Galloway accepted Norman's terms. He would probably have accepted terms
far less easy. But Norman as yet knew with the thoroughness which must
precede intelligent plan and action only the legal side of financial
operations; he had been as indifferent to the commercial side as a pilot
to the value of the cargo in the ship he engages to steer clear of
shoals and rocks. So with the prudence of the sagacious man's audacities
he contented himself with a share of this first venture that would
simply make a comfortable foundation for the fortune he purposed to
build. As the venture could not fail outright, even should Galloway die,
he rented a largish place at Hempstead, with the privilege of purchase,
and installed his wife and himself with a dozen servants and a
housekeeper.
"This housekeeper, this Mrs. Lowell," said he to Dorothy, "is a good
enough person as housekeepers go. But you will have to look sharply
after her."
Dorothy seemed to fade and shrink within herself, which was her way of
confessing lack of courage and fitness to face a situation: "I don't
know anything about those things," she confessed.
"I understand perfectly," said he. "But you learned something at the
place in Jersey City--quite enough for the start. Really, all you need
to know just now is whether the place is clean or not, and whether the
food comes on the table in proper condition. The rest you'll pick up
gradually."
"I hope so," said she, looking doubtful and helpless; these new
magnitudes were appalling, especially now that she was beginning to get
a point of view upon life.
"At any rate, don't bother me for these few next months," said he. "I'm
going to be very busy--shall leave early in the morning and not be back
until near dinner time--if I come at all. No, you'll not be annoyed by
me. You'll be absolute mistress of your time."
She tried to look as if this contented her. But he could not have failed
to see how dissatisfied and disquieted she really was. He had the best
of reasons for thinking that she was living under the same roof with him
only because she preferred the roof he could provide to such a one as
she could provide for herself whether by her own earnings or by marrying
a man more to her liking personally. Yet here she was, piqued and
depressed because of his indifference--because he was not thrusting upon
her gallantries she would tolerate only through prudence!
"You will be lonely at times, I'm afraid," said he. "But I can't provide
friends or even acquaintances for you for several months--until my
affairs are in better order and my sister and her husband come back from
Europe."
"Oh, I shan't be lonely," cried she. "I've never cared for people."
"You've your books, and your music--and riding--and shopping trips to
town--and the house and grounds to look after."
"Yes--and my dreams," said she hopefully, her eyes suggesting the dusky
star depths.
"Oh--the dreams. You'll have little time for them," said he drily. "And
little inclination, I imagine, as you wake up to the sense of how much
there is to be learned. Dreaming is the pastime of people who haven't
the intelligence or the energy to accomplish anything. If you wish to
please me--and you do--don't you?"
"Yes," she murmured. She forced her rebellious lips to the laconic
assent. She drooped the lids over her rebellious eyes, lest he should
detect her wounded feelings and her resentment.
"I assumed so," said he, with a secret smile. "Well, if you wish to
please me, you'll give your time to practical things--things that'll
make you more interesting and make us both more comfortable. It was all
very well to dream, while you had little to do and small opportunity.
But now--Try to cut it out."
It is painful to an American girl of any class to find that she has to
earn her position as wife. The current theory, a tradition from an early
and woman-revering day, is that the girl has done her share and more
when she has consented to the suit of the ardent male and has intrusted
her priceless charms to his exclusive keeping. According to that same
theory, it is the husband who must earn his position--must continue to
earn it. He is a humble creature, honored by the presence of a wonderful
being, a cross between a queen and a goddess. He cannot do enough to
show his gratitude. Perhaps--but only perhaps--had Norman married
Josephine Burroughs, he might have assented, after a fashion, to this
idea of the relations of the man and the woman. No doubt, had he
remained under the spell of Dorothy's mystery and beauty, he would have
felt and acted the slave he had made of himself at the outset. But in
the circumstances he was looking at their prospective life together with
sane eyes. And so she had, in addition to all her other reasons for
heartache, a sense that she, the goddess-queen, the American woman, with
the birthright of dominion over the male, was being cheated, humbled,
degraded.
