Mrs. Waring cooled suddenly toward this too sympathetic visitor, who soon left, but the words had left a secret sting. Her voice had a tragic sound when she told Beesy that she would order her meat henceforth from Einstein, as Mrs. Morris said that his prices were lower than O’Reilly’s.
“Mrs. Morris, ma’am!” caroled Beesy. “Ah, ma’am, you wouldn’t be after eatin’ the kind of stuff she does. It’s not a roast of beef that does be going in at that house from one week’s end to another—nothin’ but little weenty scraps that wouldn’t keep a dog alive. Mr. Morris, poor man, he’s that thin and wake. Oh, ’tis she has all the money, and she keeps him that close! Ellen says ’tis only a quart of milk goes to them for five days, and nobbut one shovelful of coal allowed to be put on the furnace at a time, and him with the cough that’s tearing the heart out of him! Ellen says—”
“That will do, Beesy,” said Mrs. Waring severely. The gossip of servants, the trivial conversation and fulsome pity of vulgar neighbors, was this all that was left to her?
She went downstairs again, and sat in the drawing-room, inside of the window curtains, and wept. The gathering dusk seemed to prefigure the gloom that was to encompass her future years. If people only wouldn’t pity her she might be able to live; the children would love her at any rate. Six years ago how happy she was, how dear his eyes looked when he gave her that first married kiss! She could smell even now the fragrance of the bride roses that she had held. She heard the patter of the children’s feet overhead, and tried to wipe away the blinding tears.
A quick footstep on the walk outside startled her, and the gate slammed to with a loud noise. Could it be possible? Her husband was running up the piazza steps with something white in his hand—an enormous bunch of white roses. Another moment and he was by her side, beaming down at her. Oh, how handsome he was!
“How soon can you get on your things, Doll? I’ve tickets for the opera to-night—‘Romeo and Juliet’—Emma Eames and Jean de Reszke—does that suit you?”
“Oh, Henry!”
“I’ve brought some flowers, and we’ll make a lark of it. I’ve ordered a cab from the station to be here in twenty minutes, and we’ll have to dress and get a bite, too, if we can. I wanted to come out earlier, but I wasn’t certain about the tickets until the last moment. We’ll have a little supper after the opera, and take the one-ten out. What do you say to that?”
“Oh, Henry! I thought you had forgotten, I thought—” But there was no time to talk.
Could she ever forget that delightful, bewildering, hurried twenty minutes? She spent five of them in trimming over a hat, to the masculine creature’s amazement, her deft fingers pulling off bows and feathers and sticking them on again with lightning rapidity. She ate a sandwich in the intervals of dressing and giving directions to Beesy about the babies.