"Why, I wouldn"t at all," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"Yes, you would," Miss Nicholl said. "You don"t know about how, when you can have so few things, you have to like the thing you can have. We can"t go to the Candlewick very often. It"s not at all cheap, I mean for us. You can hardly get out of there much under two dollars apiece with the tip. Listen to me! I bet you never heard of as little as two dollars."
"Now stop it," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"There"s another thing about the Candie-we call it the Candie to ourselves," Miss Nicholl said. "You have to get there pretty fairly early. It"s so small and it"s grown so popular you haven"t a chance of a table after six o"clock."
"But when you"re through dinner doesn"t that make an awfully long evening for you?" Mrs. Hazelton asked.
"That"s what we like," Miss Nicholl said. "We have to get up in the morning-we"re woiking goils, you know. Usually, when we go to the Candie, we make a real binge of it and go to a movie afterward. And sometimes, when we feel just wild, we go to the theater. But that"s pretty seldom. The price of tickets, these days!"
"You do?" Mrs. Hazelton asked. "You go to the theater alone together? Oh, I wouldn"t dare do that!"
"I don"t think anybody would try to hold us up," Miss Nicholl said. "And if they did, there"s two of us."
"I didn"t mean holdups," Mrs. Hazelton said. "It"s only I"ve always been told nothing ages a woman so much as being seen at the theater in the evening with just another woman."
"Oh, really?" Miss Nicholl said.
"Oh, it certainly doesn"t work with you," Mrs. Hazelton said. "Prob ably some silly old wives" tale, anyway. Well, but look. Suppose you don"t go to the movies or the theater. Then what do you do?"
"We just stay home and do our nails and put up our hair and talk," Miss Nicholl said.
"That must be a comfort," Mrs. Hazelton said. "To have somebody to talk to whenever you feel like it right there in the house. A great comfort."
"Well, yes, it is, you know," Miss Nicholl cried.
"It"s the only thing that could possibly make me give a thought to having another husband," Mrs. Hazelton said, slowly. "Somebody here, somebody to talk to you."
"Why, you"ve got Ewie!" Miss Nicholl cried.
"You"ve heard Ewie," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"Then some evenings," Miss Nicholl said, "when we don"t feel like going out or talking or anything, we just go to our own rooms and read. Idabel Christie, oh, she"s a wicked one! She works in a library, the way I"ve told you, and when she sees a book she knows I"d like, she hides it away for me, even if there"s a long waiting list. I suppose I"m as bad as she is, for taking it."
"I simply must order some books," Mrs. Hazelton said. "There"s not a new book in this house."
"Think of buying books, instead of borrowing them from a library!" Miss Nicholl said. "Think of being the first one to read them! Think of never having to touch another plastic jacket! Well, there"s not much use dreaming about buying books, when you haven"t got a decent rag to your back, is there? Oh, what a curse it is to be poor!"
"Mary Nicholl, no one would ever think about your being poor if you didn"t talk about it so much," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"I don"t care if they know," Miss Nicholl said. "I never heard that poverty was any disgrace. I"m not ashamed of it. However little money I may have, I earn every cent of it. There are some people who can"t say that much for themselves."
"I"m sure you ought to be very proud," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"Well, I am," Miss Nicholl said. "But I"d like to have just some clothes. The coat I"ve got to wear with this suit doesn"t belong to the skirt. The skirt it belongs to-moths ate the whole seat right out of it. That makes you feel chic, going around with your-with the whole seat out of your skirt."
"I thought what you have on looks awfully nice," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"Well, let"s talk about something prettier than my old rags," Miss Nicholl said. "I bet you"ve been getting yourself heaps and heaps of lovely new clothes, haven"t you?"
"Oh, I"ve picked up a few little things," Mrs. Hazelton said. "Noth ing very interesting. Would you like to see them?"
"Would I!" Miss Nicholl said.
"Well, come along," Mrs. Hazelton said. She rose, beautifully.
"Could I-" Miss Nicholl said. "I mean would I be awfully greedy if I just took what"s left in the shaker of the lovely little c.o.c.ktails?"
"Oh, of course," Mrs. Hazelton said. "I hope it"s still cold."
