# Munsey's Magazine/Volume 86/Issue 2/The Worst Joke in the World

Extracted from Munsey's Magazine, Nov 1923, pp. 240–252.
The Worst Joke in the World
A STORY WHICH THROWS A NEW AND INTERESTING LIGHT UPON THE TIME-HONORED PROBLEM OF THE MOTHER-IN-LAW
By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding
MRS. CHAMPNEY was putting the very last things into her bag, and Mrs. Maxwell and Mrs. Deane sat watching her. The room in which she had lived for nearly four years was already strange and unfamiliar. The silver toilet articles were gone from the bureau. The cupboard door stood open, showing empty hooks and shelves. The little water colors of Italian scenes had vanished from the walls, and the books from the table. All those things were gone which had so charmed and interested Mrs. Maxwell and Mrs. Deane.
They were old ladies, and to them Jessica Champney at fifty was not old at all. With her gayety, her lively interest in life, and her dainty clothes, she seemed to them altogether young—girlish, even, in her enthusiastic moments, and always interesting. They loved and admired her, and were heavy-hearted at her going.
“You've forgotten the pussy cat, Jessica,” Mrs. Maxwell gravely remarked.
“Oh, so I have!” said Mrs. Champney.
Hanging beside the bureau was a black velvet kitten with a strip of sandpaper fastened across its back, and underneath it the inscription:
SCRATCH MY BACK
It was intended, of course, for striking matches. As Mrs. Champney never had occasion to strike a match, this little object was not remarkably useful. Nor, being a woman of taste, would she have admitted that it was in the least ornamental; but it was precious to her—so precious that a sob rose in her throat as she took it down from the wall.
She showed a bright enough face to the old ladies, however, as she carried the kitten across the room and laid it in the bag. She had often talked to these old friends about her past—about her two heavenly winters in Italy, about her girlhood “down East,” about all sorts of lively and amusing things that she had seen and done; but she had said very, very little about the period to which the velvet kitten belonged.
It had been given to her in the early days of her married life by a grateful and adoring cook. It had hung on the wall of her bedroom in that shabby, sunny old house in Connecticut where her three children had been born. She could not think of that room unmoved, and she did not care to talk of it to any one.
Not that it was sad to remember those bygone days. There was no trace of bitterness in the memory. It was all tender and beautiful, and sometimes she recalled things that made her laugh through the tears; but even those things she couldn't talk about.
There was, for instance, that ridiculous morning when grandpa had come to see the baby, the unique and miraculous first baby. He had sat down in a chair and very gingerly taken the small bundle in his arms, and the chair had suddenly broken beneath his portly form. Down he crashed, his blue eyes staring wildly, his great white mustache fairly bristling with horror, the invaluable infant held aloft in both hands. If she had begun to tell about that, in the very middle of it another memory might have come—a recollection of the day when she had sat in that same room, the door locked, her hands tightly clasped, her eyes staring ahead of her at the years that must be lived without her husband, her friend and lover.
She had thought she could not bear that, but she had borne it; and the time had come when the memory of her husband was no longer an anguish and a futile regret, but a benediction. She had lived a happy life with her children. They were all married now, and in homes of their own, and she was glad that it should be so.
These four years alone had been happy, too. Her children wrote to her and visited her, and their family affairs were a source of endless interest. She had all sorts of other interests, too. She made friends readily; she was an energetic parish worker; she loved to read; she enjoyed a matinée now and then, or a concert, and the conversation of Mrs. Maxwell and Mrs. Deane.
With all her heart she had relished her freedom and her dignity. Her children were always asking her to come and live with one or the other of them, but she had always affectionately refused. She believed it wasn't wise and wasn't right.
She had stayed on in this comfortable, old-fashioned boarding house in Stamford, cheerful and busy. It had been a delight beyond measure to her to send a little check now and then to one of her children, a present to a grandchild, some pretty thing that she had embroidered or crocheted to her daughters-in-law. Her elder son's wife had written once that she was a “real fairy godmother,” and Mrs. Champney never forgot that. It was exactly what she wanted to be to them all—a gay, sympathetic, gracious fairy godmother.
But she wasn't going to be one any longer. What her lawyer called a “totally unforeseen contingency” had arisen, and all her life was changed. He was a young man, that lawyer. His father had been Mrs. Champney's lawyer and friend in his day, and she had, almost as a matter of course, given the son charge of her affairs when the elder man died.
She had not wanted either of her sons to look after things for her. She didn't like even to mention financial matters to people she loved. Indeed, she had been a little obstinate about this. And now this “totally unforeseen contingency” had come, to sweep away almost all of her income, and with it the independence, the dignity, that were to her the very breath of life.
If it had been possible, she would not have told her children. She had said nothing when she had received that letter from the lawyer—such an absurd and pitiful letter, full of a sort of angry resentment, as if she had been unjustly reproaching him. She had gone to see him at once. She had been very quiet, very patient with him, and had asked very few questions about what had happened. She simply wanted to know exactly what there was left for her, and she learned that she would have fifteen dollars a month.
