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Elisabeth Sanxay Holding
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Title: The Worst Joke in the World
Author: Elisabeth Sanxay Holding
Release Date: February 11, 2022 [eBook #67373]
Language: English
Produced by: Roger Frank and Sue Clark. This file was produced from
images generously made available by The Internet Archive.
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORST JOKE IN THE WORLD ***
The Worst Joke in the World
A STORY WHICH THROWS A NEW AND INTERESTING LIGHT
UPON THE TIME-HONORED PROBLEM OF
THE MOTHER-IN-LAW
By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding
Mrs. Champney was putting the very last things into her bag, and Mrs.
Maxwell and Mrs. Deane sat watching her. The room in which she had
lived for nearly four years was already strange and unfamiliar. The
silver toilet articles were gone from the bureau. The cupboard door
stood open, showing empty hooks and shelves. The little water colors
of Italian scenes had vanished from the walls, and the books from the
table. All those things were gone which had so charmed and interested
Mrs. Maxwell and Mrs. Deane.
They were old ladies, and to them Jessica Champney at fifty was not
old at all. With her gayety, her lively interest in life, and her
dainty clothes, she seemed to them altogether young—girlish, even, in
her enthusiastic moments, and always interesting. They loved and
admired her, and were heavy-hearted at her going.
“You’ve forgotten the pussy cat, Jessica,” Mrs. Maxwell gravely
remarked.
“Oh, so I have!” said Mrs. Champney.
Hanging beside the bureau was a black velvet kitten with a strip of
sandpaper fastened across its back, and underneath it the inscription:
SCRATCH MY BACK
It was intended, of course, for striking matches. As Mrs. Champney
never had occasion to strike a match, this little object was not
remarkably useful. Nor, being a woman of taste, would she have
admitted that it was in the least ornamental; but it was precious to
her—so precious that a sob rose in her throat as she took it down from
the wall.
She showed a bright enough face to the old ladies, however, as she
carried the kitten across the room and laid it in the bag. She had
often talked to these old friends about her past—about her two
heavenly winters in Italy, about her girlhood “down East,” about all
sorts of lively and amusing things that she had seen and done; but she
had said very, very little about the period to which the velvet kitten
belonged.
It had been given to her in the early days of her married life by a
grateful and adoring cook. It had hung on the wall of her bedroom in
that shabby, sunny old house in Connecticut where her three children
had been born. She could not think of that room unmoved, and she did
not care to talk of it to any one.
Not that it was sad to remember those bygone days. There was no trace
of bitterness in the memory. It was all tender and beautiful, and
sometimes she recalled things that made her laugh through the tears;
but even those things she couldn’t talk about.
There was, for instance, that ridiculous morning when grandpa had come
to see the baby, the unique and miraculous first baby. He had sat down
in a chair and very gingerly taken the small bundle in his arms, and
the chair had suddenly broken beneath his portly form. Down he
crashed, his blue eyes staring wildly, his great white mustache fairly
bristling with horror, the invaluable infant held aloft in both hands.
If she had begun to tell about that, in the very middle of it another
memory might have come—a recollection of the day when she had sat in
that same room, the door locked, her hands tightly clasped, her eyes
staring ahead of her at the years that must be lived without her
husband, her friend and lover.
She had thought she could not bear that, but she had borne it; and the
time had come when the memory of her husband was no longer an anguish
and a futile regret, but a benediction. She had lived a happy life
with her children. They were all married now, and in homes of their
own, and she was glad that it should be so.
These four years alone had been happy, too. Her children wrote to her
and visited her, and their family affairs were a source of endless
interest. She had all sorts of other interests, too. She made friends
readily; she was an energetic parish worker; she loved to read; she
enjoyed a matinée now and then, or a concert, and the conversation of
Mrs. Maxwell and Mrs. Deane.
With all her heart she had relished her freedom and her dignity. Her
children were always asking her to come and live with one or the other
of them, but she had always affectionately refused. She believed it
wasn’t wise and wasn’t right.
