THE GENERAL MANAGER
"MOTHER, don't you think that you are being rather hard on Irene to
undertake to hold her to restrictions to which she has never been
accustomed, and which to her seem narrow and unreasonable?"
Erskine Burnham had followed his mother to her room evidently with a
view to speaking to her alone, his wife having gone on into her own room
and closed the door. Even though she had not felt it in the tone of his
voice, Mrs. Burnham would have known by her son's opening word that he
was annoyed.
He rarely used the word "mother" when addressing her directly. As a rule
the habits of his childhood prevailed, and "mamma" was the name in
frequent use; or, oftener still perhaps, when they were quite alone, his
special pet name for her, "mommie," came naturally to his lips. But of
late she had heard, oftener than ever before, what was to him a colder
term "Mother," and had learned to know what it meant.
She hesitated a moment before replying, and her hesitation seemed to
irritate her son. He spoke quickly, with a note in his voice which she
had never found in it before.
"I must confess, mother, that I am surprised and not a little
disappointed at the course you are taking. When I brought Irene here, it
was not only in the hope but the assured belief that I was bringing her
to what she had never really had before--a mother,--and that you would
become to her in time, what you have always been to me. I never for a
moment dreamed of your standing coldly at one side, not only indifferent
to her innocent devices for pleasure, but actually blocking her way! If
I could have imagined such a condition of things, I would have better
understood her feeling from the very first that we ought to go into a
house of our own, where she would not feel herself an interloper."
Mrs. Burnham was ready then with her reply.
"Erskine, I do not think Irene could have understood me. I made no
attempt to hold her to any restrictions. She asked a direct question
about my own views, which, of course, I answered. But I ought not to
have to explain to my son that I do not try to force my opinions upon
any one."
He made a movement of impatience.
"That kind of thing is not necessary, mother, between us; but you know
very well that there are ways of expressing one's opinions that
effectually trammel others of the same household.
"The simple truth is that Irene has played cards, for amusement, in her
own and her friends' parlors, ever since she was old enough to play
games of any kind; and to her, our ideas concerning cards seem as absurd
as though applied to tennis or golf. Personally, I see no reason why she
should not continue to amuse herself in her own way. It is true I do not
play cards; but she knows, what both you and I understand perfectly,
that this is a concession on my part to the extreme views of my mother,
who could hardly expect my wife to have exactly the same spirit. I have
told Irene that out of deference to your feelings, I do not want her to
entertain her friends with cards, in the parlors, but she certainly
ought to be left free to do in her own rooms what she pleases."
At almost any other period in Mrs. Burnham's life, a formal and
elaborate expression of her son's views upon any subject, given in a
haughty and almost dictatorial tone, such as he was using, would have
filled his mother with astonishment and pain. She was almost curiously
interested in herself on discovering that she had passed that stage, and
was occupying her mind for the moment with quite a different matter.
Why had Irene chosen just this line of attack? What did she hope to
accomplish by such a singularly distorted representation of their talk
together? It must have been sadly distorted to have moved Erskine to an
exhibition of annoyance such as he had never before shown to her. Yet
had he been present at the interview, his mother felt confident that it
would not have disturbed him.
She went swiftly over the talk, in memory, while Erskine waited, and
fingered the books and magazines on her table with the air of a nervous
man who wanted to appear at ease. It had been a brief conversation, not
significant at least to an observer, in any way. Irene had been looking
over the mail, and had exclaimed at an invitation.
"The Wheelers are giving another card party; what indefatigable
entertainers they are! it isn't a month since their last one. This time
it is a very select few, in Mrs. Harry Wheeler's rooms. That is what
Erskine and I must do, since you won't allow cards in the parlors. Have
you really such queer notions, mother, as Erskine pretends?"
Mrs. Burnham remembered just how carefully she had watched her words, in
reply.
"I don't play cards, Irene, if that is what you mean."
"Oh, I mean a great deal more than that. Erskine says you won't allow
such wicked things in your part of the house. Is that so?"
"We have never had them in the house since Judge Burnham changed his
views with regard to them."
"Oh, did he change? how curious, for a lawyer, too! I don't believe
Erskine will get notional as he grows older. He isn't one of that kind."
Whereupon the older woman had turned resolutely away, resolved to speak
no more words on the subject unless they were spoken in Erskine's
presence. It was this conversation, reported, that had brought her son
to her in his new and lofty mood of guardian of his wife's liberties!
Just as he tossed down the magazine with which he had been playing, with
the air of one who meant to wait no longer, his mother spoke with gentle
dignity.
"Erskine, of course your rooms are your own, to do with as you will. I
made no restrictions and hinted at none. On my desk under the
paper-weight is the quotation you wished looked up, and also the
statistics about which you asked." Then she turned and passed out, to
the hall.
All this was on a midsummer morning nearly three months removed from
that moonlighted evening on which this mother had renewed her solemn
pledge to be to her son and her son's wife all that they would let her
be. In the face of steady resistance she had been fairly true to the
pledge. It had now become quite plain to her that it was not chance, nor
mere heedlessness, that was working against her, but that Mrs. Erskine
Burnham meant to resist her, meant to look upon her as a force in her
way, to be got rid of if possible; if not by persuading her son to leave
her, then, perhaps by making her so uncomfortable that she would leave
him. The plan was not succeeding. Ruth Erskine Burnham had lived through
too many trying experiences before this time to be easily routed. She
was in the home to which her husband had brought her as a bride, and she
meant that nothing but a stern sense of duty should ever separate her
from it.