Bearing her gla.s.s, which the remnant in the shaker could fill only partway, Miss Nicholl followed her hostess to a room dedicated to great deep closets. She stood close as Mrs. Hazelton slid along poles hangers bearing dress after dress, the cost of the least of which would have been two years" rent to Miss Nicholl.
"But, they"re all new!" she cried. "All of them! Oh, what did you do with the old ones-the ones that weren"t even old, I mean. What did you do with them?"
"Oh, I don"t know," Mrs. Hazelton said. "Told Dellie to get rid of them somehow, I suppose. I was sick of the sight of them." It was apparent that the question had not interested her.
Miss Nicholl went to work, and put her shoulders into it. She piled up praises until she seemed to be building them into dizzy towers. Mrs. Hazelton did not speak, but there was encouragement in the way she looked distractedly about, as if searching her stores for something to give.
Higher and higher Miss Nicholl raised her towers; admiration glugged from her lips like syrup from a pitcher, and Mrs. Hazelton seemed again to be searching. Her quest stopped when she opened a drawer and took from it an evening purse covered with iridescent sequins. She insisted upon Miss Nicholl"s accepting it.
Mrs. Hazelton was not an ungenerous lady, but she was not subject to imagination. Her most recent Christmas gift to Miss Nicholl had been a big jar of bath salts and a tall flagon of after-shaving lotion. The four women who lived on Miss Nicholl"s floor shared its one bathroom. They all rose at the same hour in the morning; they retired at the same hour at night. To have commandeered the bathroom for the time required for lolling and anointing would have been considered, in their mildest phrase, piggish. So Miss Nicholl had set the unopened jar and flagon on her bureau, where they looked rich indeed and were much admired by Miss Christie. And now a sequinned purse, perfect to be carried with a ball gown.
Still, a present is a present, and Miss Nicholl positively writhed with grat.i.tude.
She took the purse back to the drawing room when they returned from reviewing the wardrobe, and put it in her big black oilcloth handbag which, half a block away, could hardly be told from patent leather. Dellie had been in, removed the c.o.c.ktail tray, and left no replacement. Miss Nicholl gave a little yelp as she saw darkness beyond the windows, and said she really ought to go. Mrs. Hazelton"s protest was neither voiced nor worded stiffly enough to cause her to change her mind. Mrs. Hazelton seemed, in fact, somewhat languid, almost, if it was conceivable that anyone like her could have had anything to make her tired, a trifle weary.
"Mustn"t take a chance on wearing out my welcome," Miss Nicholl said. "I always come dangerously near it, when I"m here-I can"t tear myself away." She looked around the room. "I just want to take the picture of this room away with me. Oh, I simply revel in all this wonderful s.p.a.ce!"
"Yes, s.p.a.ce is the greatest luxury to me," Mrs. Hazelton said.
Miss Nicholl made a small laugh. "It would be to me, too," she said, "but it"s the costliest, isn"t it? Or wouldn"t you know, lady fair? Well, fare thee well. Lovely, lovely time."
"Be sure to come again," Mrs. Hazelton said. "Don"t forget."
"I couldn"t do that, ever," Miss Nicholl said. "I"m that regular old bad penny. I"ll be turning up again before you know it."
"Well, I"ve got myself rather tangled up, all next week," Mrs. Hazelton said. "The week after, perhaps. Call up anyway."
"Oh, I will, never fear," Miss Nicholl said. "And thanks again, a zillion, for the wonderful evening purse. I"ll think of you every time I use it."
Miss Nicholl was going home by bus; before she reached the bus stop, a vicious rain and an ugly wind attacked her. Such demonstrations worked evilly upon her spirit. As she fought through the elements, she talked to herself furiously, though her lips never moved.
"Well, that was a fine visit, I must say. A half-a-shaker of c.o.c.ktails, and not even a cheese cracker. You"d think a person could do better than that, with all her money. And pushing me out in the pouring rain-never even suggesting staying to dinner. I suppose she"s got a lot of her rich society friends coming, and I"m not good enough to a.s.sociate with them. Not that I would have stayed, if she"d got down on her knees and begged me. I don"t want anything to do with those people, thank you very much. I"d just be bored sick.
"And those faded flowers. And that awful Dellie, with never a smile out of her, no matter how democratic you try to be to her. The first thing I"d have, if I was rich, would be nice-mannered servants. You can always tell a lady by her servants" manners. And that little dog-acts to me as if it was drugged.