She had stayed on in this comfortable, old-fashioned boarding house in
Stamford, cheerful and busy. It had been a delight beyond measure to
her to send a little check now and then to one of her children, a
present to a grandchild, some pretty thing that she had embroidered or
crocheted to her daughters-in-law. Her elder son’s wife had written
once that she was a “real fairy godmother,” and Mrs. Champney never
forgot that. It was exactly what she wanted to be to them all—a gay,
sympathetic, gracious fairy godmother.
But she wasn’t going to be one any longer. What her lawyer called a
“totally unforeseen contingency” had arisen, and all her life was
changed. He was a young man, that lawyer. His father had been Mrs.
Champney’s lawyer and friend in his day, and she had, almost as a
matter of course, given the son charge of her affairs when the elder
man died.
She had not wanted either of her sons to look after things for her.
She didn’t like even to mention financial matters to people she loved.
Indeed, she had been a little obstinate about this. And now this
“totally unforeseen contingency” had come, to sweep away almost all of
her income, and with it the independence, the dignity, that were to
her the very breath of life.
If it had been possible, she would not have told her children. She had
said nothing when she had received that letter from the lawyer—such an
absurd and pitiful letter, full of a sort of angry resentment, as if
she had been unjustly reproaching him. She had gone to see him at
once. She had been very quiet, very patient with him, and had asked
very few questions about what had happened. She simply wanted to know
exactly what there was left for her, and she learned that she would
have fifteen dollars a month.
So she had been obliged to write to her children, and they had all
wanted her immediately; but she chose her second son, because he lived
nearest, and she hadn’t enough money for a longer journey. Now she was
ready to go to his house.
She locked the bag and gave one more glance around the empty room.
“Well!” she said cheerfully. “That seems to be all!”
Mrs. Maxwell rose heavily from her chair.
“Jessica,” she said, not very steadily, “we’re going to miss you!”
Mrs. Deane also rose.
“Whoever else takes this room,” she added sternly, “it won’t be
_you_—and I don’t care what any one says, either!”
Mrs. Champney put an arm about each of them and smiled at them
affectionately. She was, in their old eyes, quite a young woman, full
of energy and courage, trim and smart in her dark suit and her
debonair little hat; but she had never before felt so terribly old and
discouraged.
She couldn’t even tell these dear old friends that she would see them
again soon, for in order to see them she would have either to get the
money for the railway ticket from her son, or else to invite them to
her daughter-in-law’s house. It hurt her to leave them like this—and
it was only the beginning.
At this point the landlady came toiling up the stairs.
“The taxi’s here, Mrs. Champney,” she said, with a sigh. “My, how
empty the room does look!”
So Mrs. Champney kissed the old ladies and went downstairs. The two
servants were waiting in the hall to say good-by to her. She smiled at
them. Then the landlady opened the front door, and Mrs. Champney went
out of the house, still smiling, went down the steps, and got into the
taxi.
She sat up very straight in the cab, a valiant little figure, dressed
in her best shoes, with spotless white gloves, and her precious sable
stole about her shoulders—and such pain and dread in her heart! There
was no one in the world who could quite understand what she felt in
this hour. To other people she was simply leaving a boarding house
where she had lived all by herself, and going to a good home where she
was heartily welcome, to a son whom she loved, a daughter-in-law of
whom she was very fond, and a grandchild who was almost the very best
of all her grandchildren; but to Mrs. Champney the journey was bitter
almost beyond endurance.
She loved her children with all the strength of her soul, but she had
been wise in her love. She had tried always to be a little aloof from
them, never to be too familiar, never to be tiresome. She had given
them all she had, all her love and care and sympathy, and she had
wanted nothing in return. She wished them to think of her, not as weak
and helpless, but as strong and enduring, and always ready to give.
And now—
“Now I’m going to be a mother-in-law,” she said to herself. “Oh,
please God, help me! Help me not to be a burden to Molly and Robert!
Help me to stand aside and to hold my tongue! Oh, please God, help me
_not_ to be a mother-in-law!”
II
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!”
