



Produced by Barry Abrahamsen and The Online Distributed
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                     Little Stories of Married Life




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               “I ken far lands to wifeless men unknown.”




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[Illustration: “He kissed the laughing children as they clung to him”
“THE HAPPIEST TIME,” Page 114]




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                           Little Stories of
                              Married Life

                                   By

                          Mary Stewart Cutting

                       [Illustration: Decoration]

                         GARDEN CITY   NEW YORK
                       DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
                                  1920




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                          Copyright, 1902, by
                         Doubleday, Page & Co.

                          Copyright, 1896, by
                           S. S. McClure Co.

                          Copyright, 1899, by
                           S. S. McClure Co.

                          Copyright, 1902, by
                           S. S. McClure Co.




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                                Contents


                   Their Second Marriage           1

                   A Good Dinner                  23

                   The Strength of Ten            45

                   In the Reign of Quintilia      73

                   The Happiest Time              93

                   In the Married Quarters       115

                   Mrs. Atwood’s Outer           139
                     Raiment

                   Fairy Gold                    159

                   A Matrimonial Episode         181

                   Not a Sad Story               199

                   Wings                         225




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                         Their Second Marriage




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                         Their Second Marriage


“HENRY, do you know what day Thursday will be?”

“Thursday? The twenty-first.”

“Yes, and what will the twenty-first be?”

“Thursday.”

“Oh, Henry!” Pretty Mrs. Waring looked tragically across the
breakfast-table at her husband, or rather at the newspaper that screened
him completely from her view. “Do put down that paper for a moment. I
never get a chance to speak to you any more in the morning, and I have
to spend the whole day alone. Do you really mean to say that you don’t
know what the twenty-first is?”

“The twenty-first?” Mr. Waring met his wife’s gaze blankly as he
hurriedly swallowed his coffee, and then furtively observed the hands of
the watch that lay open on the table before him. “What do you mean,
Doll? Say it quickly, for I’ve got to go.”

“Henry, have you forgotten that it is the anniversary of our wedding?”

“Oh—oh!” said Mr. Waring, a light dawning on him, and a suspicious note
of relief perceptible in his voice. He rose from his chair as he spoke.
“Forgotten that? Why, of course not; the day I was married to the
sweetest girl in the world! How lovely you did look, to be sure, and
what a lucky fellow I was to get you! _Can_ you just help me on with my
overcoat, dear? The lining of this sleeve—Yes, I know you haven’t had
time to mend it yet. Now, Doll, I would _like_ to stand here and kiss
you all day, but the train is whistling across the bridge. By, by, dear;
take good care of yourself and the babies!”

His wife watched him fondly as he walked down the path to the gate,
strong, alert, and masculine, and waved her hand as he looked back and
took off his hat to her with a smile before joining another man hurrying
for the train. She could see him almost visibly shut out the little
cottage from his mind as he turned away from it, and set his shoulders
squarely, as if to brace himself for entering the strenuous whirl of
business life that makes up the larger, waking half of a man’s life, and
in which wife and children have but a sub-existence. But this morning
Mrs. Waring did not feel the chill depression that sometimes stole over
her as she saw him disappear; her mind was too occupied with his words,
which, few and perfunctory as they might sound to the uninitiated,
carried deepest meaning to her ears. Her ardent mind conjured up the
picture of the girl in bridal attire who had stood beside her lover on
their marriage-day, and credited him with the same wealth of imagining
and all the tender sentiment connected with it. She fell into a
delightful dream of the romantic past, from which she was only aroused
by the patter of little feet above and the reminder that she was needed
in the nursery.

Mrs. Waring had, unknown to her husband, set her mind for some months
past on a celebration of her wedding anniversary, the observance of
which had lapsed, for one reason or another, for a couple of years; but
she had said to herself firmly that Henry must propose it, and not leave
it all to her. If she had to plan it out as she had their moving into
the country, or their trip to the seashore last summer, or the Christmas
party for the babies—nay, if she even had to suggest it to him, it would
be valueless to her. If he did not love her enough, if he did not have
her happiness enough at heart to think of pleasing her without being
reminded of it—why, she would have no celebration. It was entirely
against her resolution that she had spoken of it this morning, but she
knew in her soul that he never would remember if she did not, and she
could only think that, the date once recalled, the rest must follow.

She herself thought of nothing else all day. She told little Henry all
about mamma’s pretty wedding “once upon a time,” when mamma wore a
beautiful white dress with a long white veil, and walked up the aisle in
church when the organ played, and the chancel was full of roses and
palms; and although the child only asked innocently if there were any
bears or lions there, her small nurse-maid, Beesy, was deeply though
respectfully interested, and Mrs. Waring could not help being secretly
conscious that, while apparently engaged with her infant audience, she
was in reality playing to the gallery. She even got out her wedding
jewels to hang around baby Marjorie’s neck, to provoke Beesy’s
awestricken admiration.

