The Widow [To Say Nothing of the Man] Read online

  II

  THE WINNING CARD?

  "THERE," said the bachelor as he bowed to a little man across the room,"sits the eighth wonder of the world--a man with a squint and a cork legand no income to speak of, who has just married for the third time. Whatmakes us so fascinating?"

  The widow laid down her oyster fork and gazed thoughtfully at thebeautiful girl in blue chiffon sitting opposite the man with the squint.

  "Don't generalize," she said, turning rebukingly to the bachelor. "Youmean what makes the little man so fascinating?"

  The bachelor jabbed an oyster viciously.

  "Well," he grumbled, "what does make him so fascinating? Is it thesquint or the cork----"

  The widow looked at him reproachfully.

  "Don't be envious," she said. "He might have two squints and yet besuccessful with women. Haven't you ever seen a runty, plain little manbefore, with nothing on earth, apparently, to recommend him except hissex, who could draw the women as a magnet does needles?"

  The bachelor dropped his oyster and stared at the widow.

  "It's hypnotism!" he declared with solemn conviction.

  The widow laughed.

  "It's nothing of the sort," she contradicted. "It's because he holdsman's winning card and knows how to play it. Just observe the tendersolicitude with which he consults her about that fish."

  "You mean," inquired the bachelor suspiciously, "that he has afascinating way?"

  "That's all he needs," responded the widow promptly, "to make himirresistible."

  "Then, how do you account," argued the bachelor, indicating aGibsonesque young man eating his dinner alone under a palm at the cornertable, "for the popularity of that Greek god over there? He's a perfectboor, yet the women in this hotel pet him and coax him and cuddle him asif he were a prize lion cub."

  "Oh," remarked the widow, "if you were all Greek gods--that would bedifferent. But, unfortunately, the average man is just an ungainlylooking thing in a derby hat and hideous clothes, with knuckly hands andpadded shoulders and a rough chin."

  "Thank you," said the bachelor sweetly. "I see--as in a looking glass.Evidently our countenances--"

  "Pooh!" jeered the widow, "your countenances just don't count. That'sall. What profiteth it a man though he have the face of an Apollo if hehave the legs of a Caliban? A woman never bothers about a man's face.It's his figure that attracts her. She will forgive weak eyes and acut-off chin twice as quickly as weak shoulders and cut-off legs."

  "That's why we pad them--the shoulders," explained the bachelor.

  "You wouldn't need to," retorted the widow, "if you knew how to play thewinning card."

  "What IS the winning card?" implored the bachelor, leaning across thetable anxiously.

  The widow laid down her soup spoon and bent to arrange the violets inher belt meditatively.

  "Well," she said, "Sir Walter Raleigh played it and it won him a title;and Mr. Mantellini played it and it kept him in spending money and fancywaistcoats for years without his doing a stroke of work; and LouisXIV.--but oh, pshaw! You know all about that. Briefly speaking, a man'swinning card is his knowledge of how to treat a woman. Specifically, itis a tender, solicitous, protecting manner. A woman just loves to be'protected,' whether there is anything to be protected from or not. Sheloves to know that you are anxious for her safety and comfort, even whenthere is no cause in the world for your anxiety. She loves to have youwait on her, even when there is a room full of hired waiters about. Sheloves to be treated like an adorable, cunning, helpless child, even whenshe is five feet ten and weighs a cool two hundred. She delights inhaving a mental cloak laid down for her to walk over and every time youdo it she secretly knights you."

  "It sounds awfully easy," said the bachelor.

  "But it isn't," retorted the widow, "if it were all men would tryit--and all men would be perfectly irresistible."

