"Oh, no," exclaimed Letitia, "never. Corporal punishment is so detestable, and so uncivilized. And for a mere baby! The mother slapped it while we were at dinner, and I gave her a piece of my mind."
"Well, now you are going to give the child several pieces of your collection," Mrs. Archer said airily—she seemed to be a most sensible and worthy woman—"and, of course, if you don't mind, it is all right. Personally, I never believe in spoiling children. But—well I am so glad it is nothing more than temper, dear Mrs. Fairfax, and dear Mr. Fairfax. I fancied that perhaps a murder was being committed, and although Mr. Archer warned me not to implicate myself in such matters—he is a very suspicious man, is Mr.Archer—I felt that common decency necessitated my giving you any assistance that lay in my poor power."
Mrs. Archer discreetly withdrew, and I mixed a glass of weak whisky-and-water for Letitia, who was still quite limp from the fray. We were both of us inordinately thankful, for what had seemed like a tragedy was averted.
"Only to think," remarked Letitia, haply restored to serenity, "that I know so little about children. I positively don't deserve to have any. This is really an experience, Archie, isn't it? Such a terrible commotion all hushed up by a few ivory trifles."
We looked at the cabinet. It had been rifled of its contents. The "few ivory trifles" were all over the floor. The tiny wheel-barrow had been robbed of its wheels; the pagoda was even then in process of smash; the dainty little chess-table had a leg missing. But the McCaffrey cub was joyous and smiling, and as we approached it, called out "Ga-ga!"
"Uncle Ben said they were very valuable, Letitia," I remarked rather wearily. "One or two of them, he told me, could never be duplicated. The work is very fine and artistic."
"Ga-ga!" cried the brat, as it tore off another leg from the chess-table. "Ga-ga!"
"Itisrather cute when it's pleased," Letitia declared, smiling in spite of the devastation. "Any way, Uncle Ben's present has been very useful, Archie. Nobody ever really looked into that cabinet, and it is in a dark corner of the room. I can put in a few little oddments from the five-and-ten-cent store, and they will look very well behind glass, and we can always say that Uncle Ben brought them to us from Bombay—or was it Calcutta?"
We sat there placidly and watched the ruthless destruction of the Indian treasures, anxious that they should not pall upon the McCaffrey darling. Letitia, I am quite certain, was prepared to break up the piano and give the pieces to the cub to play with, if necessary. But peace seemed more than usually delightful. Only once did another outbreak appear possible. It was when, at eleven o'clock, Letitia suggested that the child be put to bed. A mournful howl was wafted from the cabinet, and we decided to take no risks.
Just before midnight, Mrs. McCaffrey was sighted by Letitia at the window, and a delightful sense of security became ours.
"I shall tell her," said Letitia, before opening the door, "that we have had a fearful time, and have been beside ourselves, so to speak."
And as the amiable Hibernian came in, and we delivered over the child to her, Letitia explained the situation, adding that we had been horribly alarmed and distressed.
"Oh, it's nothing," said Mrs. McCaffrey indulgently. "Letitia's often taken like that. She has a bad temper, like her father. Don't pay any attention to her again, Mrs. Fairfax. Just let her howl. She won't mind it."
"Let us take a night off and enjoy ourselves, my girl," I said at breakfast in one of those elaborately, "off-hand" manners that so frequently betoken profound premeditation. "Somehow or other, we seem to be getting into a groove, and—missing things. Don't you agree with me, Letitia? A nice little dinner down town and a theater will cheer us up wonderfully. We owe it to ourselves, I think, and—well, I believe in paying that kind of debt, and not letting the account drag on," I added felicitously.
"Oh, yes," Letitia assented rather meditatively, and without enthusiasm, "it would be very nice. Not that I feel the need of a change as much as you do, Archie. However, it will do us good, and I'll tell Miriam that we shall not be home, and that if she likes to ask her sister from Tremont to dinner, she can do so. You see, dear, I fancy she was going out to-night. That is why I hesitated about going to the theater. But she will be just as pleased to entertain Mrs. O'Flaherty here, and if you don't mind—"
"Not at all," I said magnanimously, and I reallymeant it. If cook could have more fun in our "home" than I did, she was welcome to it. Domesticity, under impossible circumstances, was not essentially gay. So set was I upon an evening of forgetfulness, that it seemed a trifle to resign our apartment temporarily to cook and "me sister, Mrs. O'Flaherty, of Tree-mont."
"I fancy little Letitia looks rather pale," pursued my wife. "The run of the house for a night will do her good, I am sure—"
The run of the house had not been denied little Letitia, though I was determined to keep silent and not argue the matter. Cook's child was not particularly dear to me. We had her for breakfast and dinner. She stood and watched me while I shaved. She had become hatefully affectionate, and abominably fond of me. When I kissed Letitia before I went to the office, the McCaffrey cub insisted upon similar treatment. This might have been touching, but it wasn't. Letitia called me hard-hearted and callous. I believe that she was a bit jealous. Although she devoted herself heart and soul to the brat, it had no use whatsoever for her. But I, who loathed it, was singled out for popularity, and the compliment made no appeal to me.
"Well, my dear," I said, as I rose from the table, "I'll take my evening clothes with me in a dress-suitcase,and you can call for me at the office at a quarter to seven. We'll dine until eight o'clock, and then proceed to the theater. I'll get tickets this morning. What would you like to see?"
Letitia's lack of exuberance was rather depressing. A month ago she would have hailed the prospect with joy, and an ebullition of girlish delight. At present, she was apathetic.
"Oh," she replied in a preoccupied manner, "I have no particular choice." But suddenly she brightened up, and went on: "Yes, I have, Archie. Somebody told me thatMerely Mary Armwas absolutely charming. It is the story of a little servant girl, a drudge in a lodging-house, a pathetic figure, that—"
"No, dear," I said peremptorily, "we get all the servant girl we need in this cunning little home. I don't see why we should pay four dollars to see Mr. Zangwill's English idea—idealized, of course, for the stage. It would be cheaper to stay at home and weep over the real American thing."
"But perhaps," said Letitia thoughtfully, "if we could really feel sorry for Mary Ann, we might be less harshly disposed toward Anna Carter, or Mrs. Potzenheimer, or Mrs. McCaffrey."
"No, my dear," I murmured sadly, "it would be waste of time. I decline to seeMerely Mary Arm.The subject is disgusting to me. We want to get away from ourselves when we go to the theater. We don't want to reopen wounds, and brood."
"But in this Zangwill play," she persisted, "Mary Ann inherits five million dollars, and becomes a society girl, in pink chiffon and low-neck."
"Which is immoral," I declared. "It is a nasty, low, and revolutionary idea—enough to make all cooks anarchists. Such plays should be prohibited by a censor. Positively to make a heroine of one of these creatures, who break up happy homes and make life unendurable, who seem to be responsible for everything, from race-suicide to—"
"Hush, Archie!" cried Letitia indignantly, "I can't discuss these social questions with you. I haven't been married long enough. I still consider them improper. Besides, you can't accuse Mrs. McCaffrey of race-suicide, with little Letitia—"
"Oh, they reserve the right to have as many children as they like," I retorted bitterly, "but ifyouhad them, they would soon let you know what they thought of you."
