The Widow [To Say Nothing of the Man] Page 9

  IX

  HER WAY.

  "THERE," said the bachelor, as he nodded amiably at the big,jolly-looking man beside the little, weazened woman, "is the besthusband the Lord ever made!"

  "The Lord!" said the widow scornfully. "It isn't the Lord who makeshusbands. It's the wife!"

  "And I always thought God made Adam," sighed the bachelor, humbly.

  "Adam," said the widow promptly, as she dropped another lump of sugarinto her tea, "wasn't a husband. He was only a man. And a man isonly--raw material. He is like a ready-made frock or a ready-made coat;he has got to be cut down and built up and ironed out and taken in andto have all the raw edges trimmed off before he is properly----"

  "Finished?" suggested the bachelor.

  The widow nodded cheerfully.

  "Yes," she agreed, "and adjusted to matrimony. And even then sometimeshe is a dreadful botch."

  "And all his style is gone," sighed the bachelor.

  The widow studied her Sevres cup thoughtfully.

  "Well," she admitted, "sometimes the material is so bad or so skimpy--"

  "So--what?"

  The widow smiled patiently.

  "Skimpy," she repeated. "There is so little to some men that thecleverest woman couldn't patch them up into a full-sized specimen. Theyare like the odds and ends left on the remnant counter. You have to dothe best you can with them and then use Christian Science to makeyourself believe they are all there and that the patches don't show.Haven't you ever seen magnificent women trailing little annexes afterthem like echoes or--or----"

  "Captives in the wake of a conquering queen?" broke in the bachelor.

  The widow studied her Sevres cup as the purple plume on her hat danced.

  "Those," she exclaimed, "are the bargain-counter husbands, picked up atthe last moment and made over to fit the situation--which they neverdo."

  The bachelor set down his teacup with the light of revelation in hiseyes.

  "And I always thought," he exclaimed solemnly, "that they were pickedout on purpose to act as shadows or--or satellites."

  "Picked out!" echoed the widow mockingly. "As if all women wouldn't bemarried to Greek gods or Napoleon Bonapartes or Wellingtons or Byrons ifthey could 'pick out' a husband. Husbands are like Christmas gifts. Youcan't choose them. You've just got to sit down and wait until theyarrive; and sometimes they don't arrive at all. A woman doesn't 'pickout' a husband; she 'picks over' what's offered and takes the best ofthe lot."

  "And sometimes you're so long picking them over," added the bachelor,"that the best ones are snapped up by somebody else and you have to takethe left-overs."

  The widow poised her spoon above her cup tentatively.

  "Well," she sighed, "it's all a lottery anyhow. The girl who snaps upher first offer of marriage is as likely to get something good as theone who snaps her finger at it and waits for a Prince Charming until thelast hour and then discovers that she has passed him by and that someother woman has taken him and made him over beautifully. And even if agirl had the whole world to select from, she wouldn't know how tochoose. You never can tell by the way a thing looks under the electriclight in the shop how it will look in broad daylight when you have gotit home, or how it will make up or whether it will fade or run orshrink. And you never can tell by the way a man acts before marriage howhe will come out in the wash of domesticity, or stand the wear and tearof matrimony. It's usually the most brilliant and catchy patterns ofmanhood that turn out to be cotton-backed after the gloss of thehoneymoon has worn off. And on the other hand you may carefully selectsomething serviceable--dull and virtuous and worthy and all that--and hemay prove so stiff and lumpy and set in his ways and cross-grained andseamy and irritable that you will cultivate gray hairs and wrinkles----"

  "Ironing him out?" suggested the bachelor.

  "Yes," agreed the widow, "and the wildest 'jolly good fellow' willoften tame down like a lamb or a pet pony in harness and will become ajoy forever with a little trimming off and taking in and basting up."

  "Humph," protested the bachelor, "but when you catch 'em wild and tame'em, how do you know they are not going to break the harness or burstthe basting threads?"

  The widow considered a moment.

  "You don't," she acknowledged grudgingly. "But there is a great deal incatching the wild variety and domesticating them while they are young.Of course, it's utterly impossible to subdue a lion after he has got hissecond teeth, and it's utterly foolish to try to reform a man--after heis thirty or has begun to lose his hair. Besides," she added, "there isso much in the woman who does the training and the making over. Thereare some women who could spoil the finest masculine cloth in the worldby too much cutting and ripping and--and nagging; while there are otherswho can give a man or a house or a frock just the touch that willperfect them."

  "How do they do it?" asked the bachelor enthusiastically. "Take 'em bythe nape of the neck and----"

  "IF we're such a lot, why do you marry us?" _Page 126_]

  "Mercy, no!" cried the widow. "They take them unawares. The well-trainedhusband never knows what has happened to him. He only knows that, afterten years of matrimony, he is ashamed to acknowledge his own youthfulpicture. He has been literally re-formed in everything from his collarsand the way he parts his hair to his morals and the way he signs hisname. The best husbands aren't caught; they're made. And the luckiestwoman isn't the one who marries the best man, but the one who makes themost out of the man she marries."