So she had been obliged to write to her children, and they had all wanted her immediately; but she chose her second son, because he lived nearest. and she hadn't enough money for a longer journey. Now she was ready to go to his house.
She locked the bag and gave one more glance around the empty room.
“Well!” she said cheerfully. “That seems to be all!”
Mrs. Maxwell rose heavily from her chair.
“Jessica,” she said, not very steadily, “we're going to miss you!”
Mrs. Deane also rose.
“Whoever else takes this room,” she added sternly, “it won't be you—and I don't care what any one says, either!”
Mrs. Champney put an arm about each of them and smiled at them affectionately. She was, in their old eyes, quite a young woman, full of energy and courage, trim and smart in her dark suit and her debonair little hat; but she had never before felt so terribly old and discouraged.
She couldn't even tell these dear old friends that she would see them again soon, for in order to see them she would have either to get the money for the railway ticket from her son, or else to invite them to her daughter-in-law's house. It hurt her to leave them like this—and it was only the beginning.
At this point the landlady came toiling up the stairs.
“The taxi's here, Mrs. Champney,” she said, with a sigh. “My, how empty the room does look!”
So Mrs. Champney kissed the old ladies and went downstairs. The two servants were waiting in the hall to say good-by to her. She smiled at them. Then the landlady opened the front door, and Mrs. Champney went out of the house, still smiling, went down the steps, and got into the taxi.
She sat up very straight in the cab, a valiant little figure, dressed in her best shoes, with spotless white gloves, and her precious sable stole about her shoulders—and such pain and dread in her heart! There was no one in the world who could quite understand what she felt in this hour. To other people she was simply leaving a boarding house where she had lived all by herself, and going to a good home where she was heartily welcome, to a son whom she loved, a daughter-in-law of whom she was very fond, and a grandchild who was almost the very best of all her grandchildren; but to Mrs. Champney the journey was bitter almost beyond endurance.
She loved her children with all the strength of her soul, but she had been wise in her love. She had tried always to be a little aloof from them, never to be too familiar, never to be tiresome. She had given them all she had, all her love and care and sympathy, and she had wanted nothing in return. She wished them to think of her, not as weak and helpless, but as strong and enduring, and always ready to give. And now—
“Now I'm going to be a mother-in-law,” she said to herself. “Oh, please God, help me! Help me not to be a burden to Molly and Robert! Help me to stand aside and to hold my tongue! Oh, please God, help me not to be a mother-in-law!”
II
Mrs. Champney had arranged matters so as to reach the house just at dinner time. She even hoped that she might be a little late, so that there wouldn't be any time at all to sit down and talk. She had never dreaded anything as she dreaded that first moment, the crossing of that threshold. Her hands and feet were like ice, her thin cheeks were flushed, anticipating it. She wanted to enter in an agreeable little stir and bustle, to be cheerful, to be casual; but Robert and Molly were too young for that. They would be too cordial.
“I don't expect them to want me,” said Mrs. Champney to herself. “They can't want me. If they'd only just not try—not pretend!”
She did not know Molly very well. She had seen her a good many times—Molly and the incomparable baby—but that had been in the days when Mrs. Champney was a fairy godmother, with all sorts of delightful gifts to bestow. Robert's wife had been a little shy with her. A kind, honest girl, Mrs. Champney had thought her, good to look at in her splendid health and vitality, but not very interesting. And now she had to come into poor Molly's house!
She was pleased to see that her train was late. She had not told them what train she would take. Perhaps they wouldn't keep dinner waiting. When she got there, perhaps they would be sitting at the table. Then she could hurry in, full of cheerful apologies, and sit down with them, and there wouldn't be that strained, terrible moment she so much dreaded.
A vain hope! For, as she got out of the train, her heart sank to see Robert there waiting for her—Robert with his glummest face, Robert at his worst.
There was no denying that Robert had a worst. He was never willful and provoking, as his adorable sister could be upon occasion. He was never stormy and unreasonable, like his elder brother; but he could be what Mrs. Champney privately called “heavy,” and that was, for her, one of the most dismaying things any one could be. She saw at the first glance that he was going to be heavy now.
“Mother!” he said, in a tone almost tragic.
“But, my dear boy, how in the world did you know I'd get this train?” she asked gayly. “I didn't write—”
“I've been waiting for an hour,” he answered. “You said 'about dinner time,' and I certainly wasn't going to let you come from the station alone. This way—there's a taxi waiting.”
Mrs. Champney was ashamed of herself. Robert was the dearest boy, so stalwart, so trustworthy, so handsome in his dark and somber fashion, and so touchingly devoted to her! After all, wasn't it far better to be a little too heavy than too light and insubstantial? As he got into the cab beside her, she slipped her arm through his and squeezed it.
“You dear boy, to wait like that!” she said.
“Mother!” he said again. “By Heaven, I could wring that fellow's neck! Speculating with your money—”
“Don't take it like that, Robert. It's all over and done with now.”
“No, it's not!” said he. “It's—the thing is, you've been used to all sorts of little—little comforts and so on; and just at the present time I'm not able to give you—”
“Please don't, Robert!” she cried. “It hurts me!”
