"Yes."
"Well, of all the nerve! Look here, mammie, I tell you just now
there's no use of dad trying to put that over on me. You can just
tell him----"
"My dear child, don't be silly! Nobody's trying to put anything over
on you."
"Of course, I can marry anybody I want to, as well as not! Women do
it all the time and never say a word! But you needn't think I'm
going to; you can get that idea out of your head right now!"
"Oh, come out of it, Martha! Nobody's trying to make you do anything
you don't want to."
It would, perhaps, have been foolish to try that. For Martha seemed
able to manage. Emily didn't know exactly how she had done it, but
Johnnie came up presently from down-town, saw her there, greeted her
quite undisturbed and casually, and announced he was going to Chicago
for the week-end.
And all Martha said was, "I'll let you know next time before I come,
mammie."
Emily felt encouraged about Martha in those days. About Johnnie she
grew less and less certain as the spring came on.
Once she had to say to him: "Johnnie, I want to ask you something. I
want you to tell me what your plans are. What are you going to do?"
He was walking about her living room gloomily, with his hands in his
pockets. He stopped and looked at her. She liked him, and she saw
she had hurt him deeply.
"You getting sore at me, too?" he asked.
"No," she said, "but you _are_ going to work sometime, of course?"
"I'm working now," he said. He stopped in front of her. He stroked
his hair nervously. "I'm trying to persuade Martha to marry me!" he
said, bluntly.
"Oh, Johnnie!" she exclaimed.
"You mean she won't?" he asked.
"Johnnie, no! I don't think she will. I don't think Martha'll
marry--young. It doesn't seem to me--that it's likely."
"You mean--that affair--last summer--the summer before last?"
If she had meant it she had not meant him to refer to it. "That
affair?" How could Johnnie Benton know about it?
"Well--yes," she acknowledged, "and other things. She isn't very
domestic."
"I beg to differ with you!" Johnnie spoke with some heat. "She _is_
domestic. She loves houses. You know she loves houses and--things."
"Well, anyway, Johnnie, I think--she'd be just as apt to marry
you--if you went to work; maybe more so. Not that I think----"
Johnnie lifted his head, as if to ward off her reproof. "I'm sick of
this," he burst out. "People think I ought to settle down. Well, I
would settle down--if Martha'd agree. I'd settle down here, or any
place. It doesn't much matter what business I go into; I'll likely
be a failure in any of 'em. I'll have enough to live on for us both.
But if Martha won't, I'm going to pull out of this for a year or so;
let them settle the estate to suit themselves. I can't be bothered
with it. I'm going to sea for a year--till I get things into my own
hands."
"Oh, Johnnie, what do you want to go to sea for? There's something
better than that, surely?"
"Well, I'll have to earn my living--for a while, if things don't get
settled up. The bank's howling about advancing me any more money.
As if there wasn't plenty coming to me, some place! They won't let
me sell the house, even, till the estate's settled.".
"Oh, were you thinking of that?"
"Why not, Mrs. Kenworthy? Martha--wouldn't want to live in it."
"Johnnie, I'd give that up, if I were you. I wouldn't count on that."
"That's what I _won't_ give up. I mean I don't give a--cent--what
else happens."
Emily exclaimed. "You know there's nothing I would have liked so
well."
"If what?"
"If it--were--possible," she contented herself with saying. "We
can't force these things, Johnnie."
"But--it was all right _once_, Mrs. Kenworthy."
Emily wondered.
"Look here, what's Martha living with all those suffragettes
for--those school-teachers, and doctor women?"
And then he said, bitterly: "It's natural she'd prefer them to--some
people. Martha's been stung once, and she's afraid. That's what's
the trouble with her."
"Good heavens!" thought Emily. "This boy is too wise! What does he
know? And how does he come to know it?"
After a minute she said, "Well, Johnnie, dear, I would like to see
you--all happy--and settled down, but I don't know--that Martha's the
woman for you; and I tell you frankly I think you ought to stop this
loafing about."
"I'll ask Mr. Kenworthy for a steady job for a month, if you want me
to."
"That's not good enough for you, Johnnie; you can't work in a garage.
But it's better than nothing."
He stuck to the garage for three weeks, and then he threw it up and
departed abruptly on the spring day that Emily noticed the first tall
white iris blooming. She was rather out of patience with him. But
Bob--an amazing lot of sympathy Bob had for everything masculine--he
just grinned.
