David Graham Phillips 
 
 OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 A NOVEL 
 
 NEW YORK AND LONDON 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1908, BY 
 0. APPLETON AND COMPANV 
 
 Published March, 1908 
 
 Printed in the United States of America 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTEB PAGE 
 
 PROLOGUE . 1 
 
 I. THE AWAKENING 22 
 
 II. "WHAT ELSE Is THERE?" . . . .38 
 
 III. "A GOOD WOMAN, BUT" .... 53 
 
 IV. "My LIFE S OVER" . . . . . .62 
 
 V. SOPHY SEEKS A CONFESSOR .... 70 
 
 VI. "WHO S Miss RAEBURN?" 86 
 
 VII. DANGERFIELD S 107 
 
 VIII. VIOLA . . . ~ -. 123 
 
 IX. THE WEDDING, AND AFTER . . . .146 
 X. "MARRIAGE Is SACRED TO ME" . . . 158 
 
 XI. MOTHER AND SON 169 
 
 XII. FATHER AND DAUGHTER . . . . 181 
 
 XIII. "SHE CARES EVEN LESS THAN HE" . . 191 
 XIV. "WHAT A BEAST You ARE, TOM" . . .199 
 
 XV. DERAILED 212 
 
 XVI. SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 226 
 
 XVII. CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES .... 243 
 
 XVIII. SOPHY AND JULIET 264 
 
 XIX. "SHE SEEMED QUITE CALM" . . . .275 
 XX. SOME STRANGE NEW YORK ADVENTURES . 280 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XXI. "A FRIGHTFUL MAN" 304 
 
 XXII. FOR NORMA S SAKE 316 
 
 XXIII. MR. BLAGDEN BESTIRS HIMSELF . . . 325 
 XXIV. AND MAKES RAPID PROGRESS . . . .334 
 
 XXV. BUT CHARLEY INTERVENES .... 344 
 
 XXVI. THE AGNES-FLEURY CORSET . . . .357 
 
 XXVII. MR. BLAGDEN S BAD QUARTER HOUR . . 371 
 
 XXVIII. "MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAVED" . . 381 
 
 XXIX. JESSIE AND FLORENCE. . . . " . .398 
 
 XXX. THE STORM BURSTS . . . . . . 410 
 
 XXXI. MR. BLAGDEN PLAYS TRUMPS . . . . 427 
 XXXIL "C EST LA VIE" . . . . . . .441 
 
 XXXIII. " LOVE IN TIGHT SHOES" 448 
 
 XXXIV. SOPHY STARTS AFRESH . . . . .457 
 XXXV. THE WILD BIRD S CAGE OPEN . . .468 
 
 XXXVI. VIOLA GIVES THE CLEW 475 
 
 XXXVII. "Do You No LONGER CARE?" . 486 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 PROLOGUE 
 
 AUGUST shone hot and clear upon the hills of south 
 ern Indiana. The grain had been cut, and quail were 
 gleaning in the stubble, with a pause now and then to 
 whistle from the gray zigzag fence. But the timothy 
 was still standing, waist deep ; the full-blown blossoms of 
 clover, white and pink, were scenting the air ; and down 
 where the now shallow creek bustled along, over and 
 among the stones of its rocky bed, the cornstalks were 
 rustling like so many ladies in stiff green Sunday silk. 
 
 There was a path through the great hillside meadow. 
 It began at the barnyard, where the thrashing machine 
 was making the sweat pour from a score of workers, to 
 trickle and glisten upon their sun-scorched faces and 
 bared, hairy chests. It clove the sea of gold-tinted 
 grass straight to an island where a clump of pear trees 
 reveled in the western sun; thence it wound down the 
 slope to emerge into the road along the creek bottom. 
 On that midway island, in the shade of the pear trees, 
 sprawled in graceful idleness a boy of seventeen, like a I 
 young corn and wine god. His eyes were full of dreams ; 
 upon his handsome features lay a faint smile of content 
 that it was summer and the free open air, with youth 
 rollicking through his veins, and all the world before 
 him in the glory of its veil of illusion and hope. His 
 carelessly roving glance spied and paused upon a pale- 
 blue sunbonnet far away, down toward the creek fence. 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 The little bonnet, so blue, so airily light, suggested a 
 quaint boat adrift upon that bright bronze sea ; its oc 
 cupant was a small sweet face, like a flower afloat in an 
 azure shell. 
 
 In this boy, just then somewhat tardily awakening 
 to the sense of sex, all faces feminine aroused vague 
 confused minglings of wonder and awe and longing 
 now an impetuous impulse to push through the veil of 
 the temple s divine mystery, now a timid and even fear 
 ful shrinking. But he was a reader and dreamer, this 
 boy with the quick, blue-gray eyes and the tawny skin 
 and the splendid shock of auburn hair ; thus, no sooner 
 would he look at a woman than his glance would turn 
 impatiently away ; he had compared her with some 
 composite dream-woman, evolved from his picturings 
 of the women who lived for him in history and in ro 
 mance Cleopatra and Aspasia, Theodora and a boy s 
 version of Messalina; the two Catherines, she whom 
 Florence gave to France, and she who set upon her 
 own head the crown of great Peter s crazy, impish 
 grandson; Dickens s Agnes, and Thackeray s Becky, 
 the woman who ran away from her master in Second 
 Judges, and the burning-eyed roadside preacher, who 
 finally taught slow Adam Bede the meaning of love. 
 She was tall, this composite woman of the boy s dream ; 
 and she had masses of golden hair, and a white robe 
 with a purple cord at the waist, a robe that was flow 
 ing yet clung to her figure. A proud, haughty 
 woman, one he would be afraid to approach; yet she 
 would somehow hearten and compel him to to he did 
 not know just what; some restrained kind of worship, 
 for he had not got so far as to venture to think of 
 touching, of kissing her. 
 
 The tiny, pale-blue boat with its interesting pas- 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 senger was floating nearer and nearer on the surface 
 of that sea of emerald and gold. The tresses that 
 curled between the rim of the sunbonnet and the soft, 
 graceful contour of the small face were of the shade 
 of ripe wheat when the sun shines on it. The eyes 
 were blue, like his own, but a deeper, gentler blue, like 
 the sky, as you look straight up into it when there are 
 no clouds. It was the face of a child who was also a 
 woman a child waiting to be awakened with a kiss 
 into womanhood. The boy s face had the masculine 
 comeliness of clearness of skin and strength of line and 
 steadiness and intelligence of gaze. The girl was beau 
 tiful with that wonderful beauty of youth youth of 
 the smooth, electric skin, youth of the lips like petals 
 of a rose, youth of feeling free from the taint of 
 thought. And now she was standing straight and slim 
 before him and he did not, could not, turn his gaze 
 away. She was utterly unlike the woman of his dreams. 
 That woman compelled him to look up, was woman the 
 goddess. Here was woman the flower, to be plucked 
 and worn. He was at ease with her because he felt 
 stronger and superior. 
 
 The sun glistened upon her, upon the pale-blue 
 sunbonnet, upon her little round chin, upon her round 
 white throat left bare by her simple, single dress of 
 blue like the bonnet, and evidently off the same bolt of 
 calico. The dress came only to her elbows and to her 
 knees. Her arms, her legs, her hands and feet were 
 bare, and had been tinted a delicate golden brown by 
 the sun. Slim wrists and ankles, small but rounded 
 arms and legs, a slender, supple waist; the shoulders 
 broad and strong the shoulders of the woman who is 
 the mother born. 
 
 The boy flushed and tried to look away, yet could 
 3 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 not. He longed to say, " I love you ! " He longed to 
 take her in his arms strongly, and to kiss her He 
 blushed still more deeply, and could not even rise, but 
 lay resting upon his elbow and gazing and blushing. 
 The girl seemed to understand, as children do who 
 from babyhood have been used to being looked at be 
 cause of their beauty. 
 
 " I heard the pears were ripe up here," said she. 
 
 Her voice sounded in his ears like a strain of music ; 
 her words seemed full of delicious meaning, like a plain 
 mask that hides a ravishing mystery of beauty and ro 
 mance. " Pears ? " said he, awkwardly. " Help your 
 self." 
 
 "Well, I should think so!" retorted she, with a 
 mocking smile and a toss of the head that freed it of 
 the sunbonnet. Her hair was not in braids down her 
 back, but was done up in a soft roll like a crown. The 
 boy thrilled, flushed, looked hastily away lest longing 
 might thrust him where he would not have the cour 
 age to stay. 
 
 " My uncle owns this farm," he explained. 
 
 " But my father rents it." 
 
 " Oh! Then you are Joel Baker s daughter? " 
 
 She laughed ; very white and even were her teeth, 
 and the inside of her mouth was as rosy and fresh 
 as her lips. " Yes, I m Sophy Baker the youngest 
 of the eleven." 
 
 " My name s " the boy, or rather, the youth, be 
 gan, for he was now a youth and no longer the boy 
 who, half a brief hour before, had stretched out there 
 to dream. 
 
 " I know you" she interrupted, and she glanced 
 at his white flannel suit, the mark of the city to the 
 people of that region in those days. 
 
 4 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 He was on his feet now, was gathering ripe pears 
 from the ground, taking care to select only the ripest 
 that were also most attractive to the eye. She seated 
 herself where he had been lying, her legs curled up 
 under her skirt. " My, but it s hot ! " she exclaimed, 
 tucking in her dress a little farther at the throat. 
 
 He thrilled at the remark as if it had been won 
 drous wise and surely, more profound than the bot 
 tom of wisdom s deepest veil is the mere sound of the 
 right voice at the right time. " There you are ! " said 
 he, holding toward her a double handful of the little 
 pears that were as sweet as strained honey. 
 
 ;< Drop them," cried she, holding up her skirt to 
 catch. " Why do you blush all the time? " 
 
 " I didn t till I saw you" replied he boldly. 
 
 She was not old enough in coquetry to conceal her 
 pleasure. " You don t mean it," said she. 
 
 He sat close to her. " Why aren t you eating ? " he 
 asked. 
 
 She buried her white teeth in the largest and rip 
 est of the pears. The sight gave him a sensation of 
 delight that was also pain. " There you go again 
 blushing," cried she. 
 
 For answer, he put his arm round her, and kissed 
 her. She frowned, blushed, laughed, pushed him away ; 
 as he kissed her again, there came into her eyes a sud 
 den soft glow, and then she veiled them. " Go away," 
 she said pleadingly, almost a sob in her voice. " Go 
 away," she repeated, and from her long lashes fell two 
 big tears. He shrank before this new revelation of the 
 mystery feminine. 
 
 " I I I m sorry," he muttered. 
 
 She was smiling through her tears. At their age 
 the girls are bolder than the boys; she saw she had 
 
 5 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 unduly alarmed him. " You ought to be," said she 
 mildly. " You didn t look like that sort of a fellow." 
 She ate a pear in silence, watching his embarrassed, 
 ashamed face. " Still I reckon you felt just as I 
 did," she resumed. 
 
 He glanced at her in wondering inquiry. 
 
 " As soon as I saw you, I wanted you to," she ex 
 plained. As she finished one pear and took another she 
 added, " And I never felt that way before." 
 
 " Didn t anybody ever kiss you before ? " he asked 
 hopefully. 
 
 " Lots and lots of times." When she had suffi 
 ciently enjoyed his discontent, she went on, " In games 
 and that don t count." 
 
 "Games?" 
 
 " Kissing games." 
 
 " Oh ! " he said ; but it was plain he did not under 
 stand. 
 
 "Didn t you ever play?" 
 
 He blushed again, this time for his own evidently 
 dense ignorance. 
 
 " Why, where do you go to church ? " cried she, 
 amazed. Then, " Oh, I suppose you re Presbyterian 
 or Tiscopalian. They don t have kissing games at the 
 sociables. Well, as ma says, the Presbyterians may be 
 tonier in this world, but it s being tony in the next 
 world that counts." 
 
 He was sensitive about words ; but " tony " fell 
 from those lips as free from taint as a new coin 
 just dropped from the die. " No, we re Methodists," 
 said he. 
 
 " Oh, that s all right. The Methodists are most as 
 good as we are." 
 
 "Are you Baptists?" 
 
 6 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 " Not much ! " said she contemptuously. " We re 
 Christians." 
 
 "Christians?" 
 
 " Disciples of Christ. Some " scornfully " call 
 us Campbellites." 
 
 " Oh of course." 
 
 And their conversation ended abruptly. They had 
 but the one topic in common, and of that they dared 
 not talk even to the limited extent which their lack of 
 experience permitted. 
 
 " Going to stay long? " she asked, eating the last 
 pear slowly, because when it should be finished there 
 would be nothing between them and motionless silence. 
 
 " I was going home next week," replied he. " But I 
 don t have to." 
 
 A reflective pause. Then the girl : " I d never marry 
 anybody but a Campbellite I mean a Christian. I d 
 be afraid we d not meet over there." 
 
 " Will only Campbellites go to heaven ? " 
 
 " I hope not. But it looks that way to pa and ma." 
 
 " We think that all denominations even the Catho 
 lics maybe the Jews will go. Only there ll be differ 
 ent kinds of heavens." 
 
 She sighed. " If I thought that, I d like to go to 
 most any kind but Campbellite." 
 
 " I ve never heard of a heaven that I d change for 
 this earth," said he audaciously. 
 
 " Sh-h ! " she exclaimed a perfunctory rebuke. 
 " You mustn t talk that way." 
 
 " But I can t help thinking that way, any more than 
 I could help " a furious blush " loving a Jew or a 
 a Campbellite." 
 
 " I like that I " cried she. " Putting me in with 
 Jews." 
 
 7 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " But I like Jews. My best friend at home in Indi 
 anapolis is a Jew." 
 
 " I never saw a Jew except Cohen he s the ped 
 dler. Maybe he s a gypsy, because he has rings in his 
 ears." She complacently smoothed the skirt of her pale- 
 blue frock. " Ma got the goods this is made of from 
 him. And these stock " She thrust out one slender, 
 smooth bare leg, rosy white above the line of sunburn. 
 Her foot was small and perfectly formed. It was her 
 turn to blush. " I forgot," she said, laughing. " I 
 don t often go barefoot." And the foot and ankle and 
 leg went back out of sight beneath the skirt. 
 
 " They re very brown," suggested he tactlessly. 
 
 She looked caught, tried to save herself with, " You 
 don t know how easily I tan." And then she hastened 
 to shift the subject by asking, " Do you go barefoot? " 
 
 " No," replied he, with embarrassment. He was 
 afraid to confess that he had never gone barefoot ; she 
 might think he was posing as superior. 
 
 " I ll tell you what let s do." She rose to one knee, 
 tossed her sunbonnet on her mass of hair. " Let s go 
 wading. I know a place where the creek s deep and 
 almost sandy at the bottom." 
 
 Both were standing now. He was a head the taller ; 
 as he looked down at her, she lowered her face until he 
 could see only the crown of the sunbonnet. Suddenly 
 she whisked it off, and her eyes challenged his longing. 
 Before he could accept, " Let s race ! " she cried, and 
 was speeding down the grassy path like a fleeing nymph. 
 He pursued, but he had no desire to overtake her. He 
 preferred to be a few yards behind, where he could 
 watch her as she ran, the movements of her lithe, young 
 body, her hair frolicking and streaming in the wind. 
 She looked back at him when they neared the creek fence. 
 
 8 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 Her laughing eyes, her flushed cheeks He dashed for 
 ward, caught her, for one instant had her trembling, 
 throbbing form passive in his arms. She began to exert 
 all her strength to free herself. At first he was afraid 
 he would hurt her ; then, as he realized how strong and 
 supple she was, that fear gave way to a desire to con 
 quer ; and in her eyes laughing up at him, in her breath 
 upon his cheek, in the quick pulse of her blood, he 
 felt her desire to be conquered after a struggle 
 that she was resisting not to overcome but to make her 
 happiness and his own the greater when his strength 
 should slowly triumph over hers, and she, helpless in 
 his arms, should yield the kiss that was the reward and 
 the penalty. 
 
 He slipped in the tangled, trodden grass ; he released 
 her, fell, lay looking up at her. But she did not laugh 
 and taunt him and gloat over him. Her eyes were sud 
 denly sad, almost to tears. " If you hadn t had on 
 shoes," said she consolingly. 
 
 He drew himself to a sitting posture. It was de 
 lightful there on the warm grass from which the sun was 
 drawing a powerful perfume. He felt a languor out of 
 all proportion to the exertion he had made. She perched 
 on the top rail of the zigzag fence and busied herself 
 tightening the loosened coil of her hair. She glanced 
 at him; the color poured into her face, suffused her 
 cheeks. Her fingers faltered, missed their way among 
 her thick locks. Longing conquered his shyness and 
 fear. He rose, put his arms round her. She did not 
 resist. 
 
 " You ll give me the forfeit, anyway," he said. 
 
 She slowly lifted her eyes until they were gazing 
 straight into his. " Yes," she answered softly. 
 
 He did not kiss her. Instead, each continued to 
 2 9 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 gaze into the other s eyes. The blazing sun stung their 
 vigorous young bodies ; the call of the birds seemed the 
 intense passionate cry of their hearts. Their lips met. 
 His arms tightened about her, and she let herself slide 
 from her perch until he was holding her. One of her 
 arms was locked in one of his, the other was round his 
 neck. " Sophy ! " he murmured. And now they were 
 looking gravely each at the other. She drew away, shyly 
 began to close her dress at the throat. 
 
 " No ! No ! " he cried. " Sophy, I love you ! " And 
 he kissed her protesting fingers until they ceased to bar 
 the way and were fluttering through his hair, while his 
 lips touched her white neck, her throat, her cheeks, her 
 lips. 
 
 " Don t ! " she pleaded, her voice choked with a sob. 
 And again the big tears glittered in her long lashes. 
 
 " I love you, Sophy. Do you love me? " 
 
 " I don t know what it is," she answered, hiding her 
 face in his shoulder. 
 
 The fierce rapping of a yellow-hammer in the walnut 
 tree above their heads startled them. In silence they 
 climbed the fence, descended to the creek. The woods 
 seemed a temple; and they, two worshipers moving 
 along the aisle toward the altar. 
 
 " It s farther up the place I meant," said she in 
 the low voice people use instinctively in cathedrals. 
 
 He followed her until they came to a grassy bank 
 overhanging a pool. "Is this it?" he asked. They 
 were gazing each at the reflection of the other in the 
 dark quiet water. 
 
 * Yes. You can take off your shoes and stockings in 
 the grass here." 
 
 He sat and took them off, Sophy watching him. 
 " How white your feet are," said she. 
 
 10 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 " Not so white as you, where the sun hasn t tanned 
 
 you." 
 
 " But you re white like a woman." 
 
 " So s everybody," retorted he, not quite sure 
 whether she meant it as a compliment, not quite sure 
 that he liked it, even if she did. 
 
 Sophy seemed not to hear. " I thought I d be afraid 
 of you," she went on. 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " They all said you were so smart." 
 
 " And you see I m not." He laughed. 
 
 " No, not a bit. You re I was going to say you 
 were like the rest of the boys. But " with a quick 
 glance and a little color " you re not. No, you re not 
 a bit like them. I d do anything you said. I guess you 
 are smart. I m afraid you ll You see, I ain t a bit 
 smart, not even at baking and doing housework." 
 
 " Sophy ! " He wasn t listening to what she was 
 saying. He had been drawn close to her by the note in 
 her voice that seemed to be drawing him to her. His 
 arms went round her. " You re so beautiful, Sophy." 
 
 " I m glad you think so. Everybody always said I 
 was. You won t mind because I m not smart ? " 
 
 " But you are ! " he cried. " And if you 
 weren t He finished with a kiss. They sat down on 
 the edge of the bank and trailed their feet in the water. 
 And after a while he rolled up his trousers, she twisted 
 in the folds of her skirt, and they waded. The bottom 
 of the creek was gravel rather than sand, and the sharp 
 stones bruised his feet. But the coolness of the water, 
 the sense of freedom, and of her nearness Watching 
 the water just miss the edge of her skirts, he did not in 
 the least mind the bruises. There were great flat stones 
 in the bottom of the pool, with crawfish under them and 
 
 11 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 now and then a big minnow. She tucked her skirts close 
 round her legs and pinned them ; he rolled his trousers 
 far above his knees and his sleeves to his shoulders. 
 They waded and splashed and turned stones ; they chased 
 and caught and gingerly lifted the awkward, squirming 
 crawfish. And the sun slowly descended until it was, 
 streaming great level shafts of gentle golden light ! 
 through the foliage. 
 
 " My, but it must be late ! " exclaimed she. 
 
 He glanced at the sun. " About four o clock, I 
 guess." Then the idea of separation came like a sudden 
 falling of dusk. " That s not late." 
 
 " I must go home," sighed she, her sweet face over 
 cast. 
 
 They sat on the bank again. He unwound the strip 
 of gray silk that served him as a belt. " Let me dry 
 your feet," said he. She held up one long slim leg and 
 he drew the silk over it softly, lingeringly. " What 
 pretty feet you have ! " 
 
 She turned her arched foot sideways and glanced at 
 it critically. " Most feet are so ugly," said she. Then 
 she added : " But not yours." 
 
 " Oh, they ll do," replied he, busy now with her other 
 ! foot. When he had finished, he bent and kissed her in- 
 
 step. " May I come to see you after supper ? " he 
 
 asked. " It s only a little ways from my uncle s to your 
 house." 
 
 " Not to-night. We ve got the harvest hands, and 
 I have to work till bedtime. Pa don t allow anybody to 
 sit up after He goes to bed." 
 
 "Then to-morrow?" 
 
 " Yes to-morrow." She sighed. " That seems a 
 long way off, don t it?" 
 
 "Couldn t I come to-night? " 
 12 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 " No you mustn t." She seemed very young, child 
 ish, again. " You don t know how strict father is. I ll 
 catch it for staying away this long." 
 
 " To-morrow." 
 
 " Up by the pear trees. I can come about nine, I 
 reckon. But not for long. When did you say you were 
 going away ? " 
 
 " I don t know. I don t have to go back to school 
 for " 
 
 " Oh, do you still go to school? " 
 
 " Yes years yet." 
 
 " Ain t that dreadful ! " 
 
 " Oh, I don t mind." 
 
 " That s so. You re smart. Are you going to be a 
 preacher ? " 
 
 " Mother wants me to. But I " 
 
 " You d better be. It s a nice business. You sit 
 round dressed up all the time. And when you come, 
 everybody s glad, and they kill the best chickens, and 
 have everything good to eat." Her eyes sparkled, her 
 rosy lips seemed rosier, her white, sharp teeth whiter 
 and sharper. " Yes, I d like you to be a preacher." 
 
 " I thought I d be a lawyer." 
 
 " That s nice, too. You weren t made to work. 
 Smart people never do. I ve noticed that. They make 
 other people work and give them the money." 
 
 She stood up. He looked at her. On a swift im 
 pulse, he rose to his knees, caught her round the waist. 
 " How pretty you are ! " he cried, kissing her waist, her 
 bare forearms, the palms of the restraining hands she 
 laid upon his face. " How beautiful ! " 
 
 " Don t," she murmured, crimson. " You make me 
 feel ashamed." 
 
 " Ashamed ! " he exclaimed. " Sophy " 
 
 13 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 "No not just that," she interrupted. "I don t 
 know what it is." She hid her face in her bended arm 
 and turned away. He kissed the nape of her neck. She 
 sank back against him. " I don t know what makes me 
 feel so queer. I guess it must be She hesitated. 
 
 " Love," he murmured. " Love ! " 
 
 " Love," she repeated dreamily. And a light, as 
 from a new sun upon a new world, came into her eyes. 
 
 " I love you, I love you ! " he cried passionately. 
 
 She touched his cheeks tenderly with her slim fingers. 
 " I love you," she said. 
 
 When she drew away again, it was to start resolutely 
 along the road homeward. She turned to say, " I m 
 going to make pa send me to school some more." 
 
 " Let me walk home with you, Sophy." 
 
 " No, you mustn t. If pa knew what I d been up 
 to My, how mad he d be ! " Her eyes were dancing. 
 She nodded gayly to him, and went, swinging the sun- 
 bonnet by its strings, and walking with a natural, grace 
 ful rhythm. " To-morrow," she called at the turn of 
 the road. " Don t forget! " At that they both laughed, 
 so light-hearted were they. And soon he heard her 
 voice singing. 
 
 As he went up the hill toward his uncle s house, the 
 whole world seemed changed transfigured. And sud 
 denly he felt enormously hungry. " I do hope supper s 
 ready," he said to himself. 
 
 He was surprised to find everything at his uncle s 
 just as it used to be, just as it was when he, a boy, wan 
 dered down to the pear trees, not to return until he had 
 become a man. At all ages we necessarily reckon the 
 importance of the things of the universe as they are re 
 lated to us. Perspective must be personal. Years had 
 passed over him what is time but measure of event? 
 
 14 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 year 4 had passed over him since he last saw that big white 
 house with its green shutters, with its pillared porch in 
 front, and the long grape arbor at the back where they 
 ate in summer, the chickens passing in and out, chirping 
 and clucking. The lightning rod still glittered in new 
 ness above the roof, and at the back the preparations 
 for the evening meal for the family and the " hands," 
 which had been under way when he left, were only just 
 completed. 
 
 He was hopeful, yet afraid, too, that they would ob 
 serve the change in him. There was no reason for se 
 crecy. To love the daughter of prosperous Joel Baker, 
 owner of many hundred acres, and so shrewd a manager 
 and so good a worker of his wife and sons and daughters 
 and outside help, both male and female, that he was 
 renter of many hundreds more to love Sophy Baker 
 would not rouse opposition at his uncle s or at home in 
 Indianapolis. He was proud of his new and mighty sen 
 sations, of his discovery that there was in matter a soul, 
 tangible, alive, no vague unreality like the soul that was 
 part of religion. But somehow he could not talk of these 
 things, though he was bursting with them ; they seemed 
 the secrets of a sacred order of which he had taken the 
 vows. 
 
 At sight of his cousin Ellen, carrying a huge glass 
 pitcher of milk to the table to set it between a vast plat 
 ter of corn bread and a vaster platter heaped high with 
 fried chicken at sight of her, similar in figure and in 
 coloring to the wonderful being who had evoked the reso 
 lute, passionate spirit of manhood within him, he felt 
 the blood rush to his heart, then in mad torrent to his 
 brain. On his face was again the sweet sting of her soft 
 hesitating kisses. He looked round, fearful lest he had 
 been observed. But the men his uncle with a great 
 
 15 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 beard like a prophet s, his big, hulking, husky cousins, 
 and the eighteen slouching, awkward harvest hands 
 had eyes for the table only. The women his aunt, 
 with the sweet, tired face and the air of refinement that 
 made his uncle still in awe of her after thirty years of 
 the most practical married life, the four handsome, 
 hearty girls who were his cousins, and the three women 
 from neighboring farms called in to help the women 
 were too intent upon the wants of those twenty-one vast 
 appetities to note the faint outward signs of enormous 
 inward perturbation in " that youngest boy of Joe Mur- 
 dock s Joe that went away to Indianapolis and got 
 elected judge." 
 
 Next to work, there is no inspirer of appetite like the 
 example of a horde of hungry workers. The bees were 
 still busy among the grapes overhead ; a wasp or a mud- 
 dauber flew in and darted out, now and then ; the even 
 ing song of the birds filtered down through the broad 
 leaves of the vines like the voice of the wine locked 
 away in the round, ripe, rich blue grapes. But none 
 of those ravenously hungry eaters spoke; wrestling 
 with the great emotions, the great appetites, man is 
 always silent. 
 
 When all had eaten until they could eat no more, his 
 uncle coughed loudly and stood. They knew the mean 
 ing of that signal and pushed back their chairs and 
 stood also. Then the old farmer said grace, ending with 
 a tremendous amen that made the birds whose nests were 
 in the eaves just above the arbor dart from home and 
 flap away with cries of alarm. In those regions and in 
 those days, endless were the developments of individual 
 ity about its one opportunity religion. Everyone else 
 said grace before meals ; his uncle insisted that after the 
 meal was the proper, the only time, that it was insincere, 
 
 16 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 not to say impious, to give thanks in advance of the 
 benefit. While grace was saying, the young man s 
 eyes had been roving. Through a break in the leafy wall 
 he saw a house far away across the valleys. It was white 
 like his uncle s, and almost as large. The setting sun 
 was reflecting from its windows in a glory of rosy golden 
 fire. * 
 
 " Whose house is that on the crest of the second 
 hill to the east ? " he asked his cousin Amanda, in the ^ 
 pause after his uncle s thunderous amen. 
 
 w Joel Baker s. He s an old crank. But you ought 
 to see his daughter Sophy. My, she s a beauty. She fc 
 knows it, and she s got a selfish disposition and an empty 
 head, and is as lazy as the law allows. But the men 
 don t mind that." 
 
 " To hear you, I d think she d stole your beau," said 
 young Murdock shrewdly. 
 
 Amanda laughed disagreeably. " How d you guess, 
 Charles ? " Then, with a shrug of her fine shoulders, 
 " I didn t really care for him or you can bet she d not 
 have got him away. And what I said was so, even if it 
 was spiteful. It takes a mighty foolish woman to lie 
 about another woman to a man. What s the use lying, 
 when there s always so much to tell that s true? Wait 
 till you see her. She s not a bit your style. She don t 
 know a thing, except how to stir up the boys." 
 
 A sharp, shooting pang of jealousy. He watched 
 those flaming windows till they grew dark, watched the & 
 house till it faded into the black of the night. And all 
 the time he was seeing her as plainly as if she were be 
 fore his eyes, was feeling her as thrillingly as if her 
 bosom were fluttering against his chest like the soft 
 smooth wings of a white bird, soft yet firm white wings, 
 crimson at their arches. 
 
 17 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 The night was hot and close ; yet the sky was clear, 
 and he thought he had never seen so many stars. In 
 stead of going to bed, he crept down the stairs and 
 out by the unlocked back door. On cots under the wood 
 shed near the house the harvest hands were sleeping 
 noisily. He went through the garden gate and across 
 [ the potato patch, and the melon patch, and through the 
 - orchard keeping due east, where he knew her house 
 was. He skirted the dark wood of the first hollow, fol 
 lowed the road to the brickkilns until he came to the 
 bridge over the creek above the fall. 
 
 " Yes, that was what I came for," he said to himself, 
 turning aside to go along the bank of the creek. The 
 trees were thick overhead now, and the air was moist 
 and cool. There was something beautiful and friendly 
 in the shapes that seemed to peer from the deep dusk on 
 either side the dusk not so deep that he could not 
 clearly make out the creek foaming along as if practic 
 ing for the joyous abandon of its approaching tumble 
 of half a hundred feet. He descended, moss under his 
 feet, thickets of fern about him. Soon he was at the 
 pool beneath the falls, the pool into which the creek 
 leaped with a musical shout that drowned every other 
 ^m sound. He was seeking the ledge where one could stand 
 | and be showered and drenched by full half the mass of 
 ] falling water. He had just reached the outer edge of 
 the long flat stone, was still several yards away from 
 I even the spray of the waterfall, when he drew back with 
 * a sharp exclamation. Some one was there before him. 
 
 It was so dark that at first he could see only a sway 
 ing elusive outline. As his eyes strained and stretched 
 to take in every particle of the light, he saw, as in a 
 clouded mirror, the whole figure. " Sophy ! " he ex 
 claimed under his breath. 
 
 18 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 His eyes devoured that misty vision of a water sprite, 
 free and fair and unearthly, the spirit of the cascade. 
 Then he came to himself ; and, white and shaking, as if he 
 had seen a ghost, he fled up the road he had descended. 
 When he reached the bridge again, he sat on its rail and 
 waited, the noise of his rushing blood mingled with the 
 noise of the rushing water. After a long time, when 
 the moon was sailing high above the treetops, was shin 
 ing full upon him, he saw a movement at the entrance 
 to the path. He stood, turned so that his face was clear 
 in the moonlight. Her figure advanced out of the dark 
 ness. He went forward. 
 
 "Is it you, Sophy?" 
 
 " Oh ! " she exclaimed, her hand on her heart. " I 
 thought I was dreaming or that that you had died 
 and had come to say good-by." She clung to him, sob 
 bing. 
 
 " What are you doing here ? " he asked. 
 
 " I was down to the fall," she explained. " It was so 
 hot, and I couldn t sleep. I don t know what s the mat 
 ter with me. I feel so queer. I m happy and sad, both 
 at once. I sing a while, then I burst out crying and 
 I m sad as I sing and happy as I cry." 
 
 She was gazing up at him, a wistful look in her azure 
 eyes that shone in such splendor in the moonlight. He 
 pushed off the cap that bound her hair. A shower of 
 silvery gold suddenly enveloped her shoulders. " Oh, 
 Sophy ! Sophy ! I love you ! " he cried, and he buried his 
 face in her hair, and through its soft veil kissed her cool, 
 magnetic skin. 
 
 " I love you," she echoed softly. And she kissed him 
 passionately. 
 
 " Will you marry me, Sophy ? " 
 
 " Why, of course," she answered. " What else can 
 19 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 we do but get married? I couldn t think of anything 
 but being your wife." 
 
 The word " wife " thrilled him so that he trembled 
 from head to foot. Oh, youth of fire and passion, youth 
 that has the strength and the courage and the innocence 
 to feel ! " My wife," he said, and repeated, " My wife." 
 That word meant all this beauty his, forever his, forever 
 to shine clear and bright as a sunset planet upon his life, 
 forever to burn in his veins, inspiring him to do and 
 dare everything, anything, to fulfill all the audacities of 
 his daydreams. 
 
 " I felt it d be that way as soon as I heard of you," 
 she went on. " My sister saw you the day you came, 
 and she said you were different from the boys round 
 here. And I thought you were the one I was waiting for. 
 Often, the last year or two, I ve waked up with a start 
 because in a dream somebody had called Sophy, I love 
 you ! and kissed me. But I never could make out what 
 he looked like. It was you I know it was. I went to 
 fcleep as soon as ever I got into bed to-night. And it 
 Was you, plain as now, that woke me up." 
 
 "With a kiss?" 
 
 " With a kiss." 
 
 " Like this? " And their lips met. 
 
 They drew apart, hot yet shivering. "Sophy! 
 Sophy ! " he murmured. 
 
 " I was afraid, when I saw you at first to-day," she 
 went on. " You looked so so smart as if you were 
 full of the big books they say you read all the time. 
 Then there s a spark comes in your eyes when you look 
 at me Yes, I see it plain. It s like a little a little 
 star only it seems to burn out at me burn into me. 
 I saw it the first time you looked at me up there in the 
 meadow, and I didn t feel a bit afraid I don t need to 
 
 SO 
 
PROLOGUE 
 
 know anything. You know enough for us both, don t 
 you?" 
 
 " You know how to make me I burn whenever I 
 look at you, Sophy. And I feel so bold, and so afraid, 
 too." 
 
 " When I stood out under the water to-night down 
 there and it came tumbling down on me and seemed 
 to take hold of me everywhere It was like you. It 
 was fierce, but soft, too. And I called out your name." 
 
 " Just as the moon rose ? " 
 
 She glanced quickly at him, hid her face in her 
 hands. 
 
 He drew her closer to him. " Aren t you mine, So 
 phy all mine? " 
 
 In the dusk before dawn he went with her to the 
 gate at the end of the grove of cedars before her father s 
 house. In the shadow of the great lilac bushes there, 
 they lingered until the loud, hoarse salute of the roos 
 ters to the new day startled them apart, sent her hurry 
 ing into the house, sent him off toward home, marching 
 proudly erect. To those born with that in them which 
 had looked from his eyes since babyhood, life is no net 
 work of casual paths ; it is a definite road along which 
 they press steadily from purpose to purpose. He had 
 entered its first stretch ; he had his first purpose ; he had 
 begun to live. 
 
THE AWAKENING 
 
 EVERY American city and large town now has its 
 newly built district, where live the families thrust up 
 into affluence because their bread winners had the sagac 
 ity or the slyness to be among the lions in the divid 
 ing of the last quarter century s unwieldy riches through 
 the sudden development of the sciences and the swift mul 
 tiplying of the population. In middle western Saint 
 Christopher " Saint X," as it is always called to save 
 breath and time this newly built district for the newly 
 rich is on the bluffs that in winter frown and in summer 
 smile down upon the city. Parts of it the Whitney 
 castle at Point Helen, for example, or the vast rambling 
 Eyrie of John Dumont are grandiose, indeed. Most 
 of it is the more or less luxurious country places of 
 families of smaller incomes or of less advanced " culture." 
 
 It is one of these a square, brick house trimmed 
 with Indiana limestone that we enter just as the wait 
 ress parlor maid, capless and with none too clean apron 
 over none too fresh black dress, sends the tintinnabula 
 tions of the dinner bell resounding out upon the verandas 
 and up the well through which the front stairway 
 ascends. As the sound dies away a boy, in fashionable 
 summer dinner suit of gray well off the black, rises from 
 a hammock on the front veranda. He leans upon the 
 railing, looks down the grassy slope toward the there 
 
THE AWAKENING 
 
 not-distant edge of the bluffs toward a summer house 
 where a girl a year or so older than he sits gazing out 
 over the river, absorbed in evening dreams. 
 
 " Norma ! . . . Norma ! . . . Nor-ma ! . . . Norma Mur- 
 dock!" 
 
 The girl sighs, rises, turns. None could deny her 
 beauty; the critical would add the unpleasant but un 
 deniable truth that it was of the sort likely soon to be 
 eclipsed behind the homeliness of fat unless guarded as 
 carefully and intelligently as one must guard any other 
 of the winged treasures of life. But, standing there in 
 the seductive glory of her just seventeen years, she was 
 exquisite. "What is it, Charley?" she called. 
 
 " Dinner ! Stop dreaming about Joe Degarmo, and 
 come in and feed ! " 
 
 She colored, laughed, gathered in the trailing skirt 
 she was not yet expert at managing, came running up th 
 path and her run was not the awkward, cowlike gait 
 of the old-fashioned girl who never ran when she could 
 walk and never walked when she could ride; it was, on 
 the contrary, as graceful a dash as her handsome athletic 
 brother could make. When she stood beside him in the 
 broad entrance, he surveyed her with patronizing ap 
 proval. " Gad, Norma," said he, " it does you good to 
 be in love. You certainly are about the prettiest ever. 
 You re a dead ringer for the picture of mother when she 
 was your age." 
 
 As he made this remark the door to the left opened 
 and there appeared a youngish man in an unassuming *> 
 business suit. There was a sprinkle of gray in his 
 rather fair, slightly waving hair, quite a streak of it at 
 his left temple ; it strengthened the impression of youth 
 because it framed an unwrinkled face and clear and 
 ardent eyes. In the mouth its firmness, its lines of will 
 
 23 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 and achievement experience was more distinctly hinted. 
 A typical American face resourceful, courageous, self- 
 reliant ; the relentless pursuit of the fixed purpose, miti 
 gated by kindliness and the saving sense of humor. 
 
 " Isn t she, father? " said the boy, appealing to him. 
 The boy was evidently the son of the man a superficial 
 copy of a masterly original. / 
 
 Murdock came out of his abstraction, looked at his 
 daughter with a fascinating lighting up of the keen 
 gray eyes that made him seem even younger. " Isn t 
 she what? " 
 
 " Like that picture of mother taken at her age." 
 
 The smile vanished; he scanned his daughter, face 
 and form, narrowly, anxiously. " Very," replied he 
 curtly and coldly. Then as the two stared at him and 
 at each other in astonishment, he added in his ordinary 
 calm, rather indolent voice, "Where s your mother?" 
 
 " Here I am," came from the head of the stairs in a 
 slow, plaintive tone with a note of vague discontent in 
 it, but withal musical, sweet, youthful. 
 
 There descended toward them a woman whose appear 
 ance was a somehow irritating disappointment of the 
 expectations raised by the voice. She was young, was 
 in a way handsome even. But there was an unyouthful 
 breadth to her cheeks, to her bosom, to her arms and hips, 
 a distinctly elderly caution and ponderousness of step. 
 It was instantly apparent that this was because feet and i 
 ankles were far too small for body. In fact, her feet 
 and her hands, her wrists and ankles, slender, delicate, 
 in themselves inost attractive, had a suggestion of ab 
 normality, so out of proportion to her body were they. 
 It was unpleasant, almost painful, to recognize this 
 portly and sedate person, in rustling, much-trimmed 
 black silk, as the lithe embodiment of youth and love who 
 
THE AWAKENING 
 
 flitted through the odorous shadows of Joel Baker s 
 lilacs. The lines of grace and symmetry were still there, 
 though woefully obscured; and in a setting of features 
 less heavy the eyes, young and soft and azure, would still 
 have been glorious. It being particularly difficult for 
 4 a " sizable " woman to array herself becomingly, Mrs. 
 Murdock, slowly descending, looked more bulky than she 
 
 really was, and uncomfortable and dressed up, to boot. 
 
 ! The beaded trimming about her shoulders seemed to 
 stoop them ; the heavy, rich black silk was of the kind 
 that makes the dresses that will stand alone, the kind that 
 
 used to be regarded as the last word upon elegance, the 
 necessary " best dress " of the married woman of the 
 prosperous class. Her abundant hair was primly sleeked 
 and gathered in a heavy shiny roll at the back of her 
 head. In the contrast between her appearance her 
 dress, air, look out of the eyes and that of the other 
 three members of the family, there was at once a con 
 tinuation and an explanation of the queer commingling 
 of old-fashioned farmhouse crudity and new-fashioned 
 costly luxury that met the eye on every side within the 
 house. 
 
 The impatient children rushed on into the dining 
 room with its country painter s frescoings and its costly 
 rosewood furniture. Murdock waited at the foot of the 
 stairway. If there had chanced to be with him some man 
 
 .friend who had not seen Sophy since her wedding day 
 and had never happened to note how often the charms of 
 a bride hardly outwear her trousseau, he would have 
 found it difficult to believe Murdock s expression of sim 
 ple waiting not a veil for chagrin, perhaps anger. How 
 ever gradual these changes might have been, how could 
 even a husband s partial eyes readjust to them without 
 acute distress, recurring each time he saw again? No 
 3 25 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 more years had elapsed for the one than for the other. 
 If her life had been by chance hard, had not his life 
 been one of incessant toil? Why then the changes in 
 him all for the better, the changes in her all the other 
 way? 
 
 When her slow pace had brought her almost down, 
 he said: " How are you this evening, Sophy? Better? " 
 
 " The headache a little better," replied she. " But 
 the neuralgia s worse. Nobody ever will know what I m 
 suffering. But then I m used to it. Women were made 
 to suffer, I suppose." 
 
 " You certainly have had a hard time ever since the 
 beginning of last winter." His manner perhaps sug 
 gested that his was the somewhat mechanical sympathy 
 of those whose sympathy has been heavily overdrafted. 
 
 " Last winter ! " cried she angrily. " You know 
 very well I ve never had a single really comfortable day 
 since Charley was born I might say since Norma. But 
 then what can a woman expect? How can a man appre 
 ciate what she goes through in carrying children and 
 bringing them into the world? " 
 
 Murdock seemed as abashed by this the thousandth 
 reminder, at least, of the horrors of maternity as he had 
 been the first time it had put him down ; for, the woman 
 who uses this weapon always contrives to poison its barbs 
 with the intimation that the man was wholly, deliberately 
 and wickedly to blame for those horrors, and could hardly 
 atone by lifelong contrition on his knees. 
 
 Sophy was of those classified by the casual as " good- 
 natured " because of the widespread delusion about the 
 relationship between girth and good nature. Indeed, 
 until the previous winter she had not been bad-tempered. 
 But then the long gathering punishment for her indolent 
 and self-indulgent mode of life had tardily begun; and 
 
THE AWAKENING 
 
 now the drooping corners of her mouth and the line of 
 temper above her straight delicate nose were surer indi 
 cations of her character than her generous expanses 
 or even than the sweet, low voice with its note of plain 
 tive meekness. 
 
 A woman of the familiar type familiarly known as 
 " settled." Plainly, she regarded her life as past its 
 climax ; and the stage of physical and mental deteriora 
 tion, indicated in slovenly corpulence, in carelessness of 
 toilet, in stale, monotonous expression of eyes, proclaimed 
 that she had been of this mind for some time, several 
 years at least. Indeed, she bore suspicious resemblance 
 to those not rare women to whom the matrimonial altar 
 is the topmost tip of feminine ambition, is the high-water 
 mark up to which the tide of feminine life flows ever 
 fuller and beyond which it abruptly ebbs. To glance 
 from her to her husband was to have the impulse to com 
 miserate them both and to wonder. For, it was as ob 
 vious as her having ceased to live and having begun a 
 long placid death of the dry rot that the man to whom 
 she was married stood just at the beginning of the age 
 of achievement. 
 
 The conquests of active life, peace no less than war, 
 rest chiefly upon youth s cardinal quality, audacity, and 
 little upon intellect. The intellectual achievements, the 
 consolidating of what youth s daring has won into solid 
 structure of power, do not begin until forty or there 
 abouts ; for then the mind enters its period of greatest 
 dexterity and strength, the judgment is formed, the am 
 bitions and appetites are at their most clamorous. With 
 a yokemate who was not a helpmate, with a partner 
 who was not a companion, with a wife who could neither 
 appeal to nor appease the gorgeously imaginative pas 
 sions that flamed for Sophy, slim sprite of the fields 
 
 27 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 and the waters, Charles Murdock was entering life s 
 golden age. 
 
 As soon as this family of four was at table, the boy 
 began upon his sister again : " And Joe old enough to 
 be your father ! " 
 
 " I want a husband," retorted the girl, " not a child 
 to raise. I can t bear little boys except you, Charley. 
 * They re so silly and ignorant." 
 
 "What an unnatural child you are, Norma ! " rebuked 
 her mother. " Wherever did you get such ideas? And 
 you with your first long skirt I let you have that only 
 because it didn t seem proper for a girl in short dresses 
 to be engaged. But young people ought to be young. 
 When your father and I were young we didn t act like 
 grown-up people." 
 
 " Why, father s still young," cried Charles Junior, 
 with the brutality of the tactless boy. 
 
 A flush overspread the faces of both the husband and 
 the wife. The husband hung his head in apologetic 
 silence; the wife burst out: "You know your father s 
 several years older than I am." As she spoke she 
 glanced at him and felt moved to add still more crossly : 
 " Oh, I admit I don t look young any more. That s the 
 curse of being a woman. The woman has all the heavy 
 burden of care and suffering and anxiety, and it wears 
 her out." Her eyes flared somberly at her husband ; his 
 expression of discomfort deepened. 
 
 " Pity about you, mother," teased her son. 
 
 " Charles ! " exclaimed Sophy in sharp appeal to 
 her husband. " Do you sit silent and let your son talk 
 this way to his mother? " 
 
 Murdock came out of pretended abstraction. " What 
 was it, Sophy?" asked he. "I didn t hear. I was 
 thinking about business matters." 
 
 28 
 
THE AWAKENING 
 
 " Of course ! " said Mrs. Murdock, in resigned dis 
 gust. " It seems to me a man might leave his business 
 when he comes home to his family. It sets the chil 
 dren such a bad example. No wonder they fail in proper 
 respect to me." 
 
 " I m very sorry." Murdock s tone was contrite, 
 out of all proportion to the apparent seriousness of the 
 incident; Sophy and the children were astonished and 
 showed it. 
 
 " We were talking about Joe Degarmo," explained 
 Charley to Charles. " I was telling Norma she ought 
 to be ashamed of herself to get engaged to a man who 
 looks older than you do." 
 
 " There you go again ! " cried his mother. " Will 
 you stop him, or won t you, father? " 
 
 At the word " father " Norma and the boy burst 
 out laughing. " It does sound queer especially just 
 now for you to call the governor by such a venerable 
 name," said the boy. " Why, Norma ll have to call her 
 Joe grand-daddy." 
 
 Sophy tossed her head and pursed her lips. " I ve 
 been opposed to this engagement from the first," declared 
 she. " It s indecent yes, indecent. A husband and 
 a wife should be near an age, and should get old 
 together." 
 
 " Stay young together," suggested Norma dreamily. 
 
 " No ! " retorted her mother. " It isn t proper for 
 the heads of a family to act and look like children." 
 
 Norma s lips closed firmly to press back the eager 
 retort. Sophy went on : "I don t know what the 
 world s coming to. Everything your father and I were 
 brought up to respect is being laughed at and despised. 
 They call it improvement, but I say it s the road to 
 ruin. What s this, Mary ? Washington pie ? Oh, dear ! 
 
 29 
 
OLD WIVE* FOR NEW 
 
 Didn t I tell you to tell the cook not to have these things 
 any more? They re so fattening" crossly "and she 
 knows I can t resist." 
 
 Mrs. Murdock helped herself liberally to the Wash 
 ington pie, her eyes eager, her mouth petulant. Char 
 ley winked at his sister; she frowned at him. Both 
 glanced at their father. He was gazing at his wife, 
 and he continued to gaze as she ate the Washington pie 
 in silence and content. His expression was so strange 
 a mixture of amusement and some other emotion, not 
 definable but quite different, that Norma, the observant, 
 felt a queer sensation at the heart. Presently he lowered 
 his eyes and resumed his usual abstraction. 
 
 Charley happened to observe the waitress. As soon 
 as she withdrew he said : " Lizzie s serving without her 
 cap again. And she looks mussy and frowzy." 
 
 " You d better mind your own business, young 
 man," retorted his mother. " How can I see to every 
 little thing when I m nearly crazy with pain?" 
 
 " I wasn t thinking of you, mother," protested Char 
 ley. " I was blaming the housekeeper." 
 
 " Mrs. Theron has been busy waiting on me." 
 
 " She s n. g.," insisted the boy. " I ve been home 
 only three days, but I ve found that out. The house 
 is almost as bad as before you hired her." 
 
 " I never heard of such impudence ! " cried Sophy. 
 " Next thing you ll be criticising the food, and " 
 
 " It is pretty bum," said he. " Ain t it, Norma? " 
 
 " Do shut up ! " exclaimed Norma. 
 
 " Everybody, except my own family," pursued 
 Sophy, " admits I m about the best housekeeper in 
 Saint X. Mrs. Theron does what I tell her to do. As 
 she often says, she never began to learn how to keep 
 house till she came here and saw how I did it." 
 
 30 
 
THE AWAKENING 
 
 " She s a worthless old toady." 
 
 " If you can t behave yourself," interrupted Mur- 
 dock sternly, " you ll have to leave the dining room. 
 We ve had nothing but bickerings at this table since 
 you came home." 
 
 "Please don t correct the boy so harshly," said 
 Sophy plaintively. " Never rebuke temper in tem 
 per, mother used to say." 
 
 A long silence; then Charley asked Norma, 
 " When does Joe get back? " 
 
 " To-morrow, I think," replied she. 
 
 " Do have some of the pie, Norma," urged he. 
 " Don t be afraid of your precious complexion." 
 
 " No, thank you." 
 
 " Well, I will or mother ll take it all." And he 
 laughed alone and boisterously at his joke. Sophy 
 bridled, but did not again call upon her husband. 
 
 After dinner he immediately withdrew to the li 
 brary. In a few minutes Norma came seeking him, 
 found him at the farthest of the three long French 
 windows giving on the veranda and commanding a 
 wide sweep of hillls and valleys and sinuous river. At 
 the sound of her rustling, he turned, a frown added 
 to his sternness or rather somberness from his inter 
 rupted thoughts. Her timidity he was in the mood 
 to note everything sent a sharp pang through him. 
 : Why do you look at me like that?" he said, direct 
 and unconsciously peremptory. 
 
 She shrank not so much through actual fear, for she 
 was not afraid of him, as through that feeling of diffi 
 dence which men long accustomed to successful sway over 
 their fellows cannot but inspire, even in each other. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," he exclaimed. "I I " 
 He could not explain; so he added: "Please tell me 
 
 31 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 why you looked at me like He was smiling now 
 that winning, youthful smile of his. 
 
 " Like what ? " asked Norma, confused by this 
 new manner. 
 
 " As if you were afraid I d eat you alive." And 
 he laughed boyishly. 
 
 " You you always make everybody feel afraid 
 like a a " She glanced up at him, her eyes wa 
 vering between his haughty but graceful rather than 
 harsh Roman nose and his thick, clean and vital-looking 
 fair hair, one lock of which hung stubbornly down 
 upon his brow. She burst into smiles " a lion that s 
 condescending to be sociable, but may change his mind 
 at any moment." 
 
 He reflected her amusement, not wholly losing his 
 first expression of wistfulness. " But I never did 
 change my mind, did I? " 
 
 " No and I know you won t. But Somehow-* 
 Well, you make people look to their ps and qs. Oh, 
 I like it," she hastened to explain. " As Joe says, it s 
 your mark of superiority the sign you belong to the 
 aristocracy of men. And they all say you were that 
 way, even as a boy." 
 
 A sad satirical smile played over his features. He 
 was remembering that, even as a boy, he had never had 
 real friends, equal friends, only followers. He could 
 not see that he had ever done anything, as boy or 
 1 man, to make his fellows afraid, to put himself aloof 
 and, indeed, he had not. His thoughts came back 
 to his daughter. "Well what do you want?" in 
 quired he, good-humoredlv. 
 
 She stood beside him in the window and looked up 
 at him remorsefully. " I never do come except when 
 I want something, do I? " 
 
 32 
 
THE AWAKENING 
 
 " Naturally not," replied he. And he excused her 
 to herself, and to himself, with " A busy man soon 
 gets everyone into the habit of letting him alone when 
 they ve no business with him." 
 
 He saw that she was turning on her finger a ring 
 set with two huge stones, a diamond and a pearl. " Is 
 there nothing in the world but business ? " she asked < 
 softly, her eyes down and upon her ring. 
 
 His expression of sadness deepened. He stood in 
 one of his frequent attitudes hands crossed behind his 
 back, head a little to one side and forward, eyes pierc 
 ing into the horizon, lips slightly compressed, the pow 
 erful muscles of his jaw contracting nervously. After 
 a heavy silence, he made an impatient gesture, like a 
 man exorcising a phantom or phantoms of folly. 
 " What did you want? " he repeated. " Was it about 
 the Dumont place? " 
 
 " Yes," she confessed, with evident nervousness. 
 
 " You wish me to buy it ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " What does your mother say ? " 
 
 That released Norma s tongue. " She says she s too 
 far along to undertake the care of such a great place. 
 That s perfectly ridiculous. Why, she s younger than 
 Joe and the same age as Mrs. Berkeley, who s al 
 ways being taken for twenty-five. Yet she says she 
 belongs to a different generation from what we do. 
 She says in her day it wasn t respectable not to settle 
 down. She seems to think it s a crime for a woman to 
 have her looks or her figure five years after she s mar 
 ried." 
 
 A queer look flitted across Murdock s face, and fled. 
 
 Norma, feeling she had said too much, ended with, 
 " I don t think we ought to encourage her to give in 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 to age before it has hardly so much as glanced in her 
 direction." 
 
 Murdock abruptly changed the subject. " When 
 do you and Joe marry? " 
 
 " Not for ages ! Not for eighteen months, at least. 
 I must come out first. And I did so want to have the 
 Dumont house to come out in. The caretaker let me 
 look it over the other day. There are six rooms on 
 the ground floor that can be thrown into one, practi 
 cally." 
 
 "I ll get the house, if Mrs. Scarborough will let 
 me have it at a reasonable figure," interrupted Mur 
 dock. " And when you and Joe marry if he doesn t 
 die of old age before the eighteen months the ages 
 are up why, I ll give it to you as a wedding present. 
 Does that content you?" 
 
 She turned impulsively and, her face radiant, was 
 about to throw herself into his arms. Never had he 
 seen her so startlingly like the picture of her mother 
 as bride. Murdock drew back. " Norma ! " he cried 
 sharply, in his eyes the terror of one who sees the 
 ghosts that none disputes the ghosts from the graves 
 of memory. 
 
 She clasped her hands. " What is it? " she gasped. 
 "What did I do?" 
 
 He shook his head impatiently. " Nothing noth 
 ing," he said. And he put a hand on each of her 
 shoulders, gazed into her eyes with a tenderness and 
 pity that moved her almost to tears. " You re very 
 fond of Joe? " he asked. 
 
 " I love him," she replied simply. 
 
 Murdock kissed her. She thought there were tears 
 in his eyes. " Tell your mother you ll take care of 
 the new house now, and relieve her of it altogether 
 
 34 
 
THE AWAKENING 
 
 when you marry." He kissed her again, his expression 
 sad and cynical and tender. " Be happy, child. Youth 
 is brief and joy is fleet." Then, repentantly, " I was 
 only joking. Of course you you and Joe will be 
 happy ages ! " 
 
 He turned away, thus indicating that she was free 
 to go and that he expected her to go. But she lin 
 gered. "What s the matter, father?" she inquired. 
 " Has anything gone wrong? " 
 
 " Nothing," he assured her. " The contrary. To 
 day Berkeley and I completed the sale of the works, 
 and for the first time in my life I m free ! " He 
 laughed, straightening his shoulders as if he liked to 
 remind himself that the harness was no longer binding 
 them. " Free ! " 
 
 " I m so glad ! " cried the girl. " Now you can 
 enjoy life." 
 
 " So I can," said he with light irony. " I ve been 
 in here all afternoon, thinking about it." The ab 
 stracted look came into his eyes. "Thinking! I ve 
 done precious little of it during these years of work 
 precious little. I ve really had no time until to-day. 
 This afternoon I ve been feeling as strange as a man 
 who has been doing a long sentence in the * pen and 
 is out in the free air again." He glanced at Norma s 
 sympathetic, puzzled face. "I m half inclined to go 
 back to the 4 pen and ask them to lock me up 
 again. There seems to be no place for me in the life 
 outside." 
 
 " I think I understand," said Norma reflectively. 
 
 " I hope you don t," replied he, with a queer laugh. 
 " Now run along." 
 
 When she had kissed him and was gone, he lit a 
 cigar and seated himself on the veranda and resumed 
 
 35 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 his thinking his survey of past, present, future. 
 All those years he had been doing with all his might 
 the task he had set for himself as soon as he discovered 
 that to live, in any true sense of the word, one must 
 be financially secure, independent. And now he had 
 completed his task, had earned his independence, his 
 freedom, had come out of the "pen." And, lo! his 
 children were grown one of them about to marry 
 the other no longer at home, except for little stops be 
 tween visits during the brief school vacation and his 
 w ife Well, she was a wife and what else was 
 there? Either he must go back to the " pen " or make 
 a wholly new life for himself. What kind of a new life? 
 The only kind he had had a chance to learn about 
 was that life of the " pen." Was there no other? Was 
 there in all the world nothing to satisfy the longings 
 that were beginning to stir and to sprout within him? 
 Must he go back to his dreary, sordid task, his dollar- 
 chasing? "There must be something else something 
 worth while. What I need is a teacher, a helper." . . . 
 And he was all alone except Sophy. He did not even 
 think of her, so preposterous was the idea of appealing 
 to her to aid him in such a matter as discovering how 
 to use his powers to some purpose. 
 
 An hour two hours nearly three passed, he ob 
 livious of his surroundings. He was startled by 
 Sophy s voice, peevishly plaintive now : " Charles, 
 aren t you ever coming to bed? " 
 
 He glanced up like a rudely awakened sleeper. His 
 wife s form seemed to fill the doorway, and the beams 
 of the early setting moon upon her face revealed no 
 trace of the romantic beauty that had been hers. She 
 looked enormous in her loose white nightgown with a 
 kimono flung askew over it enormous and shapeless. 
 
 36 
 
THE AWAKENING 
 
 " You d better have been in bed than sleeping in 
 your chair," she went on, frowning and fretful, and 
 accusing him of her own pet weakness. Indulgence 
 in it had just upset her temper and given her a slight 
 headache and set the neuralgia faintly to threatening. 
 
 He looked away. " She has sacrificed herself to 
 her children," he muttered in self-reproach at his 
 thoughts during the past hour, at their savagely crit 
 ical climax on sight of her. But the perverse voice 
 within him retorted, " Not so ! She has sacrificed her 
 beauty and your love to her indolence." He knew that 
 to blame a human being for not being different was 
 much like blaming an apple tree for not being a rose 
 bush; so, he retorted upon his insurgent self: "Still, 
 she couldn t help it." Yet, by that same rule, how 
 could he blame himself for not being able to accept her 
 as she was, for not being, like her, " settled " ? 
 
 " The trouble with me," he reflected, " is that I m 
 out of work. I must get in harness again. I must 
 stop thinking." 
 
 " Do come to bed ! " railed Sophy, who had been 
 regarding him sourly. " You know how the lights 
 distress me." 
 
 " Beg your pardon," apologized he, with an eager 
 and embroidered courtesy that disconcerted her. 
 
 He rose and followed her upstairs. Soon they were 
 asleep side by side as peaceful a picture of domestic 
 unity as the moon saw in its tour of the round world. 
 
II 
 
 t 
 
 " WHAT ELSE IS THERE ? " 
 
 MURDOCK was off early next morning for New 
 York to join Tom Berkeley and sign the final papers 
 and receive the checks and securities. This business 
 was a matter of a few hours. But, instead of going 
 straightway home as he intended when he left, he lin 
 gered in New York. 
 
 "Why rush back?" said Tom. "You forget 
 you re free now. There s nothing to go back to." 
 
 " That s a fact," agreed Murdock. 
 
 " Except, of course, the family." 
 
 " Of course," said Murdock, with unnecessary 
 haste and emphasis. 
 
 " And I don t think," Tom went on, " that your 
 family bothers you much more than mine does me. As 
 my wife often says she s mighty shrewd As she 
 often says, American men are a race of bachelors. It s 
 amusing to hear foreigners and these scrubby half- 
 males that do the scribbling talk about this country 
 as the paradise of women, as the place where the women 
 run everything. We do let the women run the chil 
 dren and the culture and the frivolous end of the 
 game. But when it comes to things worth while, the 
 women aren t in it. When I talk to my wife about 
 business or politics, it s just as if I was alone and 
 talking to myself to get a line on what I ought to do. 
 
 38 
 
"WHAT ELSE IS THERE?" 
 
 She don t know the a b c s of practical affairs. That s 
 as it should be." 
 
 Murdock made no comment. If he had spoken, it 
 would have been simply to assent. 
 
 " The respectable women," proceeded Berkeley, 
 like a man feeling his way with another, " are the 
 steady round of the three plain square meals. The 
 others are the occasional banquet with French cooking 
 and several kinds of wine." 
 
 Murdock saw that Tom was breaking ground for 
 an attempt to induce him to join in the extremely un 
 conventional relaxations of which he had observed his 
 elderly ex-partner was becoming increasingly fond, 
 and in which he was indulging with rapidly accelera 
 ting boldness. As he had no intention, or inclination, 
 to enter this new partnership, he cut Tom off with 
 a curt, " Women don t interest me. I ve forgotten 
 how to play games, and I m too old and too tired to 
 relearn." 
 
 " Well," said Tom, by way of dismissing the sub 
 ject for the time, " a man of leisure a gentleman 
 has got to pass the days and the evenings somehow. 
 Maybe, you ll find out that you aren t older than you 
 look, and aren t tired at all." 
 
 Indeed, while he was uttering the words, Murdock 
 was thinking how false they sounded. In that casual 
 way in which he observed matters not directly con 
 nected with his career, he had seen that his wife was 
 losing her youth; and he assumed that he himself was 
 " getting on," also. And all this had seemed natural 
 and proper because most of the people round about, 
 following the traditional unenlightened, unthinking 
 ways that lead to premature decrepitude, physical and 
 mental, were aging even more rapidly. But what 
 
 39 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 Charley and Norma said, coining just when he was in 
 the frame of mind to hear and to note, seemed to have 
 set him off in a new direction. He was watching un 
 easily, yet with growing fascination, the spring of 
 youth, of interest in the pleasures of youth, bubbling 
 up within him, now that the weight of business care 
 had been removed from its source. He was making 
 dutiful efforts to suppress it, like a monk who fights 
 against being a man. But his efforts only seemed to 
 demonstrate how futile his struggle was. On came the 
 spring sparkling flooding overflowing fields so 
 long fallow that he had thought them desert. 
 
 Perhaps the first symptom at any rate the first 
 that definitely disquieted him was finding his own eyes 
 following Berkeley s wandering glances at the expen 
 sive looking women who are seen in New York ever 
 more boldly and in ever-increasing numbers, in public 
 places. When he was a boy that sort of women were 
 a sorry lot of stealthy creatures, rarely seen in the 
 streets, visited only in secrecy; they were ignorant, 
 could appeal only to appetite in its coarsest, crudest 
 form, seldom saw respectable men not under the in 
 fluence of drink. Now 
 
 " How clean and neat these women are," said Mur- 
 dock to Tom, without suspecting his own deep hidden 
 train of thought. 
 
 Very different from the respectable domestic 
 frumps, ain t they?" replied Tom, with no intent to 
 stab; for he saw Sophy rarely and only when she was 
 got up for company. 
 
 Murdock flushed, glanced quickly at Berkeley, was 
 reassured. 
 
 These luxurious, elegant, expert women seemed to 
 have command of all the arts that appeal to the lighter 
 
 40 
 
WHAT ELSE IS THERE? 
 
 side of man s nature. They were like fine wines could 
 be taken in whatever quantity the whim of desire hap 
 pened at the moment to demand as a gentle, exhil 
 arating stimulant, or as provokers and panders to the 
 frenzy of the debauch. They looked as if with them 
 the whole gamut of sensation could be run from the 
 most delicate subtle sensuousness refined as indulgence 
 in a taste for flowers or art or poetry, down and down, 
 and yet down. But his intelligence, aided by closer ob 
 servation of them, as they disported themselves in his 
 neighborhood, showed him that their range was limited, 
 very limited, would satisfy only the moods of such coarse 
 and undiscriminating tastes as those of his friend Berke 
 ley. After the first glance, at the second glance, he 
 penetrated their shallow shimmer, and they ceased more 
 than casually to attract him. But they had by no means 
 been uneifectual. They had moved him to wonder 
 vaguely whether there might not be a woman who could 
 tempt him a woman who did contain the whole gamut, 
 the appeal to every mood, a woman who was the sum of 
 all the delights, the woman he had dreamed as a boy. 
 And he admitted there might be such a one but not 
 among these. 
 
 He made another discovery that had immediate 
 and obvious results. 
 
 The Puritan idea as to sobriety of dress soon 
 lost its influence over woman. It interfered too seri 
 ously with her chief business, the winning of the male ; 
 it cut too savagely into profits and possibilities of 
 profit in sundry and divers industries. But this idea 
 has not yet lost its hold upon the other sex, has been 
 vigorously assailed only within a very few years, at 
 least in America. Murdock had always accepted and 
 acted upon it, without giving the matter any thought 
 4 41 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 whatever. He inherited from his mother an unpuri- 
 tanic instinct for neatness and cleanness and against 
 that profound slovenliness which is hid beneath a sur 
 face shine. He adopted the custom of bathing every 
 day as soon as he heard of it, and he put bathrooms 
 into his house long before New York took up cleanli 
 ness as a fad. Also he gradually developed a sensi 
 tiveness about his linen and underclothing. But in 
 outward dress he conformed to the custom established 
 around him. Two years before, he took a valet, but 
 only because he happened to observe how much time 
 Berkeley s valet saved his master, and how much petty 
 annoyance. He ignored his valet s hints as to the 
 meagerness of his wardrobe; he assumed he had quite 
 as many and as good clothes as a sober, hard-work 
 ing, serious man of affairs could afford. 
 
 Now, however, he began to observe the rapid revo 
 lution in man s dress that came in America with the 
 sudden development of wealth and leisure. He saw 
 that all the Eastern men of his acquaintance, men as 
 important in affairs as he, men of far greater impor 
 tance, were most particular in dress that they gave 
 it more attention and spent more money on it than the 
 average woman of the prosperous classes out Wc.st. 
 He saw that not only was it not regarded as effemin 
 ate to be well dressed throughout, but also it was re 
 garded as a mark of crudeness, of vulgarity even, to 
 be badly or carelessly dressed. A few years before, 
 there had not been in New York s fashionable district 
 half a dozen shops for finery for men; now he saw al 
 most as many shops offering men s luxuries as shops 
 offering luxuries for women. And up rose within him 
 the progressive man s desire to keep abreast of the 
 times, to dress like the men of his time, not like those 
 
"WHAT ELSE IS THERE?" 
 
 of the more provincial, more Puritanic era from 
 which New York had shaken itself free. He began to 
 shop to investigate, to discover, to order. The far 
 ther he went, the more interested he became, and the 
 more eager to surround himself with the attractive 
 comforts of which he, through inattention and igno 
 rance, had been depriving himself. 
 
 Education in these matters came as easily to Mur- 
 dock as one recalls a disused language one has once 
 known well. If he had thought about it and had been 
 of those who love fanciful explanations for common 
 place phenomena, he would have suspected himself of 
 having had royal ancestors, or of being a reincarna 
 tion of some classic voluptuary. But he was, in fact, 
 hardly conscious of what he was doing. It was his 
 habit to decide a course of action almost by intuition, 
 apparently, and to pursue it to its goal without argu 
 ment or reflection or deflection. He imagined he was 
 simply making rather extensive purchases to supply 
 too long neglected personal needs. In reality, he was 
 definitely breaking with his whole past. For, of those 
 external forces that combine to make us what we are, 
 dress is one of the most potent. It determines the 
 character of our associations, determines the influences 
 that shall chiefly surround and press upon us. It is 
 a covering for our ideas no less than for our bodies. 
 True, in changing his appearance Charles Murdock 
 was merely giving frank expression to his real per 
 sonality, which had all those years been latent and un 
 suspected even by himself. But it is also true that if 
 he had not thus given expression to it, given it a taste 
 of freedom from its lifelong Puritanic restraints, he 
 might easily have remained until the end what he 
 had so long seemed to be, and had always honestly 
 
 43 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 believed himself to be. Rarely, indeed, are our acts 
 that seem crucial and decisive really of any great 
 importance ; and how often do the seeming trivialities 
 work the profound changes. Causes, the real causes, 
 must be sought with the microscope, not with the tele 
 scope. 
 
 The morning of his last day in New York he hesi 
 tated before the glass when he finished shaving. Then, 
 with color in his cheeks and embarrassed self-mockery 
 in his eyes, he lathered the mustache he had worn for 
 twenty years. A few strokes of the razor; the face 
 before him transformed. He gazed long at it, not in 
 vanity, though vanity would have been excusable, but 
 with a mingling of wonder, pleasure and dread. He 
 went to the handsome new leather traveling box on 
 the trunk rests at the foot of the bed. He lifted the 
 cover and from a pocket in its lining took a folded 
 photograph case the pictures of his wife and 
 their two children. He opened the case, stood it up 
 on the dressing table before him, studied the face of 
 his wife. 
 
 The photographs must have been taken full five 
 years before, for the boy and the girl there were not in 
 their teens. But as early as the birth of the first baby 
 Sophy had discarded the enchantment that captured 
 him. The vanity of clothes and jewels she retained, 
 and, to the limit of her small knowledge and timid 
 ideas of spending money, fostered. That cost her no 
 effort; she had only to buy, the dealers even sparing 
 her the exertion of choosing. But at the behest of in 
 dolence and self-indulgence she put out the eyes of her 
 vanity of personal appearance. Why strive to keep 
 contour and waist and youthful bust and hip measure, 
 when those carnalities had served their whole purpose, 
 
 44 
 
"WHAT ELSE IS THERE?" 
 
 when the only man she needed to please was solemnly 
 pledged to be permanently pleased under the seal of 
 the marriage vows? 
 
 Guiltily Murdock folded the case and put it away. 
 " I ought to be ashamed," he muttered. 
 
 And he was ; but we cannot shame ourselves away 
 from thought. 
 
 He dined in the men s cafe of the Waldorf that 
 night. Not that he had definitely reasoned out his 
 peril ; simply an instinctive wariness of the impulses 
 now astir at the very surface before a straight admir 
 ing glance into his rejuvenated face from any woman 
 with beauty and slenderness and that alluring New 
 York scrupulousness as to the smallest detail of person 
 and dress. All those years he had been bent over his 
 task; now he had dropped it, was in the doorway of 
 his bare, dismal workshop, was looking out over the 
 world, beckoning him to the far-stretching sensuous 
 gardens radiant in the sunshine. And the youth within 
 him was saying : " You have slighted, suppressed me 
 long enough. I demand my right to live, to enjoy. 
 You cannot hold me in leash with this slender cord of 
 duty and propriety. I shall compel you to live before 
 you grow old and die." 
 
 Murdock was in his doorway, was pretending to 
 himself that he had no intention of advancing. But 
 his late partner made no such pretenses indeed, never 
 had. " It s amazing how many of the good-looking 
 females are in this part of New York," said Tom, ad 
 dressing no one in particular, as he and Murdock and 
 their chief New York lawyer, Morris, sat at dinner in 
 Delmonico s palm garden. Tom s bold, greedy eyes 
 were roaming restlessly. Whenever they found a 
 woman to his taste, their expression was enough tr 
 
 45 
 
OZ.J) WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 give her the sense of actual handling by those thick, 
 white hairy fingers of the sensualist. 
 
 " They bear a casual glance fairly well," conceded 
 Morris, with a sour thought for his own fashion 
 able " home." " They re always on the watchout for 
 men with money. That s all the women care about now 
 adays the money to keep em going." 
 
 Murdock could not have colored more uncomfortably 
 had Morris been aiming directly at him. "Of course 
 that s why," thought he. " They suspect me of having 
 money." 
 
 But somehow the reflection did not make them less 
 attractive. Their skins looked just as clear and cool 
 and soft; their sensuously draped figures and the lan 
 guorous shine of their eyes were just as alluring. " I 
 seem bent on making a damn fool of myself," he jeered 
 at himself angrily. " I must get back home." 
 
 And next morning he was off in his private car, 
 Berkeley reluctantly consenting to go with him. The 
 first few hours they talked business the successful set 
 tlement, the enormous profit, the future investments. 
 But neither was interested ; each was secretly revolving 
 the same idea. Berkeley brought it toward the surface 
 by saying : " Well, Charles, and what are you going to 
 do to pass the time? Our places on the board needn t 
 give us much worry." 
 
 Murdock shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Rather extensive orders you left at that tailor s," 
 teased Berkeley. " And why this sudden interest in ties 
 and shirts and silk socks and fine underclothes and 
 pyjamas with big monograms in colors. Suspicious 
 that, old man. Those monograms ! " 
 
 Murdock s response was a slight indifferent laugh. 
 
 " Beginning to sit up and take notice, eh? " sug- 
 
(f WHATELSEISTHEBE? " 
 
 gested Tom with a chuckle that got upon Murdock s 
 nerves. " Next thing, you ll be looking for trouble." 
 
 " What are your plans ? " inquired Murdock, appar 
 ently not the least interested in Tom s diagnosis. 
 
 " No more business for me, thank you," replied 
 Berkeley, easily set off upon the subject that occupied 
 him exclusively himself. " I never did have any taste 
 for it. I m going to shoot and fish, race horses, travel 
 a bit perhaps, do a little collecting. One thing is cer 
 tain. I m going to live in little old New York. No more 
 town or country for me. The finest views on earth are 
 out over the roofs of houses acres and acres of roofs. 
 Then you feel that you ve got human beings round you, 
 that there s something doing." 
 
 Pie half closed his eyes, leaned back, blew a great 
 cloud of smoke upward, and seemed to be enjoying with 
 all his senses the visions in the cloud. " I always get 
 rooms in New York high up, where I can look out over 
 the city. Talk about the elixir of youth it s the air 
 of a big city ! The people don t dodder and rot in a big 
 city. They live I They ve got something to live for. 
 They keep their youth and their looks and their minds. 
 It takes a city, a smashing big city, to turn out the right 
 sort of men and women, and good food and plenty of 
 amusement. And everybody isn t prying into your 
 affairs all the time." 
 
 Murdock glanced at Berkeley with good-humored 
 irony. Berkeley s expression became somewhat sheepish. 
 Said Murdock : " We know what it means, when a man 
 or a woman complains of being spied on." 
 
 " It s all very well for you to feel that way, 
 Charles," retorted Berkeley. " You re content at home." 
 
 " Rather ! " exclaimed Murdock, precipitate and vig 
 orous, 
 
 47 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " I m fond of lier" Berkeley continued. It was his 
 habit to speak of his wife as her or she, varying occasion 
 ally with " Mrs. B." " I didn t marry till I was old 
 enough to know what I was about." 
 
 Murdock moved uneasily, looked sharply at the un- 
 intending Tom. 
 
 " And," pursued he without pause, " I ve never re 
 gretted. She keeps herself up to the mark looks the 
 part. She s a fine, superior woman cultured. There 
 ain t any big cultured subject she can t go to the mat 
 with. Just the thing for the home. But she lives on too 
 high a plane for an ordinary chap. I tell you, Charles, 
 the truth about married life is it s too damned pure for 
 just a human being like me. I haven t been myself, ex 
 cept in spurts, since I was a bachelor kicking round. 
 Not that I m objecting to the purity of the home. On 
 the contrary, I m hot for it. It s like religion and all 
 those kind of things. It s necessary for the women 
 and the children for the welfare of society. But a 
 man must have his cigar and his drink and his latch 
 key." 
 
 His eyes twinkled and the end of his nose twitched. 
 His eyes and his nose suggested a pig s, but not repul 
 sively, because both eyes and nose, the one hardly less 
 than the other, were of the humorous cast the ferocity 
 and greediness of the appetites almost neutralized by the 
 good-natured content of the whole animal. He glanced 
 at Murdock for approval. Murdock was gazing out 
 into the flying landscape. There was nothing in his face 
 to encourage Berkeley; but Berkeley, in the habit of 
 finding what he sought, felt encouraged. 
 
 " Of course she looks down on me and probably I 
 deserve it. But " He sprawled more comfortably in 
 the easy chair " I don t mind, so long as she lets me 
 
 48 
 
"WHAT ELSE IS THERE?" 
 
 alone. Damn it, I didn t create myself. Anyhow, 
 ain t I just a natural man, not afraid to be what I 
 am? " 
 
 Murdock surveyed the powerful, healthy, well-fed, 
 well-dressed figure. He had the habit of giving people 
 a noncommittal look, no hint of verdict one way or the 
 other. * 
 
 Berkeley grinned. " I suppose you re thinking I m 
 an old fool that the women ll make an ass of me." 
 
 " Is that what you re thinking? " ; 
 
 " Well, that s what the women think. Do you sup- * 
 pose 7 don t know it ? They might still get up real en- ^ 
 thusiasm for you." He inventoried Murdock s attrac 
 tive exterior with one quick glance of good-humored 
 envy. " You re like a boy just out of college, now that 
 your mustache is off. While I Look at the roll of 
 fat under my chin and at the back of my head ; look at 
 my bald poll and the tufts of gray hair in my ears and 
 nose." Berkeley laughed cheerily. " I never was a 
 beauty. I ve small doubt in fact, I m sure she mar 
 ried me more for a home than because she took a shine 
 to my looks. But what do I care? I got her, didn t 
 !?...! remember, when I used to see an old chap going 
 about with some fair, fresh young thing, I d sneer at him 
 and call him an old dodderer for believing the stuff the 
 girl was ladling out to him, simply to get hold of his 
 money. But that was because I didn t understand. I 
 know now what s going on in the old chaps heads." 
 The humorous twinkle of the eyes, the humorous twitch 
 of the end of the nose. " Us old fellows realize perfectly 
 that it s all a matter of money with the lady that she 
 has hard work to conceal her dislike. But, damn it, she 
 does conceal it. She don t dare show it. And we get for 
 money just as good, to all practical purposes, as we d 
 
 49 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 get for like, and we haven t the annoyance of being liked 
 loved." 
 
 Murdock gave a quick glance of dissent. Berkeley 
 would not have understood, had he noted; his imagina 
 tion had no wings. " A sensible man wants to love a 
 woman," he proceeded, " but he don t want love from 
 her. Love means jealousy, hanging on when a man 
 wants to go. It means scenes and tears and no end of 
 sloppy gush." 
 
 " That sounds like good business sense," commented 
 Murdock. He was not certain whether he was more re 
 pelled or more roused to envy by his friend and partner s 
 views. 
 
 " I never could see why men don t apply common 
 sense to their relations with women just as they do to 
 business," pursued Berkeley. " What the world needs is 
 to be got on a sound business basis, and all this silly 
 slush of sentiment done away with. I want friends who 
 do something for me in exchange for what I do for them. 
 Give and take that s the right basis. I never yet saw 
 a sentimental friendship or a love affair, where one 
 party, and usually both, wasn t longing yes, by gad, 
 and scheming to get something for nothing. But all 
 this isn t an answer to my question. Don t be so damn 
 secretive. You needn t be afraid you ll shock me. Tell 
 me what you re going to do. ... I ve an idea you ll 
 rush back to business. You don t care much for friends 
 . or for the ladies, God bless em though those gorgeous 
 monograms " 
 
 " Business, I guess," said Murdock. He looked som 
 ber, and his tone was somberer. 
 
 That s where you get your happiness." 
 
 " Occupation," corrected Murdock brusquely. " I m 
 not looking for happiness. Happiness is like that love 
 
 50 
 
"WHAT ELSE IS THERE?" 
 
 you rail against. It s hard to get, impossible to lieep, 
 hard to get over." 
 
 "That depends on what you mean by happiness. You 
 don t include my kind. I intend to get and to keep 
 myself in A-l physical condition lots of fresh air 
 and exercise, little food, less drink, no excesses. I ll 
 treat my five senses like so many valuable workmen 
 that you can t replace work em up to capacity, 
 but see that they have plenty of rest and recupera 
 tion. I ll live thirty years yet thirty good years, 
 for I m only fifty-five." The end of his long, strong 
 nose twitched. " And I ll enjoy every minute of them. 
 And I tell you, Murdock " He gave his thick leg 
 a thwack with his hairy, well-kept hand " I ll be 
 liked better and spread more sunshine in surrounding 
 myself with cheerfulness than any of the high-plane 
 people." 
 
 " Probably," said Murdock. With an expression 
 far from flattering he studied the sybarite, now ab 
 sorbed in the dreams he had conjured. Berkeley was 
 one of those rich voluptuaries who note and keenly en 
 joy every item of the luxury and comfort and consid 
 eration their riches give them. As he smoked he looked 
 with shining eyes at the costly cigar, enjoying its 
 
 I color, its fine unbroken ash ; and each time he put it to 
 his mouth he tasted it, rolling it over his thick moist 
 lips. There is an animalism self-delighted and self- 
 
 1 unconscious that has a certain fascination. Such was 
 Berkeley s; and Murdock would no more have con 
 demned him than he would have condemned a pig. But 
 the Berkeley plan of life had small attraction for him. 
 It was too infantile, too much like leading processions 
 of children endlessly through candy shops. He envied 
 Tom the ability to be a child, a mere animal; but 
 
 51 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 he himself must adapt his own life to his own tempera 
 ment. " Business, I guess," reflected he, " with possi 
 bly politics. What else is there ? " He was intense, con 
 centrated; he could not wander aimlessly even in the 
 garden of pleasure. 
 
XXI 
 
 " A GOOD WOMAN, BUT " 
 
 HE was descending at the side door from the auto 
 that brought him from the station when his son, on the 
 porch, cried out : " Why, father ! Your mustache is 
 off!" 
 
 " So it is," said Murdock, feeling his lip, as if just 
 discovering his loss. 
 
 " Look at his lip, mother ! " cried Charley, as Sophy 
 appeared. There being " nobody " to see, she was in her 
 normal state the private condition of those who like to 
 live one way in the parlor and another in the rest of the 
 house. Her hair, carelessly done, showed it had not been 
 washed recently. There was a highly unbecoming shine 
 on her face. Her ill-fitting corset, her blouse so badly 
 cut that it pulled across the bust, would have made her 
 lack of symmetry grotesque to unaccustomed eyes. The 
 only feature of her toilet not unattractive was her shoes. 
 She was extremely proud of her feet, as indeed she had 
 reason to be. And she always wore boots or shoes or slip 
 pers worthy of them. But usually, as now, her feet were 
 hidden by the bottom of a dowdy skirt. She fixed a dis 
 approving gaze upon her husband s shaven lip. 
 
 " What did you do that for? " she demanded, as he 
 touched the cheek she offered for the perfunctory matri 
 monial salute. Her voice was sour, suspicious. 
 
 " I ve often intended to shave it, as I never liked it,** 
 53 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 said he. " But I ve always been too busy in too big 
 a rush to get through and away." 
 
 " Now, you look younger than ever," cried Charley. 
 " If I were mother, I d keep an eye on you." 
 
 "Where did you learn to talk so low?" said his 
 mother severely. " You never heard that kind at home." 
 
 " Mother mother ! " exclaimed her son, exasper 
 ated. " Haven t you got any sense of humor? " 
 
 But Sophy was moodily eying his father, who was 
 giving orders to the chauffeur. The boy went into the 
 house. " What were you doing in New York so long? " 
 she demanded, when the auto was gone and her husband 
 returned to her. 
 
 " I ve been gone only about a month," was his reply 
 in a mollifying tone, though it irritated him to be thus 
 cross-examined. Never before had he had the experi 
 ence. 
 
 " I wanted to go," she went on. " But you said it d 
 simply be a case of there and back." 
 
 * You told me nothing about wanting to go. If you 
 wish to go to New York, why don t you? What s to 
 prevent? " 
 
 ; * You know I couldn t, without you. I wouldn t 
 give people cause to talk." 
 
 " I think your reputation would weather it," said he, 
 with intent of pleasantry. 
 
 Her eyes snapped. " That s right insult me ! 
 Taunt me because I ve sacrificed myself to you and the 
 children." 
 
 " Sophy ! " he exclaimed in astonishment. He had 
 no suspicion that during the month she, too, had been 
 revolving thoughts suggested by their children s care 
 less talk. Even where women, or men, are forced by 
 flaunted signs to admit they are " not what I once was." 
 
 54 
 
"A GOOD WOMAN, BUT 
 
 a very little flattery, however faintly insinuated, will 
 cause vanity to perk up and to become fantastically 
 optimistic. Sophy Murdock, studying her reflection in 
 the mirror with the infatuate eyes we turn upon our 
 selves, discovered that her change w r as hardly more than 
 in style of beauty, that she had merely bloomed from the 
 girlish into the womanly. If she had believed her own 
 oft-repeated phrases of self-depreciation, she would 
 never have uttered them. 
 
 She was waiting now for him to smooth her ruffled 
 vanity. But the unconscious Murdock busied himself 
 unbuttoning the dust coat he had worn in the auto. As 
 he took it off, he revealed a new suit of traveling tweeds 
 of far more youthful cut and style than he had ever 
 worn before; and, instead of the familiar four-in-hand 
 tie of some unobtrusive pattern, there fluttered before 
 his wife s wide, wrathful eyes a bright butterfly of 
 summer silk. At the effect of his new finery upon her 
 he flushed; the flush spread as he grew angry at him 
 self for showing embarrassment, angry at her for hav 
 ing the unexpected shrewdness to penetrate the reasons 
 for this blossoming out reasons he was not admitting 
 to himself. 
 