"You mustn't talk to me like this, Archie," said Letitia, vexed, "you wouldn't have done so when we were engaged. I consider such conversation rowdy—just fit for the smoking-room. And as we haven't asmoking-room you must restrain yourself, please. However, I am willing to dropMerely Mary Arm. The reason I suggested it was that I thought it might make us both kinder and more indulgent."
"Imagine old Potzenheimer with five million dollars, and low-neck!" I exclaimed, outraged. "I call it absolutely nauseating."
"Not if wecouldimagine it, dear," she said gently. "Zangwill is an artist, and I hoped that if we saw the subject poetically treated, and really shed tears for Mary Ann, as Aunt Julia wrote me yesterday that she did—"
"No, Letitia. I should shed tears only for Mary Ann's employer. It is the employers who are the martyrs. It would be better and less expensive to stay at home and shed tears for ourselves. For example, I feel depressed when I think of that cabinet of Indianbibelotsall in rack and ruin—the only present that Uncle Ben ever gave me, and he is dead!" I added lugubriously.
"Howcanyou be so petty, Archie? I am surprised at you worrying about that ivory rubbish hidden away in a cabinet."
"Please, Letitia," I interrupted with dignity, "please don't call it rubbish. Uncle Ben was not the man to give his favorite nephew rubbish."
"Oh, how we argue! How we argue!" she exclaimed desperately. "I am astonished at this acidulation of character. No more ofMerely Mary Arm. You ask me what I want to see, and then decline to see it. It doesn't matter. I'll select something else. Suppose you get tickets for the Barrie play,The Admirable Crichton."
"That's more like it, old girl," I responded exultantly. "Barrie is delightful. He wroteThe Little MinisterandQuality Street, didn't he? He is reliable; always good—like tea. I admire his originality."
"InThe Admirable Crichton," said Letitia, rather demurely, I thought, "there is an old nobleman, who believes in equality. His mania takes the form of treating his servants as his equals. He invites them to parties in his own drawing-room, and makes his own daughters, ladies of title, wait upon them, and ply them with cake and lemonade."
"Bosh!" I ejaculated furiously. "It must be in the air—this vile theme. It is a germ. It is a microbe. I won't pay to see such depravity on the stage. I simply refuse. I—"
"And then," Letitia went on sedately—I couldn't help fancying that she was enjoying herself, and that galled me—"they are all wrecked on a desertisland, and the servant becomes the master of the situation, while the old nobleman fetches and carries, and proves that outside of civilization there is no such thing as social superiority."
"Ha! ha!" I laughed sarcastically. "Imagine going to a desert island to prove it. He could find proof of that right here in New York—right here in this very apartment."
"Archie!"
"Certainly he could. Moreover, it is an idea that needs no illumination, to my mind. If that isThe Admirable CrichtonI don't want to see it. I wouldn't sit it out. Possibly it might be amusing in England. Here, I should consider it insulting. The idea of letting a foreigner treat the servant question for New York. Where is the American playwright? Why don't we foster him? Why are we obliged to swallow the dramatic food made for European stomachs? The only 'servant' play I want to see, is one that places her in her true light—as the bar to marriage, the bar to family life, the bar to domesticity, the bar to digestion, to mental serenity, to—"
Letitia rose suddenly, and confronted me. "I can suggest nothing else," she asserted doggedly; "I seem unable to please you. Take tickets for anything you like."
"There seems to be a cook in everything," I declared dejectedly, "and I want to escape it. Don't be so angry with me, Letitia. In reality, it is for your sake as much as for my own. I guess I'll take tickets for the opera. It'sParsifalto-night. I never read musical criticisms, as they are so prohibitively prosy, but if you can assure me that there is no cook inParsifal—"
"How ignorant you are, Archie!Parsifalis sacred, and deals with the Holy Grail."
"Still, they might sneak a cook in," I insisted with irony. "I wouldn't put them past it. Everything is adapted, nowadays, and grand opera artists would lend themselves so easily to the rôles of cooks. However,Parsifalseems safe. There is less risk about it than anything else. To be sure, Wagner is rather stupefying, and you remember, dear, that we had our first quarrel after hearingSiegfried. It made us both so cross."
"It doesn't needSiegfriedto do that, nowadays," she said sadly.
"I'm a brute, Letitia. I know I am. Forgive me just this once, dear, and I'll try and be better. I—I'll look on the bright side of things, and—and I won't argue so much. I'll take tickets forParsifaleven though they cost ten dollars apiece. The ideaof the Holy Grail appeals to me. It doesn't sound humorous, and Barrie and Zangwill seem to be dying to vent their sense of the ridiculous upon a suffering public. So it is understood, Letitia.Parsifalto-night, preceded by a dainty little dinner."
"The opera begins at five," said Letitia, "and I don't think I could leave the house at that hour. It is an uncomfortable hour."
"Quite right, dear. LetParsifaladapt itself to us. It is absurd to make a toil of pleasure. Besides, one never understands anything at the opera, so it doesn't really matter at what time one gets there. We will not alter our plans. I shall wait at the office for you until a quarter to seven. Then dinner, a cab, andParsifal. Say that this pleases you, Letitia."
"Oh, I'm glad, dear. I want to see you pleased. I hate to have my poor boy cross and disagreeable, and misanthropic. And I am anxious to hearParsifal, so that I cansayI have heard it. You understand, Archie. Perhaps we may not enjoy it while we are there, but I know we shall be delighted when it is over, and we can truthfully say that we have sat through it. There is no glory in sitting through an amusing play. But itisquite a feather in one's cap to go deliberately through a performance ofParsifal. It is a good idea, Archie."
Letitia put my evening clothes in a dress-suit-case, and, with a heart once more lightened, I departed. The old affection lingered in her parting kiss; she clung to me tenderly, and although the McCaffrey brat hovered around, and Letitia insisted upon my kissing its sticky face, I made no protest. The prospect of a night off made a boy of me again. I felt young, and enthusiastic, and happy.
It was not easy to buyParsifaltickets. Evidently the subject of the Holy Grail, heavy, lugubrious, massive, with an elusive fantasy about it, appealed to the wearied hearts of New York. A long line of women stood makingParsifalinvestments, anxious doubtless, as we were, to spend a cookless evening. Probably these women would have winced at suggestions ofMerely Mary AnnandThe Admirable Crichton. I couldn't help thinking, as, in return for a twenty-dollar bill, I received a couple of pasteboard bits, that if New York managers had homes of their own, and lived the lives of the public, for which they cater, their views upon the desirability of certain plays would change. Managers are not conspicuously domestic in their habits, and they have no inkling of the real joys and sorrows of their clients. They produce plays written in other lands, for the people of other lands, and reason that human nature is thesame everywhere. In which, I ween, they err. They are impatient and restive at their many failures, but—they continue their policy of risk.
The day passed slowly. Tamworth seemed sorry for me when I told him that I was going to the opera, and suggested that I take a pillow with me—a rather tactless remark, I thought. He had once suffered, he said, from insomnia, and the doctors had almost despaired of curing him. He grew thin and restless, through lack of sleep. He read the very dullest books he could find, every night—all the romances and historical novels—and even these that had never failed him before as a narcotic, were useless. Then, in an inspired moment, he went to the Metropolitan House and tackledDer Nibelungenring. Wagner triumphed over the physicians. Morpheus emerged from his hiding-place, and insomnia was vanquished. Said Tamworth: "Nowadays, if I have a return of my old complaint, I just walk up Broadway and look at the outside of the Metropolitan House. The effect is magical. I go home and sleep the sleep of the virtuous."
