Mrs. Champney had arranged matters so as to reach the house just at
dinner time. She even hoped that she might be a little late, so that
there wouldn’t be any time at all to sit down and talk. She had never
dreaded anything as she dreaded that first moment, the crossing of
that threshold. Her hands and feet were like ice, her thin cheeks were
flushed, anticipating it. She wanted to enter in an agreeable little
stir and bustle, to be cheerful, to be casual; but Robert and Molly
were too young for that. They would be too cordial.
“I don’t expect them to want me,” said Mrs. Champney to herself. “They
can’t want me. If they’d only just not try—not pretend!”
She did not know Molly very well. She had seen her a good many
times—Molly and the incomparable baby—but that had been in the days
when Mrs. Champney was a fairy godmother, with all sorts of delightful
gifts to bestow. Robert’s wife had been a little shy with her. A kind,
honest girl, Mrs. Champney had thought her, good to look at in her
splendid health and vitality, but not very interesting. And now she
had to come into poor Molly’s house!
She was pleased to see that her train was late. She had not told them
what train she would take. Perhaps they wouldn’t keep dinner waiting.
When she got there, perhaps they would be sitting at the table. Then
she could hurry in, full of cheerful apologies, and sit down with
them, and there wouldn’t be that strained, terrible moment she so much
dreaded.
A vain hope! For, as she got out of the train, her heart sank to see
Robert there waiting for her—Robert with his glummest face, Robert at
his worst.
There was no denying that Robert had a worst. He was never willful and
provoking, as his adorable sister could be upon occasion. He was never
stormy and unreasonable, like his elder brother; but he could be what
Mrs. Champney privately called “heavy,” and that was, for her, one of
the most dismaying things any one could be. She saw at the first
glance that he was going to be heavy now.
“Mother!” he said, in a tone almost tragic.
“But, my dear boy, how in the world did you know I’d get this train?”
she asked gayly. “I didn’t write—”
“I’ve been waiting for an hour,” he answered. “You said ‘about dinner
time,’ and I certainly wasn’t going to let you come from the station
alone. This way—there’s a taxi waiting.”
Mrs. Champney was ashamed of herself. Robert was the dearest boy, so
stalwart, so trustworthy, so handsome in his dark and somber fashion,
and so touchingly devoted to her! After all, wasn’t it far better to
be a little too heavy than too light and insubstantial? As he got into
the cab beside her, she slipped her arm through his and squeezed it.
“You dear boy, to wait like that!” she said.
“Mother!” he said again. “By Heaven, I could wring that fellow’s neck!
Speculating with your money—”
“Don’t take it like that, Robert. It’s all over and done with now.”
“No, it’s not!” said he. “It’s—the thing is, you’ve been used to all
sorts of little—little comforts and so on; and just at the present
time I’m not able to give you—”
“Please don’t, Robert!” she cried. “It hurts me!”
He put his arm about her shoulders.
“You’re not going to be hurt,” he said grimly; “not by _anyone_,
mother!”
His tone and his words filled her with dismay.
“Robert,” she said firmly, “I will not be made a martyr of!”
“A victim, then,” Robert insisted doggedly. “You’ve been tricked and
swindled by that contemptible fellow; but Frank and I are going to see
that it’s made right!”
“Oh, Robert! You’re not going to do anything to that poor, miserable,
distracted man?”
“Nothing we can do. You gave the fellow a free hand, and he took
advantage of it. No, I mean that Frank and I are going to make it up
to you, mother.”
He might as well have added “at any cost.” Mrs. Champney winced in
spirit, but at the same time she loved him for his blundering
tenderness, his uncomprehending loyalty. He meant only to reassure
her, but he made it all so hard, so terribly hard! She felt tears well
up in her eyes. How could she go through with this gallantly if he
made it so hard?
Then, suddenly, there came to her mind the memory of a winter
afternoon, long, long ago, when Frank and Robert had been going out to
skate. She had heard alarming reports about the ice, and she had run
after them, bareheaded, into the garden. She could see that dear
garden, bare and brown in the wintry sunshine; she could see her two
boys, stopping and turning toward her as she called.
Frank had laughingly assured her that there was no danger at all. That
was Frank’s way. She didn’t believe him, yet his sublime confidence in
himself and his inevitable good luck somehow comforted her; and then
Robert had said:
“Well, look here, mother—we’ll promise not to go near the middle of
the pond at the same time. Then, whatever happens, you’ll have one of
us left anyhow—see?”
And that was Robert’s way. The very thought of it stopped the dreaded
invasion of tears and made her smile to herself in the dark. Such a
splendidly honest way—and so devastating!
The taxi had stopped now, and Robert helped her out in a manner that
made her feel very, very old and frail.
“Wait till I pay the driver, mother,” he said. “Don’t try to go
alone—it’s too dark.”
So Mrs. Champney waited in the dark road outside that strange little
house. Her son was paying for the cab; her son was going to assist her
up the path; she was old and helpless and dependent.