 " I knew it ! " she exclaimed. " I ve had a presenti 
 ment all the time you ve been away. You ought to be 
 ashamed of yourself, Charles Murdock for the chil 
 dren s sake even if you haven t any regard for my feel- 
 ings." 
 
 "What now?" cried he. 
 
 " To come back home, dressed like a boy that s run 
 ning round with the girls. You, a settled married man, 
 with grown children." 
 
 " Sophy, what is the matter? " he demanded; for he 
 now realized that she was stirred to the depths. 
 
 55 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " It s for me to ask what s come over you," retorted 
 she. No longer could she deny to herself that anybody 
 would say this husband of hers looked younger than 
 she, might put it that he " looks almost young enough 
 to be her son." And he, deliberately dressing himself 
 to encourage malignance it was intolerable ! " I 
 thought," she sneered, " you had sense enough to be 
 sober and dignified, as you should be at your time of 
 life." 
 
 He felt apologetic before her fury, felt he must try 
 to calm her. Also, there would presently be disclosed 
 that entire new wardrobe, extensive, luxurious, gay be 
 yond any apparel he had ever possessed. " Sophy, don t 
 you think we d be making a mistake to let ourselves 
 grow old before there s any necessity for it ? The world 
 has changed. When we were children, people looked on 
 themselves as out of it and on the way to old age long 
 before they were forty. That isn t the way nowa 
 days " 
 
 " I ve got no liking for foolishness," she cut in, 
 " We re grown-up people. I, for one, don t propose to 
 make a fool of myself by trying to act otherwise. When 
 I was. a child, as the apostle says, I acted like a child. 
 But now that I m grown, I ve put away childish things." 
 
 " That s all very well," replied he persuasively. 
 " But it s not what I m talking about. I m simply 
 saying, it s not dignity but a very unwise kind of lazi 
 ness to give up physically. It reacts and makes one 
 sodden and stupid " 
 
 " So ! You think your wife sodden and stupid, do 
 you ? " Her heavy face was red with rage ; her eyes 
 blazed at him a fury that was very like hatred. " Sod 
 den and stupid ! " 
 
 He made an impatient gesture, gave her a look that 
 56 
 
"A GOOD WOMAN, BUT" 
 
 cowed her into silence ; for she did not understand him, 
 and we are all in awe of what we do not understand, 
 and can be frightened by its unfathomed possibilities. 
 He went into the house, shut himself up in the library, 
 At dinner he spoke only when Charley or Norma ad 
 dressed him directly; his wife did not venture even to 
 1 glance at him. After dinner he retired to the library 
 again, not to reappear until eleven o clock. She was 
 still in the sitting room, though it was an hour past her 
 : bedtime. He had been looking at her several minutes, 
 j as she sat humped up and reading a novel, before she 
 realized that he was in the room. 
 
 "Are you ready to go to bed?" said she, laying 
 aside the novel and rising. 
 
 " Yes," he replied, and opened the door for her to 
 pass out. 
 
 When they were in the dressing room they used in 
 common, she by way of overture toward resuming their 
 ordinary relations began crossly, " I had to wait for 
 you. It disturbs me when you come to bed after 
 I do." 
 
 4 You spoke of this the other day," said he. A long 
 pause, then he added : " You know, I once suggested 
 we d be more comfortable with separate dressing and 
 sleeping rooms." 
 
 " I know you did," snapped she, and anger made her 
 fingers so clumsy that she tore out a buttonhole in her 
 blouse. " And I told you what I thought of it. I wasn t 
 brought up with such immoral ideas. Husband and 
 wife are one flesh. They belong together." 
 
 " As you please." 
 
 When she was in bed, and he about ready to join 
 her, he went toward the windows. " Don t touch those 
 windows," cried she. " Leave them shut." 
 5 57 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " The room s so close, I can hardly stand it now," he 
 began. 
 
 " Not a thought for me ! " railed she. " Never a 
 thought for me. It s the open windows that have been 
 giving me the neuralgia. Katy warned me, but I didn t 
 pay attention. I was brought up to be careful and keep 
 out the poisonous night air, but you would have every 
 thing open, and I never insist on myself. I got rid of 
 the neuralgia while you were away, and I won t go back 
 to it." 
 
 " But the night s very warm hot." 
 
 " How can you be so brutal ! But, then, what d you 
 care, if I was tortured with pain? " 
 
 " Very well very well," interrupted he. " The win 
 dows stay shut." 
 
 When the lights were out, she tossed and turned 
 irritably, more wide awake than when she was up and 
 dressed. Dr. Schulze had once told her that in her 
 case, as with almost all the pathetic victims of mental 
 anguish, there was a purely physical reason for insom 
 nia, quite sufficient to account for it and for her 
 headaches, neuralgia, sciatica, and all her woes, mental 
 and physical. He had said she had that painless kind 
 of indigestion which gives no physical warning but 
 causes ferocious attacks of " the blues " by day, and 
 drives sleep from the eyes at night and keeps the mind 
 tossing in a foaming flood of melancholy fancies. But 
 she disdained this unspiritual explanation. And now it 
 was her husband only, the anxieties he was causing her, 
 that made her thus miserably wakeful. She told her 
 self that while he was away in New York somebody 
 " probably that low Tom Berkeley, perhaps some 
 woman " had filled him with silliness and wickedness. 
 " I couldn t go with him. I ve got the house and the 
 
 58 
 
"A GOOD WOMAN, BUT" 
 
 children to look after and my health poor from all 
 my toiling and slaving." In fact, she had had servants 
 to wait upon her all her married life, had done no toil 
 ing, much less slaving. But " toiling and slaving " 
 was one of her pet phrases, got from her mother, who 
 had excuse, perhaps right, to use it. By reiteration 
 any idea, however palpably absurd, gradually wins ac 
 ceptance, if nobody has any especial reason of interest 
 to combat it. Sophy had made not only herself but 
 also her family, and the people of Saint X generally, 
 believe that she had " toiled and slaved " by saying 
 it frequently and with plaintive meekness. " Hus 
 bands," ran on the gloomy current of her wakeful night 
 thoughts, " ought never to be allowed to go away with 
 out their wives. Men are so weak and coarse. Now, 
 here he s come home, a moral wreck." 
 
 How reclaim him? Not how make him again the 
 lover. No, not the lover again; there was a time for 
 the " foolishness " of passion, and a time for putting 
 " foolishness " forever aside. No, not the lover again. 
 How make him a model husband, even as she was a 
 model wife a sober, sensible, "settled" person? 
 
 While she tossed and fretted and raged he lay be 
 side her motionless, but as far from sleep as she. He 
 had trained himself to dismiss at will any disagreeable 
 subject when revolving it would avail nothing. But 
 that night he could not dismiss the odor from her hair. 
 She never washed it while one of her spells was on, and 
 she would not resume the not very frequent washings 
 until absolutely sure she was entirely well. He lay as 
 near his edge of the bed as he could ; he tried to con 
 vince himself that he was yielding to perverse and most 
 unkind imagination. In vain. With the windows 
 tight closed the air was so close that in ordinary cir- 
 
 59 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 <mmstances he would soon have been stupefied into a 
 semblance of slumber. But every time she twisted or 
 turned there arose from her mop of hair that strong, 
 sour, sickening odor to rouse his nerves from on- 
 creeping stupor, to sting them till they quivered. 
 
 " Good God ! " he muttered, " surely a little soap and 
 water wouldn t kill her ! " 
 
 He reminded himself, by way of self-reproach, that 
 he had often before noticed this odor, and others even 
 more trying, yet had not been thus insurgent. " It s the 
 closed windows," thought he. " If they were open, even 
 an inch or so " 
 
 But the shut windows did not wholly account for 
 the change in him, though he fancied they did. There 
 tofore he had accepted her slovenliness, personal and in 
 the household, as necessary incidents to married life, 
 as in a way the conventional signs of the domestic woman 
 of the virtuous " homebody," free from " foolishness." 
 Now, with the new ideas that had come as soon as he 
 had begun to put his mind to other than merely com 
 mercial uses or, rather, the newly awakened part of his 
 nature he was beginning to question, to dispute, to 
 deny to flout his long dominant other self of the old- 
 fashioned ideas and of the old-fashioned unquestioning 
 reverence for custom and tradition. 
 
 " No wonder men fly from home to those other 
 women," he muttered, with somewhat the blasphemer s 
 combination of fear and recklessness. " Why, if they 
 acted like this they wouldn t make their salt." 
 
 If he had not quarreled with her that afternoon he 
 would have risen up and passed the night on the sofa 
 down in his library. As it was, he stiffened his nerves 
 and lay quiet. " She s far too good for me, anyway," 
 isaid he to himself. " I m getting to be a kicker and a 
 
 60 
 
"A GOOD WOMAN, BUT 
 
 crank like all idlers. I must go to work again or I don t 
 know where I ll land." 
 
 But these reflections seemed to have no calming effect 
 upon the odor. " Yes," thought he, " she s a good 
 woman, but it does seem to me I d wash at least my 
 hair now and then, and risk neuralgia. It can t be 
 much worse than this." 
 
IV 
 
 HE waited until her breathing assured him he was 
 free; then he stealthily rose and went into the dressing 
 room, softly closing the door between. Wrapped in a 
 bath robe, and covered with an afghan, he got a few 
 hours sleep on the little lounge there near an open win 
 dow. When she awoke it was nearly nine o clock; as 
 he was very regular she knew he had been gone since half 
 past seven. We are all surprised to find our troubles 
 with us after a sleep ; Sophy was not an exception. In 
 addition to her mental or moral woes there was now a 
 fierce headache. Also, a sciatic pain was stabbing at her 
 left side. " He ll be the death of me," she moaned. 
 " After the life I ve led I ve not got much endurance 
 left." She rang for Katy, and said to her : " I 
 don t want any breakfast. I couldn t swallow a 
 mouthful." 
 
 Katy was prepared for this, and had her habitual 
 answer ready. " Oh, but you must eat something, Mrs. 
 Murdock," urged she. " You know it s mighty bad to 
 begin the day on an empty stomach. I ll just go down 
 and have the cook fix you up something tempting and 
 tasty." 
 
 " Well, I ll do my best," conceded Sophy, speaking, 
 and feeling, as if she were doing Katy a favor. " I do 
 
 62 
 
MY LIFE S OVER 
 
 believe coffee is bad for me. You might bring me choco 
 late with a little whipped cream." 
 
 " Cream s very nourishing. They ve got some nice 
 sausages very light and small." 
 
 " Just one, Katy. And maybe I could eat a few corn 
 cakes if they re crisp and thin." 
 
 While Katy was gone Mrs. Murdock lay motionless, 
 hoping to allay the throbbing in her head. " Thank 
 God," said she, " I ve got a good digestion. I don t 
 know what d become of me if I couldn t eat enough to 
 keep up my strength." 
 
 In her healthy, vigorous girlhood every pleasure of 
 the senses attracted her. But eating being the only 
 pleasure that calls for no effort whatever she had now 
 narrowed down to it, and was in the way to become a 
 glutton. When Katy appeared with the breakfast tray 
 she at once felt a little better. The odor from it from 
 the sausage, the well-browned hot cakes, the chocolate 
 was most stimulating. She sat up in bed, put 
 both the pillows behind her. The big oily coil into 
 which her hair had been done for the night was loose 
 and hung over one ear, threatening to fall. She took 
 it down and rerolled it. " I think we ll have to wash 
 my hair soon, Katy," said she. " It s getting so it ll 
 hardly stay up. What a trouble long hair is! Now 
 put the tray on my lap. Why, you ve brought three 
 sausages." 
 
 " There s really nothing to em, Mrs. Murdock. 
 They just melt away. And you mustn t starve yourself, 
 you know." 
 
 Sophy fell to, ate all the sausages, all the cakes, drank 
 two cups of the chocolate with whipped cream. Katy 
 begged to be allowed to bring more. But Sophy re 
 sisted. " No, I guess I d better not. It s only three 
 
 63 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 - " -^ 
 
 hours till lunch, and I think I ve taken enough to 
 stay me." 
 
 " And you do feel better, don t you, ma am? " 
 
 " Very much," replied Sophy. " I ll just lie here a 
 few moments, and then I think I ll be strong enough to 
 get up and dress." 
 
 Katy took away the tray. When she returned Sophy 
 was groaning. " It s come back ! " she cried. " My head 
 feels as if it d burst, and the pain in my heart is fright 
 ful. I m afraid I oughtn t to have eaten." 
 
 " Oh, you d have been much worse if you hadn t, 
 ma am. Taking a little nourishing food could never do 
 a body any harm." 
 
 " Dr. Schulze says food s poison when the system 
 isn t in condition to receive it." 
 
 " I m surprised at your paying attention to that 
 crank," said Katy. " And he s an atheist, too." 
 
 i f ee l dreadful ! " moaned Sophy. " But it can t 
 be the to eakfast, for my digestion is all right. No, it s 
 oil m y m y worries. Let me have the hand glass." 
 
 " I ll pull down the shades and put hot water on 
 your head," pleaded the maid. 
 
 " The glass first," insisted Sophy. 
 
 Katy went into the dressing room for it most re 
 luctantly, as her mistress was looking her worst. But 
 Katy was reckoning without the partiality of the hu 
 man glance when it is bent upon the features that are 
 the dearest and most attractive in all the world. In 
 stead of dropping the glass in horror Sophy gazed 
 long and earnestly. " I do look bad, don t I ? " 
 said she, in the tone that invites contradiction. But 
 Katy was silent. " Still, I m showing that I m not 
 well," continued Sophy. "And what wonder that I 
 ain t." 
 
 64 
 
MY LIFE S OVER 
 
 " Yes, indeed with all the work and worry you have, 
 
 am." 
 
 Sophy sighed. " You don t know half not half," 
 she said with gloomy mystery. " I m afraid I ll have 
 to go to old Schulze. I m a little yellow, and a little 
 bit flabby." Not very flabby; she could find nothing 
 to criticise in the broad expanse of her neck. " And my 
 skin," thought she, " is as smooth as it always was. No 
 body ever did have such a skin." Still, a tonic would do* 
 her good ; then, she d not take such an absurdly gloomy 
 view of Charles s silly attempt to defy nature and con 
 ventionality by trying to go back to youth. " Yes, I 
 must see Dr. Schulze if I don t feel better in a day or 
 two." 
 
 To Katy she said, " Take the glass away and bring 
 the hot water. I ll not get up till I feel better. I think I m, 
 having a chill and my head " She sank back with a 
 groan " Oh, Katy, how I am suffering ! I m sure I 
 oughtn t to have eaten those sausages. Why did you 
 bring three? I told you not to. Not a word ! You know 
 you ve done wrong. Get the hot water and I ll take 
 one of those headache powders. Is there a capsicum 
 plaster in the house? If not, send somebody for one. 
 No, get two. They come two for a quarter. No matter 
 how sick I am I never neglect things." 
 
 She felt when the headache was quieted somewhat 
 by the powder she felt that, in a way, this illness was 
 not inopportune. She could put it to use in bringing 
 round her wayward husband. With Charley, and Blag- 
 den, his former chief secretary, whom he had retained 
 as private secretary, he was about to go away on a shoot 
 ing trip ; her time was short. Tears he could withstand, 
 as she had learned early in their married life. Re 
 proaches and entreaties had no effect, so far as she had 
 
 65 
 
OLD WIVtiS FOR NEW 
 
 ever been able to discover. But before illness he was 
 always soft. She waited in confidence, not leaving her 
 bedroom, scarcely leaving the bed, neglecting her toilet 
 even more than usual and her habits were those of the 
 period preceding the gospel of the daily bath, the time 
 when people regarded much attention to the intimate 
 toilet as certainly unnecessary, probably sinful, and 
 were disposed to interpret personal cleanness as a clean 
 face and hands and regularity at church, and good 
 housekeeping as a clean parlor and front stoop and 
 everybody* at family prayers before breakfast. 
 
 He suspected fraud in this illness; besides, he felt 
 he had no responsibility in it. Still, he was gradually 
 wrought upon by her abject appearance, the softening 
 process being greatly aided by certain deep-down qualms 
 of self-reproach for errant thoughts, for private criti 
 cisms of her appearance and mentality and inertia, criti 
 cisms the more unkind because true. Also, as she had 
 been insisting on his occupying the same bed and sleep 
 ing, if it could be called sleeping, with the bedroom 
 windows down, he was feeling none too well himself. 
 When she began to take on that mortal look which 
 makes so ghastly the faces of the fat though they be 
 but indisposed and for only a few days, he felt guilty, 
 remorseful. 
 
 On the sixth morning, soon after she had had Katy 
 prop her up and bring breakfast, he braved again the 
 close air, the stale, nauseating odors of their bedroom 
 from which he had hastened at daybreak. " Have you 
 had the doctor? " he asked abruptly, his tone a shallow 
 pretense of gruffness, his eyes full of pity and pain. 
 
 She turned her face away to conceal her satisfaction. 
 She shook her head and sighed. 
 
 " You must see Schulze." 
 66 
 
MY LIFE S OVER 
 
 " What does it matter? " she muttered. " Nobody 
 cares whether I live or die. My life s over." 
 
 " Nonsense," said he, seating himself on the bed 
 and laying his hand upon hers, the more tenderly because 
 touching her thus brought to him vividly the contrast 
 ing memory of a time when the sense of her would have 
 made the blood leap in his veins. " Nonsense Sophy ! " 
 He happened to glance down at her hand a naturally 
 beautiful hand it was soft yet firm, slender, delicately 
 shaped in palm and in fingers. And the nails were thin 
 and pink and convex. But she had let the dead flesh 
 grow raggedly up round the base of the nails, and under 
 the rims they were far, far from clean. He did not drop 
 her hand immediately; but he did immediately look 
 away. 
 
 " A woman had better die when the bloom of her 
 youth is gone," she continued mournfully. She glanced 
 at him ; so low in mind was she that for once his look 
 of vigorous young manhood, his cleanness and fresh 
 ness, the attractive way he was dressed, did not rouse 
 her anger and hatred, but a dreary, resigned hope 
 lessness. " Men care only for freshness," moaned 
 she. " Gratitude and duty and respect are only words 
 to them." 
 
 Bloom of youth! His eyes shifted from her di 
 sheveled, repellant homeliness. As he had imagination, 
 his heart ached with pity. " Sophy," he said earnestly, 
 " it s your illness that makes you think these things. 
 Get well, and you ll be all right again. I ll call Schulze 
 on the phone." 
 
 Her silence was assent; she herself was a little 
 alarmed about her condition, was fearing she had gone 
 too far in desperate measures to restore him to sense of 
 her due. He went to the telephone in the dressing room, 
 
 67 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 presently to return with: " Schulze wants to know 
 whether you ve had any breakfast." 
 
 " No," replied she, adding reproachfully, " how 
 could I, sick as I am? I just forced down some oatmeal 
 and cream and a cup of coffee." 
 
 Murdock was gone longer. When he reappeared, he 
 said indignantly : " He won t come. He says you must 
 come to him." 
 
 Her eyes flashed and she sat up in bed energetically. 
 " Why didn t you tell him how ill I was ? " 
 
 " I told him you couldn t raise your head off tho 
 pillow." Sophy hastily sank back. " Then," continued 
 Murdock, in spite of himself less indignantly, " when 
 I told him what you said about breakfast, he said: If 
 that didn t kill her, it won t hurt her to come to me, 
 and he rang off. And when I got his office again his 
 daughter said he was too busy to come to the phone." 
 
 Mrs. Murdock s eyes were sparkling. The appalling 
 yellowish pallor of her skin was overlaid with the red 
 of anger. " And the worst of it is, we re at the mercy 
 of that brute ! " she cried. " If he wasn t such a won 
 derful doctor he d have been white-capped long ago 
 tarred and feathered and railed out of town. Here, I 
 ^ may be dying for all he knows, and he refuses to come ! " 
 
 " It s useless to offer him an extra fee." 
 x " Worse than useless," retorted she. " He d prob 
 ably refuse to treat me at all." 
 
 " We can get another doctor. There s his daughter, 
 young Mrs. Ranger." 
 
 Sophy did not let slip the opportunity to discharge 
 her anger upon some one less distant and less secure than 
 Schulze. " What do you take me for? Do you think 
 I d let a woman touch me? The women, the good-look 
 ing ones, can fool you men. But / know women. Thej 
 
 68 
 
MY LIFE S OVER" 
 
 can t learn anything." She collapsed into sullen tears. 
 " No, I ll risk my life and dress and go to him. The 
 brute!" 
 
 By this time Murdock was seeing that her illness 
 could not be so serious as he had imagined. " I guess 
 there s nothing else to be done," said he, concealing his 
 suspicion under a discreet appearance of deep sympathy. 
 He noted the overpowering air of the room. " It ll 
 certainly do her good to get any sort of a change from 
 this air," he reflected. And he left her, to go to his 
 affairs downtown, in a chastened but no longer humble 
 mood ; indeed, he felt somewhat foolish about the exag 
 geration of remorse that had dominated him a few mo 
 ments before. " If she d only eat less and stir about a 
 little," he said to himself. " First thing she knows she ll 
 be really sick. Her timidity about fresh water and 
 fresh air is beginning to get on my nerves." But there 
 he halted his dangerously frank thoughts; instinct 
 warned him that in that direction lay truths he must not 
 face. 
 
v 
 
 SOPHY SEEKS A CONFESSOR 
 
 IN the course of an hour Sophy, groaning at every 
 step but carefully dressed even to the cruelly tight stays 
 wherewith she deemed it expedient in public to restrain 
 her amplitude, descended to her victoria, to be driven 
 to Dr. Schulze s trim little house with its gay German 
 garden in front and at the side. 
 
 She made an astonishingly good appearance as 
 she sat in her carriage in state, and as she swept 
 into the sanitarily bare offices. But Sophy was al 
 ways careful of appearances. None but her own fam 
 ily, the servants and, occasionally by accident one 
 of the tradespeople, ever saw her as she was. She took 
 the only vacant chair in the long line ranged against the 
 wall of the waiting room ; she noted that, save herself, 
 the most important person in that motley assembly was 
 a small grocer. " If I hadn t given him a piece of my 
 mind and ordered him off the place," she thought, eying 
 him severely, " he d offer me his turn. As it is, I ve got 
 to wait. What an outrage ! " But she knew she could 
 only let her fury consume itself and vanish in its own 
 steam; one of Schulze s many coarse notions was that 
 disease and pain were no more severe and no more im 
 portant in one kind of human being than in another. 
 Indeed he would admit only two human estates " sick- 
 
 70 
 
SOPHY SEEKS A CONFESSOR 
 
 ness and health. The rest is either poppycock or tom- 
 myrot or both." 
 
 Like every man of will and intellect who does not 
 have to conciliate his fellow-citizens in order to make a 
 living, he was positive in speech and in action, was simple 
 and direct. He traced all human ills, mental, physical, 
 moral, economic, political, to the poor health of the over 
 whelming mass of the human race ; he therefore revered 
 his profession as above all the others. But, for that 
 profession as usually practiced and for most of its prac 
 titioners, he had profound contempt. 
 
 " A tough race ! A tough race ! " he used to say. 
 " It has been preyed upon by the priests and the doctors 
 from the beginning mind and body. Yet it survives 
 and has even here and there made some slight progress." 
 And again : " Medicine is like all the other professions. 
 It advances only by compulsion from without. The 
 average doctor resists a new truth about health and 
 disease, partly because it is an insult to his pretense of 
 already knowing all, but chiefly because it forces him 
 to do some thinking." To Schulze the usual doctor 
 seemed the exact synonym for pretentious ignorance. 
 " Nothing is simpler than the science of health," he 
 would say. " It consists in regularity, fresh air, simple 
 food in small quantities, plenty of exercise. Dosing is 
 simply an attempt to cure one disease by setting up 
 another that may be slower, but is usually none the less 
 deadly." And again : " Nothing better illustrates the 
 ignorance and the depravity of the medical profession 
 than the fact that, although all disease originates in 
 disorder in the digestive apparatus, a doctor s first move 
 is to make his wretched victim swallow a drug that 
 will upset the stomach." And again : " The human 
 body isn t a mystery; it s a machine. The mystery 
 
 71 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 is how it withstands the abuse of its owner and his 
 doctor." 
 
 The first twenty years of his career had been years 
 of humiliation and poverty because he scorned to practice 
 his profession as the " black art." The doctor who mys 
 tifies with hocus-pocus and " cures " with something to 
 take two or three times a day in a spoon, or as a pill, 
 appeals at once to the credulity and to the laziness of 
 his patient, like the priest who sells indulgences. But 
 the doctor who shows his patient that disease isn t a 
 visitation of Providence or bad luck, but is the patient s 
 own mortal assaults upon his own health through eating, 
 drinking and irregularity, and who orders as medicine a 
 sane and temperate mode of life, with all the " good 
 things " cut off such a doctor seems a poor creature, a 
 crank, to the average laymen, and to the average 
 46 learned practitioner." However, Schulze began by 
 getting as patients those who " could not afford a better 
 doctor," performed miracles of cure, gradually made his 
 way against Saint X s passion for pretense and pref 
 erence for the darkness of hocus-pocus rather than the 
 light of unpretending common sense. The theory in 
 Saint X was that his years of fierce struggle had em 
 bittered him; in fact, he was not bitter at all, simply 
 uncompromising and using a gruff manner to protect his 
 temper and his time against his patients. The attitude 
 of most laymen toward the physician is precisely that 
 of the people of the Middle Ages toward their priest 
 a notion that if they can wheedle him into giving them 
 easy penance they will be saved just as securely as if 
 they repented and reformed. Schulze would have none 
 of this. 
 
 Mrs. Murdock had to wait full three quarters of an 
 hour before her turn came. Instead of a servant to intro- 
 
 72 
 
SOPHY SEEKS A CONFESSOR 
 
 duce his patients, Schulze had upon the door between 
 office and waiting room a card which read, " When the 
 lock clicks, the next in line will please enter." The 
 spring attachment on the lock was worked from his desk. 
 At the click Mrs. Murdock, the last in the waiting room, 
 rustled and groaned into the presence of the ugly little 
 man with the scarlet button of a nose and the eyes that \ 
 were wondrous keen and kind. He was at his desk facing 
 the door ; a huge Oriental image, its face a ludicrous 
 yet somehow awe-inspiring caricature of his own, 
 squatted on a pedestal behind him. The light from the 
 windows fell full upon the chair opposite him. which 
 was obviously for the patient. 
 
 " So you managed to get here alive," he began, his 
 tone and manner so sarcastic and so formidable that 
 Sophy s great desire to rage at him vanished in a greater 
 desire to conciliate him. Schulze applied to human na 
 ture the principle of physics that the way to overcome a 
 force is to meet it with a stronger force from the opposite 
 direction. 
 
 " And that s about all," replied she piteously. " I ve 
 been ill for the past six weeks. There s a pain in 
 my " 
 
 " Put out your tongue," he interrupted. 
 
 She put it out. Having thus at a stroke reduced 
 her to compulsory and undignified silence, he with delib 
 eration set his glasses on the tip of his buttonlike nose 4 
 threw his head back and, without moving nearer her, in 
 spected the tongue. " Frightful," he said. " Frightful. 
 Hide it!" 
 
 She drew her tongue in. " I don t wonder," she be 
 gan again, " when I think of the pain 
 
 " Stop ! " commanded the old man sharply. " The 
 last time you were here, what did I prescribe? " 
 6 73 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Sophy looked miserable. " Two meals a day," she 
 replied feebly. 
 
 "What kind of meals? " 
 
 " You said simple meals." 
 
 "I did. And what else?" 
 
 " I believe you recommended a walk." 
 
 " I prescribed a walk a five-mile walk daily, rain, 
 now, or shine." 
 
 " Yes that was it, doctor," said Sophy humbly. 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 iidid it." 
 
 " Until you felt all right again." 
 
 " My appetite came back." 
 
 " Urn um," he exclaimed contemptuously. " And 
 the walk?" 
 
 " I take a drive almost every day." 
 
 " Didn t I tell you that while we re all moving toward 
 death, those who walked there arrived long after those 
 who drove? " 
 
 " You told me not to drive, if I could help it. But 
 doctor, it s impossible for a woman of my physique " 
 
 " And what are you doing with such a physique? " 
 demanded he. " In Strasburg where I was born the 
 people live by nailing the feet of geese to the floor and 
 stuffing them till their livers get fat. You treat your 
 self as those Strasburgers treat their geese. Didn t I 
 tell you that fat was a disease? Didn t I warn you 
 that if you let that disease run a few years longer, you d 
 be a shapeless mass before you were forty ? " 
 
 " I wanted to see you about that, too," she said has 
 tily. She colored. " I suppose you think I m vain and 
 set on foolishness that doesn t belong to my time of 
 life- 
 
 " Nonsense!" he interjected. "You re a young 
 74 
 
CONFESSOR 
 
 woman. You ve been letting yourself go to rack and 
 ruin. That s the way with human beings. Give them 
 a chance at luxury, and they act like a cow in a corn 
 patch. There s no excuse for you. If you hadn t a 
 magnificent constitution, you d be dead. You most 
 of the women of your class are a disgrace. Never 
 exercising, always ailing tossed up in bed much of 
 the time taking on fat." 
 
 " Now, doctor! " she pleaded. " You re unjust. It 
 runs in our family to lose our looks and get fat 
 young." 
 
 Then it runs in your family to lazy about and 
 eat enough at each meal to choke them up for a week. 
 It runs in families to be ignorant, madam, unless they 
 go to school. It runs in families to be dishonest, un 
 less they learn to make a living by honest work. It 
 
 runs in families to " 
 
 " Well, anyhow," she interrupted sullenly, " I want 
 to get thin or, at least, thinner." 
 
 " One sensible meal a day, and a ten-mile walk 
 regularly." 
 
 " But I want to get thinner right away. I must 
 must ! " she exclaimed. 
 " It can t be done." 
 
 [ know there s some medicine I could take " 
 
 " I m a healer, not a murderer. Any medicine you 
 took to make you thin would shorten your life." 
 
 ^ Sophy began to sob. " I don t care if it does," she 
 cried hysterically. "I can t live on, this way I I 
 I m losing my husband. He s trying to pretend he s 
 a young man and is looking about. He don t admire 
 stout women I always knew it, but I couldn t help 
 being stout. Besides, it s his duty to love me, his 
 wedded wife, the mother of his children." 
 
 75 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " One meal a day ; ten miles regularly" 
 
 Yes yes I ll even do that," cried she. "Oh, my 
 God, doctor ! You don t know how I m suffering. Not 
 the physical pain that s nothing. But can t you 
 appreciate the misery, the heartache? What fiends 
 men are! He took the best of my life, my beauty and? 
 my youth. And now he wants to cast me off. Yes, 
 I know he does. Haven t I seen how the good women 
 are treated by their husbands. How coarse and low 
 married life is ! A girl thinks it s romance. She thinks 
 love means something above mere physical passion. 
 Yet it s nothing but that at least, the love of man 
 is nothing but that. He never cared anything for me 
 except for my looks " 
 
 Schulze .held up his stubby finger. " Listen to me, 
 madam," he said. " Suppose you wanted a loaf of 
 bread. Suppose you saw a lot of loaves in a bakeshop 
 window. You d take the one that looked best, wouldn t 
 you?" 
 
 She made no reply. 
 
 " Are you listening ? " he demanded severely. 
 
 " Yes," she said, gathering herself together. 
 
 "Wouldn t you?" 
 
 " Yes," she muttered. 
 
 " That s it ! " he exclaimed. " A man wants a wife. 
 He takes the girl that looks the best to him. Why 
 not? That s not coarse and low; it s sensible. It s 
 the wisdom of instinct. The girl with the clear eyes 
 and skin, the girl with the form that comes nearest 
 the ideal of health and strength and a capacity for 
 maternity. Sound hearts and sound minds live in 
 sound bodies. Well! Now, suppose when he gets his 
 loaf home he finds it s not good bread, finds that the 
 
 brown, crisp surface was merely a trick, a snare 
 
 76 
 
SOPHY SEEKS A CONFESSOR 
 
 " But I ve been a good wife to him. I ve made him 
 a home " 
 
 " You ve made yourself a home," said Schulze im 
 patiently. " Don t cant, madam at least not to me. 
 You ve come to me to get well, not to pose. You your 
 self had to live somehow and somewhere, didn t you? 
 Fou might as well put in a claim for his gratitude be 
 cause you keep alive and don t starve yourself to death. 
 The point is, what have you done for him ? " 
 
 " I was a wife to him " her eyes dropped " as 
 long as as he seemed to wish me to be." 
 
 " But when your looks began to go what ap 
 pealed to him in your looks then Yes, I under 
 stand. You were a wife to him for a while, and you 
 deserve no credit. He was, no doubt, an equally good 
 husband. And then you got lazy and indolent I 
 needn t go into that. What next? " 
 
 " The children " she ventured hesitatingly. 
 
 " Oh yes the children ! You didn t want them, 
 J. suppose ? " 
 
 She was silent. 
 
 " He didn t insist on it? " 
 
 Silence. 
 
 " No claim on him there, then." 
 
 " But I ve been a good mother " 
 
 c You mean you ve superintended the mothers you 
 hired for them. No cant, please. Let s get to the bot 
 tom of this. Plave you been a companion to him in 
 any way ? " 
 
 " It isn t my fault that I m not clever," she urged. 
 "He didn t marry me for brains, anyhow. A man 
 never does." 
 
 " Of course not. But there s something between 
 a blue stocking and a blockhead isn t there? And if 
 
 77 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 you re stupid, whose fault is it but yours? Lazy, 
 madam, lazy! You took him for granted. It s lucky 
 for you that, when it came to paying the bills, he 
 didn t take it for granted they d be paid somehow." 
 
 " But I ve toiled and slaved " 
 
 Schulze halted her with that irritating finger. 
 " You ve always had servants. Your physical condi 
 tion shows you ve done nothing practically nothing. 
 When your husband had all the real work and worry, 
 how comes it that he s still young, and you re " 
 He waved his hand toward her as if she were an exhibit. 
 
 " You don t understand," she cried angrily. She 
 would have stormed out of the office, but she felt she 
 must discuss her affairs with some one and who else 
 was there who else that would not betray her, gos 
 sip about her ? " You put everything on a low plane," 
 she went on. " You don t make any allowances for the 
 sacred relationship of husband and wife, of " 
 
 " Perhaps if you d made less allowances for the 
 sacred side of life and devoted more attention to the 
 practical side you d not be consulting me. Now, tell 
 me, what have you really done for him? " 
 
 " But what has he done for me? " 
 
 " That s not the question. Let him take care of 
 his own virtues and sins. What we want is to find out 
 how you are to get well. And the first thing is to find 
 the disease your disease, not his." He rapped the 
 fingers of his right hand irritatingly upon the knuckles 
 of his left hand. "Do you love him?" he asked 
 abruptly. 
 
 Her eyes dropped. " Of course," she said. 
 
 " You mean you don t." 
 
 " I I never did understand him very well," she 
 confessed. 
 
 78 
 
SOPHY SEEKS A CONFESSOR 
 
 " You probably never thought much about him. 
 He didn t run after other women, and he brought the 
 money home regularly. So you just forgot about 
 him, treated him as a person to get things from, not 
 to give thought to ? " 
 
 " He didn t need waiting on. We ve always had 
 servants." 
 
 " So he didn t even get that ! " 
 
 " I did did love him at first," said she. " But 
 after a while Well, we didn t seem to have much to 
 talk about, except just the things round the house. 
 And he was busy, and I didn t know about his busi 
 ness." 
 
 " If you don t love him, what s your objection to 
 losing him? " 
 
 She gazed at him in amazement. " Why, he s my 
 husband ! " she exclaimed. 
 
 Schulze lay back in his chair to laugh. " And what 
 the devil does that mean?" he demanded. 
 
 " Oh, I know you have no respect for religion 
 or anything sacred," retorted she. 
 
 " Sacred be damned. Let s talk sense. Is it 
 money or just dog-in-the-manger vanity? " 
 
 " What do you mean ? " she asked indignantly. 
 
 Sophy Murdock had had a moment of restlessness 
 or resentment now and then, as Dr. Schulze s questions 
 or comments cut sudden and deep into some particu 
 larly sensitive part of her vanity. But she had been 
 under the hypnotic spell which the strong and steady 
 intelligence can always throw over the weaker and 
 vacillating. This spell was the more potent because 
 Schulze was a doctor. Sophy had the usual feminine 
 reverence for medical learning, and the feminine love 
 of the confessor, to boot. With non-Catholic women 
 
 79 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 the doctor, as a rule, supplies the universal longing 
 for a secure confidant. But her vanity, sore through 
 and through, began now fiercely to resent this " in 
 sulting and heartless " attitude toward her woes, phys 
 ical and mental. 
 
 " You are no gentleman," she said haughtily, ris 
 ing to go. 
 
 " I hope not," replied Schulze. " Good morning, 
 madam." And click went the spring lock of the door 
 into the hall. 
 
 Sophy lingered that sharp click of dismissal 
 struck terror to her heart. " I am a sick, a very sick 
 woman," she wailed. " You have taken advantage of 
 my illness to insult me." 
 
 Schulze, reading her like an open book, saw that 
 his medicine was taking effect. He gave her the final 
 dose : " I don t minister to sick vanities, madam, but 
 to sick bodies. I know nothing about sensitive souls, 
 but a great deal about sensitive stomachs. Your 
 trouble is not in your soul but in your stomach not 
 in your heart, I may add, but in your vanity. Any 
 of my colleagues will serve you far better than I could. 
 You wish to be coddled, not cured." 
 
 Sophy flung pride and pretense to the winds. She 
 sank upon a chair, clasped her hands, and with stream 
 ing eyes cried : " For God s sake, doctor, have mercy 
 on me! I don t trust any of em but you. Say what 
 you please. Only tell me how I can make myself at 
 tractive to my husband." 
 
 Her voice, naturally sweet and deliciously clear, 
 could be very moving. It was moving now and her 
 soft, azure eyes, too. Schulze s tender heart responded 
 to her sincerity. But he knew it would be fatal to let 
 her see how she had touched him. With face very rosy 
 
 80 
 
SOPHY SEEKS A CONFESSOR 
 
 and eyes blinking, he gained time by rising to close 
 the door of exit. 
 
 " I know I don t love my husband," she sobbed. 
 " How can you love anybody you don t understand and 
 feel at home with? I m not interested in what he talks 
 about, and he don t listen when I talk. I don t even 
 love my children as I used to, since they ve grown up 
 and got so much smarter than me. But I m proud 
 of him, and it d kill me to lose him to some other 
 woman. . . . Don t you think I ve got any rights over 
 him at all? " 
 
 " It s hardly a question of your rights," replied 
 Schulze, his voice hoarse and uncertain. " That s 
 something for the courts. It s a question of what you 
 can make him glad and eager to give you." 
 
 " That s it, that s it! " she assented. " I ll do any 
 thing you say." 
 
 He looked at her pityingly, dubiously. "You ll 
 have to change your whole course of life. You and 
 your husband have reached the perilous period of mar 
 ried life among the well-to-do. Things aren t as they 
 used to be the husband and wife working together, 
 growing old together, sinking together into the stu 
 por of old age when they ought still to be young. 
 Now, one or the other is sure to keep alive, and the 
 one that dies must inevitably be sloughed off." He 
 was soliloquizing, unmindful of her presence. " When 
 it is the woman that stays alive, the tragedy usually 
 ends or takes on another, a more acute phase in the 
 divorce court. When it s the man, we don t know- 
 about the tragedy so often men are more merciful 
 to women than women to men. In fact, mercy isn t a 
 feminine quality. Nature made their nerves less sen 
 sitive than men s, because they are the childbearers ; so, 
 
 81 
 
OLD KlrmS FOE NEW 
 
 they arc naturally less sensitive about giving pain." 
 He noted Sophy again. " But In your case " 
 He p.iuscd, reflecting. 
 
 " I ll do anything you say anything ! " she re 
 peated. 
 
 " I doubt it frankly," said he. " But I ll tell you 
 what to do. Rouse yourself. Take an interest in 
 things in helping those about you. Make your house 
 your own, instead of a mere hotel with your house 
 keeper as manager. See that your husband is fed and 
 clothed and made comfortable to the smallest detail. 
 See to it that there s a reason beside pious flapdoodle 
 a real reason why your husband should prefer to keep 
 on with you. Make it unnecessary for him to sup 
 plement you with mistresses. Make it absurd for him 
 to think of replacing you and trying again for com 
 fort and companionship and love." 
 
 Sophy was speechless with terror at these plain 
 statements of her impending peril. 
 
 " You re a young woman," Schulze went on. " You 
 are still intact, despite your efforts to ruin your health 
 and looks. Behave yourself, and you ll soon be all 
 right. Stop stuffing yourself. How can your brain 
 work when it s steeped in the gases of undigested food? 
 How can your body be active and beautiful when it s 
 staggering and sagging under the load of rubbish you 
 thrust into it three times a day with often a fourth 
 meal at night when the gnawing of ptomaines makes 
 you have the sensation of hunger? " 
 
 " That s getting to be my besetting sin my ap 
 petite," moaned Sophy. 
 
 " If you had cared as much for your husband s 
 love as you ve cared for pies and cake and candy, you d 
 not be sitting there, weeping over your sorrows. Will 
 
 82 
 
SOPHY SEEKS A CONFESSOR 
 
 the human race never learn that its emotions are not 
 in its soul, but in its body? I suppose not, as long 
 as the priests and the poets and the romancers can 
 make a living by flattering it about its heart and its 
 soul, and appealing to its pretenses instead of to its 
 common sense." 
 
 " Just write down, won t you, please, exactly what 
 and how much and when I must eat, in order to 
 get thin." 
 
 " I ll send you a bill of fare by to-night s mail. 
 Don t hump down in a chair after meals. Stand and 
 walk about for half an hour to an hour. Then, there s 
 the exercise. Ten miles a day ten real miles, every 
 day, at the same hour." 
 
 " But I can t begin with ten miles," she pleaded. 
 
 " No, I suppose not. Three miles the first week, 
 five the second, ten the third. If your husband had 
 taken as poor care of his property if your maid took 
 as poor care of your dresses, as you ve taken of your 
 good looks " 
 
 " And you guarantee a cure? You know my heart 
 is not strong." 
 
 " I know nothing of the kind. You haven t yet 
 quite suffocated your heart with fat. Heart disease ! " 
 Schulze snorted. " Not one person in a million lives 
 beyond childhood if born with a weak heart. Yet these 
 fool doctors give medicine for heart disease and, 
 when people die, ascribe it to heart failure. The phys 
 ical heart gives as little trouble as the other one, if 
 the digestive apparatus is right. Do you know that 
 practically all the insanity and absolutely all the sui 
 cides and the murders and other acts of violence, 
 too, for that matter are directly due to stomach 
 or intestinal trouble? Disposition is digestion and 
 
 83 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 where the stomach is all right and the disposition all 
 wrong, then the trouble is in the intestines not in 
 the soul, dear lady. Yes, I ll guarantee to thin you 
 down if you follow my advice exactly for one year." 
 
 So well had his unpalatable but powerful nerve 
 tonic acted upon her that she already felt better, on 
 the way to cure. " I ll follow your advice, never fear," 
 she said, cheerful and grateful. " Doctor, you have 
 raised me from the dead." 
 
 " I ve told you how to raise yourself from the 
 dead," he replied. 
 
 " And I ve got sense enough to see it." 
 
 " You d be in an asylum if you hadn t. The trou 
 ble with us isn t lack of sense it s lack of persistence." 
 He stood, shook his head and his forefinger at her 
 half severely, half humorously. " Now, don t you 
 come back here again! I ve told you what to do. If 
 you don t do it, I don t want to see you. If you do, 
 I ll discover it as I catch sight of you now and then 
 in the street. But, I ve got no time to waste on any 
 body. I m seventy, and I can t reasonably count on 
 more than twenty years of active life." 
 
 " Seventy ! " she exclaimed. " And do you expect 
 to be alive at ninety ? " 
 
 " I shall be, accidents barred. And at work. Ac 
 tion is the essence of life. To rest is to rust and rot." 
 
 But she was not listening. " I ve got two months," 
 said she. " He s taking Charley away to hunt in the 
 Northwest. I can do a great deal in two months, 
 can t I?" 
 
 "Wonders wonders," replied Schulze. "If if 
 */!" 
 
 He clicked the lock of the hall door loudly ; she took 
 the hint, gkd to escape, but gladder that she had come. 
 
 84 
 
SOPHY SEEKS A CONFESSOR 
 
 Instead of hastening to change his clothes for his lab 
 oratory work, he paused at the window, watching her 
 enter her carriage and drive away. " Now, there s a 
 case in point," said he aloud, addressing his hideous 
 familiar, the Oriental image. " These stupid, unthink 
 ing writers, pandering to the stupid, unthinking pub 
 lic! Plays and novels and poems about the petty, 
 unreal, essentially ridiculous violations of man s silly 
 little conventionalities of law and morals, when the real 
 * strong situations, the real tragedies all center about 
 the immutable laws of the universe. He that sins 
 against conventional morals can laugh, if he is strong 
 enough to shrug at public opinion. But, health that 
 determines life and happiness and love and friends and 
 food, clothing, shelter The soul that sinneth against 
 health, it must die! ... Poor woman! Driveling 
 about duty when she d better have been worrying 
 about weight! If the girth had stayed right, there d 
 have been no need of appeal to the policeman duty. 
 Poor woman! Ignorance! Ignorance! Ignorance 
 and vanity and superstition ! " 
 
 His grotesque Oriental confidant echoed him with 
 its eternal grin of derision unutterable. 
 
VI 
 
 MURDOCK had been gone a month; and still Sophy 
 had not begun. There are always a hundred reasons, 
 excellent reasons, why any venture, great or small, 
 should be put off, should be given up at whatever stage, 
 should not be begun at all. And where vanity is enlisted 
 against action, the strongest will and the most inflexible 
 purpose must hesitate. The rearrangement of the new 
 house Dumont s Eyre, which Murdock just before his 
 departure had bought as it stood, furnished throughout, 
 including linen and china and the preparations for 
 moving were Sophy s pretexts for postponing the re- 
 conquest of her youth. The real cause, deeper than 
 laziness, was belief in her vanity s reassurance that she 
 was " all right as I am, or at least as good as can be 
 expected at my age and with my natural tendencies." 
 She no longer had before her Murdock s youthful face 
 and figure and ominous reserve ; her physical qualms had 
 yielded to the new kinds of nerve pills and digestive 
 tablets she had bought after reading their advertise 
 ments and testimonials. To bother about such vanities 
 as personal appearance was unnecessary, was foolish. 
 Was it not even impious? 
 
 " The Lord clearly intended me to be large," she re 
 flected. Were not Old Testament and New full of denun 
 ciations of vanity? As for health, she decided that the 
 
 86 
 
"WHO S MISS RAEBURN?" 
 
 patent-pill advertisements were right, that her trouble 
 was altogether nerves, the baleful reaction of her 
 worries and troubles upon her body; there was no 
 connection between her sluggishness, her headaches 
 and sciatica, and the kind and quantity of food 
 she ate. " Schulze s a crank everybody knows that," 
 reflected Sophy. " I ll trust to nature. God gave 
 the sense of taste to show us what to eat and what 
 not to eat, and He proportioned our appetites to our 
 needs." 
 
 So she definitely abandoned what she soon saw was a 
 sinful impulse to transfer her trust from her God to 
 Doctor Schulze ; instead of dieting and exercise, she read 
 the Bible a great deal, expanded in pious conversation, 
 included in her resumed morning and evening prayers a 
 petition to the Lord to keep her husband s love for her 
 and remove vanity from his heart and took pills and 
 powders and liquids for her aches and pains, and ate 
 caramels to remove the taste and help the medicine 
 digest. Thus, her problem was solved, and in the most 
 satisfactory way. If all went well, it was the Lord s 
 will that it should be so; if she did not get answer 
 to her prayer, then the responsibility was with the 
 Lord. Had Sophy not been a religious woman, her 
 laziness would have selected some other of the super 
 natural scapegoats of self-excuse fate, for instance, 
 or luck. 
 
 Sophy was resigned, but in no very good humor 
 about it. She felt resentful against her deity, felt he 
 owed her some extremely pleasant apology for having 
 created her into these degenerate times. She thought lit 
 tle about abstract matters, yet she could not help realiz 
 ing that everything was unsettled and unsettling in this 
 modern world. She dimly saw how these new and there- 
 
 87 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 fore wicked impulses to change were affecting all ages 
 and stations and both sexes, were disregarding the mat 
 rimonial and the family barriers in fact, all the bar 
 riers which religion and tradition had established. Hus 
 bands and wives no longer had the habit of contentedly 
 and decently growing old together, as unmoved by 
 change as oysters in their deep-lying beds by swing of 
 tide or whirl of tempest. Instead, one or the other, or 
 both, became tainted by this craze for change; and 
 there were scandals, domestic upheavals, divorces. What 
 right had Providence to thrust her into such a devil s 
 stew of a time? Having seen fit to do her this injus 
 tice, Providence could hardly do less than see her safely 
 through. 
 
 The new house being Sophy s prime reason for not 
 showing distrust in the divine custodian of her destinies, 
 she left all the planning and all the execution to her 
 daughter. She remained seated in her favorite chair, 
 usually with a box of candy at hand ; when she was not 
 nursing a headache or an attack of sciatica or neuralgia, 
 she suspended her Bible or her novel, listened to what 
 Norma had to say, and assented, with occasional crit 
 icism to give herself the sense of doing the whole thing. 
 But if neuralgia or headache or any other reason made 
 her feel unequal to such arduous labor, she would send 
 Norma away with, " Why do you bother me, child, with 
 such trifles? You know I m not well. You know how 
 hard I ve toiled to bring up you children and take care 
 of Charles and the house. It seems to me I ve earned the 
 right to a little rest." 
 
 And Norma, partly because she was really contrite 
 over her thoughtlessness, chiefly perhaps because she 
 was glad to have a free hand for carrying out her own 
 teeming and positive ideas, would say: "I m sorry, 
 
 88 
 
"WHO S MISS RAEBUSN?" 
 
 mother. You certainly have done more than your share. 
 Is there anything I can do for you? " 
 
 When Murdock and his son returned, brown and 
 hearty and looking like elder brother and younger, they 
 found the family established in the Eyrie. Norma was 
 fresh and full of enthusiasm ; Sophy was haggard, more 
 ample than ever, and completely worn out. As Blag- 
 den, before whom she always to a certain extent kept up 
 appearances because he was a formal and most correct 
 Easterner as Blagden had not come back with her 
 husband and her son, she received them in the loosest and 
 laziest of negligees, her poor health being the sufficient 
 excuse. Murdock s expression, at sight of her, was in 
 teresting and significant. He looked at her furtively, 
 with a suggestion of embarrassment or guilt. The kiss 
 which the occasion demanded he gave, not in the usual 
 half-absent, altogether perfunctory way, but with 
 heightened color and a sort of boyish timidity. He 
 noted the signs of ill-health with a solicitude that was 
 exaggerated but sincere. 
 
 " You ve been working too hard, Sophy ! " he ex 
 claimed. 
 
 " Yes, indeed. You don t look at all fit," chimed 
 in young Charles. " Your color s something awful, 
 mother." 
 
 Sophy, dismayed by her first glance at her young, 
 handsome husband, clear of eye and skin and in perfect 
 health, had shrunk sullenly within herself. At her son s 
 tactless remark, she reddened and her eyes sparkled. 
 But she was too depressed for more than a mere flash- 
 in-the-pan ; the contrast between her husband and her 
 self made hitherto sustaining vanity slink away like the 
 treacherous coward that it is. " He s worse steeped than 
 ever in sin and folly and worldliness," she said to herself 
 7 89 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 which was her way of beginning to clear herself of 
 responsibility for what instinct warned her might 
 happen. 
 
 Murdock was overwhelmed with remorse ; for he felt 
 that, while he had been away enjoying himself and draw 
 ing huge splendid draughts from the reservoirs of youth 
 and health, Sophy had been toiling under the many addi 
 tional burdens his yielding to his daughter s pleading had 
 placed upon her. " I thought there d be nothing to do 
 but move," said he. He turned reproachfully upon 
 abashed Norma : " You ought to have taken at least 
 part of the work and worry off your mother s shoul 
 ders." 
 
 The girl hung her head. " Norma has been very 
 good," Sophy hastened to say, magnanimously and with 
 not a qualm. " She has done all she could, and it was 
 a great deal. But of course she s a mere child, and most 
 of the heavy work I had to do myself." Mrs. Murdock 
 gave the martyr s sigh, then added with human peev 
 ishness : " I knew how it d be. That was why I was 
 against taking the house." 
 
 Sophy s family had always accepted her theory that 
 she was hard-worked and overworked. Had they not be 
 fore their very eyes the proof of it in her prematurely 
 worn face and her illnesses that must be in large part 
 at least the result of self-sacrifice for home, husband, 
 and children? Before her plaints and implied re 
 proaches they all looked, and felt, thoroughly ashamed 
 of themselves. In the hope of lightening the gloom, 
 Norma suggested timidly : " But now that it s all over, 
 you re glad we moved, aren t you, mother dear? " 
 
 Sophy sighed, not discontentedly. " It s certainly 
 roomier and more convenient," she conceded, submitting 
 to her daughter s caress. 
 
 90 
 
"WHO S MISS RAEBURN?" 
 
 " Well, rather ! " exclaimed young Charles, gazing 
 delightedly round the handsome, spacious general sit 
 ting room, with its cheerful coloring in furniture, wood 
 work, and brocaded silk walls. " This is something 
 like ! My, but we are grand now." 
 
 " Wait till you see the rest of the house," cried 
 Norma. " It s a regular palace." 
 
 As Mrs. Scarborough had kept the house in condi 
 tion, and as the Murdocks had bought it as it stood, 
 there had been little refurnishing to do. Norma had 
 shown her father s own executive ability in assembling 
 servants and establishing routine and discipline. Her 
 mother, not trained to the management of any but the 
 most primitive kind of household, had made a failure 
 of the other house, where there had been only five serv 
 ants. The cooking had been bad, the airing and dusting 
 slipshod; except in Norma s own room, there had not 
 been a closet that was not a wild chaos tumbling out 
 whenever the door was opened. The kitchen had been 
 dirty, and the servants bedrooms ; the housekeeper, 
 finally engaged in desperation, had kept her place by 
 concentrating on Mrs. Murdock s vanity to the neglect 
 of everything else. Roaches had even been seen on the 
 dining-room table, and once they had had a pest of bugs 
 and mice throughout the house. Norma, from the very 
 early age at which her paternal inheritance of strong 
 character and instinct for order had begun to develop, 
 was daily tempted to interfere, did occasionally burst 
 out. But her mother was as jealous of prerogative as 
 people usually are when they are slothful in exercising 
 it ; she always quelled her daughter not a difficult mat 
 ter, as Norma had also inherited her father s aversion to 
 petty quarrelings and bickerings. 
 
 In making the change to the Eyrie, Norma, for the 
 91 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 first time invested with authority, had had a clash with 
 the housekeeper, Mrs. Theron. That lady had presumed 
 too far upon her " pull " with Mrs. Murdock, had lost 
 the battle and her place. " I am housekeeper now," 
 said Norma to her father, with a great air. Since she 
 had won Joe, a splendid catch and a really grown-up 
 man, her own opinion of herself, never small, had grown 
 hugely. She went stepping about like a matron with 
 a brood, and delivered herself of her book-acquired 
 household wisdom as if it were the ripe result of long 
 years of experience. 
 
 " Yes," said Sophy complacently. " I decided Norma 
 must be trained in housekeeping. I don t approve of 
 the way girls are brought up nowadays, ignorant of 
 everything but foolishness. So I m giving her lessons." 
 
 " I m glad Mrs. Theron has gone," said Charles 
 Junior. " The way she did bootlick mother was some 
 thing sickening. I ve always believed the fire in her 
 room was caused by her being drunk and upsetting the 
 candle." 
 
 " Not at all ! " cried Sophy, who prided herself upon 
 standing valiantly for her friends. Hers was the con 
 ventional interpretation of the word friend one who 
 flatters us, ignores our faults, panders to our weak- 
 nesses, and does as we wish. " Mrs. Theron was a good 
 woman. She had a hasty temper. But who wouldn t, 
 that had been brought up in luxury and had lost it all 
 and had to work for a living, just like a domestic? " 
 
 " But she was a " 
 
 Murdock stopped his son with a frown ; he had had 
 enough of the ugly reminders of what home in its essence 
 had for years been to him. He turned to his daughter, 
 his stern and somber eyes changing to their more natural 
 good humor. " And Joe how s he ? " he asked. 
 
WHO S MISS RAEBUEN? 
 
 Norma s face was instantly radiant. " The same " 
 with a smile " only more so." 
 
 Murdock stroked her hair and kissed her. " I bet 
 Charley a dinner that Joe wouldn t join us." 
 
 " Who d a thought him such a muff? " grumbled 
 Charley. " Now, if you were like Miss Raeburn, I could 
 excuse his giving up all that fun to hang round you. 
 But for a stay-at-home, a house cat, a girl that won t go 
 in for violent exercise because, when she stops, the mus- 
 cles ll change to fat " 
 
 Norma forgot her dignity of housekeeper and en 
 gaged young lady, sprang at him and fell to mussing 
 his hair. " You know entirely too much, Charley boy," 
 she cried. "Who s Miss Raeburn?" 
 
 " Ask your father," replied Charley mischievously, 
 as he pushed her away. " Tell what a crack-a-jack she 
 is, pop elder brother, I should say." 
 
 The " elder brother " flushed guiltily ; he knew his 
 wife s gaze was suspiciously on him. But he said care 
 lessly enough, " We met Miss Raeburn in the woods. 
 One day, when Blagden and I were at a distance, Charley 
 here missed a cornered grizzly and it closed in on him. 
 She stopped it with a long-range shot." 
 
 " Who is she, Charley? " asked Sophy, like a senti 
 nel who has heard a suspicious sound, has decided that 
 there was nothing in it, but is on the way to make sure. 
 
 " The finest ever ! A peach, but a brick, too. Ask 
 Blagden, when he comes. My, what eyes ! They go 
 straight through you, setting you afire as they go. 
 And no nonsense from her, though she makes you feel 
 like talking nothing else. I d marry her in a minute, if 
 she d have me." 
 
 " But who is she? " demanded Sophy. In her best 
 moods, there was latterly little enough trace of her natu- 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 ral good traits which the years of self-indulgence and of 
 indulgence from all around her had so deeply buried. In 
 her worst moods she was what unchallenged selfishness 
 would in a very little time make of an angel of light. 
 Her eyes, bent upon her husband, showed that she was 
 on the verge of one of her very worst moods. 
 
 " I m telling you who she is," retorted Charley. 
 " She came up there with a maid " 
 
 "Came from where?" 
 
 " New York, I guess Blagden felt sure of it. With 
 a maid and a patent tent like a palace, and a complete 
 outfit for the easy life. She wore as many veils as 
 Norma does, and took no end of care of her hair and 
 skin. And my, what hair ! Do you remember, brother, 
 the morning you and Blagden caught her drying it up 
 among the rocks ? " 
 
 Murdock, pale, with features curiously set, seemed 
 not to hear. Sophy s hands, in her lap, were trembling 
 and fluttering viciously. 
 
 " No hardship for her not a mosquito bite, not a 
 freckle," continued her tormentor. " They all laughed 
 when she first came, but not for long. She d go any 
 where and shoot! and fish! She has Nimrod and 
 old Isaak stung to a standstill." 
 
 " It sounds bold and common," said Sophy, in a 
 suffocated voice. 
 
 " So it does," mocked her son. " And she had no 
 chaperon but the maid. Just the two women and their 
 guides, and not a house or a road within fifty miles. Be 
 careful what you say about her, mom. You may have 
 to receive her as your daughter yet." 
 
 If Norma had been observing her mother, she would 
 have tried to change the subject. But she was absorbed 
 in her brother s narrative. " Pretty? " asked "she, a lit- 
 
"WHO S MISS RAEBURN?" 
 
 tie jealously. She had an excellent opinion of her own 
 charms and talents; these eulogies were too sweeping 
 not to be ruffling. " Really pretty ? " 
 
 " Pop and secretary thought so the minute we saw 
 her, and I didn t. But he and Blagden were right. She 
 looks well, different. You can t forget her eyes." 
 
 Both Norma and Charley startled and stared open- 
 mouthed as Sophy burst out at her husband : " What 
 kind of a person is this, anyway?" The voice was 
 utterly unlike hers, and her features were painfully awry 
 and overspread by a purple flush. She had the intense 
 jealousy that goes with exaggerated self-esteem; but in 
 their entire married life she had never before had oppor 
 tunity to reveal it. Just the right conditions had come 
 about ; the apparently harmless chemicals exploded. 
 
 The children s eyes turned from their mother to 
 their father. He, suddenly cool and self-possessed, ele 
 vated his eyebrows in indifference that was slightly dis 
 dainful. " How could anybody add to what the boy has 
 told you ? Come along, Norma, and show me the house. 
 I want to see what your mother and you have done." 
 
 " You can t put me off, this way ! " cried Sophy, 
 with flashing eyes and dilating nostrils. " I ve the right 
 to know the kind of people you ve been allowing my boy 
 to associate with." 
 
 Murdock frowned, froze. " I don t think the boy 
 came to any harm," he said curtly. " I know nothing 
 about her, beyond what he has told you." 
 
 " Where does she come from ? " 
 
 " Really, she didn t say." 
 
 " Yet you saw a good deal of her ! " 
 
 " Well, we did go in bathing with her a few times," 
 put in Charley, with intent to aggravate the situation 
 whose seriousness he did not in the least appreciate. 
 
 95 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " And she taught me how to swim overhand that is, 
 she and I taught the governor." Then, seeing in his 
 mother s countenance that the joke was coming on 
 splendidly, he added : " We got Blagden to tell her we 
 were brothers, and didn t undeceive her till the last day." 
 
 " Is this true? " demanded Sophy of her husband. 
 
 " Why not? " said he indifferently. 
 
 " The governor made me tell her," the boy went on. 
 " I will say that for him. And, my eye ! How queer 
 she did act when I gave the snap away. She looked 
 shaky in the steeple for a minute, and then I think she 
 got mad or something like that. But she pretended 
 not to care. . . . Come to think of it, brother, you must 
 have made quite a hit with her." 
 
 Murdock laughed easily. " That s modest of you," 
 said he. 
 
 " How long were you with this person? " demanded 
 Sophy of her husband, her manner so insulting that 
 Norma, on the way to the door to escape the distressing 
 scene, turned and, before she could restrain herself, made 
 an appealing gesture toward her. 
 
 " Every day for six weeks," answered Murdock. 
 
 " And I guess we d have been with her yet, if she 
 hadn t left us," said Charley. " She went to join her 
 sister at Lake Minnetonka. You remember, it was the 
 day after she found out the truth about us." 
 
 " So it was," said Murdock. 
 
 " What made you so anxious all of a sudden to have 
 her know?" inquired Charley, as if the strangeness of 
 it had just flashed upon him. 
 
 Sophy s expression became so terrible that even Char 
 ley was alarmed. " I never heard the like never ! " 
 exclaimed she, when she recovered power of speech. " I 
 don t know what to say or think." 
 
 96 
 
"WHO S MISS RAEBURN?" 
 
 "Really?" said Murdock coldly. And his look 
 checked her, gave her a menacing glimpse of that awe- 
 inspiring mystery within him which she had never fath 
 omed. He addressed his daughter. " Come, Norma. 
 Let s look through the house." Both the children, after 
 frightened wondering glances at their mother, followed 
 him from the room. 
 
 But for the collision with his wife, he would probably 
 have noted only casually if at all the ingenious arrange 
 ments which Norma had made for the family comfort, 
 certainly would never have thought to inquire where they 
 originated. Like most men he knew little about house 
 keeping, and that little had not roused his curiosity to 
 inquire further, had rather made him feel that it was 
 wise to ignore domestic economy under pain of increasing 
 his irritations and completing the destruction of any 
 remaining illusion he might have on the subject of home. 
 Now, with the results of Norma s intelligent turning to 
 account of everything in that well-planned, well-equipped 
 house passing in review before him, he began to see that 
 if the business is one half of life the housekeeping is 
 the other half, is the coordinate and equal branch, de 
 serving and demanding equal skill and industry. He was 
 getting concrete illustration of the great truth, so im 
 portant to civilization yet universally overlooked, that 
 the problem of spending money is as complex, as difficult 
 as the problem of making it. 
 
 His silence, as he revolved these new ideas, with their 
 far-reaching implications, made his daughter more and 
 more uneasy. " You don t like it? " she said at last, 
 disconsolately. " And I took such pains to try to please 
 you!" 
 
 His face instantly reassured her, and more. "You re 
 a genius," he replied, and in his inexperience he was 
 
 97 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 crediting to her all that had been done by their predeces 
 sors in the house as well as what she had done. " You ve 
 shown me that the word woman has a very different 
 meaning from what I suspected. Joe is getting a great 
 deal better bargain than he dreams." 
 
 " That s right, Norma," endorsed Charley with en 
 thusiasm. " You begin to remind me of Juliet Raeburn. 
 This is the sort of thing she d do." 
 
 Murdock apparently did not hear. His face had a 
 wistful, lonely expression as he went on, " And I we 
 are losing He did not finish. Presently he said, 
 in jest, but not altogether in jest: " I wish I d had some 
 of this kind of talent to help me at the works. We men 
 are a clumsy, slatternly lot." 
 
 " The women are woefully incompetent," said Norma 
 doubtfully, with a venerable air of wisdom and experi 
 ence. " If it could be arranged, I d have only men 
 servants. The young women give only a lick and a 
 promise to their work because they re looking forward to 
 trapping some man into supporting them in idleness. 
 As for the older women, they ve been demoralized in their 
 youth." 
 
 " Men are not so competent as you think," replied 
 Murdock, secretly much amused by Norma s superhu 
 man gravity. " The best of us work poorly enough 
 little system, little concentration, eyes wandering to the 
 clock." 
 
 " But if the men were as worthless as the women " 
 began Norma. 
 
 Murdock laughed. " They would be if they dared 
 if they didn t have competition to compel them," said 
 he. " Unfortunately for the women, there s no compe 
 tition among housewives." 
 
 " You d never have caught Joe with your housekeep- 
 98 
 
"WHO S MISS RAEBURN?" 
 
 ing," put in Charley. " A man doesn t marry for 
 that." 
 
 " Of course not," said Norma. " No more would a 
 woman marry the best business man among the men that 
 asked her. But a man s own self-respect ought to make 
 him inform himself about his business, just as a woman s 
 self-respect ought to make her educate herself about her 
 business." 
 
 Charley grinned. " My, but you re smart ain t she, 
 father? Look out or Joe ll be afraid to marry you. 
 You ought to have a few lessons from Juliet. Now, she 
 was smart without airs or bluff." 
 
 " Juliet ! " cried Norma, chagrined and angry. 
 " You and she must have got on ! " 
 
 Murdock had not heard these last remarks. He 
 was deep in his own thoughts. Here was a girl who rep 
 resented the new order in women just as he himself 
 represented the new order in men. There was the old- 
 fashioned woman who was more or less competent, not 
 entirely incompetent, to deal with the problems of do 
 mestic affairs as they existed under the old order the 
 order that had been established almost without change, 
 since prehistoric time. And there was the old-fashioned 
 man who could deal well enough with the conditions which 
 *? existed before the world became one vast cooperating 
 family. But discovery and invention had changed all 
 those conditions, had revolutionized them ; and how few 
 were the men and the women who had promptly responded, 
 had educated themselves, had made themselves expert, 
 had put themselves in a position to take full advantage 
 of the gifts science was thrusting upon the race ! Mur 
 dock had often thought of these things as related to his 
 own affairs to industry and commerce; he had often 
 had qualms of conscience when he, like the other strong 
 
 99 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 and acute heapers up of private wealth, had taken both 
 legitimate and illegitimate advantage of the obstinate 
 and sluggish ignorance of his fellow-men, had used their 
 tenacity in ignorance to make out of them much money 
 for himself. But he had never before noticed this vast 
 other half of the matter the bearing of the scientific 
 revolution upon woman and the home. 
 
 " You have been thinking about studying house 
 keeping a great deal? " he said to his daughter. 
 
 " Oh, I m very ignorant, as yet," replied she, quite 
 recovered from the setback Charley had given her. 
 " But some day When I ve a house of my own, I m 
 going to see what I can do. You wouldn t believe how 
 foolish the education they give women is. Why, it s 
 no education at all. And all the ideas are so false and 
 pretentious so vulgar everything for show, for play 
 ing the useless lady, for leading a life that doesn t get 
 anywhere. They call it culture. I call it rot." 
 
 "Listen to the blue stocking!" cried her brother. 
 " Better not let Joe hear you talk that way." 
 
 Norma gave a confident little toss of the head. " I 
 guess Joe and I understand each other." 
 
 " I doubt it," retorted Charley. " Nobody was ever 
 yet able to see straight in moonshine." 
 
 They returned to where Sophy was sitting with the 
 smelling salts and a novel one of those novels written to 
 appeal to the vanity of women by exaggerating their 
 brief, doubtful and dearly-bought triumphs through 
 the passions of men into substantial and important 
 conquests. She did not glance up when the three re- 
 entered the general living room. She made an oppress 
 ive silence there; Charley asked Norma to play squash 
 with him, and Norma, with an uneasy glance from her 
 mother to her father, accepted. As they were leaving, 
 
 100 
 
WHO S MISS 
 
 Charley, genius at tactlessness, said : " Just you wait, 
 Norma, till Blagden ships along the boxes and you see 
 the grizzly Miss Raeburn killed. She gave it to me." 
 
 Sophy, startled, set her teeth firmly. But she waited 
 until the children were out of earshot, before saying to 
 her husband : " The more I think of that woman, the 
 more I m astonished at you." Her voice w r as peevish 
 rather than wrathful now. In the interval she had re 
 covered her temper, had seen that her explosion was out 
 of all proportion to the provoking cause. " I simply 
 can t believe you know so little about her. And I don t 
 believe she was respectable." 
 
 Murdock moved toward the long window by which 
 Charley and Norma had gone. Halfway he changed his 
 mind, turned. " Sophy," he said in his frankest, most 
 winning manner, " can t we get through even the first 
 day without irritating each other? Come! Let s try 
 to get on together without being always on the edge of 
 a quarrel. It isn t fair to the children. Why, we ve 
 nothing to quarrel about." 
 
 Sophy refused to meet his gaze. " You d better go 
 and ask your God to forgive you for the evil thoughts 
 that ve been choking up your heart. I can t but feel 
 all this is a judgment sent on me for my carelessness- 
 about religion. It has opened my eyes to my duty to 
 God." 
 
 Since their marriage, which released them while still 
 in their teens from the stern and strenuous regimen of 
 their pious parents, they had given religion the most 
 meagerly conventional place in their lives. He himself > 
 too busy to face any problem until it faced him, was 
 not sure, or curious even, what he believed, if he believed 
 at all. Theretofore he had never seen or heard anything* 
 from her that indicated more than a perfunctory acqui- 
 
 101 
 
. .0LD r WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 escence in the faith in which she had been bred. At 
 these perfervid expressions from her, he stared. 
 
 " I ve turned to religion," she explained, rather sul 
 lenly, as if her sincerity were questioned, " for the 
 strength to bear my trials. But for the aid God has 
 given me I d have broken down under the burdens He 
 has laid upon me." 
 
 " What trials ? " he inquired gravely, though he 
 could not keep a slight quiver of suppressed amusement 
 out of his voice. " What burdens ? " 
 
 " I don t propose to be insulted," replied she. The 
 load that had broken the back of her meek, martyrlike 
 endurance was made up of a multitude of straws of 
 slight and neglect, each light in itself and apparently 
 nothing. She would not let him cleverly discredit it by 
 forcing her to exhibit the straws one at a time. " I have 
 taken my sorrow to God in prayer. He is comforting 
 me." 
 
 " What sorrow? " he demanded. Now it was irri 
 tation that he was struggling to suppress. 
 
 She held to aggrieved silence. 
 
 " If there s anything you wish, you ve only to ask 
 for it." 
 
 Silence. 
 
 " Is it with me you re finding fault with something 
 I ve done or failed to do? " 
 
 Silence. 
 
 "As for Miss Raeburn " 
 
 She turned her head angrily. " I care nothing about 
 the low woman you neglect your wife and family; 
 for." 
 
 " Sophy ! " He tried to make his tone a remon 
 strance; in spite of him it was subtly apologetic and, 
 without realizing, she felt it, was stung by it. 
 
 102 
 
"WHO S MISS RAEBURN?" 
 
 " If only vile, carnal things will keep a man to his 
 duty " She tossed her head and drew in her lips 
 acridly " I don t feel that God wishes me to keep 
 him." 
 
 " Was there ever such rubbish since the world be 
 gan ! " cried he. " If anybody in this family ought to 
 appeal to God for strength, it s certainly I strength 
 to put up with a whining woman, jealous without 
 cause." 
 
 " I jealous ! " Sophy laughed harshly. Her blue 
 eyes were pale and cold-looking. " You flatter your 
 self. I don t care what you do, so long as you don t 
 flaunt it in your family, and use your own children to 
 help you in your low intrigues." 
 
 " Intrigues ! " The charge was so unjust that he 
 now felt like outraged innocence. " Intrigues," he re 
 peated in angry disgust. " Idiotic!" And he jammed 
 his fists in the outside pockets of his coat and paced up 
 and down. " Imbecility ! " 
 
 Sophy pounced upon the advantage. " That s right 
 insult me. Oh, you think I m a blind fool. You don t 
 think I realize how you ve been contrasting and dispar 
 aging your wife, the mother of your children." 
 
 Murdock wheeled and faced her with a violent ges 
 ture. " To the devil with that mother-of-your-chil- 
 dren nonsense ! " cried he, in the frank anger that is 
 without venom. " Norma and the boy are as much 
 your children as mine. This is as much your house 
 as mine. I might as justly talk about your being 
 under obligation to me for the money you and they 
 have spent as for you to moan and whimper about 
 what you ve done in the way of looking after the house 
 and children. Have you worked hard? At what? 
 And, if you have, haven t I? Oughtn t everybody? 
 
 103 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Isn t it good to work? Where s the title to sym 
 pathy?" 
 
 Mrs. Murdock was looking at him now; her eyes 
 were ablaze with resentment. " So ! " she cried, empha 
 sizing her words with tosses of the head. " So ! I ve 
 done nothing ! I ought to be grateful to you for hav 
 ing supported me ! I m worn out, and you want to cast 
 me aside and take another fresh young girl ! " Her 
 heavy cheeks fat, yet with sick hollows in them quiv 
 ered. Her broad bosom, uppiled and festooned with the 
 lace of her gray negligee, heaved and caved stormily. 
 She burst into tears. 
 
 " I never thought such a thing," retorted he. " Be 
 careful how you put those ideas into my head." 
 
 Sophy choked hysterically. " O God ! " she wailed. 
 " What have I done that such affliction should be sent 
 on me? " 
 
 But Murdock was in no mood to be moved by this 
 spectacle. " Look here, Sophy," he said ; his face and 
 voice confirmed her in her belief in his heartlessness. 
 46 You re not nearly so irrational and unjust as you re 
 pretending. Nobody was ever created with as little 
 common sense as you re trying to make me believe you ve 
 got. But I m not going to be lured into saying the 
 things about you about our married life that I might 
 justly say " 
 
 " Instead of coming home to harass and insult your 
 sick wife, you d better have stayed on with that Raeburn 
 woman." 
 
 His anger had passed the molten stage, was getting 
 hard and cold. " As you please," said he tranquilly. 
 " But just one thing more. I understand perfectly 
 why you are suddenly irritated against me. In the life 
 of everybody who makes a mess of opportunity, there 
 
"WHO S MISS RAEBURN?" 
 
 comes a time when he or she has to choose between blam 
 ing felf and blaming some one else for the mess. That 
 time seems to have come for you. And you re try 
 ing i o make me the chief figure in your scheme for self- 
 excuse." 
 
 Sophy did not see it ; but instinct warned her that, if 
 she Hngered, she might see something which would show 
 her there was another side to this domestic question, 
 and] so, might weaken her sense of self-righteousness. 
 She rose with much dignity. " I ll not listen to such 
 talk , " cried she. " Go to your Raeburn woman ! " And 
 she riioved toward the door. 
 
 He put himself between it and her. Each was look 
 ing at the other ; their eyes were pitiless his aggressive, 
 her* passive. " Perhaps I shall ! " said he coldly. Then 
 he ^dded, " No, that is unjust to her." 
 
 " Insults for your wife. Consideration for your " 
 
 His look and his gesture stopped her. " Instead of 
 reviling her," said he, with a straightforward, inexperi 
 enced man s imprudence, " you should be grateful to her 
 for being strong where I might have been weak. Yes, 
 I was tempted though not by her no, by you by 
 your But let that pass. Just one thing more. Be 
 careful how you goad me. And, instead of making life 
 a hell for yourself and for me, instead of engaging in 
 the lazy business of praying, you d better bestir your 
 self and try to make your home comfortable and your 
 family happy. And it wouldn t do any harm to take a 
 bath once in a while and wash your hair." 
 
 She sank into a chair, and her sudden faintness was 
 not the insincerity he suspected. Her huge undigested 
 lunch was pressing heavily upon her heart. " Call my 
 maid ! " she gasped. " I m ill ill." 
 
 He looked at her, sneered, rang the bell. " If I ate 
 8 105 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW, 
 
 the things you do, and took as little exercise, I d be 
 dead," said he, and left her. 
 
 He remembered that in John Dumont s day the 
 library and the rooms adjoining it had been his private 
 suite. Murdock had his valet change them back to a 
 living suite again. And that night he established him 
 self there alone. 
 
VK 
 
 NEITHER Sophy nor Murdock expected, or intended, 
 the new arrangement to be permanent. With him, anger 
 against her speedily changed to anger against himself. 
 He had always been a keen and, what is rarer still, an 
 accurate observer of human nature particularly, for 
 reasons of self-guidance, of its disaster-breeding weak 
 nesses. He had not failed to note the universal passion 
 for self -excuse ; and, warned by its ravages, he had made 
 it his inflexible rule to assume that wherever his affairs 
 went wrong he himself and no other was primarily and 
 chiefly at fault. 
 
 Thus he was soon admitting to himself that, but 
 for his stupid, tactless confession about Juliet Rae- 
 burn, Sophy would not have provoked him into a pain 
 ful quarrel in which he had uttered truths the more in 
 excusable because they were truths for there lay their 
 rankling sting. A short time, and he was going still 
 further in the direction of just self -judgment. He re 
 viewed with less lenient eyes his month in the woods with 
 Juliet Raeburn twenty-seven days of daily, unconven 
 tional, untrammeled association with a beautiful, more 
 than beautiful, young woman, a woman such as he had 
 long since assumed had no existence outside his dreams. 
 He recalled how they had deceived themselves as to the 
 real nature of their feeling toward each other until the 
 
 107 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 very last day of her stay ; recalled the catastrophe he 
 and she fishing far upstream and alone she slipped on 
 the wet rock how, to save her from the rapids, he caught 
 her in his arms and kissed her or did their lips meet 
 halfway? and he learned his own secret and yes 
 her look revealed to him her secret. Recalling these 
 things, he felt though he was thrilling and tingling as 
 always at the memory of them he now felt there was but 
 the one reason for the dismal fiasco of his homecoming. 
 He called it a fiasco, because he had come resolved to put 
 Juliet out of his thoughts, since there was no fit place 
 for her in his life, and resolved to make the best of 
 things and " do his duty " by Sophy. 
 
 In face of these facts of his own responsibility, his 
 attitude toward Sophy became apologetic and concilia 
 tory in the guarded way which prudence imposes in 
 dealing with human nature, so prone to misinterpret con 
 sideration as weakness. As for Sophy, inertia that 
 teeming source of reputations for good nature and gen 
 erosity made it impossible for her to persist in any 
 thing, especially in such a ravenous demander of fresh 
 fuel as hate, without strong and steady pressure from 
 without. After the habit of unreflecting humanity, she 
 accepted the thing-that-is as permanent, believed change 
 highly improbable, all but impossible this, when the 
 world s sole certainty is that the thing-that-is will not 
 abide. Her husband was once more at home; at home 
 he would remain, and safe from wiles ; it was meet and 
 proper that husband and wife should occupy the same 
 bed; a few days, a few weeks at most, and the inter 
 rupted order would reestablish itself. 
 
 But the days, the weeks, the months went; and the 
 temporary separation slowly insinuated into a custom, 
 satisfactory to both. 
 
 108 
 
DANGERFIELD S 
 
 In spite of his penitence, Murdock, though under 
 less provocation than ever before apparently, as he and 
 Sophy met only at lunch and at dinner, was nevertheless 
 not occasionally but constantly in the critical mood 
 toward her stagnation in the old ways. In vain he ac 
 cused himself of being unfair, because of his, at times 
 fierce, at times wretched, always sternly rebuked longing 
 for another woman. In vain he told himself he was 
 finding fault with what was still the regular and the 
 expected among respectable women ; he made no impres 
 sion upon the outraged and now morbid sensibilities of 
 his physical fastidiousness. Also, he began clearly to 
 see that this physical fastidiousness of his was in reality 
 the deep-down ultimate moving cause of their cleavage. 
 His analytic mind went back through the years to its 
 earliest beginnings went back to apparently trivial 
 happenings which memory had filed, without his then 
 in the least comprehending their significance. These 
 happenings were of the kind that would, if he had 
 thought of them at all, have been approved by him 
 at the time as evidence that she was a modest, moral 
 woman* with no taint of carnal-mindedness. But he 
 realized now that his nerves had not approved. What 
 a man respects in a woman has a more or less conven 
 tional origin; what he likes springs from sources far 
 deeper from the very heart of the heart of his real 
 nature. 
 
 Sophy, for her part, was no less content with the 
 new order of separate beds and separate apartments. 
 She now realized of course, without analyzing her feel 
 ings that Murdock had long been an irritating in 
 trusion. His modernizing of his personal habits had 
 not been consciously noted by her; yet she had felt it 
 hardly the less keenly. The first impulse of humanity s 
 
 109 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 anger toward new truth of any kind comes from the 
 laziness that shrinks from the labor of learning; but 
 the anger abides because the new truth is essentially a 
 caustic criticism of the old error and of all who persist 
 in it. Murdock s evening bath and morning shower, his 
 fastidiousness " crankiness " she thought it about his 
 shirts and underclothes had not roused her to imitation. 
 Was she not perfectly clean and fresh? Why waste 
 time and effort? Why open the pores perilously wide? 
 Why wear out clean clothes by having them laundered 
 when they didn t need it ? Was she not more particulai 
 than most, as particular as it was necessary for a clean 
 woman to be, as particular as it was respectable for a 
 pure woman to be? His new habits had merely irri 
 tated her against him; it had never occurred to her 
 to ask herself why she would be ashamed to have it 
 known that she bathed and changed but once a week 
 at most. 
 
 Thus, the innovation of separate beds and separate 
 apartments, giving her more room, absolute freedom 
 from eyes that seemed to her to pry and censure, soon 
 contented her so completely that she would have been 
 more averse, if possible, than he to going back to the old 
 order. And, despite her almost incessant depression and 
 frequent attacks of neuralgia and headache and back 
 ache, she became less uncertain of temper. 
 
 " Mother s disposition seems to be improving," said 
 Charley to Norma. " She s more what she used to be 
 when we were children. You ve noticed it ? " 
 
 Norma admitted she had. " I guess she likes the 
 new house better," was her explanation. 
 
 "And father s, too," continued Charley. "There 
 was a time after we got back from the woods last year 
 when I thought his nerves were going to pieces. But 
 
 110 
 
DANGERFIELD S 
 
 he s himself again. So many couples are acting up 
 nowadays that I was afraid " He ended without ven 
 turing to put his fear into words. 
 
 " What a silly you are ! " cried Norma, the more 
 indignant because she had herself been secretly striving 
 with that same fear. 
 
 " Well you never can tell," maintained her brother. 
 
 " Not our father and our mother." 
 
 " No, I suppose not," assented Charley. Then, after 
 a silence, he added, in a vague impersonal way, " I tell 
 you, Norma, you do well to be mighty particular about 
 yourself about your hair and skin and bathing 
 and all that. The day s gone by when a female can 
 afford to think she s fresh simply because she has washed 
 her face and sleeked her hair down a bit." 
 
 No answer from Norma unless deepened color and 
 a glance to make sure he was filially unconscious of his 
 train of thought were answer. 
 
 Presently Charley dismissed the subject, from his 
 mind at least, with " Well, anyhow, everything s all 
 serene again." 
 
 Serene was precisely the word. The separate sleep 
 ing apartments seemed to have been just what was 
 needed to reunite Sophy and Murdock in a matrimonial 
 modus vivendi insuring peace and permanence. In fact, 
 the very act which thus seemed to have brought about 
 a reconciliation had made reconciliation impossible. The 
 husband and wife who sleep side by side may bore, may 
 irritate, may enrage each other, may quarrel bitterly, 
 may go widely separate ways from rising to bedtime; 
 still, the bond of union will be there, as irksome perhaps 
 as was that of the Siamese twins, but also as indissol 
 uble. If Sophy and Murdock had loved each other, if 
 there had even been the occasional play of passion s fitful 
 
 111 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 flame upon the matrimonial hearth, a brief separation 
 would have brought them together again, more close 
 than in years. But the content of both in the new order 
 was proof that the hearth was dead and cold. And, no 
 longer together in any hour of intimacy or real privacy, 
 they would never have the chance to become reconciled ; 
 they would remain strangers, the further apart for the 
 studied politeness of each to the other. 
 
 Taking society in its entirety, deep and strong at 
 traction, resulting in unity of mind and heart, plays 
 but an insignificant part in marriage. Instead, we find 
 a vast variety of modi Vivendi for the sake of appear 
 ances or of the children or of some other external force or 
 bogey forbidding divorce. Even marriages that pass 
 for happy are often of some one of these makeshift vari 
 eties. Because a conventional couple, blunt of nerves 
 and unanalytic, and undisturbed by serious temptation 
 to wander, regard themselves and are regarded as suc 
 cessfully married, it by no means follows that they are. 
 Disease is not always accompanied by pain ; some of the 
 very worst diseases those of steady, relentless decay, 
 for instance are painless. The disease in the married 
 life of Murdock and Sophy had passed from the acute 
 stage to the chronic. And they, and their children, 
 thought it cured. 
 
 Toward the winter s end, when the time came for the 
 journey to New York to assemble the trousseau, Mrs. 
 Murdock s courage failed her. " You ll have to go by 
 yourself and stop with Joe s sister, after all," said she 
 to Norma. " I haven t the strength. It d kill me. I ve 
 worked and slaved too hard. Now, I ve got to pay 
 for it." 
 