This was not encouraging, but I did not repine. Better a peaceful nerveless lethargy, induced by the Holy Grail, than the discordant din of horse-laughterset in motion by ill-timed variations, in fantasy form, upon tragic domestic themes.
At six o'clock, I was left alone in the office. Tamworth went home; and so did the typists and clerks. It occurred to me that I might utilize a half-hour or so by working upon myLives of Great Men, the thread of which I had lost. I was hopelessly out of tune with lives of great men. Lives of great women—the great women of the kitchen—had lured me astray. Goethe was obscured by Mrs. Potzenheimer; Molière lurked beneath the shade of Birdie Miriam McCaffrey. I found it quite impossible to concentrate my thoughts. They were diffuse, and unresponsive. They wobbled; and I abandoned my task. Instead, I donned my evening clothes, and made myself look as presentable as I could. I was alarmingly hungry, and could not repress a sensation of furtive delight at the thought that we were to dine at a restaurant, where nobody would say "Ga-ga!" and I should not have to call the waiter Miriam. We would begin steadily and industriously with oysters, and plow our way methodically through everything, until we landed safe and sound, at coffee.
Man proposes. At a quarter to seven I put on my overcoat, and went to the window to wave to Letitia as soon as I saw her approach. She was generallypunctuality itself, and prided herself upon it. As time dragged itself slowly along, however, and the slim little figure I knew so well was not to be detected in the Twenty-third crowd, I began to get nervous and apprehensive. Perhaps there had been an accident on the elevated. I thought up all sorts of catastrophes, and when the clock struck seven I had worked myself into a distressing state of perturbation. Something had assuredly happened, and I made up my mind to wait five minutes longer before telephoning. If Letitia had left the house—as she must have done—it was not much use telephoning. Certainly Birdie—I always thought of her aggressively as Birdie—would know nothing about answering telephone rings. Moreover, she was probably vividly engaged in entertaining "me sister, Mrs. O'Flaherty, of Tree-mont."
Seven-twenty, and no Letitia. Even if she came, we should have but forty minutes to devote to dinner. Food, however, was rapidly losing all interest for me. I grew cold as the minutes passed. A sense of powerlessness overcame me. At last I could stand it no longer, and going to the telephone I rang up my own address, and then stood, nervously shivering, until I got it.
"This is Archie," I said tremblingly. "It is I—Archie. Who is that at the 'phone?"
A moment's pause, then: "Birdie—I mean Miriam. You are Archie?"
My worst fears seemed about to be realized. I felt like the pain-racked husband in the little playAt the Telephone. I scarcely dared to listen. "This is Mr. Fairfax, Mrs. McCaffrey. What has happened? Tell me quickly."
"Letitia's awful sick, and the doctor's coming to see what the matter is."
The perspiration was trickling down my face. The roots of my hair seemed to tighten. Letitia was too ill to answer the telephone! The familiarity of cook's allusion to my wife passed unnoticed in the wave of apprehension that swept over me.
"Telephone at once for the doctor, and I'll come right back," I commanded.
"The doctor's telephone doesn't work," was the reply, "and your wife has gone to fetch him. Me sister, Mrs. O'Flaherty, was too tired to go, and I had to stay with Letitia."
A ray of light! I laughed—almost hysterically. The sudden removal of the nervous tension nearly made me collapse. It was the McCaffrey brat that was "awful sick," and as I hung up the receiver, I experienced nothing but a sense of utter thankfulness. Our little dinner most assuredly was off, and theHoly Grail was lost. Then a normal sense of vexation set in, and I felt indignant as I thought of Letitia trotting off for De Voursney, while I was left, lamenting.
If I had only been strong-minded enough to dine in town alone, and go to the opera in solitary state! Now that I knew Letitia was unharmed, I could easily have done this, and telephoned my determination to her. Unluckily, I was not built for such a course. Such stringency might be effective, but it was beyond me. I could not take my pleasures wifelessly. The only thing to do was to go home, and I should have been impelled to this course, even if I had been expected to sit up all night with cook's brat—and I was not at all sure that Letitia would not suggest this.
My mood had changed, and despondency had set in. I put my clothes into the dress-suit-case, locked up the office, and went home as rapidly as I could, after having bestowed the two ten-dollarParsifaltickets upon the elevator boy, who rather ruefully told me that he had seats for the Third Avenue Theater, where they were playing a pretty little thing calledToo Proud to Beg. I was not too proud, however, and I begged him to take twenty-dollars' worth of opera, for my sake, which he promised to do.
Letitia was very flushed and excited when I reached our apartment. It was she who opened the door, and I noticed that she had her hat and coat on.
"Oh, Archie, I'm so sorry," she said lachrymosely, "and I do hope that you are not disappointed. Poor little Letitia is quite ill and feverish. She has been moaning and crying 'Ga-ga!' I had to go for De Voursney, and he is here now. I couldn't send Miriam, or Mrs. O'Flaherty, or the three girls."
"The three girls!"
"Yes, Archie. Cook has three other daughters, who live with Mrs. O'Flaherty, and they are all here—very nice respectable girls."
"She has no right—"
"What can I do, Archie? Besides, they live in Tremont, so that really they don't concern us. She might have been frank, and have candidly admitted that little Letitia had sisters. But, perhaps, if you had to earn your living as a cook, dear, you would do the same thing under the same circumstances. We won't argue; I don't feel equal to it. Ah, hereisthe doctor."
Dr. De Voursney entered at that moment, and shook hands most amiably. His presence was generally reassuring, but I must admit that at present I felt no very wild sense of alarm.
"Glad to see you, Mr. Fairfax,"' he said, rubbing his hands affably. "The little patient has a febrile disturbance, and I notice a stiffening of the parotid gland in front of the ear. I should say undoubtedly—in fact I can affirm—that it is a case ofcynanche parotidaea."
Letitia grew pale. "How horrible!" she exclaimed in a low voice.
"Perhaps you could give it us in English," I suggested ironically. "Mrs. Fairfax is well versed in Latin, but medical phrases, I am afraid—"
"Certainly—oh, certainly," he said, in irrepressible good humor. "I generally use Latin in apartment houses and reserve mere English for the tenements.Cynanche parotidaeais very prevalent just at present. It is almost epidemic. Gentle laxatives and warm fomentations are really all that it is necessary to prescribe. In English, we call the malady, mumps."
"Mumps!" I murmured.
"Mumps!" exclaimed Letitia.
"It is not serious, as you may perceive. It is painful and quite ugly to look at. I shall leave some directions with the mother and shall come in to-morrow morning."
"Is it catching?" I asked anxiously.
"Nothing more so—nothing more so," he repliedcheerfully. "It is highly contagious. It spreads through schools, through apartment houses, with the rapidity of lightning."