It would have taken close study of the influences of the past year to
determine why this particular wedding anniversary should have assumed
such prominence in young Mrs. Waring’s mind. Both she and her husband
had been surprised to find that, in face of all preconceived opinions,
they had not settled down into the cool, platonic friendship held up to
them as the ultimate good of all wedded pairs, but were still honestly
and sincerely in love with each other. Yet, in spite of this fact, there
had lately been a certain strain. After all the first things are
over—the first year, which is seldom the crucial one in spite of its
conventional aspect in that light; after the first boy, and the first
girl, and the first venture at housekeeping in the suburbs—there comes a
long course of secondary living that tugs with its chain at character
and sometimes pulls it sharply from its stanchions.

Mrs. Waring greeted her husband that night with a countenance of soulful
meaning, and eyes that were uplifted to his in a fervid solemnity that
ought to have warned any man of peril ahead. She had a delightful
sensation that their most commonplace utterances were fraught with
repressed feeling, and when he finally said to her, after dinner, as
they sat by the little wood fire together, “I’ve a surprise for you,
Doll,” her heart gave a joyous bound, and she felt how truly he had
justified her thought of him.

“What is it, Henry?”

“Mother and Aunt Eliza and Mary Appleton and Nan are coming here to
lunch day after to-morrow—Thursday. Of course I said you’d be delighted.
It’s all right, isn’t it?”

“Coming on _Thursday_!”

“Yes. That isn’t a washing day or a cleaning day, is it?”

“No.”

Mr. Waring looked confounded.

“You’ve spoken so many times of their not coming out in the whole year
we’ve lived here, I thought you’d be glad, Doll.”

“Henry, why do you never call me Ethel any more? You used to say it was
the most beautiful name in the world, and now you seem to forget that I
have any name. Oh, if you knew how _sick_ I get of always being called
_Doll_! Such a horrid, common-sounding thing!”

“Why, Doll—”

“There it is again!”

“Ethel, my dear girl, don’t cry. If I had had the dimmest idea—I seem
always fated to do the wrong thing lately. Why can’t you tell me
sometimes what you’re driving at? If you don’t want my mother and the
girls, just say so. I can send them word to-morrow, and—”

“If you _do_!” Mrs. Waring stood up tragically with one hand on her
husband’s shoulder. “I wouldn’t have such a thing happen for worlds.”
She gave a little gasp of horror at the thought. “But, oh, Henry, you
nearly kill me sometimes! No, if you don’t know why this time, I shall
not tell you again.” She leaned her head against her husband as if
exhausted, and submitted to be drawn down beside him once more. “You
never think of me any more.”

“But I do think of you, sweetheart.” He patted her head persuasively.
“Lots of times, when you don’t know it. If you’d only tell me what you
want, dear. I’m such a bad guesser. And I know you really do wish to see
my mother and show her the children.”

“It’s the fourth time she has sent word that she was coming,” said his
wife pensively. She was already forecasting the plan of action to be
pursued in making ready for the expected guests.

When you are a young housekeeper with infants and only a nurse-maid
besides the cook, a day’s company means the revolutionizing of the
entire domestic machinery. In the city people carelessly come and go,
and the household of the entertainer is put to no special preparation
for them, but it is an unwritten law in the country that before the
advent of the seldom guest “to spend the day” the entire domicile must
be swept and garnished from top to bottom.

As Ethel Waring rubbed and polished and dusted she could but remember
that she had gone through the process of cleaning three times before for
Henry’s mother, who had always hitherto disappointed her. She prided
herself on being really fond of her mother-in-law, and his sister Nan
had been her particular friend, but Aunt Eliza and Mary Appleton were
the kind of people—well, the kind of people that belonged to her
husband’s family, and they always _saw_ everything around the house. She
cleaned now for the fourth time magnanimously. Since she had moved into
the country, and went to and from the city two or three times a week, it
had seemed odd to have her friends and relatives look upon the
half-hour’s journey in train and ferry-boat as a mighty undertaking, to
be planned for weeks ahead; and although she had been in her cottage
over a year, she had not yet become used to this point of view, and
still expected people to come after they had promised to.

There was something grimly sacrificial in her preparations now that
upheld her in her disappointment; her husband could not remember _her_
pleasure, but she was working her fingers off for his people. Yes, she
had nothing to look forward to but neglect—and the worst of it was that
he would not even know that he was neglecting her.

Perhaps, however, he did remember after all. She watched every word and
gesture of his up to the very morning of their anniversary. He was so
happy and merry and affectionate in his efforts to win her to smiles
that she could hardly withstand the infectiousness of it. But she felt
after his cheerful good-by as if the tragedy of her future years had
begun.