At first he saw that this sense of being wronged made it impossible for
her to do anything at all toward educating herself for her position. But
time brought about the change he had hoped for. A few weeks, and she
began to cheer up, almost in spite of herself. What was the use in
sulking or sighing or in self-pitying, when it brought only unhappiness
to oneself? The coarse and brutal male in the case was either unaware or
indifferent. There was no one and no place to fly to--unless she wished
to be much worse off than her darkest mood of self-pity represented her
to her sorrowing self. The housekeeper, Mrs. Lowell, was a "broken down
gentlewoman" who had been chastened by misfortune into a wholesome state
of practical good sense about the relative values of the real and the
romantic. Mrs. Lowell diagnosed the case of the young wife--as Norman
had shrewdly guessed she would--and was soon adroitly showing her the
many advantages of her lot. Before they had been three months at
Hempstead, Dorothy had discovered that she, in fact, was without a
single ground for serious complaint. She had a husband who was generous
about money, and left her as absolutely alone as if he were mere
occasional visitor at the house. She had her living--and such a
living!--she had plenty of interesting occupation--she had not a single
sordid care--and perfect health.
The dreams, too--It was curious about those dreams. She would now have
found it an intolerable bore to sit with hands idle in her lap and eyes
upon vacancy, watching the dim, luminous shadows flit aimlessly by. Yet
that was the way she used to pass hours--entire days. She used to fight
off sleep at night the longer to enjoy her one source of pure happiness.
There was no doubt about it, the fire of romance was burning low, and
she was becoming commonplace, practical, resigned. Well, why not? Was
not life over for her?--that is, the life a girl's fancy longs for. In
place of hope of romance, there was an uneasy feeling of a necessity of
pleasing this husband of hers--of making him comfortable. What would
befall her if she neglected trying to please him or if she, for all her
trying, failed? She did not look far in that direction. Her uneasiness
remained indefinite--yet definite enough to keep her working from waking
until bedtime. And she dropped into the habit of watching his face with
the same anxiety with which a farmer watches the weather. When he
happened one day to make a careless, absent-minded remark in disapproval
of something in the domestic arrangements, she was thrown into such a
nervous flutter that he observed it.
"What is it?" he asked.
"Nothing--nothing," replied she in the hurried tone of one who is trying
hastily to cover his thoughts.
He reflected, understood, burst into a fit of hearty laughter. "So, you
are trying to make a bogey of me?"
She colored, protested faintly.
"Don't you know I'm about the least tyrannical, least exacting person in
the world?"
"You've been very patient with me," said she.
"Now--now," cried he in a tone of raillery, "you might as well drop
that. Don't you know there's no reason for being afraid of me?"
"Yes, I _know_ it," replied she. "But I _feel_ afraid, just the same. I
can't help it."
It was impossible for him to appreciate the effect of his personality
upon others--how, without his trying or even wishing, it made them dread
a purely imaginary displeasure and its absurdly imaginary consequences.
But this confession of hers was not the first time he had heard of the
effect of potential and latent danger he had upon those associated with
him. And, as it was most useful, he was not sorry that he had it. He
made no further attempt to convince her that he was harmless. He knew
that he was harmless where she was concerned. Was it not just as well
that she should not know it, when vaguely dreading him was producing
excellent results? As with a Christian the fear of the Lord was the
beginning of wisdom, so with a wife the fear of her husband was the
beginning of wisdom. In striving to please him, to fit herself for the
position of wife, she was using up the time she would otherwise have
spent in making herself miserable with self-pity--that supreme curse of
the idle both male and female, that most prolific of the breeders of
unhappy wives. Yes, wives were unhappy not because their husbands
neglected them, for busy people have no time to note whether they are
neglected or not, but because they gave their own worthless, negligent,
incapable selves too much attention.
