Brecky stamped up the wooden steps and across the veranda, opened the
front door with his latchkey, and entered the house. It was colder in
there than it was outside. The place wasn’t designed for winter
occupation, and there was no means for heating it. Moreover, its
construction was flimsy, and a wind like that now blowing found its way
in without trouble, and went moaning through the hall, rattling the
doors and windows.
He passed through the dining room. It was entirely dark, but there was
no fear of running into anything, for all the tables were drawn back
against the walls and the chairs piled on them. He pushed open the
swinging doors into the pantry, and another door, and was suddenly in a
different world, warm, light, filled with delightful savors.
“Ah!” he said, with a sigh.
He slipped off his overcoat, cap, and rubbers, and went over to the
stove, holding out his numb hands to its welcome heat. Then he turned
and kissed his wife, absent-mindedly, almost without looking at her, in
spite of the fact that she was well worth looking at.
“Did Mullins come about those sash cords?” he asked.
“No--no one came. I haven’t seen a soul all day,” she answered; but he
missed the significance of her tone.
She hurried back and forth with steaming dishes, and at last informed
him, rather curtly, that his dinner was ready. He sat down at once and
ate with good appetite, but in silence and abstraction, because he had
to think about those sash cords. At last he finished and leaned back in
his chair, ready for the amenities of life.
“Well, Kathleen!” he said. “You’re one fine little wife!”
He was innocently oblivious of his wife’s state of mind. It hadn’t
occurred to him that she kept on existing and thinking when he wasn’t
there. His remark was a match to dry straw.
“A fine little _cook_, I guess you mean!” she said with sudden asperity.
“That’s your idea of a wife!”
He laughed.
“Well!” he said. “They kind of go together, don’t they?”
“Looks like it,” she said; “only some cooks get paid.”
It was his habit to ignore remarks like that. Women, he considered, were
often fanciful and “touchy.” It was better to leave them alone at such
times. He lighted a big cigar, deliberately took his mind off his wife
and all domestic concerns, and began to meditate on his business.
But the perverse creature continued to exist and to speak.
“I didn’t start out in life to be a cook,” she said, in an ominously
calm and reasonable tone. “I’m glad enough to do it for your sake,
Johnny; but I’d like you to remember that I’m not used to this kind of
life.”
“Yes, yes!” he said soothingly, and continued to smoke and stare at the
fire.
“You never even look at me!” she cried suddenly.
“Yes, but I do!” he protested. “Sure I do!”
He looked at her then, with a smile, and saw that she was crying.
“For the Lord’s sake, what’s the matter?” he asked, with despairing good
nature. “I’ll look at you for an hour, if you like; only don’t cry,
that’s a good girl!”
She put her handkerchief to her eyes, and went on crying. He swore under
his breath, and, getting up, went around the table and put his arm about
her.
“Come now!” he said. “You’re as pretty as a picture, and you know I love
you.”
“Yes!” she said. “You want to make it up quickly and forget all about
me!”
He couldn’t help laughing at the woman’s cleverness.
“Well!” he said. “If I do think such a lot about this business, who’s it
for? Don’t be silly! It’s all for you.”
“It isn’t! It’s because you like it. You’d go on with it just the same
if I was dead!”
He was a little in doubt what to do. Should he ignore her, and let her
get over her inopportune temper alone? Or should he wheedle her?
He was really annoyed. He thought it all rather touching and feminine.
They were all like that--wanted a man to spend his time making love and
playing the fool; and yet, if he didn’t provide all they wanted, or
thought they wanted, they’d nag him to death. He kissed her again.
“We’ll go in to the city some day next week,” he said. “We’ll take in a
show, and all that. That’s what you need.”
“It isn’t! What I need is some one to talk to. You never want to listen
to me. You never ask me what I’ve been doing.”
“But there’s nothing you could do,” he answered innocently, “except
cooking and sewing and--”
He was really surprised at her outbreak, she was usually so cheerful and
equable. He looked at her flushed and furious face, the tears still in
her eyes, and an unpleasant conviction came to him that this was going
to be serious--and lasting.
“You come in,” she went on, “and you sit down and eat your dinner, and
the only thing you can find to say to me is to call me a _cook_!”
“I said you were a fine little cook,” he began ingratiatingly. “Nothing
wrong in that, is there? Why, I’m proud of you, Kathleen! Only this
afternoon I was telling Sawyer how you could cook.”
“Well, you’d just better find something else to praise me for!” she
cried. “I’m something more than a cook, and the sooner you learn it the
better!”
He was astounded and somewhat shocked at her violence--dismayed, too. He
had an uneasy feeling that he couldn’t handle this situation adequately.
So, according to his habit, he decided to go away, believing, as many
other people believe, that if he weren’t in the situation, there would
be no situation. But his cool deliberations were upset. Moreover, his
cigar was out, and he didn’t like relighted cigars.
He got the books in which he was trying to work out a new idea of hotel
bookkeeping, but he couldn’t do a thing. He couldn’t put out of his mind
the image of that girl, that provoking and beloved girl, with her angry,
rosy little face and her eyes full of tears.
“Women!” he thought savagely.
No denying, though, that she was a wonderful wife and companion. She had
never complained before, she had never failed him. Out of the corner of
his eye, he saw her get up and begin carrying the dishes over to the
sink. He thought he would help her, and then he thought he wouldn’t. It
would be weakness.
Still, it would do no harm to conciliate her. Perhaps, if he did, his
working mood would return. He watched her for a few minutes longer,
bending over the dish pan. Then he got up, went over to her, and,
putting an arm about her, drew her close against him.
Then a devil entered into him.
“Why, you silly kid!” he said, kissing her. “You’re the best little
cook!”
She turned and gave him a smart box on the ear.
He was so astounded that he couldn’t speak. He stared at her flushed and
furious face, his own perfectly blank. Then, very slowly, the color
began to rise in his lean cheeks.
He was a man slow to anger, a man of self-control and _sang froid_; but
when his temper was aroused, it was a bad one. His wife was secretly
horrified at what she had done. She hadn’t meant to do it. She knew he
was only trying to be funny. She was ashamed and alarmed.
“What made you do that?” he asked slowly.
“Because I’m sick and tired of being called a cook, that’s why!” she
answered valiantly.
“Well, you’d better apologize!” he said.
“Well, I won’t!” she answered promptly. “I’m glad I did it. I’m just
sick and tired of--of all this--shut up here alone all day long!”
“All right!” said Brecky. “_All_ right!”
She looked at him steadily for a moment. Then she began, very
deliberately, to dry her hands. He turned away and walked back to his
books, but she saw that his hands were clenched, and she knew that he
was filled with fury. She was elated, and she was sorry.
He began figuring, but he grasped his pencil so fiercely that it broke,
and he had to get up and look for another.
He saw Kathleen standing before the little mirror she had hung up on the
wall, dressed in her fur coat and engaged in pinning on her hat.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Putting on my hat,” she answered calmly.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
“I’m not going to tell you.”
He smiled.
“Well, good-by!” he said.
Taking the key out of the lock, he went out of the kitchen, slamming and
locking the door behind him.
“She can stay in there and think it over!” he said to himself.