He put his arm about her shoulders. “You're not going to be hurt,” he said grimly; “not by any one, mother!”
His tone and his words filled her with dismay.
“Robert,” she said firmly, “I will not be made a martyr of!”
“A victim, then,” Robert insisted doggedly. “You've been tricked and swindled by that contemptible fellow; but Frank and I are going to see that it's made right!”
“Oh, Robert! You're not going to do anything to that poor, miserable, distracted man?”
“Nothing we can do. You gave the fellow a free hand, and he took advantage of it. No, I mean that Frank and I are going to make it up to you, mother.”
He might as well have added “at any cost.” Mrs. Champney winced in spirit, but at the same time she loved him for his blundering tenderness, his uncomprehending loyalty. He meant only to reassure her, but he made it all so hard, so terribly hard! She felt tears well up in her eyes. How could she go through with this gallantly if he made it so hard?
Then, suddenly, there came to her mind the memory of a winter afternoon, long, long ago, when Frank and Robert had been going out to skate. She had heard alarming reports about the ice, and she had run after them, bareheaded, into the garden. She could see that dear garden, bare and brown in the wintry sunshine; she could see her two boys, stopping and turning toward her as she called.
Frank had laughingly assured her that there was no danger at all. That was Frank's way. She didn't believe him, yet his sublime confidence in himself and his inevitable good luck somehow comforted her; and then Robert had said:
“Well, look here, mother—we'll promise not to go near the middle of the pond at the same time. Then, whatever happens, you'll have one of us left anyhow—see?”
And that was Robert's way. The very thought of it stopped the dreaded invasion of tears and made her smile to herself in the dark. Such a splendidly honest way—and so devastating!
The taxi had stopped now, and Robert helped her out in a manner that made her feel very, very old and frail.
“Wait till I pay the driver, mother,” he said. “Don't try to go alone—it's too dark.”
So Mrs. Champney waited in the dark road outside that strange little house. Her son was paying for the cab; her son was going to assist her up the path; she was old and helpless and dependent.
Then the front door opened, and Molly stood there against the light.
“Hello, mother dear!” she called, in that big, rich, beautiful voice of hers. “Hurry in! It's cold!”
Mrs, Champney did hurry in, and Molly caught her in both arms and hugged her tight.
“Just don't mind very much how things are, will you?” she whispered. “My housekeeping's pretty awful, you know!”
Tears came to Mrs. Champney's eyes again, because this was such a blessed sort of welcome.
“As if I'd care!” she said.
“Let me show your room—and Bobbetty,” said Molly.
She took the bag from Robert, who had just come in, and ran up the stairs. Mrs. Champney followed her. All the little house seemed warm and bright with Molly's beautiful, careless spirit. It wasn't strange or awkward. It was like coming home; and the room that Molly had got ready for her was so pretty!
“Dinner's all ready,” said Molly; “but—if you'll just take one look at Bobbetty. He's—when he's asleep, he's—”
Words failed her.
Mrs. Champney got herself ready as quickly as she could, and followed Molly down the hall to a closed door. Molly turned the handle softly, and they stepped into a little room that was like another world, all dark and still, with the wind blowing in at an open window.
“Nothing wakes him up!” whispered Molly proudly, and turned on a green-shaded electric lamp that stood on the bureau.
Mrs. Champney went over to the crib and looked down at the child who lay there—the child who was her child, flesh of her flesh, and was yet another woman's child. He was beautiful—more beautiful than any of her children had been. He lay there like a little prince. His face, olive-skinned and warmly flushed on the cheeks, wore a look of careless arrogance, his dark brows were level and haughty, his mouth was richly scornful; and yet, for all this pride of beauty, she could not help seeing the baby softness and innocence and helplessness of him.
He might lie there like a little prince, but he was caged in an iron crib, he wore faded old flannel pyjamas, and beside him, where it had slipped from the hand that still grasped it in dreams, lay such an unprincely toy! Mrs. Champney, bending over to examine it, found it to be a rubber ball squeezed into a white sock.
It seemed to Mrs. Champney that she could never tire of looking at that beautiful baby. She hadn't half finished when Molly touched her arm and whispered “Robert,” and, turning out the light, led her husband's mother across the dark, windy room out into the hall again.
“I heard Robert getting restless downstairs,” she explained.
Side by side they descended the stairs. Mrs. Champney was happy, with that particular happiness which the companionship of babies brought to her. She had friends who were made unhappy by the sight of babies. They said that they couldn't help looking ahead and imagining the sorrows in store for the poor little things. But to Mrs. Champney this seemed morbid and quite stupid, because, when the sorrows came, the babies would no longer be babies, but grown people, and as well able as any one else to deal with them.
No—babies were not melancholy objects to Mrs. Champney. On the contrary, they filled her with a strong and tender delight, because of her knowledge that whatever troubles came to them, she could surely help; because, for babies, a kiss is a cure for so much, and a song can dry so many baby tears; because love, which must so often stand mute and helpless before grown-up misery, can work such marvels for little children.