"Then you think that my wife might—"
"I should say it was very likely—extremely probable," he declared, beaming upon us; "still it might be worse. Now, you know, scarlet fever, at present, is raging in this neighborhood. I have just come from a house where six little children are attacked, and the seventh has all the symptoms—"
We bowed him out in a trail of depression, and stood looking at each other silently. Then Letitia slowly took off her hat and coat and I did the same, deposing my dress-suit-case in my bedroom viciously. Fate was not smiling upon us.
Miriam came bustling in, with a grim, set face. She scowled as she saw us, and placed her arms akimbo, in the style made popular by fishwives, andMadame Angot.
"I've packed off me sister, Mrs. O'Flaherty, and me daughters in a hurry," she said savagely. "Yer doctor says it's catching, and it's just me luck that Muriel, and Rosalind, and Winnifred should have been here. Worse luck to it, say I! Me poor Letitia, a-prattling so cutely as she's laid low by the nasty disease."
"It is not at all serious," murmured Letitia sympathetically.
"For them as ain't got it—no, it ain't serious," said Birdie Miriam McCaffrey mockingly. "For them as ain't got it—it just tickles, that's all. Curse me for a-comin' here. That's my motto. 'The neighborhood's just alive with it,' says yer doctor. 'It's in the air. It's epileptic. Why,' says he, 'there's hardly a house where they ain't got mumps.' Nice for me, eh? If them's yer Christian principles, luring a hard-working woman, with a child, into a mumpy house, and a-saying no word to put her on her guard—"
"You can go whenever you are ready," I said loftily, "and no impertinence, please."
"As soon as my Letitia can be moved—if the poor thing ever lives through it—and I have me doubts, as she's that delicate—we'll go. Oh, we'll go, right enough. Don't you worry about that. Not if yez poured gold at me feet, and if I wuz a-perishing for want of a bit o' food, to keep body and soul together, would I stay in a house that's alive with germs. 'Yes,' says yer doctor, 'it's a germ. It's a mikey in the air.' Me poor Mike! 'A mikey in the air,' says he. And I only hope that me Muriel, and Rosalind, and Winnifred will be spared, as it's so catching. Why didn'tye tell me, Mrs. Fairfax? Why didn't ye say, when ye come down to Sixth Avenue, that there was diseases all around? Play fair; that's my motto. I don't believe in no underhand game, I don't. Not for me!"
As she flounced out of the room, Letitia sank into a chair and burst into tears. The twittering of Birdie had been horribly effective. It had made me feel nervous and unstrung. Logic was quite unavailing, and for the first time in my life, I realized that those with a sense of humor might have fared better than we did.
It was undignified, but necessary. Any other course would have been impossible. It was a case of bowing to the inevitable—and it seems to me that the inevitable simply exists for the sake of the curtseys bestowed upon it by unfortunates. One is always bowing and scraping to the inevitable. It is a species of toadyism that is invariably omitted from textbooks on the sublime art of sycophancy.
The inevitable, in this particular instance, was Aunt Julia. After the vociferous, verbose, and vortiginous departure of Birdie Miriam and the convalescent brat, dread symptoms ofcynanche parotidaeaappeared in Letitia, herself; we were alone, helpless, and mump-ridden, and it was Letitia who suggested Aunt Julia. I made few telephonic explanations to Tarrytown. I merely begged my aunt-in-law to put a few things in a valise and come to us at once, as her niece was quite ill. This was true. By the time Aunt Julia arrived, Letitia's fair face had lost its outlines. In the grip of this most prosaic indisposition she was inclined to be irritable—particularly when she looked at herself in the glass, which she didevery five minutes. Some patients, it is said, are amused at the facial contortions guaranteed by this ailment. They must be the patients who own a sense of humor. Letitia was awed by her own ugliness, and I must confess that I hated to look at her. She insisted upon wearing a lace mantilla over her head, and fastening it with a diamond brooch beneath her chin. Under other circumstances this might have seemed Spanish, but Letitia was cross, and when I dared to suggest that she was emulating Otero, she was most indignant, and thought my remark uncalled for.
Aunt Julia's advent was very welcome. After all, she had fine qualities. There was not a suspicion of the baleful "I told you so" in her manner. Shedidturn away her head several times, as Letitia narrated the tragic stories of Anna Carter,LaPotzenheimer, and Birdie Miriam, but although I had a suspicion that she was exuding mirth, I could not prove it. I could not have sworn that Aunt Julia was laughing, although I followed her face round the corner, so to speak. Mercifully, Letitia was unable to do this, owing to circumstances—to say nothing of swellings—over which she had no control. My poor Letitia! If irritability were a good sign—as old women declare—her convalescence soon set in. She was as "cross as two sticks," as my old nurse used to remark.
The worst of it was that I had to absent myself from the office until Aunt Julia arrived. I told Tamworth that my wife had tonsilitis, as I thought it sounded better and would be more evocative of sympathy. People are sorry when you say tonsilitis; they are merely amused when you mention mumps. A heroine with mumps, or even toothache, is a romantic impossibility; but tonsilitis or nervous prostration is less destructive to poetic commiseration.
"You have probably arrived at a conclusion often forced upon me," said Aunt Julia, as her keen, beady eyes roved around the room. "The happiest day after that upon which cook arrives is that upon which cook departs."
IfIhad dared to say that, Letitia would have exclaimed ironically, "How clever!" or, "How epigrammatic!" and I should have been instantly snubbed. As it was, she murmured a dutiful "Yes, aunt," and sat with her hands folded in her lap, meekness personified.
Aunt Julia, however, was not particularly restful to the nerves overweeningly unstrung. Even while she was listening to our history she was bustling about, arranging things, and—of course!—dusting. She flicked dust from the piano, filched it from the ornaments, dug it from the tiger-head, blew it fromthe pictures, rubbed it from the chair-backs, fought it from the window-sills. And then—if any had remained—I am perfectly certain that she would have eaten it. Dust was Aunt Julia's weakness, as it is the weakness of many women. If dust had sex, it would assuredly be masculine, as the majority of women are so disgracefully attentive to it. They run after it so rudely. It is only the intellectual, large-minded women, who don't mind a little bit of harmless dust, and can sit still comfortably while it settles and enjoys itself. The others are always pottering around after it, making their own life, and that of their associates, unnecessarily miserable. Personally, dust has always seemed to me to be homelike and cozy, and I hate to see it flagged away and routed.
"You see," said Aunt Julia triumphantly, as she lifted the clock from the mantel-piece, and revealed the huge space, surrounded entirely by thick dust, upon which it had stood, "you two children, who are always talking cooks, really need what we call a general. You want somebody who will dust as well as cook. Apparently, you have secured ladies who could do neither."
"You engaged Anna Carter for us, aunt," remarked Letitia pointedly, and I could have applauded her gladly, if I had not been in my own house.The opportunities for being impolite are wonderfully curtailed nowadays. Etiquette says that you must be polite in your own house; you must be polite in other people's houses. Apparently, one can be impolite only out of doors.
"And I particularly told her," said Aunt Julia emphatically, "that the main thing was to keep the place spick-and-span. I made more of a point of that than I did of the cooking. Healthy young people don't want a lot of messy 'à la' dishes, but they do want immaculate living rooms."
"Oh, Aunt Julia—" Letitia began argumentatively.