III
It was not a comfortable meal for any of them, and Mrs. Champney was
glad when it was finished. She offered to help Molly with the dishes,
and she really wanted to do so; but when Molly refused, and she saw
that Robert didn’t like the idea, she did not persist. She went into
the little sitting room with Robert, and he settled her in an
armchair, putting behind her shoulders a plump cushion that made her
neck ache. He lit his pipe and began to move about restlessly.
“You know,” he began abruptly, “Molly’s not really—slovenly.”
“Robert!” cried Mrs. Champney. “What nonsense!”
“Yes, I know,” he said doggedly; “but I don’t want you to think—”
Mrs. Champney did not hear the rest of his speech. She was vaguely
aware that he was making excuses for Molly, but she did not stop him.
He had said enough. He had given her the key, and now she could
understand.
This was not pettiness, and Robert was not fussy. It was because he
loved Molly so much that he could not endure to have another person
see in her what might be construed as faults. If he had been alone
with Molly, he wouldn’t have cared, he wouldn’t even have noticed
these things. It was because his mother had come, and he was afraid.
It is an old and a deep-rooted thing, the child’s faith in the
mother’s judgment. If the mother has been honest and wise, if the
child has been never deceived or disappointed by her, then, no matter
how old he grows, or how far he may go from her, that old and
deep-rooted faith lives in him. Robert, at twenty-six, was surer of
himself than he was ever likely to be again. He was certain that all
his ideas were his own, and that no living creature could influence
him; yet he was terribly afraid of what his mother might think of
Molly.
For, after all, his mother was the standard, and the home she had made
for him in his boyhood must forever be the standard of homes. She
would see that this home of Molly’s was not like that. She would
think—
“You needn’t worry, my dear boy,” said Mrs. Champney gently. “I’m sure
I’ll understand Molly.”
And no more than that. It wouldn’t do to tell him what she really
thought of Molly. It would sound exaggerated and insincere. It would
startle him, and it might conceivably make him contrary; so she held
her tongue.
Presently Molly came in from the kitchen, flushed and smiling, and
sank into a chair.
“Take off that apron, old girl,” said Robert.
“Oh, I’m sorry!” said Molly. “I always forget!”
Robert took it away into the kitchen.
“Too tired for a song, Molly?” he asked when he returned.
“Of course I’m not!” said she, getting up again.
She was tired, though, and a little nervous, and Mrs. Champney felt
sorry for her; but Robert would have it so. His mother must see what
Molly could do. He lay back in his chair, smoking, with an air of
regal indifference, as if he were a young sultan who had commanded
this performance but was not much interested in it; but as a matter of
fact he was twice as nervous as Molly.
He had spoken to his mother before about Molly’s singing, and Mrs.
Champney had thought of it as an agreeable accomplishment for a son’s
wife, but this performance amazed her. This was not a parlor
accomplishment, this big, glorious voice, true and clear, effortless
because so perfectly managed. This was an art, and Molly was an
artist.
“Molly!” she cried, when the song was done. “Molly, my dear! I don’t
know what to say!”
Molly flushed with pleasure.
“I do love music,” she said. “I often hope Bobbetty will care about
it.”
“That was a darned silly song, though,” observed Robert.
Molly turned away hastily.
“I know it was!” she said cheerfully. But Mrs. Champney had seen the
tears come into her eyes. Molly was hurt. She didn’t understand, and
unfortunately Mrs. Champney did. She knew that Robert had been trying
to tell his mother that Molly could do even better than this—that she
could, if she chose, sing the most prodigious songs. He was afraid
that his mother would judge and condemn Molly for that darned silly
song about “the flowers all nodding on yonder hill.”
“That’s what being a mother-in-law really means,” said Mrs. Champney
to herself. “It means being the third person, the one who stands
outside and sees everything—all the poor, pitiful little faults and
weaknesses. Love won’t help. The more I love them, the more I can’t
help seeing, and they’ll know—they’ll always know. When Robert is
impatient, Molly will know that I’ve noticed it, and she’ll think she
has to notice it, too. When Molly is careless, Robert will imagine
that I’m blaming her, and he’ll feel ashamed of her. That’s why
mothers-in-law make trouble. It’s not because they always interfere,
or because they’re troublesome and domineering. It’s because they
_see_ all the little things that nobody ought to see—the little things
that would never grow important if a third person wasn’t there. I used
to feel so sorry for mothers-in-law. I used to think it was a vulgar,
heartless joke about their making trouble. A joke? Oh, it’s the worst,
most horrible joke in the world—because it’s true!”