  "Well, aren't they?" asked the bachelor, innocently. "I thoughtthey----"

  "The winning way, the irresistible masculine manner," pursued the widow,ignoring the interruption, "is something subtle and inborn. It can't beput on or varnished over. It is neither a pose nor a patent. It is thegift of one of the good fairies at birth. If it is going to be trainedinto a man he must be caught and schooled very early--say, before he isten years old. It's his ingrain attitude toward women and he begins bypracticing it on his mother. If he is not to the manner born and triesto cultivate it late in life, he must watch very carefully to see thathe does not overdo it like a lackey or a dancing master or the villainin a melodrama. Of course, it can be cultivated to a certain extent,like music or Christian Science, but it's hard for a man to learn that awoman is a fragile creature and needs a bodyguard, after he has beentwenty years letting his sisters pack their own trunks and lug their ownsatchels and golf clubs. Besides, most men are too busy or tooself-absorbed to cultivate it, if they could."

  "Most men," remarked the bachelor, stirring his coffee and lighting hiscigarette, "aren't anxious to become the sort of 'mother's darling' youdescribe."

  "Nonsense," retorted the widow. "Richard the Third was a perfectlyadorable ladies' man and he couldn't be called exactly--a 'mother'sdarling.' Yet the things he said to poor Lady Anne and the way he saidthem would have turned any feminine brain. It isn't milk and water thatwomen admire; it's the milk of human interest. It's the feeling that aman is gazing at you instead of through you at his own reflection--orsome other woman."

  "But if it means giving up all the easy chairs," protested the bachelor,"and packing all the family trunks and putting out your pipe every timea female member of the family approaches and eating dishes you don'twant and running round doing household errands, a man hasn't gottime----"

  "It doesn't!" declared the widow. "It has nothing to do with morals orwith selfishness. Some of the most selfish men in the world are thosewhom a poor little woman will work her fingers to the bone to support,simply because when she comes home at night after her labors her husbandputs his arms around her and tells her how sad it makes him feel to seeher struggle so, and how young and beautiful she keeps in spite of itall and orders her to lie down and let him run out and fetch her someice cream and read to her. A man with that sort of way with him can getanything on earth out of a woman and then make her eternally grateful tohim. Look at the husbands who slave all day earning money for theirwives to spend and go home tired out and grouchy and never get a word ofthanks. Yet, a man can stay out six nights in the week, and if he willcome home on the seventh with a kiss and a compliment and a box of candyand any old lie and a speech about sympathy and all that, a nicesensible wife will forgive and forget--and adore him."

  "THAT Greek god has been staring as if he contemplatedmurder." _Page 28_]

  "But are there any nice sensible wives?" asked the bachelor plaintively.

  "Have you finished your cigarette, Mr. Travers?" inquired the widowcoolly.

  "Because if there are, that is just what I am looking----"

  "If you have," pursued the widow, "I think we had better go."

  The bachelor rose with alacrity. "I think so, too," he acquiesced,pleasantly. "That Greek god over yonder under the palm has beenstaring at me as if he contemplated murder for the last half hour."

  The widow blushed.

  "Perhaps," she said with a one-cornered smile, "he is envying you----"

  "Undoubtedly!" agreed the bachelor.

  "Envying you," pursued the widow, "your fascinating ways."

  "Oh," cried the bachelor, "then I have got it."

  "What?" said the widow.

  "The winning card. The charm!"

  "Well," said the widow, putting her head on the side and gazing at himspeculatively, "you wear a derby hat."

  "I take it off in the house and in the presence of ladies," protestedthe bachelor.

  "And your shoulders----" began the widow.

  "They are my own!" declared the bachelor.

  "And your----"

  "They also are mine," broke in the bachelor quickl
y.

  "And besides all that," added the widow, "you have that little bald spotin the middle of your head. And yet----"

  "Go on," said the bachelor, "you have said the worst."

  "I broke an engagement with a nice boy to dine with you to-night."

  "That doesn't prove anything," said the bachelor scornfully. "Maybe hehasn't played the winning card."

  "No, it proves you have," declared the widow.

  "I can't see it!" protested the bachelor.

  "Well, just look at the Greek god over under the palm and then look inthe glass at yourself and--work it out."

  "But why look at the Greek god?"

  "Because," said the widow, turning to the mirror and carefully tiltingher hat, "he is the nice boy with whom I broke the engagement."