took Bessie in my arms tenderly, and kissed her tear-stained cheek almost fiercely.
This theatrical demonstration caused my mother-in-law to sweep out of the room promptly, with her temper as nearly ruffled as I had ever seen it.
“O Charlie!” whimpered my poor little wife despairingly, “what shall I do? It’s awful to have you and mamma this way!”
And now it was my turn to say, “Cheer up, my love! It will all come around right in time.”
But myarrière penséewas, “Would that that burglar had bagged the old iceberg, and carried her off to her native Nova Zembla!”
Oneday in the early fall, Mrs. Pinkerton received a letter postmarked at Paris, which seemed to throw her into a state of extraordinary excitement. I knew her well enough to be certain that she would not tell me the news, but that I should hear it later through Bessie. Such was the case. When I came home towards evening and went up stairs to prepare for supper, Bessie, who was seated in our room, said in a joyful tone,—
“George is coming home next month!”
“That’s good,” I said; and the more I thought of it the better it seemed. A new element would be infused into our home life with his advent, and I confidently believed that the widow’s society would be vastly more tolerable when he was among us. George had been so long in Paris thathe had become a veritable Parisian. That he would bring along with him a large amount of Paris sunshine and vivacity to enliven the atmosphere of our little circle, I felt certain.
“Is he coming to stay?” I asked.
“He don’t know. He says he never makes any plans for six months ahead. It will depend upon circumstances.”
“Well, that’s Parisian. I’m very glad he’s coming, and I hope circumstances will keep him here. Isn’t old Dr. Jones pretty nearly dead? Seems to me George could take his practice.”
“Now, Charlie!”
“It’s all right, puss; doctors must die as well as their patients.”
I broached the subject to mother-in-law at the supper-table, and—mirabile dictu!—she agreed with me that we must keep George with us when we got him.
In November George arrived. He didn’t telegraph from New York, but came right on by a night train, and, walking into the house while we were at breakfast, took us by surprise.
Mrs. Pinkerton taken by surprise was a funnyphenomenon, and I’m afraid propriety received a pretty smart blow when she threw her napkin into a plate of buckwheat cakes, dropped her eye-glasses, and rushed to meet the long-lost prodigal.
As for George, he brought such a gale into the house with him—there are plenty of them on the Atlantic in November—that everything seemed metamorphosed. He laughed and shouted, and hugged first one of us and then another, and finally sat down and ate breakfast enough for six Frenchmen, every minute ripping out some wicked little French oath and winking at his mother with the utmost complacency. Never since I had become an inmate of the cottage had we enjoyed a meal so much as that one. There was anabandon, aninsouciance, anesprit, aje-ne-sais-quoiabout this young frog-eater that thoroughly carried away the whole party, including even Mrs. Pinkerton.
When George had eaten everything he could find on the table, he lighted a cigarette,—right there in the dining-room, too, and under his mother’s eyes,—and we had a good, long, jolly talk together, Bessie sitting between us and feastingher eyes on her brother’s comeliness. He certainly was handsome.
“I have no plans,” he said, “except to loaf here awhile and wait for an opening.”
“A French Micawber,” said I. “And I suppose you know all about medicine and surgery?”
“I have learned when not to give medicine, I believe, and so, I think, I can save lots of lives.”
A few days after George’s arrival we received a call from the Watsons. I had never had the pleasure of meeting the Watsons, but I had had the Watsons held up before me as examples of the right sort of style so many times, that I felt already well acquainted with them.
Mr. Watson was a very retiring, quiet little man, awed into obscurity by his wife. After a long and persistent effort to interest him in conversation, I was compelled to give it up, and to leave him smiling blankly, with his gaze directed toward the Argand burner.
Mrs. Watson was immense in every sense of the word. Her moral and mental dimensions were awe-inspiring; and she delivered what I afterwards found, on reflection, to be very commonplaceutterances in a style in which unction, dogmatism, self-satisfaction, and finality were predominant. Once, when she had brought forth an unusually imposing sentence, her husband fairly smacked his lips.