"Oh, Aunt Julia!" mimicked the old lady. "Wait until you can afford to keep three or four servants before you put on so many airs. 'Oh, Aunt Julia!' Yes, and 'Oh, Aunt Julia' again! With your 'drawing-room' and your 'evening dress' and your menus you want a retinue of domestics. You think that all you have to do is to sit down and live artistically in the most inartistic and impossible city in the world. I say that, and I'm a good American, too. And there's no 'Oh, Aunt Julia!' about it, either."
I bit my lips, and impressed upon my mind the fact that I was in my own house. I should have liked to ask Aunt Julia to walk with me to the corner, sothat I could say rude things to her. Of course her statements were absolutely grotesque and ridiculous, and both Letitia and I knew it. We exchanged sympathetic glances. I could have laughed in scorn at Aunt Julia. Letitia couldn't, of course, as her face was not in laughing order.
"In the meantime, Aunt Julia," I said with an effort—Ihadthought of addressing her as "Mrs. Dinsmore," but, after all, she was there at my invitation—"you see we have no servant at present. What can we do? Letitia can't leave the house; I am unable to cook a dinner; Icouldtake a basket and sally forth to the delicatessen shops, but—"
"I'm here," replied Aunt Julia, spreading her hands whimsically. "Like the poor, I am always with you. And I assure you, you silly helpless things, that the situation is not too many for me. In fact, I am distinctly able to cope with it. My motto in life has been: Don't worry about being rich; don't bother about being poor; but do, for goodness' sake, make up your mind to be independent. That's it—independence. Do you fancy that a mere cook can either make or mar me? And yet, my dear Letitia, and my equally dear Archibald, I flatter myself that I am quite as good, socially, as anybody you are ever likely to meet. I have known the time when I havecooked an entire dinner, from soup to sweets, and sat at the head of my own table, in a low-neck dress and entertained my guests, who probably thought that I had lolled on a sofa all day, and read—er—Ovid!" she added maliciously.
This sounded horribly Sandford-and-Merton-y. I was Sandford, and Letitia was Merton, while Aunt Julia appeared to be that detestable consummation of all the virtues, Mr. Barlow. I nearly called her "Uncle Barlow," but haply refrained in time.
"I don't like the idea of your slaving, Aunt Julia," began Letitia, adjusting her mantilla.
"I don't say that I should select it as a pastime," asserted that lady, in her most formidable manner; "but when it is necessary—and it often is, even in the best regulated families (among which I do not class this household)—I am always on hand. The situation is mine, absolutely. You see my education was unlike yours, Letitia. I am saying nothing against my poor sister, Frances, your dear mother, who had her own views, but I assert that the average American woman is quite helpless and—and—the race suffers."
"Don't lecture me, please, Aunt Julia," cried Letitia feebly. "I know I'm helpless, but Archie is quite willing to pay for help, and—I can't be squalid. Excuse me, Aunt Julia."
"Certainly," she said amiably, "I'll excuse you. You can't be squalid, but youcanbe dusty. Personally, I'd sooner be squalid, as you call it, but tastes differ, as the old lady remarked when she kissed her cow. Thank goodness, I've removed a few of the evidences of neglect. I think I'll rest for a few minutes. You sit still, Letitia, and you, Mr. Archie, don't get fidgetty. The trouble to-day is that the average New York woman who gets married doesn't want cooking, or housekeeping, or children, or the comradeship of a man. She wants diamonds for her ears, silks for her back, furs for her shoulders. She'd sooner live in an apartment that has a palatial entrance, and dark, airless cubby-holes for rooms; she'd sooner go and dine at atable d'hôterestaurant than order her own dinner at home; she'd sooner pant in impossible waists and flaunt herself before the world as some odious 'Gibson' freak, than stay at home in something loose, and have healthy children easily."
"Aunt Julia!" cried Letitia, aghast. "You really mustn't—before Archie."
"Please, Mrs. Dinsmore," I objected, "such things—before Letitia—"
"Don't add prudery to your other follies," retorted this terrible old lady, "I hate it. What is, is; and we might as well talk about it. Somebody has said, Letitia(and it wasn't your friend Ovid, the chestnut), that decency is indecency's conspiracy of silence—which is clever. You see, I read occasionally, squalid though I be. It is a true remark. I hope you'll have children, but not until you know what to do with them, and are not as dependent upon a nurse as you are upon a cook. Then you would be treating your own children as badly as you now treat your own stomachs. Your poor stomachs!"
Involuntarily I placed my hand on the lower part of my waistcoat. There was certainly a flatness there. Strangely enough, Letitia did the same—omitting of course the waistcoat. We were both so indignant with Aunt Julia, that this silent action probably took the place of insulting words.
"Home is a thing that is going out of fashion in this city," Aunt Julia continued bitingly. "It is a place to sleep in, to get your letters at; a spot in which to blazon forth your name, for the compilers of the city directory. American women prefer to dine out, dance out, make merry out. They even like to get married—out. Probably they will have their children out, one of these days. There will be elegant caterers to expectant mothers. No, Letitia, you can't stop me. I intend to have my say. The situationconfronts us. Let us face it, manfully or womanfully."
"You talk as though we were trying to demolish the home, Aunt Julia," said Letitia, endeavoring to infuse an expression of indignation into her poor congested face. "We are doing our best. We are anxious to live in the house, and not out of it. What are we to do? We are unfortunate."
"Stuff and nonsense!" retorted Aunt Julia irritably; "if I were not here at this moment, and if you, Letitia, were not indisposed, the two of you would be trotting out to your meals to-day, ruining your digestions with unhealthy food, and doing it because cook had left. 'Oh, Aunt Julia!' I anticipate that you were about to remark. Bah! I've no patience with you. Now, if instead of reading the ridiculous antiquities you affect, you were to set to work and study the—er—cook-book—"
"I shall never advise Letitia, at her age, to stupefy herself with such literature," I asserted stoutly; "I don't believe in it."
"What you believe in is of no consequence, Archibald," she declared, rising suddenly, as another dusty spot dawned upon her vision. "You can put on your things, my boy, and go to your office. I take charge.I guarantee you a dinner to-night—no stickyà laaffair, but something that will appeal to a healthy appetite. Go down-town, and leave Letitia alone with me. I promise you that I shan't ask her to do anything. She can read the classics, if she likes, as long as she doesn't read 'em aloud to me. The classics in the Harlem end of Columbus Avenue! Ha! Ha! Ha! Now, vanish, Mr. Fairfax. I can't stand a man in the house, in the daytime."
"I think you're unjust, Aunt Julia," murmured Letitia; "poor Archie is so domestic. He loves to be around."
"Sitting in thick dust," added Mrs. Dinsmore, "and imagining that he's milord Tomnoddy; also encouraging you to live in the clouds. And now, if you'll excuse me, I'll go and introduce myself to the kitchen. No, Letitia, don't trouble to come with me, for I'm perfectly convinced that you don't know the difference between a saucepan and a corkscrew. I can find my way, and I shall amuse myself. I quite enjoy the idea of a regular, old-fashioned set-to.Au revoir.Dinner at six, Mr. Fairfax. By-the-by, I forgot to bring a low-neck bodice with me. Do you mind? I'll sit outside in Mrs. Potzenheimer's sanctum, if, by any chance, I should be offensive to your evening eyes."
