"Yes, her diary—or, rather, diaries. I found them a month ago among father's things. I can't tell you what was in them. I wouldn't, of course, if I could. They're too—sacred. Perhaps you think even I should not have read them; perhaps I shouldn't. But I did, and I'm glad I did; and I believe she'd have wanted me to.
"Of course, at first, when I picked one of them up, I didn't know what it was. Then I saw my name, and I read—page after page. I was a baby—her baby. Gleason, can you imagine what it would be to look deep down into the soul of a good woman and read there all her love, hopes, prayers, and ambitions for her boy—and then suddenly realize that you yourself were that boy?"
There was no answer; and Burke, evidently expecting none, went on with the rush of abandonment that told of words suddenly freed from long restraint.
"I took up then the first one—the diary she kept that first year of her marriage; and if I had felt small and mean and unworthy before— On and on I read; and as I read, I began to see, dimly, what marriage means—for a woman. They were very poor then. Father was the grandson of the younger, runaway son, Joel, and had only his trade and his day wages. They lived in a shabby little cottage on Mill Street, long since destroyed. This house belonged to the other branch of the family, and was occupied by a rich old man and his daughter. Mother was gently reared, and was not used to work. Those first years of poverty and privation must have been wickedly hard for her. But the little diaries carried no complaints. They did carry weariness, often, and sometimes a pitiful terror lest she be not strong enough for what was before her, and so bring disappointment and grief to 'dear John.' But always, for 'dear John,' I could see there was to be nothing but encouragement and a steadfast holding forth of high aims and the assurance of ultimate success.
"Then, one by one, came the babies, with all the agony and fears and hopes they brought with them. Three came and slipped away into the great unknown before I came—to stay. About that time father's patents began to bring success, and soon the money was pouring in. They bought this house. It had been one of their dreams that they would buy it. The old man had died, and the daughter had married and moved away, and the house had been for sale for some time. So they bought it, and soon after I was born we came here to live. Then, when I was four years old, mother died.
"That is the story—the bald story. But that doesn't tell you anything of what those diaries were to me. In the light they shed I saw my own marriage—and I was ashamed. I never thought of marriage before from Helen's standpoint. I never thought what she had to suffer and endure, and adapt herself to. I know now. Of course, very soon after our marriage, I realized that she and I weren't suited to each other. But what of it? I had married her. I had effectually prevented her from finding happiness with any other man; yet it didn't seem to occur to me that I had thereby taken on myself the irrevocable duty of trying to make her happy. I have no doubt that my ways and aims and likes and dislikes annoyed her as much as hers did me. But it never occurred to me that my soft greens and browns and Beethoven harmonies got on her nerves just exactly as her pinks and purples and ragtime got on mine. I was never in the habit of looking at anybody's happiness but my own; and I wasn't happy. So I let fling, regardless."
Burke paused, and drew a long sigh. The doctor, puffing slowly at his cigar, sedulously kept his face the other way. The doctor, in his fancy, had already peopled the old room with a joyous Helen and Dorothy Elizabeth; and he feared, should he turn, that his face would sing a veritable Hallelujah Chorus—to the consequent amazement of his host.
"Mother had trials of her own—lots of them," resumed Burke, after a moment's silence. "She even had some not unlike mine, I believe, for I think I could read between the lines that dad was more than a bit careless at times in manner and speech compared to the polished ways of the men of her family and social circle. But mother neither whined nor ran away. She just smiled and kept bravely straight ahead; and by and by they were under her feet, where they belonged—all those things that plagued. But I—I both whined and ran away—because I didn't like the way my wife ate her soup and spread her bread. They seem so small now—all those little ways I hated—small beside the big things that really counted. Do you know? I believe if more people would stop making the little things big and the big things little, there'd be a whole heap more happiness lying around in this old world! And Helen—poor Helen! She tried— I know she tried. Lots of times, when I was reading in the diaries what mother said about dad,—how she mustn't let him get discouraged or downhearted; how she must tell him she just knew he was going to succeed,—lots of times then I'd think of Helen. Helen used to talk that way to me at the first! I wonder now if Helen kept a diary! And I can't help wondering if, supposing I had been a little less apt to notice the annoyances, and a little more inclined to see the good— Bah! There, there, old man, forgive me," he broke off, with a shrug. "I didn't mean to run on like this. I really didn't—for all the world like the heart-to-heart advice to the lovelorn in a daily news column!"
"I'm glad you did, Burke." The doctor's carefully controlled voice expressed cheery interest; that was all. "And now what do you propose to do?"
"Do? How? What do you mean?"