The Watsons had no children. They were among the most prominent attendants of St. Thomas’s, and the old gentleman was reputed to be worth about a million.
George came in while the call was in progress, and after greeting the Watsons, he turned to Mrs. W., and uttered one of the most polished, delicate, pleasing little compliments it has ever been my fortune to hear uttered. Then he quietly withdrew into the background.
Just then some more callers were announced, and what was my surprise to see Mr. Desmond and Miss Van Duzen enter. The former was as resplendent as to his watch-chain as ever, and his niece looked charming. Introductions all round followed, and the company broke up into groups.
George took a seat near Miss Van, and a brisk fire of conversation was soon under way between them, varied by frequent bursts of friendly laughter.
Mr. Desmond soon drew out Mr. Watson, and their talk was on stocks, bonds, and the like.
After Mrs. Watson had proved her theory of the laws of the universe, and had almost intoxicated my worthy mother-in-law with her glittering rhetoric, the Watsons took their departure. Before the others followed their example, Miss Van extended an informal invitation to us to attend a “social gathering” at her uncle’s residence the following Wednesday evening.
We went, of course, Mrs. Pinkerton, George, Bessie, and I. It was a pleasant party, and it could not have been otherwise with Miss Van as the hostess. There was a little dancing,—not enough to entitle it to be called a dancing-party; a little card-playing,—not enough to make it a card-party; and there was a vast amount of bright and pleasant conversation, but still one could not name it aconverzatione. The company was remarkably good, and Miss Van’s management, although imperceptible, was so skilful that her guests found themselves at their ease, and enjoying themselves, without knowing that their pleasure was more than half due to herfinesse.
George was quite a lion, and I envied his easy tact, his unconscious grace of manner, and his faculty of saying bright things without effort. He and Miss Van got on famously together, and she found him an efficient and trustworthy aid in her capacity as hostess.
Mrs. Pinkerton made a lovely wall-flower, and I could not refrain from a wicked chuckle when I saw her sitting on a sofa, exchanging commonplaces with a puffing dowager. Presently, however, I noticed that she had gone, and I found that Mr. Desmond had been kind enough to relieve me from the onerous duty of taking her down to supper.
I wish I had a printed bill of fare of that supper, for even George, fresh from Véfour’s and the Trois Frères Provençaux, acknowledged that it was sublime, magnificent, perfect. We men folks, in fact, talked so much about it afterwards, that Bessie rebuked us by remarking that “men didn’t care about anything so much as eating.”
As Fred Marston remarked to me, while helping himself a third time to the salad, “It’s a stunning old lay-out, isn’t it!” His wife was there,dressed “to kill,” as he himself said, and dancing with every gentleman she could decoy into asking her.
After we had come up from the supper-room, Fred Marston pulled me into a corner, and inflicted on me a volley of stinging observations about the people in the room. George, Bessie, Mrs. Pinkerton, and Miss Van were, I supposed, in one of the other rooms; I had lost sight of them.
“Old Jenks lost a cool hundred thousand fighting the tiger at Saratoga, this last summer,” said Fred. “I had it from a man who backed him. Do you know that young widow talking with him near the end of the piano? No? Why, that’s Mrs. Delascelles, and a devil of a little piece she is,—twice divorced and once widowed, and she isn’t a day over twenty-five. You ought to know her. By the way, that brother of yours is a whole team, with a bull-pup under the wagon. Does he let old Pink boss him around as she does you?”
“It’s a fine night,” I said.
“Delightful! I say, Charlie, it must be a terriblebore to lug the old woman around to all these shindigs with you, hey?”
“What do you think about the State election?” I demanded.
“The Republicans have got a dead sure thing, I’ll lay you a V. She has bulldozed you till you don’t dare open your head, my boy. Yours is one of the saddest and most malignant cases of mother-in-law I ever struck.”
“Fred,” I said, in hopes of bringing his tirade to an end, “your friendship is slightly oppressive. Confine your attentions to your own grievances. I will take care of mine.”
