THE WIFE
Helen Denby had never doubted her ability to be a perfect wife. As a
girl, her vision had pictured a beauteous creature moving through a
glorified world of love and admiration, ease and affluence.
Later, at the time of her marriage to Burke Denby, her vision had
altered sufficiently to present a picture of herself as the sweet
good-angel of the old Denby Mansion, the forgiving young wife who lays
up no malice against an unappreciative father-in-law. Even when, still
later (upon their return from their wedding trip and upon her learning
of John Denby's decree of banishment), the vision was necessarily warped
and twisted all out of semblance to its original outlines, there yet
remained unchanged the basic idea of perfect wifehood.
Helen saw herself now as the martyr wife whose superb courage and
self-sacrifice were to be the stepping-stones of a husband's magnificent
success. She would be guide, counselor, and friend. (Somewhere she had
seen those words. She liked them very much.) Unswervingly she would hold
Burke to his high purpose. Untiringly she would lead him ever toward his
goal of "making good."
She saw herself the sweet, loving wife, graciously presiding over the
well-kept home, always ready, daintily gowned, to welcome his coming
with a kiss, and to speed his going with a blessing. Then, when in due
course he had won out, great would be her reward. With what sweet pride
and gentle dignity would she accept the laurel wreath of praise (Helen
had seen this expression somewhere, too, and liked it), which a
remorseful but grateful world would hasten to lay at the feet of her who
alone had made possible the splendid victory--the once despised, flouted
wife--the wife who was to drag him down!
It was a pleasant picture, and Helen frequently dwelt upon
it--especially the sweet-and-gentle-dignity-wife part. She found it
particularly soothing during those first early days of housekeeping in
the new apartment.
Not that she was beginning in the least to doubt her ability to be that
perfect wife. It was only that to think of things as they would be was a
pleasant distraction from thinking of things as they were. But of course
it would be all right very soon, anyway,--just as soon as everything got
nicely to running.
Helen did wonder sometimes why the getting of "everything nicely to
running" was so difficult. That a certain amount of training and
experience was necessary to bring about the best results never occurred
to her. If Helen had been asked to take a position as stenographer or
church soloist, she would have replied at once that she did not know how
to do the work. Into the position of home-maker, however, she stepped
with cheerful confidence, her eyes only on the wonderful success she was
going to make.
To Helen housekeeping was something like a clock that you wound up in
the morning to run all day. And even when at the end of a week she could
not help seeing that not once yet had she got around to being the
"sweet, daintily gowned wife welcoming her husband to a well-kept home,"
before that husband appeared at the door, she still did not doubt her
own capabilities. It was only that "things hadn't got to running yet."
And it was always somebody else's fault, anyway,--frequently her
husband's. For if he did not come to dinner too early, before a thing
was done, he was sure to be late, and thus spoil everything by her
trying to keep things hot for him. And, of course, under such
circumstances, nobody could _expect_ one to be a sweet and daintily
gowned wife!
Besides, there was the cookbook.
"Do you know, Burke," she finally wailed one night, between sobs, "I
don't believe it's good for a thing--that old cookbook! I haven't got a
thing out of it yet that's been real good. I've half a mind to take it
back where I got it, and make them change it, or else give me back my
money. I have, so there!"
"But, dearie," began her husband doubtfully, "you said yourself
yesterday that you forgot the salt in the omelet, and the baking powder
in the cake, and--"
"Well, what if I did?" she contended aggrievedly. "What's a little salt
or baking powder? 'Twasn't but a pinch or a spoonful, anyhow, and I
remembered all the other things. Besides, if those rules were any good
they'd be worded so I _couldn't_ forget part of the things. And, anyhow,
I don't think it's very nice of you to b-blame me all the time when I'm
doing the very best I can. I _told_ you I couldn't cook, but you _said_
you'd like anything I made, because I did it, and--"
"Yes, yes, darling, and so I do," interrupted the remorseful husband,
hurriedly. And, to prove it, he ate the last scrap of the unappetizing
concoction on his plate, which his wife said was a fish croquette.