Then the front door opened, and Molly stood there against the light.
“Hello, mother dear!” she called, in that big, rich, beautiful voice
of hers. “Hurry in! It’s cold!”
Mrs. Champney did hurry in, and Molly caught her in both arms and
hugged her tight.
“Just don’t mind very much how things are, will you?” she whispered.
“My housekeeping’s pretty awful, you know!”
Tears came to Mrs. Champney’s eyes again, because this was such a
blessed sort of welcome.
“As if I’d care!” she said.
“Let me show your room—and Bobbetty,” said Molly.
She took the bag from Robert, who had just come in, and ran up the
stairs. Mrs. Champney followed her. All the little house seemed warm
and bright with Molly’s beautiful, careless spirit. It wasn’t strange
or awkward. It was like coming home; and the room that Molly had got
ready for her was so pretty!
“Dinner’s all ready,” said Molly; “but—if you’ll just take one look at
Bobbetty. He’s—when he’s asleep, he’s—”
Words failed her.
Mrs. Champney got herself ready as quickly as she could, and followed
Molly down the hall to a closed door. Molly turned the handle softly,
and they stepped into a little room that was like another world, all
dark and still, with the wind blowing in at an open window.
“Nothing wakes him up!” whispered Molly proudly, and turned on a
green-shaded electric lamp that stood on the bureau.
Mrs. Champney went over to the crib and looked down at the child who
lay there—the child who was her child, flesh of her flesh, and was yet
another woman’s child. He was beautiful—more beautiful than any of her
children had been. He lay there like a little prince. His face,
olive-skinned and warmly flushed on the cheeks, wore a look of
careless arrogance, his dark brows were level and haughty, his mouth
was richly scornful; and yet, for all this pride of beauty, she could
not help seeing the baby softness and innocence and helplessness of
him.
He might lie there like a little prince, but he was caged in an iron
crib, he wore faded old flannel pyjamas, and beside him, where it had
slipped from the hand that still grasped it in dreams, lay such an
unprincely toy! Mrs. Champney, bending over to examine it, found it to
be a rubber ball squeezed into a white sock.
It seemed to Mrs. Champney that she could never tire of looking at
that beautiful baby. She hadn’t half finished when Molly touched her
arm and whispered “Robert,” and, turning out the light, led her
husband’s mother across the dark, windy room out into the hall again.
“I heard Robert getting restless downstairs,” she explained.
Side by side they descended the stairs. Mrs. Champney was happy, with
that particular happiness which the companionship of babies brought to
her. She had friends who were made unhappy by the sight of babies.
They said that they couldn’t help looking ahead and imagining the
sorrows in store for the poor little things. But to Mrs. Champney this
seemed morbid and quite stupid, because, when the sorrows came, the
babies would no longer be babies, but grown people, and as well able
as any one else to deal with them.
No—babies were not melancholy objects to Mrs. Champney. On the
contrary, they filled her with a strong and tender delight, because of
her knowledge that whatever troubles came to them, she could surely
help; because, for babies, a kiss is a cure for so much, and a song
can dry so many baby tears; because love, which must so often stand
mute and helpless before grown-up misery, can work such marvels for
little children.
She was happy, then, until she reached the foot of the stairs—and not
again for a long time.
Robert was waiting for them there. He came forward, with a faint
frown, and pushed into place two hairpins that were slipping out of
Molly’s hair. It was the most trifling action, yet it seemed to Mrs.
Champney very significant. He didn’t like to see those hairpins
falling out, didn’t like to see Molly’s lovely, shining hair in
disorder. He noticed things of that sort, and he cared. He cared too
much. There had been a look of annoyance and displeasure on his face
that distressed Mrs. Champney.
Fussiness, she thought, was one of the most deplorable traits a man
could have.
It was only another name for pettiness, and that was something no
member of her family had ever displayed. Could it be possible that
Robert, the most uncompromising and high-minded of all her children,
was developing in that way—and with such a wife as Molly?
She watched her son with growing uneasiness during the course of the
dinner. It was a splendidly cooked dinner. The roast veal was browned
and seasoned to perfection, the mashed potatoes were smooth and light,
there were scalloped tomatoes and a salad of apples and celery, and a
truly admirable lemon meringue pie; but Robert frowned because the
potatoes were in an earthenware bowl, and the plates did not match.
When the splendid pie appeared, in the tin dish in which it had been
baked, he sprang up and carried it out into the kitchen, to return
with it damaged, but lying properly on a respectable dish.
“Oh, I’m awfully sorry, Robert!” Molly said, each time that Robert
found something wrong; and there was such generous contrition in her
honest face that Mrs. Champney wanted to get up and shake her son.
What did those silly little things matter? How could he even see them,
with Molly before his eyes?
“She’s beautiful,” thought Mrs. Champney. “She wouldn’t be beautiful
in a photograph. I suppose she’d look quite plain; but when you’re
with her—when she smiles—it’s like a blessing!”