 " Stuff, mother, stuff ! " protested Charley, home for 
 112 
 
DANGERFIELD S 
 
 the Easter holidays. " It ll do you a world of good 
 and you needn t set foot on the ground." 
 
 " I must stay here and look after things. With 
 my neuralgia and this big house on my hands " 
 
 " Norma d be miserable at Mrs. Houghton s," pur^ 
 sued Charley. In a moment of extreme irritation Norma 
 had confided to him her antipathy for Joe s artificial, 
 supercilious New York sister, who was chagrined by 
 her brother s choice of a wife remote from " the only 
 people worth while," and did not trouble herself to con 
 ceal her chagrin. 
 
 " No, I sha n t mind her," hastily interposed Norma. 
 " Really, I sha n t." Love had softened her uncompro 
 mising arrogance and egotism of youth into sweetness 
 and consideration and even conciliation. " I know she 
 doesn t approve of me at all. But she s got tact. For 
 two or three weeks we ll get on like turtledoves." 
 
 In the bottom of her heart she was relieved that her 
 mother was not going. A woman who knows how to 
 shop dislikes having anyone along. Important work, 
 to be done well, must be done alone ; and in such delicate 
 matters as style, taste, bargaining, the presence of an 
 other causes confusion and indecision, raises the prices, 
 strengthens the hands of the shop people in forcing on 
 a woman things she does not quite like and will ever 
 afterward hate. Mrs. Murdock was a particularly try 
 ing person on a shopping expedition. The clerks always 
 at once " sized her up," flattered her into accepting the 
 goods they were most eager to be rid of, at prices of 
 their own fixing. 
 
 As Murdock was in Nevada, looking at mines, Norma 
 went East with only her maid, found Mrs. Houghton 
 sweetly amiable, and pursued her shopping alone and 
 unmolested. When her father turned up in New York, 
 
 113 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 on one of his frequent business trips, she breakfasted 
 with him at his hotel. He seemed a different person in 
 New York, more as he used to be when playing with 
 her was his only relaxation. " I m going to break my 
 rule," said she, " and take you shopping with me." 
 
 " Quite unnecessary," replied he. " No matter what 
 it is, you shall have it. Go right ahead." 
 
 " You re too suspicious," retorted Norma. " I sim 
 ply want you to see a shop that s worth while some 
 thing quite new and very interesting. It s Danger- 
 field s." 
 
 "Dangerfield?" 
 
 " Dresses and hats." 
 
 Murdock laughed, shook his head vigorously. " Not 
 I!" 
 
 But his daughter persisted. " It s much stranger 
 and more interesting especially to a man than that 
 lunatic Stock Exchange you took me to last time we were 
 here. Lots of men go. Really, father " She hesi 
 tated and smiled as she used the age-suggesting word 
 in connection with a man who was so young in every 
 way " I d not ask you if it weren t worth while." 
 
 Norma was pretty, was charmingly dressed ; when 
 7 with her, he felt less lonely, less restless. He yielded. 
 f He forgot his reluctance as they descended before the 
 - Holland brick and marble palace just off Fifth Ave 
 nue, in every way like a private house. As the great 
 ; door was swung back by the big colored man in livery, 
 j Murdock asked her: "Who is Dangerfield?" 
 
 " It s merely an old trade name, I believe. There s 
 no Dangerfield. The business is run by a stock com 
 pany." 
 
 They were at the foot of a marble staircase guarded 
 by two colossal bronzes, female figures bearing aloft elec- 
 
 114 
 
DANGERFIELD S 
 
 trie-light globes. To the left was a reception room, to 
 the right a tea room. " This looks as if we had got into 
 somebody s residence by mistake," said Murdock. 
 " Where s the business? " 
 
 " Come along," replied Norma, starting up the 
 stairs. " It s here, all right. We re early. Nobody 
 but me ever comes before eleven or half past. Besides, 
 the season s almost over." 
 
 The stairway branched to the right and to the left, 
 meeting again at the second-floor landing to form a bal 
 cony. There, a fountain was tossing high a tinkling 
 spray from the midst of flowers ; and festoons of flowers 
 hung over the balustrade. Murdock followed his daugh 
 ter to the right into a salon with pillars of variegated 
 marble, superb tapestries to match, several neither too 
 many nor too few large pieces of simple furniture. 
 The central oval of the ceiling was a fresco representing 
 Minerva, goddess of wisdom, smiling round the edge of a 
 folly mask. They crossed this salon to the correspond 
 ing room to the left ; in its doorway they got the first 
 glimpse of Dangerfield as a business establishment. On 
 tables, benches, chairs, sofas were flung in gorgeous pro 
 fusion dresses and dress materials, cascades and rivulets 
 and pools of soft color. Beyond, Murdock saw a similar 
 room that in vista gave the effect of a conservatory 
 filled with birds and flowers of every hue. " Hats," ex^ 
 ! plained Norma. " There is still another salon for the 
 millinery department. It s on the floor above, where the 
 fitting salons are." 
 
 " No wonder you women are so eager to get hold 
 of money and spend it," said Murdock. " I m amazed 
 at your moderation." 
 
 Moving about the room at whose threshold they 
 stood were a dozen girls. Murdock saw that there was 
 
 115 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 not a homely one among them. " I m willing to bet 
 anything you like that the boss here is a man and that 
 he isn t married." 
 
 " You lose," said Norma. " It s a woman." 
 
 " Then she must be young and pretty and gener 
 ous." 
 
 " Indeed she is," assented Norma, with enthusiasm. 
 
 His wandering glance went from face and figure to 
 face and figure until it lit and paused fascinated upon 
 a woman on a stepladder, delving into a big box of rib 
 bons. Her long, supple back was toward him ; he was as 
 little the expert in woman s dress as the average Amer 
 ican man, yet he noted her beautiful simple morning 
 dress of dark-green cloth, with hat and stockings and 
 shoes to match one of those unobtrusive costumes whose 
 costly perfection shows in its being unobtrusive and in 
 the surprises of pleasures its intelligent and elegant 
 details yield to the critical eye. Murdock did not note 
 those details, but he appreciated them; any spectator 
 must take pleasure in a work of real art, however un 
 conscious he may be of the source of his pleasure, the 
 thousand trifles which, as Michelangelo said, sum up 
 into perfection. Some details, however, he did conscious 
 ly note the fit of her shoes and their neatness, especially 
 about the heels that her skirt was straight, even all 
 round, at the hem how thick and crisp and clean her 
 hair was, and how beautifully arranged at the back, the 
 cleair-cut simplicity of the lines of waist and hips. 
 " There s a woman who takes the right sort of care of 
 herself," he said to himself with absolute positiveness, 
 though he had only her back to judge by. 
 
 " She s the head of the establishment," said Norma 
 in an undertone, her gaze where his was, " but she works 
 just like the rest. I think she s the cleverest woman I 
 
 116 
 
DANGERFIELD S 
 
 ever met in my life. The girls say she s rich and that 
 she made it all herself. Yet she s still very young." 
 Nbrma sighed ; she had had her own dreams of inde 
 pendent accomplishment. " There s a barrel of money in 
 millinery and dressmaking, if one can get and keep the 
 right people." 
 
 The young woman turned to descend. She smiled at 
 Norma ; then her glance, keen, quick, traveled on to Mur- 
 dock. Norma saw the strangest look flash into her won 
 derfully expressive gray eyes a look of shyness and 
 joy and fear saw the color leave her cheeks, her lips 
 even. This for an instant only. She descended, ad 
 vanced with extended hand. " Good morning," said she 
 to Norma. " So, you ve brought your father with you." 
 
 Norma laughed. " How did you know ? " cried she* 
 " I thought you d think he was my my brother." 
 
 At this Miss Raeburn s expression became so peculiar 
 that Norma glanced at Murdock. His scarlet face, his 
 uncertain eyes, his nervous attempts to readjust the 
 line of his lips, made her turn quickly upon Miss Raeburn 
 again. Then she stammered, " Oh, it was you father 
 and Charles met out West! I never thought of it be 
 fore." And so confused was she that not until afterwards 
 did she wonder how she had happened to think of it then 
 just then. 
 
 " Yes," said Murdock, a notable rigidity in his tone 
 and manner. 
 
 Miss Raeburn extended her hand. At the touch of 
 her fingers upon his palm, his eyes contracted and his 
 lips compressed. " How is your son ? " she asked, but 
 did not look at him. 
 
 " Why didn t you speak of it ? " exclaimed Norma, 
 struggling with constraint and embarrassment. " You 
 saved Charley s life." 
 
 117 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " You mean, I did him out of his first grizzly." 
 
 " You might have told me ! " 
 
 " Your father will explain to you why that would 
 have been against sound business principles. If you ll 
 wait in the salon a moment, I ll send some one to take 
 you up to the fitters." And Miss Raeburn nodded and 
 smiled, her manner perfect, but in her dark-gray eyes 
 a look that roused in Norma a feeling of suspense and 
 yes of dread. She turned away, gave several orders 
 to as many girls, disappeared into the millinery depart 
 ment. 
 
 Norma and Murdock retreated to the main salon and 
 seated themselves. Norma, coming out of a deep study 
 in which she had been fitting certain scattered fragments 
 of memory to what she had just seen, ventured a curi 
 ously timid glance at him. He was gazing tranquilly 
 into space, with the far-away look characteristic of men 
 of thought and action, even when engrossed in what is 
 going on immediately round them. The average man, 
 an observer of surfaces only, looks as if he were seeing 
 surfaces ; the rare man looks as if he were penetrating 
 through surfaces into realities he looks not only at but 
 through. As the girl was eagerly seeking reassurance 
 from the ideas her intelligence had been forcing upon her 
 against the protests of her loyal heart, she hastened to 
 find it, though in fact his features expressed simply in 
 scrutable calm. There are many, older and more experi 
 enced than Norma, who fancy that surfaces are truth 
 ful sign boards ; most of us, all our lives through, accept 
 a facial expression or a spoken word, even from an oft- 
 convicted practitioner of indirection, at its full seeming 
 value. Norma was completely reassured by Murdock s 
 unruffled tranquillity. 
 
 " How queer Miss Raeburn acted ! " said she. 
 118 
 
DANGERFIELD S 
 
 " Yes ? " absently from Murdock, when it was ob 
 vious that she was waiting for a reply. 
 
 " So, your and Charley s spirit of the wilderness is 
 a New York dressmaker. How Charley will feel! I 
 know he suspected she was a Russian grand duchess 
 mcog" 
 
 No comment from Murdock ; no indication that he 
 heard. 
 
 " Well, she certainly is beautiful, and in such an un 
 usual, strange way. And did you ever see any human 
 being so well taken care of? She s perfect throughout 
 and not a bit stiff or set, either. That s the differ 
 ence between the well-got-up lady and the well-got-up 
 not-lady. Oh, she s the real thing." 
 
 Nothing from Murdock. 
 
 " No wonder even Charley, who never sees anything, 
 noticed her eyes," she went on. " But, then, she s unu 
 sual, through and through. All the girls here worship 
 her, and at the same time they re afraid of her afraid 
 of her criticisms that s all. They say she s always 
 gentle and polite." 
 
 Miss Raeburn was the last subject Norma wished 
 in instinctive prudence to talk about. But she was 
 upset, hysterical, and her tongue ran on : " She s of a 
 good family in the western part of the State. Her 
 father died; she took her share of the estate, came to 
 New York. That was less than ten years ago. She 
 comes in a grand auto every morning exactly at nine 
 and doesn t leave until half past six. She built this 
 place last year designed it throughout, with a little 
 aid from a friend of hers a woman architect named 
 Siersdorf." 
 
 " I ve heard of her," said Murdock. 
 
 Norma, disconcerted by this evidence that he was 
 119 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 listening, and listening attentively, again tried to stop 
 herself. But she felt excited, felt she must talk, and on 
 she went, at the only subject about which any thoughts 
 would come. " She Miss Raeburn, I mean has a won 
 derful little house overlooking the park. She doesn t 
 seem to have any social life, or to want any. I guess 
 her real life is too full for social friends they re great 
 time-wasters. Sometimes I think, that s about all they 
 are taking one s time and feeling one for favors. She s 
 got an old maid sister who lives with her and and 
 that s all anybody seems to know." 
 
 " Probably all there is to know," said Murdock. " I 
 must get downtown. See you at dinner." 
 
 He put on his gloves, took his hat and stick, rose, 
 .all with his wonted languid deliberation that manner 
 led his fellow beings far away from suspicion of the 
 fiery, inflexible nature beneath. Norma was watching 
 him closely. She found nothing unusual in his expres 
 sion, nothing to justify her feeling of impending catas 
 trophe. Still, she could not banish it ; and, as he went, 
 she looked after him and fought against an impulse to go 
 with him. 
 
 As he slowly descended the main stairway, a white 
 mahogany door to the left of the entrance suddenly 
 swung open. Miss Raeburn herself issued from the 
 office for it was her office and began a hurried ascent. 
 He paused. She did not see him until she was within 
 a few steps of him. She hesitated ; two spots of color 
 burned for an instant in her cheeks. Then, with an in 
 clination of the head that might have been an avoidance 
 of his gaze or might have been a bow, she was hasten 
 ing on. 
 
 " Can t you give me one moment after all these 
 months ? " he said. His tone of almost humble entreaty 
 
 120 
 
DANGERFIELD S 
 
 sounded strangely in his own ears; for they had never 
 heard it before. 
 
 She came to a full stop, and with eyes down stood 
 waiting. Her figure was of the kind called French the 
 firm, small, swelling bust, the slender neck and arms and 
 hips a figure so slight that the strength and endurance 
 he had seen in the Northwest wilds seemed incredible. 
 Her skin was pale olive, firm and delicate and clear. Her 
 dark hair, not too fine to arrange well, had the sheen and 
 the waviness that mean vitality. As she stood there 
 without motion, not even her bosom responding to her 
 breath, she was in manner the direct opposite of her usual 
 self of the woman he had known in the woods. For re 
 pose was as foreign to that woman as to a humming bird 
 in a flowering garden ; her movements were habitually 
 quick, almost impatient, and, as he well remembered, her 
 restless gaze searched her surroundings incessantly as if 
 she were seeking something which must be found, and 
 found speedily; when she greeted anyone, it had been 
 with the darting glance of the ardent temperament, con 
 scious of the brevity of life and eager for its joys 
 the glance that seems to say, " Is it you I ve been 
 seeking ? " 
 
 He gazed at her silently, drinking her in. At last 
 her eyelids fluttered and her eyes rose ; but they avoided 
 his face. " I m sailing in the morning," said she, her 
 voice even but suggesting a ferment deep down. " I m 
 extremely busy, and " 
 
 " Juliet," he interposed in that calm slow way of his 
 that could yet be so intense and inevitable, " it wasn t 
 our fault the beginning. The very day I realized, I 
 had Charley tell you about me. And I ve tried hon 
 estly. We ve both tried. It s folly useless, too. That 
 month of happiness it was a prophecy a foretaste 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Now that I ve found you again, I ll not go on without 
 you!" 
 
 She trembled, paled, leaned against the balustrade. 
 Her bosom was no longer still. 
 
 " You can t deny. A while ago on the ladder 
 when you turned Juliet, I saw ! " 
 
 Her eyes suddenly blazed upon him, made him shrink. 
 " Forgive me," he muttered. " If you knew if you 
 knew!" 
 
 Her look softened. " Murdock," she said with gen 
 tleness it was the name by which she had called him 
 toward the last in their comradeship of the wilderness, 
 and at the sound of it his head lifted and his gray-blue 
 eyes lighted up " Murdock, you know we have nothing 
 to say to each other that can be said. Nothing you 
 ought to say or I ought to hear." She extended her 
 hand ; and her eyes, sweet as her tone, were also as reso 
 lute. "Good-by." 
 
 He took her hand, let her draw it quickly away. He 
 made no effort to detain her as she fled up the stairway 
 and was gone, light and swift as those beautiful birds 
 of the wilderness they both loved. 
 
VIII 
 
 VIOLA 
 
 NORMA brought to dinner next evening the news 
 that Miss Raeburn had sailed. " I didn t see her again, 
 but she left a very friendly good-by for me with Miss 
 Wilmot." Norma smiled mischievously. " Nothing 
 for you or Charley." 
 
 Murdock forced a smile, returned to the gloom in 
 which she had found him. In the moods of men and 
 women about each other reason plays no part. All 
 that day he had been embittered against Juliet Rae 
 burn and contemptuous of the first emotions her re 
 fusal to listen to him had inspired. Few men and 
 fewer women appreciate that woman has value as 
 woman greater than her appeal to the senses, that the 
 feminine can satisfy a need deeper than passion s gusty 
 clamor. The dim realization of this truth which Juliet 
 Raeburn had for the moment roused in Murdock soon 
 waned before passion ; for, man being primarily an ani 
 mal, appetites, so long as they are unappeased, will 
 take precedence over aspirations. In the sharp and 
 cynical reaction, he felt that she tricked him with well- 
 sounding words when he had so sorely needed bread 
 had even humbled himself to beg for it! Up rose his 
 pride of the master man and exhibited its wound. 
 Their destiny should have been for him to decide ; how 
 fatuously he had helped her to mount a pedestal of 
 
 123 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 conventional morality, and had fallen down and wor 
 shiped " like a jackass of a Tom Berkeley, with his 
 pale, cold Florence." How meekly he had yielded to 
 her; had let her take control, choose her own part, 
 assign him his! Why, the meekest in the docile hu 
 man herds he regarded with good-humored pity and 
 contempt, would have made at least a bleat of protest. 
 And he had not even thought of bleating! 
 
 He brooded throughout dinner, drove Norma to 
 the Houghtons in somber silence. On the way back 
 to the hotel alone he suddenly burst out : " She has 
 conquered me ! I have no power over her none ! " 
 Judging himself and her by the standards that had 
 been his in all his active years, he felt her despising 
 him " and I deserve it. I let her make a fool of me." 
 Was she not captor? Was he not captive, bent 
 to the dust before her under the chains of desire? 
 " No woman really wants to win, wants the man 
 to lose, in that sort of contest. If he lets her win, 
 she thinks he s even weaker than she and so he is, 
 by God!" 
 
 As he stood at the elevators, about to ascend to his 
 rooms, Berkeley and his wife came up. " Ah, there 
 j-ou are! " cried Berkeley. " I was just getting ready 
 to hunt for you. . . . Florence, go to the apartment. 
 Charles and I must finish our business to-night." He 
 winked covertly at Murdock. 
 
 Murdock glanced from the husband to the wife and 
 back again. Berkeley s full, thick face was a not un 
 attractive though frank exhibit of the easy-going 
 sensuality that takes life in huge draughts, careless of 
 quality so long as there is quantity. Florence, on the 
 other hand, had so it seemed to him, in the vividness 
 of face-by-face contrast the expression that comes 
 
VIOLA 
 
 from finer, more discriminating tastes, from living in 
 the intellect rather than in the body. To him, read 
 ing coldness into her blondness, she had always been a 
 typical instance of the sort of woman all men approve, 
 most men like to have for wife, but no man dares or 
 cares passionately to love. Berkeley could not pos 
 sibly feel at home with her. Murdock wondered how 
 he had ever got near enough to her to become engaged, 
 to marry. 
 
 " Here s a car, Florence, my dear," said Berkeley. 
 
 Her lips smiled at Murdock, as he and she shook 
 hands, but her eyes shot scorn and disapproval. 
 
 " Wait till to-morrow, Tom," said Murdock, " I m 
 tired." 
 
 " No, to-night," insisted Berkeley. And, as he hur 
 ried his wife into the car, " Don t stay up for me, my 
 dear." 
 
 " I sha n t," replied she curtly, her contemptuous, 
 coldly disapproving eyes on Murdock. 
 
 As the car vanished upward, Berkeley gave a huge 
 sigh of relief. " Now ! " said he. 
 
 "Now what?" 
 
 66 I m the bad boy and it s recess. . . . Handsome 
 woman, my wife, isn t she ? " 
 
 " Very." 
 
 Berkeley chuckled. " It s a fine thing to have a 
 wife that everybody regards as the model of just what 
 a wife should be. But It s a fine thing to live in a 
 grand palace high ceilings, big rooms, huge halls 
 a fine thing from the standpoint of other people, but 
 beastly cold and draughty and cheerless for the man 
 that lives there " Tom chuckled again " if he is 
 damn fool enough really to live there, and doesn t have 
 another place where he s comfortable and at home. * 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 There Tom winked at Murdock and burst out laugh 
 ing. 
 
 They went to the cafe, and Berkeley mused and 
 smiled over a cordial. " Cheer up ! " he finally said to 
 Murdock. " You re coming with me. I ve a date. 
 I d told her I had to see you." 
 
 " She knows better." 
 
 " Certainly. She knows me to a T she does. But 
 things must be kept smooth." He laughed. " Queer, 
 isn t it? She doesn t want me about. I bore her even 
 more than she bores me. Yet it irritates her to have 
 me amuse myself. I m sorry, but I can t oblige her. 
 Every time I think what a long time dead I ll be, I 
 get a move on." 
 
 "You re riding straight for a nasty scandal." 
 
 Berkeley gave an indifferent shrug. " I m riding 
 straight to amuse myself. She ll keep out of my 
 path " a wicked smile peered round the edge of his 
 jovial mask, and vanished " She don t want to be 
 run over. I respect her, I m glad she s my wife; she s 
 welcome to anything money ll buy. But not me, old 
 man not by a damn sight! I have some say about 
 myself. As a free American citizen, I ve got my con 
 stitutional rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
 happiness." 
 
 "And her rights?" 
 
 " Of course." Berkeley waved his hand gener- 
 /ously. "Don t she assert them all the rights she s 
 got? When a woman and a man marry, the man 
 agrees to support her and their offspring, and in ex 
 change for that she agrees to behave herself. A 
 woman s virtue is all there is to her, so far as mar 
 riage is concerned. . . . Do I ever bother about mar 
 ried women? No, indeed, I pay for what I get; I 
 
 126 
 
VIOLA 
 
 despise a man that takes what another man s paying 
 for. And a woman that cheats ain t fit to live. That s 
 good, business man s honor, isn t it? " 
 
 Murdock simply looked at him. Berkeley s way of 
 stating the case revolted him. Yet, he could not dis 
 pute that it seemed to fit the facts of life. " I m a fool 
 of a sentimentalist," he said to himself. " I ought to 
 be learning sense, after what my nonsense has just cost 
 me." 
 
 Berkeley paid for the drinks. " We must go," 
 said he. " There ll be somebody for you. Those kind 
 of girls always ring in an extra or so, when they ve 
 got a free spender on the string. And I don t care 
 what it costs, so long as I have a good time. Cheer 
 up, old man! Don t look as if you d lost the only 
 girl you ever loved." 
 
 Murdock bit his lip. The arrow stung, and the 
 fact that such an arrow from such a source should 
 sting made him despise himself. 
 
 " The peach crop s always good and always ripe 
 in little old New York, as the song says. Come 
 on!" 
 
 " No," said Murdock. His tone was final from 
 habit of refusing such invitations. But he was hesi 
 tating; to be alone meant to be prey to the pain that 
 was eating at him like a fire the pain of baffled desire. 
 " Why not ? " he said to himself. Perhaps he would 
 find some consolation, a quietus, for this passion that 
 was challenging his self-mastery. " Why not ? " he 
 repeated, defiantly, galled that anyone should seem to 
 have dominion over him. 
 
 " Come on, old man," urged Berkeley. " The trou 
 ble with you is that you concentrate too much. Re 
 lax ! Relax ! God, it d be hard on you, if you ever got 
 
 127 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 the one-woman bee in jour bonnet. You d go, hell 
 bent." 
 
 Murdock s involuntary straightening and smile of 
 defiance betrayed the boyishness which the man who 
 has always had his own way never loses and, in certain 
 moods, falls easy victim to. 
 
 " Now, I A man that takes women seriously is 
 a damn fool, and nobody knows it better than they do. 
 I never yet saw the woman with any experience who 
 didn t despise the man that took her seriously. Of 
 course, they like it. Who doesn t like it when some 
 body, anybody, falls flat and says, * For God s sake, 
 walk on me ! But they despise the man and keep 
 themselves for the chap that treats em like the dirt 
 under his feet. Come along, Murdock. You can leave 
 if you don t like it." 
 
 Yes, he must make an outlet for the flood menacing 
 him with destruction. " I will not play the fool for 
 her ! " he muttered. Then aloud, " Very well. Let s 
 be off." 
 
 " Good business," cried Berkeley, starting up 
 briskly. " Gad, what a swell you look ! " This with an 
 admiring glance at Murdock s simple, beautiful pearls 
 and well-cut waistcoat and collar. Even his sable over 
 coat seemed finer and more elegant than Berkeley s, 
 though, in fact, it had cost a good many thousands 
 less. 
 
 " There s nothing slow about you> Tom," replied 
 Murdock. 
 
 " Not bad, are they ? " said Berkeley, gazing com 
 placently at his diamond-set studs and waistcoat but 
 tons before he closed his ostentatious coat over them. 
 " It may be vulgar, but, damn it, I do like shiners. 
 Pearls are more your style. Old fellows like me have 
 
 128 
 
VIOLA 
 
 to have something that will dazzle the eyes of the girls 
 when they try to look at our hollows and creases." 
 
 Berkeley s electric brougham rushed them up 
 Broadway, bright from its hundreds of illuminated 
 signs and show windows, but with sidewalks swept 
 clean of the usual throngs by a wind straight and stiff 
 from the north and cyclonic in that canon of sky 
 scrapers. The brougham was tight closed, and Berke 
 ley and Murdock were in fur to the chin; but the 
 dampness in the wind penetrated to the very bones. 
 
 "God, this is fierce," grumbled Berkeley. "But 
 it s heaven beside the South en famille, or the stupor 
 out home. I d rather be a beggar in the Tenderloin, 
 than a billionaire in the backwoods. Why, as I lie 
 in bed here, I say to myself, The show s still on. You 
 could join any minute. And out where we come from,, 
 nothing but the moaning in the trees and dull people 
 doddering over stale gossip." Tom half turned, laid 
 his hand on Murdock s arm, and with a sudden change 
 to serious, said : " Don t misunderstand me, Murdock. 
 I m all for the home and purity in its proper place* 
 I ve got a strong sense of my duty to society." 
 
 " Overpowering," said Murdock. 
 
 " I mean it. I ve no patience with these men that 
 take duty flippantly and get divorces. I tell you, at 
 man that gets a divorce from his wife to marry some? 
 other woman is an enemy to religion and society." 
 
 "Really?" 
 
 " Yes, sir it s immoral. That s real immorality* 
 Let him have his fling that s nature. But if he s a 
 decent man, he ll not bring marriage and the home ia 
 disrepute by divorce." 
 
 " Where are you taking me ? " demanded Murdock, 
 irritated by these views, and chilled out of conceit with 
 
 129 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 an adventure that now seemed to him more worthy of 
 college boys than of men. 
 
 " Right here," said Berkeley. 
 
 The brougham was swinging in to the curb. The 
 big carriage opener a huge button-plastered coat and 
 vast fur collar and cockaded top hat caught a 
 glimpse of Berkeley s face. " Out of the way, there ! " 
 he shouted at the drivers of the line of vehicles, as he 
 rushed to the curb, and " Don t block the sidewalk ! " 
 to a group of loungers. With a pompous flourish he 
 opened the brougham and made a low bow. " All right, 
 Mr. Berkeley ! " cried he. 
 
 " You, first," said Berkeley to Murdock. He had 
 a dollar ready for the man who was giving him such 
 a conspicuous reception; he was not concealing his 
 pleasure at being thus acclaimed. 
 
 " Do you want your electric to wait, Mr. Berke 
 ley? " asked the carriage caller. 
 
 Berkeley nodded assent. " We may want to go a 
 little farther uptown, after a while," he explained to 
 Murdock. 
 
 They pushed in at the revolving door, into the 
 anteroom, crowded with men and women in evening 
 dress, some putting on, others divesting themselves of 
 wraps coats and cloaks of silver fox and ermine and 
 sable, real and imitation, wraps of silk and thick soft 
 cloth, white, silver, delicate shades of blue and dove 
 1 and pink. The women were wearing great plumed hats 
 and much jewelry. From the main room came the joy 
 ous beat of a popular air; there were odors of strong 
 perfumes, of wine, of fine tobacco. There was much 
 laughter, a taking shimmer of bright eyes, of dazzling 
 teeth framed in pretty lips ready, eager for kisses; 
 a stimulating exhibit of well-shaped, well-cared-for 
 
 130 
 
VIOLA 
 
 bodies ; the complexions of the women had that bloom 
 ing smoothness which comes only from incessant care. 
 A garden, indeed; gay, brilliant, inviting. The som- 
 berness over Murdock s features lifted somewhat, 
 though he still looked gloomy beside the boyish de 
 light of his companion, who had lost the last of his 
 never obtrusive signs of sedate man of family. His 
 grizzled mustache seemed rakish, his gaze roamed 
 eagerly, greedily, and he was breathing deeply, and 
 sparkling as if he were inhaling pure oxygen. From 
 time to time the end of his long, abrupt, rather pig- 
 like nose twitched quickly, sensitively, and his eyes 
 glistened, as if in rooting in this rich, rotten loam he 
 had turned up a truffle. He saw Murdock observing 
 him, amused yet envious. 
 
 " Now this," said he, " is living! God! I feel like 
 a fat woman as she sheds her corsets. Ah ! There they 
 are!" 
 
 Down the stairway before them were coming two 
 young women, beautifully dressed, the taller in white 
 cloth, the shorter in pale gray. The taller was curi 
 ously thin, almost emaciated, yet not angular. Her 
 figure seemed to be moving freely within her garments, 
 constantly suggesting itself and its separateness from 
 them and its desire to escape them. Murdock s eyes 
 leaped ; there was a physical resemblance to Juliet Rae- 
 burn in this free, sensuous girl a remote resemblance, 
 but strong enough to remind him, to set desire s acid 
 to eating fiercely again. 
 
 " Hello, Viola ! " exclaimed Berkeley, beaming on 
 her. " I hoped you d be here. I ve brought my 
 friend, Mr. Murdock, to meet you." Then he turned 
 to the shorter, the plump girl in pale gray. With 
 twitching end of nose and twinkling eye, he devoured 
 
 131 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 her charms of oval, soft face and sumptuous figure; 
 his thick lips grew moist. " Howdy, Jessie," said he, 
 his sensualist s fingers feeling up and down her arms. 
 " You re looking all to the good to-night. Let s go 
 in to supper." 
 
 Jessie smiled at Murdock and the four went two 
 and two into the main room, keeping to the side of 
 the room where the perfume was strongest and the 
 laughter loudest and the display of dresses and jewels 
 most extravagant. The other side was filled with a 
 quieter kind of men and women, apparently come as 
 hungry-eyed or hungry-hearted spectators of the free 
 and prodigal life of New York fashionable "after-dark 
 society." As the four sat at a table well situated for 
 seeing and being seen, Murdock felt isolated. Berke 
 ley and the two women were busily looking about, nod 
 ding to acquaintances, commenting on the various 
 celebrities, the men for the most part known to both 
 kinds of fashionable society, the women celebrated in 
 the gayer kind or on the stage or both. As soon as 
 they seated themselves, a waiter had brought a silver 
 champagne cooler and glasses, had drawn the cork 
 and filled the glasses. Berkeley made everybody drink ; 
 Murdock observed that he was himself careful barely 
 to touch the delightful but deadly wine to his lips. 
 All through the supper he was urging on the two 
 women to drink, was compelling it, and was himself 
 refraining. This evidence of calculation, this deliber 
 ate exploiting of the beauty and the vivacity of the 
 young women at the expense of their youth and health, 
 jarred on Murdock s less selfish nature. It reminded 
 him how, in business, Berkeley, always jolly and equal 
 with the men, and popular with them, was yet always 
 spurring on the foremen to wring the last drop of 
 
VIOLA 
 
 energy from their muscles that there might be more 
 and quicker dollars for him. Here, in the same plau 
 sible disguise of joviality, was the same merciless self 
 ishness, so profitable, so necessary to success in a 
 society whose law is the survival of the shrewdest. He 
 was buying from these girls their looks and their 
 spirits and their youth, and he was exacting the last 
 penny s worth of what he regarded as his own. When 
 they should be worked out Why, the price he was 
 willing to pay would buy him more youth and more 
 beauty and more laughter and all the time he was 
 shrewdly husbanding his own vitality. 
 
 " So you ve given your little friend the shake? * 
 said Berkeley to Viola. 
 
 She made a wry face. " I couldn t bear him." 
 
 " Why, where s all the jewelry? " 
 
 Murdock noted that while Jessie was festooned with 
 diamonds, and had fingers laden with diamonds, pearls, 
 and rubies, Viola had no jewelry but an inexpensive 
 diamond and pearl star at her throat. At Berkeley s 
 question, Viola blushed angrily. 
 
 Jessie laughed. " That dog ! " exclaimed she. 
 
 " You don t mean he took his presents back? " cried 
 Berkeley, amused. 
 
 " Everything ! " replied Viola. " He was one of 
 those cheap skates that bring the jewels with em when 
 they come and, when they go home, take em off, count 
 em, and put em in the box and carry em away again." 
 Her eyes flashed. " He used me as a show window. I 
 never owned a single piece." 
 
 " Her flat was in his name," Jessie now broke in, 
 appealing to Murdock s sympathy. " And all the fur 
 niture and the traps. When they quarreled, he even 
 tried to take her clothes." 
 
 133 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " He did take that ermine wrap," said Viola. 
 
 Suddenly her brows grew stormy, her bosom heaved, 
 and her even teeth small and sharp dug into her full 
 carmine lower lip until the blood came. " There he is 
 now ! " exclaimed Jessie. 
 
 Murdock saw a heavy, flabby, middle-aged man, 
 hairy except on the top of the head where he was bald, 
 advancing with a girl full a foot taller than he. She 
 was ablaze and adangle with jewelry. She had a mag 
 nificent figure, a small head, a sweet shy face, an abun 
 dance of genuinely golden hair. She walked awk 
 wardly, and wore the beautiful clothing and the jewels 
 as if she were not used to finery. 
 
 " Isn t she a lummix ! " sneered Jessie. 
 
 Viola was blazing alternately at her former lover 
 and at his new mistress. The girl saw her, blushed, 
 stumbled, almost fell. The man, noting Viola, returned 
 the furious glance with an insolent curl of his bloated 
 lips. He looked almost dead from vicious indulgence, 
 suggested something grown in a dark damp place, un 
 wholesome, perhaps poisonous. Murdock shuddered at 
 the thought of Viola s young loveliness in that embrace. 
 At the man s sneer Viola half started from her chair. 
 
 " Don t be a fool, Vi," rebuked Jessie. " Don t for 
 get you re a lady." 
 
 " I d like to tear him up," cried Vi. " And I ought 
 to strip those things off her ! They belong to me. God 
 knows I earned them, putting up with that " 
 
 She flung out from between the white teeth and the 
 fresh lips an epithet so coarse that Murdock winced. 
 Berkeley laughed. " Don t forget you re a lady, Vi," he 
 said mockingly. " Be careful what you say, or you ll 
 make a bad impression on my friend." 
 
 But Viola was too infuriated for prudence, neces- 
 
VIOLA 
 
 sary though it was that she speedily find a successor 
 to the departed lover. " I don t care a damn ! " she 
 hissed. " If he looks this way again, I ll break a carafe 
 on that bloated, bald head of his." 
 
 " Come, come ! Ladies ! Ladies ! " said Berkeley, 
 good-humored but imperative the master cracking the 
 whip warningly at the performing animals. 
 
 " You keep out of this," retorted Viola, lowering at 
 him. 
 
 Berkeley s eyes began to glitter ; but before he could 
 speak Jessie cried sharply : " Now, look here, Vi ! You ve 
 got to behave like a lady. What did you promise me 
 when I let you come along to-night? " She turned to 
 Murdock. " I never saw such a girl ! She s got the 
 worst disposition in the world. Now, when 7 break 
 with a " 
 
 " You ! " sneered Viola. " Why, you " And she 
 paused to laugh. 
 
 Jessie, cheeks aflame and eyes glowing : " Viola, if 
 you try to queer me, you know what you ll get." 
 
 With the suddenness of those whose lives swing as 
 freely to the winds of the passions as a weathervane to 
 the winds of heaven, Viola became calm, was smiling and 
 gracious, seemed the brighter, the more sparkling and 
 glittering for the storm, like the roughened surface of 
 the lake when the clouds break and the sun streams down 
 again. At first Murdock thought Jessie s warning was 
 the cause of the change, if indeed it had any cause be 
 yond the whimsical veering of her wayward temper. 
 Then he chanced to note a flashily dressed young man 
 at the next table but one, and so seated among his male 
 companions that he was full face to Viola. The young 
 man was smirking at her ; her large, brilliant eyes were 
 shining softly on him. Presently she said to Jessie, with 
 
 135 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 elaborate carelessness, " There s Billy with the other 
 boys see ? " 
 
 Jessie flung a withering glance at Billy and his 
 friends. " That beer bunch! " she retorted contemptu 
 ously. " There isn t the price of a supper in the crowd." 
 And Murdock, new to the " Broadway set " but judg 
 ing it by the universal principles of human nature, 
 knew it was for Billy s sake that Viola had quarreled 
 ivith her protector. " Vi s a good thing, she is," con 
 tinued Jessie to Murdock. " The idea of wasting time 
 on race-track touts ! " 
 
 Murdock was amused but not surprised to see, a 
 moment later, another of the young men of " that beer 
 bunch " take advantage of Berkeley s back to throw a 
 kiss to Jessie under pretense of pulling at his cigarette ; 
 and a few seconds later Jessie, after a furtive glance 
 that contrasted strangely with the mask of simple good 
 nature she habitually wore, returned the kiss with her 
 eyes, her lips touching the edge of her wine glass. And 
 now Murdock, sensitive to the realities beneath this allur 
 ing scene of free and careless gayety, noted how the eyes 
 cf all the men and women were constantly roving as if 
 each were seeking some one more attractive than his or 
 her partner, some one for whom to shake off the light 
 bond and flit away. Berkeley, too, was looking about, 
 though Jessie was trying to keep his attention upon her. 
 Her tone was caressing, but mechanically so. It would 
 have irritated Murdock; still, he envied Berkeley the 
 coarse-fibered nerves that enabled him to enjoy it, just 
 as the noisy uproar of the orchestra pleased his ears 
 more than would real music. 
 
 " So you re in love with Billy," said Murdock to 
 Viola, in an aside. 
 
 She gave him a quick, apprehensive look. Then, 
 136 
 
VIOITA 
 
 instinct guiding her, she replied candidly : " Just at 
 present. But I ll get tired of putting up for him 
 soon." 
 
 " You put up for him? " 
 
 " Of course. The men buy us ; we buy lovers." 
 
 " Naturally," said Murdock. " That s your way of 
 getting even." 
 
 " Getting even ? " Evidently Viola did not under 
 stand him. " No," she went on to explain, " it s the life 
 we lead. The men that buy us don t want love. They 
 think they do, but they don t. They want to feel free 
 to go at any minute. They just want " her look and 
 her laugh moved Murdock to pity for her, though she 
 evidently felt only the cheerfullest, most cynical sar 
 casm " what they pay for. Well, a woman s got to 
 love somebody, and the only kind she can get, if she s our 
 sort, is the Billys." She smiled charmingly. " Come 
 to think of it, love isn t in it at all. The men despise 
 us as things. We look round for something lower than 
 ourselves, something we can buy and despise." Her 
 pretty face sobered ; her pouting lips, that looked as if 
 a myriad of kisses had stung them to a fuller bloom and 
 a deeper crimson, curled in a smile of cynical self- 
 contempt. 
 
 " Cheer up, Vi ! " cried Berkeley, lifting his glass. 
 
 Viola startled, shrugged her sinuous shoulders, 
 laughed, emptied her glass. 
 
 When Berkeley, feeling that he had warded off the 
 gloom, returned to Jessie, Murdock said, " You re not 
 very prudent, are you? " 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " Letting me into the secrets." 
 
 Viola tilted her charming head and smiled at him 
 slantingly, her eyes half closed. " I don t have to be 
 10 137 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 prudent yet. I m only twenty and I ve got my looks. 
 When I m Jessie s age, I ll begin to be sly. Besides, it 
 doesn t do any harm to let the men see the game. They 
 don t care what we are or what we think. They despise 
 us. All they want is our bodies." 
 
 Murdock winced again. Yet it was impossible for 
 him to be deeply impressed by her coarseness or to 
 retain the impression long ; her figure was too stimulat 
 ing, her face too sweet and girlish. Her bloom was as 
 evanescently tainted by her coarseness as is the bloom 
 of the rose by the ugly worm that crawls across its pet 
 als and disappears. Leaning close to her, as he now 
 was, to make their conversation private, he learned why 
 she was fascinating him, why looking at her made him 
 burn with the memory of Juliet Raeburn. It was not 
 altogether, not chiefly, the resemblance of figure and 
 dress. It was her perfume faint yet strong, sweet yet 
 sharp, persistent, insistent, sensuous, the odor of fresh 
 flowers, of violets, of lilies of the valley, of all that 
 scents the springtime. 
 
 " What is that perfume? " he asked, striving in vain 
 to make his tone careless. 
 
 Her eyes flashed gayly and she waved the ends of 
 her feather boa under his nose. He paled and flushed 
 and paled again. She laughed, a little jealously. " It 
 reminds you of somebody? " she teased. And again she 
 tilted her small head and gazed at him with that slant 
 ing, daring glance, the more naked that it was half 
 veiled by her drooping eyelids. 
 
 His eyes blazed upon her the passion that had been 
 cheated of its prey. " You ll do," he said, delighting in 
 his brutality. 
 
 Her gaze softened ; she leaned toward him languor 
 ously. " I m glad," she said softly. " You re my 
 
 138 
 
VIOLA 
 
 style. I don t believe you re quite as young as I ve been 
 thinking." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " You ve been through a lot. I don t like young 
 men." 
 
 " Billy is about twenty-three, I d judge." 
 
 " Oh, that s different. Billy don t cut any ice with 
 me, not really." And again she gave him the long, lan- 
 gourous look ; there was insincerity in it, but also more 
 sincerity than his lack of vanity permitted him to credit. 
 That, however, concerned him little ; what he wanted was 
 to feel himself the master, the autocrat. And, with his 
 senses stimulated and his sensibilities blunted by cham 
 pagne, he was getting that feeling from her. 
 
 " It s dead slow here to-night," cut in Berkeley. 
 " Let s go to Churchill s or Jack s." 
 
 " Not Jack s," cried Jessie. " Vi made a scene there 
 yesterday morning." Whereat they both laughed, 
 throwing back their heads and showing the bright, fresh 
 interiors of their pretty mouths. 
 
 They were having their third quart of the cham 
 pagne. Viola was making opportunities to lean against 
 Murdock, to touch him, to insinuate her fingers into his 
 palm. Jessie, forgetting wisdom, was casting languish 
 ing glances indiscriminately round the room, as she 
 lavished upon Berkeley the stereotyped words and ges 
 tures of endearment. " Waiter, the bill ! " called Berke 
 ley, ignoring her. 
 
 " Oh, no, let s stay here," protested she, darting a 
 fiery glance at her young man at " Billy s " table. 
 
 " No, we re going," said Berkeley, smiling. " And " 
 -^-with a tantalizing laugh " if that young man of 
 yours, the one you ve been flirting with, follows us he ll 
 take you home, my dear." 
 
 139 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Jessie shrank and bit her lip ; Viola laughed. Jessie 
 scowled furiously at her; but with Jessie prudence was 
 a primal instinct, and her mask swiftly and automati 
 cally readjusted. " What young man? " asked she with 
 an injured air. 
 
 ** The one that slips out when I come, and slips in 
 when I go," replied Berkeley unruffled. " The one in 
 the * beer bunch over there." 
 
 In paying, he exhibited a great package of bills laid 
 flat between the folds of a leather case. The eyes of the 
 two girls glistened as their imaginations were stimulated 
 by the sight of the purchase price of so much luxury. 
 " How they hate him for having so much of what they 
 so desperately want," thought Murdock. He liked Vi 
 ola better as he noted that her look of envy was merely 
 human, while Jessie s was the look that goes with poised 
 beak and twitching talon. Besides, he had drunk an 
 unusual quantity of champagne. When Viola pressed 
 his arm he returned the pressure, closed his eyes, inhaled 
 the perfume that shook from the big black plumes in her 
 white hat. " Juliet ! " he muttered, the fumes of wine 
 and of perfume combining to intoxicate him. And his 
 fingers closed upon Viola s slender arm so violently that 
 she cried out with pain. " But I don t mind," she 
 hastened to add languorously. " I like it." 
 
 As the blast of outer air douched him he recovered 
 somewhat. " What the hell am I about? " he muttered. 
 Then, aloud, in a curt, abrupt tone, " I must go to the 
 hotel." 
 
 " Look at him," said Jessie to Vi aside. " I didn t 
 think he could be so fierce." 
 
 " I don t like him," whispered Vi. " But" She 
 made a pouting face. 
 
 " He s easy fruit," replied Jessie, " if you manage 
 140 
 
VIOLA 
 
 him right. And, you re lying. You do like him. Don t 
 make a fool of yourself and get soft on him." 
 
 Berkeley was remonstrating with him. " No, you 
 ain t going home," cried he. " You wouldn t leave me 
 in the lurch. Besides, the fun s just beginning." 
 
 But Murdock s jaw was set. " Here s where I drop 
 out." 
 
 " Put me in a hansom," said Viola. " I ve got 
 enough. I m going home, too." 
 
 Jessie winked at Berkeley and tugged at his arm. 
 Berkeley grinned. " Oh ! . . . All right, old man. Put 
 her in a hansom. 
 
 " Yes, put her in a hansom," said Jessie. " You can 
 drop her at my flat. She s staying with me." 
 
 Berkeley and Jessie drove away in the brougham. 
 The carriage opener ordered up a hansom. Murdock 
 held from the wheel the skirts of Viola s fur-trimmed, 
 white-cloth wrap. As she stepped up she flirted into his 
 very face the mass of flounces and laces she was hold 
 ing. The motion freed a cloud of perfume the per 
 fume. He straightened up, hesitated. As she sat in 
 the corner of the cab, her sweet, pathetic young face 
 pleading to him, she looked even lovelier than she was. 
 The wind-swept street was icy ; he felt chilled to the 
 heart with loneliness. " Hurry," she said. " Let s get 
 the glass down." 
 
 He entered the hansom, the glass dropped, and they 
 were off. " I m so cold," she murmured, snuggling 
 her bare hand into his. " Please fasten my wrap at the 
 throat." 
 
 To do this he had to bend very close to her. She 
 tilted back her head and pouted her enticing lips con 
 veniently near his, in frank invitation. He seemed not 
 to see, completed his task, drew away. 
 
 141 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 "Aren t you going to kiss me?" she pouted and 
 pleaded. 
 
 " I ll not rob Billy." 
 
 " Bother Billy ! You re in love with some woman ! " 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " Shut your eyes and imagine I m her." 
 
 " Is that the way you do? " 
 
 " Often." 
 
 She put her head on his shoulder ; he closed his eyes ; 
 the perfume and her soft, round cheek against his gave 
 him an illusion that set him afire. 
 
 At the flathouse in Fifty-ninth Street, he helped 
 her to descend, accompanied her up the steps, stood while 
 the night porter was shuffling and yawning down the 
 hall in answer to her impatient ring. " Good night," 
 he said. 
 
 " Come in a minute and get warm," urged she. 
 " You surely want to see what kind of a place old Berke 
 ley has put Jessie in." 
 
 " I don t want to keep the cabby standing in the 
 cold." 
 
 " He ll stand all night for somebody. It might as 
 well be you." 
 
 Murdock, cold, with his passion burning at his heart, 
 with the loneliness of his hotel drearily visioned, entered. 
 Jessie s flat was on the second floor. Viola gave the 
 porter a two-dollar bill as they left the elevator. " We 
 have to keep him in a good humor," she explained. 
 " This is a quiet house. Everything goes in New York 
 if you pay well." 
 
 The flat lost all suggestion of mere apartment the 
 instant one was inside the doors, and took on the appear 
 ance of a large and luxurious house. Before Murdock, 
 a grand stairway led upward to the second floor of the 
 
VIOLA 
 
 duplex. To the left was a salon with two onyx pillars 
 supporting the carved ceiling. " This furniture and 
 the pictures belong to Jessie," said Viola. Murdock 
 glanced round perfunctorily. Everything was costly and 
 ostentatious; but, like all the surroundings of the lux 
 urious class, both respectable and otherwise, there was 
 small evidence of individuality or taste, unless a crav 
 ing for the showiest and costliest be called individuality 
 and taste. 
 
 The atmosphere of the room was drenched with the 
 powerful essence Jessie used. Viola had dropped her 
 wrap on a divan. She was removing her hat pins, her 
 arms above her head. Murdock s eyes rested on her. 
 Suddenly he seized her and crushed her in his arms. She 
 gave a cry of pain; he held her the more tightly, for 
 the cry seemed somehow to assuage the flames that were 
 licking his heart. " Don t ! " she panted. " You re 
 mussing my only best dress. Almost everything I had 
 was taken by that " Again she used the epithet that 
 struck him in the face like a dab of filth. 
 
 He shuddered, shook her violently. " For God s 
 sake ! " he cried, angry as a rudely roused dreamer, 
 " can t you use decent language ? " 
 
 " What would you call a man that had treated you 
 as he treated me? " she asked, unmoved. And her limpid 
 languorous eyes were upon him, and her sensuous, yet 
 girlish lips and her warm, sweet breath were alluring 
 him. 
 
 He laughed. The worm had dropped from the rose, 
 had vanished. " Forget him," said he. " And help 
 me to forget everything unpleasant." 
 
 " I ll send away the hansom. You can ring for 
 another when you want it." 
 
 He gave her a ten-dollar bill. " Tell him to keep it. * 
 143 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 She left the room. By way of four or five mutually 
 reflecting mirrors he saw her in the adjoining room at 
 a desk. She took out a pocketbook, put his ten-dollar 
 bill in one of the compartments, took another bill and 
 some silver from another compartment. She rang. A 
 colored maid, very neat in cap and apron and black 
 dress, appeared. " Tell the porter to give this to the 
 cabman waiting outside," he heard her say. " And bring 
 some champagne a quart." 
 
 But her petty swindle did not disgust him ; it moved 
 him to pity. And in a moment he had forgotten it, was 
 reclining on the great sofa, was defying the image of 
 Juliet Raeburn. " No woman shall rule me," he mut 
 tered. " Soon I shall be master of myself again." When 
 she returned she was in a loose gown of thin silk that 
 wrapped round her legs at every step and revealed her 
 slender neck and all of her slender back. Her form was 
 flaunting more ostentatiously than ever the suggestion 
 of impatience at the restraint of its garments. She flung 
 herself into his arms with a little gasp. 
 
 "When will Jessie and Berkeley come?" he asked. 
 
 " Oh, about daybreak. But he ll go straight away 
 to his family. You say you re not married?" 
 
 " I didn t say," he replied curtly. 
 
 " How touchy you are ! " She slid her arms slowly 
 and softly over his neck and face. 
 
 " That s a wonderful perfume you use." 
 
 " I love it." 
 
 "What is the name?" 
 
 " That s my secret. I used to be a model in a dress 
 making place, and the lady that kept it " 
 
 He drew her round into his lap and held a glass of 
 champagne to her lips. " Never mind your past," said 
 he. " Let s forget." 
 
 144 
 
VIOLA 
 
 She kissed him on the eyes, on the lips. " I like 
 you," she murmured. " Really not make believe." 
 
 He shut his eyes and, with the fumes of the cham 
 pagne dizzying him and her perfume deluding him, he 
 kissed Juliet Raeburn until Viola pushed him from her. 
 " You frighten me," she gasped. " I wouldn t think 
 you could be so cruel." 
 
 " You don t know me," replied he with a grim, curt 
 laugh. " I m only beginning to get acquainted with 
 myself." 
 
 " Gad, what a relief that kind of women are," said 
 Berkeley when he met Murdock at lunch next day. " No 
 need to put on! No need to waste time in polite pre 
 liminaries. A man can just unbuckle and turn himself 
 loose. You look like a new person, Charles." 
 
 " I am," said Murdock, with a gleam of self -derision. 
 
IX 
 
 THE WEDDING, AND AFTEtt 
 
 BERKELEY had sent " her " home by a different route 
 and by the humble conveyance of the Pullman drawing- 
 room. To make his quaint domestic accounts balance, he 
 was bringing her from New York a gold and platinum 
 bag set and fringed with rubies. As these entries to 
 Florence s credit were frequently necessary, and as he 
 begrudged every dollar for purposes other than personal, 
 his admiration for himself as a model husband was 
 rapidly swelling. 
 
 " I ll have the car ready day after to-morrow night," 
 said he to Murdock, when they were about to separate at 
 the Saint X station. 
 
 Murdock looked blank, then inquiring. 
 
 " You know, we told them we d be back Thursday." 
 
 "Did we? So we did." 
 
 " You re not going to disappoint me, are you ? " 
 
 " If I can arrange it," was Murdock s unsatisfactory 
 reply. 
 
 " Tired of little Hastings? Or don t you fancy her? 
 She is thin. Perhaps you d prefer Jessie." 
 
 Murdock s expression was so peculiar that Berkeley 
 reddened. But he stood his ground. " What s the use 
 of these hypocrisies?" said he. "Of course, with the 
 ladies But, among ourselves 
 
 With a hasty " I ll see," Murdock sprang into his 
 146 
 
THE WEDDING, AND AFTER 
 
 waiting auto. Berkeley looked after him quizzically. 
 " Conscience troubling him, I guess," reflected he. 
 " Queer thing, a man s conscience or a woman s, for 
 that matter." 
 
 But Berkeley had guessed wrong. Unlike him, Mur- 
 dock did not keep accounts with conscience, but with 
 self-respect ; and it did not occur to him that in the Viola 
 incident, all but forgotten before the Saint X express 
 had cleared the suburbs of New York, he was in the least 
 involved. He had found Viola neither agreeable nor dis 
 tasteful, simply unimportant. She had been accidental 
 a fortunate accident, he thought, because when he met 
 her his madness for Juliet Raeburn was threatening not 
 only to destroy him but also to defeat itself through its 
 reckless violence. Viola had halted him long enough to 
 enable him to recall reason to its place as the chief and 
 trusty servant of his will. A horse will go farther and 
 faster under the rein than as a runaway and so will a 
 passion. But in herself, Viola had been to him merely 
 a matter of a mood and a perfume. His notion that she 
 might free him from Juliet Raeburn had passed with 
 the turbulent, champagne-hazed hours that gave it birth. 
 He could not, like a Berkeley, satisfy his imperial long 
 ings for life by any such tame and colorless impressions 
 as he could get from a woman who had only the common 
 place tricks and arts of appeal to the senses, who was 
 merely good-natured, obliging, and pretty. To his 
 strength of imagination and of passion, her prettiness as 
 a source of sensation lost its power with the falling of 
 the veil from the empty, bare, inner temple of her per 
 sonality. If he had wanted a mannikin for the display 
 of fine raiment and jewelry, or the mere sense of con 
 venient femininity that is most men s chief satisfaction 
 from the women they attach and maintain within or 
 
 147 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 without the bond, Viola would have done as well as 
 another; better than most because she was tactful 
 enough not to irritate with untimely chatter. But the 
 man who craves the ocean cannot stay himself long with 
 placid paddling about in a bathing pool. As for what 
 Viola might feel at his abrupt and final exit, it was not 
 his habit to consider others where consideration might 
 make him hesitate. The master men, playing life as a 
 game and using their fellow-men as pawns, would not 
 get far if they included consequences to others in their 
 calculations. Also, he had learned that consideration 
 usually causes greater blunders and disasters than ruth- 
 lessness ; finally, he had not the necessary vanity to imag 
 ine her interest in him other than purely commercial. He 
 rightly interpreted her constraint with him, so different 
 from her and Jessie s familiarity with Berkeley. She 
 was not at heart vulgar; the reverse. But she liked to 
 be surrounded by vulgarity ; it gave her a pleasant sense 
 of moral superiority, while the absence of it seemed a 
 criticism of her mode of life which she, still true to her 
 early training in a New England Presbyterian family, 
 regarded as degraded. 
 
 Thus, Murdock made his plans with not a sug 
 gestion of that vanity so agreeably disguised as tender 
 heartedness which dominates most men in their dealings 
 with women who care no more for them than they them 
 selves care for the women. " Berkeley can settle it," 
 said he to himself, halfway to the Eyrie. And when he 
 had decided on the size of the consolation check Viola 
 vanished, having once more and for the last time served 
 to evoke the flaming phantom of Juliet Raeburn. He 
 set his teeth together. 
 
 " As soon as Norma s wedding is over " 
 
 His passion wrapped him in the torment of its flames. 
 148 
 
THE WEDDING, AND AFTER 
 
 He could not banish the vision of Juliet s slim, cool, 
 white beauty with its mystery of magic and terror. 
 And a hot wind heavy with her perfume released her 
 long, thick hair and drenched his face with its electric 
 waves. The measure of an individuality is the sweep of 
 its imagination and the intensity of its desires. The 
 pale personalities that flicker and fade in the back 
 ground of this world do not understand, can scarcely 
 credit, the passions of the few strong men passions 
 that compel them to labors without ceasing, to sacri 
 fices without limit, to cruelties and crimes colossal. 
 " As soon as Norma s wedding is over " 
 
 In the excitement and confusion of the preparations 
 for the wedding his coming was hardly noticed. Sophy, 
 eager for grievances to enter in her ledger account with 
 him, frowned at sight of his train of secretaries with 
 bags and bundles ; and, when he kept himself shut in his 
 library with his tools for concentrating the whole world 
 at his desk, she told herself that he was outraging the 
 proprieties. " He can t take time from his business for 
 his family even when his only daughter is getting mar 
 ried," thought she. If he had not kept out of the way 
 her grievance would have been that he had not stayed in 
 New York and minded his own affairs. 
 
 Norma had wanted a quiet wedding; but Sophy 
 would not permit it. To her old-fashioned prejudices 
 there was something not quite moral in a private wed 
 ding. It was bad enough that Norma should be marry 
 ing a man older than her mother ; to marry him quietly, 
 furtively, as it were, was not to be tolerated. Norma 
 yielded to stop her mother s sighing and complaining. 
 The result was an upheaval in the domestic arrange 
 ments and in the routine of life that carried the girl 
 
 149 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 far toward nervous prostration. Instead of the wedding 
 she had dreamed, there was an elaborate, ostentatious 
 public function. It went off smoothly enough on the 
 surface ; but, behind the appearances of order and splen 
 dor, there were the petty harassments, the sordid irrita 
 tions and worries that attend the production of a spec- 
 
 . tacle the vulgar and wearing stupidities that make life 
 in a fashionable society so devoid of dignity, so ludi 
 crous to people who think. And the entire burden fell 
 upon her. 
 
 As she stood at the altar with Joe the guests, noting 
 her circled eyes, her wan cheeks, the weary, pathetic 
 drawing of the mouth, began to speculate whether there 
 were not some dark secret behind the marriage com 
 pulsion on the part of the parents, eager for an alliance 
 with the Degarmos who were of the old French aris 
 tocracy of the West that had had manners and the cus 
 tom of luxury when the East was still rude and rural. 
 At the breakfast she saw Joe s eyes on her with a dis 
 appointed expression. And she knew why. Then there 
 was her enemy, Antoinette Houghton, with a look that 
 said : " I felt there wasn t much staying power in your 
 looks, but I didn t dream how little." And the stage 
 * managers and helpers at the spectacle were all running 
 
 to her about everything. To cap the climax, she over 
 heard her mother making moan to Florence Berkeley: 
 " Yes, I am just about dead. I ve been slaving early 
 and late for a month. You know how it is nobody 
 could do anything without first pestering me." This, 
 when Sophy had not lifted a finger to help, had spoken 
 only to complain that she was being worked into an ill 
 ness, or to criticise peevishly the things that were being 
 done, without offering any coherent suggestions for 
 improvement. 
 
 150 
 
THE WEDDING* AND AFTER 
 
 Norma, turning away with tears trickling down her 
 white, hollowed cheeks, was facing her father. He was 
 not looking at her, but at Sophy ; his expression, a com 
 plete revelation of his secret mind, was so bitter, so ter 
 rible that her heart faltered in its beat. Her father un 
 derstood ; her father knew ; and he was revolving some 
 course of desperate action. She made a brave attempt 
 to smile. " This wedding has nearly cost all of us our 
 lives," said she. " I am being well punished for my 
 vanity." 
 
 Murdock made no reply; but she saw she had not 
 deceived him. 
 
 " You won t say anything to mother, will you? " she 
 pleaded. " I m all right really, I am." 
 
 He abruptly left her. 
 
 His mind was made up to begin executing his plans 
 for freedom on the following day. But when he asked 
 for Sophy the next morning, he learned that she had 
 taken to her bed for a thoroughgoing sick spell. She had 
 overeaten of the rich trash provided for the wedding; 
 also, bed was the only place where she could entirely es 
 cape the labors and annoyances of clearing away the 
 mess the wedding had made. Now that Norma was 
 gone, there was no one but herself to take charge. 
 
 " How soon will the house be straight again ? " he 
 asked Katy. 
 
 " About a week, I guess," replied the maid. 
 
 Murdock thus learned that it would be a week before 
 Sophy would emerge. He went to Chicago, to the great 
 scandal of all their friends, who could hardly believe 
 that even the cold and indifferent Murdock would treat 
 a sick wife so heartlessly. " Telegraph me," he had said 
 to the butler, as he was leaving, " when Mrs. Murdock 
 
 151 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 is sitting up." And this went the rounds as proof con 
 clusive of his granitelike heart. 
 
 In his irritation he began to dabble in speculation, 
 
 stirred up a financial war that forced him to hasten East, 
 
 involved himself so deeply that it was six weeks before 
 
 he could leave New York. He paused at Slumber Lake 
 
 1 to take up Norma and Joe Joe reluctant to end the 
 
 ; honeymoon and release his matchless bride to the rakish 
 
 eyes and thoughts of men who still were as he had been ; 
 
 Norma, glad to get away from the mosquitoes and from 
 
 Joe s incessant sounding of the one note from the harp 
 
 with the one string. 
 
 In honor of the returning bride, Sophy made a 
 special effort and met them at the Saint X station, ar 
 riving just in time, as the train was twenty minutes late. 
 She had gained considerably in weight ; but her skin was 
 clear, and Katy, unusually dextrous that day, had done 
 her hair so that its recession behind her ears and its 
 thinness at the temples were well concealed. Also, she 
 happened to have selected a becoming hat and dress, that 
 gave a fair chance to her limpid, soft, deeply blue eyes 
 and her faultless nose. Usually, she affected frills and 
 furbelows and rich trimmings, all taking from her height 
 l and adding to her girth ; to-day she was wearing a white 
 linen, plain, roomy, and a new style of corest that great 
 ly reduced her in front. Her sleepy inertia was swept 
 away by Norma s enthusiasm of young delight at being 
 home again. The bride was, naturally, the center of 
 interest, and not until Murdock and his wife were alone 
 in the rear seat of an auto, and on the way to the Eyrie, 
 did they realize what utter strangers they had become. 
 All those years of intimacy seemed to each like a faint 
 memory of a former life. 
 
 As the auto swung into the grounds, Murdock s face 
 152 
 
THE WEDDING, AND AFTER 
 
 became cold and frowning. When he left, these grounds 
 had been a model of order and beauty. Now, hedges 
 and lawns were ragged, fallen leaves were strewn messily 
 about, flower beds were unsightly with faded and dead 
 blooms and littered petals ; the caterpillars were ravag 
 ing the trees. 
 
 " Jansen sick ? " asked Murdock. Jansen was the 
 head gardener. 
 
 " No," replied Sophy, almost as if addressing an 
 acquaintance. " He came up for orders as usual this 
 morning. But I was so busy getting ready to come to 
 the station that I couldn t see him. . . . He s been do 
 ing very well this summer. Everybody speaks of how 
 beautiful the grounds are." 
 
 Murdock said nothing. A faint, sarcastic smile 
 flitted across his features. Evidently " everybody " had 
 been at " everybody s " familiar trick of encouraging 
 rack and ruin with flattery. 
 
 Now they were in front of the house ; out hurried 
 the butler and second man, both in unkempt livery, with 
 linen none too clean and unshaven cheeks. Murdock 
 glanced from one to the other; they looked uneasy, for 
 they knew at once the why of that keen scrutiny, though 
 they had not had the necessary imagination to prepare 
 for it. He ascended to the entrance ; chairs and cushions 
 untidily about the verandas, the floors neglected. He 
 muttered under his breath and entered the house. There 
 the same glaring evidences of neglect dust thick on the 
 big table in the hall, which was ironically decorated with 
 a forgotten dusting rag. A broom upon the floor in 
 full view of the entrance. One of the statues awry upon 
 its pedestal; the pictures crooked, one of them at an 
 absurd angle. 
 
 " Your rooms are ready," said his wife. " At least, 
 U 153 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 I told the servants to get them ready. I haven t been 
 able to find a housekeeper yet." 
 
 " Simcox will look after me," replied he coldly. 
 " What time do you have lunch? " 
 
 " At one o clock." 
 
 They were hesitating, he at the library door, she at 
 the elevator. " Then I ll see you at lunch," said he awk 
 wardly. And they went their separate ways, each glad 
 to be freed of the embarrassment and strain of the 
 other s presence. 
 
 Norma and Joe came at one, and just as lunch was 
 announced Charles Junior appeared, brilliant in gaudy 
 flannels and very red from a sail on the river. He seemed 
 to Murdock full a year older than two months before ; 
 certainly he had passed out of the clumsy age into a 
 graceful and manly youth. The lunch was in fact a 
 dinner, and a bad one. The service was almost sloppy, 
 a retrogression to what it had been before they moved 
 into the Eyrie with Norma in charge of the household. 
 One rich dish succeeded another turtle soup, fried fish 
 with thick sauce, roast birds saturated with butter, salad 
 with mayonnaise dressing, the ice cream with whipped 
 cream and chocolate sauce. Only Sophy and the boy 
 ate. Murdock and Joe, both at the age when a man has 
 to begin to be careful about his diet if he is not to lose 
 his waist and become bald, wrinkled, and baggy, dared 
 not adventure anything that was served. Norma was 
 in the same plight, being mindful of her complexion, 
 which had not benefited by the hardship of the camp, 
 and being also ever haunted by the fear of her inherited 
 tendency to fat. As all three were hungry, the inability 
 to eat made them grumpy and irritable, roused the crit 
 ical faculty in Norma and her father. But nothing was 
 said ; to speak would have been to quarrel. 
 
 154 
 
THE WEDDING, AND AFTER 
 
 After lunch all went to the broad, well-shaded east 
 veranda, Mrs. Murdock persistently falling asleep, star 
 tling from her cat naps and looking about with an ex 
 pression of alertness and interest that would have struck 
 them as ludicrous had they been less out of humor. 
 " I m afraid mother isn t well," said Norma in an under 
 tone to her brother, when Sophy was nodding. 
 
 "Oh, she s all right," replied Charley. "Aren t 
 you, ma? " 
 
 Sophy awakened with a start. " Yes, I think it is 
 going to rain," said she, the weather having been the 
 subject of conversation when she dozed off. 
 
 Charley laughed; the others smiled, Sophy joining 
 in that no one might suspect her having been asleep. 
 " I said you were well," explained Charley. 
 
 " Yes, I m feeling quite well," said Sophy, " quite 
 well for me." 
 
 But her face in repose told a different story. It is 
 in the hour after the meal that the penalties of unchecked 
 indulgence of natural uneducated appetite show most 
 tellingly in the face. Sophy looked worn, and her color 
 was that of a person suffering from some inward convul 
 sion. " She always sleeps a while after lunch," continued 
 her son, when she went off again. " And after dinner 
 she goes straight to bed. Oh, she s all right. She eats 
 and sleeps fine though she imagines she doesn t." 
 
 Murdock was studying his wife s unguarded counte 
 nance with an expression that made a chill creep over 
 Norma, the only one to observe it. " He realizes the 
 truth about her," thought she. And then she visibly 
 startled, for it was the first time in her life that she had 
 frankly admitted to herself that there was a " truth " 
 about her mother. Joe and Charley sauntered away 
 across the lawn. She presently said softly to her father : 
 
 155 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " Poor mother ! I don t believe there s another woman 
 in Saint X who has always stayed so close at home. She 
 has given her whole life to her family." 
 
 Murdock reluctantly took his strange eyes from his 
 wife, slowly to concentrate them on his daughter. He 
 did not speak for full half a minute, during which Norma 
 felt her blood contracting about her heart under the spell 
 of that mysterious and even terrible glance. At last 
 he said, and it astonished her that his voice was as usual, 
 " When do you want possession of this house? " 
 
 " Not at all," replied she. " You and mother and 
 Charley are going to live on here." She smiled. " Of 
 course you ve got to pay me rent." 
 
 " I bought the house on the distinct understanding 
 that you were to live in it." 
 
 " But mother has been writing me how much she 
 liked it that she had completely changed her mind." 
 
 " I am going to talk with her about it to-day or to 
 morrow." 
 
 Something perhaps it was in his tone, perhaps it 
 was only the forewarnings of her own instinct made 
 Narma say with an entreaty that was piteous : " Please 
 don t talk of it, or of anything disturbing until she is 
 better. Or, let me speak to her about it." 
 
 Murdock made no reply. Presently his wife awaE- 
 ened. " Have I been asleep ? " said she. 
 
 " You have," replied Norma. 
 
 " I oughtn t to have done it. Now, I ve got one of 
 my headaches. Sleeping in the daytime is always bad. 
 But lately I get so little rest at night. I sleep soundly 
 a couple of hours or so, and then I wake up, and stay 
 awake till nearly daylight. I suppose at my time of 
 life people begin not to need so much sleep." 
 
 Norma, of a generation somewhat better informed 
 156 
 
THE WEDDING, AND AFTER 
 
 on the subject of digestion, could have told her the cause 
 of this stupor followed by hours of insomnia. But of 
 what use? Her mother would simply have been irri 
 tated. Ignorance of all kinds resents light; ignorance 
 that shields self-indulgence repulses light. 
 
 " Charley says I worry too much about the house," 
 continued Sophy. " But that s my way. I can t change. 
 I can t be like the women who are always either enter 
 taining or being entertained." 
 
 Murdock rose and strolled into the house. Sophy 
 looked after him with a furtive expression of dislike that 
 astounded and shocked her daughter. To change the 
 subject Norma said: " Joe and I have decided to stay on 
 at the Degarmo house. We ll keep it just as it is, all 
 closed but the south wing. Don t forget, you and 
 father and Charley are dining with us to-morrow night." 
 
 " I m afraid I sha n t feel well enough." 
 
 " Trash ! " said Norma. " I m coming in the morn 
 ing to take you for a walk." 
 
 Sophy was instantly angry and showed it. " You 
 know I can t walk ! " she cried. " If it wasn t for the 
 driving, I d not be able to leave the house." 
 
 " If it wasn t for driving, you d be well and strong," 
 retorted Norma. She was thinking of her father s eyes 
 as he left. " I ll be up about nine o clock." 
 
 She whistled from the edge of the porch ; Joe turned, 
 and following the suggestion of her pointed finger, 
 struck out for a point near the first downward bend of 
 the hill drive, she cutting across the lawn to meet him 
 there. " I thought you d as lief walk home," said she, 
 " I must do my five miles." 
 
MARRIAGE IS SACEED TO ME " 
 
 SOPHY, breakfasting alone in her sitting room, with 
 the door into the hall open, glanced up to see Murdock 
 in the doorway. " Gracious ! " she gasped, much as if 
 he had been an intruder from the highroad. And the 
 tone and manner of his " Good morning " carried the 
 same suggestion. 
 
 He seated himself near the window and gazed out 
 across the balcony into the treetops sparkling in the 
 September sunshine. She resumed her breakfast. It 
 was on a huge silver tray laid with fine linen the three 
 great silver pieces of the coffee set, a plate of hot bis 
 cuits, three eggs, and two chops. She had finished eggs 
 and chops and all but two of the biscuits, and was drink 
 ing her coffee and hot cream from an English porcelain 
 cup the size of a not small bowl. She was dressed, as 
 was her early morning custom, in a mussy-f ussy negligee 
 over a torn silk petticoat and an old corset cover. Her 
 long, Indian-straight hair had been carelessly rolled into 
 a knot on top of her head. In her childhood she was 
 taught those small economies that are a temptation to 
 degenerate into the slattern was taught to be careful 
 of " Sunday clothes," to be ever mindful that frequent 
 washing is harder on garments than use, to wear out the 
 old clothes round the house, when " nobody " would see 
 
 158 
 
"MARRIAGE IS SACRED TO ME 
 
 " nobody " being those whose good opinion is, or 
 should be, worth more to one than that of all the world 
 beside. Though she had no stinginess anywhere in her, 
 and had eagerly adopted the effortless luxuries penetrat 
 ing to all parts of America with the growth of a rich 
 class and a class of ingenious and assiduous purveyors 
 to the rich, she held on to those thrifty habits of her 
 childhood. They were always peering, now shrewdly, 
 now amusingly, and again absurdly , through her veneer 
 of extravagance, as her early dialect asserted itself in 
 the more formal speech she had later learned to use. 
 She was certainly not an inviting young matron as she 
 sat there in those ill-assorted and unbecoming garments, 
 her face somewhat swollen from the night s sleep. But 
 he had seen that same spectacle and worse too many 
 times especially to note it, though its contrast with his 
 neatness and good taste would have made a painful or 
 a cynical impression upon an onlooker. She was out of 
 harmony with the room, too ; for, although she had taken 
 no care of it, had let upholstery and silk wall-covering 
 get frayed and stained, her occupancy had been too brief 
 to destroy altogether the simple but luxurious freshness. 
 More than her appearance he was noting the dowdiness 
 of her room ; and a nick in the edge of her cup was giv 
 ing him the feeling of stroking velvet against the grain. 
 Nicked dishes happened to be his especial small aversion ; 
 nor had years of daily home experience blunted his 
 senses to them. 
 
 " Are you going away again ? " she asked, trying to 
 account for the strangeness of his coming to that apart 
 ment where he had never been before. 
 
 Yes," replied he. And now his eyes were resting 
 directly upon her. " I m going to New York to-night. 
 I want to settle our affairs on a sensible basis." He 
 
 159 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 was speaking slowly, choosing his words. " We ought 
 not let them drift any longer." 
 
 To an outsider there would have been profound 
 pathos in the relations of these two the start in all 
 the glamour of passion and romance, the pitiful anti- 
 1 climax in this mutual repulsion, scarcely concealed, 
 this drearily ugly commonplace of alienation. But 
 there was no pathos in it for Murdock or for Sophy; 
 these day by day, hour to hour, driftings apart make 
 the heart callous and the imagination sterile. 
 
 " We must settle our affairs on a rational basis," 
 he repeated, as his first statement seemed to have made 
 no impression. 
 
 She looked at him. In all their married life he had 
 never discussed money matters with her ; she had spent 
 what she pleased, had h-ad her own balance at the bank, 
 and he had always kept it up beyond her demand upon 
 it. " Has Charley been spending too much ! " she 
 asked. " Anyhow, I don t know anything about that. 
 He never comes to me for money." 
 
 " I mean our affairs yours and mine." 
 
 She shook her head vaguely. " Anything you like. 
 I always have been used to sacrifice?, all my life. I 
 guess I can make out, no matter what happens. Have 
 you lost some money? " 
 
 fc " No," said he, with some irritation not at her 
 inability to see what he was trying to get at, but be 
 cause he suddenly and exasperatingly felt ashamed, 
 felt that he was a coward, using his superior intelli 
 gence and power to compel a fellow being, who was 
 generous and kind of heart, was simply weak and fool 
 ish in a different way from himself. " No," he re 
 peated. " On the contrary, everything seems to be 
 going well." 
 
 160 
 
"MARRIAGE IS SACRED TO ME" 
 
 " It d be a pity," said she reflectively, " if we had 
 to spend our declining years in poverty. I ve alwaya 
 said, I d rather never have anything, than lose it. 3 " 
 
 At " declining years " he made an impatient ges 
 ture, and rose the first outward signs of the tempest 
 within. He abruptly seated himself opposite her at , 
 the table. " Sophy," said he, " there s only one sen 
 sible course for us, and that is for each of us to go 
 his own way." 
 
 " Oh ! " A yellowish pallor overspread her face. 
 She wiped her mouth with the napkin, laid it down 
 again, steadied her trembling hand on the edge of the 
 tray. He lowered his eyes. To hold his purpose from 
 wavering required all that hardiness of fibre which en 
 ables the leaders of men to judge and to resolve and 
 to push on, where the ordinary mortal weakens. Mur- 
 dock had bared the knife to attack the cancer he 
 thought was destroying both their lives ; her shrinking 
 made him suffer, but not flinch. 
 
 " For a long time," he went on, " I ve seen that you 
 feel constrained when I come, and relieved when I go* 
 Isn t it true?" 
 
 " And whose fault is it ? " she demanded. 
 
 " Nobody s fault," replied he. " It s simply a con 
 dition. I speak of it only because it s as much to your 
 interest as to mine that we meet the condition like sen 
 sible people." 
 
 A dark-red flush came into her yellow cheeks. She * 
 pushed back her chair, shook her hair into even greater 
 oily dishevelment. " So ! " she cried. " You want to 
 go away to that Raeburn woman ! " 
 
 He rose, closed the door, seated himself again all 
 deliberately and quietly. 
 
 " Ycu d better close the door!" she sneered. 
 1G1 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " I thought so," he said tranquilly. He leaned 
 across the table. Into his eyes came the relentless look 
 that made people afraid of him ; the feeling that caused 
 that look made him often afraid of himself. " I am 
 going to be candid with you, Sophy," said he in a low, 
 even voice. " And you are going to be candid with me. 
 I am not going to tell you any lies or make any false 
 pretenses. You are not going to tell me lies or make 
 false pretenses." 
 
 Her eyes had lowered before his look. She now 
 sank back in her chair and took on a sullen, cowed 
 expression. 
 
 " We ll keep to the point," he continued. " That 
 point is you and 1 our relations, present and future. 
 I don t want to hear anything about the sacrifices 
 you ve made. I don t want any silly talk about the 
 children, or my duty to them. Norma s married; 
 Charley is practically grown. Nor will it be of any use 
 for you to beg the question by bringing in any other 
 woman. The point isn t what we think of other people, 
 or what other people think of us. It s what we you 
 and I think of each other." 
 
 She understood; she felt the foundation of her 
 ] earth shaking. " I haven t lost all my religion, if you 
 have," said she. It was pathetic to see her mind run 
 ning this way and that, like a trembling rabbit cor 
 nered by a dog. The spectacle of folly provoking fate, 
 drawing down upon itself easily avoidable calamities, 
 is exasperating, rouses no sympathy. But once the 
 blow falls, the spectacle takes on the tragic dignity 
 that always must invest woe; the causes are forgotten, 
 and all but the misery itself. " I still believe in a God, 
 and a hereafter," quavered she. " Marriage is sacred 
 to me." 
 
 162 
 
"MARRIAGE IS SACRED TO ME 
 
 " Now, Sophy," he replied, " you know that doesn t 
 mean anything. We were both brought up in the old- 
 fashioned American way. We were taught that love 
 is the basis of marriage, and that when love goes, it is 
 a degradation for two people to live on together." 
 
 " That ain t what my religion teaches me now." 
 
 " It s what your instinct teaches still the instinct 
 of every decent human being. . . . Tell me, Sophy, 
 isn t it true that you ve ceased to care for me, as a 
 husband?" 
 
 " I m past the age for such foolishness," retorted 
 she. " And you ought to be, too you the father of 
 grown children, one of them married. That woman 
 is making a fool of you, leading you on to dress and 
 act as young as your son. And what does she want? 
 Nothing but your money. You ought to have sense 
 enough to know that no woman would look at a man of 
 your age, except for his money." 
 
 " Then we can arrange our affairs very easily," 
 said he, apparently unruffled, though he was white with 
 the tension of hiding the deep wound of her stab into 
 his vanity. " As you practically admitted a while ago, 
 my only place in this household is payer of bills. Ex 
 cept for that and what you think people would think, 
 I you d be glad if I took myself off for good." 
 
 She felt that he was entirely in the wrong, but had 
 through his superior mental adroitness drawn her into 
 a position where she seemed the one in the wrong. 
 
 " What I propose is this," he went on. " You will 
 take half of all we ve got, and you and I will release 
 each other. Thus, we will cease to be each a drag on 
 the other." 
 
 A long pause. Then she started up hysterically, 
 her eyes wild, her body shaking. " Charles Murdock ! " 
 
 163 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 she cried shrilly. " O God ! Is this man the father 
 
 of my children, the man who used up my youth? When 
 
 I think of all I suffered, having Norma and Charley 
 
 and my sickness, too, since And now he wants to 
 
 cast me off! and take up with another woman. Oh! 
 
 , Oh ! Oh ! " She dropped into a chair, buried her face 
 
 j in her hands and sobbed and moaned. " This is my 
 
 reward! O my God, what can I have done that Thou 
 
 shouldst punish me so ? " 
 
 For five dragging minutes the silence was broken 
 only by the sounds of her grief. He sat passive as 
 a statue, and it would have been impossible to tell 
 what was going on in his mind. When her weeping 
 subsided into occasional sighs he said in his usual even 
 voice, " Now, Sophy, let us resume common sense." 
 
 Down dropped her hands, out flashed her angry 
 face. " You have no heart ! " she cried. " You are as 
 devoid of feeling as a fiend. You sit there and gloat 
 over the sufferings of your sick wife." 
 
 "Why do you object to releasing me? " 
 
 " Ain t you my husband my husband ? Do you 
 think a decent, self-respecting woman would give up 
 her husband, the father of her children, to another 
 woman! Do you think she d allow the whole world to 
 point at her as a cast-off wife? " 
 
 v " For years you have willingly not been my wife." 
 Her eyes shifted at those slow words, heavy freighted 
 with meaning to both. " The only thing that troubles 
 you, then," he went on, " is what people will say." 
 
 "Ain t that enough? Don t you care, haven t you 
 self-respect enough to care what people say about your 
 wife, the mother of your children ? " 
 
 " I have not," replied he. " I let people say what 
 they please. I do what I wish, and presently they tire 
 
 164 
 
"MARRIAGE IS SACRED TO ME 
 
 of railing against me, and say and think what I 
 wish them to. That s the way those who amount to 
 anything conduct their lives. With all the money you 
 could possibly spend, you ll find people will be ex 
 tremely careful what they say about you. Besides, it 
 isn t true that I wish to cast you off. It was you wha 
 cast me off. You ceased to care years ago." His [ 
 steady glance confused and downfaced her. " I re 
 member the very time, Sophy the very night though 
 I didn t understand what it meant then, and probably 
 you didn t." 
 
 A long, strained silence. " I never felt at ease with 
 you, after I came to know you," she said hesitatingly, 
 humility and apology in her voice. " And I didn t 
 want to have any more children." 
 
 " The honest truth is we weren t suited to each 
 other, and you realized it fully realized it a little 
 sooner than I did. Isn t that so ? " 
 
 " But I didn t go hunting after some other man, * 
 retorted she sullenly. 
 
 " How do you know what you d have done if it had 
 so chanced that the temptation came your way ? " 
 
 " I suppose you think I couldn t have found any 
 body. Why, to go no farther, there was Tom Berke 
 ley. Yes, your partner Oh, I didn t tell everything 
 I ve got enough sense for that. But / did my duty. : 
 / was a faithful wife and a devoted mother. And 
 everybody knows it but you." 
 
 " If it were not for what other people would say, 
 would you " 
 
 " I won t give up my husband to no woman, no 
 how ! " interrupted she. " I ain t so far lost to de 
 cency and religion." 
 
 * You mean that, while you yourself are free and 
 165 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 purpose to remain free, and to do as you please, as 
 you ve always done, you refuse to free me." 
 
 " I won t give up my husband to any woman," she 
 repeated. " I ve got the fear of God in my heart." 
 
 He leaned back and reflected. She, watching him 
 stealthily, had begun to feel the glow of victory, when 
 he resumed in the same even, inflexible, gentle way: 
 " I am not your husband, any more than you are my 
 wife. You know it. No one else will ever know just 
 how matters have stood between us two. But I know, 
 and you know, that you are showing now the same 
 selfishness, the same indifference to the feelings of 
 everyone else, that you ve always shown." As she 
 opened her lips to make angry excuse and denial, he 
 smiled and shook his head. " Oh, I know you, Sophy 
 at least, I knew you. And I can tell by your ex 
 pression that this is one of the moments in which you 
 are forced to see the real truth about yourself. You re 
 one of those women who get the reputation for being 
 domestic characters because they are lazy and indiffer 
 ent, of being self-sacrificing because they re always 
 talking about their self-sacrifice, with the world full 
 of asses who take in whatever drops into their long 
 ears and do no thinking." 
 
 " Talk on, talk on," cried she, tauntingly. " But 
 I ll not give up my husband to another woman. And, 
 let me tell you, Charles Murdock " Her voice 
 shrilled and her eyes sparkled with the hate of jealousy 
 without love " you want to look out how you goad 
 me on. If I m driven to it, I ll disgrace you and her 
 together. I ll name her! " 
 
 But she got no satisfaction from his face. His 
 voice did not betray him as he replied, " It s a matter 
 of indifference to me what you do. I am determined 
 
 166 
 
"MARRIAGE IS SACRED TO ME 
 
 to be free in form as well as in fact. Keep that clearly 
 in mind." 
 
 " Oh, I ll ask for just separation papers." 
 
 " I repeat, I am determined to be free. Do you 
 suppose I haven t planned it all ? " 
 
 She had only a vague idea of that terrible will of 
 his, because never before had any serious issue arisen 
 between them. But it would have been impossible for 
 even an unobservant and self-centered person to be his 
 nearest neighbor so many years without getting some 
 impression of the force within him the force that 
 gave power to his face where most men, as they leave 
 behind boyhood s smooth expressionlessness, have 
 weaker and weaker faces, redeemed only by that sad 
 ness which is the universal forecasting of the tragedy 
 of the ever nearer end. At those words of his she shiv 
 ered. But she said defiantly, " I guess the courts ll 
 protect my rights and my children s against that low 
 woman and you." 
 
 He rose, showed he was about to leave. " If you 
 deal justly by me," he said, " you shall have half of 
 what I ve got. If you try to keep me from my rights, 
 you will get nothing at all. I have put my prop 
 erty out of reach. As I told you, I am going to 
 New York to-night." He was on the threshold. 
 66 1 give you two weeks in which to decide." He was 
 gone. 
 