She was happy, then, until she reached the foot of the stairs—and not again for a long time.
Robert was waiting for them there. He came forward, with a faint frown, and pushed into place two hairpins that were slipping out of Molly's hair. It was the most trifling action, yet it seemed to Mrs. Champney very significant. He didn't like to see those hairpins falling out, didn't like to see Molly's lovely, shining hair in disorder. He noticed things of that sort, and he cared. He cared too much. There had been a look of annoyance and displeasure on his face that distressed Mrs. Champney.
Fussiness, she thought, was one of the most deplorable traits a man could have. It was only another name for pettiness, and that was something no member of her family had ever displayed. Could it be possible that Robert, the most uncompromising and high-minded of all her children, was developing in that way—and with such a wife as Molly?
She watched her son with growing uneasiness during the course of the dinner. It was a splendidly cooked dinner. The roast veal was browned and seasoned to perfection, the mashed potatoes were smooth and light, there were scalloped tomatoes and a salad of apples and celery, and a truly admirable lemon meringue pie; but Robert frowned because the potatoes were in an earthenware bowl, and the plates did not match. When the splendid pie appeared, in the tin dish in which it had been baked, he sprang up and carried it out into the kitchen, to return with it damaged but lying properly on a respectable dish.
“Oh, I'm awfully sorry, Robert!” Molly said, each time that Robert found something wrong; and there was such generous contrition in her honest face that Mrs. Champney wanted to get up and shake her son.
What did those silly little things matter? How could he even see them, with Molly before his eyes?
“She's beautiful,” thought Mrs. Champney. “She wouldn't be beautiful in a photograph. I suppose she'd look quite plain; but when you're with her—when she smiles—it's like a blessing!”
III
It was not a comfortable meal for any of them, and Mrs. Champney was glad when it was finished. She offered to help Molly with the dishes, and she really wanted to do so; but when Molly refused, and she saw that Robert didn't like the idea, she did not persist. She went into the little sitting room with Robert, and he settled her in an armchair, putting behind her shoulders a plump cushion that made her neck ache. He lit his pipe and began to move about restlessly.
“You know,” he began abruptly, “Molly's not really—slovenly.”
“Robert!” cried Mrs. Champney. “What nonsense!”
“Yes, I know,” he said doggedly; “but I don't want you to think—”
Mrs. Champney did not hear the rest of his speech. She was vaguely aware that he was making excuses for Molly, but she did not stop him. He had said enough. He had given her the key, and now she could understand.
This was not pettiness, and Robert was not fussy. It was because he loved Molly so much that he could not endure to have another person see in her what might be construed as faults. If he had been alone with Molly, he wouldn't have cared, he wouldn't even have noticed these things. It was because his mother had come, and he was afraid.
It is an old and a deep-rooted thing, the child's faith in the mother's judgment. If the mother has been honest and wise, if the child has been never deceived or disappointed by her, then, no matter how old he grows, or how far he may go from her, that old and deep-rooted faith lives in him. Robert, at twenty-six, was surer of himself than he was ever likely to be again. He was certain that all his ideas were his own, and that no living creature could influence him; yet he was terribly afraid of what his mother might think of Molly.
For, after all, his mother was the standard, and the home she had made for him in his boyhood must forever be the standard of homes. She would see that this home of Molly's was not like that. She would think—
“You needn't worry, my dear boy,” said Mrs. Champney gently. “I'm sure I'll understand Molly.”
And no more than that. It wouldn't do to tell him what she really thought of Molly. It would sound exaggerated and insincere. It would startle him, and it might conceivably make him contrary; so she held her tongue.
Presently Molly came in from the kitchen, flushed and smiling, and sank into a chair.
“Take off that apron, old girl,” said Robert.
“Oh, I'm sorry!” said Molly. “I always forget!”
Robert took it away into the kitchen.
“Too tired for a song, Molly?” he asked when he returned.
“Of course I'm not!” said she, getting up again.
She was tired, though, and a little nervous, and Mrs. Champney felt sorry for her; but Robert would have it so. His mother must see what Molly could do. He lay back in his chair, smoking, with an air of regal indifference, as if he were a young sultan who had commanded this performance but was not much interested in it; but as a matter of fact he was twice as nervous as Molly.
He had spoken to his mother before about Molly's singing, and Mrs. Champney had thought of it as an agreeable accomplishment for a son's wife, but this performance amazed her. This was not a parlor accomplishment, this big, glorious voice, true and clear, effortless because so perfectly managed. This was an art, and Molly was an artist.
“Molly!” she cried, when the song was done. “Molly, my dear! I don't know what to say!”
Molly flushed with pleasure.
“I do love music,” she said. “I often hope Bobbetty will care about it.”
“That was a darned silly song, though,” observed Robert.
Molly turned away hastily.
“I know it was!” she said cheerfully.
But Mrs. Champney had seen the tears come into her eyes. Molly was hurt. She didn't understand, and unfortunately Mrs. Champney did. She knew that Robert had been trying to tell his mother that Molly could do even better than this—that she could, if she chose, sing the most prodigious songs. He was afraid that his mother would judge and condemn Molly for that darned silly song about “the flowers all nodding on yonder hill.”