"He's in love, the poor devil!" he said, and winked a sort of
familiar grimace across the table at Emily. It annoyed her. All he
had ever said of Martha was: "Well, if she's in love, she'll have to
get over it; that's all." It gave her almost satisfaction to get a
letter from Martha.
"Johnnie's turned up again. I'm leaving the city for a holiday.
I'll write you about it next week."
Not another word from that child for two weeks. No sign of Johnnie;
he might at least have had the decency to write whether or not he had
taken to the sea. And Martha, Emily planned as the days passed, was
going to get a thorough dressing down when she came back. Two weeks
without writing was a little too much of a good thing. Two weeks and
five days now, still no word had come. Emily was in the garden. She
was, in fact, exactly at the side of the house which Martha had
suggested adorning with a garage. She had been digging about her
"bleeding heart" and looking down towards the river, because she had
seen orioles for the first time that morning and planning what she
would say to Martha when she got a chance. She turned around
suddenly to see what car had stopped in front of the house. It was a
brand-new little blue runabout, and expensive-looking.
And then Johnnie Benton jumped out of it, and turned about to give a
hand to some one--and Martha Kenworthy jumped out! All dressed up in
a new suit of rose color, with a lovely bit of soft fur and a new and
nifty hat. And new shoes and a new bag--glorious and smart entirely.
And she had caught sight of her mother, and came half running up to
her. Johnnie, too, dressed to kill--and beaming--was hurrying to
her. They were looking at each other.
"You two are married!" Emily cried to them; and her heart sank in a
great pity for Johnnie.
"Mammie, mammie!" Martha was crying, hugging her. They had pulled
her into the hall with cries and kisses.
"Oh, Martha!" Emily murmured.
The two were babbling.
"What she's wanted all the time, and she's pretending to scold us.
Look at her, Johnnie." Martha was laughing at her mother's
consternation. "We wanted to surprise you. How did you _know_? I
suppose we _do_ look married, maybe."
"I'm glad," said Emily.
"You're _not_; you're crying! Didn't we surprise you? Did you get
my letter? Rather smooth of me, wasn't it--'Johnnie's turned up and
I'm leaving the city!' We'd only been married an hour when I wrote
that, mammie!"
She shone, she twinkled, like not one star--but the whole canopy of
heaven. She adored her husband with her married eyes. She stood the
loveliest blossom of the season. Johnnie was explaining. Emily sat
breathless looking from one to the other of them. "They're utterly
married," she thought. "Martha isn't pretending. She isn't putting
something across now." She couldn't believe it. But the bridal
garments would have convinced her. Martha's very stockings were
shining bridally. She had taken off her rosy hat; her frock matched
her coat; she was powdering her nose before the hall glass; she was
cavorting about, and shining. She called upon her mother to admire
poor Johnnie.
"Isn't he a dear?" she chuckled. "Don't you think he's a lamb,
mammie?"
"Cut that out, kiddo!" he cried, enjoying it.
"You bring the stuff in, my son. Mammie, we're going to open up the
room. But Johnnie can have the little guest room--just for his
things, can't he? I told you so, Johnnie. He's got to go down and
break the news softly to dad. You go on, Johnnie; I want to talk to
mammie. But don't you stay more than half an hour, I tell you.
We're going to turn out that room, mammie. I knew it wouldn't be
ready. I'll get out of my glad rags right away. Johnnie can help
me. He's good at housework."
The door had finally scarcely closed behind the bridegroom when Emily
cried; "Are you happy, Martie? Why did you do this?"
Side by side they placed themselves on the sofa instinctively; and
Martha threw her arms about her mother ecstatically.
"Am I happy?" she repeated. "Can't you see I'm happy? Oh, mammie,
I've got so much to tell you. Oh, ain't I lucky, mammie? I didn't
know when I married him--I was just--mad, inside--I was hardboiled.
I didn't intend to be good to Johnnie. I didn't know what else to
do. I was sick of being called an old maid! I thought he could just
run the risk, if he would keep on asking me. I didn't intend being
nice to him, or anything. Mammie, people don't appreciate Johnnie.
I didn't. Not at first, and then I found out how SWEET he was! He
was just sweet to me, mammie, and I went and told him everything the
other night. I could just kiss the ground that man walks on, with
his dear old feet!"
Tears came springing into little Mrs. Benton's eyes.