Afterwards still further to show his remorse, he helped her wash the
dishes and set the rooms in order. Then together they went for a walk in
the moonlight.
It was a beautiful walk, and it quite restored Helen to good nature.
They went up on West Hill (where Helen particularly loved to go), and
they laid wonderful plans of how one day they, too, would build a big
stone palace of a home up there--though Burke did say that, for his
part, he liked Elm Hill quite as well; but Helen laughed him out of that
"old-fashioned idea." At least he said no more about it.
They talked much of how proud Burke's father was going to be when Burke
had made good, and of how ashamed and sorry he would be that he had so
misjudged his son's wife. And Helen uttered some very sweet and
beautiful sentiments concerning her intention of laying up no malice,
her firm determination to be loving and forgiving.
Then together they walked home in the moonlight; and so thrilled and
exalted were they that even the cheap little Dale Street living-room
looked wonderfully dear. And Helen said that, after all, love was the
only thing that mattered--that they just loved each other. And Burke
said, "Yes, yes, indeed."
The vision of the sweet, daintily gowned wife and the perfect home was
very clear to Helen as she dropped off to sleep that night; and she was
sure that she could begin to realize it at once. But unfortunately she
overslept the next morning--which was really Burke's fault, as she said,
for he forgot to wind the alarm clock, and she was not used to getting
up at such an unearthly hour, anyway, and she did not see why _he_ had
to do it, for that matter--he was really the son of the owner, even if
he was _called_ an apprentice.
This did not help matters any, for Burke never liked any reference to
his position at the Works. To be sure, he did not say much, this time,
except to observe stiffly that he _would_ like his breakfast, if she
would be so good as to get it--as if she were not already hurrying as
fast as she could, and herself only half-dressed at that!
Of course the breakfast was a failure. Helen said that perhaps some
people could get a meal of victuals on to the table, with a hungry man
eyeing their every move, but she could not. Burke declared then that he
really did not want any breakfast anyway, and he started to go; but as
Helen only cried the more at this, he had to come back and comfort
her--thereby, in the end, being both breakfastless and late to his work.
Helen, after he had gone, spent a blissfully wretched ten minutes
weeping over the sad fate that should doom such a child of light and
laughter as herself to the somber role of martyr wife, and wondered if,
after all, it would not be really more impressive and more
soul-torturing-with-remorse for the cruel father-in-law, if she should
take poison, or gas, or something (not disfiguring), and lay herself
calmly down to die, her beautiful hands crossed meekly upon her bosom.
Attractive as was this picture in some respects, it yet had its
drawbacks. Then, too, there was the laurel wreath of praise due her
later. She had almost forgotten that. On the whole, that would be
preferable to the poison, Helen decided, as she began, with really
cheerful alacrity, to attack the messy breakfast dishes.
It was not alone the cooking that troubled the young wife during that
first month of housekeeping. Everywhere she found pitfalls for her
unwary feet, from managing the kitchen range to keeping the living-room
dusted.
And there was the money.
Helen's idea of money, in her happy, care-free girlhood, had been that
it was one of the common necessities of life; and she accepted it as she
did the sunshine--something she was entitled to; something everybody
had. She learned the fallacy of this, of course, when she attempted to
earn her own living; but in marrying the son of the rich John Denby, she
had expected to step back into the sunshine, as it were. It was not easy
now to adjust herself to the change.
She did not like the idea of asking for every penny she spent, and it
seemed as if she was always having to ask Burke for money; and, though
he invariably handed it over with a nervously quick, "Why, yes,
certainly! I don't mean you to have to ask for it, Helen"; yet she
thought she detected a growing irritation in his manner each time. And
on the last occasion he had added a dismayed "But I hadn't any idea you
could have got out so soon as this again!" And it made her feel very
uncomfortable indeed.
