The doorbell rang. Gloria opened it to Dr. John.
"Well, well, is the little wife worried?" he asked in his kindly way
when he saw her troubled face. "But there's really no need of it.
Dick has just another touch of that 'flu' of his. We'll have him
straightened around in a day or two. Where is he?"
Gloria led the way to the living-room.
"So this is the way you obey orders, is it? I thought I told you to
go home and go straight to bed, young fellow!" Dr. John said.
Dick stared at him dully.
"Go up and put a couple of hot water bottles in his bed, Gloria," Dr.
John ordered, taking out his clinical thermometer. "He looks as if
he's having a bit of a chill."
The doctor popped his thermometer into Dick's mouth as Gloria turned
to go. She found the only hot water bottle in the house after a long
search and filled it.
While Dr. John was helping Dick into bed, Gloria telephoned Mother
Gregory to come right over.
Then she gathered together her night-clothes, an armful of her
boudoir pillows, and the novel she was reading. She carried them all
across the hall to the guest-room.
For she had made up her mind to sleep there that night ... that
night, at least.
Dick followed his wife around with heavy-lidded eyes.
"Here's a couple of prescriptions. Better go and get them filled
right away, Gloria," Dr. John said, busily writing on a small pad as
he spoke.
She took the slip of paper, put on her things and went downstairs.
She drew a long sigh of relief as she stepped out into the blue-gray
dusk of early evening.
... What a mess life was, Gloria thought.
It made you care for the people you ought not to care for. It made
the people who meant nothing to you at all, fall in love with you.
There was no more plan or pattern to life than there was to a
crazy-quilt. Not as much! It was thrown together, so far as she
could see.
How much more simple everything would be all the way around, for
instance, if Stan Wayburn had been in love with her a year ago as she
had been with him ... and had married her!
Then she would never have seen Dick. And he would probably have
married some nice home-making girl who would have kept all his socks
mended and given him a houseful of children to make him proud and
happy....
While the clerk at the drug-store was filling Dr. John's
prescriptions, Gloria went into the telephone booth and called Stan
Wayburn at his hotel.
"Oh, Stan, I'm so terribly sorry about this afternoon. I wouldn't
have had things happen the way they did for anything in the world,"
she told him when she heard his voice.
Stan laughed carelessly.
"Don't you bother your cute head about me, Russet, for a single
second," he said. "Just forget it. I told your husband where to
head in, though, by the way."
"You did!" Gloria's surprise was in her voice. She was sure that it
had been Dick who had told Stan where to "head in!" Moreover, she
remembered how meekly Stan had obeyed when Dick had told him to get
out of the house.
"I certainly told him nothing else but!" Wayburn went on. "You
didn't suppose I was going to lie down like a rug and take all his
insults, did you? ... Not on your gay young life, I wasn't! And
what's more, I'm going to see you wherever and whenever I want to ...
if you want me to. You do, don't you?"
"Of course, I want to ... but did you really tell all that to Dick?"
Gloria asked incredulously.
"N--no, not exactly that way," Stan admitted.
"Well, I must ring off, now," Gloria said. "Good-by, Stan."
She was vaguely disappointed in Wayburn. She would have liked him to
stand up to Dick that afternoon. She wanted to be proud of him,
somehow.
When Gloria returned to the house she found Mother Gregory in charge.
She had tied a white apron, crackling with starchiness, over her
black silk dress, and she was tenderly bathing Dick's face.
"These colds of his come from his stomach. I'm sure of it," she said
accusingly to her daughter-in-law. "He's either been upset over
something or his diet is all wrong. Do you give him much fried food?"
Gloria tried to think whether or not Ranghild fried the meat and
potatoes very often. She thought not.
"Well, anyway, Dick's to have nothing but egg-nog for his supper,"
Mother Gregory went on without waiting for Gloria's reply. "You go
down and beat it up while I make Dick comfortable for the night ...
and make me a cup of tea, while you're at it. I was just sitting
down to dinner when you phoned me, and I came right over without a
bite."
Gloria stood looking helplessly at Mother Gregory's broad
satin-covered back.
"How do you make an egg-nog?" she asked finally.
Mother Gregory turned and faced her. Her fine black eyes were
widened in astonishment.
"Well, I never heard of such a thing! You, a grown woman, not
knowing how to beat a little milk and egg together!" she exclaimed.
"You sit here and wait for a minute.... When I finish with Dick I'll
go downstairs with you, and show you how to make an egg-nog!"
She smoothed the pillows under Dick's head. Then she pulled the hot
water bottle from between the sheets, and gave it to Gloria.
"Go and empty half the water out of that thing!" she ordered. "Never
fill a hot water bottle to the very top. It'll burst if you do....
And roll it up in a clean towel before you bring it back!"
Silently Gloria obeyed. Then the two women went down to Ranghild's
spotless white kitchen.
"Now then," Mother Gregory said briskly. "Put on your apron and wash
your hands and we'll get to work." She bustled about collecting milk
and eggs and nutmeg as she spoke.
Gloria had no aprons of her own. She had no use for aprons. But she
found one of Ranghild's in a pantry drawer and tied it on.
When the egg-nog was made Dick's mother poured it into a tall glass
and set it on a little tray.
"You take it up to Dick while I stir around and get a bite of supper
for us, Gloria," she said. "And see that he drinks every drop of it!"
Slowly and unwillingly Gloria went upstairs. Dick's eyes were fixed
on the door as she swung it ajar. She set the tray on a chair at the
side of Dick's bed.
"Here's the first meal your little old wife ever cooked for you,"
Gloria said with a gayety she was far from feeling. Dick merely
looked at her.
She slipped an arm behind his shoulders to raise him but he pushed it
away.
"Give me the glass," he said shortly. He drained it, and lay down
again with his face turned toward the wall. Gloria picked up her
tray to go. But before she reached the door Dick had called to her.
"Gloria, you took your things into the guest-room," he said.
"Yes, I'm going to sleep there to-night," Gloria answered. "I think
you'll sleep more comfortably if you're in here alone."
But they both knew that was not her reason for going into the
guest-room. The thought of Wayburn rose between them like an
insurmountable wall.
"Gloria, tell me one thing," Dick said surprisingly. "And think
before you give me an answer ... you're not in love with this Wayburn
fellow, are you?" His anger was entirely gone.
"That's not the point," Gloria said coldly. "The point is that
you've shamed and humiliated me before my friends. And I'll never
forgive you for it. I don't know how I can ever face any of them
again."
Dick sat up in bed.
"I wish you never would see any of them again," he said vehemently.
"They're not the kind of people I want you to have for friends. I
wonder if you know the things people are saying about May and Jim ...
beastly things?"
"Oh, people! People make me tired the way they gossip about
everybody!" Gloria said contemptuously. She went out and closed the
door loudly.
Mother Gregory had a cold supper laid on the kitchen table. She was
drinking tea and reading the evening paper.
"Have you been asked to join the new Home Women's Club?" she asked
Gloria, without raising her eyes from the paper. "I put your name up
for it. I want my son's wife to belong to it."
"Yes, I've been asked, and have sent in my first dues," Gloria
answered as she took her place at the table. "Thanks for putting me
up for it. I guess most of the women in town are going to be
members, aren't they? I'd hate to be left out."
Mother Gregory pursed up her lips.
"Oh, there are a few women who aren't getting in!" she remarked
acidly. "Your friend, Mrs. Seymour, for instance! She'll never be
asked to join, if she lives to be a hundred!"
Gloria was silent. She knew now what Dick meant by the "beastly
things" people were saying about May ... and Jim Carewe!