IV
Mrs. Champney did not sleep well that night. When she first turned out
the light, a strange sort of panic seized her. She felt trapped, shut
in, here in this unfamiliar room, in this house where she had no
business to be, and yet could not leave. She got up and turned on the
light, and that was better, for she could think more clearly in the
light. She propped herself up on the pillows, pulled the blanket up to
her chin, and sat there, trying to find the way out.
“There always is a way out,” she thought. “It’s never necessary to do
a thing that injures other people. I must not stay here, or with any
of my children. If I think quietly and sensibly, I can—”
There was a knock at the door.
“Are you all right, mother?” asked Robert’s voice. “I saw your light.”
“Perfectly all right, dear boy!” she answered brightly. “I’m very
comfortable. Good night!”
“Sure?” he asked.
She wanted to jump up and go to him and kiss him—her dear, solemn,
anxious Robert; but that wouldn’t do. Never, never, while she had a
trace of dignity and honor, would she turn to her children for
reassurance. She was the mother. She could not always be strong, but
she could at least hide her weakness from her children. She could
endure her bad moments alone.
“Quite sure!” she answered, and snapped out the light. “There! I’m
going to sleep! Good night, my own dear, dear boy!”
“Good night, mother!” he answered.
His voice touched her so! If only she could let go, and be frail and
helpless, and allow her children to take care of her! They would be so
glad to do it—they would be so dear and kind!
“Shame on you, Jessica Champney!” she said to herself. “You weren’t an
old lady before you came here, and you’re not going to be one now.
You’re only fifty, and you’re well and strong. There must be any
number of things a healthy woman of fifty can do. Find them!”
And then, as if by inspiration, she thought of Emily Lyons.
The next morning, as soon as Robert had gone, she told Molly that she
wanted to “see about something”; and off she went, dressed in her best
again, and took the train to a near-by town. She was going to see Miss
Lyons. She had not met this old school friend for a good many years,
but she remembered her with affection and respect, and perhaps with a
little pity, because Emily had never married. She had devoted her life
to charitable work—an admirable existence, but, Mrs. Champney thought,
rather a forlorn one.
Her pity fled in haste, however, when she saw Emily.
A very earnest young secretary ushered the caller into a big, quiet,
sunny office, and there, behind a large desk, sat Miss Lyons. She rose
at once, and came forward with outstretched hands. Her blue eyes
behind the horn-rimmed spectacles were as friendly and kind as ever,
and yet Mrs. Champney’s heart sank. The Emily she wished to remember
was a thin, freckled girl with a long blond pigtail and a shy and
hesitating manner—an Emily who had very much looked up to the debonair
and popular Jessica. This was such a very different Emily—a person of
importance, of grave assurance, a person with a large, impressive
office at her command. To save her life Mrs. Champney couldn’t help
being impressed by offices and filing cabinets and typewriters.
She sat down, and she tried to talk in her usual blithe and amusing
way, but she knew that she was not succeeding at all. In the presence
of this new Emily she felt shockingly frivolous. She was sorry that
she had worn her white gloves and her sable stole. She wished that the
heels of her new shoes were not so high.
She told Emily that she wanted something to do.
“Do you mean charitable work, Jessica?” asked Miss Lyons.
“I’m afraid I’d have to be paid,” said Mrs. Champney, with a guilty
flush. “You see, Emily, I’ve had a—a financial disaster. Of course, my
children are only too willing, but—”
“They’re all married, aren’t they?” asked Emily.
Something in the grave, kindly tone of her question stung Mrs.
Champney into a sort of bitterness.
“Yes,” she answered. “All of them are married. I’m a mother-in-law,
Emily.”
Miss Lyons did not smile. She was silent for a time, looking down at
her polished desk as if she were consulting a crystal. Then she looked
up.
