Chains

by Theodore Dreiser

Think of it. Not a trace of excitement. No cape with a hood on. The light up in the dining-room and a book on the table as though she might have been reading—one of those novels by that fellow Barclay. And not a sign about anywhere that she might have been out—that was the puzzling thing. And denying that she had been out or that she had seen any car, or anything. Now what would you make of that!

Then it was, though, that he had burst forth in a fury of suspicion and anger and had dealt not only with this matter of the car in Bergley Place but the one in Briscoe Park, the letters in the ashes and the matter of Naigly seeing her come out of the Deming, to say nothing of her writing to Raskoffsky for his picture. For it was Raskoffsky, of course, if it was anybody. He was as positive as to that as any one could be. Who else could it have been? He had not even hesitated to insist that he knew who it was—Raskoffsky, of course—and that he had seen him and had been able to recognize him from his pictures. Yet she had denied that vehemently—even laughingly—or that he had seen any one, or that there had been a car there for her. And she did show him a clipping a week later which said that Raskoffsky was in Italy.

But if it wasn’t Raskoffsky then who was it—if it was any one. “For goodness’ sake, Gil,” was all she would say at that or any other time, “I haven’t been out with Raskoffsky or any one and I don’t think you ought to come in here and act as you do. It seems to me you must be losing your mind. I haven’t seen or heard of any old car. Do you think I could stand here and say that I hadn’t if I had? And I don’t like the way you have of rushing in here of late every little while and accusing me of something that I haven’t done. What grounds have you for thinking that I have done anything wrong anyhow? That silly picture of Raskoffsky that Alice sent for. And that you think you saw me in an automobile. Not another thing. If you don’t stop now and let me alone I will leave you I tell you and that is all there is to it. I won’t be annoyed in this way and especially when you have nothing to go on.” It was with that type of counter-argument that she had confronted him.

Besides, at that time—the night that he thought he saw her in Bergley Place—and as if to emphasize what she was saying, Tickles in the bedroom had waked up and begun to call “Mama, Mama.” And she had gone in to him and brought him out even as she talked. And she had seemed very serious and defiant, then—very much more like her natural self and like a person who had been injured and was at bay. So he had become downright doubtful, again, and had gone back into the dining-room. And there was the light up and the book that she had been reading. And in the closet as he had seen when he had hung up his own coat was her hooded cape on the nail at the back where it always hung.

And yet how could he have been mistaken as to all of those things? Surely there must have been something to some of them. He could never quite feel, even now, that there hadn’t been. Yet outside of just that brief period in which all of these things had occurred there had never been a thing that he could put his hands on, nothing that he could say looked even suspicious before or since. And the detective agency had not been able to find out anything about her either—not a thing. That had been money wasted: one hundred dollars. Now how was that?

II

The trouble with Gil was that he was so very suspicious by nature and not very clever. He was really a clerk, with a clerk’s mind and a clerk’s point of view. He would never rise to bigger things, because he couldn’t, and yet she could not utterly dislike him either. He was always so very much in love with her, so generous—to her, at least—and he did the best he could to support her and Tickles which was something, of course. A lot of the trouble was that he was too affectionate and too clinging. He was always hanging around whenever he was not working. And with never a thought of going any place without her except to his lodge or on a business errand that he couldn’t possibly escape. And if he did go he was always in such haste to get back! Before she had ever thought of marrying him, when he was shipping clerk at the Tri-State and she was Mr. Baggott’s stenographer, she had seen that he was not very remarkable as a man. He hadn’t the air or the force of Mr. Baggott, for whom she worked then and whose assistant Gil later became. Indeed, Mr. Baggott had once said: “Gilbert is all right, energetic and faithful enough, but he lacks a large grasp of things.” And yet in spite of all that she had married him.

Why?

Well, it was hard to say. He was not bad-looking, rather handsome, in fact, and that had meant a lot to her then. He had fine, large black eyes and a pale forehead and pink cheeks, and such nice clean hands. And he always dressed so well for a young man in his position. He was so faithful and yearning, a very dog at her heels. But she shouldn’t have married him, just the same. It was all a mistake. He was not the man for her. She knew that now. And, really, she had known it then, only she had not allowed her common sense to act. She was always too sentimental then—not practical enough as she was now. It was only after she was married and surrounded by the various problems that marriage includes that she had begun to wake up. But then it was too late.

Yes, she had married, and by the end of the first year and a half, during which the original glamour had had time to subside, she had Tickles, or Gilbert, Jr., to look after. And with him had come a new mood such as she had never dreamed of in connection with herself. Just as her interest in Gil had begun to wane a little her interest in Tickles had sprung into flame. And for all of three years now it had grown stronger rather than weaker. She fairly adored her boy and wouldn’t think of doing anything to harm him. And yet she grew so weary at times of the humdrum life they were compelled to live. Gil only made forty-five dollars a week, even now. And on that they had to clothe and feed and house the three of them. It was no easy matter. She would rather go out and work. But it was not so easy with a three-year-old baby. And besides Gil would never hear of such a thing. He was just one of those young husbands who thought the wife’s place was in the home, even when he couldn’t provide a very good home for her to live in.