“Ah! at last you acknowledge that you have one. Confess, now, that old Pink is a confounded nuisance!”
“Well, then, yes, she is! Does that satisfy you, scandal-monger? Now, for Heaven’s sake, shut up!”
I heard a brisk rustling of silk just at my left and a little back of where I sat, and some one passed toward the front parlor.
“By Jove!” ejaculated Fred, looking intently. “It’s old Pink herself, and I hope she got thebenefit of what we said about her. I had no idea she was sitting near us.”
“Whatwesaid about her!” I repeated. “I didn’t say anything about her.”
“Yes, you did. Ha, ha! You said she was a confounded nuisance!”
I shuddered.
“Oh, well, brace up! Perhaps she didn’t hear that impious remark,” said Fred, chuckling maliciously. “Or if she did, perhaps she’ll let you off easy: only a few hours in the dark closet, or bread and water for a day or two.”
“Confound your mischief-making tongue!” I growled. “Here comes Miss Van Duzen to bid you quit spreading scandal about her guests.”
Miss Van Duzen, on the contrary, only wished Mr. Marston to secure a partner for the Lanciers, which he promptly did.
I sat brooding while the dancing went on, and was somewhat astonished, when it was over, to see George making for my corner.
“How’s this?” he said. “Didn’t you go home with them?”
“With them? What! You don’t mean to say—”
“But I do, though! Bessie and mother made their adieux half an hour ago, and I thought of course you had gone home with them, as nothing was said to me. This is a pretty go! Bessie must have been ill.”
“Nonsense!” I exclaimed. “I should have known if that was the case. Where’s Miss Van?”
“I saw her. She thought it was odd, but supposed you had gone with them. What could have started them off in that fashion?”
“Well, well, don’t let’s stand here talking. Come on.”
We did not stop for ceremony. Rushing up stairs, we donned our hats and coats, and made our way out to the sidewalk without losing any time. I hailed a carriage, and we drove rapidly out of town. It was about half past one o’clock when we arrived home. There were lights in our room and in Mrs. Pinkerton’s chamber. George followed me up stairs, and I tapped at the door of our room.
“Is it you, Charlie?” said Bessie’s voice.
“Yes,—and George.”
She opened the door. It was evidently notlong since their arrival home, for she had not begun to undress.
“Explain, for our benefit, the new method of leaving a party,” said George, “and why it was deemed necessary to give us a scare in inaugurating the same.” He threw himself into an easy-chair.
“Perhaps Mr. Travers is better able to tell you why mother should have left in the way she did,” said Bessie, trying to make her speech sound sarcastic and cutting, but finding it a difficult job, with her breath coming and going so quickly.
“The deuce he is!” roared George. “Come, Charlie, what have you been up to? I must get it out of some of you.”
“I am utterly unable to tell you why your mother should have left in the way she did,” was all I could find to say.
“Sapristi! This is getting mysterious and blood-curdling. The latestfeuilletonis nothing to it. Must I go to bed without knowing the cause of this escapade? Well, so be it. But let me tell you, young woman, that it wasn’t the thing to do. If you find your husband flirting withsome siren, you must lead him off by the ear next time, but don’t sulk. Good night.”
George walked out and shut the door after him.
“See here, Bessie,” I said kindly, “don’t cry, because I want to talk sensibly with you.”
She was sobbing now in good earnest.
“I want you to tell me what your mother said to you about me.”
She couldn’t talk just then, poor little woman! But when she had had her cry partly out, she told me.
Her mother had not told her a word of what had passed between Fred Marston and me! The outraged dignity of the widow would not admit of an explicit account of the unspeakable insult she had received. She had simply given Bessie to understand that I had uttered some unpardonable, infamous slander, and had hustled the poor girl breathlessly into a cab and away, before she fairly realized what had happened.
I then told Bessie what our conversation had been, and left her to judge for herself. I had not the heart to scold her for her part in the French leave-taking, though it made me feel miserable tothink how few episodes of such a sort might bring about endless misunderstandings and heart-aches.