  "But," protested the bachelor, "if we're such a lot and such a lottery,why do you marry us at all?"

  The widow looked up in surprise and stopped with her cup poised inmidair.

  "Why do we wear frocks, Mr. Travers?" she asked witheringly. "Why do wepompadour our hair or eat with forks or go to pink teas? Marriage is acustom; and if a woman doesn't marry she is simply non--non----"

  "Compos mentis?" inquired the bachelor, helpfully.

  "Well, yes," said the widow, "but that wasn't what I meant. What is theLatin for 'not in it'? Her father looks at her accusingly every time hehas to pay her dressmaker's bill and her mother looks at hercommiseratingly every time she comes home without being engaged and allher friends look at her as if she were a curiosity or--or a failure. Andbesides, she misses her mission in life. That was what the Lord put Evein the world for--to give the finishing touches to Adam."

  "She finished him all right!" exclaimed the bachelor fervently.

  "Making a living," went on the widow scorning the insinuation, "ormaking a career or making fame or a fortune isn't the real forte ofwoman. It's making a husband--out of a man."

  "I should think," said the bachelor setting down his teacup and leaningback comfortably in his chair, "that they would form a corporation andset up a factory where they could turn 'em out by the dozen or thecrate--or---"

  "Pooh!" cried the widow, "a husband is a work of art and has to be madeby hand. He can't be turned out by machinery like a chromo or alithograph. And, besides, if you want a ready-made one you can alwaysfind plenty of them on the second-hand counter----"

  "On the--where?"

  "Where they keep the widowers," explained the widow. "If a woman isn'tinterested or clever enough to manufacture her own husband, she canalways find some man who has been modeled by another woman. And she hasthe satisfaction of knowing exactly what she's getting and just what toexpect. The only trouble is that, in case she makes a mistake in herchoice, she never has a chance to make him over. He has been cut downand relined and faced and patched already to his limit."

  "And his seams are apt to be shiny and his temper frayed at the edges,"declared the bachelor.

  "And you have to be very sure that he fits your disposition."

  "And matches your taste."

  "And that he won't pinch on the bank account."

  "Nor stretch on the truth."

  "And that the other woman hasn't botched him."

  "And even then he's a hand-me-down--and may shrink or run or--"

  "Oh, widowe
rs don't shrink or run," retorted the widow. "Matrimony is ahabit with them, and they feel like a cab-horse out of harness withoutit. They long to feel the bit between their teeth and the gentle hand onthe reins----"

  "And the basting threads," added the bachelor. "I wonder what it'slike," he went on, meditatively.

  "You'll never know," said the widow, setting her cup on the tabourette."You're too old."

  "Yes, I've got my second teeth," sighed the bachelor.

  "And your bald spot."

  "And I've sown my second crop of wild oats."

  "And yet," said the widow leaning her chin in her hand and looking upthoughtfully under her purple feather, "it would be a great triumph----"

  "I won't be put in harness!" protested the bachelor.

  The widow considered him gravely.

  "There's plenty of material in you," she declared. "You could be trimmedoff and cut down and----"

  "I'm too tough to cut!"

  "And relined."

  "I'm almost moth-eaten now!" moaned the bachelor.

  The widow leaned forward and scrutinized him with interest.

  "It would be a pity," she said slowly, "to let the wrong woman botchyou. The next time you propose to me," she added thoughtfully, "I thinkI'll----"

  "Did I ever propose to you?" broke in the bachelor with real fright.

  "Oh, lots of times," said the widow; "it's almost a habit now."

  "But you refused me!" pleaded the bachelor. "Say you refused me."

  "I did," said the widow promptly. "I wasn't looking for--remnants."

  "Never mind!" retorted the bachelor. "Some day you may find I've beengrabbed up."

  "You'll have lost all your--starch and style by then," said the widow asshe patted her back hair and started for the door.

  The bachelor followed, putting on his gloves.

  "How do you know that?" he asked, when they had bidden their hostessgood-afternoon and stood on the portico saying goodby.

  "Well," said the widow, "it would take an artist to make you over. Thewrong woman would utterly ruin you."

  "And who is the wrong woman?" The bachelor tried to look into thewidow's eyes beneath the purple feather.

  But the widow only glanced out over the lawn and swung her parasol.

  "Who is the wrong woman?" persisted the bachelor.

  The widow studied the tip of her patent leather toe.

  "Who is the wrong woman?"

  The widow looked up suddenly under her violet feather.

  "The other woman," she said softly, "of course."