One evening, she, wearing the look of the timid but resolute intruder,
came into his room while he was dressing for dinner and hung about with
an air no man of his experience could fail to understand.
"Something wrong about the house?" said he finally. "Need more money?"
"No--nothing," she replied, with a slight flush. He saw that she was
mustering all her courage for some grand effort. He waited, only mildly
curious, as his mind was busy with some new business he and Tetlow had
undertaken. Presently she stood squarely before him, her hands behind
her back and her face upturned. "Won't you kiss me?" she said.
"Sure!" said he. And he kissed her on the cheek and resumed operations
with his military brushes.
"I didn't mean that--that kind of a kiss," said she dejectedly.
He paused with a quick characteristic turn of the head, looked keenly at
her, resumed his brushing. A quizzical smile played over his face. "Oh,
I see," said he. "You've been thinking about duty. And you've decided to
do yours. . . . Eh?"
"I think--It seems to me--I don't think--" she stammered, then said
desperately, "I've not been acting right by you. I want to--to do
better."
"That's good," said he briskly, with a nod of approval--and never a
glance in her direction. "You think you'll let me have a kiss now and
then--eh? All right, my dear."
"Oh, you _won't_ understand me!" she cried, ready to weep with vexation.
"You mean I won't misunderstand you," replied he amiably, as he set
about fixing his tie. "You've been mulling things over in your mind.
You've decided I'm secretly pining for you. You've resolved to be good
and kind and dutiful--generous--to feed old dog Tray a few crumbs now
and then. . . . That's nice and sweet of you--" He paused until the
crisis in tying was passed--"very nice and sweet of you--but--There's
nothing in it. All I ask of you for myself is to see that I'm
comfortable--that Mrs. Lowell and the servants treat me right. If I
don't like anything, I'll speak out--never fear."
"But--Fred--I want to be your wife--I really do," she pleaded.
He turned on her, and his eyes seemed to pierce into the chamber of her
thoughts. "Drop it, my dear," he said quietly. "Neither of us is in love
with the other. So there's not the slightest reason for pretending. If I
ever want to be free of you, I'll tell you so. If you ever want to get
rid of me, all you have to do is to ask--and it'll be arranged.
Meanwhile, let's enjoy ourselves."
His good humor, obviously unfeigned, would have completely discouraged a
more experienced woman, though as vain as Dorothy and with as much
ground as he had given her for self-confidence where he was concerned.
But Dorothy was depressed rather than profoundly discouraged. A few
moments and she found courage to plead: "But you used to care for me.
Don't I attract you any more?"
"You say that quite pathetically," said he, in good-humored amusement.
"I'm willing to do anything within reason for your happiness. But
really--just to please your vanity I can't make myself over again into
the fool I used to be about you. You'd hate it yourself. Why, then, this
pathetic air?"
"I feel so useless--and as if I were shirking," she persisted. "And if
you did care for me, it wouldn't offend me now as it used to. I've grown
much wiser--more sensible. I understand things--and I look at them
differently. And--I always did _like_ you."
"Even when you despised me?" mocked he. It irritated him a little
vividly to recall what a consummate fool he had made of himself for her,
even though he had every reason to be content with the event of his
folly.
"A girl always thinks she despises a man when she can do as she pleases
with him," replied she. "As Mr. Tetlow said, I was a fool."
"_I_ was the fool," said he. "Where did that man of mine lay the
handkerchief?"
"I, too," cried she, eagerly. "You were foolish to bother about a little
silly like me. But, oh, what a _fool_ I was not to realize----"
"You're not trying to tell me you're in love with me?" said he sharply.
"Oh, no--no, indeed," she protested in haste, alarmed by his
overwhelming manner. "I'm not trying to deceive you in any way."
"Never do," said he. "It's the one thing I can't stand."
"But I thought--it seemed to me--" she persisted, "that perhaps if we
tried to--to care for each other, we'd maybe get to--to caring--more or
less. Don't you think so?"