 If she had been in the habit of observing the proc 
 esses of her own mind, she would have been astonished 
 at the thoughts that at once pushed in there and made 
 themselves at home. Her dislike of him had been gain 
 ing steadily. To be rid of the constraint of his pres 
 ence, rid of the disturbance his coming always raised 
 within her, and to have a fortune as her very own 
 
 167 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 She began to cast about as to how she could conform 
 her protestations and her principles to acceptance. 
 
 It was not her principles that drove out these 
 thoughts, but a sudden return of jealousy. " Let that 
 !woman have him ? " cried she. " Never ! I d die first. 
 
 ! . . God would never forgive me for such a sin." 
 That was it; God would not permit her to go into 
 partnership with adultery. " For the sake of his soul, 
 I must make him give her up. Yes, I ll make him give 
 Jher up. I ll show him whether a wife has rights or not. 
 Hiches swell men with pride and power, and they for 
 get God and their duty." 
 
 There she remembered how she had been brought 
 up, how just was his reminder that they were taught 
 that Divorce was as sacred as marriage, was a bulwark 
 of morality, of the home the real home that did not 
 rest upon mere sexual fidelity but upon the deeper 
 fidelity to the spirit of marriage. She thrust back 
 these ideas, helpful though they were to her longing 
 to be free and rich and comfortable. " I ve learned 
 better," she told herself. " It s only among the trashy 
 and the sinful that divorce is tolerated." And yield 
 ing . to the low-spirited mood which always closed in 
 soon after a meal, she fell to picturing herself the 
 lonely, discarded wife and mother, victim of a heartless 
 husband who was treating her like a rifled honeycomb. 
 She burst into tears and rang the bell for Katy. 
 
 " Send Charley to me," she sobbed. 
 
XI 
 
 MOTHER AND SON 
 
 CHARLEY had to be roused from a sound sleep. He 
 was at a dance the night before, had not got home until 
 five. At his mother s summons, delivered hysterically by 
 Katy, he thrust his feet into bath slippers, swathed 
 himself in a blue silk robe, and hurried along the hall 
 to her sitting room. " What is it, mother ? " he cried. 
 She made no answer, but continued to sob heartbrokenly. 
 
 " Shall I send for the doctor? " He glanced at the 
 tray, still on the table before her. " You know you 
 oughtn t to take cream in your coffee," he reproached. 
 " The doctor warned us it makes blisters on the liver." 
 
 " Shut the door, Charley," she sobbed. 
 
 He obeyed. 
 
 "Your father" she moaned. "O my God!" 
 
 "Father! Is he hurt? " 
 
 "O God! No no! If it were merely that! 
 Charley, your father wants to marry a low woman." 
 
 The boy started back in horror. " Mother ! " he ex 
 claimed. " Who handed you that pipe dream ? It s 
 false. Why, father wouldn t do such a rotten thing ! " 
 
 " I knew my children would stand by me ! " 
 
 " But it isn t true, mother. He s been lied about." 
 
 " He told me himself in that very chair not half 
 an hour ago." 
 
 Charley stared stupidly at the vacant chair. " Im- 
 12 169 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 possible!" he muttered. "Not father!" And he 
 seated himself in it. 
 
 " Yes, your father. Go to him. Tell him what you 
 think of him!" 
 
 " You didn t understand him, mother." 
 
 "O God!" wailed Sophy. "Is my boy against 
 me? I tell you, Charley, he ordered me to divorce him, 
 to free him so he could marry that Raeburn woman." 
 
 " Juliet Raeburn ! " exclaimed the boy, leaping to his 
 feet. " Mother, what are you talking about ? " 
 
 " He came here and insulted me, his wife, your 
 mother " 
 
 Up boiled the boy s young blood, into his mind 
 flashed a score of trifling incidents of that stay in the 
 woods, incidents now saturated, rank, with sinister 
 meaning. Without a word he darted out and down to 
 the library. He did not pause to knock, but burst in. 
 Murdock was at his table in the center of the room, 
 writing. The long French windows were open and the 
 light and air, sweeping round his strong figure, seemed 
 to encircle it with an impassable barrier. Before his 
 father glanced up, the boy was beginning to hang back. 
 
 " Well ? " said Murdock, in his even, friendly yet 
 reserved tone. 
 
 " Is it true, father ? what mother s been telling 
 me ? " stammered Charley. 
 
 " No doubt," replied Murdock, with no change of 
 tone or expression. He kept his eyes on the boy, but 
 dipped his pen in the ink and poised it above the paper. 
 
 The boy flushed, hesitated, half turned away. Then, 
 catching fire again from his outraged mother, he forgot 
 his awe and cried : " You sha n t dishonor my mother 
 and my sister ! " 
 
 Just the hint of a flush came into Murdock s cheeks. 
 170 
 
MOTHER AND SON 
 
 His tone was even but like the smooth surface of a 
 white hot, molten lake as he said : " You are making a 
 fool of yourself. She is your mother, but I am your 
 father. She and I are wife and husband and no one 
 will interfere in our affairs. Close the door after you." 
 And his pen resumed its rapid course along the sheet. 
 
 The boy could no more have disobeyed or have 
 spoken again than if he, bound and gagged, were being 
 carried from the room. In the hall outside, he wiped 
 the streaming sweat from his face, dropped weakly on 
 the lowest step of the front stairway. In at the open 
 front doors came Norma, whistling and swinging her 
 hat by its long ribbons. The morning was intoxicat- 
 ingly fine, and her spirits were soaring and darting like 
 a lark drenched and drunk with sunshine. " Hello, 
 Charley boy," she cried, kissing the top of his bent head 
 and slapping him on the back. " Walking in your 
 sleep ? Mother up yet ? " 
 
 Her brother drew her down beside him. Though 
 there were no servants in sight, he whispered in her ear : 
 " Mother and father are going to get a divorce." 
 
 To his amazement, the news gave her no shock of 
 surprise. " So it s come at last ! " she exclaimed, be 
 fore she realized what she was saying. 
 
 Charley stared at her. " How did you find out ? " he 
 cried, after a prolonged stare at her. 
 
 But she had recovered herself; she now looked, and 
 felt, as overwhelmed as he. Instinctively she, under 
 standing feminine human nature, began to sympathize 
 with her father, just as her brother, understanding mas 
 culine human nature better than feminine, took sides 
 with his mother. 
 
 " Do you know about Juliet Raeburn, too? " 
 
 " Juliet Raeburn ! " But even as Norma exclaimed, 
 171 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 she understood. " O Charley ! " she cried, " and I 
 thought her a good woman ! " 
 
 " So she is," maintained Charley. " He hasn t got 
 her yet. I ll bet she doesn t dream of this." 
 
 " Perhaps not," conceded Norma, in confusion. She 
 remembered that she had decided it was best not to tell > 
 Charley or their mother about the meeting and the dis 
 covery at Dangerfield s. " Why," thought she, amazed 
 at the revelation of herself to herself, " I must have felt 
 then that this was coming ! " 
 
 " You must talk to father," Charley was saying. 
 " He ll listen to you: 9 
 
 Norma slowly shook her head. 
 
 "Aren t you going to do anything?" demanded 
 Charley. " I tell you, Norma, this thing must be 
 stopped." 
 
 " But we mustn t say anything to either of them 
 directly." She hesitated, then went on : " Marriage has 
 already taught me that nobody can judge between hus 
 band and wife. Nobody can know but just their two 
 selves." 
 
 " It s all his fault," protested Charley, with almost 
 hysterical energy. " At least, we know enough to know 
 * he s got no cause of any kind. Why, she s always at 
 home, and she never spoke a really harsh word to him. 
 The truth is, he has gotten the swollen head through / 
 being lucky in business, and has grown away from us." 
 
 " Don t say those things to mother, please," en 
 treated Norma. " You d only encourage her to make 
 matters worse." 
 
 " But the disgrace ! The disgrace ! " 
 
 " Nobody can disgrace you but yourself," was her 
 tranquil reply. 
 
 Her brother eyed her disapprovingly. " Just like a 
 
MOTHER AND SON 
 
 woman ! Women never do care anything about each 
 other s sufferings. Not even your own mother s sor 
 row moves you." 
 
 " Perhaps I understand her better than you do," re 
 plied Norma absently. 
 
 " Well anyhow, all I know is it s got to be 
 stopped ! " 
 
 " You go and get dressed," said his sister. " I ll 
 see mother." 
 
 Mrs. Murdock had by this time somewhat composed 
 herself. When she saw it was not Charley but Norma 
 entering she refrained from bursting out afresh. Un 
 less a woman is far more studied or far less sensible 
 than was Sophy, she does not raise to another woman 
 the suspiciously clamorous conventional appeals for sym 
 pathy. Norma went straight to her and kissed her. 
 " Charley has told me," she said. 
 
 Charley had not noted his mother s dishevelment, 
 but no detail of it escaped Norma ; woman, looking at 
 woman, is always scrutinizing. Besides Norma, whirled 
 in so many respects to the opposite extreme from Sophy 
 by the warning example of physical and mental slothful- 
 ness, was so particular about her person that she 
 changed never less than twice a day throughout, As sbe 
 kissed her mother, she held her breath that she might 
 avoid at least the worst of the odor from the stale, musty, 
 oily hair. 
 
 " If I hadn t been so devoted to my household, I d 
 have seen it coming," said Sophy. " All the men act 
 that way nowadays." Her lip quivered. " It s the curse 
 of riches. If we d a been poor, your father would have 
 stayed on, a hard-working, steady family man, appre 
 ciating his home and his wife and children." 
 
 " A good many poor people act the same way," sug- 
 173 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 gested Norma. " It seems to me, more poor people do 
 it than rich. The rich are more conventional, more 
 afraid of public opinion." 
 
 " So you re turning against me ! " cried Sophy. " I 
 might have known. The daughter always sides against 
 the mother." 
 
 " Why, mother ! " exclaimed Norma. " What did I 
 say to make you think that? " 
 
 " Weren t you beginning to urge excuses for your 
 father? Have you opened your lips for a single word 
 against him ? " 
 
 " I love him, mother, and I love you. I couldn t say 
 anything against either of you." 
 
 " Not when he shows he s become a wicked man, and 
 tries to cast your mother off ! " And Sophy began to 
 weep. " My daughter may turn against me, but no one 
 else in all the world will. Everybody ll despise him and 
 sympathize with me." 
 
 Norma, knowing the shallowness of feminine tears 
 and having before her very eyes as well as in painful 
 memory what seemed to her sufficient reasons why her 
 mother did not charm, felt her heart going out to her 
 father. She reproached herself, but she could not help 
 it. " And, really, with such eyes and teeth and so much 
 naturally lovely hair mother could be beautiful if she d 
 only brace up." Aloud she said gently : " You wrong) 
 me, mother. I d never take sides against you. I ll take 
 no side at all. I ll keep on loving you and father, and 
 believing the best of both of you." 
 
 " You d better be careful, miss ! " cried Sophy. " If 
 your father and I do part, I ll have half the property, 
 and he ll have another woman. I can t believe he ll be 
 fool enough to take her to church and give her the right 
 to pick his pockets. Still, she ll likely get most of it. 
 
MOTHER AND SON 
 
 You don t seem to know which side your bread s but 
 tered on." 
 
 Norma s heart ached and she hung her head in 
 shame. Presently she said timidly : " Would you mind, 
 mother, if I went to see father ? I m not going to speak 
 to him about this, unless he mentions it first. And if I 
 do say anything, it ll be to try to bring him to you." 
 
 Sophy, with no more power to persist in anger than 
 in any other exertion, seized gratefully upon this offer. 
 " I know none of my children would act any way but 
 honorable," said she. " They ve been too well brought 
 up." And now she wept again. " When I think how 
 I carried and bore and watched over his children O 
 my God ! Why hast Thou punished me ? " 
 
 Norma knelt beside her mother. " Mother dear," 
 she pleaded softly, " if father is what you say, 
 wouldn t you be better off without him? Wouldn t he 
 be only a torment to you ? " 
 
 " I ve thought of that," conceded Sophy, trapped 
 into candor. Then, remembering her pose and her 
 principles, she pushed her daughter away and burst out 
 again : " How dare you suggest such a thing, Norma 
 Murdock! He s my husband! He s mine I And have 
 you no sense of shame? Don t you care anything about 
 scandal ? You talk like those trash along the river front 
 that are always getting into the divorce courts." 
 
 " I was only trying to imagine what I d do in the 
 same circumstances." 
 
 " You wait till Joe goes off after another woman ; 
 then we ll see what you ll do ! " 
 
 " I m sorry I said that," apologized Norma, not be 
 cause she was in the least affected by a suggestion so 
 preposterous, but to stay the storm. 
 
 " Oh, that woman, that woman ! " Sophy was pa- 
 175 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 cing the floor, her face distorted with fury. " I ll drag 
 her down. I ll disgrace her. I ll have her thrown into 
 jail." 
 
 Rage, even the most righteous, cannot but affect 
 the spectator painfully. Norma had been by years of 
 daily sight used to thinking of her father and mother 
 as related only through their children, had been forced 
 in spite of herself to see that her mother was far from 
 the dawning day s more enlightened ideal of womanhood, 
 was of the older generation s less exacting type, while 
 her father had kept pace with the world s swift develop 
 ment. Nor could she, though by no means the most crit 
 ical of daughters, deny that her mother had refused, re 
 sisted even, the best possible opportunities to progress 
 and develop. Yet Norma was no partisan to her father ; 
 his abrupt and rude proposal shocked her more and 
 more profoundly, as she reflected on it. " He d never 
 be doing this if he hadn t been infatuated and edged on 
 by another woman," she said to herself. Women, what 
 ever they may say for men s benefit, all share in the 
 feminine delusion of sex vanity that the woman alone is 
 responsible for the ensnared male ; Norma felt that her 
 mother s characterization of Juliet Raeburn was hardly 
 exaggerated. " Only a bad woman," thought she, 
 " ever so much as looks at another woman s husband." 
 Yes, her mother was right ; this woman was entrapping 
 her father for his money only. But how could he, the 
 strong, the noble, permit himself to be dragged into 
 an intrigue? That mystery shook her faith in all men, 
 strengthened her honeymoon-born suspicion that love, as 
 men understood and felt it, was a vastly different emo 
 tion from what she had been thinking, was coarser, less 
 elevated and elevating, was perhaps degrading. First, 
 Joe; now, her own father " I feel as if I were on the 
 
 176 
 
MOTHER AND SON 
 
 verge of some horrible discovery," she thought, sick at 
 heart. 
 
 Sophy s ravings were gradually subsiding, as Norma 
 sat dumb, lost in the black fog of her own thoughts, and 
 so gave her no fresh fuel. " Your turn ll come," her 
 mother was now saying to her. " You won t be new 
 and fresh forever. A few years, and you ll look back 
 on to-day, on your heartlessness, and be ashamed of it." 
 
 A shudder of disgust went through Norma. If that 
 were love, all of love, then she would despise the man 
 who felt it, would feel abased by having inspired and 
 submitted to it. Charley now came in, swelling and 
 swaggering. " I ve been thinking it over, mother," he 
 at once began. " And it seems to me, if he wants to go, 
 the best thing for us to do is to make him get out quick. 
 I can never again feel toward him as a fellow should feel 
 toward his father. And you must despise him. Every 
 time you looked at him, you d think of the vile thoughts 
 going on in his head." 
 
 " He s been led away by that low woman," insisted 
 Sophy, dismayed by the defection of her one sure ally. 
 
 " Don t you believe it, mother," said Charley author 
 itatively, in his innocence of the workings of woman na 
 ture. " I was out there in the woods with them, and the 
 very minute she found out he was a married man, she 
 froze up. And before that, she positively kept out of his 
 way out of our way, I mean. We had to force ourselves 
 on her, almost. I tell you, it s his fault nobody else s." 
 
 " You don t understand women, you little fool," re 
 torted his mother angrily. " That was part of her cun 
 ning. Women can always make idiots of the men if theji] 
 urant to." 
 
 Charley was forced to abandon that point* thpugK 
 unconvinced. " Anyhow if if he wants to go, wlrg 
 
 177 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 let him! Good riddance! He s never been much in 
 this house, anyhow always thinking about his business 
 shut up in the library in the evenings. No, he ll not 
 be missed." 
 
 Sophy and her daughter glanced furtively at each 
 other; both reddened, as each thus surprised the other 
 in the same thought that the house itself, its luxury, 
 all the luxury which had enswathed them, all the money 
 which had been promptly supplied to gratify their 
 smallest material fancy, to provide education for the 
 children, and the social environment that was regarded 
 as the best all, all had been supplied by the man whom 
 this boy was now saying " never amounted to much in 
 this house." In the strained silence Charley had time to 
 reflect, saw his own blunder. 
 
 " Of course, he has provided for us," he hastened to 
 add. " But the law and public opinion would have com 
 pelled him to do that, if he had tried to get out of it." 
 
 " Indeed it would ! " exclaimed Sophy, with a tri 
 umphant look at her daughter. " You can t even put 
 forward that excuse for him." 
 
 " Has Norma been trying to excuse him? " cried her 
 brother, turning on his sister with a frown. He now felt 
 himself the head of the family and the arbiter of its 
 opinions. 
 
 "No, I haven t," retorted Norma hotly. "But 
 mother is trying to make out that I have, because I can t 
 forget he s my father." Her indignation swelled. 
 " Yes, he is my father, and since you force me to say it, 
 mother, I can t but feel that if you had done your 
 share, this would never have occurred." 
 
 The instant the words, so useless, so unwise, were 
 out, she repented them. Her mother and her brother 
 trained upon her the lowering look for the traitor* 
 
 178 
 
MOTHER AND SON 
 
 " Turned against your own mother ! " sneered Charley. 
 " Shame on you, Norma ! Shame ! " 
 
 " Instead of trying to make matters worse between 
 father and mother, hadn t you better try to heal the 
 wounds ? " 
 
 " Matters couldn t be worse. Father has forfeited 
 all claim on us," retorted her brother loftily. " If you 
 had real good sense, you d see it s impossible for matters 
 ever to be again as they were. All mother can do is 
 what she s going to do refuse to get a divorce from 
 him. He can t get one from her. So there ll be no 
 public scandal, and things ll go on just as they are he 
 an outcast from us." 
 
 All at once it burst upon Norma what it was they 
 were thus frankly discussing the rending apart of the 
 bonds that are the sacredest, the destruction of the 
 home. And they were dissecting the situation, not with 
 aching, mourning hearts, but with anger and recrimina 
 tion and mental reservations of repulsive materialism. 
 She hid her face in her hands. " Oh," she moaned, 
 " this is frightful. Frightful! " Yes, the foundations 
 of their family life must have been flimsy and rotten, 
 thus easily to give way. And again her sympathy went 
 out to her father. " He s going because he can t stand 
 it any longer. If it hadn t been Juliet Raeburn, it d 
 have been some other woman, sooner or later. And 
 maybe she, bad though she must be, will give him 
 something better than he s been getting here." And 
 now she pressed hard against the door of her mind to 
 keep back the thoughts that were trooping in, their 
 ugly disloyal faces smirking thoughts of how her 
 mother had degenerated in mind and in looks ever since 
 she could remember ; thoughts of the confusion and 
 slovenliness and wastefulness of her mother s housekeep- 
 
 179 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 ing ; pictures of her father again and again starting an 
 outburst of exasperated protest and suppressing his 
 anger and going away that he might not be tempted 
 to set a bad example to the children. And there, before 
 her eyes, sat her mother, her own self s arch accuser 
 her mother, slovenly in dress, indifferent to all that must 
 be incessantly seen to if intimate life is not to degen 
 erate toward the sty and the den. Norma, saying in 
 a suffocating voice, as excuse for leaving, " I ll be 
 back," fled the room. 
 
 " I hate myself ! I hate myself ! " she muttered. 
 "Mother d not have been like that if he had done his 
 best to keep her what a wife should be. It s his fault, 
 for he has the better mind and the stronger character. 
 He hasn t done his duty as a man, and, like a coward, 
 he s skulking from the consequences." Yet was it just 
 deeply to blame him? He had had his own part, the 
 living, to look after. She had let him outgrow her, wai 
 bitter because he, too, was not a rotter. In flying from 
 her wasn t he only human? ... It was all appalling and 
 repulsive to her and most repulsive was her own dis 
 loyal self, criticising her parents. Of the many penal 
 ties for having a thinking mind, not the least heavy is 
 its refusal to bow to illusions, however satisfying, how 
 ever sacred. 
 
xn 
 
 FATHER AND DAUGHTER 
 
 RUSHING forth in flight from herself, she sought in 
 stinctively the little summer pavilion, overhanging the 
 river and the valley. Not until she was in its very en 
 trance did she see that some one was there before her 
 her father, his hands clasped behind his back, his erect 
 figure rigid, his gaze fixed upon the horizon. At the 
 sound of her foot upon the threshold, he slowly turned. 
 At sight of her his expression changed to one that smote 
 upon her heart. She had inherited many of his mental 
 characteristics, but physically she was her mother at 
 seventeen ; and before him there rose a vision, shaken 
 wholly free from the dust of long years of oblivion and 
 bright and distinct as at its first appearance the vision 
 of Sophy advancing through the tall grass of the 
 meadow, her flowerlike face radiant with the light that 
 streams upon the beautiful human countenance only in 
 life s morning. The other hours of a life even down to 
 evening s dusk may have each its own kind of charm; 
 but none is so altogether lovely as that first full morn 
 ing hour when day closes the dark door of night be 
 hind her and stands forth with the dew sparkling in 
 her tresses. 
 
 " Father ! " murmured Norma, half stretching out 
 her arms to him. 
 
 The look of pain shifted and his face became immo- 
 181 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 bile again. If his wife had been dead, that vision of 
 ber youth would have lingered, might perhaps have be 
 come a permanent fixed illusion with him for we usu 
 ally remember the dead at their best. But Sophy was 
 a living fact ; and to remember what she had been was 
 to shrink the more coldly from what she was, as the 
 falseness of a found-out friend is aggravated by the 
 recollection of the feelings he once inspired in us. Death 
 Alone can expiate a violated ideal. 
 
 " Father ! " Norma repeated appealingly. 
 
 His face softened again. A slight smile, amused, 
 cynical, hovered over the sternness of his eyes and lips. 
 " You have seen your mother," he said, seating himself, 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " And your brother." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 A long pause ; then he : " I count on your good sense 
 to keep you from doing or saying things that will en 
 courage your mother in hysterics for the benefit of 
 others. I have not acted without reflection. What she 
 and I are about to do is the best possible course for us 
 both, is as necessary to her comfort as to my happiness. 
 We both realize that the present conditions are intoler 
 able. There is but the one solution. Fortunately, it is 
 complete and entirely satisfactory. If you came, as 
 Charley did, to discuss the matter with me, I wish to 
 tell you discussion is useless." 
 
 " It s none of our business, father." Wistfully, 
 ** If only there were some way to avoid the the gossip 
 and scandal." 
 
 " That rests with your mother." 
 
 " Won t you see her again, father? Won t you talk 
 with her again?" 
 
 He reflected before inquiring, "Why do you ask it? " 
 182 
 
FATHER AND DAUGHTER 
 
 " Because I think It was nothing she said, sim 
 ply an instinct that she ll talk more calmly now now 
 she has had a chance to to get used to the idea." 
 
 He reflected again. " I ll be in the library the rest 
 of the day. There s a good deal of straightening out 
 of papers to be done. If she wishes to see me, I ll go 
 to her." 
 
 There was no sign of dread of the strain of an in 
 terview. Evidently he felt that he was simply con 
 ducting a business negotiation with some one in whom 
 he had no personal interest. Norma saw this ; but it 
 gave her no shock, no sense that her father was hard. 
 Instead, it somehow justified him; how could he, so 
 generous, so responsive to her own love for him, feel 
 thus toward his wife unless there were reason for it? 
 It seemed to her he, the strong and the clear-sighted, 
 was simply brushing aside the cobwebs of conven 
 tion from the affair, the misleading veilings of what 
 conventionality prescribed as the " proper " thoughts 
 and feelings and actions in such circumstances, and 
 was looking straight at the facts, and was acting fear 
 lessly upon them, as they appeared to him. This re 
 lentless disregard of the fetishes that have dominion 
 over all but the strong and simple and direct, both ter 
 rified and thrilled her. It is not in human nature to 
 refuse tribute to strength, whether it be found in the 
 company of good qualities or bad; strong fighter for 
 god or devil is always equally admired and fighter 
 for devil has the added charm of the soldier of a cause 
 foredoomed to defeat. Was he right or wrong bad 
 or good? She was not sure; but, whichever and what 
 ever he might be, she was proud that he was her father. 
 
 Her young disposition to foment herself with the 
 feeling that a tragedy was enacting, could not with- 
 
 183 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 stand the soothing quality in his equanimity. They 
 walked back to the house together talking quite natu 
 rally of indifferent matters. At the library door she 
 said, " I ll see mother right away." 
 
 He put his arm round her, held her close to him 
 for a moment, then kissed her on the brow. And she 
 understood all that was in his heart the things he 
 could not speak, the truth as he saw it about his wife, 
 and about his right not to be tied throughout his man 
 hood to the body of death, but to be free to live his 
 one chance at life as he wished, as his powerful will 
 commanded him to live it. 
 
 " Thank you, Norma," he said. He turned hastily 
 into the library, but not before she had seen that his 
 eyes were glistening. 
 
 Norma expected and feared she would find her 
 mother reading the Bible feared, because she had 
 learned that when Sophy was determined to occupy 
 high and inaccessible ground, she got out her Bible 
 and read it diligently. Norma was, therefore, relieved 
 at seeing her composedly at fancywork. And she had 
 done her hair, had washed her face and hands, and had 
 got into a cool house dress that would have been be 
 coming had it not been much too heavily laden with 
 that least artistic and showiest of all the laces. She 
 had two prime resources in her practical moods ot 
 trouble novels and fancywork. She abounded in 
 sentimentality ; so she liked as a counter-irritant and 
 solace the love story about life as it is not lived 
 though romance readers and the whole " literary " 
 cult do strive valiantly to try to live it that way. 
 Sophy was a great novel reader ; but she was even 
 fonder of fancywork not of doing it, but of doing 
 
 184 
 
FATHER AND DAUGHTER 
 
 at it. All forms of sewing are a more or less complete 
 rest for the mind; fancywork guarantees absolute 
 stoppage of thought, which must suspend while the 
 intricately aligned procession of stitches makes its con 
 tinuous march past. 
 
 Thus, Sophy s emotions had subsided, leaving be 
 hind only a mournful expression, as the ebbed tide is 
 still imaged in the sand. When her daughter en 
 tered, her look of woe became actively self-conscious. 
 Through it she frowned reproachfully as at an un 
 welcome interruption. The frown was not a pretense ; 
 she did not wish to resume her former state of mind. 
 It would be altogether artificial, now that nature, stim 
 ulated by Murdock s most attractive material proposi 
 tion, had downed the conventional impulse to think 
 and act as a respectable woman would be expected by 
 a respectable world to think and act in circumstances 
 so abhorrent to respectability. Women are the Le- 
 vites of conventionality ; but, like other priestly castes, 
 familiarity with the altars they serve inclines them to 
 be reverent of the cult in form only, to be almost, if 
 not quite, infidel at heart. Mrs. Murdock s instantly 
 snatching up her mask of woe at first sight of her 
 daughter was followed by a slower laying it down; of 
 what use to mask when the incomer was a woman also, 
 and her own daughter? 
 
 " He wants to see you again," began Norma. The 
 " he " was a planned compromise ; she feared " father " 
 might irritate. 
 
 Sophy looked alarmed and angry. 
 
 " I m sure he ll say nothing that will distress you, 
 mother," Norma hastened to add; and she spoke ear 
 nestly, as if engaging for her father s good behavior. 
 
 " I never want to set eyes on him again," said 
 13 185 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Sophy energetically. " And I ll never, never consent 
 to give him up. Never ! " And she bent to her fancy- 
 work, as if the matter were concluded. 
 
 It was at Norma s lips to say, " Perhaps it won t 
 be necessary to give him up." She forebore, because 
 she felt it would be cruel to raise false hopes. Instead, 
 she said, " I m sure, mother dear, if you and he talk 
 again, you ll come to a better understanding. For 
 the sake of Charley and me, won t you see him ? " 
 
 There was a knock at the door, which Norma had 
 closed behind her. Norma opened it. There stood 
 Murdock. " I have some things to say to your 
 mother," said he with grave politeness. He entered 
 and there did not live the human being who could have 
 refused to yield to his insistence; it had the inevitable 
 quality of the unopposable phenomena of nature. 
 Norma, as she left the room, sent an appealing glance 
 first to him, then to her mother, the true peacemaker s 
 look that soothes and softens and irritates not. 
 
 He seated himself, looking toward but not at his 
 wife; his gaze wandered uncertainly over the elabo 
 rate centerpiece she was making; he recognized it as 
 one he had seen in her hands from time to time for 
 years. " Sophy," said he, " on thinking it over, I find 
 I was too abrupt this morning. I had known so long 
 what was in your mind about me that it seemed natural 
 to talk as if we had discussed it before." 
 
 The sight of him his face and figure particularly 
 youthful in a dark-blue suit of handsome rough cloth, 
 his linen, his tie, his hair, all suggestive of youth and 
 regard for taste the sight of him set her jealousy 
 to flaming somberly again. She forgot for the mo 
 ment the satisfaction of freedom and wealth, the moun 
 tainous troublesomeness of a revengeful course. " It s 
 
 186 
 
FATHER AND DAUGHTER 
 
 no use for you to talk," retorted she. " I won t take 
 part in any immoral bargains. / realize that I ve got 
 to meet my God in the Great Day. And so have you, 
 Charles Murdock!" 
 
 "Sophy," he said gently, "for the sake of the 
 children, let us settle our affairs quietly. I will see 
 that everything is arranged for you. In your heart 
 of hearts you wish to be free from me." 
 
 His words echoed pleasantly in her ears ; they were 
 a simple statement of what seemed to her sense and 
 truth. " It ain t what you wish or what I wish," re 
 plied she, " it s what a Higher Power wishes." 
 
 " If you were going to lose anything by it in a ma 
 terial way," continued he, imperturbably, " I d admit 
 you were right. But you will gain, not lose. In every 
 way you will be better off." 
 
 Her hands were resting listlessly upon her fancy- 
 work. She was reflecting. 
 
 " Suppose," he went on, " I were to withdraw my 
 offer, and insist that we resume the old life." 
 
 Her expression stopped him. He had suspected, 
 believed that she was in fact as eager as he to be free ; 
 but he had not known it. Now, her telltale face, her 
 alarm at the very suggestion of resuming the life of 
 husband and wife with him, assured him beyond faint 
 est doubt he was right in his idea that he could not feel 
 as he did toward her unless she felt the same way to 
 ward him. There is no such thing as a magnet with 
 one pole long dead and the other alive; and jealousy 
 after marriage is a passion of vanity, not of love. 
 
 " Sophy, at the very suggestion of oui being hus- 
 hand and wife again doesn t your instinct, your con 
 science tell you it would be a sin in the sight of God? " 
 
 She did not reply immediately, and he waited until 
 187 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 she should have absorbed his subtle, yet altogether 
 sincere argument. " But," she finally said, like one who 
 wishes to be overborne, " we must think of the children, 
 of the example we set to them and to others. We 
 made our bed; we must lie in it." 
 
 " Since it was, as you say, we that made the bed," 
 replied he, " then we can unmake it. Sophy, let s put 
 aside the nonsense that might scare us if we were poor, 
 obscure people, dependent on others for bread. We 
 can t be trampled by those who never lose an oppor 
 tunity to demonstrate their superior morality at the 
 expense of anyone that can t strike back. They ll 
 never disturb you; they ll cringe before you. We are 
 strong enough to do as we wish." He rose and went 
 slowly toward the door, his hands in his coat pockets, 
 a cigarette in the corner of his mouth. " Think it 
 over," said he. " I m sure that, when you do decide, 
 it will be for what is sensible, what is best for us 
 both." 
 
 " We ve made our bed ; we ve got to lie in it," she 
 repeated, but her tone did not fit her words. 
 
 He saw he had said enough, had succeeded in lead 
 ing her to face the facts with him that she was as 
 willing, if not quite so eager, to be free as was he. 
 " Don t decide in a hurry," he said in his practical, 
 hysteria-forbidding, sense-encouraging way, and left 
 her. 
 
 Crossing the entrance hall, he saw Norma on the 
 front porch, apparently setting out for home. He 
 called to her ; when they met in the doorway he asked : 
 " Would you mind if I gave you the Whitney Place at 
 Point Helen instead of this? I think perhaps your 
 mother would prefer to stay on here." 
 
 " Certainly," replied she instantly. 
 188 
 
FATHER AND DAUGHTER 
 
 " Thank you," he said gratefully. " Shall I see 
 you again before I leave? " 
 
 " Joe and I are dining at the Hargraves," 
 
 " Perhaps you ll be in New York soon. My ad 
 dress is always The Gotham." 
 
 At " New York " her face clouded ; his eyes shifted. ; 
 After he had gone on into the library she still stood \ 
 there, fogged in those dark, dreary clouds of fancy 
 that rise from any melancholy situation to shut out 
 the light, to fill the heart with vague forebodings of 
 disaster. " But I must go home," she thought, rous 
 ing herself. " No, I must first tell mother she is to 
 have the house." And then it flashed on her that she 
 was really the bearer of a bribe, a gross material bribe 
 from her father to her mother. For was not the 
 Eyrie the most magnificent, the most dominating place 
 in that region, the local synonym for luxury? She 
 turned from the stairway that invited her to ascend 
 to her mother ; she started across the lawns toward the 
 road down the bluffs. At the edge of the grove she 
 halted. "No, I must tell her. It s my duty to do 
 everything possible to avoid scandal." 
 
 The air was fragrant with heavy autumnal per 
 fumes. All about her, far as the eye could reach, 
 stretched beauty and tranquillity sparkling river, 
 graceful, gently sloping hills, tier on tier, the rich 
 greens and grays and browns and yellows of the well- 
 tilled fields. And there was the splendid house, so 
 luxurious, apparently an ideal home for a happy family 
 able to enjoy all that is good in the world. She looked 
 round, sighed. Then she gave a short, bitter laugh. 
 
 She returned to the house, found her mother again 
 in a state of suspended mentality over the intricacies 
 of the centerpiece. " Father has given me another 
 
 189 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 place instead of this," said she, with burning cheeks 
 and eyes downcast. " He says he wants this for you." 
 As her mother did not reply, she looked. On 
 Sophy s listless countenance there was an expression 
 of covert satisfaction. Evidently, her father had well 
 measured the character he was dealing with. " Well," 
 Sophy now said, with a pretense of mournful resigna- 
 tion, " I reckon it ll be as comfortable here as any- ; 
 where. My thoughts are more on the next world than - 
 on this." : 
 
XIII 
 
 SHE CAEES EVEN LESS THAN HE " 
 
 As lunch time drew near Sophy began to worry about 
 facing Murdock again how to act, how he would act, 
 what to say should he address her for, of course, she 
 would not speak to him first, nor so much as glance 
 in his direction, unless he should compel it. Above all, 
 what should she wear? Just why this seemed impor 
 tant she could not have told; but she felt that it was, 
 and ransacked her wardrobe, wonder-struck Katy as 
 sisting. 
 
 It was an extensive wardrobe extravagant, as 
 most of its contents were never worn. Sophy was one 
 of those women who are always seeing " just what I 
 wanted" on some other woman, and after getting some 
 thing as nearly like it as they can, are disgusted with 
 the result. There are women with no taste in dress 
 who fancy their taste matchless. Sophy knew her own 
 lack ; her delusion took the form of the hope that 
 others would not realize it, and she encouraged this 
 self-deception because her vanity would not permit her 
 to ask, or suffer Norma to assist. Choice of costume 
 for this important luncheon finally narrowed to a black 
 dress covered with jet and a pink with many flounces 
 and much lace. 
 
 " The black s too heavy for such a hot day? " said 
 she interrogatively to Katy. 
 
 191 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " It suggests a funeral, ma am. I think the pink s 
 elegant and younglike." 
 
 " The black," decided Sophy promptly and with 
 some acidity. " It s low and common to dress out of 
 one s time of life." 
 
 " Lor , ma am, you ain t so old," urged Katy with 
 the sincerity of the simple truth. " And there s noth 
 ing to be mournful about." 
 
 " The black," insisted Sophy. " I shall never wear 
 anything but black again." 
 
 Just then the butler knocked. Katy went for the 
 message and returned. " Mr. Murdock asks to be ex 
 cused from lunch. He s too busy with clearing up." 
 
 Clearing up! Sophy sank down at her dressing 
 table and her tears ran freely. " Clearing up ! Oh, 
 Katy, I m miserable ! " 
 
 Katy pretended to be astonished and, indeed, she 
 did begin to wonder if the " upset " was not far more 
 serious than the servants had discovered. " Is Mr. 
 Murdock going to be gone long? " asked she, eyes 
 sparkling with curiosity. 
 
 Sophy with difficulty restrained herself. She had 
 the habit of confiding everything to Katy, though she 
 had been warned that the girl was a tattler; but for 
 once she resisted. " I don t know anything about his 
 goings and comings," replied she tartly. " I wasn t 
 thinking of him." 
 
 " Eat a good lunch, ma am, and you ll feel better. 
 Nothing makes a body so low-spirited as an empty 
 stomach." 
 
 "I ll take my lunch here," said Sophy. "No 
 there s Charley. . . . Tell him to go down to Norma s 
 for lunch. I don t believe I can eat anything unless 
 it d be some nice cold fish with jelly and a cucumber 
 
 192 
 
"SHE CARES EVEN LESS" 
 
 and tomato salad with plenty of dressing and, 
 maybe ice cream and only one piece of cake. I ll in 
 dulge myself a little to-day, as I feel bad; I ll take cof 
 fee with cream." 
 
 " That ll do you good, I m sure," said Katy with 
 enthusiasm. 
 
 Sophy ate heartily and, so effective was the com 
 bination of acids and cream, went almost immediately 
 afterward into a stupor a nap, she called it from 
 which she did not awaken until nearly four o clock. 
 Her head was aching fiercely and her heart was beat 
 ing and fluttering like one buried alive and trying to 
 break open the coffin. " Oh ! Oh ! " moaned she. 
 " His carryings-on are killing me. It just shows how 
 sensitive I am. Here, I thought I wasn t affected by 
 his wickedness hardly at all; and, all the while, my 
 nerves were in pieces." 
 
 Meanwhile Murdock had sent Simcox to the station 
 to make arrangements for the trip. Except the de 
 struction of certain piles of papers on the floor and 
 the packing of certain others on desk and table, he was 
 ready for departure for final departure though he 
 had been working less than three hours. During those 
 hours he was too engrossed by the business in hand to 
 indulge in any reflections upon the impending utter 
 disruption of ties which had seemed so close for so 
 many years. When the work was dispatched, and he 
 had leisure to think, still he had no inclination to re 
 flect on the tragic side of what he was doing. Such 
 reflections would have seemed to him, and would have 
 been, sheer, shallow theatricalism ; and Murdock had 
 neither the time nor the pretentiousness for the play 
 within the play that most people find necessary in the 
 effort to conceal their insignificance in the real drama 
 
 193 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 of life. His chief sensation was of relief. He was 
 glad to go; the dead past had buried its dead; his 
 place was with life, with the living, with the future. 
 And that chiefly meant Juliet Raeburn. When, 
 where, how, he did not know. But that she would be 
 his, and speedily, he no more doubted than he doubted 
 his memory of the look he had twice seen in her dark- 
 gray eyes or the power of the inflexible will and the 
 ingenious mind that had thus far carried him wherever 
 he had wished to go. 
 
 Simcox, returning from the station, met Charley 
 hesitating at his father s door. The young man looked 
 relieved at sight of him. " Father hasn t gone yet ? " 
 
 " I don t know, sir," said the gaunt, funereal valet. 
 
 Charley, with all his father s instinct for rule and 
 none of his father s force, had the air of the futile 
 child as he frowned fiercely and stamped. " Answer 
 me ! " he commanded. 
 
 " I don t know, sir," repeated Simcox respectfully. 
 One glance at him should have been enough to convey 
 that he was as inviolably mute as the grave he so vividly 
 suggested. 
 
 " You do know," cried the youth. " Why lie to 
 me?" 
 
 " Thank you, sir," said Simcox, not a change in his 
 slow, quiet monotonous voice or in the leatherlike skin of 
 his face. " My duty is never to know nothing." 
 
 " He s in there," said Charley. " Open the door." 
 
 " Yes, sir if you ll stand aside, sir. But I can t 
 let you in." 
 
 " I must tell him mother is ill very ill," persisted 
 the young man, though he knew Simcox, knew Mur- 
 dock s power over him so great that Simcox, a drunk 
 ard of twenty years, had on entering Murdock s service 
 
 194 
 
"SHE CARES EVEN LESS 
 
 reformed after one fall, saying : " Liquor don t have no 
 charm for a man when he can see that there eye of Mr. 
 M. s a-basilisking at him from the bottom of the glass 
 or bottle, as the case may be." 
 
 " I ll tell him, sir. My orders are positive." 
 Charley made way. Simcox entered the dressing 
 room door, closed and locked it behind him. He went 
 through to Murdock who was at the library table. 
 " Mr. Charley wishes to see you, sir," said he. 
 
 Murdock leaned back in his chair. With one of 
 those swift shifts of his from hard to soft he suddenly 
 became tender, and his very eyes seemed to be the out 
 look of a different soul. He had no illusions on any 
 subject, not even on the subject of his children. He 
 knew his son through and through, knew that he was 
 haughty and arrogant, not proud and masterful, was 
 without real force was " just what is to be expected of 
 the sons of men like me." But at the same time he took 
 pride in his real merits, his good looks, his truthfulness 
 though he could not but admit that truthfulness in 
 those who have nothing to gain by lying, nothing to 
 fear from telling the truth is hardly more of a virtue 
 than chastity in an unsought woman or fidelity in an in 
 fatuated and accepted lover. His impulse was to see 
 the boy, to talk with him. Yet what could he say ? To 
 soften the boy toward him would be to alienate him from 
 his mother. Murdock reddened, turned his face so that 
 Simcox could not see. It had suddenly flashed upon 
 him that, however he might prate about his right to be 
 free, to lead his own life, to rid himself of a weight which 
 it was destruction to carry, still the truth remained that 
 he could no longer face with straight eyes and honest 
 words this boy of his. His brow clouded and his 
 jaw set. 
 
 195 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW* 
 
 " He wants to tell you that Mrs. Murdock is ill," in 
 terrupted Simcox. 
 
 Murdock s mood changed instantly eagerly. Men 
 who habitually reach directly for essentials through the 
 fog of nonessentials that baffles most of us seem to be 
 attended by a sort of fatality which causes essentials to 
 advance to meet them. Murdock had chanced to cross 
 the hall just as Sophy s luncheon tray was on its way 
 up to her. " 111," he therefore now said to himself. 
 " Naturally." Then, turning toward his valet with his 
 usual inscrutable face : " Tell him you have delivered the 
 message, and send him away." 
 
 Simcox obeyed, and in a moment returned to report 
 on his trip to the station. The agent had got a dispatch 
 from Chicago that but one private car could be taken 
 at Saint X, because two were already on from Chicago, 
 and a third, that of the president of the road, must be 
 taken up at Cleveland. " As it is, Mr. Murdock," ex 
 plained Simcox, " they ll have to crowd the ordinary 
 passengers into the Pullmans like sardines. And Mr. 
 Berkeley, sir, spoke for this evening before you did. * 
 He did not add that the agent had said that if this 
 private-car business wasn t stopped, " the road ll be 
 given up to haulin rich thieves about, each with his own 
 car just as if cars was carriages." 
 
 Murdock took hints of an adverse decree of fate as 
 mandates to resistance. " Order a special, to precede or 
 follow the express," said he. 
 
 " They can t do it, sir. The express runs in two sec 
 tions, and there ain t room for no more without breaking 
 up the whole service. Mr. Berkeley s man was there, sir, 
 and he made the suggestion that you might prefer Mr. 
 Berkeley s company, anyhow." 
 
 There was a click of the soundless bell on the tele- 
 196 
 
"SHE CARES EVEN LESS" 
 
 phone at Murdock s elbow. It was Berkeley, inviting 
 him " I ll be glad to take you as far as Albany. I 
 switch off there for Canada. Why go to New York, 
 anyhow? Why not come with me? My family 11 not 
 be along." 
 
 Murdock debated. Now that an alternative offered 
 it came to him that, until Sophy s mind was adjusted to 
 his plans beyond power to change, he would do well to 
 go where she would not be jealously wondering and 
 speculating about his doings. Yes, Canada would be 
 wiser ; undoubtedly, Simcox corresponded with some one 
 of the servants at the Eyrie, and so Sophy would hear 
 only news tending to keep her jealously quiet. " I ll 
 go with you, Tom," was therefore Murdock s decision. 
 Then to Simcox : " You heard ? Please change my bag 
 gage accordingly. Mr. Berkeley and I will fish and 
 perhaps shoot." 
 
 Within an hour Sophy had the news ; as it came when 
 the morphine digestive tablets were putting her at physi 
 cal ease, she, without understanding why, began to cast 
 a lenient, longing eye upon his proposal to make her 
 rich, free, and tranquil. In vain she reproached herself 
 for thus quickly regarding unshocked such an immor 
 ality as divorce. Hers was the normal conscience ; it re 
 sponded only to the conventionalities as to right and 
 wrong. And soon she was reflecting : " It certainly 
 would be sinful in the sight of God for me to go back 
 to him. I guess ma and pa s teachings were right. 
 There s more fashion than real religion in the church we 
 go to now. The old way of looking at those things was 
 the religious way." 
 
 She heard the bustle of his departure ; but she had 
 not the imagination to feel its significance, to have even 
 that pang of the melancholy of the thing that is finished 
 
 197 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 which strikes through people of sentiment, even though 
 they are relieved and glad. But Murdock was not to 
 escape that pang. He left the Eyrie, unmoved, feeling 
 no differently than when he had left it for brief business 
 journeys. He passed the house where they had spent 
 all but the two first and the last years of their married 
 life ; his only sensation was relief, for his only memories 
 were distasteful. At the railway station, as he strode 
 down the long platform toward Berkeley s car, on sid 
 ing, Norma advanced through the darkness. Her face 
 was suddenly and mistily revealed by a passing train 
 man s lantern ; he halted. Memory flashed before him a 
 vivid picture of his bride coming to Saint X to join 
 him his girl bride springing into his eager arms 
 through just such a dimly lit darkness as this. And he 
 lost control of his features, of his feelings. 
 
 " Father oh, father," cried Norma, weeping on his 
 shoulder. 
 
 " Forgive me, dear," he muttered, sobbed, rather. 
 * I have to do it. I don t know what it is inside me that 
 drives me on, but I couldn t turn back if I would." 
 
 He clasped her close to him and then drew away and 
 rushed from her. And Norma knew that, if her mother 
 had made one single appeal to his heart, she would have 
 broken his purpose. " But she didn t," thought Norma. 
 " She cares even less than he." And then she felt ashamed 
 of her woman s harsh judgment of woman but could 
 not dispute its justice. 
 
XIV 
 
 ** WHAT A BEAST YOU AEE, TOM " 
 
 MURDOCH, in camp with Berkeley, a hundred miles 
 northeast of Quebec, was soon gratified by a telegram 
 from his lawyers which assured him that matters were 
 progressing. Sophy had accepted Bailby as her lawyer; 
 suit had been begun and it had been arranged with the 
 court that neither party need appear in person, and that 
 the papers would be sealed. 
 
 " How could we get along without the lawyers ? " 
 said Murdock to Berkeley that afternoon. " No matter 
 what a man wants to do, his lawyers fix it for him." 
 
 They were canoeing in the upper edge of the lake, 
 in the deep shadow of the mountain. A breeze that was 
 the breath of the vast unbroken wilderness of spruce and 
 pine and hemlock and fir made their labor the keenest 
 delight. The faint plash of their paddles echoed from 
 the cliffs, so still was it. Now and then a mysterious 
 sound from the depths of the dark forest told of some 
 wild creature abruptly changing its lurking place. Far 
 away, at the eastern shore, flocks of birds never seen near 
 the haunts of man were stalking and swimming about, 
 tranquil and beautiful. These surroundings, so remote 
 from, untouched of, the passions and prejudices and 
 plottings of men, brought out the dormant reflective side 
 of Murdock s nature, restored his sense of proportion, 
 cleared his judgment. In Europe men accept privilege 
 
 199 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 as part of the immutable order of nature and society, 
 because they and their ancestors to the farthest genera 
 tion have never known anything else, and the idea of 
 equality seems an Utopian dream of the philosophers. 
 But in America, especially in Western America, where 
 equality once existed, and still exists as a tradition and 
 a hope, the men who have acquired privilege can recall 
 the time when privilege did not exist, can appreciate its 
 injustice. They accept it; but not as a right, rather as 
 a temporary favoritism which they are more or less 
 ashamed to enjoy. Murdock, deep in the great wilder 
 ness, was seeing both sides of his enterprises. This news 
 of the eagerness of lawyer and judge to do his bidding 
 made him here smile cynically, where in civilization he 
 would simply have accepted it. 
 
 " Damned rascals," he went on, aloud yet all but un 
 conscious of Berkeley, " but damned useful." 
 
 " Thinking of your divorce? " said Berkeley. 
 
 Murdock kept his stroke, though the remark was a 
 bomb. 
 
 " Didn t think I knew, eh? " 
 
 " Hadn t given the matter thought." 
 
 " I m out of business except for a little flyer in 
 Wall Street now and then, to meet current expenses. 
 And I have to be mighty sure I know just how the cards 
 are stacked, or I don t go in. Yes, I m clear out of busi 
 ness, but I have to be in touch with what s going on 
 among the insiders. I ve got sense enough to know that 
 in this day a fellow with anything worth taking has 
 to keep on guard, or they d soon have him in his shirt. 
 So I still get my reports. That bit of news about you 
 came in one of them this morning." 
 
 Murdock was wondering at his own stupidity. He 
 could not plead in self -excuse that he did not know that 
 
"WHAT A BEAST YOU ARE" 
 
 everyone in finance, great and small, " shadowed " those 
 in whom he was interested or might be interested. He 
 himself did it, knew from many an experience how diffi 
 cult it was to keep anything a secret. 
 
 " It probably won t get into the papers," continued 
 Berkeley, assuming that this was the thought troubling 
 the silent paddler behind him. " It s not regarded as 
 honorable to peach to the public about such matters. It 
 does no good, only stirs up talk of the loose lives of the 
 better classes. The papers publish too damn much of 
 that kind of thing. They re edging the people on to ask 
 all sorts of fool questions about how it happens that 
 some are so rich and have so many luxuries. And not 
 one of the envious dogs would work as hard as you and 
 I have for twice our money." 
 
 " So it was hard work that did it," said Murdock 
 ironically. In his critical moods he was cynical about 
 the gospel of magnates and their toadies and their dupes 
 that great wealth and great labor are child and parent. 
 
 Berkeley grinned. " Anyhow, I ve earned my rest," 
 replied he complacently. A few minutes of silent pad 
 dling, and he began again with : " Gad, Murdock, I 
 envy you your nerve. I ve almost changed my mind 
 about divorce. I can see there s something to be said 
 for it. ... I haven t told you, but she has begun to 
 cut up rough." 
 
 " Bessie or was that her name? " 
 
 " Jessie hell ! I don t mind her flare-ups. They re 
 amusing. All women have a fondness for private the 
 atricals, and Jessie, passing as an actress though I 
 doubt if she ever was on the stage, even in the chorus 
 Jessie goes in for tantrums heavy. Her latest play is to 
 be jealous. She pretends she loves me, threatens to have 
 it out with my wife threatens all sorts of things." 
 14 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " Better look out," suggested Murdock absently ; 
 Berkeley s " affairs of the heart " did not interest him. 
 " When a woman s got nothing to lose and everything 
 to gain by notoriety " 
 
 Berkeley laughed easily, cunning in his good- 
 humored, sensual face. " On the contrary, she s got the 
 most powerful interest in the world to behave the money 
 interest. There s nothing that dose, raw or properly 
 coated with respectability, won t do with the fair sex. 
 I don t mention that sex invidiously it d be quite su 
 perfluous to say money in some form will buy any part, 
 or all, of any man. It s a rotten world, Murdock. But 
 jolly getting jollier every day." 
 
 More silent canoeing, each man absorbed in his 
 thoughts; then Berkeley again interrupted Murdock s, 
 this time with, " No, I was referring to my wife, not to 
 Jessie." 
 
 Murdock did not give the encouragement for which 
 he paused. 
 
 " In a way," he proceeded, when his desire to talk 
 recovered from the rebuff of his companion s silence, 
 " my domestic affairs are in apple-pie order. Then 
 again Murdock, would you think it was in her to be 
 a a blackmailer? " Berkeley stopped paddling, leaned 
 half round in the canoe, all but upsetting it. 
 
 " Mind what you re about, Berk ! " exclaimed Mur 
 dock, moving just in time to prevent a catastrophe. 
 " This water is ice, and I m not dressed for a swim." 
 
 " Yes, sir, a blackmailer," resumed Berkeley, his back 
 squarely to Murdock once more. " That s a strong 
 word, but not too strong. Do you wonder I say the 
 whole world s rotten? As you know, I ve always stood 
 stiff for the home and against divorce. But, damn it, I m 
 almost tempted to doubt my principles. . . . Yes, sir. 
 
 202 
 
A BEAST YOU ARE" 
 
 she s trying to blackmail me. Some one sent her an 
 anonymous letter about Jessie and another matter or 
 so. She said nothing to me. She didn t tear up the 
 dastardly letter, and forget it, as an honorable woman 
 would have done. I tell you, Murdock, she s been ruined 
 by wealth dragged right down off the pedestal into the 
 mire. She hired a lawyer to have the stories investigated* 
 and the skunk got her the proofs." 
 
 Now, it was Murdock who suspended paddling 1 . 
 Berkeley had his entire attention, at last. What if Sophy 
 should happen to - 
 
 " If he hadn t been a young beginner," continued 
 Berkeley, " he d have come to me with em, instead. But 
 he missed his chance to make a career. Anyhow, she 
 pounced on me. When she opened up, I was ready to 
 die. Yes, sir, I was covered with shame that that noble, 
 spiritual woman should have caught me leading an 
 ordinary human life." Berkeley laughed loudly. " Oh, 
 what asses the ladies make of us, Charles what wag- 
 eared, braying asses ! " 
 
 They paddled slowly a few hundred yards in silence ; 
 then Berkeley resumed in a gloomier tone : " Thank God, 
 she and I ain t got any children. Wealth s the ruina 
 tion of the women and the children. But, as I was say 
 ing, instead of rearing on her pedestal and smiting me 
 to earth, what do you think she did? " 
 
 Murdock did not inquire. 
 
 " She proceeded to try to blackmail me," said Berke 
 ley. " She said I must make her independently rich, 
 or she d squeal ! Think of that, Murdock - " 
 
 " Don t turn round ! " 
 
 " A man s own wife the pattern of all the virtues, 
 as he supposed a lady by birth and breeding- and act 
 ing just like a a Jessie ! " 
 
 203 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " Don t dig that paddle in so deep ! " 
 
 " But what do you think of it? " demanded Berkeley. 
 
 " She seems to have borrowed a leaf from your book." 
 
 " Not a bit of it ! She never learned that from me 
 never ! I ve never let on to her. I ve kept my home clean 
 clean as a cloister. I ve encouraged her high-plane 
 talk. I ve let her create an intellectual and artistic at 
 mosphere that nearly gave me the sleeping sickness." 
 
 Berkeley lapsed into gloomy contemplation of his 
 heroic but useless self-sacrifices. It was some time before 
 he roused himself to resume. " When I found she was 
 plain dirt, like the rest of us, I got right down to busi 
 ness. You d have thought it was Jess and me having 
 a go, Tenderloin rules. She stuck out for a big slice 
 of my fortune independence and no scandal, or scandal 
 and alimony." 
 
 " Well? " said Murdock, the first sign of interest he 
 had shown. 
 
 " I m thinking it over." 
 
 Murdock smiled grimly at the roll of self-indulgent 
 fat at the collar of the outing shirt of the man in front 
 of him. He had not been associated in business with Tom 
 Berkeley all those years without fathoming his charac 
 ter. He had too often seen this prodigal in personal 
 pleasures crouch down and thrust out his whole armor 
 of quills when approached for any sum, however small, 
 for other than his own direct use. Murdock s sympathies 
 were all with the wife ; so he said, as if the matter were 
 settled, " Well, Tom, there s only one wise course." 
 
 Berkeley bristled. " What s that? " he called over 
 his shoulder gruffly. 
 
 " To accept her terms and make peace." 
 
 " Not by a damn sight! " exclaimed Berkeley, mak 
 ing the canoe shiver and rock in his fury. " Anything 
 
 204 
 
"WHAT A BEAST YOU ARE" 
 
 she might ask that is, anything in reason anything 
 
 she might ask, for affection. But not so much as a 
 
 plugged nickel for blackmail. No, I ve got my plans." 
 
 He was silent again ; when he resumed there was in his 
 
 .voice the bluster of defiance to anticipated criticism. 
 
 * " You see, Murdock, in her train of hangers-on there s 
 
 a young chap, an artist mop of hair, low collar to 
 
 ) show his classic throat, soulful eyes rolling over the 
 
 bridge of his violin " 
 
 "Carruthers?" 
 
 " That s the baby. About fifteen years younger than 
 she. Jessie put me wise, but I slapped her mouth shut. 
 I don t allow anybody least of all a woman of that 
 sort to think I d tolerate talk against my lawful wife. 
 But I didn t fail to hear what Jess said before I clapped 
 the stopper on." 
 
 " There s nothing in that," said Murdock, cold and 
 curt. " And you know it." 
 
 " But, damn it, man," protested Berkeley, astonished 
 at his usually astute partner s obtuseness. " I ve got to 
 have something on her. I ain t going to be robbed 
 without a struggle. Besides, I m not so cocksure she 
 hasn t been up to some sort of hankey-pankey. A! 
 woman that d try to blackmail her husband would 
 stoop to most anything. The fact that she s cold with 
 me don t prove that she Anyhow, damn it, she s 
 human." 
 
 " You re judging her by your own standards," said 
 Murdock. His tone was so contemptuous and offensive 
 that it pierced Berkeley s hide and reached flesh that 
 could feel. 
 
 "To be sure I am," retorted he. "And why not? 
 I m coming round to believe there s only one standard 
 just the plain human standard. Given the same con- 
 
 205 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 ditions, Murdock, and one human being ll act exactly like 
 another. What s character, after all, but the result of 
 the material conditions that compel and mold a man or 
 woman this way or that? And among our sort of peo 
 ple, what are the conditions? You know as well as 
 I do." 
 
 Murdock did not especially like Florence Berkeley. 
 He appreciated why she had become the cold, rather 
 supercilious woman she was, disdainful of all men of her 
 husband s world; but he was none the less disagreeably 
 affected by her manner. Still, he was then struggling 
 with an impulse to knock Berkeley out of the canoe and 
 thrust him under whenever he came up until he drowned. 
 " He oughtn t to be let live," he muttered. 
 
 " What ? " asked Berkeley, who had confided to get 
 advice and wished to miss nothing. 
 
 Murdock felt he owed it to Mrs. Berkeley to restrain 
 disgust and contempt and do what he could toward help 
 ing her. " If you should be insane enough to attack 
 her," he accordingly said, " it d prove a boomerang. It s 
 cheaper and wiser, as well as decent, to give her what 
 she wants and let her get a quiet divorce." 
 
 " Never ! " snarled Berkeley. " Never ! Damn it, 
 she s my wife. She belongs to me\ While I know her 
 for a whited sepulcher, she makes a devilish fine appear 
 ance. It s true, she s a slim woman slimmer than when 
 I married her. Still, she knows how to carry the clothes. 
 And she s got a fine broad bosom something to spread 
 out the jewels on. To set off jewelry right, a woman s 
 got to have bosom. Yes, she s a credit to me. She 
 keeps up the house well, attends to all the show end, 
 and my comfort, too. A man can t be enjoying himself 
 all the time. He s got to rest, to take things moder 
 ately." 
 
 206 
 
"WHAT A BEAST YOU ARE" 
 
 Murdock changed an exclamation of repulsion into 
 a cold, insulting laugh. " What a beast you ar^ Tom ! " 
 he said, in restrained comment on the reminder of 
 Berkeley s most abhorrent characteristic, his deliberately 
 measured vices, rigidly regulated so that his health 
 would not be injured. 
 
 " Man is an animal, " quoted Berkeley. " We 
 learn that when we first start to school. And I am a 
 rational animal. Now, she provides me with a a rest 
 cure, as it were," continued this modern, scientific roue, 
 regulating his monstrosities by the laws of hygiene. 
 " I d have hard work to replace her. Besides " He 
 laughed genially " I don t want to marry again, and 
 a man that lives my kind of life has to have a wife for 
 safety s sake." 
 
 Murdock turned the canoe in the direction of camp. 
 But Berkeley, unconscious of his mood or indifferent to 
 it, proceeded to explain what he meant by " safety s 
 sake." " Wherever I go, it s known I m a married 
 man," said he. " So any lady that tried to put up a 
 game on me breach of promise, common-law wife, and 
 all that wouldn t have a leg to stand on. Marriage 
 is a great protection, Murdock. I m surprised that 
 you re cutting loose. You ll simply have to go to all 
 the bother of marrying again and getting another 
 woman used to you." 
 
 Murdock frowned and compressed his lips. In his 
 eyes the lightning began to play. 
 
 if You re the one-woman sort of man," pursued 
 Berkeley. " You must have got a bee about a woman, 
 some particular petticoat " 
 
 He glanced around, laughing. Out of the corner of 
 his eye he saw the storm about to burst. " But, about 
 my affairs, Charles," he hastened to say, his tone apolo- 
 
 207 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 getic and soothing. " I m undecided, and I want your 
 judgment. I rather think I ll threaten her with a suit 
 for divorce, naming that fiddler chap. That d quiet her, 
 for she s as sensitive about her reputation as a hen about 
 a brood of one. Did you ever hear of anything so low? " 
 
 " I never did," said Murdock, his voice as contemptu 
 ous as a kick would have been. 
 
 The back of Berkeley s neck, red from tan, became 
 crimson. " I don t mean that," he replied, sullen but 
 not daring to resent. " The way she s acting justifies 
 me in anything. The idea of a woman s dragging fam 
 ily relations down to the level of business ! I ve always 
 been a stickler for keeping business out of my home 
 life " 
 
 It came over Murdock how utterly useless, how 
 stupid it was to rage against this thick-skinned animal ; 
 as well reproach a pig for grunting and wallowing. 
 He checked his wrath, and interrupted coldly : " I warn 
 you, Berkeley, not to play any dirty trick on your wife. 
 She s too good for you other people know it, if you 
 don t. Why, God damn you, I d be one of the first to 
 attack you, if you did such a vile thing ! " He was in a 
 glow of righteous indignation. 
 
 Berkeley gave an angry sneer. " Seems to me, old 
 man, you ve got your hands full at home just now." 
 Then, frightened at his audacity with a man so danger 
 ous, he hurried on with, " I beg your pardon. I didn t 
 mean to meddle. You had a right to say what you 
 thought ; I asked you to." 
 
 If he had seen Murdock s face, he would have been 
 amused; for Murdock s sense of proportion and sense 
 of humor did not halt at his own threshold. Cant and 
 pretense and harsh judgment are so familiar a part of 
 our daily routine, we are so used to hearing and to 
 
 208 
 
"WHAT A BEAST YOU ARE" 
 
 speaking them, that it takes more than an ordinary 
 shock to awaken us. Murdock spent the rest of that 
 journey in trying to satisfy himself that his own case 
 was radically different from Berkeley s. 
 
 The canoe was close in shore before their camp when 
 Berkeley went on, " I begin to think you re right, 
 Charles. I ve about made up my mind to offer to com 
 promise with her for half what she asks on condition 
 she drops the divorce talk. She ll accept. She don t 
 want to marry anyone else, and nobody ever talks divorce 
 unless he or she has another marriage in mind." 
 
 Murdock reddened at this shrewd shot, so sly that 
 he could not resent it. 
 
 " Yes, I ll make her that offer. She s sure to accept. 
 Then, I can have Jessie here next week. She ll bring 
 Viola or somebody else whatever style you d like." 
 
 " No, thanks," said Murdock. His anger had gone. 
 " Tom can t be anything but himself," he was reflect 
 ing. His long experience in utilizing his fellow-beings 
 had taught him that they must be accepted for what 
 they are. The workman who spends his time and energy 
 in trying to make over his tools does not get far with 
 his work. Besides Well, who was he to sit in judg 
 ment on anyone? And who could judge between hus 
 band and wife ? " I must and will be free." His qualms 
 were merely in the last, deep-lying, dying remnants of 
 the " roots of an early training in narrowness and igno 
 rance." 
 
 " Then Jess ll come alone," Berkeley was saying. 
 " But won t you feel rather out of it ? " 
 
 " No," replied Murdock. " I m going the day be 
 fore she arrives. I ll join Langdon s party in the Adi- 
 rondacks." 
 
 Berkeley showed that he understood by suggesting, 
 209 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 "Why not simply send off Simcox? I ll ship my man, 
 too, if you say so." 
 
 " No," said Murdock. 
 
 However, the day he fixed for leaving was such ideal 
 fishing weather that he waited over, and Berkeley drove 
 him to the station in the trap that was to take back Miss 
 Pomeroy. Her train arrived fifteen minutes before the 
 train that was to take Murdock s car, which had been 
 sent for him. As she descended, with her octoroon maid 
 close behind her, Berkeley s good-natured face lighted 
 up, and at the extreme end of the long thrust of his 
 piglike nose there was the quick, slight twitching that 
 would have been repulsive had it not been so humorous, 
 so suggestive of the close kinship of man and the lower 
 animals. 
 
 " Don t she know how to get herself together ? " de 
 manded he of Murdock. And Jessie certainly was look 
 ing well, with her black-and-white check traveling dress 
 that brought out every good point of her full figure, 
 its skirt sweeping clear of her big-buckled tan shoes to 
 show the prettiest of ankles in the most diaphanous of 
 tan silk stockings. " It s a joy to put money into her 
 though I know she s up to mischief every minute my 
 eyes ain t on her. And I like her expression, too bold 
 and free. The sight of it always makes me feel as I do 
 when the opera s over and I m let go out into God s free 
 air again. Pity that sort of thing can t be combined 
 with respectability. If it was, I think I could sing 4 No 
 place like home, and mean it." 
 
 Murdock advanced with Berkeley to greet Miss 
 Pomeroy. She gave each in turn two fingers of her left 
 hand, calling orders to her maid over her shoulder the 
 while ; she had observed a fashionable woman perpetrate 
 .that rudeness in the station at New York a few hours 
 
 210 
 
WHAT A BEAST YOU ARE 
 
 before. " Wish I d let Vi have her way and come along," 
 said she, her accent and manner an amusing melange of 
 Broadway and Fifth Avenue. " She s mad about you 
 talks of nothing else ! " 
 
 Murdock bowed formally ; his ruddiness was not alto 
 gether from without. 
 
DERAILED 
 
 THE train trailing Murdock s car was rushing south 
 ward through the wilderness. He had finished lunch 
 and, with cigar and coffee, sat watching the swiftly 
 changing scenery. The air poured in at the windows de- 
 liciously fresh and fragrant ; his imagination was stimu 
 lated by the contrast between his immediate surround 
 ings of civilization s luxury and the reaches of untouched 1 
 nature but a glance of the eye away the haunt of deer 
 and moose and wild bird. Success, especially material 
 success, usually comes so toilsomely and bears so many 
 ills in its train that the winner, hardened and embit 
 tered, looks on his prize as about the sorriest of life s 
 sardonic jests at the expense of those who take it serious 
 ly. But there were moments when Murdock had a sense 
 of his elevation high above the masses of his fellow-men, a 
 sense of his ability to compel and to appropriate the 
 services of thousands on thousands, and to surround 
 himself with luxury and obedience. 
 
 In those Canadian woods and waters he had renewed 
 his youth in its fullness, had resumed it with an appre 
 ciation of its value, its possibilities, its power, which a 
 boy s inexperience never has. Youth! And he wa* 
 speeding southward, still young and unbroken, toward 
 the bright goal of his manhood s ambition. His eys 
 shone, a proud smile relaxed the latterly almost habit- 
 Si* 
 
^ DERAILED 
 
 ually somber strength of his features ; his heart dilated. 
 iYouth! Freedom! And soon he would be absolutely. 
 free, free to claim the woman who now more than ever 
 seemed to him the dazzling crown of reward would be 
 free to claim her, would claim her, would possess her 
 
 , and be possessed by her 
 
 [ It had been raining throughout that region, and the 
 overworked track walkers had been unable to do their 
 duty. The train, behind time, took a sharp curve at 
 express speed, tore a rail loose, shot through the air, 
 rolled down a hillside, collapsed in a shrieking, straining, 
 blazing pyramid upon the bed of an old watercourse. 
 Atop the heap of splintered, riddled coaches for ordi 
 nary people lay Murdock s private car, of triply-braced 
 steel, upside down but almost uninjured. 
 
 As the train left the rails, Simcox, in Murdock s bed 
 room, was hurled under the bed and so protected there 
 that he was unhurt beyond a few bruises. Motion 
 ceased; steam and heat from the flames began to pene 
 trate ; he pulled himself together. The inverted car was 
 full of steam and smoke. He heard the groans, the 
 screams, the yells of the other servants, and not quite 
 so piercingly horrible sounds from far beneath, from 
 the passengers buried, trapped, impaled in the ruins of 
 the other cars, and there burning to death. But Simcox 
 was not thinking of them any more than he was think 
 ing of himself; he crawled and fumbled about until he 
 felt a human body, felt the texture of material he recog 
 nized as the suit he had laid out that morning for his 
 master. He lifted the body to his back and, on all fours 
 Mke a beast of burden, crawled out of a window. The 
 wind lifted for an instant the hot black fog saturated 
 "with the smells of burning wood and roasting flesh; 
 Simcox stood erect, steadied himself on the tottering 
 
 213 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 .j III m\mm**mfm^mmum*^m***mfm^^mm*imm*fa^mmwirrrmmnrTivm--mKXM!iimjatm*mKafmtl*^ 
 
 wreckage, took his unconscious master in his arms and 
 leaped and slid to the ground, out of danger. He laid 
 him on the turf well to one side, returned to the wreck. 
 He gave no heed to the appeals, the screams, the moans. 
 He saw a man shoot his daughter, then his wife, then 
 himself as the flames swept round them to roast them in 
 slow agony. He passed opportunity after opportunity 
 to help entangled passengers. He had but the one idea 
 his master. He toiled away at the wreckage, drag 
 ging out curtains and upholstered seats; in two trips 
 he bore away enough to enable him to make Murdock 
 comfortable. Then he dashed here and there in the 
 smoke-palled confusion until he found a doctor attend 
 ing three mangled women. 
 
 " You can t do them any good," he said in a voice 
 of rough command. " Come with me to Mr. Mur 
 dock. If you can save him, you ll get a fee worth 
 while." 
 
 " Murdock? " repeated the doctor. " Charles Mur 
 dock? Was he in that private car? " 
 
 "Charles Murdock," said Simcox. "Hurry!" 
 And he seized him by the arm to drag him along as if he 
 were refusing to go. The doctor knelt beside the limp 
 form, glanced at the white face, fumbled into the torn 
 garments over the breast. 
 
 " Is he dead? " demanded Simcox, his bloodshot eyes 
 following each move. 
 
 The doctor continued his examination. Simcox drew 
 a long breath ; if Murdock were dead, the doctor would 
 not be examining further. 
 
 " Skull fractured left leg, left arm broken," was 
 the verdict that finally came. 
 
 "Will he die?" 
 
 " Probably. At any rate, nothing can be done for 
 
^ DERAILED 
 
 him just now. Let s go back to the wreck." And he 
 rushed away. 
 
 But Simcox did not follow; though the doctor s 
 abrupt departure was proof that he thought Murdock 
 beyond saving, Simcox did not lose hope; he had been 
 a professional nurse at one time in his varied career and 
 had too often seen the doomed of doctors come to life, 
 had discovered how little of practical judgment and skill 
 lies behind the pretentious learning of the average prac 
 titioner. He stood beside his master, reflecting. He 
 remembered that they had passed a small station a few 
 seconds before taking the curve. He set off at a run, 
 and within five minutes reached the station. The door 
 was open; the one room and the railed-off office were 
 empty. He knew a little about a great many things; 
 one of them was telegraphy. Seating himself at the in 
 strument, he soon got an answer to his signal, sent off a 
 dispatch to Lake Placid for immediate help, another 
 dispatch to Murdock s offices in New York, ordering a 
 corps of the best doctors and nurses at once, and that 
 arrangements be made for the construction of a siding 
 and for forwarding a private car to stand on it and 
 be Murdock s own hospital. In less than half an hour 
 he knelt again beside his master, who was breathing 
 heavily now, but still unconscious. He searched for the 
 doctor, found him bandaging the burned and torn body 
 of a child. 
 
 " Finish that quick," he commanded, " and come with 
 me." 
 
 The doctor glanced up. He had not looked at Sim 
 cox before. Not recognizing him, noting only that this 
 harsh, imperious order came from one of the servant 
 class, he resumed his task without condescending to 
 repiy. 
 
 215 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " Come with me, I tell you," repeated Simcox. 
 " Something must be done for him." 
 
 " Each must take his turn," said the doctor. 
 * There are only two of us, and a hundred to be looked 
 after." 
 
 " You don t hear me. It s the Mr. Murdock 
 Charles Murdock." 
 
 " Oh ! " exclaimed the doctor in a vastly different 
 tone. " I beg your pardon. I didn t catch the name. I 
 remember you now. Why didn t you speak plainly ? " 
 And he hastily finished the bandaging, and followed 
 Simcox. " It shows how upset I am," said he. " I had 
 entirely forgotten Mr. Murdock. Gad, I must have been 
 upset ! " 
 
 But he had his balance again ; as he and Simcox 
 hastened along, he gazed quite calmly at the frightful 
 chaos where death was torturing its victims before it 
 claimed them. His whole mind, like Simcox s, was for 
 the one sufferer. He examined Murdock with minute 
 care, Simcox studying his conventional doctor-face with 
 impatience and contempt. Finally he shook his head 
 gravely, as his puffy forefinger traced the outline of the 
 fracture of the skull in the thick, blood-matted hair. 
 " Bad ! Bad ! " muttered he. 
 
 Simcox trembled. He knew enough of surgery 
 to know how bad that wound in that place certainly 
 was. 
 
 The doctor glanced at the clouded sky. " He must 
 be got to shelter." 
 
 One of the crew of the wrecked train rushed up. 
 " Come, quick, doctor," he panted. " We ve just dug 
 out a family 
 
 " Can t you see I m busy? " cried the doctor angrily. 
 This is Charles Murdock." 
 
 216 
 
DERAILED 
 
 The trainman s expression changed. " Oh," said he 
 apologetically. He was all attention at once. 
 
 " We must get him to shelter," said Simcox. " It ll 
 be raining in a few minutes. While the doctor works, 
 help me make a stretcher." 
 
 " Certainly of course," was the ready answer. 
 
 He forgot the family whose miseries had been wring 
 ing his kind heart a moment before. He and the valet 
 attacked the wreckage ; they had neither eyes nor 
 thoughts for the horrors around them the moaning, 
 the odors of burned and burning flesh and hair and 
 clothing, the dismembered bodies, some scalded raw-red, 
 some charred black, the open eyes of the dead with the 
 fixed glare of anguish. 
 
 " Nothing more can be done except make him com 
 fortable, until instruments come," said the doctor, who 
 had finished his emergency work. " My bag is buried 
 in the wreck." 
 
 The three men lifted Murdock gently to the stretcher 
 and bore him to the station. As they reached it, a hand 
 car rolled up. There were ten men on it, seven of them 
 obviously doctors. Simcox seized upon the one who was 
 the most important and prosperous in air and dress and 
 had the largest and costliest bag. " Mr. Murdock 
 Mr. Charles Murdock is in here," cried he. " Come on." 
 
 The important-looking doctor responded to the name 
 instantly. " Indeed ! " said he, keen, metropolitan eyes 
 lighting up in the midst of black brows and beard. His 
 tone gave Simcox confidence ; he knew it at once as the 
 tone of a master man. 
 
 As they entered the station, the doctor in attendance 
 scowled; then, seeing the bag of instruments, he ex 
 claimed : " Ah thank you," and reached for it. 
 
 But the newly arrived doctor smiled blandly, ignored 
 15 217 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 the extended hand. " I will attend to Mr. Murdock," 
 said he. Then to the trainman : " Conduct my colleagues 
 to the wreck." 
 
 The six others who came in the handcar had heard 
 the magic name, glittering and tinkling gold, and had 
 crowded into the bare little waiting room. " Come 
 along, gentlemen," cried the trainman. " There art 
 fifty poor creatures crying for you." 
 
 The phrase " poor creatures " was unfortunate. 
 Four of the doctors seemed not to have heard the appeal, 
 but pushed eagerly, almost menacingly round Murdock s 
 couch, like swine at a trough. Two doctors one old, 
 the other a stripling, stood aloof, looking ashamed. 
 
 " Back ! Back ! " cried Simcox. " The master must 
 have air." 
 
 " Yes, stand back, gentlemen," said the doctor with 
 the instruments. His remark was general, but his gaze 
 rested commandingly upon the flushed bitter face of 
 his brother practitioner whom he had displaced. 
 
 The trainman s moral indignation suddenly sprang 
 from its slumber. He, being human, understood what 
 was in the minds of these doctors, and it angered him, 
 where in his own mind it had seemed the matter of 
 course. " One human being s as good as another," he 
 shouted. " You people ought to be ashamed of your 
 selves. Are you going to let those poor creatures in the 
 wreck suffer and die while you fight over this here rich 
 man?" 
 
 They followed the trainman. The doctor Simcox 
 had chosen and the doctor he had commandeered at the 
 wreck remained alone with Murdock. 
 
 " I must operate at once," said the handcar doctor. 
 
 " It would be fatal," protested the first doctor. " I 
 forbid it." 
 
 9.18 
 
DERAILED 
 
 The handcar doctor looked up at him superciliously. 
 " I think," said he, " you would do well to leave your 
 master s case to the physician." 
 
 " I am not a servant of Mr. Murdock s," exclaimed 
 the doctor from the wreck, his dullish brown eyes dan 
 cing with anger. " I am Doctor Bellowes, of Albany." 
 He turned to Simcox : " I warn you to be careful how 
 you permit your master s life to be trifled with." 
 
 The hand-car doctor was busy searching his bag 
 of instruments. " Yes, I can go ahead," said he. To 
 Simcox : " I shall want plenty of fresh water hot and 
 cold and at least two basins, or any sort of shallow 
 receptacle. You can get everything at the near-by 
 houses. My colleague here, from Albany, will help 
 you." 
 
 Bellowes reared to protest. Two men, one of them 
 roughly bandaged, now bore a stretcher through the 
 doorway; on it lay a woman in calico. The handcar 
 doctor waved them back. " No room here," said he 
 peremptorily. " Take her to the shed anywhere. 
 This place is reserved fdr Mr. Murdock." 
 
 " How the hell can it be reserved for Mr. Mur 
 dock? " demanded the bandaged man. "We re all on 
 an equality here, all equal sufferers by the criminal 
 carelessness of this railroad company." 
 
 The man at the other end of the stretcher, a train 
 hand, was moving away with his end of the burden. 
 " Come along," he said. " If it s Murdock, we can t 
 get in here." 
 
 " But I say we can ! " shouted the bandaged man. 
 "Probably Murdock, with his special car, was travel 
 ing deadhead. We other people paid our fare. We ve 
 got our rights." His sneer into the angry face of the 
 doctor was made the uglier by the stained and ragged 
 
 219 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 cloths wrapped about his forehead and ears. " You re 
 a fine doctor, you are, to think of fees at such a time ! " 
 
 The handcar doctor laughed at him. " Get along 
 with you. A doctor s like any other business man. 
 He thinks of business when there s something doing." 
 
 " Who are you, anyhow? " demanded the bandaged 
 man, mollified in spite of himself by the doctor s frank 
 ness. So loathed is hypocrisy that the most vicious 
 action loses half its repulsiveness if frankly done. 
 
 " My name s Presbury, and I m from New York." 
 
 " Well, Presbury, you re a cold-hearted scoun 
 drel." 
 
 Presbury laughed. " Get along with you, my good 
 man," said he cheerfully. 
 
 The bandaged man muttered, looked about for sup 
 porters for his view of human rights ; finding none, he 
 yielded to the urgings of his fellow-bearer. At the 
 name of Presbury, a few slow tears of relief and joy 
 rolled down Simcox s gaunt cheeks and Dr. Bellowes 
 drew back, respectful though sullen. He knew he must 
 give way before the famous surgeon, but the knowledge 
 did not lessen his ill-humor. The crow yields to the 
 vulture, but not with good grace. " Anything I can 
 do to help you, sir? " he asked with an attempt at po 
 liteness. 
 
 " Go along with Simcox," replied Presbury, indif 
 ferently. " And get back here quickly both of you. 
 There s no time to lose." 
 
 By half past six so quickly did Simcox s tele 
 grams work, through the magic of Murdock s name 
 the siding was laid and a special car, borrowed from a 
 camping multimillionaire a few miles up the road, was 
 upon it, was transformed into a hospital. At dusk a 
 
 220 
 
DERAILED 
 
 train from New York brought two surgeons of the 
 staff of Presbury s private sanatorium and four 
 trained nurses. Nor did the other injured and their 
 friends complain of this favoritism. It seemed fitting 
 that Murdock should have more attention than the 
 commonalty, obscure and without " pull." In Europe 
 favoritism in all its forms maintains itself by means 
 of the sanction of tradition; in America it has a far 
 firmer foundation. The average American feels that 
 it is only human nature to insist upon any and every 
 possible advantage. Also, he has inherited from ad 
 venturous immigrant ancestors a gambler s instinct 
 which makes him hope that his turn will come some 
 day. The bandaged man, raging against the " inso 
 lence of the rich," got no encouragement beyond a 
 carelessly sympathetic " Yes, it is a damn shame," 
 usually followed by " But what s the use of kicking? " 
 Bellowes, confident that Presbury made a fatal 
 error in operating in such circumstances, and aching 
 from Presbury s bruises on his vanity, hinted to the 
 reporters that Murdock was doomed. This was tele 
 graphed everywhere, concentrating public attention 
 upon the one victim of the disaster who was widely 
 known ; even those who had never heard his name were 
 interested as soon as they read that he was rich. Thus, 
 by nightfall that quiet darkened car on a siding at the 
 lonely Adirondack station was in the full blaze of a 
 national publicity which Murdock dying quietly in the 
 ordinary way never would have got. At ten o clock 
 that night, into that spot upon which the search lights 
 of publicity were so brilliantly playing, walked a 
 woman a young woman, calm of face and of voice, 
 but with such a look in her wan face, in her burning 
 eyes, that the man on guard at the steps of Murdock s 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 car felt a choke come up into his throat at the sight 
 of her. 
 
 " I wish to see him," she said. 
 
 The man s expression was hesitation. He examined 
 her by the dim light from the lamp in the ceiling of 
 the observation platform. " My orders are " he be 
 gan. 
 
 " I must see him," she repeated. She advanced so 
 firmly that he could not but give way. 
 
 She ascended the steps, stood before the closed 
 door. The guard, watching her, saw that she was 
 nerving herself. She knocked softly. A nurse opened 
 the door. She advanced, so evidently one whose right 
 may not be questioned that the nurse yielded, saying 
 in an undertone, " I guess the doctor wouldn t mind 
 your looking at him. But you mustn t touch him or 
 make a sound." 
 
 The young woman made no answer ; she had not 
 heard. She went along the passage between the small 
 rooms, stood at the head of the great couch in the 
 center of the large room so that it would be accessible 
 from all sides. In the dimness she gazed at that couch 
 as if it were the bier on which the dead her dead 
 was awaiting burial. He had partially recovered 
 consciousness a few minutes before her coming, and 
 was struggling vainly to reconnect the broken thread. 
 Into his nostrils stole the faint odor of her perfume. 
 " Juliet ! " he murmured. " Juliet ! " 
 
 She moved to the side of the couch and sank on her 
 knees. She did not heed the nurse s signals, the men 
 acing gesture of Presbury, who had just entered. 
 " Yes," she answered, clasping Murdock s wandering 
 hand in hers. " I am here." 
 
 " Juliet," he repeated. " My Juliet." 
 222 
 
DERAILED 
 
 " Yes, dear." And she leaned forward and touched 
 her lips to his hand. " Now you must sleep," she said, 
 her voice like a soothing caress, her fingers passing 
 softly over his brow. 
 
 " Sleep," he murmured. He gave a great sigh, and 
 was quiet. 
 
 Not until she was quite sure it would not disturb 
 him did she gently disengage her fingers. When she 
 joined Presbury outside the door, he was no longer 
 scowling. " I see you know what you re about," said 
 he. " You are Mr. Murdock s " He paused for her 
 to add the detail of exact relationship. 
 
 " My name is Raeburn Juliet Raeburn." 
 
 " Ah," said Presbury, like a man who is waiting to 
 hear more. 
 
 She and he looked intently each at the other. She 
 did not resent the insinuation in his cynical, good-hu 
 mored, beard-veiled face. " He and I," she went on, 
 " are more to each other than blood relations. Or, 
 rather, I am nothing to him, but he is everything 
 to me." 
 
 " I understand." 
 
 Her expression did not change before his look of 
 polite impertinence. " No," replied she. " You do 
 not understand. But that does not matter. I need 
 only explain that if he could speak he would wish me 
 to be here." 
 
 " So I heard," said Presbury. Then, " Mrs. Mur- 
 dock is coming." 
 
 " I must stay." 
 
 " It is impossible." 
 
 " You must make me one of the nurses. * 
 
 " Impossible." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 223 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 Presbury smiled cynically. " The deception will 
 be discovered and " He made a gesture suggestive 
 of the uproar that would follow. 
 
 " I am principal partner in Dangerfield, the dress 
 maker. I guarantee you against loss. Besides, there 
 is only the remotest possibility that the deception will 
 be discovered. No one " she smiled strangely 
 " not even he knows what he is to me. And if, by 
 chance, the deception, as you call it, should be discov 
 ered, you can plead that you, too, were deceived." 
 
 Presbury had been smiling his appreciation of her 
 acuteness, especially in going direct to his chief ob 
 jection loss and meeting it. " Oh, you are that 
 Miss Raeburn," he now said. " You ve done so much 
 for my wife and daughters, it s hard to refuse you 
 anything anything within reason." 
 
 " Thank you," said Juliet, simply. 
 
 " And you are the best possible nurse for him," 
 continued Presbury. There was no longer a hint of 
 the insolent amusement. Presbury was not so cynical 
 that he had ceased to be wise. He did not understand ; 
 but he did realize that his first suspicions were more or 
 less wide of the mark more or less. 
 