As if _she_ were to blame that it took so much butter and coffee and
sugar and stuff just to get three meals a day! And as if it were her
fault that that horrid cookbook was always calling for something she did
not have, like mace, or summer savory, or thyme, and she had to run out
and buy a pound of it! Didn't he suppose it took _some_ money to stock
up with things, when one hadn't a thing to begin with?
Helen had been on the point of saying something of this sort to her
husband, simply as a matter of self-justification, when there
unexpectedly came a most delightful solution of her difficulty.
It was the grocer who pointed the way.
"Why don't you open an account with us, Mrs. Denby?" he asked smilingly
one day, in reply to her usual excuse that she could not buy something
because she did not have the money to pay for it.
"An account? What's that? That wouldn't make me have any more money,
would it? Father was always talking about accounts--good ones and bad
ones. He kept a store, you know. But I never knew what they were,
exactly. I never thought of asking. I never had to pay any attention to
money at home. What is an account? How can I get one?"
"Why, you give your orders as usual, but let the payment go until the
end of the month," smiled the grocer. "We'll charge it--note it down,
you know--then send the bill to your husband."
"And I won't have to ask him for any money?"
"Not to pay us." The man's lips twitched a little.
"Oh, that would be just grand," she sighed longingly. "I'd like that.
And it's something the way we're buying our furniture, isn't
it?--installments, you know."
The grocer's lips twitched again.
"Er--y-yes, only we send a bill for the entire month."
"And he pays it? Oh, I see. That's just grand! And he'd like it all
right, wouldn't he?--because of course he'd have to pay some time,
anyhow. And this way he wouldn't have to have me bothering him so much
all the time asking for money. Oh, thank you. You're very kind. I think
I will do that way if you don't mind."
"We shall be glad to have you, Mrs. Denby. So we'll call that settled.
And now you can begin right away this morning."
"And can I get those canned peaches and pears and plums, and the grape
jelly that I first looked at?"
"Certainly--if you decide you want 'em," mumbled the grocer, throwing
the last six words as a sop to his conscience which was beginning to
stir unpleasantly.
"Oh, yes, I want 'em," averred Helen, her eager eyes sweeping the
alluringly laden shelves before her. "I wanted them all the time, you
know, only I didn't have enough money to pay for them. Now it'll be all
right because Burke'll pay--I mean, Mr. Denby," she corrected with a
conscious blush, suddenly remembering what her husband had said the
night before about her calling him "Burke" so much to strangers.
Helen found she wanted not only the fruits and jelly, but several other
cans of soups, meats, and vegetables. And it was such a comfort, for
once, to select what she wanted, and not have to count up the money in
her purse! She was radiantly happy when she went home from market that
morning (instead of being tired and worried as was usually the case);
and the glow on her face lasted all through the day and into the
evening--so much so that even Burke must have noticed it, for he told
her he did not know when he had seen her looking so pretty. And he gave
her an extra kiss or two when he greeted her.
The second month of housekeeping proved to be a great improvement over
the first. It was early in that month that Helen learned the joy and
comfort of having "an account" at her grocer's. And she soon discovered
that not yet had she probed this delight to its depths, for not only the
grocer, but the fishman and the butcher were equally kind, and allowed
her to open accounts with them. Coincident with this came the discovery
that there were such institutions as bakeries and delicatessen shops,
which seemed to have been designed especially to meet the needs of just
such harassed little martyr housewives as she herself was; for in them
one might buy bread and cakes and pies and even salads and cold meats,
and fish balls. One might, indeed, with these delectable organizations
at hand, snap one's fingers at all the cookbooks in the world--cookbooks
that so miserably failed to cook!
The baker and the little Dutch delicatessen man, too (when they found
out who she was), expressed themselves as delighted to open an account;
and with the disagreeable necessity eliminated of paying on the spot for
what one ordered, and with so great an assortment of ready-to-eat foods
to select from, Helen found her meal-getting that second month a much
simpler matter.
Then, too, Helen was much happier now that she did not have to ask her
husband for money. She accepted what he gave her, and thanked him; but
she said nothing about her new method of finance.