Yet Mrs. Erskine Burnham, if she had but known it, had accomplished
much. The mother no longer turned with a sickening pain from the thought
of Erskine having other home than hers. There were times when she could
almost have joined his wife in pleading for that "cunning little
cottage." There were days wherein she told herself breathlessly and very
secretly, that for Erskine to come home to her for a single half-hour,
_alone_, would compensate for days of absence.
But if she had changed her point of view, so had Irene. His wife talked
to him no more of a home by themselves. She was growing fond of the
many-roomed, rambling old house whose utter abandonment to luxurious
comfort was the talk and the pride of the neighborhood; and was the
result of years of careful study on the part of a cultured woman
accustomed to luxuries.
The new Mrs. Burnham developed an interest in the carefully-trained
servants who had been a part of the establishment for so many years that
they said "our" and "ours" in speaking of its belongings. She came to
realize, at least in a measure, that servants like these were hard to
secure, and harder to keep. She began also to like the comfort of
proprietorship, without the accompanying sense of responsibility. The
machinery of this house could move on steadily without break or jar, and
without an hour of care or thought bestowed by her; yet her slightest
order was obeyed promptly and skilfully.
Her orders were growing more and more frequent, and it was becoming
increasingly apparent to those who had eyes to see that "young Mrs.
Burnham," as some of them called her, was assuming the reins and being
recognized as the head of the house.
Ellen, the maid who had been with Mrs. Burnham since Erskine's boyhood,
and who was a rebel against other authority than hers, had openly
rebelled, one day, and with blazing eyes that yet softened when the
tears came, assured Ruth that she could not have two mistresses,
especially when the one who wasn't mistress at all took pains to
contradict the orders of the other; and if she had got to be ordered
about all the time by Mrs. Erskine, the sooner she went, the better.
"Very well, Ellen," Mrs. Burnham had said, holding her tones to cold
dignity. "I shall be sorry to part with you, but it is quite certain
that so long as you remain in the house you must obey Mrs. Erskine
Burnham's slightest wish. If you cannot do this, of course we must
separate."
So Ellen went. In a perfect storm of tears and sobs and regrets, it is
true; but she went. This arrangement pleased just one person. Erskine
openly complained that her successor was not and never would be a
circumstance to Ellen, and made his mother confess that she missed Ellen
sorely, and asked her why, after being faithfully served for twenty
years, she could not have borne with a few peculiarities. His mother was
thankful that he did not insist upon knowing just what form her
peculiarities took, and his wife's eyes sparkled. She had recognized
Ellen from the first as an enemy, and had meant to be rid of her.
In short, Mrs. Erskine Burnham had settled down. She told her special
friends with a cheerful sigh that she had sacrificed herself to her
husband's mother, who was growing old and ought not to be burdened with
the care of a house. So, much as they would have enjoyed a home to
themselves, they had determined to stay where they were.
So steady and skilful were this General's movements toward supremacy
that Ruth herself scarcely realized the fact that when she gave an order
in these days, she did it hesitatingly, often adding as an
afterthought:--
"Let that be the arrangement, unless Mrs. Erskine Burnham has other
plans; if she has, remember, I am not at all particular." And she was
never surprised any more by the discovery that there was a totally
different arrangement. It was therefore in exceeding bad taste for
Erskine Burnham to present himself to his mother in lofty mood and
threaten her with a separate home for himself and wife. One of his
mother's chief concerns at this time was to shield him from the
knowledge that she sometimes prayed for solitude as the safest way out
of the thickening clouds. That he did not realize any of this can only
be attributed to the condition of which his wife often accused him;
namely, that he was "as blind as a bat."
The proposed card-party at the Wheelers' came off in due time, both
Irene and Erskine being among the guests. Within the month, Irene gave
what the next morning's social column called "an exclusive and charming
affair" of the same kind in her own rooms. It is true that she had
schemed for a different result from this. She had meant to give a card
party on a larger scale. Her careful rendering to her husband of the
talk about restrictions had been intended to call from him the
declaration that the parlors were as much theirs as his mother's, and
that if she chose to play cards in them, no one should disturb her. She
miscalculated. Instead of this, his deliverance was more emphatic than
ever before.
"Remember, Irene, that my mother's sense of the fitness of things must
never be infringed upon in any way that can disturb her. Our rooms are
our castle and we will do with them as we choose; but no cards
downstairs, remember, or anything else that will disturb her--"
"Prejudices!" his wife had interrupted in a manner that she had intended
should be playful; but he had spoken quickly and with dignity.
"Very well, prejudices if you will. I was going to say traditions; but
if you prefer the other word, it doesn't matter. Whatever they are, they
are to be respected."
So Irene, having learned some time before this that such deliverances on
the part of her husband were to be respected, took care to keep within
the limits of their own rooms. But she took a little private revenge
upon her mother-in-law, given in that especially trying would-be playful
tone of hers.
"I am sorry that your prejudices--oh, no, pardon me, I mean your
traditions--will not allow you to meet our guests this evening; but I
suppose that would be wicked, too? Pray how is your absence to be
accounted for? Must I trump up an attack of mumps, or dumps, or what?"
As for Erskine, he remained happily unconscious of all these small
stings. He was much engrossed in business cares, and left home early and
returned late, so that in reality he knew little of what took place
during his absence. That all was not quite as he had hoped between his
wife and his mother he could not help seeing, but he told himself that
he must not be unreasonable; that two people as differently reared as
they had been must have time to assimilate; probably they were doing
very well, and it was he who was struggling for the impossible. So he
straightway put aside and forgot the words of dignified reproach that he
had addressed to his mother, and she became "mommie" again, and always
his second kiss of greeting was for her. And the mother during these
days thanked God that she was able to hide her disappointment and her
pain, and meet him always with a smile.