 " How is he ? " she now asked. " You need not fear 
 telling me the exact truth." 
 
 " We sha n t know anything definite for several 
 days. The smash he got ought to kill. Again, a man 
 as young and powerful as he is and with an incentive 
 to live " That, with a half-humorous, half-envious 
 smile at her beauty, full of the charm of mystery in 
 the nebulous starlight " Well, he ought to be able 
 to rise from the dead. And he s far from dead, my 
 dear young lady. A man is either alive or dead. 
 There s nothing between. This man is alive." 
 
 224 
 
DERAILED 
 
 " We will save him," said she. Her face had grown 
 more haggard as Presbury thus let her know that only 
 hope remained. But her tone was without a trace of 
 weakness. 
 
 " We might be able to do it," replied he. " This 
 mountain air, now that it is saturated with faith and 
 hope, ought to work miracles." 
 
 Juliet was glancing at the ends of the temporary 
 track. " This siding should be extended," said she. 
 " The car must be back in the woods, away from the 
 noise of trains on the main line." 
 
 Presbury patted her shoulder. " It shall be done 
 at once. Stupid of me not to have thought of it.* 9 
 He patted her again. " You shall stay as long as you 
 like." 
 
XVI 
 
 SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 
 
 IN the morning by the first express came Blagden, 
 with the dazed and wandering eye that betokens a 
 secret, harrowing anxiety. The news had found the 
 private secretary at Newport, passing his vacation, 
 as was his custom, in visits among his rich and 
 fashionable relations. People of their class have 
 learned by experience how rarely those born in wealth 
 have real capacity, how unlikely it is that, if they lose 
 their wealth, they will ever recuperate. In the broad, 
 human beings of whatever station give, not as they 
 wish or expect to receive, but as they actually do re 
 ceive. Used to being sought only to be exploited, they 
 seek only to exploit. Their ideal and usually their 
 pretense is altruism. But their best hope is to get 
 something for nothing, their best expectation is at 
 least to get more than they give whether of benefits 
 material or of benefits spiritual. Blagden was an unu 
 sually attractive man, a man of taste, of not a little 
 wit, of excellent address and appearance. That did 
 not save him. Between the loss of his patrimony and 
 the getting of the confidential position hopefully near 
 the rich Murdock, he had been received by his relatives 
 on his annual pilgrimage to the gates of his earthly 
 paradise with a patient resignation which would have 
 sorely tried sensibilities not coarsened and hardened 
 
 226 
 
SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 
 
 by lifelong experience of fashionable ways. His aunts 
 and cousins employed him at tasks only by strain of 
 imagination removed from the menial tasks hardly 
 the less galling because they were congenial for Mel 
 ville Blagden was a major-domo born. But the posi 
 tion near Murdock had changed all this; the relatives 
 began to think perhaps there was " some manhood in 
 poor Mel, after all " which was the human way of in 
 dicating that Melville was once more inspiring hopes 
 that, instead of being a pensioner, he would be useful, 
 perhaps very useful. Being shrewd, Blagden sedu 
 lously watered this hope, making his relatives and 
 friends believe he was close indeed to " that Western 
 bounder Mel s in with." 
 
 His cousin, Betty Sulloway, brought him the ti 
 dings that spelled disaster for him and death for the 
 hopes of his relatives. " You certainly do have the 
 damnedest luck, Mel," said she sympathetically. 
 " Now, you ll have to begin all over again." 
 
 Blagden was too crushed to reply. He went 
 gloomily through the palace " cottage " of the Sullo 
 way s to his own apartment, modest for that house but 
 far from plainly furnished and decorated. He got 
 himself out of his elegant evening dress and into an 
 elegant traveling suit the suit from the best dealer 
 in tweeds in London, the shirt and tie from the rue 
 de la Paix. Within the hour he was gone. 
 
 So delightfully is life adapted to humanity s fond 
 ness for altruistic pretense, he reached Azure Lake 
 firmly convinced that his chief anxiety was not for 
 himself but for the generous employer-friend who was 
 about to die. After talking with Presbury he felt a 
 little better; at least, there would be time to plan, to 
 look about, to search the ruins for salvage. So pre- 
 227 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 occupied was he that he passed Juliet Raeburn sev 
 eral times without penetrating the disguise of the ill- 
 fitting borrowed nurse s costume and hair primly done. 
 It was a note in Presbury s voice a note of consid 
 eration and respect that finally turned his eyes see- 
 ingly upon her face. He stared with lips ajar; when 
 he recovered himself, began his smile and made ready 
 to bow, he froze before her gaze so unruffled that his 
 first thought was, " She has forgotten me." A mo 
 ment s reflection, and he knew this could not be so; at 
 the same time he decided it was the part of discretion 
 to accept her hint. 
 
 He did not try to sound Simcox; he had had ex- 
 perience of the valet s tomblike silence that merely 
 echoed a questioner s question. Instead, he skillfully 
 gossiped round among the attendants, with the result 
 that he was soon in possession of the mode of Miss 
 Raeburn s arrival, and of the suspicion that Dr. Pres- 
 bury had covert reasons for accepting her as nurse, 
 where there were already four, all known in the New 
 York profession " and none of us ever heard of this 
 Miss Ray," said the gossiping nurse. " Do you know 
 her, Mr. Blagden ? " this with a sly smile of antici 
 pation of a sentimental insinuation. 
 
 But he was far too prudent to gratify Miss Carley. 
 " What nonsense ! " said he. " Mr. Murdock isn t that 
 sort. Women play no part in his life." 
 
 Miss Carley laughed ; as she had brilliant eyes and 
 fine teeth it was her habit to laugh a great deal, and 
 to rally her three sister nurses all of whom had 
 rather poor teeth upon their uncheerful sobriety of 
 countenance. " A man s a man," retorted she. " The 
 stronger he is as a man, the more certain to have a 
 weakness for woman or women. Besides, you should 
 
 228 
 
SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 
 
 have heard your cold, busy Mr. Murdock say Ju 
 liet. Why, he s quite mad about her." 
 
 " Pure romancing," Blagden assured her. He was 
 curt, now that he had got what he wanted; he did not 
 like Miss Carley s presuming upon his democratic man 
 ner to treat him as if he were her equal; also, he was 
 not attracted by her beauty of slenderness, his femi 
 nine ideal being of the robust, exuberant type. " Mr. 
 Murdock," he coldly insisted, "was quite out of his 
 mind." 
 
 The nurse, expert in New York fashionable class 
 psychology, instantly felt and understood the secre 
 tary s haughtiness. She tossed her head, laughed 
 again a brave show of fine teeth, but in anger. Per 
 haps, even more than his attempt to put her in her 
 place, she resented his lack of appreciation of her 
 beauty. This was the more unjust in her because her 
 taste in men corresponded to his. She detested the 
 smooth, lean, sinewy type of which Blagden was a fair 
 specimen ; she liked the obstreperously masculine, as he 
 the flauntingly feminine 1 liked bristling hair and 
 whiskers, rough skin, knotted calves and biceps and 
 shoulders, as he liked bouncing hip and bosom, massive 
 leg and arm. She eyed Blagden contemptuously the 
 contempt divided among his appearance, his " snob 
 bishness," and his remark. " He out of his mind? " 
 cried she. " No more than I am." She paused to take 
 careful aim before firing her best ammunition : " When 
 did you say Mrs. Murdock was coming? " 
 
 Blagden winced, hastened to recover. " To-night^ 
 I believe." 
 
 And with a formal bow, gracious yet definitive of the 
 nurse s social rank, went away to reflect upon the im 
 minent catastrophe. He saw it was his duty to Mur- 
 
 229 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 dock to prevent it, if possible; but how? He turned 
 the problem round and round, could find only one pos 
 sible solution to go straight to Dr. Presbury. " I 
 hope you will not insist upon my reasons, doctor," he 
 began, as they were taking a walk together after 
 luncheon, " but you must send Miss Ray away before 
 Mrs. Murdock arrives." 
 
 " Can t be done," said Presbury. Blagden thought 
 he saw a knowing grin behind those bushy brows and 
 whiskers which though coal black were so crisp that 
 they accentuated the look of cleanness his pallid, clear 
 skin gave him. " She s the best of my nurses the only 
 one who takes intelligent interest in her work. Nurses 
 are like all professional women in business simply to 
 live until they can thimblerig some man into supporting 
 them, and using the business as a blind. It s difficult 
 to get a nurse interested in a married man. Miss Ra^r 
 is my sheet anchor." 
 
 " Miss Raeburn must be sent away," insisted Blag- 
 den. 
 
 The doctor was watching the swishing trail of a deer 
 flying through the brush. " Miss Ray will stay," said 
 he, ignoring Blagden s intentional slip. " She s the 
 medicine." 
 
 " But when Mrs. Murdock comes " began Blag- 
 iden desperately. 
 
 " When Mrs. Murdock comes," Presbury cut in, " she 
 will stay quietly in her car on the other siding that was 
 finished this morning. No one no one shall see my 
 patient until he is out of danger." And he looked 
 straight into the secretary s eyes. " No one," he re 
 peated. " Not even his wife." 
 
 "Oh," murmured Blagden. "I see." Then he 
 added, " Perhaps that will be all right." 
 
 230 
 
SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 
 
 " You say you spent three years at Vienna," replied 
 Presbury. " But that was since the Ring was built. 
 Now in the old days " And Miss Ray was not further 
 discussed. 
 
 When the night express trailing Mrs. Murdock s car 
 drew up at the platform, Presbury was at Blagden s side 
 to receive her. She descended, Norma and Charley 
 close behind her. " No change," was Blagden s response 
 to the question in their anxious eyes. " Here is Dr. 
 Presbury." 
 
 " No immediate danger, madam," said Presbury. 
 " And hope ! Always hope ! " 
 
 " We will go to him," said Mrs. Murdock, in man 
 ner and in feeling the devoted, agonized wife. As she 
 was to be among strangers she was dressed with care, 
 and looked almost unrecognizably different from the inti 
 mate Sophy neater, cleaner, with her fine eyes and her 
 delicate nose and her attractive mouth getting more of 
 a chance to lift her face toward beauty. " We will go 
 to him at once," she said with a sob. 
 
 The doctor shook his head inflexibly. " I per 
 mit no one to go near the car but myself and my 
 assistants." 
 
 Sophy looked up and down the track. No car in 
 sight but those attached to the train. " The siding over 
 there," explained Blagden, " has been extended into the 
 woods, and we ve rolled his car and the one we use as 
 far as possible from the noise of passing trains." He 
 had moved to Sophy s side, and his tone was most satis 
 factory in sympathetic and soothing quality. Sophy 
 gave him a grateful look that thrilled him. He had 
 always admired her, had striven to stand well with her, 
 by no means altogether or even chiefly from motives of 
 prudence. 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 " You ll want a second car, madam," said Presbury, 
 " as it ll be a long siege." 
 
 " When can we see him ? " asked Norma of Presbury. 
 
 " When the crisis is past. He must not be agi 
 tated." 
 
 Sophy and her children gazed at one another drear 
 ily. Blagden burned with indignation. He never looked 
 at Sophy, always dressed up when he was about and, 
 further, englamoured for him by her surroundings of 
 wealth he never looked at her without admiring her eyes 
 and nose, her delicate, aristocratic hands and feet, wrists 
 and ankles, and her " sumptuous " charms of figure, 
 without thinking what a magnificent woman, what a 
 Juno, she would be, if she but knew the New York arts 
 of the toilet. " It takes substance, something more than 
 bones," he had often reflected, " to set off the position 
 her wealth ought to give her." Now, her forlornness, 
 the shameless trick Presbury was playing upon her, 
 roused his sense of her charms, " so womanly," to its 
 keenest. " A damned outrage," he muttered ; and he 
 abruptly drew Presbury aside. " Look here, doctor," re 
 monstrated he, " this won t do ! The wife and the chil 
 dren have rights. They come before before that 
 woman." 
 
 Presbury regarded him patiently. " Who is in 
 charge of this case? " said he. " Who is responsible for 
 the event? " 
 
 " But " 
 
 " Now, my dear sir ! Wouldn t it be well for you to 
 do a little thinking before you make suggestions in im 
 portant matters? Pray, in the circumstances, how could 
 you arrange it to let them see him, without throwing him 
 into violent agitation ? " 
 
 " But he knows they are here, or soon will be." 
 
SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 
 
 " He is all but unconscious and will be must be 
 until the crisis." 
 
 Blagden showed the flaring red his skin of the red 
 liaired permitted. " I am an ass," he apologized. Then, 
 " It s really amazing this lonely place, yet things going 
 on that one would say could not be kept secret even in 
 a, city." 
 
 " I don t know what you re talking about," said 
 Presbury. " Hadn t you better see that Mr. Murdock s 
 family are comfortable, now that their car is in place 
 on the other siding? Have you ordered a second car 
 for them? . . . You may be sure of one thing," he 
 added, with a stern look into Blagden s greenish eyes. 
 " In no circumstances will I deprive myself of my one 
 competent nurse." 
 
 " I ll do all I can to help you," said Blagden, with an 
 air of generosity. 
 
 " I should say that would be wise," was Presbury s 
 blunt reply. " Mr. Murdock may recover." Presbury 
 assumed all human beings acted from motives of self- 
 interest, and he always let them see he was so assuming. 
 In the practice of his profession, "he could not afford 
 to humor humanity s passion for the petty deceptions 
 of pose. Pose might be tolerated as harmless and even 
 amusing in the ordinary scenes of the comedy of life; 
 but when the stern issue of death must be faced then, 
 facts, only facts, hard and clear of all rubbish of sen- 
 timentalism. 
 
 He departed for Murdock s car ; Blagden telegraphed 
 for another car, then joined the family, to recite all the 
 details of the accident and Murdock s exact condition, 
 to give them hope yet not to raise hope so high that 
 disaster would come when Murdock died and of that 
 Blagden had hardly a doubt. He had thought little 
 16 233 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 about the complications caused by the presence of Juliet 
 Raeburn, so occupied had he been in revolving his own 
 future what should he do when Murdock was dead; 
 how could he turn the imminent setback to his career into 
 advantage? " For the strong, defeats are milestones on 
 the highway to victory," was one of Murdock s many 
 aphorisms which had found lodgment in his receptive 
 mind. Now was his opportunity to show he had not 
 gone to school to Murdock in vain, but was indeed one 
 of the strong and skillful to whom belong the earth 
 and its people. What should he do first? Obviously, 
 ingratiate himself with the family, especially with Mrs,, - 
 Murdock. He had hoped for riches through Murdock, 
 and no doubt Murdock had remembered him in his will ; 
 but at most he would get twenty thousand, possibly 
 fifty, maybe not more than ten. Mrs. Murdock would 
 need advice ; who so well qualified as he to be her intimate 
 adviser? The secretary began to see at least one po& 
 sible combination of circumstances that would change his 
 employer s death from a catastrophe to a benefit. 
 
 When Norma and Charley went for a walk, taking 
 on Blagden s advice the direction exactly opposite to 
 that of Murdock s car, he laid energetic siege to their 
 mother s confidence. We cannot but like those who sin 
 cerely like us ; it is even hard for us to withstand our 
 vanity s pleadings in behalf of those whose blandish 
 ments we know to be insincere. Sophy, absorbed in her 
 self, had given little heed to the employees Murdock 
 always had in train. She had noted Blagden hardly 
 more than the others, though each time he came to Saint 
 X he made a point of being polite to her. Now, how 
 ever, she was in a mood of upheaval ; and in her aloneness 
 and perplexity and agitation she was instantly respon- 
 
SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 
 
 sive to his tender deference. She soon let him see that 
 some secret lay heavily upon her mind and heart. 
 
 " Mr. Murdock talks over all his private affairs witK 
 you, doesn t he? " she asked. 
 
 " Naturally," replied he. 
 
 " Then of course you know about the the disagree- 
 ment between us? " 
 
 Blagden was silent, waiting eagerly for light which 
 could best be got by pretending he already had it. 
 
 " I suppose I ought to be ashamed to confess it," 
 she went on, assuming he knew all, " but a person 
 can t help thinking things. Of course, his suffering 
 has driven me nearly distracted. But I can t help wor 
 rying, too, about about whether he made some sort of 
 foolish will." 
 
 She glanced uneasily at Blagden ; his expression re 
 assured her. He had been brought up where material 
 considerations are too powerful, too dominant, too vital, 
 to be made the subject of pretenses when they are immedi 
 ately at stake. It seemed to him not only proper but 
 necessary that in the circumstances she should be anx 
 ious. " You have your children, their future, to think 
 of," supplied he tactfully. 
 
 " That s it," cried she, rewarding him with a beam 
 ing look from the fine eyes. She at once saw that it 
 wasn t for herself she was worrying, but for Norma and 
 Charley. 
 
 " Of course," . continued Blagden, " I couldn t in 
 honor say anything about his will, about any of his 
 private affairs, even if I knew." The " if I knew " saved 
 his self-respect; for he knew almost nothing of Mur- 
 dock s really private affairs, nothing at all of his will. 
 His experience of Murdock s character assured him that, 
 whatever might be the relations between the husband and 
 
 235 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 the wife, the will could not be harsh or even ungenerous. 
 But to say this might possibly be a cruel raising of 
 groundless hopes; besides, would not saying it end this 
 new and promising intimacy ? He ostentatiously pressed 
 his lips together and permitted an expression of gloom 
 to overspread his features. 
 
 Sophy began to weep. " You don t know how I have 
 suffered, Mr. Blagden. He was a good man in so many 
 ways. But he didn t appreciate having a good wife and 
 a family that loved him. I forgive him now, but it has 
 aged me terribly all the anguish he has caused me." 
 
 That Sophy could speak thus generously of Mur- 
 dock when the darkest doubts of him were harassing her 
 was for Blagden proof of the fundamental kindliness 
 of her character. But he might have withstood this had 
 she not been weeping. Those of shallow discernment 
 and shallow sensibilities are most easily moved by out 
 ward evidences of grief, though outward evidences are 
 significant only as they are suppressed. Sophy wept 
 freely; the sympathetic tears sprang to his own eyes. 
 " Dear Mrs. Murdock," he cried, " I am sure you are 
 mistaken certainly about the will." And he felt contrite 
 that he had, even by indirection, contributed to her 
 woes. " So far as my knowledge of Mr. Murdock s 
 affairs extends, there is no cause for anxiety about 
 his will." 
 
 Sophy dried her eyes. Her voice, with its vespeis 
 bell sweetness, with its note of lingering plaintiveness v 
 was most attractive, never failed to charm not too- 
 accustomed ears. Upon Blagden it had its full effect. 
 Her simple, grateful " Thank you oh, thank you, Mr. 
 Blagden," made him literally tremble with emotion. He 
 watched her innocent, limpid eyes in a kind of ecstasy. 
 Presently she went on : "I can t but feel that this was 
 
 236 
 
SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 
 
 & special providence. Yes, it was God s way of halt 
 ing him." 
 
 Blagden maintained a respectful and discreet si 
 lence. He was not religious, but under the spell of 
 Sophy s eyes and voice and ample charms he began to 
 wonder if some higher power or other had not been inter 
 fering. 
 
 " What he wanted was showiness," she went on. 
 " And he fell into the devil s trap, as so many men do." 
 
 " I can t comprehend it," said Blagden. And his 
 tone of shocked, profound amazement was quite sincere. 
 Sophy, so luxuriant of person, so rich, so grandly sur 
 rounded, seemed to him a most unusual woman. What 
 she did and what she said impressed him with all the 
 weight of her wealth. " I can t comprehend it," he 
 repeated. 
 
 " I gave him my youth and beauty," said she mourn 
 fully. " And he " 
 
 " Pardon me, Mrs. Murdock," he interrupted, in his 
 frank, engaging way. " You must let me say, as an old 
 friend, that you oughtn t to think that sort of thing. 
 Why, in New York, women much older than you are 
 regarded as young. Many don t think of marrying 
 until about your age. As for looks, you dress far too 
 old for your years if I may say it at least, according 
 to New York ideas. But even with that, you re always 
 spoken of as one of the handsome young married women 
 of Saint X." 
 
 In seven years experience in flattering his way 
 through life, Blagden had learned that subtlety in com 
 pliment is a mistake, that ears refined drink in no less 
 greedily than ears coarse the bluntest flattery, if it be 
 not too obviously insincere; also, what he had said to 
 Mrs. Murdock had been genuine. Still, his words star- 
 
 237 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 tied him ; he glanced at her, ready to draw back. Her 
 expression was more than reassuring ; it was encourag 
 ing. The effect of stimulants is in direct proportion 
 to their novelty to the system to which they are ad 
 ministered ; Elagden could not have found a better sub 
 ject than Sophy, so long without the stimulant of com 
 pliment that it would affect her as wine affects a child. 
 
 " You have been living too retired a life," said he. 
 " In trying to do your duty to husband and children, 
 you ve been forgetting your duty to yourself." 
 
 " My life s all behind me," sighed she, longing to be 
 contradicted. 
 
 He smiled with raillery. " You and I, as I happen 
 to know, are of about the same age. I consider myself, 
 and am considered, a young man just beginning his 
 career." 
 
 She shook her head in faint, reluctant protest against 
 the implication that she, too, had a career before her. 
 " It s different with a man," said she. " The world was 
 made for men. A woman s done at thirty." 
 
 There he laughed outright. " You really mustn t 
 say that sort of thing, Mrs. Murdock. That s the point 
 of view of old-fashioned people, I know ; but you and I 
 belong to the new generation. Personally, I take no 
 interest in a woman until she has passed thirty. She s 
 too unformed and unreliable. To be interesting, one 
 must have lived a while." 
 
 Sophy s azure eyes were indeed alight now. " You re 
 just saying that to cheer me up, Mr. Blagden. Men care 
 for women only when the bloom is on them." She was 
 blushing delightfully. 
 
 " Men care for women only when they re in bloom," 
 corrected he. " A man of the world wants a woman, a 
 companion, not a plaything." And his glance linger- 
 
 238 
 
SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 
 
 ingly, meaningly yet with discretion, made excursion 
 from her eyes to her luxuriant figure, to her delicate 
 hands, to her comely feet, to her eyes again. 
 
 " I m glad to hear you say that," she cried, feeling 
 a delicious tickling sensation, of unknown and unsus 
 pected origin, from head to feet. " I am glad there are 
 some men in the world not altogether low-minded. . . . 
 If I could only get my worry about about the will off 
 my mind." 
 
 " Don t let that trouble you," urged he with con 
 vincing warmth. " Not for an instant." 
 
 A pause, then Sophy ingenuously showed what was 
 really on her mind. She flushed, lowered her eyes, asked 
 shyly: " You know her? You were in the woods with 
 them that time weren t you ? " 
 
 Blagden blushed painfully. " Really, Mrs. Mur- 
 dock, I hope you ll not forget the position I " 
 
 " I beg your pardon," cried she repentantly. " But 
 I thought as he and I had practically arranged for the 
 divorce, you d feel free to talk." 
 
 The divorce ! Blagden had some difficulty in cloak 
 ing his stark amazement. The divorce ! Murdock and 
 his wife were going to get a divorce! . . . Instantly, 
 like the stage Satan suddenly projected through a trap 
 door, a scheme audacious yet apparently practicable 
 leaped into his small, quick mind. Used thus far to 
 executing orders from others, and plotting on his own 
 account in petty ways only, he was overwhelmed by this 
 project. Here was indeed opening to practice his wis 
 dom gained from Murdock. "It s my chance," said 
 he to his fluttered self. " Opportunity knocks at the 
 door just once." He hastily brought his thoughts back 
 to the conversation, to Sophy s inquiry about the other 
 woman. 
 
 239 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " I don t mind saying she s not my style not what 
 we call a lady. But then " He shrugged his shoul 
 ders faintly " what s to be expected of such people? " 
 
 Mrs. Murdock slowly reddened with the effort to 
 utter her next question. " Do you think he intends to 
 marry her? " 
 
 Blagden reflected. If he should say yes, it would 
 certainly irritate ; if he should say no, it could not but 
 please. It was a duty, as well as a wile, to please one 
 so fine, so gentle, so put-upon. " Men don t marry that 
 sort," said he. 
 
 " Then she s just a a common woman? " 
 
 " Really, I know nothing about her except her 
 Pie hesitated, ventured " her conduct." He wore a 
 hangdog look now, for he felt he was traitor, sneak, and 
 liar. But he instantly justified himself. " Isn t the 
 woman here ? " he reminded himself. " And won t what 
 I m saying help Murdock to get his divorce if he should 
 live? I m doing both him and his wife a favor in help 
 ing them to rid themselves of each other. . . . He doesn t 
 appreciate this splendid wife of his. He has only appe 
 tites where women are concerned no appreciation of 
 character, of devotion no gratitude even. . . . I m vio 
 lating no confidence of his. . . . By God, a man doesn t 
 sell his soul, his self-respect when he takes a salary as 
 confidential secretary ! My relations with him are in 
 business matters only. I ve nothing to do with his love 
 affairs his mistresses." And Blagden was in the full 
 swing of outraged virtue. 
 
 " I was afraid I d find her here," pursued Sophy. 
 
 Blagden winced. " Mrs. Murdock ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 " Yes, I was. He has put so many indignities upon 
 me. I ve no doubt he d send for her if he were conscious. 
 I thought maybe she d be brazen enough to come, just 
 
 240 
 
SOPHY FINDS A FRIEND 
 
 from reading about it in the papers. She d want to get 
 near him and take everything she could lay her hands on, 
 perhaps wheedle him into making a will. I don t mind 
 telling you, Mr. Blagden for you seem like one of the 
 family, having been at our house so often, right in with 
 us " 
 
 " Thank you," said Blagden, tears in his eyes and 
 heart beating high. " I have no immediate family left, 
 and I never can forget how good you ve been to me." 
 It seemed to him he could dimly recall numberless acts 
 of thoughtful courtesy from her. 
 
 " I m glad you realize how I ve we ve felt," she 
 went on. " As I was saying, I don t mind telling you, 
 I was so sure she d be here that I d not have come if it 
 hadn t been for appearances and for the children. As 
 soon as I heard the news I said, The hand of Almighty 
 God ! And while I ve been praying God to spare his 
 life I ve no hope." 
 
 " I fear you re right," said Blagden, his tone and 
 look baldly conventional. 
 
 He rose, eager to be gone. He did not wish to be 
 questioned further about Miss Raeburn, and so forced 
 to utter deliberate lies. Also, he must at once confer 
 alone with this newly arrived good genius or bad sud 
 denly projected into his mind, must confer at length, 
 must concert a plan of action ; for he had learned from 
 his employer that only carefully planned things have 
 much chance of coming to pass, that the chief difference \ 
 between the few who lead and the many who serve them 
 is that the leaders plan while the masses fancy things 
 " just happen." Before he had time or need to invent 
 an excuse for taking leave of Sophy, Norma and her 
 brother returned. At sight of them, both Sophy and 
 Blagden felt guilty, and Sophy looked it. She remem- 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 bered the man prostrate on the threshold of death. " He 
 idon t deserve anything from me," she thought. " But 
 I can t get rid of the feeling we re husband and wife 
 no, not even after all he s made me suffer." 
 
 Thus do we bring our very guilt itself to bear witness 
 to our superior virtue. 
 
XVII 
 
 CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 A WEEK, ten days, two weeks ; one day exactly like 
 another, eventless even as to weather. Murdock lay, 
 neither better nor worse, silent and almost motionless, 
 in the grip of death. Juliet left him only when Pres- 
 bury thrust her out to take the air; and she got such 
 small sleep as nature would not be denied in one of the 
 compartments between Murdock s and the rear door of 
 the car. Presbury and his chief assistant, Dr. Mar 
 tin, watched her one evening as she paced up and down 
 the clearing beyond the cars, doing the second install 
 ment of the two hours walk Presbury prescribed and, 
 by superintending, compelled. 
 
 " Strange case, that," said Martin. 
 
 " Unusual," corrected Presbury, " but not strange." 
 
 " What does she think about? " 
 
 " She does not think." 
 
 " Well, then, what does she feel? " 
 
 " She does not feel. ... If she thought, she would 
 go mad. If she felt, she would die." 
 
 Martin reflected on this. " Yet," he finally observed, 
 with his best air of the man who thinks he is thinking 
 and thinking profoundly, " yet we sometimes say, and 
 believe, that human nature is essentially selfish." 
 
 Presbury smiled the patient smile of one who has 
 lived at one who has merely existed, of one who has felt 
 at one who has merely sentimentalized. " My dear 
 
 43 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 young man," said he, " to get pleasure in the broad 
 sense is the sole ultimate purpose of all human action. 
 Differences of character are differences of idea as to 
 what pleasure is, and how to get it. That accounts for 
 saint and for satyr; it accounts for Miss Ray and it 
 accounts for you and me." 
 
 " A cynical philosoph}^" said Martin. 
 
 " To shallow people," was Presbury s reply, " sense 
 and truth always seem cynical or else strained. Only 
 flapdoodle sounds, smells, and tastes just right." 
 
 " Well," maintained the younger doctor, " no matter 
 what you say, / for one think she loves him." 
 
 " Who said she didn t? " demanded Presbury. " One 
 of the difficulties in the way of discussing anything more 
 abstruse than the weather or scandal with the average 
 human being is that he doesn t in the least understand 
 what one is talking about yet thinks he does. Loves 
 him ? Of course she loves him. Do you know what love 
 means? " 
 
 " I think so." 
 
 " Then disabuse your mind of the notion. 7 never 
 saw a genuine case before, and I m sure you, twenty 
 years my junior in experience, never did. That is, I 
 never saw it to know it. Love, I discover, is measured 
 wholly by what it gives. In passion, the man loves not 
 at all, for he gives nothing, and knows it; the woman 
 fancies she loves, because she fancies she has given some 
 thing and she has given her conventional self not 
 much, really, but still a little. But when a man or a 
 woman gives his or her all as that splendid woman 
 there has given " Presbury drew a long breath 
 " Martin, we have not lived in vain. We have seen 
 what men climb to the tops of the highest peaks in the 
 hope of seeing and don t see." 
 
 244 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 The younger doctor looked uneasily at his chief, un 
 certain whether this eulogy was serious or satiric. 
 
 The last traces of the wreck had been effaced by men 
 and by nature ; the newspaper reports on Murdock had 
 dwindled to a daily paragraph. Neither Sophy nor her 
 children had yet been nearer his car than fifty yards ; 
 the three other doctors, brought from New York for 
 consultation, agreed with Presbury that there must be 
 no risk of agitation. 
 
 " This is all very queer," growled Charley Murdock, 
 from the sofa in the general room of the living car, where 
 he sprawled in sullen boredom. " I suppose these doc 
 tors know what they re about, yet I must say I never 
 heard of a man s family being absolutely excluded. Did 
 you, mother? " 
 
 Sophy made no reply. She was at her fancywork. 
 Norma, reading near one of the big open windows, lifted 
 her head to give him a warning look. It seemed to her 
 that, in the peculiar circumstances, the strained rela 
 tions between their father and mother, it would be most 
 unwise to admit their mother to the hospital car; and 
 if anyone of the family were to be admitted, would it 
 not for appearances sake have to be she? Charley 
 answered the look with a defiant frown and addressed 
 himself to Blagden, who was just entering. 
 
 " Blagden," said Charley, " doesn t it strike you as 
 queer downright mysterious? Only this morning, as 
 I was circling round father s car, I saw one of the nurses. 
 I called to her. Instead of answering she made off 
 toward the car almost at a run." 
 
 The secretary wheeled abruptly to hide his discon 
 certed face. " The doctors have forbidden the nurses 
 to discuss his condition with anyone," he suggested in 
 his usual fashionable drawl, when he ventured to about 
 
 245 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 face. " Probably she took you for a newspaper 
 reporter." 
 
 " Perhaps," conceded Charley. " But, by Jove, 7 
 smell mystery." 
 
 " Now we can have a little bridge," said Sophy, roll 
 ing up the fancywork still the centerpiece. 
 
 Late that afternoon Norma, with her mother in the 
 general room of their living car, glanced up from her 
 novel to see Charley making elaborate fantastic signals 
 to her to join him without attracting their mother s 
 attention. She shook her head in an impatient negative ; 
 Charley, always a good deal of a nuisance because of his 
 headlong disconnected excitability, had become her sorest 
 trial in that isolation. He persisted in his signaling 
 until she resignedly put aside her book, yawned for 
 Sophy s benefit and said, " I m going to stretch my 
 legs." 
 
 " I wish you wouldn t say such vulgar things," said 
 Sophy, pausing in her fancywork to bend upon her 
 daughter a severe if rather mechanical expression of 
 disapproval. Under the ministrations of Blagden, 
 whose conversation was cast in the fashionable mold 
 of frank audacity, her notions of propriety were ex 
 panding; but she still clung to the forms of strait- 
 lacedness. 
 
 Norma, her temper on edge, with difficulty restrained 
 a sarcasm about the fondness of " nice " people for 
 nasty ideas. She joined Charley and they walked past 
 their dining and servants car and up the tracks of the 
 main line. As soon as they were beyond hearing of a 
 group of workmen replacing ties, he burst out excit 
 edly : " I knew it, Norma ! There s a sure enough mys 
 tery, and a damn rotten one. Blagden s a sweet-scented 
 scoundrel, he is ! " 
 
 246 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 " What is it ? " she demanded impatiently. " You re 
 always finding mare s nests." 
 
 But Charley was too agitated to resent. He hurried 
 on : " I was rummaging among my traps after lunch, 
 and I ran across these " indicating a pair of field 
 glasses swinging from his shoulder. " I thought I d go 
 up the hill and take a look round. As I was sweeping 
 the glasses from one point to another, I accidentally 
 focused on the car. What do you think I saw on the 
 rear platform? " 
 
 Father? " 
 
 " Miss Raeburn." 
 
 " Miss Raeburn ! " exclaimed Norma, breathless and 
 staring at her brother. 
 
 " Juliet Raeburn looking like a ghost but the 
 same woman. Norma, she is with father. And they 
 shut mother and us out ! " 
 
 "It can t be!" 
 
 " I tell you it was," insisted Charley. " Do you 
 suppose / don t know her? And I know now, she was 
 the nurse that side-stepped this morning." 
 
 " Charley, are you sure? " 
 
 " What do you take me for? " 
 
 Norma caught him by the lapel of his Norfolk jacket. 
 " Let s go to the hill," she cried. " Maybe she s still 
 there." 
 
 " What s the use? I tell you I looked till I was ab 
 solutely certain I wasn t dreaming." 
 
 " But I wish to see for myself." 
 
 " I say, you are upset ! What good would your see 
 ing do? You never saw her." 
 
 Norma colored violently, but her brother did not 
 observe. 
 
 " This must be cleared up at once," fumed Charley, 
 247 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 emphasizing with vicious cuts in the air with his stick. 
 " She s got to go away this very evening. Her being 
 here is an insult to mother, to us all. The papers might 
 get hold of it. It s a wonder they haven t already. I 
 suppose she was traveling with him. Well, we ll shut 
 down on this thing mighty soon." And he flung about. 
 
 Norma laid her hand on his arm. " Let me think," 
 she said imperiously. 
 
 " Think? I ve done the thinking. I m going, bang 
 off, to Blagden. I ll give him the boot, good and proper. 
 And I must tell mother." 
 
 Norma tightened her grip upon him. She could not 
 yet see, through the whirl in her agitated brain, what 
 ought to be done ; but Charley s programme instinctively 
 impressed her as what ought not to be done. " I don t 
 think Dr. Presbury " 
 
 Charley whistled. " By Jove ! I d forgot him. 
 He s in it, too. We can attend to his case when he puts 
 in his bill." 
 
 " Charley ! " cried Norma sharply. 
 
 Charley hung his head. " Well," he said defensively, 
 " we all know in the bottom of our hearts father won t 
 pull through." 
 
 Norma pressed her hands to her breast. With a 
 suddenness that was stifling it came over her how little 
 they did care about their father, how alien he was to 
 them to her even, now that she had Joe and her own 
 home and her separate and new life. " Why," she said 
 to herself, " we re no longer a family. We ve been a 
 family only in name and appearance, for years and 
 years." 
 
 " What are you looking at me like that for? " blus 
 tered Charley. 
 
 She became conscious that her thoughts were reveal- 
 248 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 ing in her expression. " I wasn t looking at you," re 
 plied she. " I was looking at at myself." 
 
 " Of course, I m sorry we all are sorry and we ll 
 be frightfully cut up " 
 
 "Don t let s talk of it please," begged Norma. 
 " As to this this other thing, I can t believe Dr. 
 Presbury would have consented to it unless there were 
 some good reason. We must first see him." 
 
 Charley opened his mouth to oppose the plan because 
 it was not his. But its wisdom was so obvious that he 
 checked himself. " Let s go, straight off." He would 
 not have confessed it, but he instinctively knew that his 
 impulses to action, like Sophy s, like those of most people 
 whom necessity does not compel, were scant of breath 
 and short of life. " Straight off ! No delay ! " 
 
 " Certainly," agreed Norma, seeing no reason for 
 delay. "At once." 
 
 As they came within sight of the three cars deep in 
 the woods Murdock s, the car for the doctors and 
 nurses, and the car for the other attendants and for 
 service they halted as abruptly as if they had been 
 challenged by a sentinel. After a moment s silence, 
 Norma said in a low tone, speaking the feeling that 
 was in her brother s mind also, " Perhaps w r e d better 
 turn back." 
 
 Just then Presbury and Blagden appeared, walking 
 slowly toward them. Into Blagden s beardless face with 
 its ruddy sensitive skin of the red-headed came a tell 
 tale look and color. " Not I," cried Charley, and he 
 advanced boldly. Norma could not but keep pace with 
 him. Before he had a chance to burst out in tactless 
 ness, she said to Presbury : " We d like to talk with you 
 alone, doctor." 
 
 Presbury halted with them; Blagden, still looking 
 17 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 the caught criminal, continued his pacing up and 
 down, but out of earshot. Presbury beamed upon the 
 brother and sister through his crisp black bushiness. 
 " Well, children what now? " 
 
 Charley scowled and, to dissipate his embarrassment 
 and inward quakings, exploded with a bullying, " Look 
 here, Presbury, we want to get at the bottom of this 
 business about the Raeburn woman father s got with 
 him." And he shook his stick menacingly. 
 
 Presbury met his eyes calmly. " The only women 
 in your father s party are five nurses. None of them 
 is named Raeburn." 
 
 " I know her well, and / saw her ! " 
 
 " There are no women here but my nurses." 
 
 " She was dressed like a nurse. It s no use to try to 
 string us further. We understand now why mother and 
 we have been kept from the car. Miss Raeburn must 
 leave at once. Disgraceful ! " 
 
 Presbury s face remained grave, but his eyes twin 
 kled as if he found the boy amusing. " There will be 
 no change in the attendance on your father," said he. 
 
 Charley was not of the wise who never join issue 
 until they are prepared for every possible event. Pres^ 
 bury s " impudence " took him wholly by surprise. 
 While he was swelling his chest and rearing his head 
 and casting about for the reply that would crush, Norma 
 interfered with a gentle, but positive, " We feel, doctor, 
 that we are entitled to an explanation. That is all. I 
 think you yourself will admit it." 
 
 Presbury s manner changed to courteous attention 
 as he shifted his eyes from the flushed arrogant boy to 
 the sweet face of his sister. " I have explained," said he* 
 
 Charley shook his stick in the air. " Come ! Come ! " 
 he cried. " It s no use to tell us any more lies." 
 
 250 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 Presbury ignored him ; Norma frowned at him. * Be 
 still," she said sharply, " and stop making silly passes 
 with that stick." Then to Presbury: "Please don t 
 think we ve come meddling in your affairs. But Charley 
 has seen. He is positive. If trouble is to be averted^ 
 don t you think you had better be frank ? " 
 
 Presbury debated. " You are right," he answered 
 her at length. " But really there is little to tell. I 
 know of no Miss Raeburn. One of your father s nurses 
 is a Miss Ray." 
 
 " I knew it ! " exclaimed Charley. That s she ! " 
 
 Presbury proceeded as if there had been no interrup 
 tion. " She is indispensable. If he is to pull through, 
 she must remain with him. There has been no deception 
 as to his condition. He is practically unconscious and 
 has been, except when he was delirious. She watches 
 over him night and day. She does for him eagerly the 
 services the lowest menials shrink from and neglect* 
 As soon as he is out of danger or " Dr. Presbury 
 paused; Norma trembled, and her brother lowered his 
 angry eyes. The doctor ended in a lower tone, " She 
 will then go at once." 
 
 Tears were in Norma s eyes. " She will then go at 
 once." Norma felt it was disloyal, immoral, but she 
 could not crush down sympathy for this woman who 
 would have to " go at once." She recalled Juliet Rae 
 burn as she had seen her in New York a generous, 
 high-minded woman, if ever there was one and so beau 
 tiful in her strength of self-reliance. What a sacri 
 fice! 
 
 The silence was broken by Presbury. " Has your 
 brother told anyone else? " 
 
 " No," said she, blushing deeply. 
 
 " Not yet," muttered Charley, with sullen obstinacy. 
 251 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " If I may be permitted to advise," continued Pres 
 bury, " don t tell your mother. If you do, one of two 
 things will happen: Either she will stay on, with her 
 unhappiness greatly increased, or she will leave, making 
 an unnecessary and painful scandal." 
 
 " Not at all ! " cried the young man, moving threat 
 eningly toward Presbury, who had half turned his back 
 on him. " There is another the real alternative. That 
 woman will leave." 
 
 " She will not leave," said Presbury, and his voice 
 had the hardness of inflexible purpose. 
 
 " I say she shall. Norma and I will not protect her. 
 Her presence is an insult to my mother, to us. She must 
 be exposed and driven out." 
 
 " She probably cares little whether she is exposed 
 or not," said the doctor, and his expression was strange 
 ly unlike his usual cynical incredulity. " I fancy, if she 
 had been that sort, she d not have come." 
 
 Norma began to see the situation from all sides ; but 
 Charley burst out afresh : " And you d let her stay on 
 here, insulting my mother, when you admit she is a a 
 low character ! " 
 
 Again Presbury turned his attention to the boy. 
 " I did not admit she was a low character, young 
 man," said he, his voice even, his eyes ominous. " The 
 
 erse." 
 
 " I shall telegraph to New York at once for other 
 physicians. As soon as they come you will consider 
 your service here at an end." 
 
 Presbury returned to Norma. It was apparent that 
 the last grains of his patience were fast running out. 
 "Any physician," said he, coldly polite, "would do 
 as I am doing, Mrs. Degarmo. You d better use 
 what influence you may have with this boy to prevent 
 
 252 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 a nasty scandal. But, nothing any of you do or try 
 to do will change the present surroundings of your 
 father." 
 
 " Come on ! " cried Charley to Norma. " We ll con 
 sult mother, and get physicians with a sense of decency. 
 This fellow is evidently in that woman s pay." 
 
 Norma swifter than thought threw herself between ; 
 her brother and Presbury. The hand, powerful as a 
 butcher s, that reached out for the boy, fell upon her, 
 upon her shoulder, wrenching it, crushing the flesh, 
 branding into it marks that remained for weeks. But 
 she hardly noted the pain, so fascinated was she by the 
 transformation of that usually imperturbable, lightly 
 satiric face into gorgonish fury. Every one of those 
 crisp black hairs of eyebrow and beard seemed to twist 
 and hiss its separate venom. Norma had always ridi 
 culed beards ; she saw now why nature had given them 
 to men. But while she was reveling in the tempest 
 across whose path she had thrown herself, it vanished. 
 " I beg your pardon, Mrs. Degarmo," exclaimed Pres 
 bury contritely. " I beg your pardon." And he was 
 once more the suave, lightly derisive mocker at human 
 ity s twin besetting terrors, life and $eath. 
 
 Before Norma could reply Charley pushed her 
 roughly aside. " I repeat what I said. You are in that 
 woman s pay." And he glared into Presbury s face. 
 
 But the doctor was now *n control of himself. " As , 
 you please," replied he. " Don t let him make a mess, 
 if you can help it, Mrs. Degarmo. I fear I hurt your 
 shoulder." 
 
 " It is nothing nothing, I assure you," said Norma, 
 though the pain was now shooting through her arm 
 and chest. 
 
 Presbury lifted his hat to her, walked away. 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " I really ought to have taken one good crack at 
 him," growled Charley. " Did he hurt you? " 
 
 Norma laughed sarcastically. " What a disgusting 
 exhibition you are! If I were a man and had made 
 such a fool of myself, I d sneak away until it was for 
 gotten." 
 
 But Charley was too well content with himself to be 
 shamed into reasonableness. " Come along," said he. 
 " We must get busy." 
 
 "What do you intend to do?" demanded she, the 
 pain goading her to rage against his blundering folly. 
 
 " Why that s settled. We re going to mother." 
 
 " But father The doctor may be right." 
 
 "And what if he is right? We must defend our 
 mother." 
 
 They heard quick steps behind them, halted and 
 turned. It was Blagden. Charley flamed out again. 
 He was not quite satisfied with the figure he had cut 
 before Presbury. The opportunity to rehabilitate him 
 self by thoroughly bullying a dependent was not to be 
 neglected. " What do you mean ? " he demanded. 
 " What do you mean by conspiring to insult my 
 mother?" 
 
 In other circumstances Blagden would have resented 
 the insolence of the tone and of the question, for he was 
 courtier only where he gave his respect, and for Charley 
 Murdock he had no respect. As it was, he showed his 
 feelings in his expression alone. " Go slow there, 
 Charley," he said friendlily. " I ve been doing what I 
 thought was for the best, what I know is for the best. 
 Presbury s right. If she s sent away, it s all up 
 with your father. I refused to be responsible for his 
 death." 
 
 Charley sneered. " I suppose you ve been fetch-and-- 
 254 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 carry between him and her so long that you ve lost all 
 moral sense." 
 
 With her father s own eyes, so terrible in wrath, 
 Norma faced her brother. " Haven t you any brains 
 at all?" cried she. "You are insufferable! I agree 
 with the doctor and Mr. Blagden." 
 
 " Oh, you do! " jeered Charley. Well, if father 
 gets well, which he won t, you d be right in it on his 
 money, wouldn t you? But you ll slip up, my dear sis 
 ter. And you ll wish you d consulted your pride." 
 
 " Pride ! " Norma concentrated her full capacity of 
 scorn upon her tone. " So, that is your idea of pride, 
 is it? " She remembered Blagden, and was ashamed that 
 an outsider should see this ugly dance of family skele 
 tons. " Leave us, if you please, Mr. Blagden," said she, 
 politely enough but with a distinct suggestion of the 
 tone for employees. 
 
 Blagden, whose pride was simply the conventional 
 vanity, was in too great an inward turmoil even to note 
 such a subtle detail. " Certainly, Mrs. Degarmo," re 
 plied he, eagerly conciliatory. Then to both of them: 
 " I hope you will spare Mrs. Murdock. I assure you, 
 no matter what doctors you get " 
 
 " Clear out ! " ordered Charley roughly. " And 
 don t you worry about our affairs. The doctors we 
 get will do what they re told to do by whoever s going 
 to pay them. You ought to know that you who are 
 doing a man s dirtiest work for pay." 
 
 " I apologize for him," cried Norma, though the sec 
 retary s fury did not alarm her as had Presbury s. 
 " Mr. Blagden, I know you ve been insulted by this 
 miserable brother of mine, but I beg you, for the 
 sake of father and mother, don t punish him as he de 
 serves." 
 
 255 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " Punish me ! I say, that s good," laughed Charley, 
 who was Blagden s equal, perhaps his superior in physi 
 cal strength. 
 
 Norma wheeled on him. " So ! " she cried. " You 
 insult men whom you feel confident you need not be afraid 
 of. You wretched coward ! " 
 
 Blagden took advantage of their absorption in their 
 quarrel precipitately to leave them. " Now," she contin 
 ued, " we ll go to mother if you insist on making a mess 
 and a scandal. I knew you hadn t much brains, but I 
 never dreamed you were a coward. I knew you were a 
 byword for lack of tact, but I didn t think you d carry 
 it to the point of murder." 
 
 " Murder or no murder, I say that woman and her 
 crowd of low creatures have got to be swept out of 
 mother s neighborhood. I ve heard women haven t any 
 real sense of decency. It must be true. But I ve got 
 it, enough for the whole family. And, by God, this 
 Raeburn woman has got to leave." 
 
 Norma was at such a pitch of exasperation that she 
 did not care what happened. " Come on ! " cried she. 
 " I wash my hands of you." 
 
 But, behind his violent gestures and language, 
 Charley s spasm of outraged virtue was subsiding even 
 more swiftly than it had risen. He had inherited his 
 mother s aversion to trouble, as well as her fitful and 
 capricious temper. Also, he had her fundamental lack 
 of self-confidence, aggravated by the fact that never in 
 his life had he had to act wholly on his own responsibil 
 ity, with the certainty that the consequences could not be 
 shifted ; there had always been his mother to excuse and 
 defend him, his father to protect him and settle the bills. 
 He was much relieved, when they reached the car, to find 
 that his mother was taking a nap. 
 
 256 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 " I ll not wake her," said he, in his surly voice the 
 note of weakness that was familiar to his sister. 
 
 " As you please," retorted she curtly, moving away 
 from him. 
 
 " Hold on. Where are you going ? Let s take a 
 walk, and talk things over for half an hour." 
 
 " I ve got something else to do." 
 
 " You know I m always open to reason," pleaded 
 Charley weakly. He was irritated with himself for hav 
 ing gone so far. Now, he had got himself into the plight 
 that is the frequent lot of those who mistake for will the 
 absence of will shown in bluster, obstinacy, and ill-tem 
 per. 
 
 " Make a scandal and kill your father, if you like," 
 said Norma, sure that he would do nothing. And she 
 retired to her compartment, to have Katy rub embroca 
 tion into her aching shoulder. 
 
 Charley, after hanging uncertainly about the steps 
 for a few minutes, heard his mother s voice, and precipi 
 tately struck into the woods. Blagden was watching 
 from afar. As the " young idiot " disappeared he has 
 tened forward and entered the car. Sophy, just emerged 
 from her nap, greeted him with her usual affectionate 
 friendliness. He saw at once that she knew nothing, 
 that he was therefore free to adopt the most satisfactory 
 of the several alternatives he had carefully thought out. 
 " You haven t seen Charley ? " he began. 
 
 " Not since lunch," replied she. As she had come 
 to look upon him as almost of the family, she was not 
 concealing her satisfaction over a new teagown, but was 
 admiring it or rather, herself in it in one of the many 
 mirrors wherewith the car was decorated. She was vain 
 of her throat, which looked best in dresses open at the 
 neck; collars pushed it up into a too heavy chin. The 
 
 257 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 particular feature of the new teagown was the arrange 
 ment of the lace at the neck. 
 
 " That s a charming gown," said Blagden, whose 
 chief topic with Sophy was dress and style and that 
 the talk was interesting and improving was shown by 
 the fact that Sophy had not been so alive or so particu 
 lar about herself in years, not since before Norma was 
 born. Blagden, with the serious air of a connoisseur on 
 a jury, walked round her, viewing the garment from all 
 points. " Most becoming," was his verdict. " But 
 then," he added in the same judicial, impartial manner, 
 " you ve been looking wonderfully well of late. So it s 
 not altogether the teagown." 
 
 If he had spoken what his eyes said as they lingered 
 upon her soft white throat, she would have been insulted, 
 ashamed, furious at him. But she delighted in his look, 
 with not the least sense of violated modesty. " Thank 
 you," said she. " I m afraid it s too youthful." 
 
 He laughed. " It always seems ridiculous to me 
 that you have grown children." 
 
 Sophy was rosy with pleasure. Without in the 
 least realizing it she would not have permitted herself 
 to realize a thing so subversive of the rigidities she had 
 always preached and had never been seriously tempted 
 to stretch she had fallen into the habit of looking 
 forward to Blagden s compliments of eye and tone as 
 the most agreeable events in her " melancholy life." 
 A greater factor in her improved appearance than the 
 air and the outdoor life, greater even than the fact 
 that she was now having things to think about, and so 
 was no longer revolving round her three meals a day, 
 as anyone will who lets himself sink to the life she led 
 at Saint X the greatest factor of all in her improve 
 ment was the stimulus of Blagden, really interested in 
 
 258 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 her, able to talk to her so that she would listen and 
 could understand. 
 
 " How is everything at the car ! " she asked. They 
 rarely spoke of Murdock except as " the car." 
 
 Blagden became grave. " That recalls me," said 
 he. " I m glad you haven t seen the boy. He has made 
 a discovery, and I feared he d tell you and, by taking 
 you unprepared, hurry you into action you d after 
 wards repent." 
 
 Sophy turned crossly from the mirror. " What 
 now? " she inquired. 
 
 " My dear friend, it s a matter I ve been doing 
 everything in my power to keep from you. God knows, 
 you ve enough to make your heart heavy and sad." 
 
 " I suppose he s worse." 
 
 " On the contrary, slightly better though there 
 is still no hope only the shadow of hope." 
 
 " Then whatever can it be? " 
 
 " Nothing but the expected in the circumstances. 
 9 . . Miss Raeburn is here." 
 
 Sophy straightened; her eyes flashed, her nostrils 
 dilated. Blagden saw that he was indeed in for a 
 stretch of extremely delicate driving. 
 
 " Charley saw her," he pursued, ignoring the signs 
 that she was about to flare up, though he was inwardly 
 trembling. " She forced her way in frightful bad 
 taste, wasn t it? Of course, they don t dare remove 
 her. The slightest irritation would kill him instantly. 
 Charley, thinking of you and forgetting everything 
 else, including the danger of a terrible and utterly un 
 necessary newspaper scandal, is all for ordering her 
 and the doctors off forthwith. But I know you don t 
 want that. It s a very difficult situation, isn t it?" 
 
 Sophy had developed a great respect for Blagden, 
 259 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 as well as liking ; she was anxious to maintain his good 
 opinion of her, and also she thought his judgment in 
 fallible in all matters of " the world." Still, the news 
 he brought set her primal passions to boiling. She 
 did not want to be Murdock s nurse ; but that woman 
 at the post rightfully her own under every law of God 
 and man, that woman watching over him while she 
 herself was not permitted even to see him " I ll not 
 endure it ! " she cried, in a suffocating voice. " Was 
 ever wife and mother so outraged ! " 
 
 " You are right, Mrs. Murdock," said Blagden, 
 deeply moved. " It has made me angry every time I ve 
 thought of it. Never was there such a situation ! Dr. 
 Presbury, who is the only other person in the secret, 
 is as indignant as I am. But She would not go 
 quietly, even if they dared try to get rid of her. Shall 
 she be driven away with great scandal, and with the in 
 evitable result that he will die? Would anything jus 
 tify us in deliberately killing him? " 
 
 "But he knows I m here!" 
 
 " Probably not. His mind is very vague. He s 
 really not conscious." 
 
 " Then he wouldn t know if she left." 
 
 Blagden s greenish eyes watched her jealously as he 
 said with a certain zest, " He has but one idea that 
 she is there and must not leave him. If you send her 
 away, he will burst into a rage and die. When I 
 insisted that you be told, Dr. Presbury said, You are 
 proposing murder. He says he himself will throw up 
 the case and leave if she goes. You can see for your 
 self, that alone would mean a huge scandal. Mrs. Mur 
 dock " solemnly " on my honor, I believe the doc 
 tors are right. It would kill him." 
 
 "I don t care! I don t care!" shrilled Sophy. 
 260 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 " He s nothing to me ! Hasn t he dragged me through 
 the depths of humiliation? I will not be outraged by 
 that creature s presence. She shall go, and go at 
 once ! " And she blazed upon Blagden. " Do you 
 hear?" 
 
 He lost his nerve; but his judgment did not desert 
 him in that moment of peril to all his plans. " What 
 ever you say shall be done," replied he humbly. u For 
 give me, I must speak my mind my dear friend." 
 And his judgment enabled him to pluck up courage 
 to say, " If he dies, the whole country will have it that 
 you, though about to divorce him, made a scene at his 
 bedside that caused his death." 
 
 The ice of this drenched Sophy s wrath. She had 
 forgotten having led Blagden to believe her the ag 
 gressor in the divorce suit. 
 
 " If he gets well," he went on, feeling his way a 
 little less timidly, " you know how relentless he is. He 
 will justify himself in any tyrannical course; he will 
 say to himself that you demonstrated your utter in 
 difference to him." 
 
 Sophy listened limply, encouraged him with a de 
 spairing roll of the eyes. 
 
 " You can drive her away, my friend," said he more 
 strongly, after a painful pause. " But any punish 
 ment you inflict on her will be mild beside what you 
 bring upon yourself. And if he should die, leaving a 
 will unfavorable to you Would not your having 
 hastened his death strengthen her case? Of course, 
 if he lives But you can imagine better than I what 
 would happen in that case." 
 
 Blagden still felt he might as hopefully be arguing; 
 with a runaway horse. He was expert enough at hu 
 man nature to know that the real motives, even of good 
 
 261 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 and worthy people, are not always those so gallantly 
 displayed on dress parade ; but he had not yet had the 
 fullness of experience that finally teaches how decisive 
 the motives of prudence always are, if they get a hear 
 ing. When he finished she turned, dropped into a 
 chair. " What shall I do ? " asked she helplessly. 
 " You ve had experience. Advise me." 
 
 Blagden, astounded by victory as unexpected as 
 complete, could not immediately frame an answer. 
 
 " And Charley and Norma know, too," she went on 
 dolefully. "What will they think of me if I submit 
 to it?" 
 
 This gave Blagden an inspiration. " Mrs. De- 
 garmo has been trying to persuade Charley not to tell 
 you. It may be she has succeeded. If so, you need 
 do nothing but hold your peace. When the crisis is 
 past you can act quietly and with dignity. . . . Per 
 haps you will will honor me by trusting me to act 
 for you ? " 
 
 " Yes yes thank you ! " she exclaimed, impul 
 sively giving him her beautiful hand which he took 
 and ventured to press with gratitude almost reverent. 
 Then, " But suppose Charley tells me," she said in dis 
 may. " He probably will. He never could keep any 
 thing, and he hasn t any sense. If he had " angrily 
 " he d have kept what he saw to himself, instead of 
 blabbing it and getting ready to worry me with it. 
 Whatever should I have done without you, Mr. Blag 
 den? It seems as if God must have sent you to help 
 me through this dreadful experience." And again that 
 slender, delicately proportioned hand of hers touched 
 his. 
 
 Blagden, proud and masterful, spoke out in a ring 
 ing voice : " If Charley does tell you, order him to be- 
 
 262 
 
CHARLEY S FIELD GLASSES 
 
 have himself and not draw the family into a scandal. 
 You will easily control him, with Mrs. Degarmo to 
 help you." 
 
 Such angry feeling as Sophy had left now took 
 the form of resentment against " that meddling boy." 
 However, with Blagden s eye warningly and encourag 
 ingly upon her when Charley came, she contrived to 
 keep her countenance. He gave Blagden a frightened 
 look. But seeing how quietly the conversation wan 
 dered among indifferent subjects, he became reassured; 
 Sophy s uneasiness was completely covered from his 
 unobserving eyes by pretended diligence at her center 
 piece. With the tea came Norma. She looked inquir 
 ingly at her brother who, after a furtive glance at his 
 mother and Blagden, shook his head. " I ve changed 
 my mind," he said in an undertone. 
 
 She patted his shoulder. " I m glad," replied she. 
 [And when Blagden left, she went with him to the plat 
 form to say, " Charley has come to his senses." 
 
 " Good ! Now all will go smoothly." 
 
 " I hope so." Norma gave a dubious, anxious sigh. 
 " I ve been praying for the end of the crisis in father s 
 illness. Now I d do anything to put it off." 
 
 Blagden, his generous, kindly instincts roused by 
 her unhappiness, said in a tone that could not but 
 reassure, "Trust me, Mrs. Degarmo. All will go 
 smoothly." 
 
 Norma thanked him with a look. And for the mo 
 ment she did feel encouraged. " What a good fellow 
 Blagden is ! " thought she. " No wonder we re always 
 congratulating ourselves on our luck in having him 
 here. If anything happens to father, Joe must look 
 out for him." 
 
XVIII 
 
 SOPHY AND JULIET 
 
 EARLY the following morning Charley was awak 
 ened by a knock at his door. "What is it? Who is 
 it ? " he mumbled. 
 
 His mother s voice answered : " I want you to bring 
 Dr. Presbury right away. I can t stand it. That 
 woman has got to go ! It isn t decent." 
 
 Charley opened the door, stared stupidly at his 
 mother s sallow face and bloodshot eyes. " Who told 
 you ? " he demanded. Then, " It was Blagden the 
 damned hound ! " 
 
 " Never mind who told me. And Mr. Blagden is 
 a gentleman. But I can t endure it. I ve not closed 
 my eyes. I could hardly wait for day. I ll die myself 
 if that woman stays." 
 
 Charley, in gaudily striped silk pyjamas, sat on the 
 edge of his bed and stared gloomily at his bare feet. 
 " What if she refuses," he finally suggested, " and the 
 doctor backs her up? You don t want to go off at 
 half-cock, mother. That was a rotten dinner we had 
 last night. It kept me awake till all hours, and / feel 
 like shooting up the place myself this morning." 
 
 This humble, even vulgar explanation of her night 
 of anguish and her morning of high moral resolve set 
 Sophy to exploding afresh. She released the dress 
 ing gown she was holding together over her bosom 
 
 264 
 
SOPHY AND JULIET 
 
 and wrung her hands wildly. " I won t listen I 
 won t ! Do you want me to die ? All night I lay feel 
 ing her gloat over me." Her words were borne out 
 ,by her hysterical dishevelment corsetless, hair this 
 way and that, eyes rolling insanely, voice shrill and out 
 of control. Her very nose, usually a thing of beauty, 
 no matter how her other features looked, seemed to 
 Lave lost its symmetry. " Will you go for Dr. Pres- 
 bury," she all but screamed, " or do I have to send 
 somebody else? " 
 
 " I ll go," said he. " Just as soon as I can take 
 my bath and get into my clothes." 
 
 " Be quick ! " And she drew his door to and went 
 away. 
 
 He dressed hurriedly; but instead of setting out, 
 he went to Norma, who was in their dining car, gaz 
 ing moodily into her coffee. " Now, mother s on the 
 rampage ! " cried he, seating himself but making no 
 move toward eating. " That red-head did tell her. 
 And she had an attack of indigestion last night it 
 seems to have hit you, too. Anyhow she says Miss 
 Raeburn s got to go." 
 
 Norma drew a huge breath of relief. "Well, at 
 least something will happen. It may be wicked to feel 
 so, but I don t much care what." As Charley had said, 
 she was showing that she had passed a bad night. 
 
 You women have no self-control at all, have 
 you ? " said Charley. And now he began to eat. 
 " Mother is saying she can t live, if that woman s here. 
 She wants me to dash off for Presbury." 
 
 "Why don t you bring him? Let s have it over 
 with." 
 
 " There s no need to rush. Besides, I find I m hun 
 gry. The muffins look fine this morning. It ll take 
 18 265 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 lier a long time to dress, judging by the state she was 
 in when I saw her. And she wouldn t let anybody see 
 her till she s dressed. Mother s getting mighty par- j 
 ticular about her appearance lately. . . . Well, I m * 
 glad to see it. I like this Philadelphia butter better 
 than that last. It s not so salt. Just jiggle that but 
 ton, won t you? I want some fresh coffee, and this 
 milk s cold as charity." 
 
 " May I go ipith you ? " 
 
 " I wish you would ! You know, I rowed him yes 
 terday." And Charley, feeling that the load of re 
 sponsibility had been lifted from him, fell more ener 
 getically upon the breakfast fruit and oatmeal, a 
 chop, several muffins, two great bowls of coffee. Norma 
 did not interrupt, did not try to hurry him. Not until 
 he finished his coffee and lighted a cigarette did she 
 move toward a start. 
 
 " What are you going to say to him, sis ? " he 
 asked as they set out through the bright, buoyant, 
 early morning air. 
 
 " Nothing beyond telling him mother wants to 
 see him about about it." 
 
 Arrived at the other settlement, they found Pres- 
 bury and Blagden breakfasting in the doctor s car. 
 When Norma explained their early visit, Blagden grew 
 white. Presbury simply said, " Um m ! " and smoked 
 on at his long, golden-brown cigar. A moment s si 
 lence, and Norma, who was looking out of the window, 
 rose with an exclamation of terror so acute that the 
 three men sprang to their feet. 
 
 " Mother ! " she gasped, her eyes wide and her hand 
 tight upon her heart. 
 
 And she darted out and down the steps, just in 
 time to see her mother wave aside the guard at the 
 
 266 
 
SOPHY AND JULIET 
 
 farther and rear platform of Murdock s car and as 
 cend. Before she could start in pursuit, Presbury 
 caught her sharply by the arm. " No," commanded 
 he. " Let me go." 
 
 He strode along the narrow path worn in the grass, 
 parallel to the three cars. The others, watching him 
 breathlessly, were astonished to see him pause at the 
 rear steps, glance up at the platform, draw quickly 
 back, then beckon the stupefied guard to come away. 
 When he rejoined them with the guard beside him, he 
 said in a casual tone, for the guard s benefit, " Mrs. 
 Murdock and Miss Ray are talking together on the 
 platform. I m sending the guard here to the station, 
 to find out whether the express will be on time. I m 
 expecting some decent chicken and a few duck. Isn t 
 the stuff round here wretched? But then, the country s 
 always a horrible place for feeding." 
 
 As the guard drew away from them, Blagden ex 
 claimed in great agitation, " But, doctor, is it wise 
 
 The doctor cut him off with a gesture. " Miss 
 Ray," said he tranquilly, " will not permit anyone to 
 disturb the patient." 
 
 " But mother may " began Norma, and stopped 
 because to have gone on would have been to bring too 
 near the surface thoughts about her mother of which 
 she was ashamed. 
 
 " Let the two women talk it out," pursued the doc 
 tor. " Trust Miss Ray to handle the situation. Let s 
 go back to breakfast. I don t enjoy smoking in the open 
 air." And he waved them up the steps. 
 
 In Murdock s car the windows to the south were kept 
 open, day and night, to admit the cool, healing air of the 
 
 267 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 forests ; the windows to the north were closed and cur 
 tained because the path ran along that side. Juliet Rae- 
 burn, standing between his couch and the closed middle 
 windows double windows of thick plate glass heavily 
 curtained heard Mrs. Murdock coming along the path. 
 Those nights and days of almost sleepless vigil had 
 sharpened all her senses ; the faintest sound made a dis 
 tinct impression on her. As she watched, she had been 
 haunted by the two fears, fear of two intruders the 
 one who could take him from her, the one who could drive 
 her from him. The sound that penetrated to her from 
 the path that morning would not have been heard 
 through those barriers by a normal human hearing, how 
 ever acute ; yet she not only heard it, but heard that it 
 was hurried, that it was feminine, that it was made by 
 none of those who habitually came to the car. 
 
 An instant of suffocating tightening at the heart; 
 then her nerves responded to her will, and she went 
 hastily to meet the intruder. As she went, she closed 
 and curtained the three successive doors between the 
 platform and the room where he lay in that baffling 
 otupor, in which he yet seemed to be conscious of her 
 .low else explain the fact that he became restless if she 
 left him more than a few minutes, and quieted the mo 
 ment she returned? Sophy had just reached the plat 
 form when Juliet came out of the car. It was an obser 
 vation platform, wide and broad; but the two women 
 were face to face and very near. Juliet had the advan 
 tage because Sophy was completely out of breath from 
 the haste of her coming and from the violence of the 
 passions which had been roused from lethargy and had 
 goaded her to act for herself. 
 
 "You came to inquire about Mr. Murdock?" said 
 Juliet. She saw the guard and Dr. Presbury at the 
 
 268 
 
SOPHY AND JULIET 
 
 steps, looking up at her; she calmly motioned them 
 away. " He is a little better this morning, they think," 
 she went on. " But he s still apparently unconscious." 
 
 Sophy, who had been speechless from exertion, was 
 now speechless from astonishment. She had no very defi 
 nite conception of the appearance of the woman who 
 had " stolen my husband," beyond a general idea that 
 she dressed so that even men observed and admired, that 
 she was extremely beautiful and had a figure of devilish 
 allurement. She knew this woman was the one she 
 sought; yet where was the beauty of dress, of face, of 
 figure? Here was a homely woman, emaciated, gaunt of 
 features, and ghastly pale, and dressed in an ill-fitting 
 nurse s costume that made her angular and hollow- 
 chested. Not a trace of coquetry ; a wan, worn creature, 
 with no beauty save possibly a pair of great dark gray 
 eyes that looked at her sweetly and dauntlessly. Sophy 
 was confounded. 
 
 " I am Mr. Murdock s wife," was all she could think 
 to say. 
 
 Miss Raeburn bent her head in a slight bow. " I 
 knew," said she. " I am one of the nurses." 
 
 "Which one?" 
 
 A tiny spot of color glowed in each of Juliet s hollow 
 cheeks and vanished. " I am the one called Miss Ray." 
 
 In those honest direct eyes, in that gentle voice there 
 was no incitement to wrath. Sophy Murdock had a 
 good heart, and persistent ill health was no longer poi 
 soning it ; she could not resist the appeal to sympathy, 
 to pity even, which this woman s appearance made for 
 her. The things she had come to say would not issue. 
 She trembled with embarrassment before Juliet standing 
 silent, courteous. From the bottom of her heart she 
 wished she had not come. " I m too soft," she said to 
 
 269 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 herself. Yet, now that she was there, how go without 
 speaking? She gave Juliet a look of appeal. " Don t 
 you think," said she, with painful embarrassment, " that 
 it s about time his own family took charge of him? " 
 
 " It is such a difficult case," replied Juliet, " that I 
 believe the doctors are right. He lies there, hardly mov 
 ing, occasionally opening his eyes, never speaking. It 
 is very strange and terrible. You would like to see him ? 
 If you will make no sound, I ll violate orders and take 
 you in." 
 
 Sophy shrank. " No no," she muttered. " You 
 are very kind, but that is no." 
 
 " It would only make you feel more unhappy." 
 
 Sophy was desperate. She made a great effort and 
 said crossly, " You have no right to be here." 
 
 " Does it make any difference who is here now, so 
 long as it is some one with strength to do the work? " 
 
 Sophy s gaze, after vainly trying to center upon 
 Juliet s eyes, wandered again. " I don t see how you 
 can stay any longer," she said, in a helpless, pleading 
 way. " It isn t proper. I can t . . . can t allow it." 
 
 " It seems as strange to me as to you that I am 
 here," Juliet replied. " I would go if it weren t that the 
 doctor says any change during this crisis would sure 
 ly " She did not finish, did not need to finish. 
 
 "Is it so?" asked Sophy. 
 
 " It is," replied Juliet. And her eyes and her tone 
 made Sophy feel the black intruder seated beside Mur- 
 dock s couch, waiting with hideous patience for the least 
 relaxing of effort. 
 
 " Oh ! " she murmured. The color was out of her 
 face, the anger out of her heart. " I ve been thinking 
 they were deceiving me," she added apologetically. 
 
 " I know you feel as I do that we mustn t consider 
 270 
 
SOPHY* AND JULIET 
 
 ourselves, only him." Juliet, wan, haggard, looked at 
 Sophy with eyes death itself could not have made more 
 moving. " Don t you think I d better stay until we 
 know?" 
 
 Sophy paled, reddened ; the tears welled up. " 1 
 can t be the cause of any harm to him. I can t I 
 can t I" 
 
 And without looking at Juliet again, she turned, de 
 scended, departed. Juliet stood without motion, her 
 gaze fixed on the point at which his wife had disap 
 peared. She drew a long, long breath, opened the outer 
 door of the car, stepped within, fell upon her knees. WitK 
 the sobs shaking her wasted frame, she repeated softly, 
 again and again : " Thank God ! Thank God ! " 
 
 Norma and Charley kept away from their mother 
 until lunch. When they, much embarrassed, faced her, 
 even more so, she said in a queer defiant tone, " I ve seen 
 her and we ve come to an understanding." No one 
 pressed her for an explanation nor did she press her 
 inmost self where this strange decision had been reached. 
 She felt that her flareout was probably due to the ignoble 
 cause Charley had assigned. As for letting Juliet stay, 
 while it was absurdly not to say immorally out of ac 
 cord with conventionality, it was somehow in perfect \ 
 accord with conscience. And she pried into herself no 
 \further. There was, however, a cause for the content 
 of conscience, a highly interesting cause, one that would 
 have scandalized her had she known it another in 
 stance of the advantage of not knowing what is going 
 on in one s own mind and heart. 
 
 Blagden, bent on having Sophy as near to his physi 
 cal ideal as he saw she could easily be, had been beguil 
 ing her into long and ever longer walks ; and his prac 
 tical interest had been stimulating her to take care of 
 
 271 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 herself, to permit and even to urge Katy to make her 
 toilet elaborately. No longer was she slovenly in the 
 morning and dressed-up looking in the afternoon, and at 
 all times suggestive of bulk and semifluidity. Her hair 
 was washed and kept in condition by a preparation sup 
 plied by Blagden. Her hands were as presentable as 
 her feet, Katy having got some simple instructions in 
 manicuring from Norma s Celeste. She had a figure 
 once more, large but definite ; and her contour was begin 
 ning to reappear from its long hiding within heavy 
 cheeks. Even in the case of a woman with no one really 
 generous gift from nature an amazingly small amount 
 of taste and intelligent persistence will produce marvel 
 ous results. Where the woman has fine eyes, good teeth, 
 a well-formed nose, a notable skin, and hands and feet 
 that are the envy of every feminine beholder, it takes a 
 great deal of corpulence and dowdiness to extinguish 
 her title to beauty; and a very slight improvement in 
 form, personal habits, and dress goes far toward re 
 habilitating her. 
 
 Without being in the least conscious of it, or of the 
 reason for it, Sophy had been taking on the alert mental 
 attitude of the unsettled woman, as distinguished from 
 that of her who regards her fate as determined for life. 
 She talked and listened more ; she thought less lazily and 
 less disconnectedly; she took increasing pleasure in the 
 company of Mr. Blagden " such a nice young man, so 
 well educated, so well bred, such an interesting way of 
 saying things." The dog wags its tail, the baby crows 
 and chortles, at whomever it relies upon for food; and 
 we are only natural when we soften more and more 
 toward whoever supplies our hearts, our vanities, our 
 souls, with the ambrosia of consideration and the nectar 
 of compliment. In those years when Sophy had been 
 
 272 
 
SOPHY AND JULIET 
 
 abandoned to the fate her indolence invited, made all but 
 inevitable, the fairest part of her nature had wilted and 
 withered her gentleness, her sweetness, her desire to 
 please. Now, its response was as prompt, as eager, as the 
 earth s to spring s returning sun. 
 
 And now that she had seen " the Raeburn woman," 
 she lost all jealousy. " I can t imagine what a man could 
 find in a poor, peaked, pinched creature like that," she 
 said to herself. " I don t wonder Mr. Blagden made 
 light of it." She was " spiritual-minded " and prided 
 herself upon it, and denounced physical attraction be 
 tween the sexes as coarse and low. But the most spir 
 itually minded will, in their unguarded moments, revert 
 to the plain, every day human standards of j udgment. 
 
 As she, divested of pose, was enjoying these com 
 forting thoughts about his charmer s lack of charm, she 
 was before a mirror, admiring the figure given her by a 
 new corset with ingenious front and hip lacings. " Mr. 
 Blagden will like this. He notices everything" Her 
 maid had been begging her for more than a year to get 
 this corset, but she had refused, because she thought it 
 a waste of money. Now, vanities, even the uncomfortable 
 ones like Agnes corsets, no longer seemed sinful extrava 
 gance. " He s welcome to her," she thought, continuing 
 her musings about Juliet. " It s no wonder he couldn t 
 be content with his family he, with such poor taste as 
 that. She probably looks a little bit better when she s 
 dressed and not so worn out ; but nobody need tell me she 
 could ever be what any sane person would call attrac 
 tive." 
 
 She was not analytic and while not to be analytic 
 prevents growth and progress, it produces the tempo 
 rary joys of optimism, and is the ideal state for those 
 who wish peace of mind, wish to believe that the profes- 
 
 273 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 sions of themselves and others are their practices also. 
 She was not analytic ; hence it did not occur to her that 
 for her spirits, for her complete content with the idea 
 of divorce, for her allayed jealousy, there might be a 
 cause as out of place among her Puritan-faced princi 
 ples for the married woman as Cupid in a convent. 
 
 " He s welcome to her" said she ; and, innocent of 
 the subtle significance of the one idea upon the very 
 heels of the other, added : " I hope Mr. Blagden will look 
 in before lunch. I feel just like a walk." Wholly unsus 
 picious also was she of her succeeding reflection : " If it 
 was as pleasant to walk out home as it is here, I d not 
 mind taking old Schulze s prescription." 
 
XIX 
 
 SHE SEEMED QUITE CALM " 
 
 ANOTHER week the fifth. The family s anxiety, 
 quite exhausted, had fallen asleep ; conventional affection 
 had worn threadbare the garment of appearances ; wife 
 and children were, as Sophy piously put it, " prepared 
 to accept with resignation whatever it may please God 
 to send " which always means that death would be a 
 welcome relief, though no one is so barbarous as to say, 
 and few are so barbarous as to admit even in thought, 
 that this is their meaning. Norma, out of conceit with 
 the sensitiveness " not to say lack of trust " which 
 had led her to forbid Joe to come where he might see 
 too far behind the scenes, was beginning to be irritated 
 and a little nervous because he remained so long respect 
 ful of her prohibition. As for Charley, he was openly 
 showing his impatience and boredom. " If this had to 
 be," he growled, " at least it might have happened some 
 where near a place where a fellow might somehow amuse 
 himself." Sophy alone was tranquil a blessing she at 
 tributed to the ministrations of a Providence which ap 
 parently gave most of its time and thought exclusively 
 to her and her comfort. Never had days passed so 
 quickly, so delightfully as these, most of whose waking 
 hours found her and Blagden together, she the most 
 attentive of listeners, he educating and stimulating her 
 in the subtlest, most entertaining way imaginable. The 
 
 275 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 kind of education Sophy needed to modernize her was 
 precisely the kind his mind and tastes fitted him to im 
 part. If it was a rare opportunity for her this oppor 
 tunity to be roused and rejuvenated by a person near 
 enough to her own mentality to be understandable and 
 sympathetic it was no less a rare opportunity for him. 
 He had always been an accumulator of every kind of 
 knowledge useful to the fashionable and the luxurious 
 how to live, how to dress, how to hold on to youthful 
 appearance and to stave off age. Only from a sense of 
 family dignity was he man of affairs, instead of beauty 
 doctor or major-domo or proprietor of fashionable shop 
 or restaurant. Aside from her physical attractiveness 
 to him, Sophy had him enlisted for her, heart and mind, 
 because he saw ever larger and larger possibilities of re 
 creating her, of making her a new being he could proud 
 ly look upon as his own handiwork. In a world where 
 the vanity of creation is the most seductive of all the 
 vanities, what greater charm could one human being 
 have for another? 
 
 The thick fog over Murdock s mind had been sway 
 ing uncertainly for nearly a week. On the thirty-sev 
 enth day Presbury saw that it was not settling back, but 
 was slowly lifting to drift away. The change was 
 slight, but to his experience decisive; the crisis had 
 passed, life and love had won. Presbury knew it was 
 a question not of how many but of how few hour? 
 before that intelligence would swing clear of mist, 
 would see its surroundings. But he did not hint it 
 to Juliet. 
 
 That afternoon he called her out to the platform and 
 in the tone that asks an explanation said, " You ve sent 
 away your trunk." 
 
 276 
 
"SHE SEEMED QUITE CALM" 
 
 " I saw the change," replied she. " He will get well. 
 I may have to go at any moment." 
 
 " You ll stay as long as you like." 
 
 " You don t understand," said she. " He mustn t 
 know I ve been here." 
 
 " They " He glanced in the direction of the other 
 settlement " They ll tell him." 
 
 " I think not," replied she reflectively. " If so at 
 least I ll have done my best. I want you to promise 
 me." 
 
 Presbury shook his head. " I ll have to tell him. It 
 isn t fair to him or to you." 
 
 She gazed with unseeing eyes into that fresh, joyous 
 splendor of limitless foliage, of hills and ravines and far 
 purple mountains. As he watched her, the full force 
 of the heart-wringing contrast, between the woman who 
 had come there five weeks before and she who was about 
 to leave, swept over him for the first time. " If I did 
 my duty," said he, " I d order you to bed for a fort 
 night. You ve all but given your life for him." 
 
 She smiled. " I m stronger than you think. A week 
 or so up North and I ll be all right." 
 
 " And you are going away ! It s frightful fright 
 ful," he cried impulsively. " You must have cared for 
 him before, to brave insult and disgrace to come to him. 
 But now, he s to you what the child she s brought into 
 the world is to its mother." 
 
 " More," was all she said ; but the tone of it brought 
 the tears into his eyes. 
 
 " Yes more," he answered. " Tell him? Why, I ll 
 tell him as soon as he has the strength to hear it." 
 
 She turned her mysterious brilliant eyes upon him. 
 " No, you will not tell him," answered she. " You mis 
 understand why I don t wish him to know. In some 
 
 277 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 circumstances if he were free I d be glad. But " 
 A little color came into her cheeks as she hesitated 
 " You compel me to explain. I don t know much about 
 his life his life at home. But I m afraid if he knew 
 I had come up here he d be tempted to to " 
 
 " To divorce her. Why not? " 
 
 " That s what I d have said, before I learned what 
 this experience has taught me. I used to be relentless 
 and I didn t understand pain because I d never felt 
 it. Now after what she did for me for him and 
 
 Presbury understood, and her changed expression 
 showed it. 
 
 " You see he mustn t know I was here. You prom 
 ise?" 
 
 " Yes," said Presbury reluctantly, after a pause 
 during which he searched in vain for an argument to 
 shake her resolution. He saw that, being the woman 
 she was, she could not but go. " Yes, if you insist." 
 
 " I do insist." 
 
 " Yes I promise." 
 
 " Thank you," she said. " I know I can rely on 
 you." And she returned to Murdock s bedside. 
 
 Early the following morning, Murdock without un 
 closing his eyes said in a weak but rational tone plainly 
 rational because querulous : " Where am I ? I ve been 
 trying to puzzle it out and can t." 
 
 Juliet, at the head of the couch, rose hastily, and 
 without making the least sound withdrew out of his 
 view. 
 
 " Anybody there? " he went on, voice a little stronger 
 and crosser. 
 
 Juliet s hands were clasped tightly to her bosom. 
 Slowly she unclasped them ; slowly she stretched out one 
 
 278 
 
"SHE SEEMED QUITE CALM" 
 
 hand so thin, so transparent a hand that told the 
 whole story of those days and nights of struggle with 
 death for the life of the man she loved. Slowly the hand 
 advanced slowly and fearfully until it hovered above 
 his pillow until it almost touched his hair. Then she 
 drew it back and the two hands met at her lips to stifle 
 a sob and she went. She had snatched him from death ; 
 now life had snatched him from her. Her head swam, 
 her courage fled, and she leaned, sick and trembling, 
 against the wall of the passageway. She must go, with 
 out a word from him without a kiss or even a hand 
 clasp must go away alone alone 
 
 She heard him calling. She composed herself, went 
 to the platform. Miss Thomas was there. She sent her 
 in, hurried away to the next car. When, a few minutes 
 later, Presbury returned from his early stroll in the 
 woods he learned that she had gone. " She found she 
 might just make the express," explained Martin. " So 
 she left her good-bys with me." 
 
 " Gone ? " echoed Presbury, dumf ounded. He glanced 
 at his watch. 
 
 " Oh, she was all right," Martin assured him. 
 " Really she seemed quite calm and " 
 
 " These shallow fools ! " muttered Presbury, dash 
 ing off toward the station. As he neared the clearing he 
 saw the train ; but before he reached it, it was under way. 
 At one of the windows flying by he saw her profile. Its 
 expression he never forgot. 
 
XX 
 
 SOME STRANGE NEW YORK ADVENTURES 
 
 As he entered Murdock s car he heard in Murdock i 
 voice: " What the devil ! What does this mean? " 
 
 " Better I see much better," said Presbury. With 
 a gesture he sent Miss Thomas away. 
 
 "Where is the other nurse?" demanded Murdock 
 peremptorily, " I want her at once." 
 
 " Which one? " asked Presbury. " There are four." 
 
 " The one that s been here all the time." 
 
 " They ve all been here in turn." 
 
 Murdock sunk into sullen silence. Presently he 
 feebly turned his head and said, " Who are you? " 
 
 " I m one of the doctors Presbury." 
 
 Another silence; then, " Where am I? " 
 
 Presbury explained in detail, Murdock listening 
 without comment. " And," he ended, " you can see your 
 wife and daughter and son to-day." 
 
 Murdock s frown had deepened to a scowl. " Who 
 has been nursing me? " 
 
 " Four nurses five until this morning. One gave 
 out and had to go." 
 
 " Who was the one that was here almost all the time? 
 Oh, I knew I don t know how, but I knew." 
 
 " I think the nursing was about evenly divided. Per 
 haps Miss Ray, who left this morning, did somewhat 
 more than the others." 
 
 280 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 r^*"*^ ^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^*^^^*^* ^^ ^^^" ^^""^^ 
 
 " Ray ! . . . Was her first name What was her 
 first name?" 
 
 " Juliet." 
 
 Murdock seemed to be reflecting. After a while 
 Presbury heard him mutter : " Yes, I may have heard 
 them call her Juliet." Then to the doctor: "Have I 
 been out of my head? " 
 
 " Much of the time," replied Presbury. " The rest 
 of the time in a sort of stupor." As the nurse reentered, 
 he rose, saying : " Here is Miss Thomas. What time 
 will you see your wife? " 
 
 Murdock turned his head, scanned for the second 
 time the bright, pretty face of Miss Thomas, sighed, 
 muttered, closed his eyes wearily. His brows again gath 
 ered in a heavy frown. 
 
 " When will you see your wife? " Presbury repeated. 
 
 " How do I know ? " replied Murdock sullenly. " Is 
 it evening or morning? " 
 
 " Morning." 
 
 " Bring my my family whenever you like. But 
 they mustn t stay long. Pm very tired." 
 
 " No, indeed," said Presbury. " And no demonstra 
 tions ! " 
 
 A smile, grimly satirical, showed through the beard 
 Murdock had grown during his illness. He slept or 
 seemed to sleep. Two hours later Sophy, followed by 
 Norma, Charley, and Blagden, came in. They seated 
 themselves in awkward silence. The sick man s glance 
 went quickly from face to face, returned to the cool, 
 dark-green foliage that almost brushed the car. There 
 seemed to be nothing to say. He broke the painful si 
 lence with a question to Blagden " How s everything 
 in business? But, I suppose you d not tell me, if things 
 had gone wrong." 
 