“That's what being a mother-in-law really means,” said Mrs. Champney to herself. “It means being the third person, the one who stands outside and sees everything—all the poor, pitiful little faults and weaknesses. Love won't help. The more I love them, the more I can't help seeing, and they'll know—they'll always know. When Robert is impatient, Molly will know that I've noticed it, and she'll think she has to notice it, too. When Molly is careless, Robert will imagine that I'm blaming her, and he'll feel ashamed of her. That's why mothers-in-law make trouble. It's not because they always interfere, or because they're troublesome and domineering. It's because they see all the little things that nobody ought to see—the little things that would never grow important if a third person wasn't there. I used to feel so sorry for mothers-in-law. I used to think it was a vulgar, heartless joke about their making trouble. A joke? Oh, it's the worst, most horrible joke in the world—because it's true!”
IV
Mrs. Champney did not sleep well that night. When she first turned out the light, a strange sort of panic seized her. She felt trapped, shut in, here in this unfamiliar room, in this house where she had no business to be, and yet could not leave. She got up and turned on the light, and that was better, for she could think more clearly in the light. She propped herself up on the pillows, pulled the blanket up to her chin, and sat there, trying to find the way out.
“There always is a way out,” she thought. “it's never necessary to do a thing that injures other people. I must not stay here, or with any of my children. If I think quietly and sensibly, I can—”
There was a knock at the door.
“Are you all right, mother?” asked Robert's voice. “I saw your light.”
“Perfectly all right, dear boy!” she answered brightly. “I'm very comfortable. Good night!”
“Sure?” he asked.
She wanted to jump up and go to him and kiss him—her dear, solemn, anxious Robert; but that wouldn't do. Never, never, while she had a trace of dignity and honor, would she turn to her children for reassurance. She was the mother. She could not always be strong, but she could at least hide her weakness from her children. She could endure her bad moments alone.
“Quite sure!” she answered, and snapped out the light. “There! I'm going to sleep! Good night, my own dear, dear boy!”
“Good night, mother!” he answered.
His voice touched her so! If only she could let go, and be frail and helpless, and allow her children to take care of her! They would be so glad to do it—they would be so dear and kind!
“Shame on you, Jessica Champney!” she said to herself. “You weren't an old lady before you came here, and you're not going to be one now. You're only fifty, and you're well and strong. There must be any number of things a healthy woman of fifty can do. Find them!”
And then, as if by inspiration, she thought of Emily Lyons.
The next morning, as soon as Robert had gone, she told Molly that she wanted to “see about something”; and off she went, dressed in her best again, and took the train to a near-by town. She was going to see Miss Lyons. She had not met this old school friend for a good many years, but she remembered her with affection and respect, and perhaps with a little pity, because Emily had never married. She had devoted her life to charitable work—an admirable existence, but, Mrs. Champney thought, rather a forlorn one.
Her pity fled in haste, however, when she saw Emily.
A very earnest young secretary ushered the caller into a big, quiet, sunny office, and there, behind a large desk, sat Miss Lyons. She rose at once, and came forward with outstretched hands. Her blue eyes behind the horn-rimmed spectacles were as friendly and kind as ever, and yet Mrs. Champney's heart sank. The Emily she wished to remember was a thin, freckled girl with a long blond pigtail and a shy and hesitating manner—an Emily who had very much looked up to the debonair and popular Jessica. This was such a very different Emily—a person of importance, of grave assurance, a person with a large, impressive office at her command. To save her life Mrs. Champney couldn't help being impressed by offices and filing cabinets and typewriters.
She sat down, and she tried to talk in her usual blithe and amusing way, but she knew that she was not succeeding at all. In the presence of this new Emily she felt shockingly frivolous. She was sorry that she had worn her white gloves and her sable stole. She wished that the heels of her new shoes were not so high.
She told Emily that she wanted something to do.
“Do you mean charitable work, Jessica?” asked Miss Lyons.
“I'm afraid I'd have to be paid,” said Mrs. Champney, with a guilty flush. “You see, Emily, I've had a—a financial disaster. Of course, my children are only too willing, but—”
“They're all married, aren't they?” asked Emily.
Something in the grave, kindly tone of her question stung Mrs. Champney into a sort of bitterness.
“Yes,'” she answered. “All of them are married. I'm a mother-in-law, Emily.”
Miss Lyons did not smile. She was silent for a time, looking down at her polished desk as if she were consulting a crystal. Then she looked up.
“We happen to need somebody in the Needlecraft Shop,” she said. “I could give you that, Jessica, at eighteen dollars a week; but—”
“But what?” asked Mrs. Champney, after waiting a minute.
“I'm afraid you haven't had much experience,” said Miss Lyons.
“I've done a good deal of parish work,” said Mrs. Champney anxiously.
She had known love, and happiness with the man she loved. She had endured the anguish of losing him. She had borne three children and brought them up. She had traveled a little in the world. She had even known a “financial disaster” at fifty; but in the presence of Emily Lyons she was ready to admit that she had had no experience—that her sole qualification for any useful occupation was the parish work she had done.
