The collected stories of Elisabeth Sanxay Holding from Munsey's Magazine, 1920-1928

MUNSEY’S MAGAZINE
DECEMBER, 1921 Vol. LXXIV NUMBER 3
By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding
Author of “Angelica”
SHE had got used to Andrew’s forgetting all sorts of important anniversaries. In fact, she rather liked him to do so. It gave her something to forgive, and fed her measureless indulgence. All his eccentricities, his absurdities, his brilliant and explosive energy, his terrible exactions, constituted “Andy’s ways,” which she loved with a deep and pitying love.
Even if he was clever and successful and attractive, he couldn’t do the things she could do so easily and so well. He couldn’t darn his own socks or cook a dinner or make a bed. She insisted that he was helpless—that all men were helpless. She was the sort of woman who would have pitied Julius Cæsar because he couldn’t make an omelet.
Something of this kindly indulgence was reflected upon her nice face as she sat in the library sewing and waiting for Andrew. She was a handsome, dignified, good-tempered woman of thirty-five, who was never to be taken by surprise. No matter what might happen, she would raise her eyebrows and smile and say, “Well?”—which was her nice, kind way of saying, “I told you so!”
And generally she had told you so, because, like so many other unimaginative people, she could almost always foresee ordinary consequences. Her prognostications were based, not upon probabilities, but upon experience.
It was the tenth anniversary of their wedding—an important day in a household. And yet, knowing Andrew as she did, Marian had made no preparations for festivity, because he was as likely as not to forget or to neglect even a special dinner. She would remind him when he came in, and smile at him, and he would be startled and contrite. She would not acknowledge the little wound that was there, even to herself.
Nor would she acknowledge what she really knew quite well—that Andy wasn’t happy, as she was. Hadn’t she provided him with all the materials for happiness—a lovely, peaceful home, three pretty, healthy children, and just the social background he required?