"I'm going to keep it secret till the stores send him the bills," said
Helen to herself. "Then I'll show him what a lot I've saved from what he
has given me, and he'll be so glad to pay things all at once without
being bothered with my everlasting teasing!"
She only smiled, therefore, enigmatically, when he said one day, as he
passed over the money:--
"Jove, girl! I quite forgot. You must be getting low. But I'm glad you
didn't have to ask me for it, anyhow!"
Ask him for it, indeed! How pleased he would be when he found out that
she was never going to ask him for money again!
Helen was meaning to be very economical these days. When she went to
market she always saw several things she would have liked, that she did
not get, for of course she wanted to make the bills as small as she
could. Naturally Burke would wish her to do that. She tried to save,
too, a good deal of the money Burke gave her; but that was not always
possible, for there were her own personal expenses. True, she did not
need many clothes--but she was able to pick up a few bargains in bows
and collars (one always needed fresh neckwear, of course); and she found
some lovely silk stockings, too, that were very cheap, so she bought
several pairs--to save money. And of course there were always car-fares
and a soda now and then, or a little candy.
There were the "movies" too. She had fallen into the way of going rather
frequently to the Empire with her neighbor on the same floor. It did her
good, and got her out of herself. (She had read only recently how every
wife should have some recreation; it was a duty she owed herself and her
husband--to keep herself youthful and attractive.) She got lonesome and
nervous, sitting at home all day; and now that she had systematized her
housekeeping so beautifully by buying almost everything all cooked, she
had plenty of leisure. Of course she would have preferred to go to the
Olympia Theater. They had a stock company there, and real plays. But
their cheapest seats were twenty-five cents, while she might go to the
Empire for ten. So very bravely she put aside her expensive longings,
and chose the better part--economy and the movies. Besides, Mrs. Jones,
the neighbor on the same floor, said that, for her part, she liked the
movies the best,--you got "such a powerful lot more for your dough."
Mrs. Jones always had something bright and original like that to
say--Helen liked her very much! Indeed, she told Burke one day that Mrs.
Jones was almost as good as a movie show herself. Burke, however, did
not seem to care for Mrs. Jones. For that matter, he did not care for
the movies, either.
No matter where Helen went in the afternoon, she was always very careful
to be at home before Burke. She hoped she knew what pertained to being
a perfect wife better than to be careless about matters like that! Mrs.
Jones was not always so particular in regard to her husband--which only
served to give Helen a pleasant, warm little feeling of superiority at
the difference.
Perhaps Mrs. Jones detected the superiority, for sometimes she laughed,
and said:--
"All right, we'll go if you must; but you'll soon get over it. This
lovey-dovey-I'm-right-here-hubby business is all very well for a while,
but--you wait!"
"All right, I'm waiting. But--you see!" Helen always laughed back,
bridling prettily.
Hurrying home from shopping or the theater, therefore, Helen always
stopped and got her potato salad and cold meat, or whatever else she
needed. And the meal was invariably on the table before Burke's key
sounded in the lock.
Helen was, indeed, feeling quite as if she were beginning to realize her
vision now. Was she not each night the loving, daintily gowned wife
welcoming her husband to a well-ordered, attractive home? There was even
quite frequently a bouquet of flowers on the dinner table. Somewhere she
had read that flowers always added much to a meal; and since then she
had bought them when she felt that she could afford them. And in the
market there were almost always some cheap ones, only a little faded. Of
course, she never bought the fresh, expensive ones.
After dinner there was the long evening together. Sometimes they went
to walk, after the dishes were done--Burke had learned to dry dishes
beautifully. More often they stayed at home and played games, or
read--Burke was always wanting to read. Sometimes they just talked,
laying wonderful plans about the fine new house they were going to
build. Now that Helen did not have to ask Burke for money, there did not
seem to be so many occasions when he was fretful and nervous; and they
were much happier together.
All things considered, therefore, Helen felt, indeed, before this second
month of housekeeping was over, that she had now "got things nicely to
running."