"I told him everything about New York. I told him I'd been crazy.
He said we'd be a pair of nuts, then. Fifty fifty, he said, I told
him, no, mammie. A thousand to one, I told him. I tried to make him
see, but he said I just thought that because I was such a good little
kid! He said I was a good little kid, mammie. Those were his very
words! I tell you right now, mammie, nobody's ever going to say a
word about his mother to me! Because she WAS part of him, after all,
and he hates it. I never knew there was anything in the world so
darling as that man! You just ought to see him in his pajamas! He's
too sweet! Blue and white striped they are. I'll let you see them,
mammie!"
"Rare treat," thought Emily, dazedly.
"Don't you think he's a lamb, mammie? Don't you think he's too dear?"
"I always liked Johnnie."
"Oh, I don't mean that way! You just wait till you know him better!
But nobody can appreciate Johnnie till she's married to him!"
"That seems too bad!"
"Oh, I don't know. It suits me!" she retorted, immediately. "Nobody
wants a lot of women sitting around appreciating her husband.
Mammie, it was too funny the way it happened. You know, Mrs.
Blacksley and I had an awful row. She practically put me out of the
shop."
"Oh?"
"Yes, she did. It was too funny, when you think about it. You
see----"
She chuckled. She could enjoy any joke herself in her high mood.
"She had to have some money to go on with, and she asked me straight
out if there was any chance of me putting some in. And I said no,
not unless she got rid of that man of hers. Mother, you can't
imagine what a temper that woman's got! I thought she was going to
pull my hair or slap me. I kept backing out towards the door, and
she kept coming after me. She called me----" Martha giggled. "She
called me an evil-minded little old maid! She said she'd like to see
me groveling--groveling, it was she said--before some man. And here
I am already just groveling! She said she hoped I'd have enough
sense some day to appreciate a real man. It was pretty rotten of me
to say that to her, because she is fond of him. She said his very
cough was precious to her; she said she hoped I'd fall in love till
I'd kiss somebody's false teeth when he wasn't there himself!"
Martha snickered and added, "But, of course, he'd take them with him,
his teeth, but I didn't think of that in time to answer her. I was
afraid of her. And I was mad, I can tell you. And then, of course,
Johnnie came along again. I was hardboiled and I went and married
him. Because, after all, you've got to marry or be called an old
maid in this world, haven't you, mammie? Let's ask her down now
after a while, for a week. Mrs. Blacksley, I mean. But maybe she
won't come. She's got such an awful temper."
Emily cried, the moment there was a pause--suddenly:
"Martha, I was never unfaithful to your father in my life--your
father, I mean Bob Kenworthy!"
"You weren't?" She stared at her mother, taken aback. "Well, that's
sort of funny."
"I ought to have told you that at once that day when you told
me--what you thought! But I didn't."
Martha was looking at her thoughtfully.
"Well, that's sort of funny. I was just thinking of that this
morning!" She had spoken slowly, but a thought quickened her pace
again. "Mammie, you just ought to see Johnnie in the morning! He's
too sweet! His hair never gets mussed up a bit, it's so short, and
sort of soft in the morning. And I was just thinking this morning
about what you said, or what I said to you, rather, and it would have
been a raw deal for dad, after all. Because really, if a woman's got
a good husband, she ought to treat him right, I think. Don't you?"
"I CERTAINLY DO!"
"I wouldn't want anybody treating Johnnie that way, I know that."
And her tongue wagged happily on. Mother's vices or virtues were
dismissed as slight things, in this new joy. They sat still there,
Emily listening to Johnnie's praises till he came back into the room
with Bob.
The paternal blessing detained them only for a minute. They hurried
away to their housekeeping. A hurricane of happiness; seemed to be
moving the furniture in the painted room about, judging from the
noise. Bob and Emily sat side by side listening to the chortles of
mirth that came down to them. Bob couldn't stop grinning.
"I always said this would happen, Emily. I always knew it would."
"Right as usual!" said Emily. If a woman has a good husband, what's
the use of reminding him of all he doesn't know? she mused, happily.
She scarcely knew the painted room itself when she went up to it
later. It was noon, but the curtains were pushed back as far as
possible, and the blinds rolled to the top, so that the sunshine came
crashing down like thunder from paradise on the roused and choral
colors. The Victrola was grinding out:
Two for tea,
And tea for two.
A girl for me,
And a boy for you.