“If you'd like to try it, then,” said Emily gently. “I've found, though, that women who have led a sheltered domestic life are inclined to be a little oversensitive when it comes to business.”
Mrs. Champney, into whose sheltered domestic life had come only such incidents as birth and death and illness and accident and so on, said that she hoped she wasn't silly.
“Of course you're not, my dear!” said her old friend, taking her hand across the desk. “You're splendid! You always were!”
And Mrs. Champney had to be satisfied with that. She was to begin at the Needlecraft Shop the next morning. She was at last to enter the world; but instead of being filled with ambitious hopes and resolves, she actually could think of nothing but how she was to tell Robert about it.
The only possible way was to take a mighty high hand with him from the start, and the trouble was that she didn't feel high-handed. She felt depressed, and tired and—yes, crushed—that was the word for it. She was not going to let Robert suspect that, however, or Molly, either.
She decided to take her time about getting back. After leaving Emily, she walked for a time through the streets of the brisk suburban town. Then, seeing a clean little white-tiled restaurant, she went in there and had her lunch. It was noon, and there were a good many other business women there. Mrs. Champney tried to feel that she was one of them now, but somehow she could not. Somehow the whole thing seemed unreal, and even a little fantastic.
She mustn't think that it was unreal or fantastic, or how could she convince Robert? She tried to make it real by doing all sorts of calculations based upon eighteen dollars a week. With that amount, and with what was left of her income, she could manage to live by herself, somewhere near Robert and Molly, where she could see them and the baby often, and yet be independent. Once more she could be a fairy godmother—with sadly clipped wings, to be sure, but still able to bestow a little gift now and then.
She thought she would get something for Bobbetty now, and she bought one of the nicest gray plush animals imaginable. The saleswoman said it was a cat, but Mrs. Champney privately believed it to be a dog, because of its drooping ears. Anyhow, it was a lovable animal, with a frank and kindly expression and a most becoming leather collar. On the train, going back, she regretfully took out its round yellow eyes, for they were pins, and unless she forestalled him, Bobbetty would surely do this.
Even then it was a lovable animal, and Bobbetty received it with warm affection. He was sitting in his high chair in the kitchen, while Molly cooked the dinner. He was almost austerely neat and clean after his bath, and he was eating a bowl of Graham crackers and milk, with a large bib tied under his chin. A model child—yet, in the sidelong glance of his black eyes in the direction of the new bowwow, who was not to be touched until supper was finished, Mrs. Champney saw a thoughtful and alarming gleam. Bobbetty was not quite sure whether he would continue being good, or whether it would be nicer suddenly and violently to demand the bowwow. Mrs. Champney helped him to choose the better course. She entertained him while he ate, and then carried him off upstairs, with the bowwow, and put him to bed. He became very garrulous then. He lay in his crib, clasping the bowwow, and he told Mrs. Champney all sorts of interesting things in such a polite, conversational tone that she felt quite ashamed of herself for interrupting him and telling him to go to sleep.
He was nice about it, however. He paid no attention to this rudeness, but pleasantly went on talking. Even when she went out of the room and closed the door behind her, she heard his bland little voice continuing the story of a wild horsy who stampled on six policemens. Bobbetty was not yet three, but he had personality.
She was smiling as she went down the stairs—until she saw Robert. He came to the foot of the stairs, watching her as she came toward him. She had to meet his eyes, she had to smile again, but it was hard beyond all measure.
She had never seen that look on his face before. He had always been utterly loyal to her, had always loved her, but it had been after the fashion of a boy. The look she saw on his face now was not a boy's; it was the profound compassion and tenderness of a man. It came to her, with a stab of pain, that she had cruelly underrated her son. She had thought of him as a dear and rather clumsy boy, and he was so much more than that—so much more!
Her own affair seemed mere fantastic than ever now. Here was Robert, making his valiant battle in the world for the life and safety of his wife and child. Here was Molly, busy with the vital needs of life, with food and clothes, with the care of their child; and she herself was going to work in the Needlecraft Shop.
She had to tell them, of course. When they were all seated at the table, she did so, in the most casual, matter-of-fact way.
It was even worse than she had feared. Robert grew very white.
“You mean—a job?” he asked.
“It's charitable work, really,” Mrs. Champney explained. “The foreign-born women bring their needlework to the shop, and we sell it on commission for them. The idea is to encourage their home industries, and—”
“But you're going to get paid for it?” asked Robert.
“Why, yes!” said Mrs. Champney brightly. 'I'm sure I'll enjoy the work, too. I've always—”
“You mean you're going off to work every morning in this shop?” said Robert. “Do you mind telling me why?”
“Because I consider it very useful and interesting work, Robert,” replied Mrs. Champney, with dignity.
There was a long silence.
“All right!” said Robert briefly.
She knew how terribly she had hurt him. He had wanted to do so much for her, to take her into his home and protect her and care for her, and she would not let him. She had turned away with a smile from all that he had to offer. She would take nothing.