“We happen to need somebody in the Needlecraft Shop,” she said. “I
could give you that, Jessica, at eighteen dollars a week; but—”
“But what?” asked Mrs. Champney, after waiting a minute.
“I’m afraid you haven’t had much experience,” said Miss Lyons.
“I’ve done a good deal of parish work,” said Mrs. Champney anxiously.
She had known love, and happiness with the man she loved. She had
endured the anguish of losing him. She had borne three children and
brought them up. She had traveled a little in the world. She had even
known a “financial disaster” at fifty; but in the presence of Emily
Lyons she was ready to admit that she had had no experience—that her
sole qualification for any useful occupation was the parish work she
had done.
“If you’d like to try it, then,” said Emily gently. “I’ve found,
though, that women who have led a sheltered domestic life are inclined
to be a little oversensitive when it comes to business.”
Mrs. Champney, into whose sheltered domestic life had come only such
incidents as birth and death and illness and accident and so on, said
that she hoped she wasn’t silly.
“Of course you’re not, my dear!” said her old friend, taking her hand
across the desk. “You’re splendid! You always were!”
And Mrs. Champney had to be satisfied with that. She was to begin at
the Needlecraft Shop the next morning. She was at last to enter the
world; but instead of being filled with ambitious hopes and resolves,
she actually could think of nothing but how she was to tell Robert
about it.
The only possible way was to take a mighty high hand with him from the
start, and the trouble was that she didn’t feel high-handed. She felt
depressed, and tired and—yes, crushed—that was the word for it. She
was not going to let Robert suspect that, however, or Molly, either.
She decided to take her time about getting back. After leaving Emily,
she walked for a time through the streets of the brisk suburban town.
Then, seeing a clean little white-tiled restaurant, she went in there
and had her lunch. It was noon, and there were a good many other
business women there. Mrs. Champney tried to feel that she was one of
them now, but somehow she could not. Somehow the whole thing seemed
unreal, and even a little fantastic.
She mustn’t think that it was unreal or fantastic, or how could she
convince Robert? She tried to make it real by doing all sorts of
calculations based upon eighteen dollars a week. With that amount, and
with what was left of her income, she could manage to live by herself,
somewhere near Robert and Molly, where she could see them and the baby
often, and yet be independent. Once more she could be a fairy
godmother—with sadly clipped wings, to be sure, but still able to
bestow a little gift now and then.
She thought she would get something for Bobbetty now, and she bought
one of the nicest gray plush animals imaginable. The saleswoman said
it was a cat, but Mrs. Champney privately believed it to be a dog,
because of its drooping ears. Anyhow, it was a lovable animal, with a
frank and kindly expression and a most becoming leather collar. On the
train, going back, she regretfully took out its round yellow eyes, for
they were pins, and unless she forestalled him, Bobbetty would surely
do this.
Even then it was a lovable animal, and Bobbetty received it with warm
affection. He was sitting in his high chair in the kitchen, while
Molly cooked the dinner. He was almost austerely neat and clean after
his bath, and he was eating a bowl of Graham crackers and milk, with a
large bib tied under his chin. A model child—yet, in the sidelong
glance of his black eyes in the direction of the new bowwow, who was
not to be touched until supper was finished, Mrs. Champney saw a
thoughtful and alarming gleam. Bobbetty was not quite sure whether he
would continue being good, or whether it would be nicer suddenly and
violently to demand the bowwow.
Mrs. Champney helped him to choose the better course. She entertained
him while he ate, and then carried him off upstairs, with the bowwow,
and put him to bed. He became very garrulous then. He lay in his crib,
clasping the bowwow, and he told Mrs. Champney all sorts of
interesting things in such a polite, conversational tone that she felt
quite ashamed of herself for interrupting him and telling him to go to
sleep.
He was nice about it, however. He paid no attention to this rudeness,
but pleasantly went on talking. Even when she went out of the room and
closed the door behind her, she heard his bland little voice
continuing the story of a wild horsy who stampled on _six_ policemens.
Bobbetty was not yet three, but he had personality.
She was smiling as she went down the stairs—until she saw Robert. He
came to the foot of the stairs, watching her as she came toward him.