 19 281 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 " Of course I shouldn t," replied Blagden. " But 
 it so happens that we ve had a quiet summer. Your 
 stocks slumped on the news of your accident, but they ve 
 about recovered." 
 
 " I m afraid I ve given you all a bad summer," he 
 said, addressing himself to Norma. 
 
 " Indeed you have," replied she cheerfully. " But, 
 thank heaven, it s over." 
 
 "And Joe?" 
 
 " He wanted to come, but I wouldn t have it. We ll 
 take you with us to Bar Harbor as soon as you re able 
 to travel. You ll have the sea as well as the mountains 
 there." 
 
 Murdock made no reply. He lay listless, frown 
 ing. Dr. Presbury appeared in the doorway. This 
 was the signal agreed upon. Blagden rose. " Our 
 orders are to stay only a minute to-day," he ex 
 plained. 
 
 " That s right," said Murdock, too weak to hide his 
 relief. " Perhaps one of you say Norma will come 
 again this afternoon. But I m not going to allow you to 
 bore yourselves with me. When can I send them all 
 away, Presbury?" 
 
 " We ll see about that." 
 
 " Didn t you say I was out of danger? " insisted 
 Murdock, irritable at once. 
 
 " Certainly you are. But " 
 
 " Appearances, I suppose you mean. Well, appear 
 ances be damned. It ll retard my recovery if I ve got 
 it on my mind that a lot of people are waiting impa 
 tiently about." 
 
 " We ll talk of this later. You must rest now." 
 
 The family and Presbury withdrew. Presbury was 
 about to accompany them to their car when the nurse 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 called him. " Mr. Murdock wishes to speak to you," 
 said she. 
 
 As he entered, Murdock said, " Are we alone ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Now, tell me the truth about the nurses about 
 that nurse." 
 
 " I have told you all there is to tell." 
 
 " I wish to see the nurse you say went this morning." 
 
 " She took the nine o clock train. She s well on the 
 way to Canada to visit relatives and rest. I advanced 
 her some money in fact, all that was due her. I felt 
 her faithfulness had earned her a vacation. Besides, she 
 was really tired out. That s the way it always is. 
 There s sure to be one that s more sympathetic to the 
 patient, and the brunt of the burden falls on her." 
 
 A pause, then Murdock said, " I do not believe you." 
 
 " As you please," replied Presbury, as if humoring 
 the fantastic notions of an invalid. 
 
 " Did Mrs. Murdock send her away? " 
 
 " She did not." 
 
 " I do not believe you. Mrs. Murdock sent her 
 away." 
 
 " All the nurses were here when your family arrived. 
 All are here now, except Miss Ray. She left only this 
 morning, left of her own accord." 
 
 " On your honor? " 
 
 " On my honor." 
 
 " Of her own accord? " 
 
 "Certainly. Why not?" 
 
 Murdock s face had the puzzled, baffled expression 
 again. " At any rate, you ve taken a weight off my 
 mind," said he. " Whatever the truth is, there was 
 nothing disagreeable." 
 
 " My dear sir " 
 
 283 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Murdock made a gesture of dismissal of the subject. 
 " I ll see Norma this afternoon. They must all go to 
 morrow. I need no more coddling. Tell Blagden to 
 order an extra operator here and a clear wire to New 
 York or Chicago by day after to-morrow. And a 
 clean shave this very day." 
 
 " The shave yes. But no business for a week," said 
 the doctor. " Do you want me to drug you ? " 
 
 " You ll have to, if this machine inside my head 
 isn t to get away with me. Was Miss Ray ill? " 
 
 " Only tired. She ll be back on duty in two weeks. 
 She s going to graduate in medicine and enter the prac 
 tice. If you want to, you might give her something 
 extra. She s worked hard here and she needs the money. 
 But do as you like. I congratulated myself when I 
 found I could get her for this case. Though, the others 
 . have done very well, too very well indeed." 
 
 As he talked Murdock watched him with angry sus- 
 
 i picion. But Presbury was not the man to fail in a lie 
 
 when he determined to tell it convincingly ; and he had 
 
 decided it was best for all concerned, especially for 
 
 Miss Raeburn, that he should keep to the spirit as well 
 
 as to the letter of his promise. Murdock gave a sound 
 
 between sigh and groan; Presbury knew he had won. 
 
 " Yes, I ve been out of my head," said Murdock, to 
 
 himself rather than to the doctor. Then, with a com- 
 
 , plete change of tone: " Tell Blagden to send for Berke- 
 
 * ley. I must see him. Also, I want Fullerton a lawyer 
 
 in our New York offices." 
 
 " All right," growled Presbury, going. " Have your 
 way. Have your way." 
 
 When Murdock was asleep he returned and gave him 
 an injection that would stupefy him for twenty-four 
 hours. " They re bad business, these hypodermics," he 
 
 284 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 muttered, as he withdrew the empty needle, " but he has 
 got to be quiet a week longer." 
 
 As soon as Presbury permitted him to have pos 
 session of his faculties, he again insisted that his 
 family should leave. " Humor him," Presbury advised j 
 them; and they took the advice with alacrity and 
 cheerfulness unconcealed. Sophy had found herself acci- j 
 dentally alone with him for a few minutes and, while he 
 tactfully saved her and himself from embarrassment by 
 pretending sleep, she dreaded a repetition of the distress 
 ing experience. Charley had never before experienced 
 the intolerable burden of week after week of fine weather 
 in inactive idleness ; he was as fidgety as a sleepy child 
 that is trying to keep itself awake, and as exasperating. 
 Norma, though really the most impatient, and the most 
 justifiably impatient, to be gone, was the only one of 
 the three to feel the tragedy of this fizzling fiasco of 
 an end to their family life. She saw that the last of the 
 flesh and blood ties had been cut, and she felt the wound 
 or, rather, to be exact, she felt distress of conscience 
 because she felt no distress of heart. She realized there 
 was no longer any sympathy whatever between Murdock 
 and the rest of them, even between him and herself. She 
 could understand his conduct toward her mother, but 
 she could not forgive it. In theory she held her Joe hers 
 only so long as she could hold him ; but in her heart she 
 felt he was hers for all time, rightfully hers, regardless 
 of any change in her which might set him to thinking 
 of wandering. The happily married woman, vaguely yet 
 persistently conscious of and in dread of the fleeting 
 nature of feminine charms, resents any infraction of the 
 marriage tie almost as fiercely as a widow who in vain 
 longs and seeks to remarry. Norma had raised between 
 
 285 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 herself and her father a barrier as effective as the bar 
 rier which his secret plans and desires forced him to raise 
 against his whole family. 
 
 When Berkeley came, Norma hastened back to Joe, 
 Charley went to New Hampshire to visit school friends, 
 and Sophy, accompanied by Blagden whom Murdock 
 sent on business, departed for New York to join Mrs. 
 Berkeley and Mrs. Fred Hastings at the Holland House. 
 Blagden had been talking to her almost every day about 
 how diligent and resourceful and successful the fashion 
 able women of the East were in prolonging youth and 
 beauty. He was unable to satisfy her speedily roused 
 curiosity by going into practical details ; he knew little 
 beyond the results women of thirty, thirty-five and 
 forty, of forty-five even and beyond, with the charms of 
 their younger days intact and in not a few instances en 
 hanced. But he had heard enough of the methods to 
 clear Sophy s mind of the popular notion that this pro 
 longed youth was due to superficial artifices, to paints 
 and powders, false hair and pads. He knew, and he 
 assured her, that there were in New York, in London, 
 Paris, Vienna, able physicians and surgeons who devoted 
 themselves to correcting nature s blunders, to repairing 
 the ravages of self-indulgence, to renovating and restor 
 ing the bodies of their patients as thoroughly, as radi 
 cally as an old house is made over into a new. When 
 he first began to talk of course, taking care to make 
 himself apparently impersonal she listened with amused 
 incredulity. But after her discovery of Juliet, and her 
 resignation to the impossible situation, she stealthily 
 read the advertisements of the " beauty fakirs " in the 
 New York Sunday newspapers. Blagden had told her 
 of these advertisements, had warned her they were for 
 the most part inserted by clumsy or fraudulent imitators 
 
 286 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 of the practitioners of a real science and art who did 
 not advertise. So she read to learn, not where to go, 
 but what to do, what could be done. 
 
 It is one of the curiosities of psychology, that vanity 
 over a purely imaginary charm ceases the moment some 
 way of substituting the genuine for the imaginary is 
 discovered. Sophy began to see her defects with eye? 
 as sharp as an enemy s, began to analyze her physical 
 appearance, to catalogue good, bad, and indifferent, to 
 survey just what foundation she had upon which to 
 rebuild the impaired structure of her beauty. Her mind 
 was not capable of the higher processes of thought. But 
 it was a good average mind, perfectly competent, when 
 awake, to deal with the ordinary routine, and endowed 
 with that shrewdness which is of more value than intellect 
 in the practical petty-retail business of keeping com 
 fortably alive. Soon she was viewing herself with far 
 less englamoured eyes than was Blagden. He thought 
 her merely a trifle too plump and pillowy, not indeed 
 for his personal taste which was all for bulk, but for 
 the compromise taste he had made between his own and 
 the fashionable fad of leanness. She saw that she must 
 make many and drastic changes, if she was to become the 
 woman she felt she ought to be and could be. Once the 
 idea of improvement, and that for a definite purpose 
 though she did not disclose even to herself the purpose 
 became firmly imbedded in her sluggish but practical 
 mind, it flourished as sturdily as pine in sterile soil. 
 Like all the emotions, vanity, a bad master, is a good 
 servant. 
 
 In the years when Sophy was thinking about her 
 self with results damaging physically, mentally, and 
 morally, she had not the slightest sense of shyness or 
 of shame; but now that her self-centering promised at 
 
 287 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 least physical and mental improvement, she became self- 
 conscious, secretive, teased of conscience. She looked 
 forward to meeting her friends, Florence Berkeley and 
 Henrietta Hastings, with no pleasure ; how was she to go 
 about her programme without their discovering her and 
 \ laughing at her? Yet she felt she must at any cost have 
 some one to back her up. Blagden she could not trust 
 with secrets so peculiar; besides, he would not be avail 
 able now. Should she confide in Florence, disdainful of 
 physical vanity but discreet and reliable friend ? Should 
 she select Henrietta, in sympathy with vanities of the 
 flesh but loose of tongue and sparing no one in her love 
 of ridicule? 
 
 While she was still debating into which of these two 
 beds of thorns to cast herself, she made an astonishing 
 discovery. Both Florence and Henrietta were in New 
 York, not to shop, at least not primarily, but to have 
 themselves renovated ! The greetings were hardly over 
 before they began to talk of fat and wrinkles, of no hair 
 where hair should be, of hair where no hair should be; 
 of hollows and protuberances; of the dangers in foods 
 and combinations of food regarded by the inexpert, even 
 by most physicians, as harmless; of the dire disasters 
 that lurked in candy, in soda, in all kinds of between- 
 meal eating. And presently it came out that Florence, 
 the spiritual, was arranging to be rid of a mole in front 
 ? of her left ear and of certain menacing wrinkles, that 
 1 Henrietta was worried about the deepening hollows in 
 her cheeks, and was also trying to decide whether injec 
 tions of paraffin would really improve the appearance 
 of her rather scrawny hands and fill up the holes between 
 the base of her neck and her collar bones. 
 
 " I am surprised, Florence ! " exclaimed Sophy. 
 "I d be satisfied to let myself alone," apologized 
 288 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 Mrs. Berkeley, without, however, so much as a blush of 
 embarrassment, " if it wasn t for the other women of my 
 generation. I don t purpose to let them stay young 
 while I get old. You ll have to come to it, Sophy. It s 
 silly and it s vain, but we ve got to do as others do or be 
 shelved." 
 
 " And you say the man claims to be able to remove 
 wrinkles? " pursued Sophy, with the air of an incredu 
 lous but interested inquirer into a matter entirely new 
 and unheard of. She had no wrinkles; she simply 
 wished to bring the conversation back to the impor 
 tant subject. Inevitably, sooner or later, her own 
 needs would be touched on, without her having to be 
 tray herself. 
 
 " He does it," Florence assured her. " Mrs. Whit 
 ney sent three women to him. I saw one of them Mrs. 
 Siddons, of Chicago. Do you know her? " 
 
 "No," said Sophy; "but I ve heard of her, of 
 course. Won t it be frightfully painful? " 
 
 " Indeed it will. But the pain lasts only a few days, 
 and the new skin will last a year or two. Mrs. Whit 
 ney has hers done in Paris every two years, and 
 look at her over fifty, and not a wrinkle; cheeks and 
 brow like a baby. This is the same process." 
 
 " Somehow, it seems to me not quite moral," sug 
 gested Sophy. " It s like interfering with the plans 
 of the Almighty." 
 
 " God didn t make the wrinkles," retorted Henrietta 
 Hastings. " And now He has let us learn how to keep 
 ourselves as He made us." 
 
 Sophy suspected Henrietta of levity, she being 
 reputed a scoffer ; still, was Scripture any the less Scrip 
 ture, though quoted by the Devil himself? " When you 
 come to think of it," said she, " it ain t right, is it, that 
 
 289 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 good women should let bad women triumph over them. 
 It s our duty to be as attractive as we can." 
 
 " Duty ! " Henrietta made a wry face. " Why do 
 you try to spoil every pleasure in life, Sophia," cried 
 she, " by sliming it over with cant about duty ? " 
 
 But Sophy was absorbed in contriving how to con 
 vince her fellow-townswomen that they were leading her 
 into these vanities ; for Sophy, thoroughly human, had 
 her full share of humanity s fondness for evading re 
 sponsibility. If the experiments turned out well, then 
 she could accept the full credit ; if, however, they should 
 turn out badly, she wished to have some one to blame. 
 " I can t get over my surprise," said she to Florence, of 
 whose intellect and " culture " she had always been in 
 awe. " It don t somehow seem a bit like you to take to 
 this kind of thing." 
 
 Florence tall and fair, a touch of haughtiness care 
 fully cultivated with an eye to conveying the " grande- 
 dame " impression shrugged her shoulders. " Why 
 shouldn t I?" 
 
 " Well, you seemed to me to care only for for the 
 things of the mind." 
 
 " But I have to live in a body, don t I ? Naturally, 
 I want it to be sightly as long as possible. Besides, 
 people don t take nearly so much interest in you 
 intellectually if you look tumble-down and gone to 
 pieces." 
 
 Sophy was cowed by that " tumble-down and gone to 
 pieces." It gave her the impression of her friend dis 
 dainfully flashing a mirror before her. " Florence 
 means she likes to have the men about," put in Henri 
 etta, " and she knows they come only when their eyes are 
 pleased." 
 
 Sophy, to show that such ideas were utterly foreign 
 290 
 
SOME STRANGE ADFENTURES 
 
 to her, looked scandalized. But Florence was undis- 
 turbed. " I don t care about the men as men," said she. 
 " I prefer them because they know and do, while women 
 amount to nothing. Besides, women are so petty and 
 sneaky with each other." 
 
 " The men are on earth chiefly to attract the women, 
 but they don t know it," declared Henrietta. " The 
 women are on earth chiefly to attract the men, and they 
 do know it though some of us pretend otherwise. 
 Wherever people are really civilized you find both the 
 men and the women giving a lot of attention to their 
 bodies. We are only showing our intelligence, our ap 
 preciation of the advantages civilization offers us." 
 
 " I don t know as I d exactly care to have everybody 
 know what I was about," said Sophy, so simply and 
 earnestly that the others laughed. 
 
 " Certainly not," said Henrietta. " I wouldn t let 
 even my husband know." Whereupon both Mrs. Mur- 
 dock and Mrs. Berkeley looked embarrassed, 
 
 As the two women had confided in Sophy, they were 
 determined she should have the best of reasons for re 
 specting their confidence. Accordingly, Sophy was able 
 to pretend the extreme of reluctance, to deceive even 
 herself, and finally to accompany Florence with the air 
 and the feeling of one overborne and forced. 
 
 Florence s doctor was Secor, with the reputation of 
 being able to reconstruct the human face and figure en 
 tirely, and almost deserving his reputation. Secor was 
 about the first American doctor of standing to go into 
 what is beginning to be spoken of respectfully as the 
 aesthetic branch of the profession. He was exceedingly 
 proud of his marvelous skill, much irritated at the igno 
 rance and barbarism that compelled him to practice it 
 in stealth ; but he was too conventional at heart, had too 
 
 291 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 much regard for the social position of his family, to 
 defy public opinion and the opinion of the less enlight 
 ened but more numerous members of his own profession. 
 The preachers were especially irritating to him. " Why r 
 madam," said he to Mrs. Murdock, " there was one 
 preacher whose eyes I straightened and whose project 
 ing thin ears I trimmed and set back against his empty 
 head. Would you believe it, that scoundrel is now 
 preaching against the wicked worldliness of those who 
 seek to correct the mistakes of nature and lessen their 
 handicap in the race of life ! " 
 
 He, however, did not at heart blame the preachers. 
 In the development of aesthetic hygiene, medicine, and 
 surgery, he saw another evidence of the decay of the 
 old religious faith which despised the body and exalted 
 the soul, neglected this life and fastened wholly upon the 
 life beyond the grave. " The soul having become prob 
 lematic," said he, " men and women naturally begin 
 again to give attention to the body. The hope of a 
 future life having become hazy, they try to make the 
 best possible out of the one they are sure of." 
 
 Mrs. Murdock was not shocked because she did not 
 hear. It was her habit to stop listening whenever any 
 one talked what she regarded as profound matters. 
 Who pleased might flounder about in the ocean of 
 thought ; for herself, she would stay on shore. Besides, 
 her interest in Secor was concentrated upon what he 
 could do for her body. Alone with him she abandoned 
 all pretense of reluctance, and together they canvassed 
 the situation frankly and minutely. With a clearness 
 of expression and an intelligence and impartiality that 
 would have astounded all who knew her, she pointed out 
 to him just what she was and just what she would like 
 to be. And Secor took deep interest ; he was especially at- 
 
 292 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 tracted by her slight vanity as to the charms she had 
 charms of eyes and complexion, of nose and most unu 
 sual hands and feet, which so many women would have 
 regarded as in themselves quite sufficient. She seemed 
 to him to substantiate his favorite theory, that a 
 woman s vanity and her estimate of her physical value 
 are great directly as her justification is small. His 
 theory, based upon vast experience, is interesting, but 
 probably erroneous. It may be, perhaps, nearer the 
 truth to say that we are all as vain, regardless of basis for 
 vanity, as the limits set by our sense of humor permits ;. 
 and that the vanity in those wholly unjustified and usu- 
 ally aggressive because uneasy, merely seems greater, 
 for the reason that it is so grotesque. Secor agreed 
 with Sophy that the important defect in her face was* 
 its lower part. " Yes, that s really the whole cause of 
 your look of maturity," said he. " You ve no wrinkles 
 to speak of. Your nose is excellent excellent. I 
 couldn t do better than nature has done for you in the 
 matter of mouth. I suggest that you have the two gold 
 fillings in your upper front teeth taken out and care 
 fully matched porcelain substituted. Perhaps a little 
 just a little straightening of the teeth, but really they re 
 very good." 
 
 " I ll have my teeth gone over thoroughly. I ve 
 got the address of a dentist who, they say, can do 
 wonders." 
 
 "Bowker?" 
 
 " That s the name. Is he all right? " 
 
 " None better. About the contour." And he eyed 
 Sophy s heavy cheeks and chin, laid hold of the super 
 fluities, felt them, twisted and pinched them this way; 
 and that. 
 
 " Gan t it be cut off somehow ? " inquired Sophy, 
 293 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW, 
 
 much pleased with effects of slender face he got she 
 was following his movements with the aid of a mirror. 
 " You say you can heal cuts without a scar." 
 
 " Certainly," replied Secor. " I could operate. But 
 it s always wise to put off drastic measures. First, let s 
 see what comes of systematic massage, breathing, diet, 
 and walking." 
 
 Sophy sighed. No royal road to beauty ! " I sup 
 pose I ve got to come to it," said she. 
 
 " All a question of habit," Secor assured her. " In 
 six months you ll have no desire to go back. . . . Yes, 
 I think the bosom ll yield nicely to massage properly 
 directed. And the hips in part. Breathing, dieting, 
 and walking ll do the rest. Of course I can t make you 
 a willowy creature. Your natural type is the sumptuous. 
 It s much admired, too." 
 
 " I shouldn t care to be thin," replied she. 
 
 " We ll get you a competent masseuse," continued 
 he, " one with firm, sure, well-padded fingers. And you 
 must have your maid learn massage. Send her to me. 
 I want to look at her hands." 
 
 Secor had long since learned to discount the opti 
 mism of his female clients by being moderate, even pes 
 simistic, of promise. In fact, he was confident and the 
 event justified his diagnosis that Sophy needed no sur 
 gery, needed nothing beyond a chance for her superb 
 constitution. She had done her best to destroy it ; but she 
 had not even shaken it, so firmly was it founded and built 
 by those early years of work in house and garden and 
 dairy, of climbing fences and trees and hills, of rang 
 ing freely in the open air all the year round. In heart, 
 in lungs, in all the vital organs she was absolutely 
 sound. 
 
 She got a letter from Norma, with news that in a 
 294 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 _ ,. 
 
 few months she would be a grandmother. The word, 
 the idea, at just that time, when her mind was all upon 
 the things of youth, drew a smile even from her literal- 
 ness. " A grandmother ! " thought she. " White hair 
 and caps and the corner of the fire. I don t feel a bit 
 like that and I m not. Yet I suppose Norma would 
 think I was a silly old fool. Well, maybe I am ; but I m 
 going to be happy, and get all I can out of life." 
 
 The three friends and companions in aesthetic ad 
 venture, to be free from interruption and secure from 
 observation, removed to a small private sanitarium of 
 Doctor Secor s. The women who went there cut them 
 selves off from friends and family and gave out that 
 they were taking a " complete rest cure." It was in a 
 dull, down-at-the-heel block, aside from the fashionable 
 and frequented district and convenient to Secor s office. 
 Mrs. Berkeley s treatment, temporarily frightfully dis 
 figuring, forced her to stay indoors, venturing out only 
 behind heavy veils and at night ; so Mrs. Murdock went 
 about with Henrietta, who was a great walker and an 
 indefatigable shopper. It was Sophy s first experience 
 of the very fashionable New York shops ; indeed, it was 
 her first experience of the New York that is a world-city. 
 When she was last there, a dozen years before, it had 
 been an overgrown provincial town, countrified, com / 
 monplace, without individuality. Now, its Titanic archi - 
 tecture, its vast reaches of prodigal luxury, its extrava 
 gance and excitement and laughing defiance of all she 
 had been regarding as sacred and fine of her religion, 
 her morality, her ideals of every kind awed her, 
 stunned her, made a furious, envious anger, which she 
 thought was righteous indignation, surge up within 
 her. The feeling was formless, far beyond her vocabu- 
 
 295 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 lary. She could express but a small part of it. Her 
 outlet was the flaunting displays of women s apparel in 
 the shop windows. These outraged her notions of mod 
 esty. " If this isn t stopped," cried she, " what chance 
 will a respectable woman have ? Why, it used to be that 
 a man stood in awe of a woman s privacy. There was 
 a refined, sacred mystery about her. But what mystery 
 could there be for a man that walks these streets and 
 looks in at these windows? He sees everything she s 
 got even the most private things." 
 
 " Nothing left for us," said Henrietta, " but to enter 
 the competition with the other kind of women and try 
 to be finer and more delicately perfumed and wear more 
 lace and ribbons than they." 
 
 " Scandalous ! " 
 
 " No more scandalous than the things the churches 
 do to compete with the saloons for souls," sparred Hen 
 rietta. " The truth is, it s laziness and stinginess and 
 lack of taste that makes respectable women denounce as 
 devilish all the arts and graces. Now that just posing 
 as virtuous isn t enough any more, now that they ve got 
 to compete with the women who have to be alluring or 
 go to the wall, they ll be the better for it." 
 
 Henrietta was chagrined to observe that Sophy was 
 not wincing, was not taking these home-thrusts home. 
 " I suppose so," she answered absently. Her eyes lit 
 upon a window bedecked with stockings and under 
 clothes upon wax figures. " A woman oughtn t to let 
 her husband come here and walk about," she said, with a 
 toss and an angry compression of the lips. 
 
 " My Fred s safe at home. These show windows alone 
 would put him in the way to being discontented and 
 worse." 
 
 Sophy was filled with sullen hatred of New York, 
 296 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 with despair. What chance would she have, even though 
 free, when there was such competition? Then, she re 
 membered Juliet Raeburn, and her lip curled in scorn 
 of Murdock. " With all these to pick and choose 
 from," thought she, " he took up with her ! " Certain 
 ly, there was no accounting for tastes. " Men are fools 
 where women are concerned plain fools." Well, after 
 all, the competition was not hopeless for any woman. 
 Blagden s compliments, carefully preserved like rare 
 jewels, were here reexamined; and her feeling of insig 
 nificance subsided. 
 
 As soon as the shopkeepers and clerks discovered who 
 she was, her pendulum began to swing swift and far in 
 the opposite direction. They paid servile court to her 
 money ; she thought it was to herself, and there opened 
 merits in New York that mitigated its vicious defects. 
 Saint X did not appreciate her, as did New York. And 
 soon New York had firm hold upon her. She went from 
 shop to shop in ecstasy. Everything she saw seamed 
 beautiful, and she longed to buy it. Luxury, even the 
 luxury she adopted, had always offended her old-fash 
 ioned frugality as foolish and sinful; now she began to 
 feel that every costly thing had its uses, was put into 
 the world by the Almighty -to soften its hardships. Yes, 
 she must make haste to take advantage of the blessings 
 the Lord had created and had put within her reach. \ 
 Her one remaining difficulty was selection. " I just f 
 can t decide," she cried. " Everything I see seems bet- 
 ter than the last thing." 
 
 " Most of this stuff is trash," replied Henrietta. 
 " It s got together to catch the eye at a glance. Make 
 it a rule never to think of buying till you ve seen every 
 thing, and never to open your purse till you ve slept on 
 your choice. Then, you ll find there s little you want, 
 20 297 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 and that little mighty hard to find. Most women are 
 no more fitted to be trusted with the shopping than a 
 child with the range of a toy shop." 
 
 " I guess I m one of those women," said Sophy. 
 
 And she threw herself upon Henrietta s superior ex 
 perience and decision. She would not buy the smallest 
 trifle without first consulting Henrietta ; and, while Hen 
 rietta s taste was commonplace, it was at least not fan 
 tastic. " I don t seem able to get myself up as well as 
 some of the women, the really smart-looking ones. But. 
 thank goodness, I don t put on absurd or fussy or taw 
 dry things." Nor did she buy anything for Sophy that 
 was positively bad, and much of the new outfit was ex 
 tremely becoming; the main point after all was to get 
 Sophy broken of the habit of ordering dresses and hats 
 of elderly types and accustomed to taking the sort of 
 things she had thought fit only for Norma, almost too 
 young even for Norma, now that she was married. 
 
 The great cities of the earth are so many alchemist s 
 retorts into which are constantly pouring vast quantities 
 of human raw materials, presently to emerge as fin 
 ished products in infinite variety. Of these magic retorts 
 New York is the greatest, because its receipts of raw 
 humanity, domestic and foreign, are largest, and the 
 wonders of transformations wrought in it by its power 
 ful chemicals are the most marvelous. The Sophy who 
 was deposited, fresh from Saint X and the mountains, 
 at the Holland House, bore small resemblance to the 
 Sophy who in a few brief, but busy weeks, greeted Blag- 
 den, coming to New York from Chicago on business for 
 Murdock. And she thoroughly enjoyed the dazed ex 
 pression which did not wear off even after an evening 
 with her and Henrietta at the theater. 
 
 " I always did think her a fine type of woman, to 
 298 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 look at and in character," he reflected, as he was driving 
 away from the boarding house after they had had sup 
 per together at Sherry s a supper at which Sophy re 
 sisted even lobster Newburg and a concoction of fresh 
 peaches and ice cream that made her ache with longing. 
 " But now she s right in it. A man could love her on 
 slight provocation. And I don t see how he could possi 
 bly do better than marry her." 
 
 To Blagden, born with an aristocratic, worshipful 
 mind, and bred in aristocratic adulation of wealth, this 
 audacious soaring glance of a dizzy ambition seemed even 
 less sane now than when he first dared to lift his eyes t<| 
 the exalted golden height where his employer s family 
 was ensconced. But even the most reckless ideas can be 
 come familiarized; man, the infinitely adaptable, can so 
 train himself that with no more than a tremor he will 
 cut loose from the solid earth in a balloon or promenade 
 a chasm on a tight rope. 
 
 The two women, or, rather, Sophy, asked Blagden 
 about the New York shops, as they wished to overlook 
 none of the best class. He mentioned several of which 
 Henrietta, who had been doing her shopping in Chicago 
 the past four or five years, had never heard. Finally, 
 he said : " Then, of course, Dangerfield, for hats and 
 dresses and, I believe, fine underclothes. But no doubt 
 you ve been there." 
 
 " No," Henrietta was forced to confess. " I ve ofter 
 heard of it, but it quite slipped my mind. Sophy, we l; 
 go to-morrow." 
 
 And go they did. As soon as they were before the 
 Holland brick and marble building, Henrietta began to 
 reproach lierself, privately, for having been so stupid. 
 " Sophy ll imagine I don t really know anything about 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW. 
 
 New York," she thought. And a very humiliating 
 thought it was to one who, while posing as an indiffer 
 ent, had the provincial s infantile pride in her intimate 
 knowledge of the metropolis. But she soon forgot her 
 self in amazement before the new departure in shop- 
 keeping. 
 
 " The prices will be something fierce," she murmured, 
 with intent to lead Sophy to think that the reason for 
 her glaring oversight. " The customers have to pay for 
 all this gorgeousness. . . . Those flowers are real. 
 They must cost a small fortune, every day." 
 
 They wandered up the grand staircase and into the 
 main dressmaking salon. It was off season, and they had 
 been having -difficulty in getting anything at all because 
 so many of the special shops were closed or emptied of 
 their best for their seaside branches. But Dangerfield s, 
 although almost deserted on that particular day, was 
 ready for business ready for, and getting, the big out- 
 of-town trade, the rich people of the West and South 
 who make New York City their summer resort. Njot a 
 fashionable crowd, but eager to become fashionable, and 
 grateful for aid toward that goal, no matter how heavy 
 the charge. Sophy continued to show that she was over- 
 awed ; but Henrietta, as became a leader and guide, con 
 cealed her awe and bestirred herself first among the 
 dresses, then among the hats, and finally in the new de 
 partment, the showings of the most alluring and most 
 expensive underclothing she had ever seen. Sophy fol 
 lowed, so bewildered by marble pillars and fountains 
 and tapestries and Oriental carpets that she hardly 
 saw what the salesgirls were exhibiting. Though she 
 had been speedily cured of all feeling about the sin- 
 fulness of luxurious outer dress, she had until now 
 retained the feeling that in simple and moderate under- 
 
 300 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 clothing the upright woman showed her real quality; 
 she might yield in other things, but there she must 
 stand or be lost. 
 
 Henrietta had the same feeling, as an instinct; but 
 she was ashamed of it and fought it. " Such things as 
 these are waste of money," said she to Sophy. " Fred 
 never looks at me, and no one else can." Still, Henrietta 
 yielded to the extent of some stockings and chemises, 
 several hundred dollars for a mere handful of those cob- 
 weblike goods. 
 
 When the stockings and chemises passed to the 
 ownership of a respectable woman, Sophy Murdock 
 looked at them with different eyes. " I must have some 
 too," cried she. She bought, became intoxicated by 
 possession, bought more and more, until Henrietta 
 could not keep envy out of her handsome, if rather 
 too sharp, features. 
 
 " One d think you were buying your trousseau 
 or worse, Sophy," said she with a sarcastic laugh. 
 
 Sophy colored high. " They re so pretty," she 
 pleaded. 
 
 " Yes, it will be a temptation to show them," re 
 torted Henrietta. 
 
 Sophy burst into a profuse sweat of embarrass 
 ment. She abruptly ceased to buy, though the sales 
 woman tempted her more subtly than ever, looking 
 daggers at the meddlesome Mrs. Hastings. 
 
 Details, such as these extravagant purchases of 
 beautiful clothing to be worn where no man could see, 
 are usually disdained by biographers of character. 
 Yet it was on that day and at those displays of under 
 clothing that the character of Sophy Murdock began 
 its final and most radical change. Clad in those gar 
 ments, beneath her new elegances of gown and hat and 
 
 301 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 gloves, she had the courage to be herself, to dare to 
 think the thoughts she had been all those years sup 
 pressing, to dare to send freely out from her heart 
 into her blood the emotions she had been taught as 
 a child to believe were " the natural sinfulness of the 
 flesh." 
 
 When she accompanied Henrietta or rather, when 
 Henrietta accompanied her to Dangerficld s again, a 
 week later, there was a difference in her carriage, in the 
 sparkle of her eye, in the tone of her voice ; there was 
 even a distinct new sprightliness and attempt at what 
 Henrietta called " free and easy breadth " in her con 
 versation. In this world, the psychologists to the con 
 trary notwithstanding, there are far more souls living 
 up to the character of the bodies they dwell in than 
 there are bodies living up to the character of their 
 tenant souls. 
 
 As they were walking in Fifth Avenue, Sophy 
 stopped Henrietta at a window displaying a model 
 bathroom for a palace marble floor, walls, ceiling, 
 marble pool, tub, footbath and stand, palms and white 
 fur rugs, long mirrors, tables with astonishing arrays 
 of toilet articles. " I m going to have a room just like 
 that put in my suite at home," said she. 
 
 Poor and rich are too remote for poor definitely 
 and actively to envy rich. It was the real and hateful 
 envy of not so rich for rich that made Henrietta s face 
 ugly, even bestial for an instant. 
 
 " I mustn t forget to write down the names of 
 those powders and perfumes, too," continued the un 
 conscious Sophy. " But, then, Katy will know. I m 
 having her take a course in manicuring and hair dress" 
 ing, in addition to the massage lessons." 
 
 Henrietta s eyes sparkled with pretended amuse- 
 302 
 
SOME STRANGE ADVENTURES 
 
 ment, with real suspicion. She could not trust herself 
 to speak. " And I thought Sophy was a settled 
 woman," she said to herself. " I might have knownJ 
 She wouldn t be astir after all these years, except for 
 
XXI 
 
 SOPHY had been at Dangerfield s for several fit 
 tings, both alone and with the others for Mrs. 
 [Berkeley, without the mole, and with a skin as young 
 and smooth as Norma Degarmo s, was going about in 
 daylight again. On the morning before the departure 
 for Saint X, she took Henrietta with her, when she 
 went to make arrangements about the things that 
 would not be done in time to go into the trunks. Flor 
 ence would not accompany them. " It s only an irri 
 tation to see all those tempting things," said she. 
 " Secor s bill is frightful, and I can t afford to buy 
 clothes, Dangerfield clothes " which meant that she 
 had reached and strained the limit of Berkeley s domes 
 tic allowance. 
 
 Sophy was impatient to be home again. She was 
 debating whether she should not herself stir up the 
 matter of the divorce, if she did not soon hear from 
 Murdock s lawyers ; she was impatient to begin the new 
 career opening before her the more brightly because 
 vaguely the career in which she would be a woman of 
 fortune, and free and unencumbered. 
 
 Henrietta had drifted into the millinery depart 
 ment; she herself, through with the last fittings, was 
 resting and discussing styles with the head saleswoman. 
 There entered from the hall, with a footman bearing 
 
 304 
 
A FRIGHTFUL MAN" 
 
 small parcels in her train, a woman whom she instantlyj 
 decided was the most beautifully dressed she had ever 
 seen. She had on an early fall street dress of a delicate 
 shade of tan, with an edge of creamy white showing 
 here and there; on her plumed hat, of the same shade 
 as her dress, was a big white buckle that depended upon 
 its shape and position for its effect of crowning to per 
 fection a perfect costume. She was a slender woman, 
 her figure seeming to be vividly alive everywhere with 
 in her garments. Her hands and feet were also very 
 slender. She was carrying a big bunch of lilies of the 
 valley. Sophy could see only her profile the profile 
 of a pale, slender, exquisite face, high-bred, eager, 
 feminine, yet curiously resolute. 
 
 " Who is that lady? " Sophy inquired. 
 
 The saleswoman turned just as the newcomeB 
 glanced in their direction. " Why, that s Miss Rae 
 burn," she cried. " She must be just back. She s been 
 away for a long rest. I ll bring her and introduce her 
 to you." 
 
 Miss Raeburn ! Sophy s head swam ; unconscious 
 of appearances, she craned her neck in her eagerness 
 to see. Yes, this exquisite woman was none other than 
 the wan, fagged, narrow-chested nurse, Miss Ray. 
 " No, no," she stammered, terror and command in her 
 voice for the girl was already started toward Miss 
 Raeburn. If Miss Raeburn recognized her, she gave 
 no sign of it. She smiled and waved her flowers friend" 
 lily at the girl and passed on into an inner room. 
 
 " No, no," repeated Sophy hysterically. " H 
 haven t got time." 
 
 " You d have liked her," said the girl regret 
 fully. " We all adore her here. And she s not a biti 
 et up." 
 
 305 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 When Sophy could trust herself to speak, she 
 asked, " Is she one of jour customers ? " 
 
 The girl laughed. " Dear me, no. She s Danger- 
 field s. She s the whole show." 
 
 Sophy rose, color high, eyes glittering. " I ll not 
 wait for Mrs. Hastings," she said haughtily to the 
 startled, astounded girl, and without another word 
 swept from the room and from the house. Her ejno- 
 tions raged through her brain in a succession of cy 
 clones. She felt she had been tricked and outraged in 
 a dozen different ways. So this was the woman who 
 had lured her husband away! Not a miserable, com 
 mon nurse person, poor and meek and homely; but a 
 brazen creature, beautiful after a fashion, though loud 
 especially loud in dress and a woman engaged in a 
 business from time immemorial as intimately associated 
 with irregular living as the stage. " I ll never consent 
 to it never ! " she cried, as the electric cab took her 
 toward the Holland. " He and she shcCnt triumph 
 over me! ... I ve no doubt she came back to him as 
 soon as I and the children left. . . . And I ve been 
 spending money with her! been giving her thousands 
 of dollars ! . . . No doubt he s backing her in that 
 low, wasteful, wicked business. But I ll stop that ! I ll 
 stop her switching round as if she had a tail. I ll 
 make such a scandal that he ll come crawling home, and 
 we ll see how long this Dangerfield business lasts. 
 Dangerfield! why, it s money that belongs to his wife 
 and family that s keeping it up. I ought to have de- 
 liounced her right there. I ought to have torn those 
 clothes of shame off her back." 
 
 It was the irony of fate that, when she got to the 
 hotel they had left the boarding house as soon as 
 Florence was presentable she found a note from her 
 
 306 
 
"A FRIGHTFUL MAN 
 
 husband a scrawl without beginning, and ending 
 simply " Murdock " saying that he would return to 
 take her to lunch, as he had a matter of business to 
 talk over with her. Her eyes blazed as she read and 
 her face was aflame. " Yes, I ll talk business with 
 him ! " she muttered. 
 
 Two hours later she was not less angry and deter- 
 minded, but had her jealous rage under better control. 
 She was even taking a certain cold pleasure in plan 
 ning how she would lead him on and then suddenly 
 crush him with a refusal to divorce and a proclama 
 tion of defiance. Henrietta and Florence came into 
 the sitting room the three shared, just as the bell boy 
 brought his card. She did not wait for the boy to 
 depart. " My husband is lunching with me," she said 
 to her two friends. " For some time he s been carrying 
 on with a woman named Raeburn. I ve just found out 
 that she keeps Dangerfield s. He s been paying for 
 her extravagances. But I m going to stop it." 
 
 Mrs. Berkeley, shocked by the outburst, and 
 amazed that quiet, rather shy Sophy should thus de 
 scend to making a public scandal, frowned the open- 
 mouthed, open-eared bell boy from the room. Hen 
 rietta said eagerly, " This is the first I ve heard 
 of it. Dangerfield! Miss Raeburn! Are you sure, 
 Sophy?" 
 
 Mrs. Berkeley, mindful that Mrs. Hastings was 
 about as ardent and industrious a gossip as a quiet 
 town ever bred, said entreatingly : " Please don t say 
 any more, Sophy." 
 
 "Say?" cried Sophy. "Why, I want the whole 
 world to know ! I ll drag her down ! I ll teach him to 
 insult me and disgrace his children ! " And she rushed 
 toward the hall door. 
 
 307 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " Don t you think some one ought to be with you 
 when you talk to him? " suggested Henrietta. 
 
 " Henrietta ! " exclaimed Florence, horrified by this 
 bold bid for the gratification of morbid curiosity and 
 of cynical passion for mischief-making. 
 
 But Sophy, always easy to swerve and always 
 eager for support, had paused. " You re right, dear." 
 She turned to Florence. " You ll come with me, Flor 
 ence? " 
 
 " No, Sophy. You and he should talk over youu 
 private affairs alone." 
 
 Sophy, abashed by the severity of Mrs. Berkeley s 
 tone, glanced uncertainly at Henrietta. " If you want 
 my opinion," said Henrietta, " no one woman is a 
 match for such a man as he. Of course, if you wisK 
 to give in to him " 
 
 " I do hope you ll see him alone," pleaded Florence. 
 "He may have come seeking a reconciliation, and " 
 
 " Reconciliation ! " raged Sophy. " I ll have noth 
 ing to do with him. He has turned my love into hate. 
 If it weren t for the wickedness of it, I d divorce him* 
 Come, Henrietta! Let s go to him." 
 
 Murdock was in the main parlor, walking slowly 
 to and fro with a military regularity of step that gave 
 him an air of inevitableness. The outdoor life he had 
 been leading continuously since he got clear of doctors 
 and nurses had put a deeper bronze upon his tawny 
 skin, had brightened his eyes and hardened his flesh. 
 As Mrs. Hastings looked at him, handsome, distin 
 guished and young, she wondered at Sophy. " Still," 
 she reflected, " there s no accounting for physical at 
 tractions and repulsions. I can understand why peo 
 ple think it queer I love Fred, with his big fat face 
 and his great stomach. I think it s queer, myself." 
 
 308 
 
A FRIGHTFUL MAN 
 
 Further, she remembered she had often thought that, 
 for all his good looks and agreeable manners, she could 
 never fancy Murdock. There are men whom all women 
 like ; there are women all men like. They are usually of 
 conspicuous sex development and chameleon like adap 
 tability. But the men and women of the Murdock sort, 
 strongly individual, careless of their fellows, whom the 
 timid conciliate through fear of enmities, indifferent 
 to the opposite sex unless themselves attracted, yield 
 ing then with reluctance to a force that threatens their 
 self-control such men and women create, where they 
 do not care to charm, an impression of coldness, often 
 of apathy, of entire lack of charm. Murdock had 
 penetrated the clever, insincere, footless Henrietta 
 years before, and had tossed her on that large private 
 human rubbish heap which everyone of wide acquaint 
 ance accumulates. He saw her, frowned impatiently. 
 His glance sped on to Sophy. 
 
 Like most married people, he was not in the habit 
 of actually seeing his wife, as a rule, when he looked at 
 her. In fact, he had trained himself, not wholly con 
 sciously, to see as little as his habitually observant 
 eyes could see. But the alteration in her dress, in her 
 face, in her figure, in her whole exterior personality i 
 was so marked that his attention was arrested. Not in 
 many a year had she looked so well. She was still a 
 large woman, but her body now seemed part of her, 
 and no longer an ill-fitted, cumbersome envelope. Pier 
 face was in better proportion also; her dress and hat 
 had distinction, and were of style and colors befitting 
 her youth. He noted the change, in general and then, 
 in detail, with surprise, but without the smallest sense 
 of personal interest. For him his married life was a 
 finished episode, sealed and filed. It belonged to the 
 
 309 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 past, not to the present ; it was part of the career of a 
 Charles Murdock who was as dead as yesterday. He 
 extended his hand coldly to Mrs. Hastings, withdrew 
 it the instant it had touched hers, stood smiling pleas 
 antly at his wife. " How well you are looking ! " saic 
 he. " I like that dress. You got it here? " 
 
 Sophy gave a contemptuous sneer. " From Dan- 
 gerfield," she said, eyes fiercely upon him. 
 
 He felt what was coming, straightened, stiffenec 
 himself, effaced all expression from his face. 
 
 " From that Raeburn woman," she went on, loudly 
 " From the dressmaking establishment you are keep 
 ing up for her." She turned to Henrietta. " And h< 
 soon to be a grandfather ! " 
 
 It was Murdock s first news of the venerable dig 
 nity Norma was about to confer upon him. But aJ 
 the moment he had none of the pleasant thoughts thai 
 normally come in the train of such tidings. The wore 
 " grandfather " produced precisely the effect Sophj 
 intended. It smote and staggered him with the verj 
 sight and odor of old age. It rang a knell in his ears 
 the dolorous funeral bell over youth. " My God ! 
 he muttered, his features showing how profoundly h< 
 was moved ; the two women, not unnaturally, thoughl 
 him conscience-stricken. 
 
 " Shame on you ! Shame on you ! " declaimec 
 Sophy, following up her fancied advantage. 
 
 There were several people near; they heard, looked 
 listened for more. Henrietta put a monitory hand or 
 her arm. " Let s go into the side parlor," she said 
 She glanced at Murdock. " Or, shall we go down t( 
 lunch?" 
 
 " We are not going to lunch," cried Sophy. 
 
 Mrs. Hastings drew her insistently toward th< 
 310 
 
"A FRIGHTFUL MAN 
 
 nearest of the small parlors. Murdock hesitated, fol 
 lowed them. " I wish to talk with my wife alone, Mrs. 
 Hastings," he said. 
 
 " But I do not wish to talk to you alone," retorted 
 Sophy. " You ve disgraced your family, and I refuse 
 to be silent any longer. Oh, I know what you ve come 
 for. Well, I tell you now that I ll live up to my marriage 
 vows, as I always have done. I promised to remain your 
 wife until death, and I will. I ll be no accomplice in 
 adultery. And you and I grandparents ! " In the 
 sweep of outraged virtue she quite forgot her own atti 
 tude, up to two hours before, toward the venerable honors 
 and duties of grandparentity. 
 
 Murdock s stern, steady gaze finally pierced her 
 through the veil anger had drawn over her sight. " So 
 much the greater reason for repairing our errors," said 
 he, " and hastening to make the best of life." 
 
 Her eyes had sunk before his ; but his words were 
 fuel to her fury. And it did not burn the less fiercely 
 because she, full of youthful projects and of desires 
 for life in its heydey, could guess what was passing 
 in his mind, could not but feel that her belief in her 
 own persisting charms was discredited by his anxiety 
 to be rid of her, to spend his summer in another s com 
 pany. " I suppose," she sneered, " you and that Rae- 
 burn woman came to town together " 
 
 " Stop," said Murdock quietly. " All that you say 
 about her is false on my honor, it is false." 
 
 " Your honor? " she taunted. " Your honor! " 
 
 " I beg you to leave us, Mrs. Hastings," said Mur 
 dock with icy politeness. 
 
 " She ll do nothing of the kind," cried Sophy. " I 
 want Henrietta to hear me say what I m going to say 
 to you." 
 
 811 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 Murdock rose. " I must be going," he said calmly. 
 
 " Unless you can tell the truth, I hope you will go," 
 replied his wife. " I want to hear no more denials of 
 the truth." He bowed and turned away. " Henrietta, 
 all the time I was up there," she went on, " waiting and 
 watching over him, when he was pretending to be dying, 
 he had that woman with him day and night." 
 
 Murdock wheeled upon them so abruptly that Hen 
 rietta shrank in alarm. His face had been like stone ; it 
 was now all fire and energy. " Is that true? " he de 
 manded. " Was she there? " 
 
 Sophy laughed in derision. " Listen to that, Henri 
 etta! I suppose she hasn t dared tell him I saw her." 
 
 But Murdock was not listening. He had instinctively 
 half turned away to hide his expression, and was mutter 
 ing : " So it was she. It was she ! " And his glowing 
 face was but a faint reflection of the emotion, surging, 
 sparkling within him, like spring s delicious, delirious 
 tide of life in all that lives or can live. He knew now 
 he had not really believed she was there, even when he 
 fancied he did. But here was his dream come true. She 
 did indeed love him even as he loved her. He had 
 hoped, had believed it. Now, he knew ! She loved him, 
 for "it was shel 99 
 
 His wife caught the words. " Yes, it was she, it was 
 she," she mocked. " And the whole world shall know 
 it. You ll find out both of you what people think of 
 such proceedings." 
 
 This threatened assault upon Juliet Raeburn in 
 stantly sobered him. " I tell you," replied he, " I did 
 not know Miss Raeburn was one of the nurses. I had 
 been told not, and I believed them. It seemed too im 
 probable that she should be there. In the presence of 
 Mrs. Hastings I wish to repulse every insinuation against 
 
 312 
 
A FRIGHTFUL MAN 
 
 Miss Raeburn s character." He turned to Henrietta. 
 " My son and I met Miss Raeburn in the northwest 
 woods two years ago because her camp and ours hap 
 pened to adjoin. How she came to be one of my nurses 
 I do not know. There is some simple, certainly harm 
 less explanation. She may have happened to be on the 
 
 ] wrecked train " 
 
 " No doubt she was ! " cried Sophy with a triumphant 
 laugh. 
 
 Murdock flushed, ended with a calm frank, " Your 
 good sense will tell you, Mrs. Hastings, that my wife is 
 yielding to jealous and unwarranted imaginings." 
 
 " Do you deny you love her? " demanded Sophy. 
 " Do you deny she loves you ? " 
 
 " We have already taken Miss Raeburn s name in 
 yain too often in this conversation." 
 
 " Take her name in vain her name ! The name of 
 his woman ! Hear him, Henrietta ! " 
 
 Murdock suddenly bent upon Henrietta a look of 
 dark fury, of imperious command that drove her in con 
 fusion from the room. His wife was about to follow 
 when he turned the same gaze on her. She shrank before 
 it. " You have goaded me too far, madam," he said with 
 \ dangerous calm. " You have lied about me and about 
 an innocent woman; you have made a scandal before 
 strangers, before the most notorious gossip and tale 
 bearer out home. Very well. Now hear me. If you 
 open your lips again to anyone about Miss Raeburn, 
 and if you do not at onye resume the proceedings for 
 divorce, you will not get another penny. I will not even 
 pay your outstanding bills. What am I to you but a 
 pocketbook? There never was a more blindly devoted 
 husband until you deliberately alienated yourself from 
 me. You have not been a wife but a drag; an indolent, 
 21 313 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 shiftless No, I am forgetting myself. For years our 
 relations have been on a business basis only. Well, if 
 you want money, you must bargain for it. You can 
 have half of all I ve got if you meet my terms. If you 
 don t, not a cent ! Your allowance stops with this month. 
 That is all ! " 
 
 He turned on his heel and strode away. In the outer 
 parlor he met Henrietta. He paused before her; the 
 calm fury of his gaze fascinated her. " Mrs. Hastings," 
 he said, " you thrust yourself into my family affairs, 
 and heard things you ought to have been ashamed to 
 listen to. You evidently have no shame. I shall appeal 
 to an emotion to which you will respond. If you repeat 
 to a living soul anything you heard to-day, if you speak 
 of Miss Raeburn or of my wife s affairs or of mine I 
 shall hear of it. And I shall wipe out your fortune 
 and reduce you to poverty. Do I make myself clear? " 
 
 Henrietta did not answer; she was gray to the lips, 
 and shaking in the spasms of a violent nervous chill. 
 
 " Answer me ! " he commanded. " Do you under 
 stand? " 
 
 " Yes," said she faintly, though her teeth clinched 
 to keep them from chattering. 
 
 " Then guard your tongue." 
 
 And he went, Henrietta s hypnotized eyes following 
 him, in them a look of fear and of admiration. When 
 she could no longer see him she drew a great breath and 
 said to herself : " Any woman would be glad to have 
 such a man as that trample on her. And Sophy has 
 thrown him away! Fool! Selfish, ignorant, conceited 
 fool!" She rejoined Sophy, who was sitting stupefied 
 under the blow of Murdock s last words. " Poor dear! " 
 she said soothingly. " He is a frightful man. Every 
 body will sympathize with you." 
 
 314 
 
A FRIGHTFUL MAN 
 
 Sophy s reply was a look of agony. 
 
 Murdock s threat struck such terror into Henrietta 
 Hastings s soul that she did not go West by the train 
 Sophy and Florence took, but changed her tickets to 
 another route. And she never hinted even to Fred what 
 she had seen and heard. 
 
XXH 
 
 FOB, NOEMA S SAKE 
 
 MRS. MURDOCK and Mrs. Berkeley and their maids, 
 all parading trophies of protracted and diligent metro 
 politan sojourn, descended from the express at Saint X. 
 The station hack drivers, countrymen, flown from the 
 lonesomeness of farm life and making a living in the way 
 that in town comes handiest to the farm-bred, gaped in 
 astonishment and delight. " Who d think," said one high- 
 hipped ex-farmer, a young man made prematurely de 
 crepit of aspect and voice by hot bread and fried things 
 three times a day for thirty years, " who d think them 
 two yander was Sophy Baker and my wife s second 
 cousin Flora Warfield that used to go tearin and rarin 
 licketty-split over the fields barefoot in calico slips? " 
 Mrs. Murdock saw her aristocratic son-in-law just be 
 hind Mrs. Berkeley s advancing groom. She was sur 
 prised and flattered by this attention. 
 
 " I thought Norma oughtn t to come out," explained 
 Degarmo, " and it did seem cheerless for you to arrive in 
 J this nasty drizzle with no one to welcome you." 
 
 " Is Norma ill? " said Sophy, whose mind had lat 
 terly been only for her own affairs. 
 
 "Oh, no fine as a fiddle. Only in circum 
 stances " 
 
 " Of course naturally," the prospective grand 
 mother hastened to say. 
 
 316 
 
FOR NOBMA S SAKE 
 
 " No," continued Joe, " she s as active as can be. 
 She has fceen up at the Eyrie every day for a week, 
 putting things to rights." 
 
 Joe was at once impressed by the great and gratify 
 ing improvement in his mother-in-law s appearance her 
 less heavy, less stolid face, her more shapely figure, her 
 fashionable, youthful traveling dress and hat. But he 
 also saw what he was looking for the signs of secret 
 anxiety weighing upon her. A genuine secret anxiety, 
 as distinguished from our more or less theatrical emo 
 tions for the purpose of making ourselves interesting to 
 ourselves and our fellow-beings, has to be intense indeed 
 before we can no longer contrive to prevent it from show 
 ing itself outwardly. Sophy s look of care and worry; 
 was proof how deep Murdock had shot dread into her. 
 Craft could not have suggested a more effective way of 
 dealing with her. To kill any passion, it is only neces 
 sary to kindle another and stronger passion. Sophy s 
 jealousy, her smarts and stings from wounded vanity, 
 had been forgotten, swallowed up in fear for her material 
 welfare perforce the prime concern with all human 
 beings, except in moments of impulse. In those weeks 
 in New York she had learned of the treasures that open 
 to golden keys ; and no miser values wealth as do those 
 who know and love what it will buy. 
 
 " Norma s suspicions weren t groundless," thought 
 Joe, from whom Norma s pride had withheld all but 
 a prudence-compelled hint of her family s troubles. 
 " There s the devil to pay between them." On the way 
 to the Eyrie he disclosed the real reason for his un 
 wonted and even superfluous courtesy in meeting heiv 
 though she, never delving into motives and always ac 
 cepting surface-seeming as reality, did not see it. Her 
 newly energized vanity told her he had come because she 
 
 317 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 was a person of such consequence ; and she accepted this 
 as she accepted for true the exclamations of ravished 
 delight from milliners and dressmakers when she was 
 trying on their wares. " You ll pardon me for speak 
 ing of it," began Joe, " but Norma has somehow got the 
 notion that that things are not going quite as smoothly 
 as they might between you and her father." 
 
 " Yes, I wrote to her. I wanted her to know the 
 rights of the way I ve been treated." 
 
 Joe diplomatically concealed the anger roused in him 
 by what he regarded as evidence of Sophy s utter selfish 
 ness ; for it seemed to him the outermost limit of selfish 
 ness for a woman, knowing her own daughter was about 
 to become a mother, deliberately to harrow her mind. 
 " Please don t think Norma asked me to speak of it to 
 you," said he. " She hasn t even spoken of your letter. 
 But I feel and no doubt you do, too that she mustn t 
 be worried. It s only four months away now." 
 
 Sophy welcomed her son-in-law s intrusion; he had 
 opened the subject she most wished to discuss. " Yes," 
 said she, " he is acting scandalously. I ve done my best 
 to keep it quiet, but he won t have it. No, I m going to 
 bring suit for divorce against him. Some women might 
 be able to stand it. 7 can t. I m not sure what the 
 teachings of religion are, but I won t believe God would 
 want me to continue this life of martyrdom." She was 
 crying softly now. " I suppose there are those that envy 
 me wealth and luxury. But it s just as I said to my 
 maid this morning when she was doing my hair. Katy, 
 says I, I d gladly change places with you. And I 
 meant it." 
 
 Joe, of a less credulous and more analytic genera 
 tion, was not in the least moved by her tears. He re 
 garded tears as simply a feminine weapon, and of a past 
 
 318 
 
FOR NORMA S SAKE 
 
 era antiquated and futile as fainting fits. His was 
 merely the conventional tone for sympathy as he said: 
 " You know how I feel about your unhappiness, mother. 
 But can t you put off the the scandal until after the 
 baby is born? You must do it! The worry would 
 You know what the effect would be on as sensitive a 
 child as Norma." 
 
 Sophy had by no means lost her longing for free 
 dom ; nor had her up-piled resentment against Murdock 
 lessened. But she felt she would almost be willing to live 
 again with him as his wife rather than give him license 
 for the wicked j oy s he had planned for himself ; and her 
 jealousy was solidly backed up by her stubbornness. To 
 release him to a life of happiness with another woman 
 was bad enough; to release him under compulsion was 
 unendurable. Now, Joe s interposition set hope to 
 stirring hope that she might use him and Norma s 
 approaching confinement to relax, perhaps to break, 
 Murdock s grip upon her destiny. But, as she had 
 committed herself with Joe, had led him to believe 
 it was she who was eagerly seeking divorce, she must 
 advance cautiously. Her answer to his plea was a 
 heavy sigh. 
 
 " Did you In the letter, did you speak of the 
 divorce? " inquired Joe. 
 
 " No," was Sophy s reassuring reply. 
 
 " Then she needn t and mustn t have a suspicion 
 a divorce is coming. I debated whether to talk to you 
 first or to to Mr. Murdock. It seemed best to see you. 
 Now that I ve your consent, I m going on to New York 
 without letting Norma know why and I shall get Mur 
 dock to do his part. Thank you, mother dear." He 
 pressed her hand feelingly between both his. " Thank 
 you. You are so good, so self-sacrificing. * 
 
 319 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Sophy, like most women with children, was used 
 to being called, and to calling and thinking herself, self- 
 sacrificing. But those who love that role never lose 
 their pleasure in having it acclaimed. " I can t for 
 get I m a mother," said she, with the sincerity of con- 
 
 ^vinced virtue. " You men never understand a mother s 
 
 , heart." 
 
 She was now seeing a way of escape clear before her 
 a chance to be free herself, and to substitute gall for 
 sweetness in the freedom of this husband who had mis 
 treated her so shamefully. Acting upon a hint in a 
 newspaper account of a divorce case she had, just be 
 fore leaving New York, engaged the Mulvihill Private 
 
 i Detective Agency to " shadow " Murdock. The first 
 
 ! report on him had been most encouraging. Delay would 
 
 I give her detectives opportunity to explore thoroughly. 
 
 ! Once she had proofs of his perfidy, of Juliet Raeburn s 
 true character, not he but she would be arbiter of des 
 tiny. The longer she considered Joe s interposition the 
 more patently providential it became. " Yes," she said 
 to herself, " God is still in His Heaven. * Though hand 
 join in hand, the wicked shall not triumph. Then 
 to Joe : " I ll do my part if you get a promise from him. 
 
 j iYou are right ; Norma must have her mind easy at this 
 time. If she s fretting and worrying it may make the 
 
 x child an idiot." 
 
 He had been haunted by many dark and dire possi- 
 
 bilities of disaster to his and Norma s hopes through the 
 scandal; this terror, the most hideous of all, was new. 
 Suppose his wife were to die, and the child were to live, 
 an idiot! " I think I ll go to New York this very even 
 ing," cried he, sweat beading his forehead. " My God, 
 it is frightful!" 
 
 " Now, you ve got some ioW what Tve suffered f Km 
 320 
 
FOR NORMA S SAKE 
 
 him," said she. " For it s all my fault. Everybody here 
 knows there never was a patienter wife or a more sacri 
 ficing mother than I ve been." 
 
 Degarmo telegraphed Murdock, and they met at the 
 University Club the next evening. He had not had time 
 to change from traveling clothes ; Murdock was not only 
 in evening dress, but also in evening dress of a quality 
 that impressed Joe, expert at such matters. In all those 
 small details, so important in fashionable dress for men, 
 Murdock was perfection, the best of London combined 
 with the best of Paris. Joe was profoundly concerned 
 about Norma, regarded his mission as an issue of life 
 and death; yet, so sacred were appearances to him, he 
 began with a rambling, confused apology for his tweeds. 
 Murdock, never resigned in the presence of folly, and in 
 those days extremely irritable, cut his son-in-law short 
 with, " Did you come from Saint X to see me about your 
 clothes?" 
 
 " No," said Joe, instantly responding to the curb, 
 " I came about the divorce." 
 
 Murdock frowned imperiously. 
 
 " Don t imagine I m impertinent enough to interfere 
 in matters that don t concern me," Degarmo hastened 
 to say. "But have you thought of Norma? She is 
 to become a mother within the next four months." 
 
 " Ah ! " exclaimed Murdock. But his expression re 
 mained unreadable. 
 
 " She doesn t dream you and her mother are thinking- 
 of divorce. All she knows is there s trouble between you 
 estrangement. Murdock, I want to ask you " 
 
 " I understand," said Murdock, in a tone that for 
 bade him to finish. 
 
 " I put that same question to Mrs. Murdock " 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Into Murdock s face and out again flitted a smile, 
 satiric, contemptuous. 
 
 " And she says she s willing to wait if you are." 
 
 A long silence, Joe watching his face anxiously but 
 in vain. He might as well have watched the dead-white 
 expanse of his shirt front. 
 
 " The child might be an idiot. Norma might 
 might " 
 
 " I understand," interjected Murdock. 
 
 Five minutes, ten minutes, passed a quarter of an 
 hour; and still there was no abatement of his will s 
 struggle against deviating from any purpose it had 
 fixed. His will was Murdock s master, and never had it 
 turned aside because of consequences. The suggestion 
 of deviating conjured forebodings of disaster; for he 
 knew fate is only too eager to make playthings of those 
 who yield in the smallest degree to its insidious tempta 
 tions to swerve. And Degarmo was asking a delay of 
 six months, perhaps a year ; and when that period was 
 ended, there would be some fresh equally imperative rea 
 son for further delay. Delay always breeds delay 
 
 " Let us dine," he said. 
 
 " I can f. until I have your answer." 
 
 " I will give you my answer to-morrow." 
 
 Degarmo, cowed and insignificant though he felt 
 before Murdock, could scarcely refrain from bursting 
 out in denunciation of such hardness of heart. He 
 watched Murdock furtively, horror surging up in him. 
 " He is a brute," he said to himself. " No wonder 
 men fear him and obey him. So this is what success 
 makes of a man." And he exclaimed aloud : " My God, 
 Murdock! Don t you realize your daughter is at 
 stake?" 
 
 The eyes that turned upon Degarmo withered his 
 322 
 
FOR NORMALS SAKE 
 
 hatred and horror. " You don t know what you re 
 talking about," Murdock said, his cold, slow voice in 
 strange contrast to his eyes. " There are other con 
 siderations besides Norma. I never give a decision in 
 an important matter the same day." He rose from the 
 sofa, threw away his cigarette. " Let us dine." 
 
 " But Murdock " 
 
 " I wish to hear no more." 
 
 It was a silent dinner, and afterwards they went 
 to Healey s, Murdock playing and winning heavily, 
 Degarmo merely looking on, as when he married he 
 made a resolution not to play again in a gambling 
 house on the American side of the Atlantic. At break 
 fast next morning, each showed plainly that he had 
 passed the time of life when a dash of cold water drives 
 away the traces of lost sleep. Joe knew he was wrin 
 kled and haggard ; he saw that Murdock merely looked 
 weary. But he consoled himself by noting the profuse 
 sprinkle of gray in Murdock s thick, fair hair. 
 
 " When do you expect the child ? " asked Murdock. 
 
 " In four months." 
 
 " In six months from now the proceedings will be 
 resumed. You will hear no more of it until then." 
 
 " Thank you " 
 
 Murdock dammed the impending flood with a look. 
 Stronger even than Degarmo s sense of catastrophe 
 averted, was his awe of the man before him this slave 
 of an inflexible will with its relentless purposes. " How 
 can a monster and a man contrive to live in the same 
 body, without either destroying the other ? " thought 
 Joe. And then he forgot all about it, and, for the 
 time, about Norma, in observing the details of Mur 
 dock s dress a strikingly good pattern of cheviot, cut 
 in a new way, a strange silk scarf of a new pattern, 
 
 323 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 and so on, and so on. Presently curiosity got the bet* 
 ter of manners. " I say, old man," he asked, " where 
 did you get that suit and that tie and that shirt ? " 
 [And Murdock said to himself, " How is it possible for* 
 Joe the shallow fool about clothes and society, and Joe 
 the decent and fond where Norma is concerned, to be 
 parts of the same person ? " 
 
xxni 
 
 ME. BLAGDEN BESTIRS HIMSELF 
 
 (BENT only on insuring Norma s peace of mind, Joe 
 so reported his interview with Murdock to Sophy that 
 she, like most drifters, a roseate optimist, decided the 
 divorce was as good as abandoned. She ordered her 
 lawyer, Graves, to discontinue the expensive service of 
 the detective agency; and, at home again, and with 
 no one behind her to push and encourage and applaud, 
 and comfortably settled in the old rut of novels, fancy- 
 work and three " square " meals she began to shed 
 the ideas Blagden had sown and New York had wa 
 tered, as the desert sheds heat and grows cold when 
 the sun sets. Soon, about all that remained of the 
 rigid beauty regimen was Katy s energetic massage 
 twice a day; and she persisted in this, not because it 
 was good for her, keeping the contour she had re 
 gained, and to a certain extent holding her flesh down, 
 but because she liked the soothing sensation of Katy s 
 dexterous fingers. Like most of us, Sophy was simply 
 a creature of surroundings, passive, ready to advance 
 if there were stimulus, equally ready to retrograde if 
 there were not. Those who condemn her might prof 
 itably consider whether they owe their graces of per 
 son and character to their surroundings or to their 
 own unaided efforts. 
 
 Presently she resumed the service of the Mulvihill 
 325 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Detective Bureau. " It s dreadfully dear," reasoned 
 she, " but if he ever does make trouble I ought to be 
 good and ready." 
 
 The universe s chain of causes and effects is never 
 broken ; no action is without a cause. Often, indeed 
 usually, there are many motives for any human action ; 
 usually, there is one that is the impelling motive and 
 rarely is it the one ascribed either by others or by one 
 self. Prudence undoubtedly figured among Sophy s 
 reasons for resuming the shadowing of her husband 
 and Juliet Raeburn ; but it was not the impelling rea 
 son. She began again because, after the excitement 
 of New York, which makes a business of providing 
 amusement for those incapable of amusing themselves, 
 Saint X was dull and tedious. Sophy might have 
 occupied herself with the preparations for her coming 
 grandchild; but that called for exertion, more exertion 
 even than looking after her own neglected person and 
 household. The regular twice-a-week reports on Mur- 
 dock and " that bad woman " were exciting in them 
 selves, more exciting than the best play, cost her no 
 effort, gave her subject for thought, for vague, va 
 porous, endless speculation such as purposeless people 
 delight in. The private detective agency knows its 
 feminine clients, sees to it that the reports they receive 
 stimulate curiosity and create an appetite for more 
 and more of the same food; the writing of artistic 
 reports is the chief part of the task of the private de 
 tectives. Graves re-engaged the agency; and, warned 
 by the discontinuance, it proceeded to make itself in 
 dispensable. 
 
 Twice a week she had before her two voluminous 
 reports a minute account of the movements of her 
 husband, an even more minute account of Juliet Rae- 
 
 326 
 
MR. BLAGDEN BESTIRS HIMSELF 
 
 burn. She was paying for but one " operative " to 
 watch Murdock; two were required for Miss Raeburn, 
 one a woman apparently in the employ of Dangerfield s 
 in some capacity that gave her access to the waste- 
 basket in Miss Raeburn s private office. All three op 
 eratives, with a persistence that might have raised a 
 suspicion of collusion and fraud in a less unsophisti 
 cated mind, agreed in pointing toward a connecting 
 mystery in the ostentatiously separate lives of Murdock 
 and Juliet Raeburn. Each operative in turn was just 
 about to solve this mystery; thus, their reports gave 
 her powerful doses of that delightful stimulant of sus 
 pended sensational interest which makes the story-paper 
 serial so welcome wherever it goes. Sophy felt she knew 
 what this mystery was where " M." and "Miss R." 
 were when each, about the same hour on the same day 
 or evening, succeeded in throwing her detectives off the 
 scent. " And they ll catch them, sure ! " she exclaimed, 
 eyes flashing in anticipation of triumph. Wkat 
 stronger moral confirmation of their intrigue could she 
 have had than those reports from two, practically 
 three, independent sources, showing simultaneous de 
 sire to hide? "And I ll soon get the legal proof. 
 Then let him look out! I ll bring him to his knees 
 and drive her out of New York." It was one of her 
 dreams, as she sat with her fancywork, to stand in 
 front of Dangerfield s and see it dismantled and to let. 
 Murdock s monthly deposit to her credit had al 
 ways been liberal. In the days before the open es 
 trangement, he had often suggested increasing it, and 
 she had refused. When all he had was freely at her 
 command, in the old, easy-going American fashion, 
 why trouble herself with money she did not need? Im 
 mediately after the open breach, he of his own motion 
 
 327 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 doubled the monthly allowance. Not until the heavy 
 charges for detectives began did she give the money 
 relations between him and her a conscious thought. 
 Then, however, step by step, she moved or rather was 
 moved into the point of view where she regarded her 
 self as unjustly placed by him in the position of pen 
 sioner upon his niggard bounty. " This is my re- 
 ;ward," said she to herself bitterly, " for not having 
 been a wheedler and a grabber like other wives of men 
 of means." She observed that several of her friends 
 among the married women were rich in their own right. 
 " Florence Berkeley, for instance, could live well on 
 the income of what she could realize from her jewelry 
 not to speak of that big block of stores and flats 
 they say he has just settled on her. But what have I 
 got? Nothing! What has he given me? Only a lit 
 tle jewelry hardly enough to keep me five years, ex 
 cept in the poorest, stingiest way. I ought to have 
 had more sense." 
 
 But immediately she was transferring the blame to 
 him. " He wouldn t have waited for me to ask for 
 things if he had been really decent. He has taken ad- 
 yantage of my easy, good-natured ways. That s been 
 the whole trouble my unsuspicious nature. I never 
 dreamed what a heart he had. No wonder he was al 
 ways so secretive and distant." Nor was her condem 
 nation of him mitigated by reflecting on the reason 
 she did not now ask an increase of the allowance her 
 fear lest he somehow should discover her guilty secret. 
 
 And he would have discovered it but for Blagden. 
 
 One afternoon Blagden, in Murdock s outer office 
 downtown in New York, saw before him a stocky dis 
 sipated-looking man, with greasy, kinky gray hair, 
 drooping iron-gray mustache. He had the shady, fur- 
 
MB. BLAGDEN BESTIRS HIMSELF^ 
 
 tive-brazen air of those who live by divers gainful 00* 
 cupations not yet recognized as legitimate, rapidly] 
 though we have been extending the mantle of respecta-1 
 bility over all who live well without work withdraw-* 
 ing it as rapidly from the mutton heads who still adhere 1 
 to the slow and painful and comparatively unremunera- 
 tive methods of honest toil. "My name is Mr. Noo- 
 nan," said the greasy-gray furtive man, producing an 
 enormous seedy pocketbook bulging with thumbed and 
 frayed papers. From it he extracted a printed card 
 which he handed to Blagden. 
 
 " Thomas K. Noonan," Blagden read. " With the 
 Fidelity Detective Agency." Blagden lifted his eyes 
 from the card to the hard, corrugated countenance. 
 " Well ? " said he, concentrating an insultingly suspi 
 cious look upon Mr. Noonan s spongy, brick-red nose. 
 
 " I want to see the boss on very particular busi 
 ness." 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 " I don t deal with understrappers. Tell him I ve 
 come about his being shadowed." 
 
 Blagden went through the several offices between 
 the outer room and the place where Murdock was se 
 cluded in solitary quiet. Murdock listened indifferent 
 ly. " I care nothing about it," said he. " I ll not see 
 him. Let him talk to you or get out, as he pleases." 
 
 When Blagden returned with this message, Noonan 
 accepted it as the expected. " Go tell him," said he, 
 " that both he and the lady are being surveilled for a 
 third party, and that I can put him wise." 
 
 Blagden dropped his gaze to conceal suddenly flam 
 ing interest. " I ll see," he said, and disappeared in 
 the direction of Murdock. But after waiting a mo 
 ment or so out of sight of the detective he returned. 
 22 329 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 His color was high, and he did not meet Noonan s hard 
 bright eyes as he said : " He won t see you. But, as I 
 explained to you, I have charge of his private affairs. 
 He has no secrets from me." 
 
 Noonan eyed him for some time in silence. " Is 
 there a place where we can talk private ? " he asked at 
 length. 
 
 Like all the adepts in the mysteries of high finance, 
 Murdock had attached to his offices a series of small 
 withdrawing rooms, " sweat boxes " as they are called, 
 with exits in various directions, so that there might 
 be every sort of comings and goings without attract 
 ing any more public attention than the stealthy move 
 ments of criminals in and out of their dens. Blagden 
 led Noonan into one of these sweat boxes, and closed 
 the door. They sat ; so small was the room that their 
 knees touched, and the air was instantly heavy with the 
 fumes of stale tobacco and whisky from the saturated 
 person of the detective. 
 
 " An old kick of mine beg pardon side partner, 
 who drinks a bit too much at times " he began. 
 
 " You mean," interrupted Blagden, " that your 
 agency and another are the same under different names, 
 that you play into each other s hands, that somebody 
 has hired the other agency to shadow Mr. Murdock, 
 and you ve come to get a 6 rake-off from him." 
 
 Noonan grinned. " Not at all," said he. " But 
 one agency can see to it that the other gets throwed 
 off the track." 
 
 "What track?" 
 
 Noonan winked and nudged Blagden s knee with 
 his. 
 
 "What track?" repeated Blagden, drawing his 
 knees out of reach. 
 
 330 
 
MR. BLAGDEN BESTIRS PI IMS ELF 
 
 Noonan looked significantly at the secretary, ele 
 vated his hand, rubbed its thumb over its first and sec 
 ond fingers. 
 
 " Not a cent," said Blagden, rising. " If you ve 
 got anything of value to us, you know you ll be paid. 
 But we don t pay until we inspect the goods." 
 
 Noonan nodded appreciation. " All right sit 
 down," said he. " His wife is shadowing him and 
 the lady." 
 
 "What lady?" 
 
 " Miss Raeburn, of course." 
 
 There was a conscious pallor in Blagden s cheeks, 
 a shiftiness in his eyes, as he said curtly : " Let em 
 go ahead. We care nothing about it. Good day." 
 And he held open the door of the sweat box that gave 
 into a dark, narrow passage and thence into the main 
 hall. 
 
 " I m giving it to you straight," urged Noonan. 
 66 And your boss can rely on us. My principals always 
 play square with the side that s got the most money. * 
 
 " It s of no interest to us," said Blagden. " We 
 thought it was another matter. Good day." And 
 Noonan lingeringly edged into the passage, Blagden 
 closing the door upon his heels. 
 
 As Murdock and Blagden were dining together 
 that evening Murdock happened to remember the visit 
 of the detective and vaguely wondered what the man 
 had wanted. He recalled Tom Berkeley s story up in 
 the woods about Florence and her detectives. It was 
 unlikely that Sophy had had either the " gumption " 
 or the " get up " to employ detectives ; but if she had, 
 she could learn nothing harmful to Juliet. Even as 
 Berkeley was telling him he had made up his mind to 
 let no temptation lure him to the folly and the in- 
 
 331 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 justice of compromising her in any way. And when he 
 found out that it was she who had shielded him from 
 | death and snatched him back to life, he fought down 
 I the longing to go to her. More than ever it was her 
 ! right that her reputation be not put in danger of 
 i smirch through him. He had tried writing to her. 
 [But the results sounded labored, stilted, either too for 
 mal or too florid, and he gave that over. It was best 
 to wait. He was daily strengthened in this resolution, 
 so difficult for his temperament, by reading or hearing 
 of scandals, catastrophes precipitated by just such im 
 patience and recklessness as were urging him. The 
 woman who had beaten off death from him when he lay 
 helpless would wait for him; why risk anything, per- 
 i haps everything, simply to gratify a longing that 
 ; would not be appeased, but the reverse, by yielding? 
 
 It was with no uneasiness of mind and with only the 
 mildest curiosity that he said to Blagden, " By the 
 way, did you find out what that detective wanted ? " 
 lAs he did not look up from his plate, he did not note 
 how suddenly rosy the always ruddy secretary grew. 
 
 " He didn t say," replied Blagden, offhandedly. 
 " Guess it was simply a play for a job. His smell still 
 ] hung in my clothes when I took them off to dress for 
 dinner." 
 
 In the woods Blagden s treachery to his employer, 
 whom he sometimes liked, sometimes hated, always en 
 vied and copied, had been by the veiled routes of innu 
 endo and implication. This was the first overt act, 
 the first lie direct and face to face. He was getting 
 on, was Blagden was educating his mind to be expert 
 and his conscience to be placid when the severer strains 
 upon both should come, as his programme of chicane 
 unfolded. " Murdock really didn t want to be an- 
 
 333 
 
ME. BLAGDEN BESTIRS HIMSELF, 
 
 noyed," he said to himself, composing his conscience 
 for sleep that night. " He s doing nothing that could 
 get him into trouble. Why, he won t even dine or take 
 supper with Berkeley if there are to be any women. 
 rThen, too, it was my duty as a decent man to protect 
 that noble wife of his at any cost." 
 
XXIV 
 
 AND MAKES RAPID PROGRESS 
 
 Two months, to the day, after Murdock got Joe 
 Degarmo s telegram announcing the auspicious arrival 
 of Joseph Degarmo second, he said to Blagden, when L 
 they had finished the morning s routine of business : 
 
 " Please take the afternoon express for Saint X. 
 See Mrs. Murdock alone. Say to her, The time is 
 up. " 
 
 If Murdock had been looking at his secretary, he 
 would have been forced to wonder why his countenance 
 suddenly lighted, why this curt and mysterious mes 
 sage not only was understood, but also was hailed 
 with a delight so keen that it could not be concealed. 
 After a moment s silent waiting Blagden asked, " Is 
 that all?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " I am to simply say, * The time is up ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 Blagden looked at his chief. Murdock was sitting 
 in the peculiar, motionless, rigid attitude he sometimes j 
 took, an attitude that suggested one waiting for the 
 shock of the assault, ready to receive it, certain to repel 
 it. He seemed almost a youth at the first glance; yet 
 there was in him Blagden sometimes thought it was 
 in the eyes, again in the chin, again in the bulge of 
 brow, or perhaps the set of the head upon the shoulders 
 
 334 
 
AND MAKES RAPID PROGRESS 
 
 a fixedness, a concentration that was at the opposite 
 extreme from youth s reckless, aimless prodigality of 
 time and strength. To-day that expression terri 
 fied the secretary as it had terrified Joe Degarmo. 
 " If he should ever find me in his path ! " he muttered. 
 A feeling of chill started somewhere away down in the 
 center of his body, slowly spread, grew intenser, until 
 he was cold from vitals to skin, was shaking so violently 
 that he was afraid Murdock would see his jaws chat 
 tering. 
 
 At the Eyrie he found neglect bordering on desola 
 tion. The hedges were undipped and dust-stained. 
 Lawns, gardens, walks, and drives looked worse for 
 slovenly attention than if they had had no attention at 
 all. Within the house, disorder and dust. " Poor wom 
 an ! " thought Blagden. " She has no heart for any 
 thing." And his own heart grew heavy with the sympa 
 thetic sorrow we can so readily summon for those whose 
 lives touch ours only casually and whose weaknesses and 
 shortcomings inconvenience us not at all. He was pre 
 pared to see a very Lady of Woe; he was, therefore, 
 moved to admiration by the bravery of soul shown in 
 the placid exterior presently appearing at the drawing- 
 room door. Sophy looked somewhat better than she had 
 formerly at Saint X, even at her best " company best," 
 but not nearly so well as during her stay in New York. 
 The warmth of her greeting thrilled him. The truth was, 
 in her mind he had gone the way of the ideas and impulses 
 he stimulated ; he had grown hazy to her, for people of 
 impulse without persistence soon lose distinct memory 
 of whoever and whatever is not immediately before them. 
 But now that he was again before her all that had been 
 came flooding back; and she honestly felt that she was 
 speaking the truth as she said with her sweet, whole- 
 
 335 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 souled smile : " I think so often how good and kind you 
 were to me during those trying days up there. Is is 
 Mr. Murdock coming? " 
 
 " No," replied Blagden. " He sent me with a mes 
 sage to you." 
 
 Mrs. Murdock shrank. 
 
 " A message you ll be very glad to get," he went on. 
 They were in her sitting room. He rose and closed the 
 door into the hall. " I remembered our talks together, 
 and when he said, * Tell her the time is up, I knew I was 
 carrying you your freedom." 
 
 " Yes," said Sophy faintly. And only that day she 
 had been thinking she would hear no more of his attempt 
 to marry again, had been thinking he must be tiring of 
 his dressmaker " No man ever respects a woman who 
 gives up to him that way, and a man doesn t make a 
 wife of a woman he doesn t respect." Having no fixity 
 of purpose within herself for comparison, she not only 
 did not understand it in another, but did not believe in 
 its existence. 
 
 Blagden saw that, for some reason or other, his news 
 was the reverse of welcome, that it had overwhelmed her. 
 But it was his cue to ignore this, to continue to assume 
 she was impatiently longing for freedom. " A few 
 months more, that will quickly pass, and your troubles 
 will all be over," said he encouragingly. " Perhaps I 
 shouldn t say so, occupying the position I do, but I have 
 thought every day of the heavy burden you were carry 
 ing, and my heart has ached for you." 
 
 Sophy s eyes filled with tears. " It s a wonder it 
 doesn t age me," cried she. A year before, she would 
 have wailed that it had aged her. 
 
 " If anything, you look younger than when I last 
 saw you," said Blagden, full as much genuineness as flat- 
 
 336 
 
AND MAKES RAPID PROGRESS 
 
 tery in the admiring glance he boldly gave. The flow 
 ing negligee flung a friendly grace over her too loosely 
 corseted form, was most kind to her real charms her 
 satin-smooth fair skin, her shapely head, her glorious 
 eyes. And, though she had been neglecting Secor s pre 
 scription for the contour, the former heaviness of the 
 lower part of the face had not yet returned. Besides, 
 she was neater, had not abandoned the habit of bathing 
 before dressing, and of regularly washing the hair ; and 
 there were the eyes, the incomparable nose, those beauti 
 ful, luxury-loving, luxury-suggesting hands. Blagden 
 had no need to strain his imagination; and while the 
 amplitude of her person might have off ended his acquired 
 taste, had he indulged his critical faculties, it appealed 
 to and stimulated an emotion far stronger than taste 
 imposed by fashion. 
 
 Before his worshipful incense Sophy revived, expand 
 ed in soul, felt the yearning to confide and to lean. " I 
 trust you," said she. " You are the only one I do trust. 
 In New York last fall when that is, when he thought 
 I wasn t as eager for the divorce as I had been You 
 know, Mr. Blagden, I have religious scruples that I m 
 finding it hard to conquer then, too, perhaps he only 
 said it to frighten me from the divorce " Sophy was 
 red, was stammering, as she poured out these confused 
 sentences, for she was not experienced in willful mis- 
 statement of the truth " Anyhow, you can t im 
 agine the brutality of his treatment. He said if I 
 didn t get the divorce, he would impoverish me stop 
 my income." 
 
 Blagden started up indignantly. " Incredible ! " he 
 exclaimed, eagerly seizing the opportunity to put his 
 conduct in a better light with himself. " Why, you ve 
 as much right to the fortune as he has ! Without you, 
 
 337 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 _/ - 
 
 where would he have been? . . . Pardon me for saying 
 these things they seem disloyal. But I am human." 
 
 Sophy pressed his arm gratefully. " Thank you," 
 said she, all in a glow at finding some one who had 
 fathomed the obscured but essential truth of her im 
 portance as a factor in the making of Murdock s career. 
 " You are not disloyal. You are simply an honest man. 
 But his threat worried me. I consulted a lawyer not 
 the lawyer he imposed on me, that Bailby, but dear old 
 Mr. Graves, our family lawyer up home, where I come 
 from originally. And he assured me I need have no 
 fears." 
 
 " I suspect Mr. Graves, being old-fashioned, doesn t 
 appreciate the power nowadays of such men as Mr. Mur- 
 dock," replied Blagden, looking grave. " If he wished 
 to do such a dastardly thing, he could do it. Mind you, 
 I say, if he wished to do it. 
 
 " I can t believe it! There is such a thing as jus 
 tice!" 
 
 Blagden shook his head sadly. " Not for ordinary 
 mortals, against such men as Mr. Murdock." 
 
 " I m sure Mr. Graves would not mislead me," cried 
 she, irritated against Blagden. 
 
 He had rather anticipated the fate of the bearer of 
 bad news to unreasonable, capricious woman, and was 
 prepared to resist and insist. He put apologetic gen 
 tleness into his manner and voice, but not into his words. 
 " Granting that the courts would allow you something 
 . . . and that you could collect it ... making the fight 
 each time all over again . . . still, how much would it 
 be? Why, at most hardly enough to keep up a place like 
 this. You d have to cut down your expenditures, and 
 everybody would know about your changed condition. 
 And you d still be his dependent." 
 
 338 
 
AND MAKES RAPID PROGRESS 
 
 Sophy was listening, sour but attentive. " I m so 
 glad I talked of this to you," said she, in the tone in 
 which one doles out reluctant justice. 
 
