His Second Wife Part 28

"Come here by the fire and sit down." Mrs. Crothers' voice was suddenly kind. "Now tell me how I can help you," she said.

"Thank you. Why, it's simply this. I've had trouble with Joe, my husband--just lately--in the last few days. And the trouble is so serious that--it's my whole life--one way or the other. At least it--certainly feels so! And I have no women friends I can go to.

They're all his--hers, I mean."

"Hers!"

"Yes. My sister's. She is dead--but very much alive at times--through the friends she left behind her. I've been fighting them all my life, it seems--ever since I married Joe!"

"Why were you fighting them?" Ethel frowned:

"Because they--well, they were all just fat--in body and soul--the women, I mean--and the men were just making money for food and things to keep them so. Do you know what I mean--that kind of New Yorker?"

"I do," said Mrs. Crothers. "Was that the cause of your trouble with Joe!"

"Partly--yes. You see when I tried to shake them off, they wouldn't be shaken--they hung on--because Joe was growing rich all of a sudden. Oh, I got pretty desperate! But then I learned of other friends that Joe had had here long ago--before he married _her_, you know. And I hunted for them--one by one. I could feel they were just what he needed, you see. I mean that back among such friends I hoped he'd stop just making money and get to work--on things he had dreamed of! You understand?"

"I think so--but not fully. Go on in your own way, my dear. Don't try to think. Keep talking."

"Thank you. I was in love with him. There was n.o.body else, man, woman or child--except Susette. She was Amy's little girl. You see, Mrs.

Crothers, when Amy died I was there--I had just come to town. So I stayed with Joe to look after Susette. Then later on I began to feel that he was beginning to care for me. And I didn't like that--on Amy's account, for I worshipped her then. So I broke away and took a job. . . . Oh, what in the world am I getting at!"

"Don't try to think. Just tell me. You took a job. What was it?"

Ethel told of Greesheimer, and then of coming back to Joe, of his poverty and of her nursing Susette, of dreaming of children, of falling in love, of marriage and the birth of her boy.

"But all the time Amy had been there. Do you understand! Like a spirit, I mean! She had Joe first! She had shaped him!"

"Yes--"

"And so when he loved me even more, I do believe, than he ever loved her--still he did the thing she would have wanted. Amy had taught him to show his love by loading money on his wife. And that was what started everything wrong. For he got rich--for my sake--and the money brought Amy's friends back in a horde! Oh, now I'm repeating! I've said all that--"

"Please say it again! You're doing so well!" Ethel told about f.a.n.n.y and the rest. "I tried to like them--honestly! But I simply couldn't!" she cried.

"Why couldn't you? Tell me plainly just what it was you wanted."

"What I wanted? Plainly? Oh, dear--I can't exactly--"

"What kind of people?"

Ethel frowned.

"Not just eaters!" she exclaimed. "I wanted men and women who--well, who were seeing something big--and beautiful and real in life! Life is so hard and queer in this town--so awfully crowded and mixed up--and empty, somehow. You know how I mean? But they see something in it all.

Not clearly--it's way off, you know. And they're busy of course, and by no means saints. They have their worries and their faults and pettiness--they're human, too, But they're looking for something really worth while! Oh, I can't express it--I really can't!"

"Oh, yes you can, you've done quite well," said Mrs. Crothers steadily.

"And now to narrow this down to Joe, you wanted him to be like that--in his work and so in his life with you. Was that it?"

"Yes! And he used to be! You must know that!"

"Yes--I knew that. Your husband and I were once very good friends."

"That's it, and I guessed it!" Ethel cried. "I was making wild guesses in the dark. And at last I put my finger on his partner, and we had a talk. It was a talk, a hard one--but I made him believe me in the end.

And he told me a little about you--and I wanted to meet you, oh, so much! But he seemed to be out of touch with you, so he took me to Mr.

Dwight instead. I had always wanted to sing, you know--and the rest of it--well, Mr. Dwight must have told you."

"Only a little," was the reply. "I don't yet fully understand. How did all this bring trouble with Joe? It's something serious, you said--"

"It's something very nasty." And Ethel began telling of f.a.n.n.y's revelations. In the midst of it the door-bell rang.

"One moment." And Sally went into the hall. "Whoever it is, say I've a headache," Ethel heard her tell the maid. "The same old headache,"

Sally remarked as she grimly pulled the portieres. They waited in a tense little silence till the visitor had gone. "And Alice," Sally called to the maid. "If any one else comes, say I'm out." She turned back to Ethel, smiling:

"Suppose you stay to supper. I'll telephone my husband to dine at his club--and we'll go right on with this talk of ours. We'll go on," she added determinedly, "until we have Joe so in our toils that he'll be yours so long as he lives."

Ethel suddenly sniffed and swallowed hard, and said, "Oh, what a dear you are to me!"

Sally looked at her queerly.

"This is to be a talk without tears, but much good sensible planning,"

she said. "I don't blame you a bit for having been frightened--you've been through an ugly time. But I think with a little common sense--"

"I know," said Ethel, "that's just what I need. And that is why I came to you."

"Thank you," Sally smiled again. "Now go on about Mrs. Carr."

The talk went on, with interruptions for supper and Sally's two small children, far into the evening. And Mrs. Crothers did her share--filling in for Ethel the picture of Joe's old life, his work and dreams, and his first marriage. She told of several meetings with Amy.

And all the time she kept watching, probing into this young second wife, skilfully raising Ethel's hopes, her vivid freshness and her youth, her hunger for a life she saw only in dazzling glimpses.

"Do you want my advice about meeting Joe! Then here it is," she said at the end. "I needn't say don't go on your knees--"

"You needn't!"

"I thought so--you're not that kind. And I wouldn't explain too much about Dwight, and those little things you did with him. Make Joe take you on faith or not at all. Have a long talk and make him listen--don't give him a chance to say a word. Talk right on and give him the picture of his two wives, and then let him choose--between letting you go, while he takes her friends, or dropping them and keeping you and finding what he had before. I can help you in that--but before I do, I think you've got to lay a ghost. She's in the way of everything. She has been in your home long enough. And her strength is the fact that you and Joe never mention her name to each other. I wonder if you realize how great a danger that has been. At any rate I'm very sure that you must break the silence now. It has been like a spell between you."

CHAPTER XXVI

The next afternoon she sat waiting for Joe. She had come home the night before feeling so strong and sure of her course. But beginning at the moment when she came into the empty apartment, subtly and by slow degrees again her home had cast its spell, as though the rooms were haunted. "I've got to lay the ghost," she thought. She had telephoned to Joe to come, and he had replied abruptly, "All right, I'll be there about four o'clock." It was just that now. Ethel poked the logs in the fireplace until there was a cheerful blaze. As she straightened up she caught sight of her face in the mirror over the mantel. Even in the firelight how gaunt and strained it looked to her.

"Not very attractive," she grimly thought. "This has got to be done by brains, my dear."

In a moment she heard Joe's key in the door. She heard him taking off his coat and then coming slowly into the room. With an effort she turned and looked at him. His face appeared even more tense and grey than it had two days before; the nerves seemed quivering under the skin.

And she felt a pang of pity. "He wasn't to blame for the way he acted, it was his wretched nerves," she thought. "He'll have a break-down after this."

"Well, Ethel!"

"Oh, Joe, I'm so glad you're here." All at once she felt herself change.

She had meant to be so firm with him; but now, after one quick anxious look, in a low eager voice she said, "I'm not going to talk much of myself. It won't do any good--I'm sure it won't. I love you, Joe, and I can see you still love me. We need each other. And if we can just be sensible now--and you can only believe in me--"