The Chorewoman: “Mem?”
Mrs. Roberts: “I was just looking for my husband. He was to meet me here at ten minutes past three; but there don’t seem to be any gentlemen. You haven’t happened to notice—”
The Chorewoman: “There’s a gentleman over there beyant, readin’, that’s just come in. He seemed to be lukun’ for somebody.” She applies the mop to the floor close to Mrs. Roberts’s skirts.
Mrs. Roberts, bending to the right and to the left, and then, by standing on tiptoe, catching sight of a hat round a pillar: “Then it’s Mr. Roberts, of course. I’ll just go right over to him. Thank you ever so much. Don’t disturb yourself!” She picks her way round the area of damp left by the mop, and approaches the hat from behind. “It is you, Edward! What a horrid idea I had! I was just going to touch your hat from behind, for fun; but I kept myself from it in time.”
Roberts, looking up with a dazed air from the magazine in his hand: “Why, what would have happened?”
Mrs. Roberts: “Oh, you know it mightn’t have been you.”
Roberts: “But it was I.”
Mrs. Roberts: “Yes, I know; and I was perfectly sure of it; you’re always so prompt, and I always wonder at it, such an absent-minded creature as you are. But you came near spoiling everything by getting here behind this pillar, and burying yourself in your book that way. If it hadn’t been for my principle of always asking questions, I never should have found you in the world. But just as I was really beginning to despair, the Chorewoman came by, and I asked her if she had seen any gentleman here lately; and she said there was one now, over here, and I stretched up and saw you. I had such a fright for a moment, not seeing you; for I left my little plush bag with my purse in it at Stearns’s, and I’ve got to hurry right back; though I’m afraid they’ll be shut when I get there, Saturday afternoon, this way; but I’m going to rattle at the front door, and perhaps they’ll come — they always stay, some of them, to put the goods away; and I can tell them I don’t want to buy anything, but I left my bag with my purse in it, and I guess they’ll let me in. I want you to keep these things for me, Edward; and I’ll leave my shopping-bag; I sha’n’t want it any more. Don’t lose any of them. Better keep them all in your lap here together, and then nobody will come and sit on them.” She disburdens herself of her packages and parcels, and arranges them on her husband’s knees, while she goes on talking. “I’m almost ready to drop, I’m so tired, and I do believe I should let you go up to Stearns’s for me; but you couldn’t describe the bag so they would recognize it, let alone what was in it, and they wouldn’t give it to you, even if they would let you in to inquire: they’re much more likely to let a lady in than a gentleman. But I shall take a coupe, and tell the driver simply to fly, though there’s plenty of time to go to the ends of the earth and back before our train starts. Only I should like to be here to receive the Campbells, and keep Willis from buying tickets for Amy and himself, and us, too, for that matter; he has that vulgar passion — I don’t know where he’s picked it up — for wanting to pay everybody’s way; and you’d never think of your Hundred-Trip ticket-book till it was too late. Do take your book out and hold it in your hand, so you’ll be sure to remember it, as soon as you see Willis. You had better keep saying over to yourself, ‘Willis — Hundred-Trip Tickets — Willis — Hundred-Trip Tickets;’ that’s the way I do. Where is the book? I have to remember everything! Do keep your ticket-book in your hand, Edward, till Willis comes.”
Roberts: “But I want to read, Agnes, and I’ve got to hold my Pop. Sci. with one hand and keep your traps in my lap with the other. Did you find a cook?”