Of course more or less talk was caused by the mysterious manner of our several departures from Miss Van’s party; and, thanks to Fred Marston and his wife and similar rattle-pates, it became generally known that there was a skeleton in the Pinkerton closet.
Miss Van soon heard how it came about, and nothing could have afforded a more complete proof of her refinement of character than the delicacy and tact with which she ignored the whole affair.
Thewinter, with its petty trials and contentions, had gone by; spring, with its bloom and fragrance, was far advanced; and already another summer, with its possible pleasures and recreations, was close upon us. Before it had fairly set in, however, an event of extraordinary importance was to occur in our little household. There had been premonitions of it for some time, which had a tendency to soften and soothe all asperities, and cause a rather sober and subdued air to pervade the little cottage, and now there were active preparations going on. Of course, the widow was gradually assuming the management of the whole affair, and it was a matter in which I could hardly venture to dispute her right. Her experience and knowledge were certainly superior to mine, and it was an affair in which these qualities were veryimportant. In fact, I seemed to be counted out altogether in the preparations, as if it was something in the nature of a surprise party in my honor. Mrs. Pinkerton had an air of mysterious and exclusive knowledge concerning the grand event. Miss Van, who had come to have confidential relations with Bessie, of the most intimate kind, notwithstanding the mother’s objections, knew all about it, but had a queer way of appearing unconscious of anything unusual. There seemed to be a general consent to a shallow pretence that I was in utter and hopeless ignorance. It annoyed me a little, as I flattered myself that I knew quite as much about what was coming as any of them, and I thought it silly to make believe I didn’t, and to ignore my interest in the affair. Bessie had no secrets from me, of course, and our understanding was complete, but one might have thought from appearances that we had less concern in the matter than anybody else.
As the auspicious time drew near, the goings-on increased in mystery and the widow’s control grew more and more complete. Bessie showed me one day a wardrobe that amused me immensely.It was quite astonishing in its extent and variety, but so liliputian in the dimensions of the separate garments as to seem ridiculous to me.
“Aren’t they cunning?” said the dear girl, holding up one after another of the various articles of raiment. Then she showed me a basket, marvellously constructed, with a mere skeleton of wicker-work and coverings of pink silk and fine lace, and furnished with toilet appliances that seemed to belong to a fairy; and finally, removing a big quilt that had excited my curiosity, she showed me the most startling object of all,—a cradle! I had seen such things before and felt no particular thrill, but this had a strange effect upon me. I didn’t stop to inquire how these things had all been smuggled into the house without my knowledge or consent, but kissed my little wife fondly, and went down stairs in a musing and pensive mood.
The next day a decree of virtual exile was pronounced upon me. My mother-in-law thought perhaps it would be better if I would occupy another room in the house for a time, and let her share Bessie’s chamber. The poor, dear girlmight need her care at any time, and the widow looked at me as much as to say, “You cannot be expected to know anything about these matters, and have nothing to do but obey my directions.” I consented without a murmur or the least show of resistance, for I admitted everything that could possibly be said, and lost all my spirit of independence in view of the impressive event that was coming. So I meekly took to the attic, and put up with the most forlorn and desolate quarters. One or two mornings after, I was aroused at an inhuman hour, and ordered in the most imperative tones to call in Dr. Lyman as quickly as possible, and haste after Mrs. Sweet. I hurried into my clothes in the utmost agitation, raced down the street in a manner that led a watchful policeman to stop me and inquire my business, rung up the doctor with the most unbecoming violence, and delivered my errand up a speaking-tube, in answer to his muffled, “What’s wanted?” Then I rushed to the neighboring stable, and got up the sleepy hostler with as much vehemence in my manner as if he were in danger of being burned to death, and induced him to harness a team,in what I considered about twice the necessary length of time; drove three miles in the morning twilight for Mrs. Sweet, a motherly old maid in the nursing business, who had officiated at Bessie’s owndébutupon the stage of life. When I had got back and returned the team to the stable, and was walking about the lower rooms in a restless manner, feeling as if I had suddenly become a hopeless outcast, the doctor came down stairs, and said, with amazing calmness, as though it was the most commonplace thing in the world,—
“Getting on nicely. Fine boy, sir! Mrs. Travers is quite comfortable. Will look in again in the course of the morning.”