There was, indeed, no time for the luxury of quiet wretchedness. The two
children had to be bathed and put to bed for the morning nap, which both
she and Beesy prayed might be a long one, so that the last clearing up
might be done, and the table set, and the salad-dressing made, and the
cream whipped for the jelly, and she herself dressed and in the
drawing-room before twelve o’clock.

There was the usual panic when the butcher was late with the chickens,
and the discovery was made that the green grocer had not brought what
was ordered, and the usual hurried sending forth of Beesy to the village
at the last moment for the missing lettuce, only to be told that “there
was none in town this day”—a fact that smites the suburban housekeeper
like a blow. But finally everything was ready, the table set to
perfection, the drawing-room curtains drawn at their most effective
angle, the logs burning on the andirons, the chairs set most cozily, and
the vase of jonquils with their long, green stalks showing through the
clear glass, giving a lovely brightness to the room in their hint of
approaching spring. The babies, sweet and fresh, in the whitest of
frocks, and hair curled in little damp rings, ran up and down and
prattled beside the charmingly dressed, pretty mother, who sat with her
embroidery in hand and who could not help feeling somewhat of a glow of
satisfaction through her sadness. But after Harry had peeped out from
the curtains some twenty times to see if grandmamma was coming, and
little Marjorie had fallen down and raised a large bump on her forehead,
and the one-o’clock train had come in, there was a certain change in the
situation. The cook sent up word should she put on the oysters, and Mrs.
Waring answered no, to wait until the next train, although that did not
arrive until two o’clock. She pretended that her guests had missed the
earlier train, but in her soul she felt the cold chill of certainty that
they would not come.

As she sat eating her luncheon afterward in solitary state, and wishing
that she knew any of her neighbors well enough to ask them to join her,
she received a belated telegram from her husband: “Nan says party
postponed; Aunt Eliza has headache.” She read it, and cast it from her
scornfully.

And this was her wedding-day, passed in unnecessary work, futile
preparation for people who didn’t care a scrap for her! Oh, if she had
only been going in town that afternoon, as she had dreamed of doing, to
have a little dinner with Henry at the Waldorf, or Sherry’s, or the St.
Denis even—and go to a play afterward—she didn’t care where—and have
just their own little happy foolish time over it all! She had hardly
been anywhere since little Marjorie was born.

She was surprised to have a caller in the afternoon, a Mrs. Livermore.
The visitor was a large, stout woman with very blond hair, who lived on
the opposite corner. She was dressed in a magnificently florid style,
and sat in the little drawing-room a large mass of purple cloth and fur
and gleaming jet spangles, surmounted by curving plumes, that quite
dwarfed Mrs. Waring’s slender elegance. She apologized profusely for not
having called before, as illness had prevented her doing so, and sailed
at once smoothly off into a sea of medical terms, giving such an
intimate and minute account of the many diseases that had ravaged her
that poor Mrs. Waring paled. The one bright spot in her existence seemed
to have been her husband, whom she described as the most untiring of
nurses.

“I really didn’t know whether I’d find you at home this afternoon or
not,” she said. “Your nurse-girl, Beesy, told my cook that this was the
anniversary of your wedding. Willie and I always used to go off
somewhere for a little treat, but since I’ve been such an invalid I’ve
had to stay at home. But he never forgets. What do you think, Mrs.
Waring, every Saturday since our marriage, fourteen years ago, he has
brought me home a box of flowers! He always says, ‘Here are your roses,
Baby’—that’s his pet name for me. I don’t know what I’d do if Willie
wasn’t so attentive.”

“Indeed,” said Mrs. Waring.

On her return to the nursery she took occasion to reprove Beesy for
gossiping. Beesy was loud in extenuation. In a cottage one is thrown in
rather close companionship with one’s nurse-maid.

“Ah, I never said but two words to Ellen; but Mrs. Livermore—there’s
nothing she doesn’t find out. And the way she and Mr. Livermore
quar’ls!”

“Why, she says he is so devoted to her,” said Mrs. Waring incautiously.
“He brings her flowers every week.” She sighed as she thought of the
husband who did not bring them once a year.

“Him! Ah, ma’am, Ellen says they fights like cat and dog, and ’twas only
a week ago a-Monday the plates was flyin’ that thick in the dinin’-room,
Ellen she dassent put her head in at the door to take away the meat.
Ellen says ’twould have curdled y’r blood to hear ’em. The neighbors
have complained of ’em in the court. He drinks terrible!”

“You must not tell me these things, Beesy,” said Mrs. Waring with
dignity. “I do not wish to hear them. Come, Marjorie, sweetest, play
pat-a-cake with mamma—this way, baby darling. Oh, Beesy, there’s the
bell again!”

This time it was a neighbor whom Mrs. Waring had met before and rather
liked, a gentle, faded, sympathetic woman who had admired the children.
Mrs. Waring confided some of the household perplexities to her, and they
talked of the village markets and compared notes on prices, gradually
reaching even more personal ground. Mrs. Waring finally divulged the
fact that this was the anniversary of