And off she went. Letitia and I sat staring at eachother, lacking even the gumption to smile. Upon the silence was borne the tin-ny noise of pots and pans apparently being routed and abused. A second later, and we heard Aunt Julia singing. That settled it. I closed the door. I loathe cheery kitchen music—especiallyBedelia.
"I'll go, Letitia," I sighed; "I'm turned out. I shall advertise at once. We can't trespass upon Aunt Julia's—er—er—kindness."
"Yes, do, Archie,"—and Letitia also sighed; "Aunt Julia means well, but she's very old-fashioned. You mustn't mind what she said, dear. I dare say I don't know very much, but if I had been a kitchen-y oldFrau, you wouldn't have liked me, and we shouldn't have been married. Of course, thereareservants. Somebody must have them. We've had a few failures, but we'll try again."
I kissed her quite pathetically, and started officeward with a heavy heart. It seemed delightful to get away from the mugginess of home, and I marveled at my sensations. They were so strange. The people in the streets all interested me. There seemed to be such a quantity of women. Women, women, everywhere, but not a cook to greet! A longing to pounce upon some of the nice, comfortable-looking women I saw, and cry: "Come live with me, and bemy cook," took possession of me. We wanted so little, Letitia and I; just a domesticated home-body who would ply us with easy dishes, and let us "live our life"—as Ibsen would say. Was there anything exaggerated in these demands?
In the train, I sat opposite a most attractive looking colored person; one might have almost called her a party. She eyed me rather furtively, and had perhaps some telepathic inkling of my mood. Oh, if I had owned the courage to throw myself at her feet, and beg her to come cook for us! I lacked the necessary nerve. She looked as though she could contrive dainty Southern dishes, and I was particularly fond of terrapin. But perhaps, I told myself cynically, she couldn't even boil an egg, and I should find myself landed again in the midst of the alarms of delicatessen.
At Eighty-first Street, a neat looking young woman got in, and became the object of my culinary speculation. I liked her appearance immensely, and would have engaged her upon the spot, without references, if the opportunity had been there. I felt certain that she would get along admirably with Letitia,—my poor Letitia, who would have been so considerate and indulgent with her cooks if they had only permitted it. Why, she had even hinted at herintention of giving Birdie Miriam her low-neck, white chiffon bodice, in a week or two, when she had no more use for it. Fool that I was! I had argued with Letitia upon the incongruity of presenting Mrs. McCaffrey with adécolletéwaist, and had quite vexed myself. I had told Letitia that I couldn't possibly eat stew, if a low-neck cook brought it in. It was so unnecessary, for Birdie Miriam had departed long before the gift was ready for her acceptance.
The girl who got in at Eighty-first Street appealed to me. An impulse, quite irresistible, seized me. I felt that both Aunt Julia and Letitia would look upon me as a hero, if suddenly I marched in with a splendid cook that I had fished, unaided, from an elevated train. I say the impulse was irresistible. It was. I edged up to the young woman. I tried to attract her attention by nudging her. I smiled, and was about to speak, when she rose, and in a loud voice, cried: "Say, you're too fresh! Where d'ye think ye are?"
In an instant a stout Irishman was on his feet, and I heard him mutter something about "cursed mashers." A disgraceful scene impended, and the horror of being accused of "mashing," when I was merely intent on "cook-ing," overwhelmed me. I apologized abjectly, and though I was now more certain than Ihad been before that the young woman was a cook, the fact that I was laying myself open to suspicion dawned suddenly upon me. The Irishman sat down glowering, presumably rather vexed at the de-materialization of a fight, and I continued my journey down-town, silently. The young woman left the train at Fifty-third Street, with a malicious, provocative smile in my direction, but I was in no mood to notice it ostentatiously.
The car was filled with smiling, radiant women, all evidently free from domestic care. My poor mind ran in the one groove only. Had they cooks? If so, how? Did they dine at restaurants? Had they homes? I listened to their conversation. It was not exhilarating; it was interspersed with "and I says," "and she says," and then, "says she to me," and "says I to her." They were jovially wallowing in a cheery labyrinth of non-refinement and banality, and it occurred to me that perhaps some of this domestic problem's difficulties lay in the fact that the mental difference between cook and her mistress was not marked enough! This was a horrid thought. Don't blame me for it. One thinks horrid things when one is gloomy and oppressed—horrid things that are also unjust.
At Twenty-third Street domestic thoughts vanished.The troubles of home evaporated in that atmosphere of stately hotels, and shops, and carriages, and pretty women, and theaters. Just once these memories returned. It was when I passed the Flat-iron Building, and thought, in a bitter vengeful spirit, that I would like to condemn Aunt Julia to flick dust from every window in that most oppressive pile. What a gorgeous revenge it would be!
At the office I worked automatically. I read two manuscripts that had been submitted for publication. Both were humorous, and they disgusted me. My mood was not one that the authors of those luckless manuscripts would have liked to see. It augured ill for their work. I frowned at their fantasies and ground my teeth at their airy flights. This was rank injustice, of course, and I felt it my duty to state, in declining these works, that "humor was not our specialty." I thought that rather neat. Of course, in these days of ferocious competition, the authors would feel but little discomfiture. Others would appreciate their labors. Personally, as I have said, I hate humorists. Undoubtedly there are perversities on earth who could turn my cooks to humorous account. They need never apply to me for a lift toward publicity. Humor is assuredly abnormal.
I rather dreaded the idea of going home. I hadvisions of boiled mutton, which I detest, and then there would be, perhaps—the mere idea sickened me—stewed prunes! Aunt Julia, being old-fashioned, would probably deem this menu wholesome, and American. To me it was appalling, deadening. I could see the meal before me—the loathsome prunes set before my eyes, at the same time as the meat, to confront and defy me, as I sat at table. Everything would be spotlessly clean—you could "eat your dinner off the carpet" of course—but spotlessly unappetizing.
It was a shock to me to find that Letitia had not "dressed" for dinner. She explained quickly that she was not well enough to don evening dress, but begged me to do so, and not to let Aunt Julia think that I was afraid of her. Afraid of her! Perhaps I was, but I had no intention of admitting it. I went at once to my room, selected the most immaculate shirt I possessed, decorated it with my pearl studs, and then, putting on my Tuxedo coat, I sallied forth to Letitia, who had a turpentine-soaked flannel round her neck.
Aunt Julia was in the kitchen, and I could hear her laboring atBedelia, in high spirits, and an undaunted voice.
"She went out shortly after you left," said Letitia, "and I haven't seen her since. Of course, it is awfullygood of her, Archie. She didn't even consult me as to what she should get. At any rate, dear, it's a case of beggars mustn't be choosers. Please try and be amiable."
As the clock struck six, Aunt Julia announced dinner and Letitia and I went to the dining-room. The old lady was as calm and unruffled as though she had been napping all afternoon. Her silk dress was unperturbed; her lace collar knew its place; she was not even flushed. I felt rather guilty. The table looked so nice! There were oysters at the three places; there was no vestige of a stewed prune; the table napkins were daintily folded, with a pallidly baked roll in each. It certainly didn't look a bit old-fashioned—in the abused acceptance of that phrase.