"And all those clothes, on all those hangers. Why, it would take a girl twenty years old the rest of her life to wear half of them. Yes, and that"s just who they"re appropriate for, too-someone twenty years old. If there"s anything I hate to see, it"s a woman trying to keep young by dressing like a girl. Simply makes a laughing-stock of herself. And giving me that sequinned purse. What does she think I"m going to do with it, except stick it away in my bottom drawer? Because that"s where it"s going to go, with not even tissue paper around it-no, not even newspaper. Well, maybe I"ll show it to Idabel first. It must have cost a mint; Idabel will enjoy seeing it. Oh, my G.o.d, Idabel won"t be home. My whole afternoon, just wasted.
"Yes, and the gorgeous Mrs. Hazelton is putting on weight, too. She must be five pounds heavier than she was last time. My, it will just kill her to get fat. Just absolutely finish her. Well, she"ll put on many a pound before I telephone her again. She can call me when she wants to see me. And I"m not so sure I"ll come, either.
"And that child. That child doesn"t look right to me. So pale, and all. And all that talk about sickness and funerals. There"s no good behind that. It"s like some sort of sign. It will be a big surprise to me if that child ever makes old bones.
"Not that it"s the poor thing"s fault. Her mother doesn"t do a thing about her. Nothing but "Stop that, Ewie," and, "Don"t do that, Ewie." Ewie, indeed-what a name! Sheer affectation. It"s no wonder the poor thing likes that Dellie better than her mother. Oh, what a frightful thing it must be to have your own child turn from you! I don"t see how she can sleep nights.
"What kind of life is that, sitting around in a teagown, counting her pearls? Pearls that size are nothing but vulgar, anyway. Why should she have all those things? She"s never done anything-couldn"t even keep a husband. It"s awful to think of that empty existence; nothing to do but have breakfast in bed and spend money on herself. No, sir, she can have her pearls and her hangers and her money and her twice-a-week florist, and welcome to them. I swear, I wouldn"t change places with Alicia Hazelton for anything on earth!"
It is a strange thing, but it is a fact. Though it had every justification, a bolt did not swoop from the sky and strike Miss Nicholl down, then and there.
Mrs. Hazelton, when Miss Nicholl was gone, sank into her chair, crossed her incomparable ankles, and smoothed her chiffon folds. She breathed the soft long sigh that comes after duty well done, though with effort. That was the trouble with such as Miss Nicholl-once they came, G.o.d, how they stayed. Well. The poor thing was so delighted with that purse; how little it took! Those binges with Miss What"s-her-name from across the hall, in that tearoom with the little touches, the prune spin with cherries in it!
Ewie came in. "You know what?" she said. "Dellie"s sister"s husband is lots worse. Dellie"s sister telephoned, and Dellie says it sounds to her as if her sister"s husband is as good as a goner from what her sister says."
"I"m not interested," Mrs. Hazelton said. "It"s quite enough to listen to what Dellie says, all day long, without having to hear what her sister says too."
Ewie sat down, mainly on her shoulders and the back of her neck. "Miss Nicker isn"t very pretty, is she?" she said.
"Beauty isn"t everything," Mrs. Hazelton said.
"I think she"s the most terrible-looking person I ever saw," Ewie said. "And her clothes are something awful."
"They"re not awful at all," Mrs. Hazelton said. "She dresses herself very sensibly, for her type. You"re not to say a word against her, do you hear, Ewie? She"s a wonderful woman."
"Why is she?" Ewie asked.
"Well, she works very hard," Mrs. Hazelton said, "and she doesn"t do anybody any harm, and people like to do things for her because it gives her so much pleasure."
"I sort of feel sorry for her," Ewie said.
"You needn"t," Mrs. Hazelton said. "She has more than a good many people. Much more."
She looked around the big, beautiful room, sweet with shimmering blossoms. She touched the pearls about her throat, twined her fingers in the long rope, and glanced down at the delicate slippers that were made for her in Rome.
"What"s she got that"s so much more?" Ewie asked.
"Why," Mrs. Hazelton said, "she hasn"t any responsibilities, and she has a job that gives her something to do every day, and a nice room, and a lot of books to read, and she and her friend do all sorts of things in the evenings. Oh, let me tell you, I"d be more than glad to change places with Mary Nicholl!"
