Revelations of a Wife Part 34

"It is truly wonderful, d.i.c.ky," I returned, trying to make my voice enthusiastic.

I could have raved over the room, for I did think it exquisitely beautiful, had not my woman's intuition detected that another hand than d.i.c.ky's had helped in its preparation.

Only a woman's cunning fingers could have fas.h.i.+oned the curtains and the cus.h.i.+ons I saw in profusion about the room. I knew her ident.i.ty before d.i.c.ky, after pointing out in detail every article of which he was so proud, said hesitatingly:

"I wish, Madge, you would telephone Miss Draper and ask her to run over tomorrow and see the room. You see, I was so anxious to surprise you that I did not want to have you do any of the work, and she kindly did all of this needlework for me. I know she is very curious to see how her work looks."

"Of course, I will telephone Miss Draper if you wish it, d.i.c.ky, but don't you think you ought to do it yourself? She is your employee, not mine, and I never have seen her but twice in my life."

I flatter myself that my voice was as calm as if I had not the slightest emotional interest in the topic I was discussing. But in reality I was furiously angry. And I felt that I had reason to be.

"Now, that's a nice, catty thing to say!" d.i.c.ky exploded wrathfully.

"Hope you feel better, now you've got it off your chest. And you can just trot right along and telephone her yourself. Gee! you haven't been a martyr for months, have you?"

When d.i.c.ky takes that cutting, ironical tone, it fairly maddens me. I could not trust myself to speak, so I turned quickly and went out of the room which had become suddenly hateful to me, and found refuge in my own.

My exit was not so swift, however, but that I overheard words of my mother-in-law's, which were to remain in my mind.

"Richard," she exclaimed angrily, "you ought to be ashamed of yourself. You act like a silly fool over this model of yours. What business did you have asking her to do this needlework for you in the first place? You ought to have known Margaret would not like it."

I did not hear d.i.c.ky's reply, for I had reached my own room, and, closing and locking the door, I sat down by the window until I should be able to control my words and actions.

For one thing I had determined. I would not have a repet.i.tion of the scenes which d.i.c.ky's temper and my own sensitiveness had made of almost daily occurrence in the earlier months of our marriage. I could not bring myself to treat Grace Draper with the friendliness which d.i.c.ky appeared to wish from me, but at least I could keep from unseemly squabbling about her.

But my heart was heavy with misgiving concerning this friends.h.i.+p of d.i.c.ky's for his beautiful model, as I opened my door and went down the hall to d.i.c.ky's room. My mother-in-law's voice interrupted me.

"Come in here a minute," she said abruptly, as she trailed her flowing negligee past me into the living room.

As I followed her in, wondering, she closed the door behind her. I saw with amazement that her face was pale, her lips quivering with emotion.

"Child," she said, laying her hand with unwonted gentleness on my shoulder. "I want you to know that I entirely disapprove of this invitation which Richard has asked you to extend. Of course, you must use your own judgment in the matter, and it may be wise for you to do as he asks. But I want to be sure that you are not influenced by anything I may have said in the past about not opposing Richard in his whims.

"He is going too far in this thing," she went on. "I cannot counsel you. Each woman has to solve these problems for herself. But it may help you to know that I went through all this before you were born."

She turned swiftly and went up to her room again.

d.i.c.ky's father! She must mean her life with him! In a sudden, swift, pitying gleam of comprehension, I saw why my mother-in-law was so crabbed and disagreeable. Life had embittered her. I wondered miserably if my life with her son would leave similar marks upon my own soul.

XXIV

A SUMMER OF HAPPINESS THAT ENDS IN FEAR

I do not believe I shall ever know greater happiness than was mine in the weeks following Grace Draper's first visit to our Marvin home.

Many times I looked back to that night when I had lain sobbing on my bed, fighting the demon of jealousy and gasped in amazement at my own folly.

That evening had ended in d.i.c.ky's arms on our moonlight veranda, and ever since he had been the royal lover of the honeymoon days, which had preceded our first quarrel. I wondered vaguely sometimes if he had guessed the wild grief and jealousy which had consumed me on that night, but if he had any inkling of it he made no sign.

Grace Draper had gone out of our lives temporarily.

If I had needed rea.s.surance as to d.i.c.ky's real feeling for her, the manner in which he told me the news of her going would have given it to me.

