Her husband seemed to shrink at the cheaply aspiring phrase, then looked at her with something like the patience of one who refuses to be hurt.
“So now you want to be the breadwinner too, my dear?”
Perhaps she took that for jocosity. She did not answer directly.
“I met Mrs. Brownley—the Mrs. Brownley—at a meeting not long ago. She said she thought there would be a future for me.”
“No doubt,” said her husband, again.
He gazed into the sausage platter reflectively.
Twenty years ago, he might have remembered, Adeline Miller had thought there was a future for him. She had intended to better herself through him. She was teaching then in a little town and he was county superintendent. They had met and been attracted and after a little she had condoned the fact of his Swedish name and of the two parents who spoke no English. She had exchanged the name of Miller for Thorstad, soberly, definitely determined to better herself and profit by the change.
Then there came Freda. Freda, who had stimulated them both as healthy promising babies are likely to stimulate their parents. Thorstad had become a High School instructor, then had left that position after eight years to come as assistant to the professor of psychology in the Mohawk State Normal School, at a slightly lower salary, but “bettering himself.” Ten years ago, that was. He was head of his department now—at three thousand a year. It was his natural height and he had attained it—not a prospector in his work, but a good instructor always. It had taken much labor to have come so far, nights of study, summers spent in boarding houses near the University that he might get his degrees. And Adeline had gone along her own path. During all these years in Mohawk she had been busy too. First with little literary clubs, later with civic councils, state federations, all the intricate machinery of woman’s clubdom.
She had her rewards. Federation meetings in the cities, little speeches which she made with increasing skill. She had been “speaking” for a long time now. During the war she fortified her position with volunteer speaking for Liberty Loans, War Saving Stamps. All this in the name of “bettering others.” All this with that guiding impulse to “better herself.”
Her husband made no demands on her time which interfered with any public work. If it was necessary he could cook his own meals, make his own bed, even do his own washing, and there had been times when he had done all this for himself and Freda. Not that Mrs. Thorstad ever neglected her family. The Family, like Democracy and the Cradle, were three strong talking points always. She was a fair cook and a good housekeeper, a little mechanical in her routine but always adequate. And when she was away she always left a batch of bread and doughnuts and cookies. It was never hard on Eric and he, unlike some men, was handy around the house. He was handy with Freda too from the time he dressed her as a baby until now. Now he was handy with her moods, with her incomprehensible unwillingness to better herself by sharing in her mother’s plans.