And again that bolt, though surely sufficiently provoked, stayed where it was, up in back of the blue.
Esquire, December 1958.
SKETCHES.
Our Tuesday Club.
MISS HARRIET MEEKER.
For the last decade, now, every time that Miss Meeker"s friends are gathered together-in the absence of Miss Meeker-someone is certain to "wonder why it is that Hettie Meeker has never married; she"d make such a splendid wife for some man." From constant repet.i.tion the speculation has rather lost its initial zest; in fact, the remark has come to be delivered a bit perfunctorily, and the responses it reaps, if any, are merely preoccupied nods or half-hearted generalities about man"s international stupidity in the matter of mate choosing. Indeed, only the loyalty of Miss Meeker"s friends keeps the ancient formula of wonder still in use, for the reason for her celibacy is as well known to them as it is to Miss Meeker herself. In so many words, no one has ever asked Miss Meeker to make any radical change in her mode of living. Yet Miss Meeker would, indeed, make a splendid wife for some man. No man would ever have a moment"s uncertainty about her affections. She would be the most enthusiastically exemplary of helpmates, almost aggressively contented with her home, resolutely good-humored, violently proud of her spouse, fiercely faithful, breathlessly interested in his every concern.
It is, indeed, in the quality of enthusiasm that Miss Meeker excels. She is vivacious to the verge of hysteria about everything; life is a succession of superlatives to her. Every jest, be it never so feeble, is the funniest thing she ever heard; every bit of gossip, be it never so mild, is the most thrilling thing she ever listened to. Her iron-bound high spirits have never been known to weaken. One cannot help but wonder if sometimes, in the maiden fastnesses of her chamber, Miss Meeker"s rigid exuberance ever relaxes, if her gleaming smile vanishes for a while, and her high laughter is temporarily stilled. But as to that, no one will ever be able to render a true report.
Somehow, there is about Miss Meeker the faintly unpleasant suggestion of an overzealous salesman. Her wares of good humor and vivacity are spread out a little too obtrusively; potential customers are intimidated by such a lavish display. Then, too, Miss Meeker is a victim of injudicious advertising. The publicity campaign which her friends have carried on for her has been along too broad lines. With admirable loyalty her friends long ago volunteered to put Miss Meeker"s matrimonial drive over the top; but in the excitement of the campaign they lost their heads and overdid things. They ceaselessly hymned her praises to every eligible man that they encountered; they doggedly had her to dinner and the theater and bridge and weekends with their husbands" unmarried friends; they constantly stressed her unparalleled fitness for the post of somebody"s wife. They lost no opportunities and they overlooked no bets. And all their devoted and conscientious work brought absolutely no results. Just a little more subtlety in publicity methods might have made a world of difference to Miss Meeker.
For the fact remains that she would make a splendid wife for some man.
MRS. FELIX THROOP.
It is one of Mrs. Throop"s most frequent remarks that she hasn"t had a well day since that period in the dim past which she refers to as "I don"t know when." It is not always the same complaint that prevents her feeling really herself; her scope of ailments is practically limitless. Sometimes she is attacked by one of the standard illnesses, spoken of by her in an affectionate possessive as "my rheumatism" or "one of my headaches." Again, it is a coy affliction, eluding the most expert diagnosis, a shooting pain, a heaviness, or a sort of a funny dull feeling. Whatever it may be, however, she is never unaccompanied by an ill of some sort. As she says herself, she really doesn"t see how she stands it.
In appearance Mrs. Throop is what has aptly been called the picture of health; she might be cla.s.sified as belonging to the extreme milkmaid type. To comment on this, though, is markedly to ruffle Mrs. Throop"s feelings, as well it may. For that healthy look, she explains, is the most insidious feature of her collective diseases. No matter what she may be suffering, she is always blooming to the eye. But, as she a.s.severates, never were appearances more deceptive than they are in her case; to use her own whimsical phrase, she could be dying and n.o.body would ever know it, to look at her. And it is indeed hard, as you can readily imagine, to be so defrauded of sympathy by an unfortunately buxom physique.