She had to meet his eyes, she had to smile again, but it was hard
beyond all measure.
She had never seen that look on his face before. He had always been
utterly loyal to her, had always loved her, but it had been after the
fashion of a boy. The look she saw on his face now was not a boy’s; it
was the profound compassion and tenderness of a man. It came to her,
with a stab of pain, that she had cruelly underrated her son. She had
thought of him as a dear and rather clumsy boy, and he was so much
more than that—so much more!
Her own affair seemed more fantastic than ever now. Here was Robert,
making his valiant battle in the world for the life and safety of his
wife and child. Here was Molly, busy with the vital needs of life,
with food and clothes, with the care of their child; and she herself
was going to work in the Needlecraft Shop.
She had to tell them, of course. When they were all seated at the
table, she did so, in the most casual, matter-of-fact way.
It was even worse than she had feared. Robert grew very white.
“You mean—a job?” he asked.
“It’s charitable work, really,” Mrs. Champney explained. “The
foreign-born women bring their needlework to the shop, and we sell it
on commission for them. The idea is to encourage their home
industries, and—”
“But you’re going to get paid for it?” asked Robert.
“Why, yes!” said Mrs. Champney brightly. “I’m sure I’ll enjoy the
work, too. I’ve always—”
“You mean you’re going off to work every morning in this shop?” said
Robert. “Do you mind telling me why?”
“Because I consider it very useful and interesting work, Robert,”
replied Mrs. Champney, with dignity.
There was a long silence.
“All right!” said Robert briefly.
She knew how terribly she had hurt him. He had wanted to do so much
for her, to take her into his home and protect her and care for her,
and she would not let him. She had turned away with a smile from all
that he had to offer. She would take nothing.
“I’ve always led—such an active life,” she said, in a very unsteady
voice. “I should think you could understand, Robert—”
“I do!” he said grimly.
“You don’t!” she cried. “You don’t! You—”
She could not go on. She bent her head and pretended to be cutting up
something on her plate, but she could not see clearly. He never would
understand that she was doing this only for love of him, only so that
she might not be here in his home as the sinister third person who saw
everything and—
She started at the touch of Molly’s hand on her arm.
“If that’s your way to be happy, darling,” said Robert’s wife, and
Mrs. Champney saw tears in her honest eyes.
V
Mrs. Champney envisaged her life as divided into epochs, each one with
its own significance and its own memories. There was her childhood,
there was her girlhood. There were the early days of her married life,
when she and her husband had been alone. There were the crowded and
anxious and wonderful years when her children had been little. There
was the beginning of her widowhood, overshadowed with anguish and
loneliness, yet with a dark beauty of its own. There was her tranquil
middle age, and there was her business life.
She had begun it on Tuesday, and this was Friday. It had lasted four
days, yet it seemed to her quite as long as all the years of her
youth. It seemed a lifetime in itself, in which she had acquired a new
and bitter wisdom.
The train stopped at her station, and, with a crowd of other
home-going commuters, Mrs. Champney got out and hurried up the steps
to the street, to catch a trolley car; but she was not quick enough.
By the time she got there the car was full, and she drew back and let
it go. She never was quick enough any more. She seemed to have been
transferred into a world of terrific speed and vigor, where she was
hopelessly outdistanced, hopelessly old and weary and slow.
She had thought, until this week, that she was a fairly intelligent
and energetic woman. She had even had her innocent little vanities;
but now, standing on the corner and looking after the car—
“I’m a silly, doddering old thing!” she said to herself, with a
trembling lip.
She remembered all the dreadful defeats and humiliations of the week.
She remembered how slow she had been about wrapping up things and
making change—how curt she had been with some of the wealthiest and
most important customers—how stupid she had been about understanding
the Polish and Italian women who brought in their work. She remembered
the weary patience of Miss Elliott, who managed the shop. Miss Elliott
was not more than twenty-eight, but she had been to Mrs. Champney like
a discouraged but long-suffering teacher with a very trying child.
“Doddering!” Mrs. Champney repeated.
