Jerry made the most careful plans for the transfer of his family to the
new studio. He was like an eager little boy in his anxiety to have Jane
see and approve the home he had chosen for them. It was a bright, late
fall day, with sun and clear brisk air, when they started downtown, with
the trained nurse in charge of baby.
"I feel as if the river had become my friend. I shall come up often and
visit it," Jane said as they turned off Riverside Drive. "My! how many
people there are and how they hurry," she added.
"Back in the world again, Jane. Are you sorry?"
"No. Glad. I feel like a dynamo, waiting to blow off."
After awhile they turned into Washington Mews and drew up before the
stable, with its box trees and its window hedges, its quaint little
windows, and brass door-rail.
"Here we are!" cried Jerry.
"Oh, Jerry, it is adorable!"
"Wait till you get inside."
The door was opened by a middle-aged woman.
"This is Anna, who is to look after us, Jane."
"Good-afternoon, Anna. I am glad you're here."
"Yes'm. I'm here. Oh! ain't the baby sweet?"
A little, square hall welcomed them, with a reception-room at one side
and white stairs leading up to the second floor. It was done in pale
yellow and Chinese blue and led directly into the great studio room
which was beyond. It was a noble room of great size and distinction,
with one whole wall of glass, the opposite one containing a fireplace
which held six-foot logs. It was decorated in shades of brown, with the
most daring use of colour--orange, black, blue, and yellow. A balcony
swung over half the room, with a magnificent Chinese coat hung over the
rail.
"Jerry, it is perfect!" Jane exclaimed.
"Isn't it ripping? I wish we could buy it."
"It's wonderful enough to me to rent it. Let's go upstairs."
Above, there were several bedrooms, a dressing-room, and baths.
"This is the sunniest room, so I allotted it to his Royal Nobs," Jerry
explained.
"How clever of you to have his bed ready."
"Oh, Bobs did that. This is our suite."
"Jerry, are we really going to live here?"
"We are! I'm so glad you like it. I could hardly breathe for fear you
wouldn't," he said excitedly.
"How could I help liking it? It is beautiful!"
They went over it from top to bottom, discovering new joys. Anna
displayed her department with pride. Also her bedroom, light and
attractively furnished, with a bathroom off.
"I think we are going to be very happy here, Anna."
"Yes, ma'am, if I can suit you."
"I think you can. Come up and see baby in his new bed."
That night at dinner, Jerry smiled at her over the candles.
"Isn't this fun, Jane?"
"It's like a dream, Jerry. I'm afraid I'll wake up."
"We can give some real parties in this place."
"We must have all the studio crowd in for a house-warming," she
answered.
Bobs and the Chatfields came in, during the evening, to wish them
welcome. Bobs slipped off upstairs to see baby, and Jane followed.
"I see your fine hand in many things provided for our comfort and
pleasure, dear."
"Oh, I just looked after things a bit. Doesn't he look like a kitten,
all relaxed and soft?"
"He is a wonderful possession," Jane said, with so much feeling that
Bobs dared not look at her.
Life in the new home fell into its wonted routine. They became
accustomed to the new luxuries with the usual ease and celerity. The
baby's regime was, for the present, the nurse's affair, except for
certain essential contributions on Jane's part. Jerry's sittings began,
so Jane took up the old habit of running away to the white room at Mrs.
Biggs's, as soon as the house and her son were started on the day. She
had three full hours, all her own, and she gloried in them.
She attacked the book with fervour. But as she read over the completed
chapters, she found no trace of her present self. It seemed dry, too
analytical, too intellectualized.
"What has happened to me?" she asked herself. "Something has opened up
in me like sluice gates. I feel that I want to deluge the whole world
with feeling, with happiness."
True to her instinct, she began to work over the whole book. For the
first time she wrote with abandon. The chapters came hot, fluid, swift.
She marvelled at her speed, and with difficulty she dragged herself out
of her work-trance to go back to her small son.
For two weeks she wrote at white heat; then a crisis arrived. She
realized that they could not afford to keep the trained nurse any
longer, and her departure meant the loss of Jane's freedom. She thought
about it a good deal, pondering a way to work it out. Anna proved a
treasure; she marketed, cooked, served; acted as major-domo over the
whole establishment, but she could not add baby to her duties. She did
not want to confess about her work to Jerry yet, and at the same time
she knew she simply could not be interrupted now.
"Jerry, the nurse leaves to-morrow," she said to him.
"Too bad we can't afford to keep her on."
"I was wondering. Your model comes about eleven, doesn't she?"
"Usually."
"You don't often go out before that, do you?"
"No."
"Would it make any difference to you if I took my time off from eight to
eleven, after baby's early feeding, and would you sort of look after
him, if he should wake up before I get back?"
He stared at her.
"You mean you intend to turn out to walk or shop or whatever you do, at
eight in the morning?"
