VII. MARTIN BATTLES WITH DUST
THE human animal is a strange spectacle to behold, let alone comprehend. Not infrequently he goes along for years developing a state of mind, a consistent attitude, and then having got it thoroughly established does something in distinct contradiction to it. Martin had never cared for music, but when one evening, a little more than a week after Rose's arrival, she suggested, with a laughing lilt, her fondness for it, he agreed that he had missed it in his home and, to Bill's and Mrs. Wade's unbelieving surprise, dwelt at length upon his enjoyment of Fallon's band and his longing to blow a cornet. A little later, finding an excuse to leave, he drove into town on a mission so foreign to his iron-clad character that it seemed to cry against his every instinct, but which, for all that, he did with such simplicity as to indicate that it was the most natural step imaginable. He actually bought a two-hundred-dollar mahogany Victrola and an assortment of records, bringing both home with him in his car and, assisted eagerly by Bill, carrying them into the front room with an air that said it was a purchase he had been intending to make for a long time. Rose rewarded him with her bubbling delight and her aunt noticed with an odd constriction about her heart how Bill revelled at last in the new treasure, until now so hopelessly coveted. Martin had never shone to better advantage than this evening as he helped select and put on different pieces, lending himself to the mood of each. It was while a foot-stirring dance was on that Rose asked suddenly:
“Oh, Uncle Martin, do you know how?”
He shook his head. “You'll have to teach me to square up for learning to drive the car.”
“That's a bargain; and I'll teach Bill too,” she added with native tact. But Mrs. Wade, ill at ease in her own parlor, caught the afterthought quality of Rose's tone. There was no question but that it was for Martin she sparkled, sweet and spontaneous as she was. Decidedly, the time had come when definite action should not be delayed.
It was nearly twelve o'clock when they finally broke up and husband and wife found themselves alone in their own room. As they undressed, Mrs. Wade acted nervously, confused as to how to begin, while Martin whistled lightly and kept time by a slight bobbing of his head. She shot a meaning look in his direction.
“You seem happy, don't you?”
He stopped whistling instantly and assumed his more normal look of set sternness. This was the man she knew and she preferred him that way, rather than buoyant because of some other woman, even though that other was as lovable and innocent of any deliberate mischief as her niece. Not that she was jealous so much as she was hurt. When a woman has fortified herself, after years of the existence to which Mrs. Wade had submitted, with the final conviction that undoubtedly her husband's is a nature that cannot be other than it is, and then learns there are emotional potentialities not yet plumbed, not to mention a capacity for pleasant comradeship of which he has never vouchsafed her an inkling, she finds herself being ground between the millstones of an aching admission of her own deficiencies and a tattered, but rebellious, pride.
Martin, when her remark concerning his apparent happiness had registered, let his answer be a sober inspection of the garment he had just removed.