I
The parlour now rejoiced in a new and pretty little "set," put in there
only the week before in order to receive the visits of Eddie. On one of
the chairs sat Mrs. Kennedy, dressed in silk, her hair skilfully fluffed
by her daughter, her hands manicured, her feet in soft new boots. She
was well aware that she had never looked so common, so perfectly the
janitress and scrubwoman. Her strained, haggard face, her faded eyes,
her blunted and withered hands belied her fine attire. They could have
belonged only to a woman who had worked brutally and hopelessly. She was
years younger than Mrs. Russell, but she might have passed for her
mother.
Her patient hands were folded in her silken lap; she had nothing to do,
and very little to think about. The blasphemous triumph was
accomplished; she was about to see Sin crowned and rewarded, Innocence
betrayed and abandoned--in other words, Angelica married to Eddie. She
was disgusted with life, thoroughly disappointed with her God. She took
no pleasure in these preparations, or in any of the comforts and
enjoyments before her. Nothing sustained her but a vague sort of hope
that her just God would retrieve Himself by stopping this wedding in
some way--with thunderbolts, or the flaming swords of archangels. And
she was well aware that one couldn’t really count upon anything of that
sort.
Out in the kitchen she could hear the servant--she, the charwoman,
servant of servants, sitting in the parlour while another woman drudged
for her! In half an hour an automobile was coming to take them to the
church, and then they were going off to Buena Vista, going to leave all
this poverty and humiliation behind forever. She had been given to
understand that she wasn’t to _live_ with her child, only to visit until
a suitable home could be found for her. She was to have an apartment and
a servant all of her own; she was to furnish the place as she wished,
and she was to be provided with a new wardrobe.
"And start a new life," Angelica told her.
"I’ll need to!" said Mrs. Kennedy. "This one is about done."
And although a great deal of this was paid for by Angie herself, out of
the money she had saved, her mother had never expressed gratitude. She
didn’t feel any. She had never at any moment of her life been so utterly
dissatisfied.
She glanced at the new clock.
"Angie!" she called. "What are you doing?"
"Dressing!" called back a gay, a too gay voice.
"He’ll be here in half an hour."
"I’ll be ready!"