Another deplorable phase of her condition is her craving for food-abnormal, she feels it to be. When the refreshments are served at the club meetings Mrs. Throop sighs gloomily, as if at the ordeal that she must face. She protests courageously at first, insisting that "half of that is more than enough for me." The proved futility of protest depressing her, she lingeringly abandons it, and, once she gets under way, performs some really spectacular feats of consumption. Yet even at such inspired times she cannot wholly give herself over to the pleasures of the moment; always mindful of her afflictions, she murmurs darkly that she knows she will suffer for it tomorrow.
What remnant of health remains to her Mrs. Throop guards jealously. It is her favorite axiom that one cannot take too good care of oneself. It is impossible to enjoy her company without being conscious of the heady scent of camphorated oil, by which, as by an aura, she is always surrounded. She never under any condition omits her rubbers, and she is no believer in saving her umbrella for a rainy day. In fair weather as in foul it is her constant companion. The merest intangible rumor of an epidemic suffices to keep her cowering for weeks within doors. Her panic at the thought of germs is pitiful to behold. If she were ever brought face to face with a germ she would promptly lose consciousness from sheer terror.
So, one rather imagines, would the germ.
MRS. ALBERT CHENEY.
In appearance Mrs. Cheney is strikingly like Queen Mary of England, without the parasol. She is justifiably proud of this resemblance and heightens it by following as closely as possible in her dress the fashions set by her royal prototype, which means that she can buy nothing ready-made. She carries herself with a royal rigidity, holding her mouth shut, in a thin and slightly puckered line; yet this is not due to emulation of royalty so much as to the realization of her exalted position of wife of the head of the Cheney drop forge works and, as such, of her acknowledged leadership of society.
To listen to Mrs. Cheney"s abundant conversation is to marvel at the practiced ease with which she puts every subject in its place. When she speaks, it is as though the language contained no such weak-kneed phrases as "I think" or "It seems to me"; in her crisp statements a thing is so or it is not so; that is all. Uncompromisingly, she voices her opinions, as if well knowing that there could be no permissible others.
Mrs. Cheney is a positive genius at disposing of world problems in a single scathing sentence. Take, for instance, her att.i.tude on the issue of woman suffrage. "Perfectly ridiculous!" she is wont to exclaim contemptuously. "What should I want to vote for?" And there you have it. What, indeed, should Mrs. Albert Cheney want to vote for? So much for suffrage.
So does Mrs. Cheney settle all other problems. As there is no issue too great, so is there none too small for her attention. She can find time to settle the little problems of everyday life also. If asked about a play that she has seen, Mrs. Cheney will succinctly reply that it is good or it is bad. There is no quibbling, no allowance for personal biases, no concession to the possible taste of others. It is a good play or it is not a good play.
In like manner does Mrs. Cheney deal with all other questions, whether of literature or art, of servant keeping or child rearing, of etiquette or ethics. She p.r.o.nounces her dictum, and the subject is closed.
It is but natural, therefore, that Mrs. Cheney should wield the chief executive powers in our Tuesday Club. The members often remark, sagely, that you could go a long way before you could find a cleverer woman than Mrs. Cheney.
In which opinion they are heartily indorsed by Mrs. Cheney herself.
MISS IDA ODDIE.
Miss Oddie is one of those rare women who are born to be unmarried; one cannot possibly conceive of her in any other capacity. She makes little innocuous jokes about her spinsterhood, and in a spirit of gentle banter frequently refers to herself as an old maid. It is typical of Miss Oddie that any little jests which she might make would be at her own expense. She would perish rather than run the least chance of hurting anybody else"s feelings.
There is a persistent sweetness about Miss Oddie that will not be downed. In fact, she is so consistently sweet in her att.i.tude toward everything that one cannot help but detect a slight savor of monotony about her. This determined saccharinity of Miss Oddie"s is a phenomenon observable in many extremely unmarried women of a-as the saying goes-certain age; her unused affections have, as it were, turned to sugar; one might say that she has diabetes of the emotions.
Miss Oddie"s habitual att.i.tude is one of apology. She flutters timidly about, asking pardon by her manner for being in a state of existence. It is her laborious efforts to efface herself that render Miss Oddie so noticeable. It is she who insists on sitting upon the uncomfortable chair, who is always last through the door, who persistently holds the umbrella over her companion, reserving the drippings for herself. She will sit in a draft for hours at a stretch rather than trouble anyone to close the window. If by so doing she contracts a heavy cold, she bears it uncom plainingly, sweetly making the best of it.