"Yes. I have to get up early on baby's account anyway."
"But, Jane, I don't know anything about kids. If he cried, I wouldn't
know what to do."
"I could show you. It is my job the rest of the twenty-four hours, you
know."
"I suppose it's only fair, but...."
"I think you ought to learn what to do for him, just as I did. I might
die or get hurt."
"Don't be silly."
"Is it a bargain? Will you take a three-hour period?"
"On your responsibility."
"Oh, no; it must be on yours, Jerry. If you don't do a whole-hearted
job, I can't trust you. He is our baby, you know--not mine."
"All right," he sighed. "When do I begin?"
"To-morrow. Come up now, and the nurse and I will show you how to manage
him. He almost never wakes up," she reassured him.
The next day they inaugurated the plan. Jane had an early breakfast,
before Jerry was up, bathed and fed baby, and left him asleep on the
balcony. Then she fled to her haven, worked until a few minutes before
eleven, when she went back to the studio. From then until lunch time she
could revise, or work over her first draft, but for the first process,
she still had quiet and her own free soul.
The first few days the scheme worked beautifully. The fourth day, Jerry
Jr. awoke at nine-thirty, and all efforts to induce him to sleep, on the
part of his parent and Anna, were in vain. Jane found Jerry pushing the
baby carriage up and down the studio furiously. He was hot, flushed, and
mad.
"Oh, did he waken?"
"Did he? He's been acting like the devil for hours."
"That's too bad."
"Where do you go for all these hours, Jane? You can't walk all this
time."
"Have I ever asked what you do with your time, Jerry?"
"I don't expect you to do my work."
"Do you feel that you are doing my work when you share the care of our
baby for three hours a day?"
"It's no man's work, pushing a baby carriage."
"If you feel demeaned by looking after our son, I shall certainly not
ask your help again."
"It's no fun, trying to keep him quiet."
"No. I've discovered that."
She took their protesting offspring upstairs without more words. But the
next day she did not go to her work. When Jerry finished his late
breakfast, he found her in the studio.
"You still here?" he asked.
She nodded cheerfully.
"Aren't you late getting off?"
"I'm not going out."
"Why not?"
"I thought we decided that yesterday."
"I didn't know we decided anything."
"You were very definite in your complaint that I shirked my duties upon
you."
"Can't Anna take care of him in the morning?"
"No. She has all she can manage."
"When are you going to get your exercise?"
"Naturally I cannot take any, unless I push the baby carriage."
"Good Lord! Go get your things on. I'll watch him."
"Thank you, Jerry, but I cannot accept sacrifices. It must be your job
and mine, and nobody abused."
"I thought it over last night. I agree. Your job and mine; nobody
abused. Now, scat."
"Much obliged, Jerry; that's fair and square."
This time the agreement held. Jerry learned to handle the occasional
outbursts of his son without calling for help. In the meantime Jane's
work was growing. Martin Christiansen returned after a month away from
town, and Jane sent him a dozen chapters of the rewritten version. It
brought him to the studio, post haste. Jerry was painting, so they sat
alone in the reception-room.
"But, Jane, what has happened to you?" he demanded.
"Life, experience, marriage, baby; all the big things have happened to
me since I began that book. I'm only just beginning to be _me_, Martin."
"I was astonished, Jane! It was as if sunshine suddenly played over a
gray room. The room was charming, well appointed, choice, but a trifle
cold. But now, you've let the sun into it. It's warm, it's human, it's
home."
"That's what I want you to feel. I'm just as new-born as baby. I had to
write it all over, to bring me up to date. I feel so young--younger than
I ever felt in my life. Of course, youth must be a state of mind, since
I find mine when I'm almost thirty."
He smiled his appreciation.
"Certainly, wise woman, youth has nothing to do with time. It comes to
some of us young and to some of us late. When it comes to us at thirty
we are lucky, for by that time we know how to value it. The old saying
that no actress under thirty is a good Juliet has true psychology behind
it. She has only just gotten far enough away at thirty to analyze youth,
to dramatize it, get at the heart of it."
"My youthful vigour is such, Martin, that at this rate I shall be
through by Christmas," she smiled.
"How do you manage--small infant, house, gifted husband, and secret
career?"
"I have health, brains, and a most sensible husband. He helps with the
baby."
"You mean it?" unbelievingly.
"Certainly. While I work, he watches son; while he works, I watch son."
"But he doesn't know about your work."
"No. But I convinced him that it was fair to divide the responsibility a
little."
"I'd no notion that he had modern ideas on this subject."
"He hasn't. He is the most anti-feministic,
'woman's-place-is-in-the-home' enthusiast you ever heard preach."
"But he practises Ellen Key!"
"Oh, well; who ever held a preacher strictly to practice?" she laughed.
"And we men go on believing that the serpent actually fooled Eve, back
there in the Garden!" laughed Martin Christiansen.