The children had tried again and again to pry Pop out of Waupoos, but he clung to it like a limpet. He had had opportunities, too, to move his business to big cities, but he was afraid to venture. He was fairly sure of sustenance in Waupoos so long as he nursed every penny; but he could never find the courage to transplant himself to another place.
The worst of his cowardice was that he blamed the children—at least, he said he dared not face a year or two of possible loss lest they might need something. So he stayed in Waupoos and managed somehow to keep the family afloat and the store open.
When Mère revolted and longed for a glimpse of the outer world he always advised her to take a trip and have a good time. He always said he could afford that much, and he took an interest in seeing that she had funds to buy some city clothes with; but he never had funds enough to go along.
That was one of mother's grievances. Pop bored her to death at home and she wanted to scream every time he mentioned his business—it was so selfish of him to talk of that at night when she had so much to tell him of the misbehavior of the servants. But, greatly as he annoyed her round the house, she cherished an illusion that she would like him in a hotel.
She had tried to get him to read a certain novel—a wonderful book mercilessly exposing the curse of modern America; which is the men's habit of sticking to their business so closely that they give their poor wives no companionship. They leave their poor wives to languish at home or to go shopping or gossiping, while they indulge themselves in the luxuries of vibration between creditor and debtor.
In this novel, and in several others she could have named, the poor wife naturally fell a prey to the fascinations of a handsome devil with dark eyes, a motor or two, and no office hours.
Mère often wondered why she herself had not taken up with some handsome devil fully equipped for the entertainment of neglected wives.
If she had not been a member of that stanch American womanhood to which the glory of the country and its progress are really due, she might have startled her husband into realizing too late, as the too-late husbands in the novels realized, that a man's business is a side issue and that the perpetuation of romance is the main task. Her self-respect was all that held Mère to the home; that and—whisper!—the fact that no handsome devil with any kind of eyes ever tried to lure her away.
When she reproached Pop and threatened him he refused to be scared. He paid his wife that most odious of tributes—a monotonous trust in her loyalty and an insulting immunity to jealousy. Almost worse was his monotonous loyalty to her and his failure to give her jealousy any excuse.
They quarreled incessantly, but the wrangles were not gorgeously dramatic charges of intrigue with handsome men or painted women, followed by rapturous make-ups. They were quarrels over expenditures, extravagances, and voyages.