Peace in Friendship Village

to write my answer till after dinner, because it wouldn't go out until the four o'clock mail anyway. I kind of left the situatio

little baby to amuse myself with, and the whole world sitting around me, expansive, and waiting for me to enjoy

unno, but I did—sheer through instinct, I guess. And then I wrote my letter

105] I got down the first page. I'll be there Monday night. Do you care if I wear your table-spread for dress-up, whe

Call

nd Mis' Holcomb-that-was-Mame-Bliss, downtown to get

r shawl farther up her

she. "To think you're going to do someth

point, and

wish I had something to tell you about, or you had something to tell

e land we could do something—or be something—that would

ds and wives is awful sim

I wasn't married to one; and they di

g

ved her cheese

and then went home to cook

he two of them—that hadn't seen over the rim o

le after all, in spite of its foreign name, ending in a letter that no civilized name ought to end in. And never, never, not if I live till after my dying day, will I forget my

ith my eyes on her white embroidery cap, perked up on

d about them, but yours is the first one I ever saw. M

thing—'most as stiff as her

ough—and I see she was fr

g

e Marsh," I says, he

I guess not many pai

e expected," she says, an

make much more light than one, only spread it out more. The piano was open, and there was a vase of roses—in Winter! They seemed to have them, I

y eyes' four corners, while the rest of

rty, perpetual. But there was something else there in a white dress, too, sitting on her lap, with his pink, bare feet stretched out to the blaze. And he was laughing, and Ellen

g

says I—which was the fir

ightest notice of them. It was the baby I was engaged in. I'd never seen him before. In fact, I'd never seen Ellen and Russe

lar and my cameo pin and my best back comb. And then dinner was ready—a little, round

h my melon that came first, "why, you t

ys, looking

utely, radiantly

broke his bread, and nodded to b

n any decent man has a ri

now, I know that that very first [Pg 109]evening I begun noti

ned yesterday. They've got some great li

f you are,"

time, but I can't very well meet you there i

about a third as much

hen I'm along, you know,

isn't what I

eyes with her eyes. But I saw that he looked

he ain't along is a kind of joyful sacrifice,

me kind of a collection, and couldn't he come home some night early and ta

fun, half earnest, and waited for him to deny it. But he did

g

of your skin? By the time dinner was over, I knew most as much

on't have to be said or called or looked, but that just are. To my mind they mean a thousand times more. But I thought that in her heart she sort of hankered for the said

gs that you love even the names of. And when we went back, Ellen went to the piano and begun to play rambley things but low so's you could hardly hear them acros

'll come and turn the music,

more luxurious. But he got up, sort of a one-joint-at-a-time fashion, and came slumping over, with his hair stick

ow I'll just finish my

d into the fire. And I got up and went over and stared out the window. It seemed ki

her one of her. And that seems to me a terrible thing for any human bein

I was looking the city plain in the face. Rows and rows and fields of little lights from windows that were homes—and homes—and homes. I'd never seen so many homes in my life before, at any one time. And it came over me, as I looked, that in all the hundre

ing and the managing and took part care of the baby and mended up clothes and did the dozens of thing

ever once seen him take it out in his conversation with his wife merely because he had had a hard day. We'd just gone in

go over to Beldon'

r, and I remember how she

aid. "Have—have y

anted me to come in and h

g

only, and she went and

ame over and stooped down and kissed her. She kissed him, but she hard

ig chair where I had first seen her, and put her head on its arm, and cried—cried till her little should

led down beside her. "Oh, Calliope, Call

ays I, "

dn't you realize," she says, "that that is the first time my h

none, if I was to help her—and help him. And all at once I felt

man. For out of it there are likely to come down onto her the issues of either life or death; and the worst of it is th

idn't see anything at all, instead of s

't you understand," sh

ants a game of billiards, the way a

her head

at Russell had free, he wanted to spend with me. That Winter before we were married, do you suppos

ut then, you see, he couldn't be with you every eveni

he looks at it—There is no way in this world that I would rather

115] that's true of most wives. And it's something

"Then," says she, "they'll have

'll have to get over thinking that selfishness is love—for o

"To think," she says over, "that now it'll never, never be the same

her cry till it was time to go and feed the baby. And then she sat nursing him, and breathing long, sobbing

I'd got so old that I couldn't help in a thing like this, for I have a notion that there is nothi

of the apartment. And she came trotting i

g

ss Marsh," she says. "Mis'

ard, and I flew to the

vermore," says I. "Whe

t is the most backward-feeling of any of our women, was a step behind Mis' Toplady, and had hold of her arm. An

any, is there?" she s

"not a soul.

