THE HAPPY FAMILY
“I have so much to tell you,” said the Beauteous Maiden’s happy voice
over the telephone. “Listen. I’ve heard from Mummer. She ’phoned. My
Cruel Stepmother, you know, only she isn’t any more. She says she is
entirely disenchanted, and she was perfectly lovely to me. I told her
all about you, and she was so pleased. She wants to meet you, of course,
but I thought it was safer to wait until you had killed the Giant.
Mummer says he’s terribly hard to get on with, now that she’s stopped
being a witch. He doesn’t like it a bit. When do you think you can kill
him?”
“I want to ask you about that,” interrupted Wendell, and he laid his
plan before her. “The Beauteous Maiden was very enthusiastic over it.”
“Better!” she exclaimed. “Oh, much better! Now what shall he be changed
to? Something useful, as you say.”
“I thought of a victrola,” urged Wendell, who was fond of music. “You
haven’t a victrola, have you? And every family needs one.”
“No--o, we haven’t,” said the Beauteous Maiden. “That’s rather good, if
we can’t think of anything better. But, let me see. What we
really need in our family, more than a victrola, even, is Social
Placement,--Background,--that sort of thing, you know. Even with Youth,
Innocence, and Beauty, you do need Background, too, if you know what I
mean. And it’s been an awfully hard thing to manage--impossible,
really--with a Giant and a Witch right in plain sight in the family. Now
what _can_ you change the Giant to that will be most useful for
Background?”
“Mayflower Society?” said Wendell. “Sons of the American Revolution? We
have a lot of those in our family. That’s what you mean, isn’t it?”
“In a way,” said the Beauteous Maiden. “But those things aren’t any use
unless they are handled properly. I’ll tell you the kind of thing I
mean,--a Harvard professor, say. That would give us Atmosphere as well
as Background.”
“But they’d have to create a special Chair for him, wouldn’t they?”
hesitated Wendell.
“Why, no,” said the Beauteous Maiden. “You’ll change him down small, of
course, and then he can use any chair they have.”
“Well, all right,” said Wendell. “I’ll do it this afternoon, if you
like.”
“Oh, will you?” cried the Beauteous Maiden. “That will be simply
wonderful. And we’ll go out to call on them to-morrow afternoon if you
can.”
So it was settled. Wendell was to work the charm at once and meet the
Maiden at the Frog Pond after school next day. Of course, it was a
perfectly easy thing for Wendell to do, after all his practice; so he
was sure the charm had worked, and felt entirely safe in going out to
Brookline with the Beauteous Maiden next afternoon. She looked very
charming when he met her at the Frog Pond. Even though not liking her
general style, Wendell had to admit that she was good looking.
“I’m making a tremendous success,” she told him. “And listen. I have
such good news for the family. I’ve got a job for my sister in character
parts. Isn’t that fine! Poor thing! Of course she never could play
anything calling for Youth, Innocence and Beauty, but she has just the
face for character parts. Don’t you think so?”
How very strange it seemed to Wendell to be alighting from the electric
at the familiar corner, to be retracing his hazardous steps towards that
dangerous house, in perfect safety, on an entirely conventional errand.
He said so to the Beauteous Maiden, and she smiled and answered softly.
“I know you ran some frightful risks for my sake. Believe me, I am not
unappreciative, as time will show.”
Wendell wished he hadn’t mentioned it.
The neat white house was unchanged without, but the moment the Beauteous
Maiden opened the door with her latch key and called, “Mummer, I’m
here,” Wendell was conscious of an entire change in the mental
atmosphere. The Good Stepmother came running out from the kitchen to
meet them. Her gray hair was arranged in a recent and becoming fashion;
she had had her projecting teeth out and had some new pivot teeth that
looked much better; and she wore an inexpensive but tasteful afternoon
frock. But the greatest change was in her sweet motherly face. She put
her arms around the Beauteous Maiden, half laughing and half crying,
called over her shoulder, “Daughter, Daughter, here’s your dear sister,”
and then drew her into the living-room for one more kiss. The Beauteous
Maiden, for her part, looked up at her mother with all her Youth,
Innocence, and Beauty shining in her eyes, and said,
“Mummer, dear, you _must_ meet my Deliverer, Wendell Bradford. I can’t
tell in one breath how much he has done for me, but when you know it
all, you will welcome him as a son even as you welcome me as a
daughter,” and Wendell found himself folded in the Good Stepmother’s
embrace.
He was very much alarmed, and before he could escape, he found the
Stepsister giving him a sisterly kiss too.
“You know,” he explained, in horrible embarrassment, “I’m not old enough
to think about marrying.” He hoped this would end the matter, but the
Good Stepmother said, “I know she will wait for you, dear boy;” at which
Wendell writhed, but tried to hide it.
Then the ex-giant came in, and such a family reunion as took place then!
The present professor was a scholarly looking man with a benignant
face. He welcomed the Beauteous Maiden with great affection, and shook
Wendell’s hand cordially and called him a noble fellow.
The family had so much to talk about, after their long separation, that
they hardly knew where to begin. The Beauteous Maiden had told her
mother over the telephone all about her success in the pictures; but of
course her Stepsister had innumerable questions to ask her, for
movie-life is always fascinating to non-professionals. When the
Stepsister heard that the magic doors of movie-land had been opened to
her, too, through this excellent offer to play character parts, she
almost wept for joy.
“And to think of my envy and jealousy of you, dear Sister,” she said,
“and what kindness you are showing to me now, in spite of it all!”
“Hush! do not let us speak of that!” said the Beauteous Maiden. “You
know, my Youth, Innocence, and Beauty are equalled only by my Beauty of
Character.”
Then the family plans had to be discussed. The ex-giant was very happy
in his professorship, and talked enthusiastically of the courses that he
was to give, and an annotated text-book that he had been asked to edit.
“Then there is the question of my library,” he said. “Have you any idea
of the size of a college professor’s library?”
Wendell said he hadn’t.
“Well, I haven’t either,” said the Professor. “But I’ve been shopping
for a library this morning, and I talked with a very intelligent
second-hand-bookstore man. He said five feet was the standard length
for a student’s library, and he showed me several five-foot-lengths that
had been turned in to him by college students--in excellent condition.
Some of them, indeed, looked as if they had never been opened. I bought
ten lengths. Don’t you think fifty feet of library should be about right
for a professor, if five feet is required for a student?”
Wendell and the family, after some intelligent discussion of this point,
agreed with him.
Wendell was feeling quite at home with his new acquaintances by this
time. The Professor sat in a big Morris chair with the Beauteous Maiden
on a cricket at his feet, while his hand strayed lovingly among her
curls. The Stepsister perched with one arm around the Professor’s neck.
On the sofa, the motherly Stepmother sat beside Wendell and leaned over
occasionally to pat his hand. It was altogether a charming scene of
family happiness, such as is too rare, alas! in these modern days of
automobiling, jazz, and summer camps. Wendell was thinking how happy
they all seemed, when the Stepsister suddenly said,
“You’ll have me for bridesmaid, won’t you, dearest?”
“Of course, dear, if Wendell agrees with me,” said the Beauteous Maiden,
smiling.
Poor Wendell! With all his heart he wished that he had never become
involved in his heroic role. Of course, as Deliverer, he _had_ to marry
the Beauteous Maiden, but he did not conceal from himself the fact that
he had never really fancied her. “Even when she was a Frog,” he thought,
“I didn’t want her around.” He was thoroughly unhappy.