She was alone on the corner. In this new world nobody waited for
anything. Those who, like herself, had missed the car, had at once set
off on foot; and Mrs. Champney decided to do so herself. It was less
than a mile—a pleasant walk in the soft April dusk.
This walk might have been specially designed by Miss Elliott to teach
Mrs. Champney another lesson; only it was a lesson that she had
already learned. She really needed no further demonstration of the
fact that she was fifty and utterly tired and miserable. It was
superfluous, it was cruel, and it made her angry. When she reached the
street where Robert’s little house stood, her heart was hot and bitter
with resentment.
“If they’d only let me alone!” she thought. “I don’t want any one to
speak to me or look at me. I know I’m unreasonable. I want to be
unreasonable. I want to be let alone!”
But of course she couldn’t be. Nobody can be let alone except those
who would give all the world for a little tiresome interference. Molly
saw at once how tired she was, and wanted her to lie down and have
dinner brought up to her. Robert, by saying nothing at all, was still
more difficult to endure.
“I’m not particularly tired, Molly, thank you,” said Mrs. Champney,
with great politeness.
What she wanted to do was to stamp her foot and cry:
“Let me alone! Let me alone! Tomorrow is Saturday, and the next day is
Sunday. You can talk to me on Sunday. Let me alone now!”
She sternly repressed all this. She sat down at the table and tried to
eat her dinner. She forced herself to remain in the sitting room until
ten o’clock.
“In a week or two I’ll go away and get a room for myself,” she
thought, “where I can be as tired as I like!”
When the clock struck ten, she sat still and counted up to five
hundred, so that she wouldn’t seem like a tired person in a dreadful
hurry to get to bed. Then she rose, said good night to Robert and
Molly, and went upstairs.
Even then she would not slight or omit any detail of her routine. She
washed, rubbed cold cream into her hands, braided her hair, folded her
clothes neatly, ready for the morning, and knelt down to say her
prayers. Then she turned out the light, opened the window, and got
into bed; and she was so glad to be there, so glad to lay her tired
gray head on the pillow, that she cried.
She was ashamed of this weakness, and meant to struggle against it;
but sleep came before she had driven it away—a heavy and sorrowful
sleep, colored with the mist of tears.
She slept. Then she sighed, and stirred in her sleep. Something was
coming through into the shadowy world of dreams—something imperious
and menacing. She didn’t want to wake up, but something was forcing
her to do so. She heard something calling.
She sat up suddenly. It was a child’s voice calling “Mother!”—a sound
which would, she thought, have reached her even in heaven.
“Mother! Mother! I _want_ you!” It was Bobbetty screaming that, and no
one answered him. “I want you, mother!”
“What’s the matter with Molly?” thought Mrs. Champney in a blaze of
anger.
She got out of bed and hurried barefooted across the room. That baby
voice was filling the whole house, the whole world, with its
heartbreaking cry:
“Mother! Mother!”
Mrs. Champney went out into the hall, and there she found Robert and
Molly standing in the dim light outside Bobbetty’s door—Molly with her
magnificent hair hanging loose about her shoulders, her face quite
desperate, tears rolling down her cheeks.
“What’s the matter?” cried Mrs. Champney.
“Hush!” whispered Robert. “Dr. Pinney said we weren’t to take him
up—said it was nothing but temper. I went in to see, and he’s
perfectly all right. He simply wants Molly to take him up.”
“But he’s—so little!” sobbed Molly, in a smothered voice.
“Mother! I want you, mother!” shrieked Bobbetty.
Molly made a move forward, but Robert clutched her arm. He, too, was
pale and desperate.
“No, Molly!” he said. “Dr. Pinney told us definitely—”
“Bah!” cried Mrs. Champney, in a tone that amazed both of them. “Dr.
Pinney, indeed!”
She opened the door of Bobbetty’s room, went in, snatched him out of
his crib, and carried him off, past his speechless parents, and into
her own room.
VI
Bobbetty’s hand was flung out and fell, soft and limp, across Mrs.
Champney’s face. She opened her eyes. The dawn was stealing into the
room, coming like music. One drowsy little bird was awake in the
world, piping sweetly. The breeze came, fluttering the window curtain,
and it seemed to her that she could hear the footsteps of the glorious
sun coming up the sky. All creation waited for him—waited breathless,
to break into a great chorus of ecstasy when he appeared.
