The McGibneys lived in the second-floor rooms. McGibney was log-shaped; he seemed as big around at his ankles as at his chest, and, though he wore collars, it was because everyone else wore collars, and not because his neck was perceptible. Close-cropped hair, a rather sharp nose, bright, alert eyes, cheeks red and all other visible parts of him pinkish. Mrs. McGibney was a plump, delicately featured little woman, who could express most amazing firmness upon her small features. When she had household cares, she worried; when she had household duties, she bustled. And it would surely please you to look at Mrs. McGibney when she worried; left forefinger beginning over the fingers of the right hand; left forefinger lodging on right little finger, Mrs. McGibney pausing to look into space, counting up to assure herself that the butcher had not cheated; forefinger beginning again and dealing with the grocer, this time; another fixed look into space to be sure the grocer had not imagined a can of tomatoes or a pound of flour. It would please you, because you would know that not one penny, worked so hard for by McGibney, would be wasted. When Mrs. McGibney bustles—ah, now that is pretty! That means a very keen sense of responsibility, nothing shirked, nothing that will make McGibney’s comfort neglected. Bustling to the oven door, opening and shutting it; fingers dabbing at under lip and sizzling on under side of a flat iron; frying-pan moved back on the stove; quick, short steps to the table to roll out breadcrumbs; dash to a window to sharpen a knife on the sill—when Mrs. McGibney bustles!
Evening! Both of them in the cheerful kitchen. Very cheerful kitchen! Three conch-shells, like big pink ears, up on the mantelpiece, and four palm leaves, painted green, stuck in a flower pot, just like a bit of Florida. The dish-pan, on the stove murmuring; a subdued rattle and good-natured growling of bubbles forming on the bottom of the pan, and dishes fluttering on them. The oil-cloth was bright and new-looking, except in the corner where heavy McGibney sat. There, chair legs had indented as if someone had beaten around at random with a hammer. And in his corner, reading the newspaper, sat McGibney, his wife sitting beside the table his elbow was on, frowning, puzzling, and counting her fingers. “Yes,” said Mrs. McGibney, “I can keep expenses down to five dollars a week, but you mustn’t charge on my book what you spend. I don’t think I ought to mark down the cent for your newspaper, do you? I’m not going to have my book any more than it’s got to be. I’ll cross off this two cents for a stamp. Now, you know you oughtn’t to charge me for that; it was for your own letter—don’t sit like that! How often have I told you you ruin the oil-cloth?”
McGibney not only continued to tilt back and dig into the oil-cloth but rocked himself on the hind legs of the chair; one is sometimes tempted to torment severe little women when they are too serious.
“Oh, I don’t care; you’re not harming me. Go ahead, if you feel like paying for new oil-cloth.” McGibney could not sit straight without some demonstration to cover his accession; he put out fingers like tongs and pinched just above her knee. If you are an old married man, you know just how far from dignified and severe that immediately made McGibney. Then McGibney sat straight, sat as if he would have sat straight anyway.
A rap on the door. Mrs. McGibney put away her account book as if it were wrong to keep account-books; McGibney sat crooked as if it were wrong to sit straight. No matter what one is doing, one feels that someone else coming makes a difference. Mrs. McGibney started toward the door, went to the stove instead, and covered the dish-pan; started again but paused to twitch a curtain; finally got to the door and opened it, but had glanced back twice and had motioned to McGibney to put away a bag of crackers.
“Oh, it’s you, Clara?” exclaimed Mrs. McGibney. “Why, come right in!”
Into the room came a stocky person, with a broad, flat, amiable face. Everything about her seemed to suggest that she was made to work hard and suffer, usually not complain, but, quite without reasoning, flash into short-lived rebellion against hardships now and then. Like your impression of peasantry more than a century ago, down-trodden, without leaders, should be your impression of Clara. In her heavy arms was a huge bundle, done up in a sheet, four corners of the sheet hanging loose at top. She appeared to be carrying a monstrous turnip, all white, loose ends like white turnip-tops.
“Why, good evening!” said Clara awkwardly, turning to the right, turning to the left, with her huge bundle, looking for a place to set it down, but still clinging to it, her chin buried in the top of it, the big bundle making her look like a pouter-pigeon.
“Mrs. McGibney,” said Clara, turning to the right, to the left, still clinging, “I don’t like to ask you, knowing you ain’t got accommodations, but could you lend me the loan of your ironing-board for the night? I’ve flew the coop on him for good and all this time, and tomorrow will get a room for myself; but, if you can let me have your ironing-board, I can sleep on it here, on the floor tonight. This is my wash, which I brought with me, not to leave him so much as a stitch that’s mine. Would it be too much to ask for your ironing-board?”
“Why, put down that heavy bundle, Clara!” cried Mrs. McGibney, having dabbed at the bundle, but missed it; “it’s sopping wet!”