 " You see, your best interest is where your inclina 
 tion leads," he went on. " If you pursue your original 
 plan, you will be free, you will be independent, you will 
 have a fortune. You will have power happiness 
 everything ! " 
 
 " But " began Sophy. And there she stopped. 
 How tell him she did not wish to enable " that woman " 
 to triumph, yet not give him the impression of a vulgar, 
 carnal jealousy? " The only thing that makes me hesi 
 tate," said she, feeling her way, " is aside from the 
 scandal and my religion That is a very deep feel 
 ing with me, Mr. Blagden." 
 
 " I appreciate that," murmured Blagden. He 
 thought religion a fine trait in a woman, like many other 
 virtues which he regarded as ridiculous, not to say im 
 becile, in a man. 
 
 " I was brought up to believe and I do believe ! " 
 Sophy uttered this as defiantly as if it were being vigor 
 ously disputed. "Without a higher power sustaining me, 
 I don t know what would have become of me. But, as 
 I was saying and it grows out of my religious feeling, 
 too I sometimes feel it isn t right for me to release 
 him, and let him perhaps marry that bad woman." 
 
 " Why should you think he d marry her ? " said he. 
 Then, with an intonation for which he despised himself, 
 he added, " Why should he? " 
 
 "Why, indeed?" echoed Sophy. 
 
 " When he is free and doesn t marry her, you will 
 have put on her the greatest humiliation possible." 
 
 Sophy was delighted; she had not thought of this. 
 " If I could be sure he wouldn t ! " 
 
 339 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Blagden smiled meaningly. " I can assure you he 
 won t." He pretended to hesitate before saying, " I 
 know he s not been seeing her these last few months." 
 
 " Oh, yes, he has," cried Sophy. She halted, decided 
 for giving him her whole confidence. " I have means of 
 knowing. I engaged detectives." Defiantly, " I know * 
 it sounds badly, but I simply had to protect myself." 
 
 " Naturally," said Blagden, with the utmost hearti 
 ness. " Did your detectives tell you he was seeing her ? " 
 
 " Not exactly, but practically. I had them both 
 watched, and they d both disappear at about the same 
 time." 
 
 " That does look like it," admitted Blagden. "But 
 You mustn t ask me any questions about what I m going 
 to say. Mrs. Murdock, I know where he was at some 
 many of those times." 
 
 She winced, flushed. Then it came to her, making 
 her radiant, that through these other women her tri 
 umph over Juliet Raeburn had already begun. Also, 
 while the wife who is discarded for a woman is pitied and 
 scorned, she who is discarded for women is congratulated 
 on being well rid of a beast. " So ! There are other 
 women? " inquired she. 
 
 Blagden glanced away. " I did not say so." 
 
 " And that s why you say he won t marry her." 
 
 Blagden made no reply. 
 
 Sophy reflected long. Thanks to his impulsive hints 
 and sensible advice, her right course lay clear and easy 
 before her. After all, freedom with wealth that was her 
 very own would be best ; and how could morality demand 
 that she remain linked to a loose, a promiscuous char 
 acter? Why, decency forbade it. " Sooner or later, if 
 I remain his wife," she reflected, " he ll be exposed in 
 some low, dreadful scandal. Yes, I must clear my skirts 
 
 340 
 
AND MAKES RAPID PROGRESS 
 
 of him. I ve done my best. He that is filthy, let him 
 be filthy still. And he won t marry her never ! He s 
 not that big a fool to give her a wife s power over his 
 pocketbook. No, he ll keep her where he can hold the bit 
 on her if he doesn t get tired and throw her over en 
 tirely. Probably he s trying to get rid of her, even 
 now." 
 
 Blagden did not interrupt her reflections; he read 
 in her face how favorable to his plans they were. In 
 stead, he went to the window and pretended to inspect the 
 view. When he did speak, it was to say, " I am going 
 to resign from Mr. Murdock s service." 
 
 " Oh, no not on my account," protested Sophy, in 
 alarm, feeling that if he left she would have lost her 
 mainstay. " I understand how it is. I don t blame you 
 not in the least. You must make your career." 
 
 " I ve not been staying on with him for that reason. 
 I ve done it simply for the experience. You see, my rela 
 tives haven t at all fancied my being in such a position. 
 They ve got a kind of foolish pride. They seem to think 
 something is due them simply because they ve lived in 
 New York always and been at the front socially. I don t 
 care for that sort of thing myself, but they want me 
 to live on my little private income and make a social ca 
 reer. You know, my uncles and aunts are But what s 
 the use of talking that nonsense? As I was about to 
 say, I ve had enough experience of finance, and Well, 
 , Mrs. Murdock, I d have resigned long ago if it hadn t 
 been " He paused, reddened ingenuously, blurted 
 out " Well I thought I might be able to help you 
 if I stayed on." 
 
 He put into tone and manner what he would not have 
 dared put into the words a discreet but distinct avowal 
 of love the worshipful love of moth for star the 
 
 341 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 chivalrous devotion of knight for lady whom it is joy 
 enough just to serve, without expectation or hope of 
 reward. 
 
 Conventionality and morality protested in vain; it 
 is not in human nature to be profoundly shocked, or not 
 to be flattered, by a respectful avowal of love. The pink 
 j stole into Sophy s cheeks, and her handsome eyes became 
 handsomer than ever. " You have helped me," she said, 
 in about the sweetest tones of that sweet soft voice of 
 hers. " You have, indeed." 
 
 " That is all I ask," replied he humbly. " I am more 
 than repaid." 
 
 Until now she had thought little, and that vague, of 
 his high social position, of the fashionable family to 
 which he belonged. He had been too easy, too natural, 
 too comfortable to get along with ; an entirely different 
 person from her ideal of the socially grand people of the 
 Eastern " smart set." All at once he seemed a sort of 
 prince in disguise, one who had descended from his royal 
 heritage to be near her, to serve her, to worship her in 
 silence and humility. She had never especially noted his 
 appearance beyond the fact that he was a nice-looking 
 man ; now she saw how well-dressed he was, what well-kept 
 * hands he had, the evenness and whiteness of his teeth. 
 : She remembered that he did not smoke she detested the 
 odor of tobacco, thought its use a filthy habit. She 
 hadn t especially liked his red hair; she now observed 
 what a fine, gentlemanly skin went with that hair, and 
 the hair itself seemed more golden than red. Her brave 
 knight was emerging from his disguise, full panoplied 
 in all the charms a knight must have. 
 
 " But," she went on, blushing and uncertain of voice, 
 " if you resign, I ll not see you any more, and I do need 
 .your advice. Who can I turn to? " 
 
 342 
 
AND MAKES RAPID PROGRESS 
 
 He glanced meaningly at her, glanced away. " I 
 shall be free," said he. " As it is now, I can t help feel 
 ing like a sort of traitor whenever I tell you what s in 
 my mind. You can always count on me " Again he 
 looked at her, lowered his eyes, flushed, stammered, " Al 
 ways always, my dear friend." 
 
 " I ll not forget," she assured him, suddenly nervous 
 and shy, in a way she had not known since girlhood. 
 And he, seeing it and realizing he could not advance 
 himself further by lingering, took leave. They both 
 blushed violently as their hands met in a lingering clasp ; 
 and both had that glow of elation which is only the 
 warmer for its slight sting of guilt. 
 
XXV 
 
 BUT CHARLEY INTERVENES 
 
 LAWYER BAILBY, on a hint from Murdock s personal 
 counsel Wickham, waited upon Sophy " to pay my re 
 spects, Mrs. Murdock, and to let you know that if your 
 case is to go upon the present-term calendar, my dear 
 Mrs. Murdock, it should be prepared at once." 
 
 Bailby was a rotund, rugged-looking person, in loose 
 black clothes, a devotee of the fair sex, with a sympa 
 thetic quiver in his voice and a merry eye that was yet 
 instantly ready to shed the quick tear of the tender 
 heart. In the first few moments of their interview Sophy 
 was upset and confused, sullenly suspicious of this lawyer 
 who had been practically thrust upon her, uncertain 
 whether she was glad or sorry at his mission. But when 
 two such temperaments come together, suspicion and 
 embarrassment cannot long endure. Soon Sophy, too 
 honest herself really to credit double-dealing in any hu 
 man being, was speedily unfolding herself, luxuriating in 
 the story of her husband s coldness and neglect. As for 
 Bailby, had he been a bad man which he was not he 
 must have pledged his lance to one who was in his eyes 
 such a " superb figure of a young woman," whether he be 
 lieved her right or wrong. Being a man of sentiment, 
 and having the keenest appreciation how the most dread 
 ful wounds can be made in a sensitive feminine soul by 
 irords and acts that might seem trivial to the ordinary 
 
 344 
 
BUT CHARLEY INTERVENES 
 
 coarse male, Bailby was all tenderness and encourage 
 ment. 
 
 " No man, dear madam," said he, his prominent blue, 
 eyes swimming, " no man is good enough for a good 
 woman." 
 
 " That s true, Mr. Bailby," assented Sophy. " Men 
 are so coarse." 
 
 " Coarse that s the very word. And woman s na 
 ture is so fine, so different from ours." 
 
 " You ought to marry, Mr. Bailby." 
 
 " I ve never had the courage, ma am. I ve always 
 been afraid of what d happen when Mrs. B. found me 
 out. I ve seen so much of married unhappiness. Your 
 case is very sad. I can appreciate how your heart has 
 ached and bled. I know I m a man ; but I had a mother 
 and a father. But, as I was saying, your case, hard 
 though it is, dear madam, is no exception. Oh, the 
 sufferings of women ! " 
 
 Sophy heaved a deep sigh. " I don t want Mr. Mur- 
 dock to be made out a monster, you understand." 
 
 Bailby raised his fat brown hand soothingly. " Cer 
 tainly not certainly not." 
 
 " He s not that, you know." 
 
 " I understand I understand. Just a man. And 
 you a woman unusually tender and delicate." 
 
 " I never say anything," said Sophy. " But I 
 feel." 
 
 Bailby shook his head mournfully. " I ll prepare the 
 papers so you ll only have to write your name. You ll 
 have no trouble whatever. We ll see to it that your feel 
 ings are spared in every way." 
 
 They parted warm friends, Sophy almost in an 
 ecstasy of exalted martyrdom. He had so whetted her 
 appetite for unbosoming, had so loosened up her mind 
 23 345 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 on the subject of her sorrows that she straightway sat 
 down and addressed herself to the composition of a letter 
 to Charley, in prep, school in Massachusetts. As she 
 was more fluent with tongue than with pen she would 
 have preferred to seek out Norma. But in those days 
 Joe was guarding Norma and the new-born with a vigi 
 lance that distrusted everything and everybody. Also, 
 there was naturally a stronger bond of sympathy be 
 tween mother and son. Then, too, women never do ap 
 preciate women; for real, heart-whole, generous sympa 
 thy that questions not, the sex line must be crossed. She 
 covered many sheets of paper with reproaches of Mur- 
 dock and lamentations over the ruined home in her small, 
 neat handwriting. With Sophy grief was of the or 
 dinary human variety. Its tongue did not cleave to the 
 roof of the mouth, neither was its writing arm paralyzed. 
 
 " And even yet," wrote she, to clinch her own and 
 Charley s conviction of the sincerity of her sorrow, " even 
 yet, I do believe I m so weak and forgiving I do 
 believe I d try to forgive him if he d stop wasting money, 
 that ought to be his children s some day, on that New 
 York dressmaker and flaunting his shame so that we are 
 all bowed in the dust. I pray for him night and morn 
 ing. I can t forget that he s the father of my boy and 
 my girl. And t his is my reward for letting that woman 
 stay on up there, just through my soft-heartedness. I 
 don t regret doing it, but I should think they d be 
 ashamed. I suppose they re so sunk in sin that they 
 have no shame." 
 
 It was as she was writing that this last grievance 
 came to her. Theretofore it had not occurred to her that 
 she had done a generous act in letting Juliet stay on ; 
 she had simply done it, without thinking much about 
 the whys and wherefores. And she forgot this additional 
 
 346 
 
BUT CHARLEY INTERVENES 
 
 aspect of it as soon as she had dispatched the letter; 
 in fact, she all but dismissed her woes, so absorbed 
 was her attention in the matters of self -improvement 
 that now interested her more than anything else in the 
 world. 
 
 Since the Adirondacks, Charley had been taking a 1 
 much calmer view of the family troubles. The divorce 
 seemed the remotest of possibilities, highly improbable ; 
 so he was able to look at such things more judicially. 
 In that fashionable school there were no less than eight 
 boys whose parents had divorced, and three of them lux 
 uriated in two sets of mothers and fathers, all liberal 
 and of the best social position. Now that divorce had 
 ceased to be confined to the common people, had become 
 fashionable, it might be well for a man of the world, a 
 member of the senior class at the famous Glaston Acad 
 emy, to keep his mind open on the subject. It certainly 
 did seem more sensible for two who didn t get on to 
 agree to let each other alone; and since the Almighty 
 had so created people that a man needed a woman about 
 and a woman a man, what more natural than remar 
 riage ? " And wouldn t it really be more moral for 
 father to free himself and remarry than presently to 
 blossom out into a middle-aged or elderly cut-up like 
 the Tom Berkeley sort of men? . . . There s a lot of 
 rot talked about divorce but then, there s a lot of rot 
 talked about a lot of things." 
 
 But when -his mother s letter came Charley switched 
 round. " A dressmaker ! " he cried ; for upon that em 
 phasized word his attention caught and hung. In those 
 cultured Eastern surroundings the young Westerner was 
 absorbing the culture of snobbishness with a rapidity that 
 bade fair to put him soon in the class with the boys 
 from Boston and New York. "A dressmaker!" This 
 
 347 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 was frightful nothing fashionable nothing romantic, 
 therefore. A common, disgusting affair that would dis 
 grace him with the boys, would cost him his as yet none 
 too secure social position. " A dressmaker ! " For the 
 moment Charley thrust aside the impression Juliet had 
 made upon him in the North woods ; and that was not 
 difficult for him to do, now he had got a less provincial, 
 more cultured insight into life, had grasped the great 
 truth that rank makes the man, not man the rank. Juliet 
 Raeburn was a dressmaker, hence a common person, no 
 matter what she might seem to be. 
 
 A ray of light shot into the gloom. " No doubt 
 mother s right. No doubt he ll not marry her. No, he 
 couldn t think of such a thing. He wouldn t drag us 
 down that low. Why, I d have to leave school. I d 
 never dare show up among decent people." Again the 
 clouds closed in ; for a vision of Juliet Raeburn flashed 
 upon him " She ain t that kind ! Mother s dead 
 wrong. He ll have to marry her to get her. Of course 
 she s not exactly a lady now, as she has to work for a 
 living; but she s a lady by birth and breeding." So 
 
 I potently was Juliet s spell reasserting itself that his 
 Wad began to fill with excusing, disloyal thoughts. " I 
 mustn t forget my position as head of the family," he 
 hastily rebuked himself. " Mother looks to me to stop 
 
 ! this thing, and I must do it." 
 
 Charley always put off thinking until he had acted. 
 He telegraphed his father that he wished to see him on 
 very important business, and must have permission to 
 leave Glaston and come to New York. The answer he 
 wished came promptly and he set out. He tried to 
 evolve a plan of campaign on the train; but somehow 
 the clatter of the wheels or the people or something 
 wouldn t permit his mind to dispatch the problem as 
 
BUT CHARLEY INTERVENES 
 
 he had assumed it would. He decided it was best to trust 
 to the inspiration of the moment. " I ll lead him up 
 to the question then he ll say something and then 
 I ll open out on him." It might look rather dubious 
 and hazy at a distance ; but as soon as he was face to 
 face with his father it would doubtless instantly clear. 
 
 On the way to the Gotham from the station he began 
 to have qualms which he could hardly keep from classify 
 ing themselves as fear. However, arrived at his father s 
 apartment he marched in, head high, shoulders erect, face 
 haughty. He had arrayed his person to his great sat 
 isfaction in the noisiest of patterns made in the extreme 
 of the latest style. Murdock, at the fireplace with his 
 hands behind his back, received him with a smile of pleas 
 ure and kindly amusement on his handsome face. And 
 certainly Charley was a cheerful and goodly sight to 
 see a fine, strong young fellow, with a clean skin and 
 a clear eye and the " upper class " air of the well fed, 
 well housed, well groomed, who take no thought for the 
 morrow or for anything else. 
 
 " Glad to see you," said Murdock heartily. 
 
 The instant his eyes met his father s he quailed. He 
 wished he had written instead of coming. Still, now that 
 he was here, he would not show the white feather for 
 Charley was at the age when males are extremely nervous 
 about their courage an age most males never pass. 
 66 How are you, sir," said he boldly. 
 
 " Did you just want to see New York," inquired 
 Murdock, going direct to the point as always, " or is it 
 some trouble you re in up there? " 
 
 " Neither," replied the youth. He hesitated, shot it 
 out. " I got a letter from mother." 
 
 " Oh ! " Murdock s tone was not f ormidablq but 
 there was in his tranquil face an expression of something 
 
 349 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 going on behind and that was formidable; so formid 
 able that the boy swallowed hard several times. 
 
 " I didn t come to interfere, gov nor," he stammered. 
 
 " I m glad to hear that," said Murdock dryly, and 
 waited. 
 
 " Mother s frightfully cut up because " Like an 
 inspiration what Sophy had happened to write about her 
 letting Juliet stay on came back to him. He went for 
 ward impetuously: " I just wanted to tell you something 
 that perhaps you don t know, though she assumes you 
 do. When we were up there with you mother found 
 out that that she was there and mother went to the 
 car and they talked and she pleaded. And, father 
 mother gave her leave to stay on and nurse you." And 
 the boy, not in the least afraid now, faced his father 
 with straight manly simplicity. 
 
 Murdock stared at him astounded. " Impossible ! " 
 he exclaimed in a sharp, quick voice. 
 
 " It s the truth," insisted Charley. 
 
 " Impossible ! " repeated Murdock in a tone of com 
 mand a command that the truth be not the truth since 
 it was inconsistent with his will. 
 
 " She did it, father, to help save your life," main 
 tained the boy. " And I want to ask you if you think 
 you re giving her a square deal. Of course, she pretends 
 she s getting the divorce. But I could tell from her let- 
 ter she d not be doing it unless you were insisting on 
 it. And I don t believe you ll insist, now you know 
 what she did up there. I don t believe Miss Raeburn d 
 stand for it." Charley squared himself, looked defiantly 
 at his father. " If the worst comes to the worst, I ll 
 go to her and tell her. Yes, I will ! " 
 
 Murdock made an impatient gesture. He was not 
 listening, had hardly heard. The sound of the boy s 
 
 350 
 
BUT CHARLEY INTERVENES 
 
 voice annoyed him. With his second " impossible " he 
 had passed from disbelief to belief, and his whole mind 
 had concentrated upon the central fact. For he realized 
 instantly all that it implied. " It mustn t be true," he 
 muttered, with the furious unreasonableness of the will 
 ful. He turned upon Charley. " Does Presbury know 
 this ? " he demanded. 
 
 " He knows all about it." f 
 
 " Wait here ! " Murdock strode to the door. " I ll 
 be back." And he was gone. 
 
 Charley drew himself up proudly. " I thought I 
 could settle it ! " said he, with a self-satisfied nod at his 
 own image in a mirror. " Mother knew she wouldn t be 
 appealing in vain." 
 
 Murdock descended to the office, telephoned Pres- 
 bury s house, learned that he was out of town. But he 
 did not return to Charley. He had called up Presbury 
 mechanically ; if Presbury had been at home he would 
 not have gone there. He knew now, beyond any power 
 of his will to befog his intelligence, that the boy was 
 telling the truth. He took an auto cab, said " Up the 
 Riverside Drive " to the motorman, threw himself back 
 in the corner and forgot his surroundings. Two things 
 were perpectly clear to him : that it would be cruel cow 
 ardly contemptible to persist; that, even if he could 
 keep Juliet Raeburn from knowing he had compelled the 
 divorce, he would put her in a dishonorable position / 
 and he would live with her in dread of the day when 
 she should find him out. 
 
 Cruel cowardly contemptible. A cruel retort 
 upon an act of mercy. A cowardly retort upon an act 
 of courageous self-sacrifice. A contemptible retort upon 
 an act of generosity. 
 
 When he first made up his mind to free Sophy and 
 351 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 himself, the thing had seemed as easy as rational and 
 natural. All that would be necessary was a few for 
 malities, work for the lawyers, and no trouble to Sophy 
 or himself. None of the obstacles that forbid so many 
 ill-mated couples no difficulties about money or about 
 children ; the single strand of the marriage bond would 
 be quietly cut then, freedom! But gradually he had 
 been learning that there are many and great differences 
 between a marriage contract and other business con 
 tracts. Instead of a single strand there were a multi 
 tude ; and no sooner was one cut than new ones appeared. 
 He had a suffocating, a maddening sense that he was 
 being made the victim of one of fate s savage practical 
 j okes ; that he would go on and on struggling to be 
 free, only to find himself at the end still bound, still 
 ridiculously struggling. 
 
 He tore apart Sophy s action in letting Juliet stay. 
 He found a score of motives, possible, probable, certain ; 
 and none of them was generous. But when he had fin 
 ished his cynical dissection he was back where he started : 
 Nevertheless, Sophy had done a generous thing, and he 
 had retorted upon her by trampling her. In vain he 
 pleaded to himself that he had the right to be free, that 
 if Sophy were not jealous and short-sighted she would 
 be as eager to be free as he was. There still stood^ 
 squarely across the path to his desire, the rock of Sophy s 
 generosity when he was helpless. And he knew that one 
 of her motives not the determining one, perhaps, but 
 still one of them had been her kind heart. She had 
 won the right to decide without coercion. If the auto 
 were going a thousand miles an hour instead of ten it 
 couldn t take him away from that. In all his life he had 
 never done a deliberately mean act. Should he begin 
 here and now? 
 
 352 
 
BUT CHARLEY INTERVENES 
 
 " I ve got the right to do it," he muttered, " and I 
 ought to do it. Why not? " 
 
 He felt no softening toward Sophy felt only as if 
 they two had been playing a game and she, inexpert, 
 a bungler, had yet contrived by a fluke to checkmate him, 
 a master at the game. If he should leave it to her to 
 say whether or not there should be a divorce, it would 
 not be because conscience commanded it or because he 
 was yielding to gratitude s soft insistence. Those forces 
 he could have routed as easily as can the average 
 man. But the power he hesitated before was fear 
 fear of that most eccentric and most tyrannical of 
 masters self-respect. He had never done a deliberate 
 mean act. Should he could he to win freedom and 
 Juliet? 
 
 As he reentered his apartment Charley, at ease, smok 
 ing a cigarette, rattling and throwing about the Sun 
 day papers, rose and said in his self-assured way, " I 
 had it right, didn t I?" 
 
 Murdock looked as calm and deliberate as usual. All 
 signs of haste and agitation were gone. He replied with 
 his customary slow tranquillity, " I m much obliged to 
 you, Charley." 
 
 Charley swelled himself. " I knew you didn t know, 
 and would want to know," he began 
 
 Murdock laid a firm kindly hand on his shoulder. 
 " Never keep on talking when you find you ve said 
 enough. You re taking the five o clock back, aren t 
 you?" 
 
 And the boy s prompt and only answer was a meek 
 " Yes, gov nor." 
 
 Toward ten that night Blagden, following his Sun 
 day custom, called up Murdock to find out whether 
 
 353 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 anything was wanted. Instead of the usual " Mr. 
 Murdock says there s nothing," from Simcox, it was 
 Murdock s own voice, polite but impatient. " I ve been 
 trying to get you since four," said he. " Where are 
 you now ? " 
 ! v " At the club. I was just going to bed. I m sorry 
 
 . |j 55 
 
 " That s all right. I ll have to ask you to take a 
 run out to Saint X to-night. Get ready, please, while 
 I m on the way up to you." 
 
 " Glad to go," was Blagden s answer. It would have 
 been prompt in any circumstances ; it was distinctly 
 eager. And when, twenty minutes later, the hall boy 
 knocked to tell him Murdock had come he was able to 
 say : " Take down the bag. I ll be there in two min 
 utes," though he had had to change from evening dress 
 and pack for a possible long stay where he especially 
 wished to make his very best appearance. In somewhat 
 less than two minutes he descended, ready for traveling ; 
 he was carrying a suit of cream silk pyjamas. " I for 
 got these," he explained to Murdock, as he unfastened 
 the bag and thrust them in. 
 
 " Sorry to upset you in this fashion," said Murdock. 
 " But it s necessary." 
 
 By the brilliant lights over the club door Blagden 
 saw the sternness of his features that seemed to add ten 
 years to his age. " Something wrong at the Saint X 
 plant? " asked the secretary, as they rushed up Fifth 
 Avenue. 
 
 Murdock apparently did not hear. Blagden ven 
 tured nothing further. They entered the park, flew 
 swiftly and noiselessly up the East Drive. Blagden 
 noted that it was just after they passed Miss Raeburn s 
 bouse, plainly to be seen across the low wall of the park 
 
 354 
 
BUT CHARLEY INTERVENES 
 
 and through the as yet scantily clad trees and bushes, 
 when Murdock broke his silence. " I m taking you to 
 the 125th Street station," said he. 
 
 " But does my train stop there ? " 
 
 " It will to-night. I had Simcox telephone." 
 
 Another long pause. As they shot from the park 
 at 110th Street and started up wide Lenox Avenue, 
 Murdock went on : "I want you to go to Saint X, to 
 the Eyrie, and tell Mrs. Murdock that, unless she her 
 self wishes the divorce proceeding to go on, it can be 
 dropped. Tell her I m willing to continue as at present, 
 and to provide a separate maintenance will transfer to 
 her sufficient to cover all her expenses on her present 
 basis of living. If she says she wishes the proceeding 
 dropped, go to my lawyers talk only to Wickham 
 Wickham senior and tell him." 
 
 Blagden repeated the instructions, as Murdock had 
 trained him always to do. His voice was so monotonous 
 and strained that Murdock said solicitously, " Are you 
 ill, Blagden?" 
 
 " No, oh, no," replied the secretary, in better voice. 
 " A bit tired that s all. I was playing hard squash 
 all afternoon." 
 
 " If you are ill " 
 
 " I assure you I m not. All I need is rest sleep." 
 
 When the auto drew up at the curb before the rail 
 way station, Murdock said, " Please repeat my instruc 
 tions again." 
 
 Blagden glanced at the clock in the auto. " The 
 train s overdue." 
 
 " They ll hold it. Their orders are positive. Please 
 repeat. Don t hurry." 
 
 Blagden repeated the exact language. 
 
 " That s right," said Murdock. " I want the mes- 
 355 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 sage delivered precisely as I gave it to you. But make 
 no memorandum." 
 
 Blagden hastened away, and into the waiting train. 
 He went to bed at once, but not to sleep. With his cur 
 tain up and the majestic panorama of Palisades and 
 Catskills and placid Hudson streaming by, clear in the 
 diaphanously misty moonlight, he revolved temptation to 
 villainy. Not as temptation to villainy, however. Such 
 temptations always present themselves to intelligent and 
 resourceful and conscientious minds as opportunities 
 to do right in a slightly devious way or in a way liable 
 to be misunderstood if discovered by some one with only 
 partial knowledge of the facts. The educated gentle 
 man s conscience is also educated, skilled in logic, proud, 
 acutely honorable. And Melville Blagden was an edu 
 cated gentleman. He could never do wrong except from 
 a right motive. He would never cut a throat or scuttle 
 a ship as a crime; of what use is education, if no* to 
 enable a man to demonstrate that such an act is in the 
 circumstances a virtue eighteen carats fine at least? 
 
XXVI 
 
 THE AGNES-FLEURY CORSET 
 
 SOPHY kept him waiting nearly two hours ; for, when 
 he arrived, she was deep in most important business that 
 could not be put off. 
 
 With the revival of the divorce proceedings had come 
 prompt revival of anxiety about her looks. The very 
 day Blagden brought Murdock s command to resume 
 the divorce suit indeed, within an hour of his going 
 she locked herself in her dressing room and examined 
 herself with patient, serious care, unlighted by the faint 
 est gleam of humor. When she finished she lay down 
 and had a good cry partly over the sad state of dis 
 repair she had found, principally over the impending 
 labor and dieting and general effort, mental and physi 
 cal. After the cry she admitted her maid and said: 
 " Katy, how much larger is my waist than it was six 
 months ago when I got those last new corsets ? " 
 
 " I ll see, ma am," Katy replied. " I never changed 
 the strings in the last one of Madame Agnes s you wore." 
 
 When Katy returned and measured her mistress, cor 
 seted tightly but endurably, she announced, " You ve 
 taken on a good three inches and five sixteenths, ma am." 
 
 Sophy gazed ruefully at her figure or lack of it 
 reflected to her by her mirror. She tried to put on one 
 of the Agnes corsets, made especially to compel her flesh 
 to shapeliness. It was far too small, without letting out 
 
 357 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 the lacings; and if the lacings were let out, the whole 
 purpose of the contrivance would be defeated. " I ll have 
 to get a new set," sighed she. 
 
 But she was not yet thoroughly roused. Sending 
 for Agnes to measure her and ordering a dozen pairs 
 of the corsets meant exertion, not to speak of the expen 
 diture of nearly two thousand dollars ; she put off writ 
 ing until Katy informed her that her waist measure had 
 increased by another " good inch and a quarter snug 
 measure." To have watched her during those months 
 of settling back and neglecting what she had learned 
 from Blagden and from New York would have been to 
 have decided that here was a hopeless case. But there 
 was one difference between the two periods of slovenli 
 ness, and that difference decisive. The backslidden 
 Sophy did not loll contented in her sloth, was, on the 
 contrary, wretchedly ill at ease, stung by the flies and 
 gnats of anger and shame. When Katy sounded the 
 second warning she acted like the sleeper who lies on 
 after the first call because he hates to leave his warm bed 
 for the cold room and the bother of dressing, though he; 
 knows he must, and who at the second call springs out 
 and begins to dash madly about. Sophy did not write 
 Agnes ; she telegraphed. 
 
 Agnes s woman, Mademoiselle Fleury, arrived on 
 Sunday morning with a trial corset. Sophy was eager 
 for the fitting, but she felt she could not afford to take 
 chances with the higher powers when she was trying 
 their forbearance so severely by her divorce suit. On 
 Monday, at eight in the morning, Mademoiselle Fleury 
 appeared in her dressing room with the corset Madame 
 Agnes s latest invention for relieving the sufferings of 
 the vanity of women too self-indulgent to diet and too 
 lazy to exercise, by increasing the sufferings of their 
 
 358 
 
THE AGNES-FLEUEY CORSET 
 
 bodies. Taken by pretty Miss Fleury with much proud 
 ceremony from its wrappings of paper and cloth, it was 
 revealed as strange a machine as female ever wore to aid 
 her to gain or maintain sway over the male. It weighed 
 about four pounds and a half, and was a combination 
 corslet, back strap and leggings all of steel and stiffest 
 buckram. 
 
 " Mercy me ! " exclaimed Sophy, viewing the un 
 couth-looking, complicated contraption with repulsion 
 and dismay. " That s much worse than the others. And 
 ain t it going to be covered with satin? " 
 
 Up went mademoiselle s eyebrows, lips, shoulders, 
 hands in polite expostulation. " Mais, madame, s vous 
 plait, il vous don " 
 
 " I d rather you spoke English," interrupted Sophy 
 crossly. 
 
 The young woman had deliberately begun in French, 
 having had experience how vastly American women of 
 the class she played upon were impressed and disadvan- 
 taged by it, even where they themselves spoke it, or 
 fancied they did. But she cried, " Ah pardon ! " as 
 if she had been guilty of a stupid blunder. " It is a 
 gran advance magnifique. It give madame ze superb 
 exquise physique. Ve do not cover him avec wiz 
 anysings. It make ze bulk too gran ." And, face aglow, 
 hands incessant in graceful gesticulation, manner that 
 impressive seriousness which enables our French friends 
 to invest the most trivial matter with dignity and inter 
 est, the young woman explained, chiefly by pantomime, 
 the advantages of the various new bulwarks, retaining 
 walls, fat diffusers, and binding chains. When she had 
 Mrs. Murdock wrought up to the fit pitch, she in per 
 oration to her eloquence put the corset on her as an arch 
 bishop might personally invest a monarch with the robes 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 and dignities of his sovereignty. This meant full fifteen 
 minutes of artfully concealed struggle and strenuous 
 muscular exertion that showed not at all in mademoi 
 selle s serious-smiling, affable face, but was more than 
 hinted in the drops of sweat beading her pretty brow. 
 
 " How well you do your hair, mademoiselle," said 
 Sophy, perspiring profusely also, but patient after the 
 nature of woman the long-suffering. " You must teach 
 my Katy." 
 
 " Wis plaisir, madame," said Miss Fleury, bowing 
 gratefully. "But ze corset!" She stood off and 
 viewed it as if she had suddenly burst upon a rare and 
 beautiful work of art. The steel and buckram crushed 
 in part of the fat, divided the rest, thrusting some of it 
 up toward the chest, coercing more downward to be 
 taken care of by the lower straps, clamps, and plates 
 which mewed up the hips and molded stomach and back 
 to less obstreperous convexity. Mrs. Murdock was large 
 still that could not be denied. But she now had figure, 
 a figure of the most generous contours, indeed, but one 
 she need not be ashamed of. 
 
 " It s really splendid," said, or rather gasped, she, 
 admiring herself front, and with the aid of a large hand 
 glass held by Katy, sides and back. She had a full and 
 fair view, as the corset was applied direct to the skin. 
 
 " Madame perhaps finds it snug a leette? " 
 
 "Well, it isn t what you d call loose," admitted 
 r Sophy, trying to take a real breath and failing. " It 
 looks as if I d have to learn to talk in it without gasp 
 ing." 
 
 " But zat vill pass " Miss Fleury waved her hand 
 in a vanishing gesture " entierement. And if madame 
 vill vear it vhen she sleep, ze figure vill grow to her." 
 
 " Good Lord ! " exclaimed Sophy, gazing at her in 
 360 
 
THE AGNES-FLEUEY CORSET 
 
 horror. " I can never stand it day and night. Only 
 when I have to see people." 
 
 " Parfaitement," assented Miss Fleury. " Still, ze 
 figure graduellement become madame s veritable figure. 
 It ze corset melt avay ze fat." 
 
 " I believe it," said Sophy. She turned slowly round, 
 admiring her new self from all points of view. " I really 
 must be careful what I eat. There s no sense in my not 
 having this figure all the time naturally, I mean. . . , 
 Those braces and laces at the back begin to cut into me 
 a little, mademoiselle." 
 
 " Alas, madame, it is necessaire " 
 
 " Oh, I m not complaining. I ll get used to it. ... 
 But can I sit down in it ? " 
 
 Katy brought a chair from the dressing table. Mrs. 
 Murdock slowly bent her knees, tried to sit. " I can t ! " 
 she exclaimed, in agony and despair. " Whatever shall 
 I do?" Between sitting and standing she gazed trag 
 ically at her image in the mirror. 
 
 " It could be let out," suggested Katy, who was on 
 the broad grin. And she hastened from the room to 
 laugh " fit to bust," as she put it in relating the matter 
 afterwards to the assembled backstairs. 
 
 " Mais non ! Non ! " protested Miss Fleury. " Ma 
 dame is large in ze back. It spoil ze tout ensemble to 
 disturb ze contour zere. Is it not so, madame? " 
 
 Sophy inspected the rear view of her figure, saw that 
 any relaxation of the pressure would result in an un 
 sightly, deforming release. " I reckon you re right, * 
 she was forced to admit. " But I ve got to sit some 
 times." 
 
 Miss Fleury gazed at the constricting bulge of the 
 corset like a general studying a map of a proposed bat 
 tlefield. " Perhaps," she finally said, " I could put heffy 
 24 361 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW: 
 
 a heffy elastique zere." The idea grew more feasible* 
 more promising as she revolved it. " Ah, yes it is ze 
 vary ting. Heffy vary heffy elastique vich concede 
 ven madame sit herself, vich close back ven madame 
 stand. I can do it zis morning, and madame can try zis 
 afternoon." 
 
 Sophy s expression of despondency lifted. " Katy 
 will help you and anyone else you want," she said. 
 
 She took a last lingering look at her new figure ; then 
 Miss Fleury swiftly removed the corset corslet, rather, 
 for it would have turned bullet or poniard point. As 
 the fastenings sprang open Sophy, with an enormous 
 sigh, expanded to her normal proportions. Miss Fleury, 
 who had been between her and the glass, stood aside. 
 Apparently her movement was accidental ; in fact it was 
 one of the thousand and one clever tricks which were 
 forcing Madame Agnes to face the necessity of taking 
 in Miss Fleury as a partner. Not often do we get a 
 sharp impression of the contrast between ourselves as 
 we should be and ourselves as we are. Sophy now had 
 one of those rare unhappy but salutary lessons. An 
 instant before she had seen reflected from that mirror a 
 woman of prodigal proportions indeed, but of propor 
 tions ; now, there faced her at full length a body a 
 mass She became scarlet, and her impulse was to 
 hide her face with her hands, that she might shut out 
 the repellent image and the shame of seeing the pretty, 
 French girl, so perfect in figure, and the just-returning 
 Katy observing her. They noted her abject confusion, 
 turned away, and pretended to busy themselves with 
 doing up the corset. Sophy, seeing that she was unob 
 served, took another look at herself. 
 
 " I m a sight," she said to herself, " and there s no 
 denying it." If she had gone on to make one of those 
 
 362 
 
THE AGNES-FLEURY CORSET 
 
 brave resolutions wherewith we are always quieting our 
 consciences and preventing ourselves from improving, ; 
 then and there would have been the end of the incident. 
 But the dart had struck too deep. Sophy made no reso 
 lution ; she simply became a resolution ; she would get rid 
 of those soft rolls and folds of shapeless and sloppy sur- if 
 plusage at any cost. Thenceforth temptation to self- 
 indulgence would be faced and shamed by that repellent 
 image. Vanity, the most potent of human qualities for 
 good as well as for ill, had definitely and finally become 
 the faithful and vigilant ally of her sluggish impulse to 
 self-improvement. At last, Sophy s self-respect was up 
 and doing. 
 
 When Blagden s card was brought that afternoon, 
 Sophy was trying on the Agnes model as improved by; j 
 the Fleury elastic contrivance for permitting the wearer ! 
 to sit. She found she could seat herself without great j 
 effort. " And," said she, " as I get used to it, I think 
 I ll not mind. Now, I ve got a feeling that the thing ll 
 burst front and back." 
 
 " Jamais, jamais, madame," protested Miss Fleury. 
 " Jamais! " 
 
 " I don t think you could blow it open with dyna 
 mite, ma am," said Katy. 
 
 " I reckon not," assented Mrs. Murdock. She hesi- 
 
 ^ated, and with heightened color, " Have you got to 
 
 1 take this back to New York with you, mademoiselle? " 
 
 " It vould be better, madame." 
 
 She reflected. "Well," said she, "anyhow I can 
 wear it this afternoon. Your train doesn t leave till 
 after five. Come, Katy, I must dress quickly. I ve kept 
 Mr. Blagden waiting too long." 
 
 Sophy put on over the new corset a beautiful gray 
 afternoon dress she had bought at Dangerfield s when in 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 New York, but had been unable to wear because of the 
 increase in her bulk. Also, she accepted Miss Fleury s 
 offer to do her hair, with the result that its abundance 
 looked attractive, as it had not looked since the illness 
 after the second baby deprived it of much of its original 
 natural beauty of growth and texture. She was not 
 comfortable physically as she descended to the east 
 drawing-room to greet Blagden ; but she felt she was 
 looking well, better than she had looked in years, and 
 the moral uplift of that feeling made her mentally con 
 tent, despite her uneasiness as to what Blagden s visit 
 might mean. When she entered he flushed with pleas 
 ure. His glance swept from the " voluptuous figure " 
 directly to the new style of wearing her hair. He had 
 always disliked the old way, which gave a bare, sleek 
 look about the temples and the nape of the neck. " A 
 mighty handsome woman," he said to himself. " And 
 she d be a stunner if some one who knew something 
 would take her in hand. She certainly does need a man 
 like me." 
 
 Sophy had colored as vividly as he; he had let his 
 delight and admiration show plainly in his pleasing, if 
 insignificant, features. " I m glad to see you again," 
 5 cried she, extending her hand with a cordial smile. 
 
 " And I m doubly glad," replied he, " as I m bring- 
 ing news that s in every way agreeable." 
 
 "Really?" 
 
 " Mr. Murdock has sent me to ask you to stop the 
 divorce proceedings." 
 
 Sophy s face became radiant. " He has come to his 
 senses ! I knew he would." And her first thought was, 
 " Perhaps, after all, I d better take only one of these 
 corsets. They re very trying and so expensive." 
 
 " He says," Blagden was continuing, " if you will 
 
THE AGNES-FLEURY CORSET 
 
 stop the suit, he will agree permanently to make you 
 your present allowance." 
 
 Sophy s fine eyes opened wide in wonder. " Make me 
 independent of him? " 
 
 Blagden s glance shifted. He said nothing. 
 
 " Still," she went on, taking his silence for a nega 
 tive answer, " that doesn t matter, does it ? " 
 
 Blagden looked grave, but said nothing. 
 
 " Whatever brought him round, I wonder ? I sup 
 pose I mustn t ask you, you re so sensitive about being 
 loyal to him." 
 
 The secretary colored. After a pause he gave Mrs. 
 Murdock a curious glance. " You re sure you want to 
 accept? " he said. Then, with an air of contrition, he 
 hastened to add, " Pray, forget I asked that ! " 
 
 Sophy took alarm. " Please, Mr. Blagden," she im 
 plored, " tell me what you re thinking." Pathetically - 
 " I ve no one to advise me." 
 
 66 You must not ask me. You really must not." H 
 rose in agitation and stood at the window with his back 
 to her. 
 
 Sophy was in a panic. " Mr. Blagden ! " she 
 pleaded, following him and laying her hand on his arm. 
 
 He startled as if her touch had stung him. He gave 
 her a hurried glance, respectful, timid, but burning 
 ind no woman could have mistaken its meaning. 
 
 She took her hand lingeringly away; a warm glow 
 of pleasure in her power over this man was suffusing 
 her skin and brightening her handsome eyes. " Mr. 
 Blagden," she urged gently, " you say you are my 
 friend. Advise me." 
 
 He stared out of the window for a few seconds ; then, 
 turning abruptly to her, he said : " If I were you, Mrs. 
 Murdock, I d go on with the divorce." 
 
 365 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " I thought you d say that," exclaimed she. " I ve 
 an instinct the same way " And she had not the faint 
 est suspicion whence that instinct had come. The corset 
 had been cutting into her in a dozen places, but she had 
 been able to endure, even almost to disregard. Now, 
 however, it began to attack her breathing. She has 
 tened to sit down. Sitting required less breath than 
 standing; also the change of position shifted the pres 
 sure, easing parts tormented to their limit of endurance. 
 " Yes, that s my instinct. But I can t just " She 
 hesitated. 
 
 He continued to look at her, with that expression of 
 sympathy and reluctance. " You are honest yourself. 
 That makes you too confiding." 
 
 " I know, I know," she replied mournfully. " As 
 Charley says I m a good thing. If it hadn t been 
 for that, I d never have got into all this trouble." 
 
 " You must see, there never can be any real recon 
 ciliation between you and Mr. Murdock." 
 
 " No," she assented. " He has gone too far. I can 
 try to forgive him, but " Her lip trembled, and her 
 eyes flashed with anger and tears " I can t ever for- 
 get." 
 
 " He knows that as well as you do." 
 
 Blagden let Sophy reflect on this, with the result 
 that she presently said : " It is strange, isn t it his 
 wanting to stop all of a sudden? There s something 
 hidden some kind of a trap. . . . Please, Mr. Blag- 
 den," she begged, " help me ! I m very stupid at these 
 kind of things." 
 
 Blagden seemed to be and almost thought him 
 self struggling between duty to his employer and 
 manly sense of the just and decent. " If you go 
 on with the divorce," he said reluctantly, " you get 
 
 366 
 
THE AGNES-FLEURY CORSET 
 
 freedom and a fortune. If you don t go on, what do 
 you get? " 
 
 Sophy puzzled with this. Despite the distraction of 
 the stabbing and suffocating corset, she presently saw 
 what he was thrusting into her very eyes. " Why ! " 
 she cried. " I don t get anything, do I ? He can be 
 gin again whenever he likes ! And maybe he ll do it in 
 such a way that he won t have to give me more than a 
 bare living " 
 
 " If that," interrupted Blagden, in a most meaning 
 tone. 
 
 " Oh, what a scoundrel ! " cried Sophy. And her 
 physical pain the stabbing into her sides, the tingling 
 and pinching under the elastic was as a fiery goad to 
 her wrath. " I see it all ! What a fool I was, not to 
 know at once that such a man as he is wouldn t make 
 a move unless it was to get some underhanded advan 
 tage." Impulsively she stretched out both her hands 
 to Blagden, and he took them. The gesture gave her 
 momentary relief from her tormentor. " I ll not accept 
 his proposition ! " she cried with flashing eyes. " Now 
 that I ve begun, I ll go on to the bitter end. I won t 
 have this awful, wicked business dragging and nagging 
 at me." 
 
 Blagden pressed her beautiful hands enthusiastically. 
 " How sensible you are, my dear friend ! " he exclaimed. 
 " Now that you ve taken the right course, I feel free 
 to say I was in terror lest you d not see the trap." 
 
 " See it ? Why, I was sure to see it. He always 
 did think I was a fool. But I m not." 
 
 " If I were you, I d telephone for my lawyer this 
 very afternoon, and make him hurry matters. You 
 see, Mrs. Murdock, I ve got to go back at once and 
 report. I can t possibly put off my report longer than 
 
 367 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 day after to-morrow. But much can be done to-mor 
 row before I arrive in New York. I imagine Mur- 
 dock had everything arranged with the judge. You 
 know, he can do about what he pleases with the 
 courts " 
 
 " But," interrupted Sophy shrewdly, " suppose 
 he should refuse to make the settlement he promised? " 
 
 Blagden had canvassed this in his solitary council 
 of war on the train the night before. He had the an 
 swer ready : " Your lawyer has it in writing. Besides, 
 isn t it very evident that for some reason you mustn t 
 ask me what reason you have him in your power for 
 the moment? Use your power, while you have it, Mrs. 
 Murdock. I know this sounds disloyal to him. But 
 my conscience is clear. I am acting in what s really 
 his best interest as well as in yours." And Blagden 
 looked it, and felt it. 
 
 " You needn t tell me that, Mr. Blagden," Sophy 
 earnestly answered him. " I know it without your say 
 ing it. I know an honest man when I see one. And 
 trust a woman s instinct to judge a sincere, disinter 
 ested friend." 
 
 Blagden blushed furiously. " Sincere," he said in 
 a low, hesitating voice, " but not disinterested. If I ve 
 exceeded my right, it s because But I mustn t say 
 that Forgive me." 
 
 Sophy smiled quickly and friendlily at the aristo 
 cratic-looking, fashionably dressed young man. What 
 a lovely skin did go with red hair ; and really, the hair 
 was of the most aristocratic red not in the least com 
 mon and carroty. Besides she felt that he could be 
 highly useful to her, indeed was necessary; it would 
 be most unwise to discourage him in his friendliness. 
 
 " This is the last service I shall ever perform for 
 368 
 
THE AGNES-FLEURY CORSET 
 
 him," Blagden continued after the long, surcharged 
 pause. " I shall resign as soon as I make my report. 
 You don t know how repulsive this whole business has 
 been to me ! " 
 
 " But you mustn t resign," pleaded Sophy. She 
 had been eager to go, that she might hasten to her 
 room and free herself from the suffocating grip of her 
 corset. This new anxiety diverted her mind again. 
 " Indeed you mustn t leave until the divorce is - 
 granted." 
 
 Blagden shook his head. 
 
 " For my sake, Mr. Blagden for my sake ! It t - 
 will only be for a few weeks." Smiling and blushing, 
 " I forbid you to resign ! " 
 
 Blagden heaved a sigh. " Perhaps it is my duty," 
 he said and he meant it. He half turned away. " I 
 cannot resist you," he muttered, so low that she could 
 pretend to think he believed she had not heard. 
 
 " Thank you," she said gently. And she took his 
 hand and pressed it. " Whatever should I have done 
 without you! God has been good to me. He has 
 raised up a friend for me in my hour of affliction." 
 
 " I would would do anything for you," he 
 burst forth. Then, in real agitation for he had not 
 intended to go so far he hastened away. And she, 
 at the end of physical endurance of the torments her 
 " figure " was causing, made no effort to detain him, 
 though she had a sense that the talk between them was | 
 somehow incomplete. 
 
 On the evening express for New York traveled 
 Blagden and the pretty little corset maker. Blagden 
 was ensconced in luxury in a Pullman compartment. 
 Miss Fleury and her bundle were tucked away in a 
 
 369 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 stuffy seat in a day coach ; thus she could without vio 
 lating her conscience collect from Madam Agnei tKe 
 price of a sleeping car berth. Both were bearers of 
 Sophy Murdock s destiny. It is difficult to say is 
 it not? which had the more important share of thf 
 burden. 
 
XXVII 
 
 ME. BLAGDEN S BAD QUARTER HOTJ* 
 
 AT his club again, Blagden searched his mail, sick 
 Mth anxiety. Suppose Sophy changeable, with no self- 
 reliance, " thoroughly womanly " should have tele 
 graphed him that she had changed her mind and would 
 accept Murdock s terms what should he do? He had 
 been able to think of no plan that did not involve in its 
 execution a frank throwing away of self-respect the 
 necessity that in acting he confess himself to himself a 
 plain rascal. " I ll let her go," he had been saying. 
 " I will not do a dishonorable trick even for her sake, 
 even to save her from her own weak womanly good 
 ness of heart." But his self-reassurances of unshaken 
 high principle somehow did not reassure; and he was 
 dreading the approach of a situation that would 
 tempt him perhaps beyond his moral strength. 
 
 He was enormously relieved when he found no tele 
 gram from her, so relieved that he was almost recon- ; 
 ciled to a message awaiting him from Murdock " Mr. j 
 Murdock wishes to see you at his hotel, no matter what 
 time you get in." 
 
 Blagden read this gloomily, angrily. Eager for 
 pretexts for hating Murdock, he read into its curt di 
 rectness the arrogance of master to slave. " I m too 
 tired to go to-night," said he to himself. " I can pre 
 tend I didn t get this message." 
 
 371 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Even as he decided for delay the doorman came to 
 him. " Mr. Murdock s man, Simcox, is waiting for 
 you, sir." 
 
 Blagden s sudden sinking at the heart showed it 
 was not altogether fatigue from the journey that had 
 made him seek to delay facing his employer. " You 
 told him you didn t know whether I was in or not? " 
 
 " Pie was at the corner, sir, when you got out of 
 your cab. He saw you come in." 
 
 " I might have known ! " muttered Blagden. 
 " That damned scoundrel never takes chances." Men 
 tally his name for Murdock now was " that scoun 
 drel " ; it seemed to aid him to keep steady the poin- 
 of view that he was not a traitor, but an honest man 
 unfortunately so placed that his high-minded actions 
 might be misinterpreted as treason. 
 
 In the servant s waiting room stood Simcox, grim, 
 funereal, suggesting to him the guard that leads the 
 prisoner to execution. " Mr. Murdock told me to 
 come here and stay round, sir, until eleven. He 
 thought possibly you might return by the ten-fifteen 
 to-night." 
 
 " I ll drive down to him straight away," said Blag- 
 den, with such offhandedness of manner as he could 
 muster. 
 
 Outside, he climbed into a hansom and told Sim 
 cox to get in also. " Thank you, sir," said Simcox. 
 He, all servants, liked Blagden because he, so certain 
 of his superiority that he was not disturbed about that 
 particular kind of " appearances," had a highly at 
 tractive democratic way with his " inferiors." All the 
 way down the avenue Blagden was nerving himself for 
 the ordeal. He knew Murdock, knew what it meant 
 to face that mind accustomed to meeting and vanquish- 
 
 372 
 
BLAGDEN S BAD QUARTER HOUR 
 
 ing all the forms of indirection. True, Murdock was 
 not in the least suspicious of him, and was probably 
 eager for just the news he was bringing there lay 
 his hope of getting through without discovery and 
 disaster. " But," reflected the secretary, " if I m mis 
 taken, and he really wants her to stop that divorce 
 suit, he ll act as he always does when he s in earnest 
 he ll tear every word I say to pieces and find out 
 all that s in it and under it." 
 
 Never had Blagden been put to such a test as in 
 preparing for that interview. And it was proof of the 
 essential strength of his character that his nerves were 
 steady and his features calm when he entered the salon 
 of Murdock s suite, where Murdock and Berkeley, in 
 dinner jackets, were talking sport listlessly. 
 
 He assumed he would immediately be taken aside 
 and questioned. Instead, Murdock, after a handshake, 
 and without glancing at him, invited him to be seated, 
 had the servant bring him brandy and soda, drew him 
 into the conversation. Half an hour, an hour, an hour 
 and a half passed; Murdock showed no sign of im 
 patience, but talked, and sure evidence of willingness 
 to continue asked Berkeley questions involving ex 
 tended answers. " If it wasn t for that note at the 
 club," thought Blagden, " I d believe he didn t care a 
 damn." The conversation dragged on and on, until 
 Blagden s whole body was aching with the nervous 
 tension of frightful suspense. " If he d only send 
 Berkeley away and begin ! " he groaned, as he fought 
 against the impulse to take a drink of the brandy. 
 
 At last Berkeley rose, yawned cavernously. " I ll 
 be off to bed," said he. 
 
 " Better finish your cigar," urged Murdock. 
 
 Berkeley tossed it into an ash tray. " I forgot 
 373 
 
01,0 WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 and lighted one more than my allowance. Come on, 
 {Blagden. He wants to go to bed." 
 
 " Don t go just yet," said Murdock to Blagden. 
 " I want a word with you." 
 
 The secretary shivered; for Murdock s tone was 
 unnatural, ominous. Had Sophy telegraphed him di 
 rect? It was most dangerous, this conduct in a man 
 who had always theretofore been for dispatching an 
 affair forthwith. As the sound of the outer door clos 
 ing behind Berkeley came to them, Murdock said: 
 " Splendid chap, physically Berkeley isn t he ? " 
 
 " Superb," replied Blagden. 
 
 "How he does enjoy life!" continued Murdock. 
 " He drinks it as a connoisseur drinks a fine wine 
 tasting each drop." 
 
 " That s why he s unattractive to me, I fancy," 
 said Blagden. " He seems so so lacking in gener 
 osity." 
 
 " Generosity? My dear Blagden, no man who has 
 made his own fortune is ever generous. The habit of 
 insisting on full value for each dollar and more is 
 too strongly developed." 
 
 " I ve seen no sign of it in you." Blagden took on 
 a judicially impersonal air whenever he thus frankly 
 flattered, and so carried it off without offense or 
 seeming of degradation. 
 
 " I won by gambling, chiefly," replied Murdock. 
 " Then, too, perhaps, I keep my true disposition a 
 little better concealed. Few of us have the courage to 
 be as frankly Sybarite as Tom. We lie to others and 
 to ourselves about our real tastes and methods and 
 motives. Deception self-deception ! " He smiled 
 grimly. " We go through life most of us knowing 
 less about ourselves than we do about our most casual 
 
 374 
 
BLAGDEN S BAD QUARTER HOUR 
 
 acquaintances. That s because, when we study our 
 selves, we study our minds instead of our acts our 
 selves in repose, and sleeked up for inspection, instead 
 of in action." 
 
 The secretary flamed and paled. Was this a hit 
 at him? Was this the sardonic glitter of the jaws of 
 a trap? 
 
 " Acts ! " repeated Murdock, with an absent-mind 
 edness that seemed studied to the unnerved Blagden. 
 " Acts reveal the man. Not what he professes or im 
 agines not the lies he tells himself in excuse or in 
 flattery. Only acts count." 
 
 Blagden set his teeth together hard. He felt that 
 Murdock was indeed playing with him as cat with 
 mouse. He grew weak, sick from head to foot. 
 
 Murdock lapsed into silence. Presently he said, 
 musingly, " Still, Tom Berkeley is happy happy in 
 mind and in body exasperatingly sane but happy 
 because of it. He drinks the wine of life alone, but 
 he can enjoy it that way. I envy him." 
 
 Murdock had dropped into the corner of the 
 lounge where his face was shaded from the light. Af 
 ter a few silent puffs at his cigar, he almost exploded 
 an interrogative, " Well ? " 
 
 Blagden shook his head, wet his lips several times. 
 " I regret to have to report, sir," he said constrain 
 edly, " that I ve failed." 
 
 " Didn t you see her ? " demanded Murdock 
 sharply. The false note in his envoy s voice had not 
 escaped him. 
 
 " Yes certainly." 
 
 "What did she say?" 
 
 Blagden nerved himself. " She s determined to 
 
 go on." 
 
 375 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Murdock sank deeper among the cushions. His 
 cigar dropped from between his relaxing fingers to the 
 floor. Blagden tried in vain to see his face. " What 
 does that mean ? " he inquired, after a moment. 
 
 " To go on with the divorce." 
 
 " Her exact words? " 
 
 " She she said said a great deal. I " Blag- 
 den with trembling fingers picked up Murdock s fallen 
 cigar, slowly crossed the room to put it in an ash 
 bowl. 
 
 " You misunderstood her," said Murdock bluntly. 
 
 Blagden clenched his teeth; his nails bit into his 
 palms. 
 
 " You ll have to go back." 
 
 Instantly Blagden relaxed, grew weak in the re 
 vulsion. It was now clear that his fears had been 
 groundless, that Murdock had been hesitating and put 
 ting off through dread lest the result of the mission 
 would not be what he longed. No, Murdock knew 
 nothing, or he d not be saying, " You ll have to go 
 back." Blagden spoke out boldly : " She made herself 
 very clear, sir. She said : Tell him a reconciliation 
 or any arrangement but absolute and immediate di 
 vorce is impossible. Tell him I shall expect him to 
 abide by the terms agreed on with my lawyers. 
 
 Murdock slowly lifted himself, stood, paced the 
 floor, his head bent, his hands behind his back. At one 
 end of the room he would pause to stare up into the 
 leaves of the huge palm ; at the other end he would halt 
 to gaze absently down upon the books and magazines 
 littering a table. He kept muttering, " She never 
 said that never." In those ten minutes Blagden real 
 ized what few human beings ever have opportunity to 
 realize in their whole lives that there actually can be 
 
 376 
 
V&LAGDEN S BAD QUARTER HOUR 
 
 mental anguish more savage, more searching than the 
 fiercest physical pain. Suddenly Murdock wheeled 
 sharply upon him. "What did you say to her?" he 
 demanded. And those blue eyes of his seemed to Blag- 
 den to be searching every corner of his soul under a 
 flooding light. 
 
 " I I We talked mostly commonplaces. 
 .Vaturally, I would not presume to " 
 
 But Murdock had already turned away. He had 
 instantly dismissed the vagrant suspicion as merely 
 the precaution of his habit of neglecting no possibility 
 however preposterous, in the survey of a situation. He 
 resumed his muttering, not so low that the words es 
 caped Blagdeii s terror-sharpened ears. " Who can it 
 have been? . . . She never made up her mind to that 
 alone. . . . Probably those lawyers. . . . Yes, it 
 must have been those greedy jackals. I must fix her 
 property so they can t get it away from her. . . . 
 Yes, the lawyers." 
 
 Murdock flung himself at full length on the lounge 
 and, his hands clasped under his head, stared up at the 
 lofty ceiling. Usually, when he found an explanation 
 that explained, he dismissed a problem as solved ; but he 
 could not dismiss this. " What difference does it make 
 how she happened to do what I wanted ? " he said to 
 himself, irritated that his mind continued to vex itself 
 with the trifle and refused to relax and enjoy the all- 
 important fact that he had gained his point. 
 
 " If you ll permit me, sir," began the secretary 
 timidly. 
 
 "Yes?" said Murdock. 
 
 " There can be no possible doubt of Mrs. Murdock s 
 meaning. Her manner was very convincing. She said: 
 * He offered me freedom and independence. I s-ccepted* 
 25 377 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Now, I ll not draw back. Perhaps I m doing no good 
 by repeating it, but she seemed very bitter against you, 
 had a very false I assured her in vain it was false 
 notion about you and a lady." 
 
 Murdock stirred. "No matter!" said he. "I m 
 convinced you re not mistaken." 
 
 " I simply couldn t be," reiterated Blagden. " Lan- 
 guage could not have been clearer than hers was. And 
 her manner was most most resolute." 
 
 Murdock sat up, waved his arm in dismissal of the 
 subject. Blagden, restless, began to wander about the 
 room. He saw and touched a bundle on the chair by 
 the table. " Something for me to look after, sir ? " 
 inquired he. 
 
 " A house I ve taken near Nice for the winter. Look 
 at them." He joined Blagden, opened the bundle, fell to 
 exhibiting and discussing the prints and photographs. 
 The chief difference between youth and age is youth s 
 energetic, impatient enthusiasm, age s lack of it ; and this 
 difference, physical in its origin, is mental in its first 
 deep effects, thence gradually reacting with ever-increas 
 ing power upon the physical appearance. Murdock had 
 retained almost unimpaired this fresh and vivid interest 
 in life; but during the past ten years it had been sub 
 dued by his responsibilities and anxieties and by his 
 constant association with older men. To-night, as he 
 talked of the villa by the Mediterranean where he pur 
 posed to spend the winter, and as the weight of his mar 
 riage burden rolled from him, he began to act and to 
 look like a boy. Blagden watched him grow youthful 
 with the same sort of wonder one feels in watching the 
 performance of an Oriental magician. There was to 
 the secretary something uncanny about this transforma 
 tion, some suggestion of Faust s bargain with the deviL 
 
 318 
 
BLAGDEN S BAD QUARTER HOUR 
 
 Murdock had always been simple and direct with Blag- 
 den, but had kept a narrow but deep gulf between them, 
 the gulf of his natural reserve of the leader who is forced 
 consciously or unconsciously to keep himself wrapped in 
 the mystery that is his best aid in maintaining discipline 
 and docility. Now, he was laughing and joking, with 
 eyes sparkling and hands active in free, expansive ges 
 tures. He even clapped Blagden upon the shoulder two 
 or three times. And, in spite of himself, Blagden yielded 
 to his magnetism, began really to like him, began to feel 
 as if Murdock were his friend, to forget that he was a 
 person to be hated, to be envied, to be courted for the 
 sake of what there was " in it." 
 
 The telephone bell clicked insistently. Murdock 
 glanced at the clock. " After one ! " he exclaimed. 
 " Old man, I m sorry. You must be tired. Why didn t 
 you rein me in ? " He took down the receiver. As he 
 listened his face clouded. "Where?" he asked. "At 
 the house in Madison Avenue? Yes yes I ll come at 
 once." 
 
 He hung up the receiver. " Would you believe it? " 
 he cried to Blagden. " I never saw Berkeley looking so 
 fit as this evening and in the best spirits. You remem 
 ber what we were saying. Well he s been taken ill 
 dangerously ill, the doctor says which probably means, 
 as usual, simply the first move in laying the foundation 
 for a big bill. Let s hope so. However, I m going over. 
 Perhaps you d be willing to come." Murdock pressed a 
 button in the wall near him. " It s not much out of your 
 way. I ll send you on to your club, and the cab can 
 come back for me. . . . Simcox, my hat and a light 
 coat." 
 
 " The air s very sharp, sir," said Simcox, appearing 
 in the doorway. 
 
 379 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " The light one. I couldn t stand fur." And he ex 
 panded his chest, threw back his handsome head, his eyes 
 alight, his face smiling. " What selfish beasts we are ! " 
 thought he. " Poor Tom! Yet I can t feel it. I can t 
 even piretend." 
 
XXVIII 
 
 " MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAVED " 
 
 ON the way Murdock said : " Fortunately, Mrs. 
 Berkeley is in Washington. This house we re going to 
 it s where Miss Hollingshead lives the actress." 
 
 " Has Berkeley taken her up? I thought it was still 
 Jessie Pomeroy." 
 
 " He drained that cup. He had a sudden complete 
 change of taste from buxom maturity to the greenest 
 juvenility to Bertha Hollingshead not eighteen lit 
 tle and thin comic-opera star pretty, but the exact 
 opposite of all Tom s fancies heretofore. . . . Queer 
 man, Tom. There are many sides to his character that 
 one sees only after knowing him years." 
 
 They were at the door of a brown-stone house one 
 of a row, and hidden in the middle of the row. " You 
 are to go straight up to the bedroom, Mr. Murdock," 
 said the half-dressed servant who opened the door as 
 they ascended the steps. " We re not allowed on that 
 floor doctor s orders." 
 
 " Wait here a moment, Blagden," said Murdock, and 
 he hurried up the stairs. 
 
 A young man, looking and smelling the doctor, was 
 pacing in agitation the second-story hall. " Mr. Mur 
 dock? " he asked, as Murdock reached the head of the 
 stairs. " They are waiting for you." And he opened 
 the door of a small salon, Murdock entered; the young 
 
 381 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 doctor followed him, closed the door quickly and noise 
 lessly. " Mr. Berkeley is still alive," said he. " But he 
 can live only a few minutes." 
 
 Murdock, astounded, stared at the young man, then 
 gazed ftund the room as if seeking the explanation of a 
 statement so unbelievable. The little salon was gaudy, 
 yet not altogether without taste, and it had individuality 
 the individuality of a gorgeous, luxurious, whimsical 
 cocotte. At the gilt table in the center sat a girl, child 
 ishly pretty, her artificially waved hair in disorder, a blue 
 silk dressing gown over her nightgown, both open wide. 
 There was a faint fascinating tracery of tiny blue veins 
 upon her white shoulders and slim, new-fledged bosom. 
 Her small face rested upon her hands too carefully 
 manicured hands, which still suggested that they had 
 passed through rougher days. Her large eyes, blue in 
 the pale way of the earliest violets, were glazed and fixed, 
 staring straight before her, as if she were out of her 
 mind. The young doctor stopped the nervous twisting 
 of the tail of his little blond Vandyke, touched her gently 
 on the shoulder. As if his touch had carried a terrific 
 electric shock she bounded to her feet, opened her mouth 
 to an incredible width, showing its whole interior, red as 
 a ripe watermelon. Just in time, the doctor seized her 
 by the nape of the neck, clapped his palm over her 
 } lips, and partly stifled the scream which was issuing. 
 
 " Hush ! " he commanded sternly. " Hush, I say ! " 
 
 " Oh, don t take me," she moaned, sinking back 
 into the chair. " I didn t kill him ! I swear to God 
 I didn t." 
 
 " This isn t the police. It s Mr. Murdock." And he 
 grasped her bare shoulder and shook her. " Mr. Mur 
 dock ! " he repeated, as if she were deaf. 
 
 But Murdock was not heeding. The instant he 
 382 
 
MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAVED 
 
 grasped what had happened he saw its full meaning for 
 him. Another delay! For, such a scandal as this 
 about his ex-partner and most intimate friend could 
 not but stir up a storm that would compel hup to put 
 off his divorce, in justice to Juliet. He could hear 
 press, pulpit, public shrieking about the " loose morals,* 
 the " lawless lives." He could hear the hue and cry for 
 " the woman in the case " and they d find her and 
 would pillory her. 
 
 " This must be hushed up ! " he cried. Then, remem 
 bering himself, he looked at the young actress who was 
 staring vaguely at him. " Don t you know me, Bertha ? " 
 he asked, standing directly in front of her. 
 
 She gazed up at him, slowly became reassured. " / 
 didn t kill him, Mr. Murdock," she pleaded. Her eyes 
 closed, she shuddered, collapsed in a heap in the big 
 chair. 
 
 "Where is Mr. Berkeley?" asked Murdock of the 
 doctor. 
 
 The young man indicated a door to the right. " Go 
 in," he said. " I must stay here. She s got a scant 
 spoonful of brains, and they re thoroughly addled now. 
 I ve been having the devil s own time with her." 
 
 Murdock opened the door, was in a bedroom evi 
 dently a woman s bedroom, with wall coverings and 
 hangings of pale-blue silk, the ceiling a fresco of Venus 
 charioted by Cupids, the bed with hand-painted head and 
 footboards, its pale-blue silk coverings tossed this way 
 and that upon footboard and floor. In the bed lay 
 Berkeley at full length, his coat, waistcoat, and pumps 
 removed, his shirt and undershirt cut away, baring the 
 white, firm, muscular flesh and curling gray nair of his 
 broad, flat chest. Over him, an either side, were bending 
 Dr. Presbury and another. Presbury was probing into 
 
 383 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 a round ringed hole just above the heart. As Murdock 
 reached the foot of the bed Presbury straightened him 
 self with a grunt of irritation. " Hell ! " he muttered. 
 
 In Iterkeley s voice came, " No use, eh, doctor? " 
 
 " Here s Mr. Murdock," replied Presbury. 
 
 With an effort Berkeley turned his head. His face 
 was yellow, the cheeks sunken, the piglike nose a frozen 
 white, the eyes withdrawn far into the head and sur 
 rounded by deep circles of blue-black, like bruises. They 
 were unmistakably the eyes of a dying man ; theirs was 
 that look of everlasting farewell which appears even when 
 lying hope still reigns within. Berkeley smiled faintly 
 in the direction of Murdock. " Suppose it s you, 
 Charles," said he, hoarsely and jerkily. " Can t see your 
 features. Hell of a mess eh? " 
 
 Murdock s face was showing that sincerity of sympa 
 thy and tenderness of which only strong natures, strongly 
 roused, are capable. For the moment he almost forgot 
 his own plight. He seated himself on the bed. " What 
 can I do ? " said he. 
 
 Berkeley s eyes were closed. He stopped his horrible 
 gasping for breath, drew his wide-open mouth together 
 enough to say, " Tell him about it, Presbury." 
 
 " He came here after midnight," explained Presbury 
 rapidly, raising his voice to make it reach above the noise 
 of Berkeley s gulpings for breath. " The servants had 
 gone to bed. Hollingshead herself answered she was 
 rather expecting him. A woman rushed up the steps and 
 entered with him " 
 
 " Jessie ! " gasped Berkeley. " It was Jess, Mur 
 dock ! The " He ended with a vile epithet. 
 
 " Hollingshead, in a fright, ran up the stairs, the 
 woman after her," Presbury went on. " Berkeley fol 
 lowed caught up with them in the salon tried to 
 
 384 
 
MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAVED 
 
 wrench the pistol away from Jessie. It went off or she 
 fired in a rage " 
 
 " She said she d kill me, since I wouldn t let her kill 
 Bertha," gasped Berkeley. "God! God!" And he 
 resumed the frightful clamorous gulping for air. 
 
 " The woman shot ran downstairs out away. 
 Hollingshead telephoned for me, without rousing the 
 servants." 
 
 Berkeley s hand fumbled about for Murdock s, 
 caught it, held it in a grasp so fierce that it pained. 
 " This must be hushed up," he said. " You can do it. 
 Charley." 
 
 " Yes," said Murdock. " It shall be hushed up." 
 
 Presbury shrugged his shoulders. " It has been 
 done in such cases a good many times." 
 
 " I tell you it must be done ! " said Berkeley. He 
 raised himself in the bed. " It must be done ! My 
 reputation must be saved, God damn it ! " 
 
 The blood poured from his mouth, from his ears, 
 spouted over his bare chest, so white and strong-looking, 
 drenched the curling gray hair there. He fell back dead, 
 his eyes and mouth wide, streaks of blood upon his cheeks, 
 a broad, trickling, crimson smear down his chin and 
 throat. And the long, humorous thrust of the piglike 
 nose made the face seem a grotesque mask, sensual as a 
 satyr, foolish as a clown. 
 
 " A hell of a mess," said Presbury, looking disgust 
 edly at the dead man and the rivulets of blood running 
 off his body. 
 
 Murdock roused himself. " We must get to work," 
 said he sharply. The corpse was not his friend Berke 
 ley, but an obstacle to his plans that must be removed. 
 " Let your assistant attend to this. Come into the next 
 room." 
 
 385 
 
OLD WIPES FOR NEW 
 
 Bertha was lying on the sofa now, in a deep sleep, 
 and the young doctor was slowly pacing the floor. 
 " What do you advise?" asked Murdock of Presbury. 
 
 " What s the use? Let it come out." 
 
 " No," said Murdock. " I simply meant, what must 
 be done to hush it up ? " 
 
 " The woman s running wild probably telling 
 everybody." 
 
 " Not likely," said Murdock. " The chances are a 
 million to one the instant she saw what she d done she 
 came to her senses " 
 
 " Servants always suspect." 
 
 Murdock seated himself at the table and reflected. 
 " We ll take him to the hotel," he finally said, " and have 
 him die there of say, of heart disease? " 
 
 " The servants know he s here," objected Presbury. 
 " We mustn t try to conceal too much." 
 
 Murdock frowned impatiently. " We can disregard 
 the servants. Who d dare publish their whisperings, 
 with you doctors and me against them and all the sur 
 face appearances correct? " 
 
 " The authorities the coroner the district attor 
 ney," reminded Presbury. 
 
 " I can take care of them if it becomes necessary. 
 The main point is to get Tom to the hotel." 
 
 " But all those bloody clothes in there ? " 
 
 " We ll take them along. Hollingshead s servants 
 f will think it natural that his friends should get him out 
 of this house." 
 
 " But " Presbury pointed to the young woman in 
 the morphine stupor on the lounge. 
 
 " She must sail for Europe in the morning with 
 our young friend here on the same steamer. Money 
 will keep her quiet for the time and that s all that * 
 
 386 
 
MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAVED 
 
 necessary. The next few days weeks are the cru 
 cial " 
 
 " Impossible, Murdock," said Presbury. " Impos 
 sible. The more I think of it, the less feasible it is." 
 
 Murdock rose, laid his hand strongly on the doctor s 
 shoulder. " Not only not impossible, but easy." 
 
 " I don t see it. I m willing to take long chances. 
 But if we re caught " 
 
 " We ll not be caught. It will cost something, but 
 there ll be no scandal. You and your assistants will dress 
 Berkeley. We will send the house servants upstairs. We 
 will ourselves carry him to a carriage, and take him up 
 to his apartment in the hotel by the private entrance. 
 He will die there to-morrow or, rather, this afternoon, 
 or next day, with his wife by his side. Simcox, my valet 
 he s my friend, too, perhaps the best I ve got in the 
 world will come here before we leave. He ll take charge, 
 lock up these rooms, hold the servants together for a 
 week, then pay them off and dismantle the house." 
 
 Presbury s long, thin finger was pointing to the floor 
 in front of the sofa where the girl lay. There was a 
 great dark stain upon the light carpet. Murdock, on 
 impulse that showed how matters were with him beneath 
 his smooth, languid surface, dragged a rug across the 
 room and covered the stain. " Simcox will attend to 
 that. Now, to work. My secretary s in the hall down 
 stairs. I ll send him for a carriage." 
 
 Presbury bent over the sleeping girl. " She s safe 
 for an hour or so," said he. " Come on, Dodge." 
 
 The two doctors entered the bedroom and closed the 
 door. Murdock went into the hall and called Blagden. 
 When they were together at the head of the stairs, he 
 said in an undertone : " Berkeley has had an attack of 
 heart disease. He may not live. We are going to move 
 
 387 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 him to the hotel. He can t be allowed to die in this 
 house." 
 
 Blagden s expression was peculiar. 
 
 " What is it? " asked Murdock. 
 
 " The butler down there says he thinks he heard a 
 shot." 
 
 " Butlers always think they hear shots. Please go 
 to the hotel and send Simcox at once. And come back 
 in half an hour not sooner with a carriage. Don t 
 get out of the carnage ; just have the coachman draw up 
 in front of the door." 
 
 " And Berkeley s valet? " 
 
 " Urn yes See him at once. Tell him Berkeley s 
 very ill. Send him off to Washington by the newspaper 
 train to help Mrs. Berkeley hurry here. He ll barely 
 have time to catch it. Telephone the station master at 
 Jersey, so he ll have no trouble." Murdock gave 
 Blagden s arm a friendly pressure. " I appreciate your 
 thinking of that chap, Blagden." 
 
 The secretary had a thrill of that pleasure wherewith 
 any recognition however trivial from the great fills the 
 less. " I ll hustle him off. Shall I telegraph Mrs. Berke 
 ley? " 
 
 " Yes to be delivered at seven o clock. It would be 
 useless to disturb her earlier." 
 
 It was Blagden s turn to admire and wonder Mur 
 dock, hard, cold, inconsiderate, yet in this hour of excite 
 ment, thinking of such a trifle as the sleep of a womap 
 who was nothing to him, a woman he did not like. 
 "Everything shall be attended to," said Blagden. 
 " Some one ought to talk to the butler about his notion 
 that there was a shot." He looked directly and signifi 
 cantly at Murdock. " He is very positive and prob 
 ably garrulous." 
 
 888 
 
MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAFEL> 
 
 " I ll see to that," said Murdock. " On second 
 thought, send the carriage and stay at the hotel. Wait 
 at the private entrance." 
 
 Blagden hastened away; Murdock returned to the 
 salon. Bertha, still asleep, was lying on her back now 
 and breathing rather heavily through her open mouth ; 
 but the sight was not unattractive, so childlike did she 
 look. Murdock gazed at her pityingly, then roused her 
 by shaking her with gentle firmness. She pushed back 
 her thick waving hair, passed her hand over her eyes 
 several times, gradually returned to consciousness and to 
 pain and terror. Murdock s gaze was steady and stern ; 
 before it she slowly settled against the back of the sofa 
 and began to weep. 
 
 " You are awake ? " said he. " You hear me ? Yon 
 understand?" 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " Tom is dead." 
 
 She gave a startled cry. " I didn t shoot him. Be 
 fore God I didn t ! " And she clasped her hands stagily,, 
 and. her waved hair fell in clusters about her pretty 
 childish face and throat. 
 
 " We do not care to hear anything about that," Mur 
 dock interrupted commandingly. " We purpose to hush 
 up this scandal. You are to leave for Europe by the 
 first steamer that sails in the morning. Dr. Dodge is to 
 accompany you. Whether you are guilty or not, we will 
 protect you if you behave yourself." 
 
 Like all people of feeble mentality and strong primal 
 emotions her first instinct was to oppose ; she drew down 
 her brows and her mouth sullenly. " I ll not go," said 
 she. " I ve done nothing wrong." 
 
 "Who shot Mr. Berkeley?" asked Murdock, his 
 voice cold. 
 
 389 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " I don t know her," Bertha whimpered. " She fol 
 lowed him in, and " 
 
 "She? Who?" 
 
 " I don t know." 
 
 " Then it is your word against all these circum- 
 
 * stances. But if you go quietly away you will get into 
 
 no trouble. There will be no scandal. We will take Mr. 
 
 Berkeley to his hotel, and he will die of heart disease 
 
 there." 
 
 " My God, and I have no money ! " cried Bertha. 
 " He always kept me close. He was a dog a dog ! " 
 She checked herself in terror. She fell on her knees be 
 fore him. " No, I didn t mean that," she moaned. 
 " You mustn t use it against me." 
 
 Murdock seemed inexorable. " Nothing will be 
 used against you if you do as I say do what is best 
 for you. And you will be well taken care of." He 
 took out his pocketbook, took from it several bills of 
 large denomination, tossed them into her lap as she 
 sat upon her heels on the floor. He smiled satirically 
 at her instant change of expression tribute to the 
 shrewdness of his guess as to the wisest way quickly to 
 come to terms with the sort of human nature before 
 him. 
 
 " Then I ll go," said she. Now, she felt she was 
 secure. The sight of the money had brought home to 
 her how powerful a protector she had in Murdock, 
 had convinced her that he was sincere. " Anyhow," 
 she went on, " I want to get away from all this and try 
 to forget it. Oh, I wish I d never seen him! What 
 have I got out of it? Nothing but promises I knew 
 he d not keep, though I was fool enough to live on 
 them." Not thinking what she was doing, she thrust 
 a slim girlish leg from her skirts and tucked the bills 
 
 390 
 
MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAILED 
 
 into the thin blue silk stocking. " I did whatever he 
 .wanted just because he was rich; and a comparatively 
 poor man would have done better by me. ... I must 
 go into " She turned her eyes slowly, timidly to 
 ward the door behind which lay the tragedy. 
 
 "You can t get into your bedroom for half an 
 hour." 
 
 She shuddered. " I d not dare go! " 
 
 " Dr. Dodge will pack for you. You needn t take 
 much along. He ll see that you get everything in 
 Paris." 
 
 At that magic word Paris her mind was off her 
 woes again, was flitting up and down the Rue de la 
 Paix which she had been dreaming of and longing for 
 ever since she outgrew dreaming of and longing for 
 Heaven. " A trunk and all I really need are in my 
 dressing room. I can get in there from the hall." 
 
 She rose from the floor, light, graceful, eager, as if 
 she were making an entrance on the stage. Murdock 
 accompanied her to the hall door of the dressing room, 
 saw her safely in and busy with her trunk and travel 
 ing bag and humming under her breath one of the 
 gay tunes of her opera. There was a bitter smile 
 on his somber face as he turned away. The last time 
 he had seen her with Berkeley, she was on his knee, 
 mussing his hair, pulling his ears and calling him 
 fond names in melting tones. " But why not ? " he 
 reflected. " Tom wanted only what he paid for and 
 he got it." 
 
 In the bedroom he found Presbury and Dodge 
 dressing Berkeley s still warm body and lightening the 
 labor by cheerful, half -jesting remarks. Brierly, the 
 other physician, was making into two small and com 
 pact bundles all the blood-stained articles. " The mat- 
 
 391 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 tress is hopeless," said he, pausing to look up at Mur- 
 dock. " You ll see, when they get him dressed and 
 off it." 
 
 " Simcox will attend to that," said Murdock. 
 * Fortunately, it s not too late in the season for furnace 
 fires. . . . There ll be plenty of time. No one but Sim- 
 cox will ever see this room as it is." 
 
 " He s ready even to the shoes," Presbury now 
 announced. " We found a business outfit of his, com 
 plete, and dressed him in that. Dodge suggests that 
 at the hotel we d better perform an operation that ll 
 hide the wound. Bright idea, that original." He 
 laughed at the assistant, went on ironically, " You ve 
 got brains, Dodge real brains. What a mess we d 
 have made without you." 
 
 " Yes," assented Murdock absently. He was star 
 ing, sick and fascinated, at Berkeley s figure, fully 
 dressed and propped to a half-sitting, half-reclining 
 position. He felt that his stomach was about to give 
 way. No one, not used to the sight of death, can view 
 it unmoved; and when it is stripped of all dignity, as 
 it was there, its effect is not melancholy but repulsive. 
 " I must get the butler out of the way," said he, 
 ] hastily leaving the room. 
 
 In the lower hall was Simcox, as always like a fu 
 neral mute, with the disheveled, half-dressed butler 
 talking excitedly to him. Murdock took him into the 
 reception room and closed the door. " Mr. Blagden 
 told you what has happened? " he began. 
 
 " Yes, sir," said Simcox. " I ve just been assur 
 ing the butler he was mistaken about the shot." 
 
 " We are going to carry Mr. Berkeley away. You 
 will take full charge here keep the servants to their 
 own quarters until morning yourself straighten out 
 
 392 
 
MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAVED 
 
 the room upstairs, and lock it up till you ve paid off 
 and got rid of the servants. You understand?" 
 
 " Perfectly, sir." 
 
 " You will find things that might lead people to 
 believe Mr. Berkeley was a victim of violence. No one 
 else must see those things. They must be got out of 
 sight before morning. Then, they must be burned." 
 
 " They will be, sir. In the furnace." 
 
 Years of close association with Murdock had given 
 the valet the master s imperturbable manner and, by 
 reaction of exterior upon interior, much of Murdock s 
 calmness and decision. Murdock put out his hand and 
 Simcox took it. " I trust you entirely," said Mur 
 dock. " It s an ugly business, but you and I will see 
 it through. It s important for me, personally most 
 important that this be smoothed over." 
 
 Simcox s only change was in the eyes. He showed 
 there that Murdock had now roused him to the kind 
 of interest which quickens the mind like cocaine. All 
 he said was his usual " Yes, sir." 
 
 " When you get the butler on the top floor, and 
 are sure the lower part of the house is clear, come to 
 the salon just over this room." 
 
 Murdock peered through the shutters ; the carriage 
 had come. He went back to the second floor, waited 
 in the salon until Simcox appeared. He opened the 
 bedroom door. " Now ! " said he to Presbury. 
 
 Simcox preceded, with the two bundles ; then came 
 the doctors bearing Berkeley as if he were helplessly 
 drunk or ill ; then Murdock. The procession descended 
 the stairs, passed out into the deserted street. Two 
 blocks up, under a lamp-post, stood a policeman ; but 
 he happened to be looking the other way. As they 
 lifted the body into the carriage, Brierly for the 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 benefit of the coachman, gave two deep, agonized 
 groans. And again Murdock all but staggered under a 
 wave of nausea; Presbury muttered in a jocose under 
 tone, " Good business, Brierly. You must do that 
 again, and curse a little, as we lift him out." 
 
 " Drive slowly and very carefully, coachman," 
 cautioned Murdock, the last to enter. He put his 
 hand out through the window and shook the hand of his 
 valet once more. " I count on you, Simcox," said he. 
 As the carriage drove away, he saw Dodge and Simcox 
 reentering the house. 
 
 The short drive was made in silence. Brierly sat 
 beside the corpse, Presbury opposite it, Murdock next 
 him and grateful for the sharp night air blowing full 
 upon his face, damp with the sweat of weakness and 
 nausea. The two blood-soaked bundles were in the lap 
 of the corpse, Presbury steadying them. Once Mur 
 dock shot a glance at his dead friend, tottering in stiff 
 lifelessness with every slight motion of the carriage. 
 The head was covered with a fur cap drawn well down ; 
 its visor hid the upper part of the face, but Murdock 
 saw the lower part the fallen jaw, the protruding 
 tongue. "God!" he muttered. "God!" And his 
 brain and his stomach reeled. 
 
 At the private entrance to the hotel stood Blagden. 
 He came to the curb, leaned in at the carriage window. 
 " I ve been able to get the porter away," said he. 
 66 Told him you were bringing Berkeley home, consid 
 erably soused and didn t want anyone to see. The 
 door s open." 
 
 " Good ! " said Presbury. " It begins to look as if 
 we d succeed." 
 
