"Are you ill, madame? Here!" and she held a glass of water to my lips.
I drank it and motioned her away.
"I'll be all right in a moment," I murmured. "Thank you, but I am quite well."
So this was what marriage would mean to me, a contest with another woman for my husband's love! A fierce anger took possession of me. One moment I regretted my marriage to Dicky, the next I was fiercely primitive as any savage woman in my desire to crush my rival. I could have strangled Lillian Gale in that moment. Then common sense came back to me. What was it that woman had said? I had all the best cards in my hand? Well! I would play them. I felt sure that Dicky loved me. I would not jeopardize that love for a temporary pride. I would eliminate Lillian Gale from Dicky's life, but I would bide my time to do it.
IV
DIVIDED OPINIONS
If anybody wishes an infallible recipe for taking the romance out of life, I can recommend washing a pile of dishes which have been left over from the day before, especially if there be among them a number of greasy pots and pans. Restoring order to a badly cluttered room is another glamour destroyer, but the first prize, I stoutly affirm, goes to the dishes.
An especially aggravating collection of romance shatterers awaited me the morning after our visit to the theatre, and my first encounter with Lillian Gale.
Dicky took a hurried breakfast and rushed off to the studio, while I spent a dreary forenoon washing the dishes and putting the apartment to rights. I dreaded the discussion with Dicky at luncheon. I had insisted before my marriage that I must either do most of the housework, or keep up some of my old work to add to our income. To have a maid, while I did nothing to justify my existence save keep myself pretty and entertain Dicky, savored too much to me of the harem favorite.
A mother of small children, a woman with a large house, one who had old people to care for, or whose health was not good, was justified in having help. But for me, well, strong, with a tiny apartment, and just Dicky, to employ a maid without myself earning at least enough to pay for the extra expense of having her—it was simply impossible. I had been independent too long. The situation was galling.
The postman's ring interrupted my thoughts. I went to the door, receiving a number of advertisements, a letter or two for Dicky, and one, addressed in an unfamiliar handwriting, to myself. I opened it and read it wonderingly.