Then I was left alone again, an outcast and a wanderer in my own home. All the life was up stairs, including the wee bit of new life that had come to venture upon the perils and vicissitudes of the great world. It was two hours, but it seemed a month, before any one relieved my solitude, and then it was at Bessie’s interposition—in fact, a command that she had to insist upon until her mother was afraid of her getting excited—that I was admitted to behold the mysteries above.
Well, it is nobody’s business about the particulars of that chamber. It was too sacred for description; but there was the tiny, quivering, red new-comer, already dressed in some of the dainty liliputian garments, and very much astonished and not altogether pleased at the effect. Bessie was proud and happy, the nurse, moving about silently, knew just what to do and how to do it, and the mother-in-law held supreme command. She was grand and severe, and evidently her wishes had been disregarded in respect to the sex of her grandchild. She feared the consequences of another Charlie launched into a world already too degenerate, and she had hoped for an addition to the superior sex. But Bessie and I were mightily pleased that it was a boy.
There was little to be said then, but in a few days the restraint began to be relaxed, and discussions arose about what had become the most important member of the household. Even the widow must be content with the second place now, but I began to have misgivings lest my position had been permanently fixed as the third. In my secret mind, however, I determined toassert my rights as soon as Bessie was strong again, and reduce my mother-in-law to the position in which she belonged. I had put off doing it too long, and advantage might be taken of the present juncture of affairs to strengthen her claim to supremacy, and it really wouldn’t do to delay much longer.
“I think he looks just like Charlie,” said Bessie to Miss Van, the first time the latter called after the great event.
“Well, I don’t know,” was the reply. “It seems to me he has his papa’s dark eyes, but I can’t see any other resemblance.”
“Oh, I do!” Bessie replied with spirit. “Why, it is just his forehead and mouth, and his hair will be just the same beautiful brown when he grows up.”
The old lady was looking on reproachfully, and finally said, “Bessie, my dear, that child looks precisely like your own family. George at his age was just such an infant; you couldn’t tell them apart.”
George entered the room at that moment, and with his boisterous laugh said, “You don’t meanto say that I was ever such a little, soft, ridiculous lump of humanity as that, do you?”
“As like as two peas,” was the reply of his mother.
For my part I kept out of the discussion, for I must confess I could see no resemblance between the precious baby and any other mortal creature, except another baby of the same age. I thought they looked pretty much all alike, and was not prepared to deny that it was the exact counterpart of anybody at that particular stage of development.
“I tell you what, Bess,” said George, after the debate had fully subsided, “you must name that little chap for me.”
“Oh, no,” replied the proud mother, “that is all settled; his name is Charlie.”
Nothing had been said on the subject before, and I was a little startled at Bessie’s positive manner, for I thought even this matter would not be free from her mother’s dictation. The old lady seemed surprised and vexed. “George is a much better name, I think,” she said very quietly, keeping down her vexation, “but I thought perhapsyou might remember your dear father in this matter. His name, you know, was Benjamin.”
“Yes, I know,” said Bessie, very firmly, “but I think there is one with a still higher claim, and the child’s name is Charles.”
“Good for you, little girl!” I thought, but I said nothing. Within me I felt a gleeful satisfaction at Bessie’s spirit, which showed that if it ever came to a sharp contest with her mother, nothing could keep her from holding her own place by her husband’s side. All my misgivings about her possible estrangement by her mother’s influence vanished, and I saw that the new tie between us would be stronger than any earthly power.
“Well,” said George abruptly, after a pause, “I wouldn’t be so disobliging about a little thing like that.”
“Ah! you wait until you can afford the opportunity of furnishing names, and see what you will do,” I said jokingly. My joke was not generally appreciated. The widow gave me a look a little short of savage. Bessie suppressed a smile, in order to give me a reproof with her eyes, andMiss Van just then thought of something wholly irrelevant to say, as if she had not noticed my remark at all. On the whole, I was made to feel that it was a disgraceful failure.
