THE ANNIVERSARY.
Having unexpectedly retained possession of my seat in the Tube the other evening I over-read myself and ran past my station, so it was rather late when I reached home.
"Hullo!" I called out cheerily.
"Hullo!" echoed Margaret in a flat sort of voice; "you back?"
I refrained from facetiousness and told her that I was.
"Oh!" she said.
"Well, well, Margaret," I said in a bright and bustling manner, "we haven't got on very well so far, have we? Can't you think of some subject on which we can conduct a conversation in words of more than one syllable? The skilful hostess should so frame her questions that not even the shyest visitor can fall back on a simple Yes or No. Now," I continued, spreading myself luxuriously over the chesterfield, "you know how shy I am. Try to draw me out, dear. I'm waiting."
I lit a cigarette. Margaret looked reproachfully at me.
"What was yesterday?" she said.
"Tuesday, my dear. We will now have a little chat about Tuesday. Coming as it does so soon after Monday, it not unnaturally exhibits—"
"Tuesday the 25th of February," said Margaret solemnly.
"Possibly, my dear, possibly. But I cannot say that I find your remarks very interesting. They may be true, or they may not, but they certainly seem to me to lack that agreeable whimsicality usually so characteristic of you."
"Our wedding-day," said Margaret impressively.
"Was it really?" I said in a whisper. "And you let it pass without reminding me. Oh, how could you?"
Margaret smiled.
"I didn't think of it till this morning—after you had gone," she said.
We both smiled. Then we laughed.
"You know, we really are a dreadful couple." I said. "Your fault is greater than mine, though. I'll tell you why. Everyone knows that a man—especially a manly man—" I tugged my moustache and let my biceps out for a run—"never remembers anniversaries, whereas a woman—a womanly woman—does." Here I plucked a daffodil from a bowl near by and tucked it coyly behind her ear.
"It really is rather awful of us." Margaret restored the daffodil to its young companions. "We've only been married three years, too, and yet already—" She threw out her arms in a hopeless gesture.
"Still," I said presently, with my hand full of her hand—"still I daresay we shall get used to it in time—forgetting the day, I mean. After about the fourth lapse there will be hardly any sting in our little piece of annual forgetfulness."
"We mustn't forget to remember we've forgotten it, though, Gerald, so that we can test the waning powers of the sting."
"I can see this habit growing on us," I said dreamily; "a few more years and we shall forget we are married even. I shall come home one day—provided I remember where we live—and be horrified to find you established in my house and using my sealing-wax. Or maybe I shall arrive with some little offering of early rhubarb or forced artichokes only to be sternly ordered away by a wife who does not recognise me. 'Please take your greens round to the tradesmen's entrance,' you will say coldly."
"I think," said Margaret, "that we ought to be extra nice to each other now, seeing how short our married life may be. Let's begin at once. You let me tidy your desk every day for you and—"
"Won't twice a week satisfy you?" I asked desperately.
"Perhaps; and anyway"—she put a little packet into my hand—"here's my present to you, even though you did forget yesterday."
"You are a dear, Margaret. And now I'll tell you something. It was—"
Just then James came in and announced dinner. James is all our staff; but her other name is Keziah, so we had no choice.
As we sat down I took a small box out of my pocket.
"Give this to your mistress, please," I said to James.
"O-o-o. How ripping of you, Gerald! So you did remember, after all."
"As soon as I got to the station this morning," I said, "I remembered that our wedding-day was to-day."
Margaret lifted her eyebrows at me. "To-day?"
"Yes. You are a little behind—or in front of—the times, I'm afraid. The twenty-fifth was a Tuesday last year, but it's trying Wednesday for a change now. Many Happy Returns of the Day, dear."
We both laughed.
"Now let's look at our presents," said Margaret happily.