"Blast the luck," he growled one evening, after reading a ma.n.u.script which he had been commissioned to ill.u.s.trate. "Here's something I'll need Draper for, and she's 200 miles away. I ought to have known better than to let her go."

The tone and words were exactly what he would have used if the girl had been a man or boy in his employ. Even in my surprise at his news, I recognized this, and my heart leaped exultantly. I was careful, however, to keep my voice nonchalant.

"Why, has Miss Draper gone away?" I asked.

"Oh, that's so, I didn't tell you," he returned carelessly, looking up from the ma.n.u.script. "Yes, she went away two days ago. She has a grandmother, or aunt, or old party of some kind, down in Pennsylvania, who is sick and has sent for her. Guess the old girl has scads of coin tucked away somewhere, and Draper thinks she'd better be around when the aged relative pa.s.ses in her checks. Bet a cooky she won't die at that, but if she's going to, I wish she'd hurry up about it. I need Draper badly, and she won't be back until the old girl either croaks or gets better."

Under other circ.u.mstances, the callousness of this speech, the coa.r.s.eness of some of the expressions, the calling of Miss Draper by her surname, would have grated upon me. But I was too rejoiced both at the girl's departure and the matter of fact way in which d.i.c.ky took it to be captious about the language in which he couched the news of her going.

"Grace Draper is gone, is gone." The words set themselves to a little tune, which lilted in my brain. I felt as if the only obstacle to my enjoyment of our summer in the country had been removed.

How I did revel in the long, beautiful summer days! d.i.c.ky appeared to have a great deal of leisure, in contrast to the days crowded with work, which had been his earlier in the spring.

"Each year I work like the devil in the spring so as to have the summer, June especially, comparatively free," he exclaimed one day when I commented on the fact that he had been to his studio but twice during the week.

I had dreamed in my girlhood of vacations like the one I was enjoying, but the dream had never been fulfilled before. d.i.c.ky had fixed up a tennis court on the, gra.s.sy stretch of lawn at the left of the house, and we played every day. Two horses from the livery were brought around two mornings each week, and, after a few trials, I was able to take comparatively long rides with d.i.c.ky through the exquisite country surrounding Marvin.

Our motor boat trips were frequent also, although d.i.c.ky found that it was more convenient to rent one when he wished it than to enter into any owners.h.i.+p arrangement with any one else.

Automobile trips, in which his mother joined us, long rambles through the woods and meadows which we took alone, little dinners at the numberless sh.o.r.e resorts, all these made a whirl of enjoyment for me unlike anything I had ever known.

I was careful to cater to my mother-in-law's wishes in every way I could. Either because of my attentions or of the beautiful summer days, she was much softened in manner, so that there was no unpleasantness anywhere.

"This is the bulliest vacation I ever spent," d.i.c.ky said one evening, after a long tramp through the woods. It was one of the frequent chilly evenings of a Long Island summer, when a fire is most acceptable. Katie had built a glorious fire of dry wood in the living room fireplace, and after dinner we stretched out lazily before it, Mother Graham and I in arm chairs, d.i.c.ky on a rug with cus.h.i.+ons bestowed comfortably around him.

"I am naturally very glad to hear that," I said, demurely, and d.i.c.ky laughed aloud.

"That's right, take all the credit to yourself," he said, teasingly.

Then as he saw a shadow on my face, for I never have learned to take his banter lightly, he added in a tone meant for my ear alone:

"But you are the real reason why it's so bully, old top."

The very next day, d.i.c.ky and I went for a long walk.

We had nearly reached the harbor, when I saw d.i.c.ky start suddenly, gaze fixedly at some one across the road, and then lift his hat in a formal, unsmiling greeting. My eyes followed his, and met the cool, half-quizzical ones of Grace Draper. She was accompanied by a tall, very good-looking youth, who was bending toward her so a.s.siduously that he did not see us at all.

"Why! I didn't know Miss Draper had returned," I said, wondering why d.i.c.ky had kept the knowledge from me.

"I didn't know it myself," d.i.c.ky answered, frowning. "Queer, she wouldn't call me up. Wonder who that jackanapes with her is, anyway."

d.i.c.ky was moody all the rest of the trip. I know that he has the most easily wounded feelings of any one in the world, and naturally he resented the fact that the beautiful model, whom he had befriended and who was his secretary and studio a.s.sistant, had returned from her trip without letting him know she was at home.