Anothersummer with all its glory was upon us. It was nearly a year since we were married, and I was beginning to feel the dignity of a family man. As Bessie regained her strength and bloom, she seemed to have a matronly grace and self-command quite new to her. As I looked back over our married life I saw no dark shadows, no coldness between us two, no misunderstandings that need occasion regret, but somehow it seemed as though that year had not been so bright and happy as it ought to have been. We had lived under an irksome restraint that was depressing. I had felt it more than Bessie, for she had been accustomed to submit to her mother, and did not chafe, but she plainly saw that my life had not that blithesomeness that would have been natural to me, and which she would have been glad to give it.
It was the presence and influence of the mother-in-law that gave a chill to my home life, and yet I could accuse the good woman of no special offence. She was no vulgar meddler, and never wished or intended to mar our domestic felicity. She had managed to keep control of our household arrangements and we had passively acquiesced, but I felt that it would be better if Bessie would take command and cater more to our own desires. We could then have things our own way, and her position would be more becoming as the lady of the house. She began to regard it in the same light herself. Our social life, too, had been restrained and restricted. I was very fond of having my friends about me, and wished them to come in for the evening or to dinner or to pass a Sunday afternoon in our little bower, as often as they could find it agreeable. Mrs. Pinkerton made no open objections, but I knew the company of my friends was not congenial to her, and so was reluctant and backward in my invitations to them. Besides, they were apt to be chilled and disconcerted by the widow’s stately presence and rebuking ways, and were disinclined to make themselvesquite at home with us. Fred Marston and his wife had been quite driven away. Mrs. Pinkerton had declined to speak to the latter, and had told the former in plain terms that he used language of which no gentleman would be guilty.
“By thunder!” roared the impulsive fellow, “I’ll have you to understand that my wife and I are just as good as you, with your cursed airs of superiority!” and he stormed out of doors, and incontinently returned to town. When I met him afterwards he condescendingly declared that he didn’t blame me, except that I ought to be a man and not allow “old Pink” to insult my guests. I did not particularly regret his discontinuing his visits, for, to tell the truth, I did not like his manners, and he had drifted into a circle and among associates not at all to my taste, but it galled me to have any one whom I chose to entertain driven out of my house.
I think nothing saved our charming friend, Miss Van Duzen, to whom we had both become greatly attached, from being gracefully snubbed and insulted, except the presence of her uncle, whenever she came out to visit us in the evening. Mr. Desmond’sindisputable social rank, his unimpeachable demeanor as a gentleman, and the dignity and impressiveness of his presence, though it could by no means overawe my mother-in-law, made it impossible even for her to give him an affront. Besides, she seemed to have a real respect for that fine old gentleman. She would doubtless have thought better of him if he had been a regular attendant at St. Thomas’s Church, but she could not learn that he was very constant at any sanctuary. His views were decidedly what are called liberal, and yet he was very considerate of the religious beliefs and practices of others, and would cheerfully acknowledge the worthy aims and good works of all the different Christian denominations. He seemed to understand why other persons should choose to join one or another, while he preferred to stand aloof, have his own ways of thinking, and do whatever good he might in his own way. He had large business interests and great wealth, and though he maintained his mansion in the city in great elegance, his family expenses were comparatively small, and he was reputed to make it up fully by supporting more than one poor family ina quiet way. He was liberal in his conduct as well as his belief, and his character and habits were above the reproach of the severest critic. Hence it was that the widow was forced to respect at least this one of our visitors, and to treat his niece with common civility, though cordiality was out of the question.