"Sit down, cookless ones," said Aunt Julia, with a laugh, "and revel in your squalor. I haven't known what to do with myself all afternoon. The time has positively hung on my hands. I took a doze, Letitia, because there was nothing else to take. Work in an apartment! It's child's play."
We ate our oysters in a somewhat embarrassed mood. Aunt Julia was as lively as a kitten. She chatted and criticised, and asked questions, and never waited for the answers, and actually enjoyed herself. Then she skirmished quickly away with the oysterplates, and brought in the silver tureen, filled with strong beef soup. It all seemed to be ready at hand and piping hot, and as I tasted it, the cockles of my heart expanded and I smiled. Letitia'scynancheseemed remarkably better, and I don't know how it was, but the three of us found ourselves engaged in the most enlivening conversation, without having to seek for it in racked brains. Nor was it small talk.
So interested were we, that we never noticed how the soup got away. Yet it did, and I suddenly perceived before me an appetizing dish of fried smelts, nestling beside a silver receptacle containing asauce tartare. It was marvelous. It was as though a conjurer had cried, "Presto!"—and behold the metamorphosis! The fish was delicious and Aunt Julia enjoyed it quite as much as we did.
"I'm very fond of my own cooking," she said. "I take a scientific interest in it. I like to see what one can do with various foods. I love experiments. I have the same interest in asauce tartarethat—er—Sir Oliver Lodge has in radium. One is born that way, I suppose."
I continued to expand. How could I help it? Aunt Julia seemed suddenly transfigured. She was no longer the fussy old meddler, but the Good Samaritan. I liked her silk dress, her lace collar, herantique cameo brooch, and with every glass of sauterne that I took, I liked them better! It was quite wonderful how they grew upon me. Letitia seemed to be equally effervescent. I quite forgot her lack of evening dress, in which she had been so resplendently imperious at Anna Carter's delicatessen spread. This was a meal at which evening dress would have been perfectly appropriate, but this meal, alas! was born of no cook's efforts. It was original. Perhaps we scarcely dared to hope for its repetition. And as this thought occurred to me, I sighed.
The chicken was roasted to perfection, and its dressing was almost poetic. An epicure would have delighted in it. Brillat-Savarin, himself, would have commented favorably. Aunt Julia explained that she had not tried to display any particularly "fancy" cooking, but she opined that this was sufficient to remove satisfactorily the edge from the ordinarily unfastidious appetite. How I had wronged her! How different was the reality to the anticipation of boiled mutton and stewed prunes! We finished with a firm and convincing jelly, and some of the best black coffee I have ever tasted outside of Paris.
It was the first comfortable meal we had enjoyed at home! It was the first time we had ever sat at our own table, to arise therefrom at peace with the world!
"And now," said the old lady solemnly, "you two young people may go into the parlor—oh, I beg your pardon, I mean drawing-room—and your squalid aunt will clear the things away. She will be with you in fifteen minutes, ready to preach, or answer questions, or do anything you like."
Home certainly did seem like home. The drawing-room was cozy and inviting. I felt stimulated to mental effort. Letitia had forgotten her ailments, and was lively and amusing.
"I must try and learn Aunt Julia's system," she said, "so that I can at any rate, supervise, though, Archie, I'm quite sure that frauds like Anna Carter, or Potzenheimer, or Birdie Miriam would never brook supervision."
"There you're right," remarked Aunt Julia, entering suddenly. "These women know little and what they know, they know wrong. Get a clean slate to work upon, secure a girl whom you can teach, and—well, your chances will be better."
We fell back upon the sublime, the luminous art of newspaper advertisement. Alluring pictures of natty maids in jaunty caps and perfectly fitting dresses, as an answer to the question, "Do you need help?" emerged from our subliminal consciousness, capped by the legend, "If so, advertise in ——" So we advertised in ——. Each newspaper seemed to vie with the other in exquisite promises to be-cook our kitchen. There appeared to be no possible, probable shadow of doubt about the proceeding. It was so easy that the inelegant simile of "rolling off a log" impressed us as being absolutely justifiable. I flatter myself that the advertisements I composed were delightful—gems of succinct thought, though Letitia seemed dubious.
"I think you ought to offer some inducement," she said, "in order that our advertisement should stand out from the rest—something to indicate that we really are desperate. I suppose—please don't smile, Archie—that it wouldn't do to hint that we give handsome Christmas presents."
"What an immoral suggestion, Letitia!" I exclaimed testily. "It is putting a premium on cupidity and incompetence. I am surprised at you. Moreover, it is so horribly suggestive of the idea of beating a hasty retreat after the receipt of those presents."
"Don't be so snappy, Archie," retorted Letitia peevishly. "I am merely trying to throw light upon the situation. We ought to do something. What do you say to mentioning matinée tickets once a week?"
"Or souvenirs if she runs for a hundred nights," I suggested gloomily.
"Of course," said Letitia resignedly, "if you ridicule everything I say, there is no use my making further remarks. Put in the advertisement as you like—'Cook wanted.' How original! Eighteen hundred people want cooks, and eighteen hundred people won't get them. I merely meant to emphasize our own special need. Do you think"—suddenly—"that if we made it worth while at the newspaper offices, they would print our advertisement in red ink—right in the center of all the others—or—or in gold?"
"No, my girl," I replied shortly, pretending to look very sapient, as though I were marvelously familiar with the inner workings of newspaper offices.Then, conciliatingly, "Your idea is good, Letitia, but impracticable. We must take our chance with the vulgar herd."
"At any rate," she cried despairingly, "you can surely say that this is a lovely, refined home, with scarcely anything for a cook to do, and—and—paint it up, Archie; paint it up. Moreover, we want a clean slate, as Aunt Julia suggested—something inexperienced for me to teach."
To my credit, be it said, I did not smile. The effort to resist was intense, almost painful, but I succeeded in maintaining an owl-like expression, and Letitia's quick glance at me—a glance that seemed to suggest that she expected and dreaded a smile—was wasted.
We advertised in five papers, and the sense of elation that came with the deposit of each advertisement was most refreshing. It looked as though failure were impossible. Letitia calculated that seven million people in New York would know of our need, and when I told her that there were not seven million people in the greater city, she airily decided that some of them therefore would know it twice—a piece of logic that needed no squelching. That evening, that cookless evening of waiting, after a restaurant dinnerthat had been particularly indigestible and saddening, we discussed in low voice the possibilities of the morrow.
Five advertisements! Letitia wondered what the neighborhood would think of the crowd of aspiring, eager cooks that must assuredly besiege our door. She even suggested that I notify the nearest police station, and ask for a special squad of police to keep order. Her enthusiasm was contagious. I pictured the battling mob outside—long lines of throbbing, expectant women clamoring for an interview. The moral effect of advertising is quite irresistible. It is not to be gainsaid. Whatever the mere practical results may be, there is no doubt in the world but that advertisement, psychologically, is worth its price. The notion that from all the readers of five important newspapers, entering into all the nooks and crannies of metropolitan life, a huge and varied collection of cooks would fail to materialize was ridiculous. It was not to be entertained for a moment. Letitia even mentioned the possibilities of the poor women waiting outside all night on camp stools; in fact, taking a look into the electric-lighted street, at about eleven o'clock, she announced positively that she saw two women already standing outside the door.