“I've always led—such an active life,” she said, in a very unsteady voice. “I should think you could understand, Robert—”
“I do!” he said grimly.
“You don't!” she cried. “You don't! You—”
She could not go on. She bent her head and pretended to be cutting up something on her plate, but she could not see clearly.. He never would understand that she was doing this only for love of him, only so that she might not be here in his home as the sinister third person who saw everything and—
She started at the touch of Molly's hand on her arm.
“If that's your way to be happy, darling,” said Robert's wife, and Mrs. Champney saw tears in her honest eyes.
V
Mrs. Champney envisaged her life as divided into epochs, each one with its own significance and its own memories. There was her childhood, there was her girlhood. There were the early days of her married life, when she and her husband had been alone. There were the crowded and anxious and wonderful years when her children had been little. There was the beginning of her widowhood, overshadowed with anguish and loneliness, yet with a dark beauty of its own. There was her tranquil middle age, and there was her business life.
She had begun it on Tuesday, and this was Friday. It had lasted four days, yet it seemed to her quite as long as all the years of her youth. It seemed a lifetime in itself, in which she had acquired a new and bitter wisdom.
The train stopped at her station, and, with a crowd of other home-going commuters, Mrs. Champney got out and hurried up the steps to the street, to catch a trolley car; but she was not quick enough. By the time she got there the car was full, and she drew back and let it go. She never was quick enough any more. She seemed to have been transferred into a world of terrific speed and vigor, where she was hopelessly outdistanced, hopelessly old and weary and slow.
She had thought, until this week, that she was a fairly intelligent and energetic woman. She had even had her innocent little vanities; but now, standing on the corner and looking after the car—
“I'm a silly, doddering old thing!” she said to herself, with a trembling lip.
She remembered all the dreadful defeats and humiliations of the week. She remembered how slow she had been about wrapping up things and making change—how curt she had been with some of the wealthiest and most important customers—how stupid she had been about understanding the Polish and Italian women who brought in their work. She remembered the weary patience of Miss Elliott, who managed the shop. Miss Elliott was not more than twenty-eight, but she had been to Mrs. Champney like a discouraged but long-suffering teacher with a very trying child.
“Doddering!”” Mrs. Champney repeated.
She was alone on the corner. In this new world nobody waited for anything. Those who, like herself, had missed the car, had at once set off on foot; and Mrs. Champney decided to do so herself. It was less than a mile—a pleasant walk in the soft April dusk.
This walk might have been specially designed by Miss Elliott to teach Mrs. Champney another lesson; only it was a lesson that she had already learned. She really needed no further demonstration of the fact that she was fifty, and utterly tired and miserable. It was superfluous, it was cruel, and it made her angry. When she reached the street where Robert's little house stood, her heart was hot and bitter with resentment.
“If they'd only let me alone!” she thought. 'I don't want any one to speak to me or look at me. I know I'm unreasonable. I want to be unreasonable. I want to be let alone!”
But of course she couldn't be. Nobody can be let alone except those who would give all the world for a little tiresome interference. Molly saw at once how tired she was, and wanted her to lie down and have dinner brought up to her. Robert, by saying nothing at all, was still more difficult to endure.
“I'm not particularly tired, Molly, thank you,” said Mrs. Champney, with great politeness.
What she wanted to do was to stamp her foot and cry:
“Let me alone! Let me alone! To-morrow is Saturday, and the next day is Sunday. You can talk to me on Sunday. Let me alone now!”
She sternly repressed all this. She sat down at the table and tried to eat her dinner. She forced herself to remain in the sitting room until ten o'clock.
“In a week or two I'll go away and get a room for myself,” she thought, “ where I can be as tired as I like!”
When the clock struck ten, she sat still and counted up to five hundred, so that she wouldn't seem like a tired person in a dreadful hurry to get to bed. Then she rose, said good night to Robert and Molly, and went upstairs.
Even then she would not slight or omit any detail of her routine. She washed, rubbed cold cream into her hands, braided her hair, folded her clothes neatly, ready for the morning, and knelt down to say her prayers. Then she turned out the light, opened the window, and got into bed; and she was so glad to be there, so glad to lay her tired gray head on the pillow, that she cried.
She was ashamed of this weakness, and meant to struggle against it; but sleep came before she had driven it away—a heavy and sorrowful sleep, colored with the mist of tears.
She slept. Then she sighed, and stirred in her sleep. Something was coming through into the shadowy world of dreams—something imperious and menacing. She didn't want to wake up, but something was forcing her to do so. She heard something calling.
She sat up suddenly. It was a child's voice calling “Mother!”—a sound which would, she thought, have reached her even in heaven.
“Mother! Mother! I want you!” It was Bobbetty screaming that, and no one answered him. “I want you, mother!”
“What's the matter with Molly?” thought Mrs. Champney in a blaze of anger.
She got out of bed and hurried bare-footed across the room. That baby voice was filling the whole house, the whole world, with its heartbreaking cry:
“Mother! Mother!”