Bobbetty was waking, too. His hard little head bumped against her
shoulder. His toes moved softly, he scowled, his great black eyes
opened, he looked sternly into her face, and then he smiled.
“Gramma!” he said contentedly, and sat up.
“We must be very quiet, not to wake mother,” said Mrs. Champney.
“Why?” asked Bobbetty.
In his superb arrogance he looked upon his mother somewhat as he
looked upon the sun. She existed solely for him. He adored her and he
needed her—that was why she existed. Mrs. Champney did not trouble to
explain. He would learn soon enough how very many other people there
were in this world, and that it was not his own world and his own sun
at all. In the meantime, let him make the most of it. She said that
they would surprise mother, and the idea appealed to Bobbetty. He said
he would be as quiet as a mouse, and so he was.
Mrs. Champney got his ridiculous little garments and dressed him. She
knelt at his feet to put on his stubby sandals. She even kissed his
feet, and his hands, and his warm, olive-tinted cheeks, and the back
of his neck. He smiled upon her, condescendingly but kindly.
Then she carried him down into the kitchen. He was a plump and sturdy
baby, but he was no burden to her arms. She wasn’t tired now. Indeed,
she thought she had never in her life felt so gay and light and happy.
The sun had come, and the kitchen was filled with it. The aluminium
saucepans glittered like silver, and the water ran out of the tap in a
rainbow spray. She laid the table in the dining room, and Bobbetty
followed her back and forth, carrying the less dangerous things.
There was a wonderful perfume in the air—the intangible sweetness of
spring—and with it, and no less wonderful, was the homely fragrance of
coffee and oatmeal and bacon. It was a divine hour, and Bobbetty knew
it. Bobbetty could share it with her—he and he alone.
He dropped a loaf of bread that he was carrying, and, moved by
impulse, kicked it across the room. Mrs. Champney picked it up,
without a word of reproof. She knew how Bobbetty felt.
Then she drew the chairs up to the table—and made her great discovery.
“There are four chairs!” she cried aloud. “There are four of us! Why,
I’m not the third person at all!”
She was so overcome by this that she sat down, and stared before her
with a dazed look.
“There were three already—I’m the fourth, and four’s such a nice
number! I can’t go away and leave Robert and Molly alone together.
They’ll never be alone together any more—there’s Bobbetty. I can help
so much! They’re both so very, very young, and I could do so much!
Molly could have time for music. There are two buttons off Bobbetty’s
underwaist. Mother-in-law, indeed!”
She heard the percolator boiling too hard, and she got up. In the
kitchen doorway she met Bobbetty with the bowwow.
“Bobbetty!” she said. “Do you know something?”
“Yes, I do!” shouted the child.
But Mrs. Champney told him, anyhow.
“Bobbetty,” she said, “there’s a Lucy Stone League for women who don’t
want to use their husbands’ names. I believe I’ll start a Jessica
Champney League for women who refuse to be called mothers-in-law.
There’s really no such thing as a mother-in-law, Bobbetty. It’s just a
joke, and a very nasty one. Really and truly, Bobbetty, there are
nothing but mothers-in-nature. I think I’ll invent some other word.
Why not ‘husbandsmother,’ or ‘wifesmother,’ or—”
Molly appeared before her, evidently in great distress.
“Oh, mother darling!” she cried. “You shouldn’t have done this! You
shouldn’t be up so early! You’ll be tired out before you start!”
Mrs. Champney stirred the oatmeal, which was bubbling and spouting
like molten lava.
“I don’t believe I will go,” she said. “It seems—such a waste of time.
I think I’ll stay home, and help you, and be a grandmother. I’ve tried
everything else, and I believe I’d do well at that.”
Molly stared for a moment. Then she ran to the foot of the stairs.
“Robert!” she called, in her ringing, joyous voice. “Robert! Mother’s
going to stay home!”
[Transcriber’s Note: This story appeared in the November 1925 issue of
Munsey’s Magazine.]
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