In fact, we owed to Mr. Desmond not a little for what relief we obtained in our social life from the chilling restraints of the mother-in-law’s presence. He seemed to take a real pleasure in coming out to our little snuggery. His stately establishment in town could not be very home-like. His niece presided over it with great skill, and saw that every wish or taste of his was gratified. She could always entertain him with her sprightly wit, and their social occasions were among the most elegant in the city. He had his club to go to, which furnished every means that ingenuity and lavish resources could contrive to minister to the pleasures of man. And yet, there was wanting to his life that element that was the essence of home. He had longed for it when he was young, and had provided for it in hishousehold; but the wife of his youth had been called from him early, and he had vainly tried to fill all his life with business, with silent works of charity, with elegance and profusion in his house, with his clubs, his studies, and his travels; but still there was a void, and when he came to visit us, he seemed to find something akin to the home feeling in our little circle. So he came far oftener than was to be expected of one in his position. Clara was his excuse, but it was plain to see that he liked to come on his own account, and he made himself very agreeable to us all; and when he came, we noticed the chilling influence of Mrs. Pinkerton much less than when he was not there.
Sometimes we had a whist party. It was generally Bessie and I against Clara and George, but the widow had no objection to whist and was occasionally induced to take a hand, while Mr. Desmond was quite fond of the game and was a consummate player. When we young people made up the set, Mr. Desmond would converse with the widow, for though reticent where politeness did not call upon him to talk, he was incapable of the rudeness of sitting silent with oneother person, or in a small party of intimate friends; and these conversations, showing his wide information on all manner of subjects, his sympathy with all charitable movements, and his tolerant regard even for the widow’s pet ideas on church and society, evidently increased her respect for him.
George must not be forgotten as a member of our circle, and never can be by those who were in it. His vivacity did much to relieve us from the depression that brooded over us. He and Clara Van, as he had taken to calling her as a sort of play upon caravan,—for was she not a whole team in herself? he would say,—he and Clara had many a lively contest of words, and were well matched in their powers of wit and repartee.
Thus there were lights as well as shades, relief as well as depression, in our social life, but over it all was a shadow, the shadow of my mother-in-law.
AsI was saying, I made up my mind that our happiness was marred by habitual submission to mother-in-law, and I determined to shake off the nightmare, to assert myself, and to reduce that stately crown of gray puffs to a subordinate place. How was I to do it? There was nothing that I could make the cause of direct complaint, and it was hard to get into a downright conflict which would involve plain speaking. I consulted with Bessie, and she agreed with me, and promised to assume the direction of household affairs. She did not like to hurt her mother’s feelings, but she admitted that it was best for her to be mistress. I could but admire the matronly firmness and tact with which she played her part. She gave her orders and told her mother what she proposed to do, and then proceeded to execute it as if therewas no room for question. If opposition was made, she very quietly and firmly insisted. Her mother was astonished and had some warm words, in which she accused me of trying to set her daughter against her.
“Oh, no,” said Bessie, “Charlie does not wish to set me against you or to have you made unhappy, but he thinks it better that I should be the mistress here, and I quite agree with him, and propose henceforth to be the mistress.”
The widow was not offended, but hurt. She had too much good sense not to see the propriety of our decision, and she surrendered and tried not to appear affected.
This was the first victory. Another time, at the table, she had exercised her prescriptive right of extinguishing me for some remark of which she did not approve. I fired up and remarked, “I have the right to speak my own opinion in my own house, Mrs. Pinkerton.”
“Certainly you have a right to speak your own opinion in your own house,” she replied, with the least little sarcastic emphasis on “your own house,” which cut me to the quick.
“But you don’t seem to think so,” I said. “You have had a way of snubbing me and putting me down which I don’t propose to tolerate any longer. I am master of my own conduct and of my own household, and I hope, in future, that my liberty may not be interfered with.”
The widow’s lip quivered, her great eyes moistened, and she left the table, not because she was offended, but to hide her injured feelings. I felt mean, and would have apologized, but that I felt that my cause was at stake. There was no after-explanation. My mother-in-law came and went about the house as usual, calm and polite. A silly woman would have refused to speak to me for some weeks; but she was not a silly woman, and took pains to speak with the most studied politeness, and to avoid offence. Here, too, she had evidently surrendered.