Mrs. Roberts, with rapturous admiration of him: “Well, Edward, you have got a brain! I declare, the cook had utterly gone out of my mind. Forgetting that plush bag makes me forget everything. I’ve got a splendid one — a perfect treasure. She won’t do any of the wash, and we’ll have to put that out; and she’s been used to having a kitchen-maid; but she said we were such a small family that she could shell the pease herself. She’s the most respectable-looking old thing you ever saw; and she’s been having ten dollars a week from the last family she was in; but she’ll come the summer with us for six. I was very fortunate to get her; all the good girls are snapped up for the sea-side in May, and they won’t go into the country for love or money. It was the greatest chance! She’s such a neat, quiet, lady-like person, and all the better for being Irish and a Catholic: Catholics do give so much more of a flavor; and I never could associate that Nova Scotia, sunken-cheeked leanness of Maria’s with a cook. This one’s name is — well, I forget what her name is; Bridget, or Norah, or something like that — and she’s a perfect little butter-ball. She’s coming to go out on the same train with us; and she’ll get the dinner to-night; and I sha’n’t have the mortification of sitting down to a pickup meal with Amy Campbell, the first time she has visited us; she’s conceited enough about her house-keeping as it is, I’m sure, and I wouldn’t have her patronizing and pitying me for worlds. The cook will be here at half-past three precisely; I had to pretend the train started a little earlier than it does so as to make her punctual; they are such uncertain things! and I don’t suppose I shall be back by that time, quite, Edward, and so you must receive her. Let me see!” She glances up at the clock on the wall. “It’s just quarter-past now, and our train goes at ten minutes to four — My goodness! I’ll have to hurry.”
The Colored Man who cries the trains, walking half-way into the room and then out: “Cars ready for Cottage Farms, Longwood, Chestnut Hill, Brookline, Newton Centre, Newton Highlands, Waban, Riverside, and all stations between Riverside and Boston. Circuit Line train now ready on Track No. 3.”
Mrs. Roberts, in extreme agitation: “Good gracious, Edward, that’s our train!”
Roberts, jumping to his feet and dropping all her packages: “No, no, it isn’t, my dear! That’s the Circuit Line train: didn’t you hear? Ours doesn’t go till ten to four, on the Main Line.”
Mrs. Roberts: “Oh yes, so it does. How ridiculous! But now I must run away and leave you, or I never shall get back in time. Be sure to speak to the cook as soon as she comes in, or she’ll get discouraged and go away again; you can’t depend on them for an instant; I told her you would be here to meet her, if I wasn’t — I thought I might be late; and you mustn’t let her slip. And if the Campbells happen to get here before I’m back, don’t you give them the least inkling of our having just engaged a cook. I’m going to smuggle her into the house without Amy’s knowing it; I wouldn’t have her know it for the world. She prides herself on keeping that impudent, spoiled thing of hers, with her two soups; and she would simply never stop crowing if she knew I’d had to change cooks in the middle of the summer.”
Roberts, picking up and dropping the multitudinous packages, and finally sitting down with them all in his lap, very red and heated: “I’ll be careful, my dear.”
Mrs. Roberts: “How flushed you are, bending over! You’re so stout now, you ought to bend sidewise; it’s perfect folly, your trying to bend straight over; you’ll get apoplexy. But now I must run, or I shall never be back in the world. Don’t forget to look out for the cook!”
Roberts, at whom she glances with misgiving as she runs out, holding the parcels on his knees with both elbows and one hand, and contriving with the help of his chin to get his magazine open again: “No, no; I won’t, my dear.” He loses himself in his reading, while people come and go restlessly. A gentleman finally drops into the seat beside him, and contemplates his absorption with friendly amusement.
II. ROBERTS AND WILLIS CAMPBELL
Campbell: “Don’t mind me, Roberts.”
Roberts, looking up: “Heigh? What! Why, Willis! Glad to see you—”
Campbell: “Now that you do see me, yes, I suppose you are. What have you got there that makes you cut all your friends?” He looks at Roberts’s open page. “Oh! Popular Science Monthly. Isn’t Agnes a little afraid of your turning out an agnostic? By-the-way, where is Agnes
?”
Roberts: “She left her purse at Stearns’s, and she’s gone back after it. Where’s Amy?”
Campbell: “Wherever she said she wouldn’t be at the moment. I expected to find her here with you and Agnes. What time did you say your train started?”
Roberts. “At ten minutes to four. And, by-the-way — I’d almost forgotten it — I must keep an eye out for the cook Agnes has been engaging. She was to meet us here before half-past two, and I shall have to receive her. You mustn’t tell Amy; Agnes doesn’t want her to know she’s been changing cooks; and I’ve got to be very vigilant not to let her give us the slip, or you won’t have any dinner to-night.”
Campbell: “Is that so? Well, that interests me. Were you expecting to find her in the Pop. Sci.?”