Mrs. Champney went out into the hall, and there she found Robert and Molly standing in the dim light outside Bobbetty's door—Molly with her magnificent hair hanging loose about her shoulders, her face quite desperate, tears rolling down her cheeks.
“What's the matter?” cried Mrs. Champney.
“Hush!” whispered Robert. “Dr. Pinney said we weren't to take him up—said it was nothing but temper. I went in to see, and he's perfectly all right. He simply wants Molly to take him up.”
“But he's—so little!” sobbed Molly, in a smothered voice.
“Mother! I want you, mother!” shrieked Bobbetty.
Molly made a move forward, but Robert clutched her arm. He, too, was pale and desperate.
“No, Molly!” he said. “Dr. Pinney told us definitely—”
“Bah!” cried Mrs. Champney, in a tone that amazed both of them. “Dr. Pinney, indeed!”
She opened the door of Bobbetty's room, went in, snatched him out of his crib, and carried him off, past his speechless parents, and into her own room.
VI
Bobbetty's hand was flung out and fell, soft and limp, across Mrs. Champney's face. She opened her eyes. The dawn was stealing into the room, coming like music. One drowsy little bird was awake in the world, piping sweetly. The breeze came, fluttering the window curtain, and it seemed to her that she could hear the footsteps of the glorious sun coming up the sky. All creation waited for him—waited breathless, to break into a great chorus of ecstasy when he appeared.
Bobbetty was waking, too. His hard little head bumped against her shoulder. His toes moved softly, he scowled, his great black eyes opened, he looked sternly into her face, and then he smiled.
“Gramma!” he said contentedly, and sat up.
“We must be very quiet, not to wake mother,” said Mrs. Champney.
“Why?” asked Bobbetty.
In his superb arrogance he looked upon his mother somewhat as he looked upon the sun. She existed solely for him. He adored her and he needed her—that was why she existed. Mrs. Champney did not trouble to explain. He would learn soon enough how very many other people there were in this world, and that it was not his own world and his own sun at all. In the meantime, let him make the most of it. She said that they would surprise mother, and the idea appealed to Bobbetty. He said he would be as quiet as a mouse, and so he was.
Mrs. Champney got his ridiculous little garments and dressed him. She knelt at his feet to put on his stubby sandals. She even kissed his feet, and his hands, and his warm, olive-tinted cheeks, and the back of his neck. He smiled upon her, condescendingly but kindly.
Then she carried him down into the kitchen. He was a plump and sturdy baby, but he was no burden to her arms. She wasn't tired now. Indeed, she thought she had never in her life felt so gay and light and happy.
The sun had come, and the kitchen was filled with it. The aluminium saucepans glittered like silver, and the water ran out of the tap in a rainbow spray. She laid the table in the dining room, and Bobbetty followed her back and forth, carrying the less dangerous things.
There was a wonderful perfume in the air—the intangible sweetness of spring—and with it, and no less wonderful, was the homely fragrance of coffee and oatmeal and bacon. It was a divine hour, and Bobbetty knew it. Bobbetty could share it with her—he and he alone.
He dropped a loaf of bread that he was carrying, and, moved by impulse, kicked it across the room. Mrs. Champney picked it up, without a word of reproof. She knew how Bobbetty felt.
Then she drew the chairs up to the table—and made her great discovery.
“There are four chairs!” she cried aloud. “There are four of us! Why, I'm not the third person at all!”
She was so overcome by this that she sat down, and stared before her with a dazed look.
“There were three already—I'm the fourth, and four's such a nice number! I can't go away and leave Robert and Molly alone together. They'll never be alone together any more—there's Bobbetty. I can help so much! They're both so very, very young, and I could do so much! Molly could have time for music. There are two buttons off Bobbetty's underwaist. Mother-in-law, indeed!”
She heard the percolator boiling too hard, and she got up. In the kitchen doorway she met Bobbetty with the bowwow.
“Bobbetty!” she said. “Do you know something?”
“Yes, I do!” shouted the child.
But Mrs. Champney told him, anyhow.
“Bobbetty,” she said, “there's a Lucy Stone League for women who don't want to use their husbands' names. I believe I'll start a Jessica Champney League for women who refuse to be called mothers-in-law. There's really no such thing as a mother-in-law, Bobbetty. It's just a joke, and a very nasty one. Really and truly, Bobbetty, there are nothing but mothers-in-nature. I think I'll invent some other word. Why not 'husbandsmother,' or 'wifesmother,' or—”
Molly appeared before her, evidently in great distress.
“Oh, mother darling!” she cried. “You shouldn't have done this! You shouldn't be up so early! You'll be tired out before you start!”
Mrs. Champney stirred the oatmeal, which was bubbling and spouting like molten lava.
“I don't believe I will go,” she said. “It seems—such a waste of time. I think I'll stay home, and help you, and be a grandmother. I've tried everything else, and I believe I'd do well at that.”
Molly stared for a moment. Then she ran to the foot of the stairs.
“Robert!” she called, in her ringing, joyous voice. “Robert! Mother's going to stay home!”
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929.
The longest-living author of this work died in 1955, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 68 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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