This was victory number two. One more and the battle was won. It was a Sunday in June. I had especially invited Mr. Desmond and his niece to come out to dinner and to spend the afternoon, and had insisted to Fred Marston that he should come with his wife. I wanted tovindicate my right to have what friends I pleased, and then I didn’t care overmuch if I never saw him again. Mrs. Pinkerton had gone to church alone as usual. For some weeks Bessie had been unable to accompany her, and I preferred the sanctuary at which the scholarly, but heterodox, Mr. Freeman preached. When she returned, our guests had arrived. She put on her eye-glasses as she entered the gate, and looked about with evident disapproval, as we were scattered over the lawn. She did not believe in Sunday visits. She was even stiff and distant to Mr. Desmond, and refused to see the Marstons at all, though they were directly before her eyes. She walked straight into the house.
“By Jove,” said George to me in an undertone, “that isn’t right! I shall speak to mother about cutting your guests in that way.”
“Never mind,” I replied, “don’t you say a word; I want an opportunity.”
He saw it in a minute, and acquiesced with a queer smile. He fully sympathized with me, and had even encouraged me in the work of emancipation. He had the utmost respect and affection forhis mother, but he said it was not right for her to make my home unpleasant.
That Sunday Mrs. Pinkerton joined us at the dinner-table. I knew she would not be guilty of the incivility of staying away.
“You remember my friends, Mr. and Mrs. Marston?” I said, by way of introduction, as she came in.
“I remember them very well,” was the reply; “too well,” the tone implied. I made a special effort to be talkative, and to keep others talking during the dinner. It was very hard work, and I met with indifferent success. It was not a pleasant dinner. Mr. Desmond alone appeared not to mind the restraint, and he alone ventured to address the widow. She was polite, but far from sociable. We contrived to pass the afternoon tolerably, but not at all in the spirit which I wished to have prevail when I had friends to visit me, and all because of that presence.
After they were gone, I took occasion to introduce the subject, for I had learned that Mrs. Pinkerton’s skill in expressing her disapproval in her manner was so great that she relied on italmost altogether, and rarely resorted to words for the purpose.
“I am afraid you did not enjoy the company very much to-day,” I said, as we were sitting in the little parlor, overlooking an exquisite flower garden.
“No, sir,” she answered, with the old emphasis on the “sir.” “I do not approve of company on the Sabbath, and I had hoped you would never again bring those Marstons into my presence at any time.”
“Excuse me, madam; but I propose to be my own judge of whom I shall invite to visit me, and of the time and occasion. I presume you admit my right to do so.”
“Certainly, sir. I never disputed it, and had no intention of saying anything if you had not introduced the subject.”
“I introduced the subject for the very purpose; in fact, I brought out the company for the very purpose of vindicating my right, and it would be very gratifying to me if you would concede it cheerfully, and not, by your manner and way of treating my friends, interfere with it hereafter.”
I was almost astonished at my own courage and spirit, and still more so at Mrs. Pinkerton’s reply. It was dusky and I could not see her face, but her voice trembled and choked as she answered,—
“God knows I do not wish to interfere with your happiness. Bessie’s happiness has been my one thought for years, and now it is bound up with yours. I have my own notions, which I cannot easily discard, but I would not do or say anything that would mar your enjoyment for the world. I have long felt that I did do so, and have made up my mind to make any sacrifice of pride and inclination to avoid it.”
Here she actually broke down and sobbed, and I was very near joining her. “Never mind,” I said at length, quite softened; “I guess we shall get along pleasantly together in the future, now that we have an understanding.”
“I hope so,” she said, recovering her serenity, and we relapsed into a painful silence.
This was the third and final victory, but I felt no elation over it. My mother-in-law receded somewhat into the background, but it was so muchin sorrow, rather than anger, that I felt her new mood almost as depressing as the old. I didn’t want her to feel injured or subdued, but evidently she couldn’t help it, and the mother-in-law, though conquered, was herself still, and that congeniality that would make our life together wholly pleasant was impossible. Her existence was still a shadow, less chilling and more pensive, but a shadow in our home, and it seemed destined to stay there.