Roberts: “Oh, I’d only been reading a minute when you came in.”
Campbell: “I don’t believe you know how long you’d been reading. Very likely your cook’s come and gone.”
Roberts, with some alarm: “She couldn’t. I’d only just opened the book.”
Campbell: “I dare say you think so. But you’d better cast your eagle eye over this assemblage now, and see if she isn’t here; though probably she’s gone. What sort of looking woman is she?”
Roberts, staring at him in consternation: “Bless my soul! I don’t know! I never saw her!”
Campbell: “Never saw her?”
Roberts: “No; Agnes engaged her at the intelligence-office, and told her we should meet her here, and she had to go back for her purse, and left me to explain.”
Campbell: “Ha, ha, ha! Ha, ha, ha! How did she expect you to recognize her?”
Roberts: “I — I don’t know, I’m sure. She — she was very anxious I shouldn’t let her get away.”
Campbell, laughing: “You poor old fellow! What are you going to do?”
Roberts: “I’m sure I’ve no idea. Agnes—”
Campbell: “Agnes ought to have a keeper. You know what I’ve always thought of your presence of mind, Roberts; but Agnes — I’m really surprised at Agnes. This is too good! I must tell Amy this. She’ll never get over this. Ah, ha, ha, ha!”
Roberts: “No, no! You mustn’t, Willis. Agnes would be very much provoked with me, if you told Amy she had been engaging a cook. She expects to smuggle her into the house without Amy’s knowing.”
Campbell: “And she left you to meet her here, and keep her — a cook you’d never set eyes on! Ha, ha, ha, ha! Ah, ha, ha, ha! What’s her name?”
Roberts: “Agnes couldn’t remember her last name — one never remembers a cook’s last name. Her first name is Norah or Bridget.”
Campbell: “Maggie, perhaps; they all sound alike. Ah, ha, ha! Ha, ha, ha! This improves.”
Roberts: “Don’t, Willis; you’ll attract attention. What — what shall I do? If Agnes comes back, and finds I’ve let the cook get away, she’ll be terribly put out.”
Campbell: “Perfectly furious, you poor old fellow! — the rage of a disappointed pigeon! I wouldn’t be in your shoes for anything. Oh my! I wish Amy was here. Did — did — Agnes” — (he struggles with his laughter, and explodes from time to time between syllables)— “did she tell you how the woman looked?”
Roberts: “She said she was a very respectable-looking old thing — a perfect butter-ball. I suppose she was stout.”
Campbell: “That covers the ground of a great many cooks. They’re apt to look respectable when they’re off duty and they’re not in liquor, and they’re apt to be perfect butter-balls. Any other distinctive traits?”
Roberts, ruefully: “I don’t know. She’s Irish, and a Catholic.”
Campbell: “They’re apt to be Irish, and Catholics too. Well, Roberts, I don’t see what you can ask better. All you’ve got to do is to pick out a respectable butter-ball of that religion and nationality, and tell her you’re Mrs. Roberts’s husband, and you’re to keep her from slipping away till Mrs. Roberts gets here.”
Roberts: “Oh, pshaw, now, Willis! What would you do?”
Campbell: “There’s a respectable butter-ball over in the corner by the window there. You’d better go and speak to her. She’s got a gingham bundle, like a cook’s, in her lap, and she keeps looking about in a fidgety way, as if she expected somebody. I guess that’s your woman, Roberts. Better not let her give you the slip. You’ll never hear the last of it from Agnes if you do. And who’ll get our dinner to-night?”
Roberts, looking over at the woman in the corner, with growing conviction; “She does answer to the description.”
Campbell: “Yes, and she looks tired of waiting. If I know anything of that woman’s character, Roberts, she thinks she’s been trifled with, and she’s not going to stay to be made a fool of any longer.”
Roberts, getting to his feet: “Do you think so? What makes you think so? Would you go and speak to her?”
Campbell: “I don’t know. She seems to be looking this way. Perhaps she thinks she recognizes you, as she never saw you before.”
Roberts: “There can’t be any harm in asking her? She does seem to be looking this way.”
Campbell: “Pretty blackly, too. I guess she’s lost faith in you. It wouldn’t be any use to speak to her now, Roberts.”