"If I were quite sure that they were applicants," said Letitia, "I'd ask them up at once, and listen to them. Perhaps we ought to send out a little soup or hot coffee."
I remembered my experience in the elevated train. It recurred to my mind so vividly that I uttered a "Pshaw!" rather brusquely, and then meekly told Letitia that she was probably mistaken.
"You see," remarked Letitia thoughtfully, "five advertisements in one day, are rather unusual. There are bound to be results. Think of the colossal population of Greater New York! In fact, Archie, I really feel a bit afraid. We have perhaps reared a Frankenstein. I am not at all sure that I can cope with an immense crowd."
My rest that night was fitful. I had nightmare of a most distressing nature, which I will refrain from describing for the reason that daymare seems more popular, as a rule, with readers. Letitia rose at seven o'clock just as I had fallen into refreshing slumber, and went, in her nightgown, into the drawing-room to note the line of cooks from the window. I was unable to sleep again, and lay there awaiting her return, anxious and uncomfortable.
She came back, looking like Lady Macbeth, andexclaimed in a voice of dire amazement: "Not a soul, Archie! Positively, there's not a human creature in the street. What can it mean?"
"It's early," I suggested feebly.
"Oh, nonsense!" cried Letitia. "Out of four million people, there must be a very large percentage that doesn't regard seven o'clock as so frightfully early. Perhaps the police, seeing a mob, ordered it to disperse and reassemble later. At any rate, we had better get ready. How annoying! I forgot all about breakfast, and we can not leave the house. I must prepare some coffee, and with the crackers that Aunt Julia bought, we must make shift."
After this meal, that was strangely lacking in solidity and in various other qualities—Letitia's coffee tasting like slate-pencils, only not quite so nice—we stationed ourselves at the window. We saw cable-cars, horse-cars, wagons, cabs, perambulators. We noted tradesmen, and tradeswomen, schoolgirls and schoolboys, business-men and business-women. There was plenty to look at, but there was no cook. Letitia grew restive; I became nervous. Every feminine creature that approached seemed to be a cook—until she went past. We looked at each petticoated passer-by, with the avid expectation of hearing her ring our door-bell and ask to be taken in.
"There's one!" cried Letitia excitedly. "I bet you anything that she's going to ring. How shabby her skirt is, poor thing. And just look at her hat! She is reading the numbers on the doors. Yes, she's stopping here. She—she—"
Went by.
"This time," I exclaimed, "I'll wager anything that—look, Letitia!—the girl opposite is going to apply. She has a newspaper in her hand and she keeps reading it. I'm not often mistaken, Letitia. When I do venture a prophecy, it is generally correct. Ah, I told you so. She is looking up at us. She has crossed the street. She has examined the house. She—she—"
Went next door.
Mariana, in her moated grange, may have had an unpleasant time of it, as she "glanced athwart the glooming flats." (I should have indignantly called them "blooming" flats, but unfortunately I'm not Tennyson.) Then, in Mariana's case, "old faces glimmer'd thro' the doors," which must have made things cheerful for her. With us, neither old faces nor young ones "glimmer'd" through anything whatsoever. Gladly would we have hailed them, for, in good sooth, we were "aweary, weary." We "drew the casement curtain by"—Letitia begged me to be careful,as it had just been done up—and stood there, stolidly, silently. There were no moldering wainscots, or flitting bats, or rusted nails, or oxen's low. In spite of which I am perfectly convinced that Mariana was less miserable than we were, as at eleven o'clock, the awful certainty was borne in upon us that "she cometh not."
"Perhaps," said Letitia dejectedly, "we are the victims of conspiracy. Anna Carter, and Mrs. Potzenheimer, and Birdie Miriam McCaffrey may have banded themselves together to—to ruin us."
"Letitia!"
"There is some reason for all this, Archie. It is to be accounted for in some way. It is absolutely impossible that five important advertisements in five important newspapers should have produced no fruit whatsoever. I shall write to each paper and say, 'After advertising in your valuable columns, I have come to the conclusion that you are no good.'"
"Why antagonize the newspapers?"
"I must have the satisfaction of recording our experience," she replied, her face flushed, her eyes bright. "I shall do it, Archie. I intend—"
At that moment there was a ring at the front door-bell. Letitia, wrought-up, nervously clutched my arm. For a moment a sort of paralysis seized me. Then, alertly as a young calf, I bounded toward thedoor, hope aroused, and expectation keen. It was rather dark in the outside hall and I could not quite perceive the nature of our visitor. But I soon gladly realized that it was something feminine, and as I held the door open, a thin, small, soiled wisp of a woman glided in, and smiled at me.
"Talar ni svensk?" she asked, but I had no idea what she meant. She may have been impertinent, or even rude, or perhaps improper, but she looked as though she might be a domestic, and I led her gently, reverently, to Letitia in the drawing-room. I smiled back at her, in a wild endeavor to be sympathetic. I would have anointed her, or bathed her feet, or plied her with figs and dates, or have done anything that any nationality craves as a welcome. As the front door closed, I heaved a sigh of relief. Here was probably the quintessence of five advertisements. Out of the mountain crept a mouse, and quite a little mouse, too!
"Talar ni svensk?" proved to be nothing more outrageous than "Do you speak Swedish?" My astute little wife discovered this intuitively. I left them together, my mental excuse being that women understand each other and that a man is unnecessary, under the circumstances. I had some misgivings on the subject of Letitia andsvensk, but the universal languageof femininity is not without its uses. I devoutly hoped that Letitia would be able to come to terms, as the mere idea of a cook who couldn't excoriate us in English was, at that moment, delightful. At the end of a quarter of an hour I strolled back to the drawing-room. Letitia was smiling and the handmaiden sat grim and uninspired.
"I've engaged her, Archie," said Letitia. "She knows nothing, as she has told me, in the few words of English that she has picked up, but—you remember what Aunt Julia said about a clean slate."
I gazed at the maiden, and reflected that while the term "slate" might be perfectly correct, the adjective seemed a bit over-enthusiastic. She was decidedly soiled, this quintessence of a quintette of advertisements. I said nothing, anxious not to dampen Letitia's very evident elation.
"She has no references," continued my wife, "as she has never been out before. She is just a simple little Stockholm girl. I like her face immensely, Archie—immensely. She is willing to begin at once, which shows that she is eager, and consequently likely to suit us. Wait for me, Archie, while I take her to the kitchen.Kom, Gerda."
Exactly why Letitia couldn't say "Come, Gerda," seemed strange. She probably thought thatKommust be Swedish, and that it sounded well. She certainly inventedKomon the spur of the Scandinavian moment, and I learned afterward that it was correct. My inspired Letitia! Still, in spite of all, my opinion is that "Come, Gerda," would have done just as well.
"Isn't it delightful?" cried Letitia, when she joined me later. "I am really enthusiastic at the idea of a Swedish girl. I adore Scandinavia, Archie. It always makes me think of Ibsen. Perhaps Gerda Lyberg—that's her name—will be as interesting as Hedda Gabler, and Mrs. Alving, and Nora, and all those lovely complex Ibsen creatures."