"Perhaps," was his careless reply. He added, "But I, for one, am well
content with things as they are. I confess I don't look back with any
satisfaction on those months when I was making an ass of myself about
you. I was ruining my career. Now I'm happy, and everything is going
fine in my business. No experiments, if you please." He shook his head,
looking at her with smiling raillery. "It might turn out that I'd care
for you in the same crazy way again, and that you didn't like it. Again
you might get excited about me and I'd remain calm about you. That would
give me a handsome revenge, but I'm not looking for revenge."
He finished his toilet, she standing quiet and thoughtful in an attitude
of unconscious grace.
"No, my dear," resumed he, as he prepared to descend for dinner, "let's
have a peaceful, cheerful married life, with no crazy excitements.
Let's hang on to what we've got, and take no unnecessary risks." He
patted her on the shoulder. "Isn't that sensible?"
She looked at him with serious, appealing eyes. "You are _sure_ you aren't
unhappy?"
It was amusing to him--though he concealed it--to see how tenaciously
her feminine egotism held to the idea that she was the important person.
And, when women of experience thus deluded themselves, it was not at all
strange that this girl should be unable to grasp the essential truth as
to the relations of men and women--that, while a woman who makes her sex
her profession must give to a man, to some man, a dominant place in her
life, a man need give a woman--at least, any one woman--little or no
place. But he would not wantonly wound her harmless vanity. "Don't worry
about me, please," said he in the kindest, friendliest way. "I am
telling you the truth."
And they descended to the dining room. Usually he was preoccupied and
she did most of the talking--not a difficult matter for her, as she was
one of those who by nature have much to say, who talk on and on, giving
lively, pleasant recitals of commonplace daily happenings. That evening
it was her turn to be abstracted, or, at least, silent. He talked
volubly, torrentially, like a man of teeming mind in the highest
spirits. And he was in high spirits. The Galloway enterprise had
developed into a huge success; also, it did not lessen his sense of the
pleasantness of life to have learned that his wife was feeling about as
well disposed toward him as he cared to have her feel, had come round to
that state of mind which he, as a practical man, wise in the art of
life, regarded as ideal for a wife.
A successful man, with a quiet and comfortable home, well enough looked
after by an agreeable wife, exceeding good to look at and interested
only in her home and her husband--what more could a man ask?
* * * * *
What more could a man ask? Only one thing more--a baby. The months soon
passed and that rounding out of the home side of his life was
consummated with no mishap. The baby was a girl, which contented him and
delighted Dorothy. He wished it to be named after her, she preferred his
sister's name--Ursula. It was Ursula who decided the question. "She
looks like you, Fred," she declared, after an earnest scanning of the
weird little face. "Why not call her Frederica?"
Norman thought this clumsy, but Dorothy instantly assented--and the baby
was duly christened Frederica.
Perhaps it was because he was having less pressing business in town, but
whatever the reason, he began to stay at home more--surprisingly more.
And, being at home, he naturally fell into the habit of fussing with the
baby, he having the temperament that compels a man to be always at
something, and the baby being convenient and in the nature of a
curiosity. Ursula, who was stopping in the house, did not try to conceal
her amazement at this extraordinary development of her brother's
character.
Said she: "I never before knew you to take the slightest interest in a
child."
Said he: "I never before saw a child worth taking the slightest interest
in."
"Oh, well," said Ursula, "it won't last. You'll soon grow tired of your
plaything."
"Perhaps you're right," said Norman. "I hope you're wrong." He
reflected, added: "In fact, I'm almost certain you're wrong. I'm too
selfish to let myself lose such a pleasure. If you had observed my life
closely, you'd have discovered that I have never given up a single thing
I found a source of pleasure. That is good sense. That is why the
superior sort of men and women retain something of the boy and the girl
all their lives. I still like a lot of the games I played as a boy. For
some years I've had no chance to indulge in them. I'll be glad when Rica
is old enough to give me the chance again."