Roberts: “I don’t know. I’m afraid I’d better. I must. How would you introduce the matter, Willis?”
Campbell: “Oh, I wouldn’t undertake to say! I must leave that entirely to you.”
Roberts: “Do you think I’d better go at it boldly, and ask her if she’s the one; or — or — approach it more gradually?”
Campbell: “With a few remarks about the weather, or the last novel, or a little society gossip? Oh, decidedly.”
Roberts: “Oh, come, now, Willis! What would you advise? You must see it’s very embarrassing.”
Campbell: “Not the least embarrassing. Simplest thing in the world!”
The Colored Man who calls the Trains, coming and going as before: “Cars for Newton, Newtonville, West Newton, Auburndale, Riverside, Wellesley Hills, Wellesley, Natick, and South Framingham. Express to Newton. Track No. 5.”
Campbell: “Ah, she’s off! She’s going to take the wrong train. She’s gathering her traps together, Roberts!”
Roberts: “I’ll go and speak to her.” He makes a sudden dash for the woman in the corner. Campbell takes up his magazine, and watches him over the top of it, as he stops before the woman, in a confidential attitude. In a moment she rises, and with a dumb show of offence gathers up her belongings and marches past Roberts to the door, with an angry glance backward at him over her shoulder. He returns crestfallen to Campbell.
Campbell, looking up from his magazine, in affected surprise: “Where’s your cook? You don’t mean to say she was the wrong woman?”
Roberts, gloomily: “She wasn’t the right one.”
Campbell: “How do you know? What did you say to her?”
Roberts: “I asked her if she had an appointment to meet a gentleman here.”
Campbell: “You did? And what did she say?”
Roberts: “She said ‘No!’ very sharply. She seemed to take it in dudgeon; she fired up.”
Campbell: “I should think so. Sounded like an improper advertisement.”
Roberts, in great distress: “Don’t, Willis, for Heaven’s sake!”
Campbell: “Why, you must see it had a very clandestine look. How did you get out of it?”
Roberts: “I didn’t. I got into it further. I told her my wife had made an appointment for me to meet a cook here that she’d engaged—”
Campbell: “You added insult to injury. Go on!”
Roberts: “And that she corresponded somewhat to the description; and — and—”
Campbell: “Well?”
Roberts: “And she told me she was no more a cook than my wife was; and she said she’d teach me to be playing my jokes on ladies; and she grabbed up her things and flew out of the room.”
Campbell; “Waddled, I should have said. But this is pretty serio
us, Roberts. She may be a relation of John L. Sullivan’s. I guess we better get out of here; or, no, we can’t! We’ve got to wait for Amy and Agnes.”
Roberts: “What — what would you do?”
Campbell: “I don’t know. Look here, Roberts: would you mind sitting a little way off, so as to look as if I didn’t belong with you? I don’t want to be involved in this little row of yours unnecessarily.”
Roberts: “Oh, come now, Willis! You don’t think she’ll make any trouble? I apologized. I said everything I could think of. She must think I was sincere.”
Campbell: “In taking her for a cook? I’ve no doubt she did. But I don’t see how that would help matters. I don’t suppose she’s gone for an officer; but I suspect she’s looking up the largest Irishman of her acquaintance, to come back and interview you. I should advise you to go out and get on some train; I’d willingly wait here for Amy and Agnes; but you see the real cook might come here, after you went, and I shouldn’t know her from Adam — or Eve. See?”
Roberts, desperately. “I see — Good heavens! Here comes that woman back; and a man with her. Willis, you must help me out.” Roberts gets falteringly to his feet, and stands in helpless apprehension, while Mr. and Mrs. McIlheny bear down upon him from the door. Mr. McIlheny, a small and wiry Irishman, is a little more vivid for the refreshment he has taken. He is in his best black suit, and the silk hat which he wears at a threatening slant gives dignified impressiveness to his figure and carriage. With some dumb-show of inquiry and assurance between himself and his wife, he plants himself in front of Roberts, in an attitude equally favorable for offence and defence.
III. THE McILHENYS, ROBERTS, AND CAMPBELL
Delphi Complete Works of William Dean Howells Page 1131