the girl, and she says she'd see. What's the use of b

why you've come. Is anything the matter? I see there ain't,

." She leaned forward in her chair. "We ain't com

117] fare a dollar and ninety-six cents each

"How long you g

is two-fifty just for us to sleep in it. I told him we shouldn

s I. "Tell me what

nd her and sighed—and anybody could of

tay overnight and one day on our chicken m

mb just gi

e while you was here, for an excuse. But we w

xamples of married contentment for thirty years on end, hand-running! It begun

he says, "the very best

I says. "You wait a minute.

g

—a mother laying a baby down. There's something in the stooping of her shoulders and the sweep of her skirt and the tender drooping of her face, with the lamp-light on

ys, "come out

en was a perfect picture of somebody's wife and a little baby's mother. Y

now so well so sudden. And two of them were nearly sixty, and one was not much past twenty; but the three

y, go ahead. You needn't mi

bit, Mis' Topla

in the fire that sort of sung—and Timothy set with his shoes off, as he so often does evenings, reading his newspaper and warming his stocking feet on the nickel of the stove. And all of a sudden I looked around at my dining-room, the way I'd looked at it evenings for thirty years or more, ever since we went to housekeeping, and I says to myself, 'I hate the sight of you, and I

't that you ain't fond of them, or that you ain't thankful you're their[Pg 120] wife, but that you've just got to have things that's different and interesting and—and tellable. Anyhow, that's the way Mame and I figgered it out. And we got into our good clothes, and we came up to the city, and went to the hotel, and got us a b

th her little laugh again

appearances, same as some. Mis' Toplady and Mis' Holcomb didn't look any more like her city friends than a cat's ta

are going back to

home in time to cook supper as na

they'd come for a change, and all they'd got was two street-car rides[Pg 121] a

llen sat up strai

ight o'clock. Why can't the f

ort of gasped,

they

Delia can stay with the baby. I'll telephone for a taxi. We can dec

, in one breath

as anybody—I hadn't been to a play in years. Ellen told us what there was as we went down, but they might have b

t up, where do you think she took us? Into a box! It was so dark that Mis' Toplady and Ma

different to do. But even more, I was watching Ellen, that had set out to make them have a good time, and was doing her best at it, getting them to talk

get back to the baby, so we left t

we were leaving. "My land, and my hat's tr

ays Mis' Toplady. "Won't they just

it was the wedding-trip poplin dress, or the thought of the two dining-rooms where they'd set for so l

e after us, and it was little bit of Mame Holcomb, look

as—what this means to us. And I[Pg 123] wanted you to know—we b

we came out in the hall, all light and red c

n," I says, "I thank you, too—ever so

s "But, Calliope, how in the world d

it, right

, and on up to divorce, come about sole because married folks will

we'd got there first, before Russell. I was glad of that. Ellen ran right down the hall to the baby's room, an

rst I knew, he was standing with his back to the fire, filling his p

ty air, and his cheeks were ruddy. He was smiling a little at something or other, and al

er door click, and Ell

efore he had married Ellen. And yet, honestly, when he looked up then, his face and his eyes were like those of a boy that had done something that he had been scolded for. He looked kind of apol

easy chair, crying and taking on. And I waited for her to come in, feeling as i

e clouds and the sky. But it was her face I looked at, because I remembered the set look it had when she'd told Russ

et and casual, "put a stick of wood

it would of if I'd heard her say "I will" when

nd sat on the low chair beside her, where I'd seen him first

?" she asks, still with that ble

e. "I did," he owns up. "You're my wife, and I

idn't mean a thing to me, but that must have meant to her

Do you know, you look a lot better than you did when you c

about an evening like that with half a dozen of 'em—it i

g

about it too long. She just nodded, and pretty soon she told him some little thi

er back in the chair again, and moved so that h

omething to

"What? Me?"—which I'd noticed was one of the little fa

t, when I went out to go over to Beldon

ays. "What made

I don't know. I imagined it, I guess," sa

d; and he said

t want to come

e home?" she say

"I thought probably—I don't know. I imagined you were going to be[Pg

says, "w

'd say if they didn't get home, I joined in with them, and

" she said. "Oh, Russell, I should hate th

dead sorry. But I wanted

efore her, with her h

this makes me—gladder than the dickens. Not for the reason you might think—

Most men don't, except for the

u see? It makes me so sure you're m

I knew how balm and oil were curing the hurt that

hings[Pg 128]—and coming home and tellin

hings, too?" s

phatic. "Haven't you seen that I want you to

you look at it?

a gay little jerk, and

n. If we really love each other, being married is

ays, "how did yo

ays. "How does anybo

way Ellen looked when

body enough, I

p short to wonder

out, if it comes

. "Oh, I found out—b

ady and Mame being

had burned down, and everything[Pg 129] acted like eleven-o'cl

Calliope and two friends of hers to the dog show. And

hed lik

ybe I can drop

FOOTNOTE

16, Pictorial Review.