 The corpse was far into the rigor mortis now and 
 exceedingly difficult to handle. Murdock and Blagden 
 
 394 
 
MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAVED 
 
 took each a bundle ; Murdock engaged the coachman in. 
 a discussion about the fare. Brierly groaned and 
 cursed loudly enough for the coachman to hear. Pres- 
 bury assisted the deception with soothing, reassuring 
 remarks. " Patience, Mr. Berkeley. . . . Just a mo 
 ment, now. . . . We re doing the best we can." As 
 soon as the body was clear of the carriage, Blagden 
 shut the door. Murdock handed the coachman a bill,, 
 and before the strangely burdened group had got 
 within the narrow private entrance, the coach was far 
 down the street. The ascent of four flights of narrow 
 stairway was made with the greatest awkwardness. 
 Once Brierly lost his hold on the corpse and it rolled 
 heavily against Presbury who, as the stronger, was 
 behind with Blagden to assist. Presbury staggered,, 
 almost fell backwards down the stairs. After that 
 Presbury went in front and took the corpse by the 
 collar, dragging it upward, the two others pushing 
 it, and Murdock carrying both bundles. After half an 
 hour of labor, the corpse was dropped in Berkeley ^ 
 bed, lay there with elbows and knees bent and head 
 fantastically awry. Its bearers sank exhausted on the 
 satin upholstered chairs. 
 
 " About nurses," said Presbury. " We can t trust 
 anybody. Brierly can pose as a nurse. Will you stay- 
 on guard with us, Blagden ? " 
 
 " Of course," replied the secretary. 
 
 Murdock, standing gloomily apart, suddenly in 
 quired, " When will you perform the operation ? " 
 
 " This afternoon. Then the embalmers can come 
 in." 
 
 " The embalmers ! " exclaimed he, startled and shud 
 dering. 
 
 "To be sure, they ll know there s something 
 395 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 wrong," replied Presbury. " But my reputation and 
 extra pay will make them discreet. Besides, they re 
 used to queer happenings. We ll get undertakers that 
 deal only with the fashionable class of business. We 
 must expect a good deal of gossip. It ll be whispered 
 round that Berkeley died elsewhere; but what of that? 
 Such things have been known to occur among respect 
 able people who, naturally, protect themselves from 
 scandal and disgrace." 
 
 " You three had better get some sleep," said Mur- 
 doclf, moving wearily toward the outer door. He 
 looked years older than his age. " When I come back, 
 I ll ring four times slowly and you can unlock and let 
 me in." 
 
 As the door closed behind him Brierly said : " Now 
 what the devil is he up to ? " 
 
 " He has probably returned to the house," sug 
 gested Blagden, " for a final look round to make sure 
 everything is all right." 
 
 Presbury yawned twice, vastly and noisily. " You 
 forget the other lady in this case," observed he, begin 
 ning to undress. " I don t envy him his job. ... 
 Murdock acts like a man who had a personal interest 
 In stopping this scandal." 
 
 " Rather," said Blagden. " He and Berkeley were 
 very fond of each other." 
 
 Presbury smiled. " I knew that. What I meant 
 was that, no matter how strong a friendship is, it d 
 have to be supplemented with some selfish interest, to 
 stir up a man s mind to think as quickly, as clearly, as 
 resolutely as Murdock s has to-night. . . . Brierly, 
 you and Blagden can have the range of the rest of 
 this luxury and splendor. I ll sleep here." He gazed 
 round the grandiose room. "Poor Berkeley! What 
 
MY REPUTATION MUST BE SAVEf) 
 
 a pity, to have to leave it all, in the very prime of 
 life." And Presbury threw back his head and yawned 
 again. 
 
 "Well," said Brierly, echoing his chief s yawn, 
 "I suppose everybody has to pay for what he gets in 
 this world, some in one way, some in another." 
 
 "Stuff!" ejaculated Presbury. "If he d been a 
 pious, virtuous citizen, felled by a brick as he passed 
 along the street, where d your moral have been? His 
 luck petered out that s all. Gad, I never saw a 
 better body perfect, absolutely perfect good for 
 twenty years of young man s fun. Poor chap ! " And 
 he yawned once more. 
 
XXIX 
 
 JESSIE AND FLOBENCE 
 
 WITH dawn but an hour away, there were still open 
 few resorts of the kind frequented by the fashionable 
 Tenderloin set in which Berkeley had been a figure. 
 " Jack s " was the second stop Murdock made ; and at 
 Jack s he found what he was seeking. The instant he 
 entered the door he saw Viola, as pretty, as smartly 
 dressed as two years before, and, in that kindly light 
 at least, as freshly young; her cheeks were flushed 
 from the champagne a stout, surly, provincial-looking 
 man in awkward evening dress was providing for her 
 party of two women and five men. At sight of Mur 
 dock, she half rose and fluttered a long slim arm a 
 not to be neglected chance to display to the entire 
 crowded room the dozen or more fine rings with which 
 her fingers were disfigured. 
 
 " Hello, stranger ! " she cried, delighted, and quite 
 forgetting how curtly he had rid himself of her by 
 proxy. 
 
 Murdock shook hands, with a slight apologetic bow t 
 to the surly man at her right one of those bows that 
 recognize only to ignore. 
 
 " So you ve come back? " said she, giving him & 
 long, alluring look through half-closed eyes. 
 
 " Just for a glance. Where s Jessie ? " 
 
 "You knew she and Berk quarreled?" 
 398 
 
JESSIE AND FLORENCE 
 
 " He told me." 
 
 " Do you come from him? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Then she mil be glad to see you. She s sulking 
 at home. She s stopping with me now. She dosed 
 up her place." 
 
 " 1 want to see her." 
 
 " Come round to-morrow afternoon. Here s one of 
 my cards." She took from a white leather case in her 
 resplendent gold bag a large square of bristol board 
 perhaps a little too elegantly engraved. 
 
 " Thanks," said Murdock. And he nodded, bowed 
 again to the surly man, passed on. 
 
 Viola did not wait until he was out of earshot be 
 fore beginning to tell her sour Southerner follower 
 who he was, how generous he was, why she had got rid 
 of him everything that would stimulate jealousy and 
 interest and belief in her importance. By the shortest 
 route among those crowded, mussy tables, he escaped 
 from the close hot room, with its sickening, stale, stu 
 pefying smells of food, of drink, of tobacco, of per 
 fumes fine and coarse. Within ten minutes he was de 
 scending at Viola s address, a house in West Sixty- 
 seventh Street. He looked up at the windows all 
 dark. " But Viola s maid must be expecting her," he 
 muttered. He ascended the steps; instead of ringing, 
 he knocked. Through the curtain over the glass in 
 the door he saw a colored maid come out from under 
 the stairway. She opened to him, started back in as 
 tonishment before his somber, ominous countenance. 
 
 " Has something happened to Miss Viola ? " she ex- 
 (daimed, her mind searching for the likeliest among the 
 Carious reasons for disaster in that turbulent life. 
 
 "No," Murdock reassured her. "I left her well 
 399 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 tnd happy a few minutes ago. I wish to see Miss 
 Bessie." 
 
 The maid looked at him doubtfully. It was a 
 fctrange time of night for calling, even in the Ten^- 
 derloin; but this handsome, fashionably dressed man, 
 with many evidences of wealth to her expert eyes, was 
 toot to be abruptly denied. 
 
 " I must see her. I m from Mr. Berkeley." 
 
 " Oh from him." The maid brightened under- 
 Btandingly, but still held the door close. 
 
 " She s expecting me," continued Murdock, and he 
 pushed a bill into her hand. 
 
 " You wake her, yo self," said the maid, opening 
 Wide and standing aside. " She s feeling poorly these 
 flays, and that touchy! Jes go upstairs two flights 
 - the door at the end of the hall in front. Don t youse 
 tell her I let you in. Don t say how you got in." 
 
 " Has she been out this evening ? " 
 
 " Lord, no. She ain t dressed for days. I ain t 
 even seen her to-day. I don t go near her unless she 
 calls down." 
 
 Murdock went up two flights, knocked at the indi 
 cated door. No answer. He knocked again. From 
 within, a sleepy cross voice, " Go way, Vi. I won t 
 talk to you to-night." 
 
 " It s I," said Murdock. " From Berk." 
 
 A long silence. He knocked again. " Let me in, 
 please. You don t want me to call out my business, 
 do you? " 
 
 Another pause ; the sound of the key turning in the 
 lock ; then, after a full minute, " Come in ! " 
 
 He entered. Unlike Viola, Jessie had the instinct 
 for order strongly developed. The large, showily fur 
 nished bedroom was in perfect order every article, 
 
 400 
 
JESSIE AND FLORENCE 
 
 every garment in its place. Beside the canopied brass 
 double bed were two small bath slippers of pink silk. 
 In the bed, resting upon her elbow and gazing at him 
 was Jessie, in a pink silk nightgown, her hair carefully 
 done and tied with a pink ribbon like an old maid who 
 still dreams of the nuptial couch. At first glance she 
 looked like a sick young woman ; but as Murdock grew 
 used to the dim light he saw that her eyes were haggard 
 and deep sunk, and that the hard, bitter lines round 
 her mouth were as vivid as they would be when they 
 came to stay. He closed the door, locked it, seated 
 himself near the bed in a slender gilt chair; over the 
 back of it hung a pair of black silk stockings, turned 
 inside out. 
 
 " You know why I ve come," he began. 
 
 She eyed him defiantly. " Does he want me back? * 
 she asked in a hard strained voice. 
 
 " He is dead." 
 
 She did not flinch; her wild, weary eyes looked 
 straight into his. 
 
 " He is dead," repeated Murdock. 
 
 " You said that before." And she forced a sneer 
 ing laugh. 
 
 Murdock could not but admire the iron nerves held 
 thus taut by the instinct of self-preservation. " I 
 hope from what I know of you," continued he, " that 
 you will help us hide the scandal. We have taken away 
 his body. He will die at his hotel of heart disease." 
 
 Her face relaxed as he spoke. When he ended, she 
 sank back into the pillow, and her breath exhaled in a 
 huge gust. 
 
 " I came to let you know, so that you d say and 
 do nothing foolish." 
 
 She began to mutter inarticulately. Her bosom 
 401 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 heaved stormily; in a sort of convulsion her arms 
 doubled up and her fingers wound themselves fiercely 
 in her hair. Then through her set teeth the tempest 
 burst. Sobs and groans, shrieks stifled with the 
 palms of her hands or with the ends of the covers 
 pressed against her face a wild war of two personal 
 ities, one bent upon relief from agony of soul, the 
 other on guard that in the paroxysms nothing incrim 
 inating might be revealed. Murdock watched in pity 
 ing silence until the storm began to abate. " That is 
 all," he said. " I ll not disturb you longer." 
 
 "Wait! Wait!" she cried. "I want to speak. 
 Wait ! " And she hung half out of the bed to seize 
 him by the coat. The nightdress slipped from her 
 large, plump shoulders and bosom. " You think I did 
 it on purpose. You think I m all to the bad." 
 
 He disengaged himself gently. " I don t judge my 
 fellow-beings," replied he, suddenly feeling for her 
 he knew not why a kinship, a sympathy, even a com 
 radeship in frailty. " The account was between you 
 and him. It s none of my business." 
 
 " I went to frighten them. That was all. I swear, 
 that was all! When he threw me back from her and 
 called me those awful names, I It went off I don t 
 know how. ... I can t believe he s dead. ... I loved 
 him yes, I did! He was a beast you never will 
 know. No man ever knows what another man is, with 
 a woman with a woman he s not ashamed of being 
 himself before. But I loved him. I don t know just 
 how, but I did I did! I m glad he s dead glad! 
 Yes, I am. . . . He was done with me. He d used me 
 up, and I couldn t do anything to please him. I tried 
 everything, and I guess I know about all the tricks of 
 the trade. But he was tired of me. He was getting 
 
 402 
 
JESSIE AND FLORENCE 
 
 old and vicious wanted youth children. It s good 
 he s dead. Now, no one else will have him. Yes, I m 
 glad glad! now that I ain t afraid. You don t 
 know what I suffered when you said it wasn t Vi on 
 the other side of the door. It was a thousand years 
 of hell, in one minute. . . . No, don t go. Stay! I 
 must talk to somebody about it. I can t talk to any 
 body else." 
 
 At this reminder of the proverbial looseness of 
 tongue in women of her kind, Murdock reflected. He 
 seated himself again. " If our plans should mis 
 carry," he began slowly. 
 
 The change in her, the lightninglike change, was 
 marvelous. Her hysteria disappeared. She sat up in 
 the bed, threw aside the covers. One of her legs trailed, 
 bare, toward the floor. Her hands, tightly inter 
 locked, pressed deep into her soft breast. " Is there a 
 chance of that ? " she said, her voice calm, but such 
 fright in her eyes that pity almost swerved him from 
 the purpose prudence commanded. 
 
 " Always," replied he. " No plan can be perfect. 
 I was about to say, if our plans miscarry, and you are 
 arrested " 
 
 She shut her teeth together with a snap. 
 
 " Arrested," he repeated, " send at once for Hink- 
 ley and Baum, the lawyers in the New York Life 
 Building. Send for them and keep your mouth shut. 
 We ll stand by you as long as there s any hope of sup 
 pressing the scandal. But not an instant longer. Af 
 ter that, you ll be prosecuted to the limit. Do you 
 understand?" 
 
 She was sitting as stiff as if frozen. 
 
 " My advice to you," he went on, " is not to see 
 anyone until your tendency to hysteria has passed." 
 
 403 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " I won t," replied she between her locked jaws, 
 " You can trust me." 
 
 " I rather think you don t care to sit in the elec 
 tric chair." 
 
 He paused; she shook in a violent chill, then was 
 rigid again. 
 
 " Whenever," he went on, " you have a yearning 
 to talk it over with some one, picture the electric 
 chair." 
 
 She was gray green. As if she had been shot, sh 
 fell back into the bed, covering her face with her arms, 
 But that only made the vision the clearer ; and so cleat 
 was it, so terrible, that while it persisted its terror 
 would spare her the deeper horrors of remorse and the 
 remoter peril of her soul. Murdock, satisfied now that 
 his plans were in no danger from her hysterical desire 
 to discuss her crime, went toward the door. A large 
 closet was partly open ; in it he saw an altar with sev 
 eral candles burning and he knew what Jessie had 
 been at, when he knocked. He departed, without her 
 giving any further sign. 
 
 In the afternoon Mrs. Berkeley arrived from 
 Washington accompanied by Berkeley s valet and her 
 maid. Murdock, alone, met her at the door of the 
 suite and took her into the drawing-room. She was 
 calm, hardly more than serious, certainly not in the 
 least grief-stricken. "How is he?" she asked. 
 " You must be prepared for the worst." 
 " I am," replied Florence. She was particularly 
 youthful in a spring traveling dress just from Paris; 
 her skin was still fresh from the treatment, and her 
 hair, formerly too thin after the habit of fair hail 
 when youth is past, was responding to a new treatment 
 
 404 
 
JESSIE AND FLORENCE 
 
 she had discovered. She was of those women who, from 
 the nature of their skin and coloring, have at all times 
 a cool, clean, fresh appearance. Her lips were thin 
 and somewhat satiric; they and her light-gray eyes 
 bespoke to the expert in temperaments an indi 
 viduality of strong passions and stronger will, sen 
 sual rather than sentimental not unlike her husband, 
 though everyone thought her his exact opposite. 
 " What is the worst ? " inquired she, seating herself 
 and in tranquil, leisurely fashion, divesting herself of 
 gloves. As he did not reply, she presently glanced at 
 him, read the truth in his face. She hastily lowered 
 her eyes. 
 
 " He is dead." 
 
 She paused in taking off the second glove. 
 " Dead," she repeated. She gazed thoughtfully into 
 space. After a minute s silence, " Disgracefully ? " 
 
 " We got him away." Murdock s eyes turned to 
 ward the closed bedroom door. " He s in there. We 
 plan to announce his death some time during the after 
 noon. He will die after an operation." 
 
 She resumed unbuttoning the second glove; when 
 it was off, she laid the two gloves neatly together, put 
 them in her lap and slowly turned the sets of her su 
 perb rings outward. " As you please. Perhaps it is 
 best that there be no scandal. Such things set a 
 bad example to the middle class, who are mad about 
 imitating us, especially our vices." She sat reflecting, 
 a slight satiric smile about her lips. A handsome wo 
 man, but of that superior " queenly " style which plain 
 men think too grand for the homely uses of daily life. 
 
 "You will see him?" 
 
 She seemed to debate, balancing reasons for and 
 against. 
 
 405 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " He looks quite natural now." 
 
 " I do not wish to see him ; so, why should I ? I need 
 make no pretenses with you. You know about all there 
 is to be known. He cared for no one but himself, and 
 no one cared for him. I used often to think that, if 
 I loved him, I should kill him." 
 
 Murdock, his nerves all but exhausted, startled. 
 She saw, and said, " It was a woman, was it ? " 
 Taking Murdock s silence as assent, she went on. 
 " There s a certain justice in that. If we believed 
 in special providences, we d say this was an instance 
 of it." 
 
 His face darkened. He knew Tom Berkeley 
 through and through; yet it seemed to him that death 
 was a quitter of all scores, that she owed it to herself, 
 if not to her husband s memory, to feel, or at least 
 to show some softness. When he looked at her again, 
 her gaze was resting upon him. 
 
 " I see," said she, " you think me hard. I am only 
 honest. Of course, I shall pretend before the world; 
 I shall do what is expected. But I tell you frankly I 
 feel only relief. You cannot understand. You d have 
 had to live with him as a woman lives with a man. I 
 thank God I had the insight and the courage to bear 
 no children to him." 
 
 " All that is past," said Murdock gently. 
 
 " I wish it were ! But it is not. It lives in me. 
 We are what association makes us, and I associated 
 with him." She struck her hands together with sudden 
 violence, and her eyes flashed. " He blighted my youth. 
 He withered my heart. To stand up against him, I 
 had to become more or less like him. . . . Not in one 
 respect, thank God. He made me loathe the very 
 thought of sex." 
 
 406 
 
JESSIE AND FLORENCE 
 
 She calmed as quickly as she had burst into storm. 
 " I do not hate him," said she. " He was what nature 
 made him. Please don t think I m ungrateful for what 
 you re doing to spare me and to prevent his tomb 
 stone from being a monument of shame." 
 
 " The least I could do was to try to carry out his 
 last wish. Besides " He hesitated, yielded to his 
 aversion to pose " scandal would have been un 
 pleasant for me, just now. There s always a personal 
 reason for one s acts." 
 
 " But with most people the personal reason is the 
 only one and so offensively personal ! " 
 
 Murdock recognized another sentence in the wife s 
 parting words over the husband. " You will stop in this 
 hotel, as I ve arranged? " 
 
 " Yes. As soon as I m settled, I ll send my maid out 
 to get my crape. I ll swathe myself so that the propri 
 eties will be more than satisfied." She drew a long, slow 
 breath. " My term is served. The prison doors are 
 open. I am free ! " 
 
 She went to the window and gazed out over the 
 sparkling city with ravished eyes, as if she had con 
 quered it and it lay at her feet, humbly awaiting her 
 good pleasure. The air of the room became stifling 
 to Murdock, and he was ashamed of the sympathy with 
 Jier that welled up in him. " Free ! " he repeated to 
 himself exaltingly. " I, too, shall soon be free." Mov 
 ing toward the door, he said, " I ll have your maid 
 sent to you in about half an hour. I ll tell her he has 
 just died." 
 
 " Thank you." As his hand was on the knob, she 
 asked, " Did he have time to make a will? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " That is fortunate for me." And her head reared 
 407 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 proudly. Under the laws of their State all he had was 
 liers. 
 
 Murdock went to the death chamber by way of the 
 private hall. Dr. Presbury had just gone. Blagden 
 and Brierly were lunching in great comfort and cheer 
 in an adjoining room, as Murdock saw through its 
 open door. He stood by the bed, gazed down at the 
 corpse, straight now, and with the mouth tied shut. 
 Death had departed from those features, taking with it 
 the sinister expression; the face wore a look of stony 
 calm. It was the face the world had always seen 
 the generous, good-natured, light-hearted Berk who 
 so well concealed his icy selfishness from the casual by 
 not concealing it at all. " Dead ! " muttered Murdock, 
 and his gaze rested upon that long, humorous, piglike 
 nose all its humor and its suggestion of jovial 
 sensuality gone now. How it had loved the odors of 
 the " good things of life " of food, of cigars, of wine 
 of woman. But it would twitch at their tickling no 
 more. " Dead ! " muttered his friend, and for the first 
 time the meaning of the crowding events of the past 
 twelve hours, the facts of violence, of murder, of him 
 self and the others as accomplices, thrust at him vivid 
 ly. But he was not moved; the element of tragedy 
 Tvas lacking. 
 
 His face grew somber, but not with grief, or re 
 gret, even; the gloomy thought was of himself that 
 after a few more of these swift revolving years he, too, 
 would be stretched out like this, the world going on 
 just the same, and he dead and disintegrating and for 
 gotten. His life had been too occupied with the im 
 mediate and the pressing, to admit the thought of 
 death; to-morrow he would be again too busy. But 
 in that hour he thought of it ; and it seemed to him the 
 
 408 
 
JESSIE AND FLORENCE 
 
 only fact in life not too evanescent and futile to be 
 worthy a thought. " Dead ! " he said. " I must make 
 haste to live!" 
 
 Blagden j oined him. " Shall we announce it, sir ? " 
 he asked. " And shall we send for the undertaker? " 
 
 Murdock nodded assent. 
 
 " I assume you wish me to make arrangements for 
 her as to burial, and all that ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Murdock. " Tell her the programme. 
 She ll carry it out." 
 
XXX 
 
 THE STORM BURSTS 
 
 BLAGDEN, just arrived at the Eyrie from Chicago 
 and Murdock, was at one of the long windows of Sophy s 
 sitting room, composing himself for what he hoped was 
 the final crisis in his enterprise. Berkeley had been un 
 derground a fortnight ; there had been published no hint 
 of the truth about either his life or his death. But the 
 whispered scandal had traveled, swift and stealthy as 
 serpent under forest carpet of fallen leaves, until the 
 whole country was half believing there was " something 
 mighty queer in that fellow Berkeley s death," and that 
 probably Charles Murdock knew more about it than he 
 cared or dared to have the public learn. Blagden, 
 hoping against common sense that Murdock would not 
 realize, had been anxiously awaiting the announcement 
 of the divorce; for if Murdock should suspect the state 
 of the public mind he would surely postpone the an 
 nouncement, might even abandon the divorce altogether. 
 That morning, as soon as he entered Murdock s suite at 
 the Auditorium, Murdock had dashed out hope by start 
 ing him for Saint X with an abrupt : " See Mrs. Mur 
 dock and tell her the decree will not be published at 
 present. Then see Wickham and confirm the telegram I 
 have just sent, instructing him to put it off." 
 
 Sophy kept him waiting less than half an hour just 
 time to put on the new-model Agnes corset, with the 
 
 410 
 
THE STORM BURSTS 
 
 Fleury elastic, and to have her hair hastily done in the 
 graceful fashion Miss Fleury had taught Katy. " I 
 didn t stop to dress," she began, as she swept in robed 
 in flowing lace and chiffon, artfully draped to decrease 
 and harmonize her proportions. " I ve been ill all day." 
 Evidently she was laboring under great excitement. She 
 thrust a newspaper at him a copy of the New York 
 News-Record. " Some one I haven t dared ask who 
 left this in my dressing room. Have you seen it? " 
 Blagden read: 
 
 One of the many explanations of the occurrences of a 
 certain tragic night is that the deceased Western millionaire 
 and an associate, even more conspicuous in the same trust, 
 were rival admirers of the young lady in question. It is said 
 that they met at the house hired for her by one of them. 
 Neither expected to see the other ; a quarrel followed, and 
 the one shot the other, so the story goes. It is known that 
 he who is said to have done the shooting has been in strained 
 relations with his wife for some time, with persistent rumors 
 of divorce pending. Like so many of our newly sprung very 
 rich he has wearied of the wife of his youth, though she is 
 still young and attractive and by no means so lacking in edu 
 cation and social graces as have been many of the women 
 whose husbands have paid them off and dismissed them. 
 
 Blagden glanced at the date the previous morning ; 
 this, then, was what had moved Murdock to post him 
 pff to Saint X. " I m sorry ! " he exclaimed, lifting his 
 ostentatiously shocked gaze to Sophy s angry counte 
 nance. " You shouldn t have seen this miserable 
 story." 
 
 " Who was the woman, Mr. Blagden ? Tell me ! Was 
 it she? " 
 
 411 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " I may not talk about it, my dear friend," he re 
 plied, apparently deeply embarrassed, but firm and dig 
 nified. " What good can come of discussing it? " 
 
 Sophy tossed her head. " Yes, yes it was she ! 
 Your manner is confession." She was pacing up and 
 down in fury ; she would have sat, but even the Fleury 
 improvement did not make sitting easy. " Thank God, 
 I m free free! All has been settled. I can do as I 
 please. I ll see that she gets her deserts ! I ll have her 
 shouted from the housetops." 
 
 " You certainly can ruin them both," admitted Blag- 
 den. " And, after all you ve suffered, it would be just. 
 . . . But, what I am saying? You ve made me forget 
 why I m here my duty to him. He sent me to ask you 
 for for mercy." He faltered ; his expression was a trib 
 ute to his manhood which he was outraging, as he went 
 on : " He wants you to consent to a postponement. . . . 
 He wants you to give the scandal time to die." It took 
 all the energy of his hungry passion and hungrier am 
 bition to nerve him to utter that last sentence, the cap 
 of the structure of passive chicane he had thought out 
 with the assistance of conscience and a high sense of 
 honor. 
 
 Sophy laughed viciously. " Not a day. No, not an 
 hour!" " 
 
 She rushed to the telephone table, plumped herself 
 down resolutely, called the Country Club. Blagden 
 watched in silence. Her bosom was heaving and her head 
 twitching. In her impatience she several times jerked 
 at the receiver hook. "Is Mrs. Monfort there? Or 
 Mrs. Hastings? Or Mrs. Dorsey? Please tell one of 
 them Mrs. Murdock wishes to speak to her, right away." 
 
 Blagden felt it was safe to let conscience interrupt 
 
 with a mild, " I beg you, Mrs. Murdock 
 
 412 
 
THE STORM BURSTS 
 
 " They can t make a cat s-paw of me ! ... Is that 
 you, Mrs. Monfort? . . . Yes? . . . Yes, it s Sophy Mur- 
 dock. I just called you up, Jane, to let you know I ve 
 got my divorce. . . . Why should you be surprised? . . . 
 Well, I couldn t suffer in silence any longer. ... I thank 
 my God I ve escaped before this frightful scandal burst. 
 . . . No, not at all. I wouldn t injure my children by 
 naming anyone. . . . Yes, the same woman, Juliet Rae- 
 burn. . . . Why, certainly, you do. Danger-field, you 
 know. . . . Yes, that dressmaker that s her. . . . No, 
 no, I ve told you more than I should. Be careful what 
 you say, Jane. Of course, I don t care who knows about 
 the divorce. That s a public matter. . . . No, not this 
 morning. I m almost prostrated. But come to lunch 
 to-morrow. . . . Good-by. . . . Yes yes You are 
 so good and true. It s in times like these that one 
 finds their real friends. ... I know you, Jane. . . . 
 Good-by ! " 
 
 Sophy hung up the receiver. " There ! " cried she. 
 * That s my answer. You can take it to him to 
 them ! " 
 
 The face of the young man was gray, and he had to 
 steady his lips several times before he was able to articu 
 late, "Well it s out!" 
 
 " Out? " cried Sophy jubilantly. " Rather! Why, 
 Jane Monfort will talk it and write it and telegraph it." 
 Her laugh and her glittering eyes suggested insanity. 
 " They re welcome to marry now. He s welcome to his 
 loose, frivolous wife. How happy they will be ! " 
 
 Blagden let her rave on and on. It was full a quar 
 ter of an hour before she subsided, heaving, her face 
 shining with perspiration, her breath coming in gasps, 
 so ill suited to the expression of violent emotions were 
 summer weather and the Agnes corset. A purplish 
 
 413 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 band appeared upon her forehead and her cheeks be 
 came leaden. But Blagden, as absorbed as a chronic 
 chess player in his next move, was not observing her. 
 When the silence had attracted her attention to him 
 he rose dejectedly. " Good-by," said he, mournfully 
 extending his hand. " I shall probably not see you 
 again." 
 
 She gazed at him in stupefied alarm. He had dressed 
 himself with the greatest care for that interview. Never 
 before had she seen him so fascinatingly the man of the 
 fashionable world. " What do you mean ? " she en 
 treated, her thoughts now entirely concentrated upon 
 him. 
 
 " I m returning to Chicago," replied he, his eyes 
 on hers in lingering sadness. " I shall resign at once. 
 Then back to New York abroad perhaps to try to 
 forget." 
 
 "You re not going to desert me just when I really 
 need you ! " It burst upon her how alone she was. 
 Norma would certainly disapprove what she had done 
 the cyclone of foul scandal she had released and so, too, 
 would her son probably. Her energy, her courage were 
 ebbing like a tide racing out through a strait. " You 
 wouldn t do that ! " she implored. " You wouldn t be so 
 cruel to me ! " And tears gathered in her limpid azure 
 eyes. 
 
 He looked down at her eagerly. " Do you really 
 mean it? " he asked. " If I could believe you valued my 
 friendship ! " 
 
 " Who else have I got ? I m all alone. And now that 
 I have a fortune I ll be beset on every side. I had hoped 
 that when you resigned we could could make some 
 arrangement." 
 
 Blagden stared at her dumfounded. Here, what he 
 414 
 
THE STORM BURSTS 
 
 expected to have to maneuver for was frankly offered 
 him, was pressed upon him. She had always been a 
 great figure in his imagination she, dwelling perpetu 
 ally in the atmosphere of gold that appealed to his per 
 fectly normal romantic instincts. Now, herself very 
 rich, a queen in her own right, even were she plain instead 
 of handsome, it would have been as impossible for him 
 to see defect in her as for the South Sea islander to find 
 ugliness in the hideous idol he adores. Temper became 
 goddesslike wrath ; fat was dignity ; her most common 
 place remark shimmered with gold, and her voice tinkled 
 with it. In his imagination she was the summit of heart s 
 desire. Nor was it illusion or delusion. The world is 
 to each of us what his own eyes and his own mind reveal 
 to him ; Blagden s world was that of most human beings, 
 bred in the sordid sycophantic traditions of the race, 
 was a world of things, not of persons ; beauty and dig 
 nity and power and rank were represented to him under 
 the material form of wealth. Had his shrewdness not 
 warned him that women, like men, become unmanageable 
 once they got the sense of power, or even the scent of it 
 in their nostrils, he would have lost all by showing how 
 much in awe of her he was, how this gracious condescen^- 
 sion of hers had overwhelmed him. He hastily concealed 
 his emotion; and very manly and frank and ardent he 
 looked as he said : " Any arrangement that enables me to 
 be near you, to feel that I am helping you will be 
 will make me content " His eyes lit with passion 
 " more than content." 
 
 Her gaze dropped before his ardor, and a blush of 
 confusion and pleasure came to her cheeks. " I was 
 afraid of him, and I stood out for absolute control of 
 of my property. I want some one to look after my 
 affairs," said she. " I must have some one." The blush 
 
 415 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 deepened. " I thought perhaps for the present we 
 might have some such arrangement as as you now 
 have." 
 
 " For the present," replied he. His tone was bold 
 and full of meaning. " But only for the present." 
 
 " That is what I meant," she murmured. And very 
 youthful she felt and looked. 
 
 A knock at the door; Katy entered. " Mrs. Berke 
 ley to see you, ma am. She says she must." 
 
 Sophy frowned. " Show her up," was her not very 
 gracious assent. To Blagden : " Poor Florence ! I can t 
 deny her. No, you must stay. You must. I guess we 
 both know what she s come for." 
 
 Fashionable mourning was most becoming to Mrs. 
 Berkeley ; her soft, somber draperies seemed to diffuse 
 about her stately fair comeliness the pensive, serene 
 allurement of twilight. " Sophy," she began, not see 
 ing Blagden who had withdrawn to the deep win 
 dow casement, " what is this dreadful story I ve just 
 heard?" 
 
 "About my divorce? It s quite true. But you 
 needn t condole. I m as glad of my release as as you 
 were." 
 
 " No no ! " exclaimed Florence. " I don t mean the 
 divorce." There she caught sight of Blagden. She 
 bowed to him, hesitated. 
 
 " You can speak quite freely before Mr. Blagden," 
 said Sophy. 
 
 Florence gave him a queer, searching look that made 
 his sensitive skin flush, then went on : " Jane Monfort 
 just telephoned me that you got your divorce because 
 Oh, I understood. She was hinting at that miserable lie 
 about a quarrel between Berkeley and Murdock a quar 
 rel over a woman." 
 
 416 
 
THE STORM BURSTS 
 
 " It is not a lie, Florence," said Sophy. Her tone 
 was restrained, but the line of her mouth straightened. 
 
 " Sophy ! " cried Mrs. Berkeley. " You surely didn t 
 believe ! Mr. Blagden, tell her the truth about it." 
 
 " I know nothing," replied Blagden calmly. " Mr. 
 Murdock did not take me into his confidence." 
 
 Mrs. Berkeley looked astonished, puzzled. But Blag- 
 den s expression was convincing. " Well, / know," she 
 went on, turning to Sophy. " My husband was shot by 
 a woman and your husband " 
 
 " He is not my husband," interjected Sophy. " I 
 am free, thank God ! " 
 
 " Mr. Murdock, then he moved heaven and earth 
 to hide the scandal." 
 
 " The woman was Juliet Raeburn." 
 
 " That s what Jane said. Sophy, it isn t true. It 
 was a cocotte." 
 
 " It was," flashed Sophy. " Indeed, it was ! " 
 
 " Juliet Raeburn comes of a splendid family. She s 
 a well-bred woman, of the highest reputation." 
 
 Sophy trembled with rage. " Hear her, Mr. Blag 
 den ! " she cried mockingly. " Just hear her ! Who 
 has been deceiving you, Florence ? I tell you, your hus 
 band was shot by Murdock in a quarrel about that 
 Raeburn woman, his mistress. And I want the whole 
 world to know it." 
 
 " Sophy, some one has been horribly deceiving you." 
 She appealed to Blagden, who was alternately paling 
 and flushing. " Mr. Blagden ! " She tried to fix his 
 wandering gaze but could not. " Tell her the truth, 
 Mr. Blagden." 
 
 " Really, Mrs. Berkeley," replied he restlessly, 
 " you must excuse me. My position with Mr. Murdock 
 makes it impossible for me to take part in such a dis- 
 
 417 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 cussion. All I know about the alleged murder is that 
 Mr. Murdock told me Mr. Berkeley died of heart disease. 
 Of Miss Raeburn I know nothing." 
 
 " Do you pretend that you believe Murdock killed 
 my husband? " demanded Mrs. Berkeley sternly. 
 
 " I do not," replied Blagden. " I believe it is not 
 true. I have told Mrs. Murdock so." 
 
 "Yes, and what s his authority?" cried Sophy. 
 " Why, it s the same as yours Murdock, himself." She 
 laughed insanely. " Poor Florence ! You thought Mur 
 dock was toiling to shield you. Instead, he was shielding 
 himself and that woman. No wonder he didn t come out 
 to the funeral." 
 
 " O Sophy, Sophy ! How can you ! " pleaded Mrs. 
 Berkeley. 
 
 " Maybe the Raeburn woman did do the shooting," 
 conceded Sophy. " What does it matter which did it? 
 It was one or the other." 
 
 " Ridiculous ! Did you tell Jane that story ? " 
 
 " I did not," replied Sophy, with the defiance of the 
 teller of half-truths. " She knew it already." 
 
 " But you did not deny it to her." 
 
 " I am done with lies, Florence. For years I ve been 
 living a lie, and eating my heart out. Now, I m going 
 to live in the open." 
 
 " Sophy," said Mrs. Berkeley solemnly, " you are 
 countenancing the spread of a frightful, a dangerous 
 falsehood. I don t know anything about your relations 
 with your husband. God knows, I wouldn t judge be 
 tween any husband and wife, after what I had at home. 
 But one thing I can say Murdock was my husband s 
 friend through his life, and showed his friendship most 
 after he was dead." 
 
 " How do you know that? " asked Sophy scornfully. 
 418 
 
THE STORM BURSTS 
 
 Mrs. Berkeley was silent. 
 
 " Only because Murdock told you ! " 
 
 " No," replied Florence with such energy that Blag- 
 den startled. " I know it by a thousand and one small 
 circumstances that convince me beyond a doubt. As for 
 Juliet Raeburn being in any way entangled in this, it is 
 preposterous." 
 
 Sophy shot her a glance of sullen dislike. 
 
 " I see you don t believe me," Florence went on. 
 " You are bent on revenge. Well, have it stuff your 
 self with it. But, Sophy, let me warn you. Be careful 
 not to go too far. If you press this lie it will be re 
 vealed as a lie, and your revenge will recoil upon your 
 own head. I know Murdock is innocent of Berkeley s 
 death. If you spread a report that he murdered him 
 the truth will come out. And you will be covered with 
 humiliation and disgrace. Instead of sympathy from 
 everybody you will get universal condemnation." 
 
 Sophy sniffed contemptuously. But she made no 
 verbal answer, because she was impressed ; perhaps she 
 had gone a little too far with Jane Monfort. Presently 
 she said, in a mollifying tone : " Well, Florence, don t 
 let us quarrel. You can believe what you please, and so 
 can I. For my part, I m going to try to forget Mur 
 dock ever lived. If anyone asks me about the business 
 I m going to refuse to discuss it." 
 
 "That is wise. Don t you think so, Mr. Blagden?" 
 
 The secretary came from the deep window to which 
 he had again discreetly withdrawn. " Certainly, the 
 world always admires a woman who, no matter what her 
 provocation, keeps silent about her husband," said he, 
 with the precision of one repeating a carefully rehearsed 
 speech. " Even if the truth about Mr. Berkeley s death 
 were different from what the public believes, Mr. Mur- 
 
 419 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 dock is not the man to conceal such a truth without tak 
 ing all precautions to protect his version of it." 
 
 " You hear, Sophy," cried Florence. " You must 
 admit, that s common sense." 
 
 " Good heavens ! " ejaculated Sophy, rolling her fine, 
 innocent eyes and waving her beautiful hands. " Why 
 do you attack me? I know what I know, I believe what 
 I believe ; but I ve not said anything. I intend to keep 
 my mouth shut. Only, I shall tell no lies." 
 
 And with that Mrs. Berkeley had to be content. 
 After she was gone Blagden said : " As she was talking 
 it occurred to me that Presbury and the two other doc 
 tors, who have pledged their reputations to the story 
 that Berkeley died of heart disease, might make trouble. 
 It would be disagreeable, wouldn t it, if they were to sue 
 some paper or person for slander? Besides, Mr. Mur- 
 dock is very resourceful. It isn t wise to stir him up too 
 much, don t you think?" 
 
 " I ve done all I m going to do," replied Sophy. 
 " That woman will be exposed, and I don t care about 
 anything else." 
 
 Blagden admired the shrewdness behind this re 
 mark. " She ll have every wife in the country enlisted 
 on her side," reflected he. " And, if I know anything 
 about American women, the wives will see to it that 
 v the husbands roar." 
 
 The waiter who brought Murdock s breakfast next 
 morning laid the newspapers before him and watched 
 his face with the eager curiosity of the humble about 
 the exalted. On the first page of each of those papers, 
 with headlines varying from three to six columns in 
 width, was the great Murdock divorce scandal; and 
 on the top of the heap he had put the one newspaper 
 
 420 
 
THE STORM BURSTS 
 
 ventured darkly to hint a connection between 
 the divorce and the " unexplained mystery of million 
 aire Berkeley s death," and to inject very guardedly 
 insinuations about Juliet Raeburn " a beautiful 
 young woman, known to every woman in the land who 
 loves fashionable dress, is said to be responsible for 
 breaking up the once happy Murdock home." 
 
 Murdock s glance fell upon the screaming head 
 lines. The waiter was rewarded; his thin, inquisitive 
 nose worked and his dull prominent eyes glistened, as 
 with a curse Murdock took up the paper. As he 
 opened it he saw a picture the palace occupied by Dan- 
 gerfield s. His eyes tore through headlines and story. 
 Simcox entered, saw the waiter feasting upon Mur- 
 dock s telltale expression, motioned him from the room 
 with a gesture that was at once a blow and a kick, then 
 himself retired as noiselessly as he had come. Mur 
 dock read on and on grains of truth buried in masses 
 of conjecture, speculations, lies; basest attacks upon 
 himself and upon Juliet Raeburn so advanced that any 
 attempt to refute them would seem an admission of 
 their partial truth; his wife lauded a beautiful, noble 
 woman, of too lofty a nature for his coarseness; the 
 victim of his depravity, finally goaded to desperation 
 by infidelities flaunted in her very face. Saint X was 
 on the date line of the main story ; but without that, he 
 knew it must have been in Saint X, from Sophy or her 
 friends, that the reporters had got most of the state 
 ments. 
 
 Murdock had used newspaper publicity too often* 
 had studied it too carefully, not to know what he was 
 now facing. From Atlantic to Pacific, wherever there 
 was interest in scandal the main subject of conversa 
 tion, not alone among the men, but among the women 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 as well, was the great Murdock explosion. And Charles 
 Murdock, sitting there alone, so high up that even the 
 noise of the granite-paved city came as a murmur, knew 
 he was at the very moment pilloried before the stares 
 and sneers and scorn of eighty millions. But he was 
 not thinking of himself. The thought that drove rea 
 son from its seat was of the woman unjustly pilloried 
 beside him the woman on whom he had brought infinite 
 disgrace. In his reckless passion, in his insolent confi 
 dence in the power of his wealth, he had neglected the 
 wisdom in one of his favorite maxims : " You can bribe 
 anybody, but not everybody " and had imagined he 
 could keep even the breath of scandal from touching 
 her. Now, there she lay, stricken down, trampled, torn, 
 befouled, and all because he had been an arrogant, head 
 long fool. He flung away the paper, bent his head upon 
 his clenched fists and groaned and gnashed his teeth. 
 What should he do? What could he do? To speak 
 about her was to convince the public of her guilt, was 
 to inflame and encourage those attacking her ; to de 
 fend a woman s reputation is to admit it needs defend 
 ing. He paced the floor ; he smote his temples until his 
 head seemed about to blow open. His fury was terrible 
 as a tempest-goaded sea s assault upon a rocky coast 
 and as futile. Insane with helpless rage he raved 
 against the hopeless, immutable facts of her plight, 
 like a child beating its bare hands upon the stone 
 against which it has clumsily fallen. Simcox entered; 
 he was horror-stricken at sight of Murdock s foam- 
 flecked lips and twisted features and wildly rolling, 
 bloodshot eyes. " Beg pardon, sir," said he in his 
 usual solemn, monotonous tones, " but here s a letter 
 from Mr. Blagden. He telegraphed me to see that you 
 got it at once." 
 
 ttft 
 
THE STORM BURSTS 
 
 Simcox, monotonous and matter of fact, took him 
 off his guard. Before he realized what he was doing, 
 he had taken the note, had torn it open, was reading: 
 
 SIR : 
 
 As you will doubtless know before you get this, my mis 
 sion was a failure. I did all I could to dissuade Mrs. Mur 
 dock, though it was against my conscience to do so. 
 
 I herewith tender my resignation, to take effect at once. 
 I have the honor to be, etc., 
 
 MELVILLE BLAGDEN. 
 
 He crumpled the note and cast it from him. In 
 itself, it had made not the faintest impression ; but the 
 interruption, slight though it was, yet gave his reason 
 the chance to rally and reassert control. With him, 
 to think was to think intelligently, and to think in 
 telligently was to act. " Wait ! " he commanded, as 
 Simcox moved to withdraw. Then, after a few sec 
 onds, " Have my car attached to the first train for 
 New York. No. Have them make it up in a special 
 to go at once." 
 
 Next morning s newspapers, east and west, led off 
 their great second day instalment of the scandal with 
 flaming announcement that Murdock was rushing to 
 New York by special train. As it steamed into the 
 Grand Central station, reporters swarmed round the 
 steps of the private car. Murdock, youthful, hand 
 some, carefully dressed, audacious, appeared upon the 
 platform. He surveyed the group of agents of pub 
 licity with a calm, cynical smile. Just behind them 
 stood Viola Hastings, " got up regardless," as she 
 would have put it. Her small, delicate, roguish face was 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 all smiles. Murdock descended, pushed through the 
 crowd, took her in his arms and kissed her. 
 
 66 1 told you I d be free within a year," cried he, 
 loudly enough for all to hear. " I win by four days." 
 
 One of the reporters recognized Viola, whispered 
 excitedly to the others. " We came," said one frank- 
 faced youth, edging up to Murdock, " because of the 
 talk about you and your wife. But it seems to be 
 false." And he bowed to Viola as if he thought she 
 were Mrs. Murdock. 
 
 " This is not my late wife," said Murdock, appar 
 ently highly amused. " This is a very dear friend of 
 mine." 
 
 He took Viola s arm with affectionate familiarity; 
 they walked down the platform to his waiting carriage, 
 he seeming to enjoy as much as did she the glances 
 of amazement, horror, indignation, shot at them from 
 every side, as they pushed through the crowd. 
 
 The whole country rang with Murdock s shameless 
 immorality, his studied insolence to public decency. 
 Every newspaper described at length the scene at the 
 station, how several fashionable hotels had turned 
 away the " guilty couple " openly applying for ac 
 commodations ; how they " finally found shelter in the 
 Hastings woman s establishment on the west side." 
 
 "Are you mad, Murdock? Are you mad?" cried 
 Langdon, his chief ally in finance, who hunted him out 
 that morning. " You have made yourself an outcast. 
 Yes, you must be quite mad. I ve known men to lose 
 their heads about women, many s the time. But, by 
 God, nothing like this. And you re the last man on 
 earth I d have suspected." 
 
 " A fool at forty is a fool indeed, " quoth Mur 
 dock. " You see, Mowbray, I didn t sow my wild oats 
 
 424 
 
THE STORM BURSTS 
 
 in season. These out-of-season crops are always diffi 
 cult and costly." 
 
 " I hope it s true you re taking her abroad to-mor 
 row." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Still, the mischief s done. You ve contributed 
 more to stir up the unruly masses against the upper 
 class than all the financial scandals together." 
 
 " Hypocrites," jeered Murdock. 
 
 " Of course. But how does that help matters ? 
 You d much better have outraged public virtue than 
 public hypocrisy. Outraged virtue has a certain hu 
 mility and meekness ; but an outraged hypocrisy is an 
 unappeasable raging lion." 
 
 Murdock listened with a faint, pleased smile. " Get 
 out and roar with the rest, old man," counseled he. 
 " If you don t heave your brick and heave it hard, 
 you ll be under suspicion." 
 
 "Mad! Quite mad!" 
 
 " As for my flaunting the vices of the rich my 
 dear Langdon, vice is human ; riches simply do not rob 
 a man of that part of human nature, though they do 
 strip him of most other human qualities. Tell me, 
 what the hell s the use of having power if one can t 
 use it as he pleases ? " 
 
 " Mad ! Quite mad ! Thank God, you re getting 
 out of the country." 
 
 Murdock s eyes flashed. " That s my one regret. 
 I d like to stay and amuse myself with my hypocritical 
 countrymen." 
 
 He and " the woman for whom he had wrecked his 
 
 home " sailed away at dawn the next morning. And 
 
 his heart was for the moment as light as hers ; for it 
 
 had been published broadcast : " The Hastings woman, 
 
 23 425 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 who has been Murdock s friend the past two or three 
 years, was prior to that employed for a time in Dan- 
 gerfield s, the woman s establishment built up by the 
 genius of Miss Juliet Raeburn. It was through the 
 fact of this employment of the Hastings woman that 
 many were led into grave misapprehension regarding 
 the Murdock divorce." 
 
XXXI 
 
 MR. BLAGDEN PLAYS TRUMPS 
 
 INSTEAD of enjoying the cyclone which, originating 
 in the tiny swirl of gossip at Saint X s Country Club, 
 was raging the length and breadth of the land, Sophy 
 hid herself and peered out at it in amazement, in ter 
 ror, and in anger. Her amazement was that of the 
 fisherman who, merely uncorking a washed-up bottle, 
 saw issue from it a vast and awful monster that over 
 spread sea and land and obscured the heavens. Her 
 terror was even greater than her wonder; for she, by 
 nature retiring and shy, was all in a twinkling whisked 
 from privacy to be exploited in print to the minutest 
 details of her routine of life. But anger soon dis 
 tanced amazement and even terror. In the press, in 
 the pulpit, among her friends, to make Murdock s in 
 famy the blacker, to point homily, and to barb jeremiad, 
 she was represented as the faded faithful wife, whom 
 mercy should have constrained him to endure, though 
 inclination hajl fled and the strong chains of duty to 
 his children and dread of public opinion were not 
 strong enough to bind. He was condemned; but she 
 she was commiserated. " Poor thing ! still, what 
 could she expect?" It gave her a sensation of acute 
 nausea to see such phrases as " noble patient wife," 
 and " motherly." " / don t look motherly*. " she 
 wailed miserably at a very motherly looking picture 
 
 427 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 of her in one of the newspapers. " Or, if I do, I ll see 
 that I get over it. Why, I m a young woman yet. 
 I ll show them!" 
 
 Thus, though Murdock s inspiration of insolence 
 completely turned suspicion from the one person she 
 had sought to reach and overwhelm, so occupied was 
 she with her own woes that she accepted it as merely 
 another, and by no means the largest or bitterest drop 
 in her brimming cup of bitterness. She shut herself 
 away, even excluding Charley and Norma, to get what 
 consolation she might from discussing with tactful and 
 stanch Blagden all aspects of her troubles, all phases 
 of Murdock s wickedness and, also, the disposition of 
 the wealth that was now hers. She was not mercenary ; 
 in fact, she had no more than her share of woman s in 
 stinctive thrift. But she was human. It was irritat 
 ing to her that the gossips were greatly underestimat 
 ing the amount she had got in the settlement. She 
 began to hint to Blagden to correct the misstatements 
 going the round of the newspapers. 
 
 " Perhaps," said he. " Let s think it over." 
 
 He had learned from Murdock never to make an 
 important move on impulse. He was glad of his cau 
 tion when he bethought him that anything which 
 tended to increase Sophy s importance and value in the 
 public mind just then would increase his own difficul 
 ties. " Why," reflected he, " she d immediately be sur 
 rounded by a swarm of flatterers and fortune hunters." 
 
 " On consideration," replied he, when she brought 
 the matter up again, " don t you think you d be giving 
 Murdock s friends a good weapon ? " 
 
 " What do you mean ? " asked she, alarmed. 
 
 " They would harp on his generosity to you. As 
 if you were not entitled to all he gave, and more ! But 
 
 428 
 
MR. BLAGDEN PLAYS TRUMPS 
 
 you ve learned how the world is." Then, seeing that 
 he had convinced her, he added : " Of course, I may be 
 mistaken. If you wish, I ll see that the exact amount is 
 announced." 
 
 " No ! No ! " she cried. She was appalled by the 
 blunder she had thought of committing. " What ever 
 would become of me without you ! I do believe these 
 low hypocrites would have made a hero of him and 
 would have attacked me openly." 
 
 " I fear they would," said Blagden. 
 
 She gave him a look of deep admiration. " How 
 clever you are ! How fortunate / am ! " 
 
 Murdock s ability, being beyond her and exercised 
 wholly outside her sphere, had made slight and hazy 
 impression; but Blagden s shrewdness was within her 
 range, was exhibited in her own intimate affairs. 
 " How lucky I am ! " she repeated, half to herself. 
 
 Blagden thrilled. Our opinion of anyone depends 
 chiefly upon whether our point of view is sympathetic 
 or the reverse. The finest human character cannot 
 withstand criticism ; and the worst has charms for him 
 or her who is determined to see charm. It was no hy 
 pocrisy, no effort, for Blagden to fall deeply, disin 
 terestedly in love with Sophy. She felt that he appre 
 ciated her ; she, therefore, showed him the best side of 
 her nature, took care to dress herself becomingly for 
 his benefit, responded to the stimulus of his admiration, 
 began to long to live up to his very human and livable 
 ideal of her. And he set about realizing his ambition 
 to make her better and still better, especially to bring 
 out the physical charms that had been hers and were 
 still hers, though in partial adipose eclipse. He was 
 most adroit, managed her so deferentially that, while 
 flattering her vanity into assuring her he thought 
 
 429 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 perfect, he stirred her common sense to show her how 
 she could be what he thought her. She took walks 
 with him, long walks, and finally climbs ; she hunted out 
 and adopted the diet Schulze had once prescribed. She 
 reestablished Secor s long-neglected beauty regimen, 
 brought from New York a masseuse recommended by 
 him, to teach and to assist Katy. And, as she was still 
 to the youthful side of youthful forty, and had by in 
 heritance both constitution and vitality, the results 
 were what might have been expected. The health she 
 had got in her youth of out-door farm life reasserted 
 itself in all its age- and decay-defying vigor. Com 
 plexion became clear, wonderfully white, radiant ; adi 
 pose envelope melted ; hips shrank toward modester 
 sightliness ; her natural body, her natural arms, and 
 legs and throat were soon reemerging, and in her face 
 the eyes and the fine delicate nose began to dominate 
 instead of cheeks. Never had love the love that in 
 spires wrought his miracles more quickly or more 
 beautifully. 
 
 " Dear me, how well you re looking, Sophy ! " said 
 Mrs. Monfort, just returned from Europe and meeting 
 her at the Country Club several months after the great 
 scandal had burst and vanished. " You ve got your 
 figure back, haven t you? You really don t look a day 
 over thirty-five." 
 
 Sophy winced, as Mrs. Monfort had intended, 
 " Well, you know I am seven years younger than you, 
 Jane," she answered, with the genuine sweetness of sat 
 isfaction in a thrust parried and returned. " Now that 
 my mind is free, I m beginning to be myself." 
 
 Mrs. Monfort smiled the smile that invites confi 
 dences. " Then, too, my dear," said she, " there s 
 nothing like falling in love for freshening a woman up. 
 
 430 
 
ME. BLAGDEN PLAYS TRUMPS 
 
 Kate Dorsey says she has a love affair regularly everjr 
 fire years, just as a tonic." 
 
 Sophy s cheeks flamed. So that was the latest gos 
 sip! A love affair between her and Blagden! Her 
 expression was so forbidding that Jane Monfort, pry 
 ing though she was under pretense of a joyous and 
 frank interest in the affairs of her friends, did not dare 
 pursue the subject. A day or so later it was Charley. 
 He looked after Blagden riding away on a hack Sophy 
 had bought him when she got one for herself. " Gad, 
 mother," said he sourly, " that chap s giving himself 
 no end of airs. He acts as if he were master here." 
 
 " Mr. Blagden is manager here," replied his 
 mother. " He has absolute authority. And very 
 grateful I am. I d not be able to get on without him." 
 
 Charley, convinced by the flatteries of servants and 
 hangers-on that he was a person of force and genius, 
 competent to the most abstruse matters without need 
 of experience, proceeded to unburden himself in dis 
 charge of his duty as head of the family. " I tell you 
 candidly, mother," said he, " the thing doesn t look 
 well. Of course, I understand how it is. I know you 
 regard Blagden as simply a useful employee. But 
 people will talk. You forget he may misunderstand 
 your courtesy. I haven t a doubt he has his eye or 
 your fortune." 
 
 Charley was even more unfortunate than usual 
 there. His mother bridled, as any woman must at the 
 suggestion that her charms are not sufficient to ac 
 count for her fascination. " You attend to your own 
 business ! If it hadn t been for Mr. Blagden, I d have 
 taken you out of Yale and put you in Tecumseh this 
 fall." 
 
 " Tecumseh ! " Into his accent the young man con- 
 431 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 f****"^^"^^* M *"** "^^"^T^TT M *rT^^^^T M **r*! > " > ^^ ^^"!^S 
 
 centrated all the alarm and repulsion which filled him 
 at the suggestion of his going to a college where all 
 the students were compelled to work their way through 
 and to live on what they made by their own efforts in 
 the college s mines, factories, farms, and stores. 
 
 " Your sister says it d make a man of you. But 
 Mr. Blagden insists it s better for you to get the edu 
 cation of a gentleman, among gentlemen. And he 
 begged me not to cut down your allowance. But I 
 haven t made my mind up about that yet." 
 
 Charley lapsed into sulky silence. He said no more 
 against Blagden, was on the contrary most affable to 
 him. " At least redney s well born and well bred," re 
 flected he he was rapidly expanding into a rare flower 
 of Eastern culture. " And the only reason he isn t in 
 our class is his lack of money. He s doing a grand 
 work, coaching mother up to the responsibilities of our 
 social position. Even if he has the impudence of think 
 ing of marrying her, she s got pride enough to put 
 him in his place." 
 
 But now it was Blagden s turn. He had been in 
 high spirits, laughing, jesting, giving the Eyrie an 
 atmosphere of brightness it had never had in all its 
 dismal history as the mausoleum of the elder Dumont, 
 the prison of John Dumont s wife, and the scene of the 
 downfall of the family life of the Murdock s. He had 
 had Sophy awake and alert all the time, both talking 
 and listening, and in the best spirits. There was her 
 self to talk about and to be talked about hours on 
 hours. And, for change, there was Murdock as a topic 
 an inexhaustible vein of conversation, that; enough 
 to last a long lifetime, enough in itself to form the 
 closest bond between them. All at once, this spring of 
 gayety and life and interest became dry. Blagden 
 
 432 
 
MR. BLAGDEN PLAYS TRUMPS 
 
 grew silent, murky, morose even. He avoided Sophy, 
 was distant with her, made a great show of respecting 
 their relations of secretary and employer. Sophy ac 
 cused Charley of having offended him, but the young 
 man stoutly denied this. 
 
 " I like him," said he. " And I think he s the best 
 possible helper for you. Look how he keeps up the 
 house and grounds. Why, there s no place in Saint X 
 that looks anywhere near so well as ours. And it s his 
 doing. What an air these hydrangeas give the ap 
 proach to the house ! " 
 
 Sophy now felt that her instinct s reading must be 
 correct. But she could not summon the courage to 
 speak out to him directly, so deep was her humility 
 about herself in the comparison with him. The solid 
 virtues put one at ease; but the showy virtues, where 
 they impress at all, dazzle and awe. Blagden s dress, his 
 aristocratic air, his reserve under a surface of engag 
 ing simplicity and frankness Sophy fell to color 
 ing and inwardly quaking at sight of him, but speak 
 she could not. 
 
 In truth, Blagden s mood was different from what 
 she imagined, from what he himself imagined. As soon, 
 as he saw he had the game in his own hands, he permitted 
 conscience to begin to reproach him for his far from 
 creditable aids to fate in bringing about the divorce and 
 the improvement in his own prospects. When the hour 
 for action strikes, the man who guides his life by the 
 code of success puts conscience and sympathy and a$ 
 the gentle feelings to the rear, as an army its women 
 before battle. But when the action is over and the suc 
 cess won, the gentler considerations are once more ad 
 mitted. There is a time for ruthless action ; there is a 
 time for repentance. Blagden, now that repentance 
 
 433 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 could do his plans no harm, was deeply and sincerely 
 repentant. 
 
 " I don t deserve her," he said to himself funereally. 
 " Of course, all s fair in love and I loved her, and I was 
 working for her happiness. Still, I wish to God it hadn t 
 been necessary to do some of the things I had to do. 
 If I should win her finally I must make amends. Never 
 again will I do anything anybody could misconstrue 
 into rascality yes, rascality ! " And he felt he was 
 indeed doing heavy penance, when he laid upon his aris 
 tocratic sensitiveness the lash of that base word. 
 
 Day after day he persisted in this penitential mood, 
 the more resolutely because its outward manifestations 
 were obviously helping his plans along. At last he de 
 cided he could afford the luxury of an honest attempt 
 at complete renunciation; as Sophy s eyes were full of 
 pathetic appeal every time they met his he felt he could 
 get full credit with his conscience, without in the least 
 imperiling his plans the reverse. Happy is the man 
 who can so order his affairs that duty will drive him to 
 the goal to which inclination beckons ! 
 
 When it seemed to him the right moment had come 
 he dressed with the most painstaking attention, linger 
 ing over the small details of his toilet with an anxiety 
 that would excite the derision of those who do not appre 
 ciate the importance of detail. No great man, not even 
 the dandified first Napoleon, about to enter a council of 
 state, ever looked more carefully to arrangement of hair, 
 to color and knot of scarf, to set of collar and crease of 
 trouser leg and coat sleeve than did Blagden about to 
 play his final trump in the game that held for him in 
 its event happiness and affluence or chagrin and servi 
 tude. Nor did he neglect the admonition of Whistler 
 that art is not in showing pains but in effacing all traces 
 
 434. 
 
MR. BLAGDEN PLAYS TRUMPS 
 
 of it. With not a hair out of place, and not a hair look 
 ing as if he had given it a thought, he sought Sophy 
 in her own sitting room at an hour when he knew they 
 would not be interrupted. As his solicitude about ap 
 parently frivolous details was not vanity but apprecia- 
 lion of the proper means toward a given end, he did not 
 look at her for the flattery of an admiring glance. His 
 mind was composed for his part; his stiffness, his mel 
 ancholy, his dignity were real, as he said: 
 
 " Mrs. Murdock, I have come to tell you I must go. * 
 
 As he spoke he glanced at her and away the high 
 est art the art that conceals his art even from the 
 artist. For in that glance he had seen the woman he 
 loved, the woman who had grown dearer and dearer to 
 him as he had watched her and developed her like a 
 gardener a rare flower. She was looking sweet and 
 even lovely. She had figure and also beauty of face ; her 
 hair was tastefully arranged, her eyes, her nose, her 
 teeth, her skin were fine. She seemed not a day over 
 thirty younger than he; like an elder sister of her 
 daughter. " Go? " she echoed in a frightened voice, and 
 the morning paper slipped from her trembling hand to 
 the floor. It was now a thoroughly manicured hand; 
 the polished, beveled nails were exquisite. 
 
 " I have been thinking it out," he went on, almost 
 coldly. " There are reasons which I perhaps ought to 
 confess to you. But I cannot. I must resign and go." 
 
 " I can t get along without you ! " 
 
 The color came into his cheeks, a most becoming ex 
 pression of sincere gratitude into his eyes. " It is very 
 good of you to say that. I have done my best to make 
 amends by doing all I could to lighten your burdens." 
 
 " Make amends ? I don t understand." 
 
 " I can t explain. I haven t the courage. ... As 
 435 
 
OLD WIVES FOE NEW 
 
 soon as you can make other arrangements, I ask you to 
 release me." 
 
 Sophy was on the verge of tears. She felt the props, 
 all the props, slipping from under her comfortable life. 
 " And here," said she, " I was thinking how smoothly 
 and happily everything was going." The tears were 
 coursing down her cheeks now. " It seems I m fated to 
 be miserable. I wish I had never been born ! " 
 
 " Don t! " Blagden entreated. " It is my duty to 
 go. Please don t appeal to my weakness." 
 
 " You simply mustn t go," she cried, encouraged to 
 redouble her entreaties. " You can have anything you 
 want anything." She gave him a long look, smiled 
 softly through her tears and an altogether alluring 
 mouth she had, now that the gold fillings in her front 
 teeth were replaced by perfectly matched and wonder 
 fully mortised porcelain. " Anything ! " she repeated. 
 
 He interlaced his fingers to restrain himself. 
 " Sophy ! " he murmured. Then bracing against a very 
 real diffidence : " After all, why should I be ashamed of 
 what I cannot help! How can I help loving you? I ve 
 loved you for years. And instead of getting myself 
 under control, as I thought I would, if I had other re 
 sponsibilities toward you, I Sophy, I cannot bear it. 
 I must go away." 
 
 She had grown pale. Her lips trembled with ner 
 vousness. She said, tenderly and sweetly, " I said you 
 could have am/thing." 
 
 He took her hands and kissed them. And his trem 
 ors, his color, the light in his eyes set her to thrilling 
 with a passion that had been dormant since motherhood 
 and her first lover s impetuosity had withered it down 
 to those tenaciously vital roots which only age can kill. 
 She disengaged one of her hands and gently stroked hii 
 
 436 
 
MR. BLAGDEN PLAYS TRUMPS 
 
 hair. " I love you," she murmured. " You will stay, 
 won t you dear? " 
 
 He lowered his head, lest she should see the rush of 
 tears to his eyes. How ashamed he was of the wretched 
 intriguing he had done ! " I have made myself un 
 worthy of her," he muttered. And aloud he said in a 
 sad, firm voice, " I can t, Sophy. I can t." 
 
 " I tell you, I love you," she repeated, the warm 
 beauty of her passion in her voice and in her face. " I 
 didn t realize it until just lately. But I suppose I 
 wouldn t have made him let me get the divorce " No, 
 it was no time for lying; before this deep emotion she 
 dared not be insincere " I mean, wouldn t have got 
 a divorce if I hadn t seen where my future lay." 
 
 He released her hand, went to the window. 
 
 " Do you despise me for confessing that that I 
 cared for you while I was still not divorced?" She 
 said this pathetically. " I know it was wicked," she went 
 on, " but I I couldn t help it. I was so alone. I had 
 been so alone for years." 
 
 He turned impetuously. " Don t make me loathe 
 myself ! " he cried. " If you knew, how you would 
 scorn me ! " 
 
 She gazed at him tenderly, admiring his bright hair, 
 the proud poise of his head upon athletic shoulders, the 
 straight, aristocratically narrow figure that appeared to 
 the best advantage in the well-draped English clothes 
 he was wearing. " Scorn you? " She laughed gently. 
 " Why, of course you re human. We all do things we 
 oughtn t. And women don t inquire into the pasts of 
 men not sensible women." 
 
 He heaved a deep sigh. " I m too hard on myself,** 
 he thought. At least, he had been true to her. If he 
 had not, if his offenses had been of that character, would 
 
 437 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 he be hesitating? Really, had not his actual sins been 
 far less grave, as between her and him? 
 
 " What is it dear? " she urged, going toward him, 
 drawn by that look. " There s something you are not 
 telling me." 
 
 " I can t give you up, Sophy ! " he cried, advancing 
 toward her passionately, then halting. 
 
 She laid her hand on his arm. " Must I do all the 
 courting, Melville? " she said, tenderness and mischief in 
 her eyes. " I don t care what you ve done. I know 
 what you are to me, and that s all I want to know." 
 
 Their lips met. " You are so good, so beautiful," he 
 murmured, kissing her between phrases, and holding her 
 tightly against him. " Ah, how ashamed you make me 
 feel ! But I loved you, Sophy. You d forgive me any 
 thing for that, wouldn t you? " 
 
 Her answer was her arms round his neck and her lips 
 upon his. Indeed she would. Those days of his morose- 
 ness, with no sympathetic talker and listener about her 
 past and her future, had taught her how she needed him, 
 how unthinkable life was without him, and him in a good 
 humor. 
 
 He presently went on : " I ll soon get what I must 
 have, to be happy with you. I feel that my love, our 
 love, will sharpen my wits. We must be on an equality, 
 Sophy. I could never consent to be merely a rich wom 
 an s husband. You can call it false pride and no doubt 
 it is. But that s the way I feel, and I d be unhappy if I 
 married you and were dependent on you." 
 
 " I should think so ! " she exclaimed. She pushed 
 him away into a chair. She seated herself on the arm of 
 it. He tried to draw her into his lap, but she laughingly 
 resisted. " No, I m too heavy yet," said she. Both 
 laughed, and he forced her to slip down and made her 
 
 438 
 
MR. BLAGDEN PLAYS TRUMPS 
 
 r frrnmmrmnn- imnn mrmin n i i i n i minium iiniiiiiMMiiiMaiaBMMiMiiiai !. n mini munii 
 
 very, very comfortable. " Now," she said, " we re going 
 to talk sense. We re not children; so I can speak 
 frankly. I wouldn t for a moment tolerate the idea of 
 the man I loved being a dependent on anybody. And 
 I ll see to it that you are not." 
 
 Tears stood in his eyes. In a social system based 
 upon material gain, money represents the supreme test 
 of generosity. He had not believed such generosity as 
 Sophy was here showing existed anywhere in human 
 nature. It awed him; it tinged his love for her with 
 reverence for her character. Nor was his fine feeling 
 marred by any cynical-wise reflection that after all she 
 was proposing to give what had cost her nothing. " O 
 Sophy, Sophy ! " he cried brokenly. 
 
 " You re making a great fuss about a very tiny 
 matter," laughed she, sincere in so saying, though she 
 would have thought him most unappreciative had he 
 agreed with her. " What is money for but to get hap 
 piness? And " She pressed her cheek against his 
 " you are my happiness." 
 
 " I can t ! I can t ! " he muttered. 
 
 " You d make me wretched, all for nothing? No, no, 
 dear. I know your heart better than that. Some women 
 can get along without anybody to look after them. I m 
 not one of that kind. I m the old-fashioned sort of 
 woman the sort mother used to make. I ve got to be 
 taken care of. I ve needed it always. I never had it. 
 That s why " She interrupted herself. " But, no mat 
 ter. That s all past and gone. At least, I don t feel 
 like talking about it just now." She kissed him, pressed 
 her hands to his cheeks, smiled softly into his eyes. 
 " Whose duty is it to take care of me? " 
 
 " There s only one answer to that," he admitted, 
 "But " 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " It s settled," said she, putting her fingers on his 
 lips. " I m going to have my way this once if you 
 never let me have it again." 
 
 " I ll think it over. And you, too, must think it 
 over." 
 
 " But you re not going away to do your thinking ! 
 I d not have a minute s peace. You ought to be ashamed 
 of yourself making the woman do all the persuading 
 and courting." 
 
 She was in his arms again. " Not quite all," he said. 
 "Eh?" 
 
 " Not quite," she murmured, utterly happy, happy 
 as never in the day? ef her youth, for then she had not 
 had the trials and sorrows that alone can teach us to 
 appreciate life s joys. 
 
XXXII 
 
 THEY decided to keep their secret for several 
 nonths that is, until a month or so before their mar 
 riage. But such a secret is not easily kept ; soon every 
 one in the household, and that meant everyone in Saint 
 X, knew there was " something doing " between Mrs. 
 Murdpck and her suave, elegant secretary; and soon 
 thereafter the gossip at the Country Club was that 
 Murdock perhaps deserved more sympathy than he 
 had got. 
 
 " A manly man," observed Mrs. Dorsey, " will go to 
 any length to shield the mother of his children from 
 scandal. Does anybody know just when Blagden be 
 came Murdock s secretary? I ve been away so much I 
 can t remember. Was it before or after the birth of 
 young Charley? " 
 
 Everybody knew it was years, ten years at least, after 
 - Charley s birth ; but nobody had so little regard for the 
 . general pleasure as to say so. Presently Mrs. Vermilye 
 remarked : 
 
 " I always wondered how Sophy could be content to 
 stay at home and see so few people. When a woman gets 
 fat young, as fat as Sophy was until worry thinned her 
 down, it s supposed to be a sure sign she has a man 
 with whom she is content. Any physiologist will tell 
 you that." 
 29 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 And Mrs. Monfort completed the syllogism with: 
 " Certainly, we all know Sophy s content couldn t have 
 come from Murdock." 
 
 Charley began to chafe under the hints and smirks ; 
 but he now had the wisdom to keep his own counsel he 
 wished to go back to Yale, and he did not wish to have 
 his allowance cut. How r ever, at the end of the long va 
 cation, the day before he started East, his desire to med 
 dle prevailed with his prudence sufficiently to permit him 
 to enlighten his sister, that she might take his place on 
 guard. " No doubt Blagden would gladly marry as 
 big a bunch as mother must have now," said he to 
 Norma. " And you know mother ; she d be easy fruit 
 for as smooth a citizen as he." 
 
 Norma had her baby in her lap, was crooning to it. 
 "Well, what of it, Charley?" she replied in the same 
 singsong undertone, as the change of voice might rouse 
 the sleeper. 
 
 " What of it! " cried Charley. 
 
 Sh h ! " warned Norma. " Sh h ! " The baby 
 had opened its big Degarmo eyes. " Rock-a-by, baby, 
 in the treetop " 
 
 " You didn t understand me," pursued he, in a less 
 startling tone. 
 
 " Oh, yes, I did," crooned his sister. " And I repeat, 
 what of it? " 
 
 Charley stared at her in disgust. " Well ! " was all 
 he said. 
 
 Norma went on with soothing her baby until she had 
 it sound asleep. She took it into the adjoining room 
 and laid it in its crib. When she returned she all but 
 closed the door. " Don t shout and don t whisper," said 
 she. " Either will start him up, and it s his time for 
 sleep." 
 
 442 
 
"CEST 1,2 TIE" 
 
 " I know you don t want mother to make a silly mar 
 riage any more than I do," proceeded Charley. " The 
 trouble with you is, you re so taken up with that babjj 
 of yours you can t think of anything else." 
 
 " Guilty ! " said Norma, smiling. 
 
 " Oh, you needn t glory in it." Charley was irri 
 tated into frankness. " It s really disgraceful. Why, 
 if I had a wife and she treated me as you treat Joe I d 
 read the riot act. No wonder he hangs out at the Coun 
 try Club, morning, noon, and night, sopping up the 
 highballs and alternating golf and bridge. First thing 
 you know, one of those good-looking young married 
 women up there will succeed in getting him away from 
 you. I should think father and mother s case would 
 have taught you." - 
 
 Norma made a brave attempt at a smile of con 
 temptuous indifference. "Always attending to other 
 people s business ! " 
 
 " Well you look out that s all. And, by gad, 
 you re taking on flesh, too quite matronly. I was just 
 watching you as you went in with the baby. Your 
 back s booming, and your hips Well, my dear, hips 
 are clear out. They re not only unfashionable; they re 
 common." 
 
 Norma was furious; he had rudely ripped the veil 
 from truths she had been for some time carefully con 
 cealing from herself. 
 
 " That s right, get mad at me instead of at the one 
 that s to blame." Nothing pleased him so much as 
 reducing some one to speechless rage before a crushing 
 truth. " You d better take a tumble to yourself," he 
 went on. " And you can look after mother a bit, too." 
 
 " Why shouldn t she marry Mr. Blagden if she wants 
 to? " Norma asked, concentrating her irritation against 
 
 443 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 her brother upon that branch of his lecture which gave 
 it an opening. " He s all right, isn t he? " 
 
 Charley stared at her. " What s got into you, Nor- 
 ma? Haven t you any moral sense left any sense of 
 decency? " 
 
 " Mother must have somebody. I m married. You 
 will be, in a year or so you re far too susceptible to 
 flattery to escape long, when you have such tempting" 
 prospects." 
 
 " There *s another reason ! What ll become of us if 
 that redhead gets hold of the dough-bag? " 
 
 " Now, the truth is out ! " exclaimed Norma, teas- 
 ingly. 
 
 But Charley was not disconcerted. " Well, grantee!! 
 that s what ails me. Why not? You and Joe have got 
 plenty. But what s to become of me? I had courage, JO 
 broke with father. 7 haven t written to him." 
 
 Norma flushed at the insinuation, but refused ta 
 gratify her brother by yielding to the temptation to de 
 fend herself. " Mother will look out for you, never 
 fear." 
 
 " Yes, but she s a young woman yet. I never saw 
 anything like the change in her. Suppose she marries 
 him ; suppose there are some more children " 
 
 " Charley ! " She dropped into a chair and cov 
 ered her face. She felt that he had insulted their mother. 
 
 " Now, now, don t put on ! " cried he. " We ve got 
 to face this thing. Whether what I said is shocking on 
 not, isn t it likely?" 
 
 Norma was silent. 
 
 " And," pursued her brother, " f ather ll be marry 
 ing again. He s a young man, and will no doubt marry 
 a young woman. He d be eligible for a girl just out of 
 school. It s done every day men older than he." 
 
 444 
 
"C EST LA VIE" 
 
 " =] 
 
 " Isn t it frightful ! " Norma s eyes showed how ] 
 profoundly she was shocked. 
 
 " C est la vie," replied her brother, with a shrug. ] 
 " I m learning to accept life without criticism, Criticis- j 
 ing it seems rather futile like suggesting modifications 
 in the law of gravitation or denouncing the moon for 
 not shining full every night. Of course, I d like to have 
 the world better not too good, or I d feel out of it but 
 still, better. But I can t see how it improves matters 
 to begin by denying that the world and the people in it 
 are what they are. Divorce remarriage all part of 
 the game. Tout cela, c est la vie." | 
 
 " Yes, it is life," admitted Norma mournfully. 
 " And, after all, father and mother have the same right 
 to seek happiness that we have." ! 
 
 Charley s laugh was disagreeable. " If Joe were to 
 lose his money you might not change your pretended 
 philosophy, but you d certainly cease to be quietly 
 resigned." 
 
 " Perhaps," admitted Norma. With reluctance and 
 against protests from illusion and delusion, she was 
 daily discovering facts in life and in human nature she 
 had never realized before, had often denied those un 
 pleasant hardnesses beneath the velvet which have no 
 reality for us until they press brutally upon us. " What 
 do you propose ? " 
 
 " Why, get after mother. Wake her up." 
 
 Norma reflected long. " It d be of no use," she 
 
 finally said, slowly shaking her head. " Besides, mother 
 
 [ will be left alone when you marry. She s practically 
 
 j. alone now. She s got to have companionship. And, if 
 
 j she must marry, why not Mr. Blagden? " 
 
 Charley, too, had been thinking. He could find no 
 answer to his sister s question. 
 
 445 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " I don t agree with you that he s merely mercenary," 
 she went on. " A man couldn t be as nice to everybody 
 as he is without having a genuinely good heart." 
 
 " I admit I ve got no objections to Blagden as a 
 man," said Charley. " But Damn it all, Norma, 
 / mother and father owe it to us not to marry ! What a 
 rotten, rotten mess they ve made ! " 
 
 Norma astonished him by looking emphatic dissent. 
 
 " You don t mean to say you approve of this scan 
 dal!" 
 
 " No, no, Charley," she answered. " But I can t 
 help seeing now that mother and father weren t suited 
 to each other. Look how this has roused her into im 
 proving herself. The change in her is almost mi 
 raculous." 
 
 " I tell you, that s Blagden." 
 
 " Well, isn t he a force that couldn t have come into 
 her life but for the divorce? And, surely, she s better 
 off than she was before. She was a burden to herself 
 and to everyone." 
 
 " If father had done his duty " 
 
 " If if if," echoed Norma impatiently. " Who 
 ever does? Who ever will? The truth is, they had lost 
 interest in each other " 
 
 " Just as you have in " 
 
 Norma colored angrily. " If it were true, your say 
 ing so would still be an impertinence. But it isn t." 
 
 " Well look out, old girl. It might become mutual. 
 Your getting cross shows there s something wrong." He 
 clapped her good-naturedly on the shoulder. " Those 
 hips ! And the up-to-the-mark young married women at 
 the club ! And do try to keep mother steady. Perhaps 
 you are right about her future. I hadn t thought of that. 
 . . . I m off to-night. I guess it ll all muddle through 
 
 446 
 
C EST LA VIE" 
 
 somehow. Gad, I m glad I stand in with our prospective 
 papa." 
 
 Norma winced again. She could reason about the 
 situation ; but reason was unable to down an instinct that 
 the whole performance, including her being able to reason 
 calmly about it, was somehow immoral. " C est la vie," 
 she repeated. " But, since it is life, why are we brought 
 up to believe it isn t? The world has changed, yet we 
 continue to be educated in the ways and the ideas that 
 are dead." She made a scornful face. " Hips ! What 
 a low plane ! " But she went to her dressing room and, 
 for the first time in many a month, examined her figure, 
 front and back, in the long triple mirrors. " Charley 
 was right," she decided. " I must get busy. " She 
 laughed. " Perhaps not such a low plane, after all. 
 Aren t slovenly hips outside evidence of a slovenly 
 inside? M 
 
XXXIII 
 
 THE newspaper cables reported Murdock and " the 
 Hastings woman " arrived at Paris and, presently, in 
 stalled in an Avenue Henri Martin villa, small but like 
 a jewel casket, so exquisitely was it carved without, S3 
 delicately furnished within. The villa was historic and 
 had been thoroughly photographed ; thus, the illustrated 
 press was able to stimulate the imagination of the pub 
 lic. From Maine to Mexico, quiet people, leading lives 
 far less tedious than luxurious vice ever afforded, were 
 participating with fascinated horror in the Babylonish 
 revels they assumed were under wild and wicked way in 
 those hand-painted, silk-draped chambers, within those 
 carved and statued walls. 
 
 The truth was far less commonplace. Viola, with 
 Lilly her faithful colored maid and several French ser 
 vants, was alone at the villa, was leading the dreariest 
 of lives, embittered by the luxury of the solitude every 
 thing to enable one to enjoy life, but no life to enjoy. 
 Each afternoon Murdock called in a victoria and ex 
 hibited himself with Viola at his left during an hour s 
 drive, twice round the big lake in the Bois and home 
 again. He was living, or, rather, hiding, at the Hotel 
 Monsigny, behind the Bourse; he chose it because it was 
 frequented by continentals only no Americans, no Eng 
 lish, no one who would take the faintest interest in his 
 movements. 
 
 448 
 
"LOFE IN TIGHT SHOES 9 
 
 For a time the excitement of the fascinating streets 
 and shop windows and shops, the delirium of getting the 
 finery she craved at the world s headquarters for finery , 
 kept up Viola s spirits. But not even Paris and an all 
 but bottomless purse, and a procession of hair dressers, 
 masseuses, manicures, pedicures, skilled time-consumers 
 all, could fill in the whole of the long days and evenings, 
 could for more than a few weeks put off the natural 
 effect of Mur dock s polite reserve and neglect upon her 
 warm and sociable temperament. " It s awful, isn t it? " 
 wailed she to her Lilly, as she was dressing for the daily 
 drive. " Here I might be having such a swell time ! 
 and he, too. ... On the steamer you told me he was 
 acting strange because people we knew were about. I 
 might have known you were wrong, Lilly. Didn t I tell 
 you he was friendliest when they were watching and 
 froze up as soon as we were alone? . . . He s just 
 the kind of man I could be crazy about, but he won t 
 let me. What s the matter with me, anyway? Is there 
 any better-looking woman? What does he want in a, 
 woman ? " 4 
 
 " Lord knows, Miss Vi," said Lilly. She was on her 
 knees, changing Viola s shoes for slippers. " It don t 
 make no difference, seems to me. Jes you quietly go 
 long, takin all you can git your pretty hands on 
 that s my advice. He s usin you as some kind of a 
 blind, but don t you let on. He s a pow ful generous 
 man, but pow ful heady, too. You kin have all the fun 
 when he settles up and goes off." 
 
 " But I don t want him to go ! " cried Viola. And 
 she fell to weeping miserably. " O Lilly ! I love him. I 
 do I do ! He s the only really gentleman I ever knew. 
 That wife of his must have been crazy to let him get 
 away. I want him, and I can t get near him. He s got 
 
 449 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 a way of looking that makes me freeze up on the outside 
 
 and burn like a house afire inside." 
 
 j Lilly went placidly on with unhooking Viola s blouse. 
 | She worked slowly ; for lack of occupation they had b 
 
 e- 
 
 gun the toilet for the drive two hours before Murdock 
 
 i would come. " Now, honey, don t you be a silly. You s 
 
 always fallin in love that way with any feller that s nice 
 
 to you. Us women s so weak. And it ain t the way to 
 
 git on. Give him what he wants, as a sensible woman 
 
 always does. If he wants love, give him love. If he 
 
 wants jes a nice polished time, play you se a lady. Be 
 
 glad when he comes, forgit him when he goes and send 
 
 him the bills. That s the way to treat the men. But 
 
 don t you spoil them lovely eyes with no tears." 
 
 " But I tell you I love him ! " cried Viola, stamping 
 her foot angrily. 
 
 | " Of course yer does, baby, of course yer does," 
 soothed Lilly, patting the soft baby shoulders as she 
 took away the blouse. " And there ain t no harm in 
 that. But love him gay and cheerful-like." She held 
 the dressing sack of chiffon and lace. " Laws, birdie ! 
 Don t take things to heart, as long as the bills is paid. 
 Don t skeer away the first liberal spender yer ever got." 
 Viola began to dry her eyes. 
 
 " Jes think of them stockbroker tight-wads with 
 ? their rolls glued where they ought to begin to peel. 
 I Say nothin and throw the hay into the barn." 
 
 This set Viola off on the subject of her bitter ex 
 periences with " tight-wads." She was so absorbed that 
 an hour took its leaden, yawning self out of the way 
 before she returned to the immediate present. She ex 
 amined herself in the full-length, triple mirrors. 
 
 " Now," she said ruefully, " I do look a sight ! 
 You oughtn t to have let me cry, Lilly. Whatever will 
 
 450 
 
"LOVE IN TIGHT SHOES" 
 
 I do, with my eyes swelled and my cheeks in streaks, 
 and he coming in half an hour." 
 
 She was in corset-cover and petticoat, both much be- 
 flounced with real lace. She turned her eyes from her 
 face to her figure, with the result that her face instantly 
 began to improve. She put her hands behind her head, 
 drawing her thick hair forward upon her slim young 
 shoulders ; she posed herself in attitudes that brought out 
 in succession the different sets of graceful curves that 
 justified her self-admiration. No, there was no denying 
 she had the right to be vain ; besides, her vanity was so 
 simple, so ingenuous, it rather added to her charm. If 
 she lived a hundred years she would remain a child at 
 heart. She seated herself, all smiles and hope again. 
 Lilly resumed dressing her hair, undisturbed and but 
 little delayed by the constant agitations of her head 
 necessitated by her emotions. The hair finished, Lilly 
 produced a wonderful pale-blue carriage coat which had 
 just come from Paquin. It had a broad, white collar and 
 cuffs, and its many buttons were huge and gold. " It s 
 even sweller than I thought," said Viola, her eyes linger 
 ing upon it in loving tenderness. " Now, get out my hat 
 with the long, blue plume the one that stands out. 
 And yes, I ll wear that new white cloth dress the 
 Callot one and " 
 
 So her troubles vanished for the time ; her face be 
 came as smooth and sweet and young as was its wont. 
 When she descended to drive with Murdock she was bub 
 bling and sparkling like a forest spring, and as little 
 suggested care or impurity. 
 
 His formal smile softened at sight of her. For the 
 moment he forgot how monotonous it was behind those 
 limpid, lustrous eyes, sparkling with invitation to im 
 pulses of passion. " You are very charming, very Pa- 
 
 451 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 risienne to-day," said he. And his grave eyes roamed 
 from her plumes down that graceful, gracefully clad fig 
 ure to where her skirts, white over delicate blue, were 
 held high to reveal stockings so diaphanous that they 
 almost seemed an azure tint upon her long, slender calves 
 
 t and ankles. " Very charming," he repeated. 
 
 This sufficed to lift her quite to the dizzy pinnacle 
 
 of delight. Everyone, looking back upon his or her 
 years, recalls habitually some moment or hour or day 
 which shines out of the vistas of the past as the very 
 best. In after years Viola always recalled that drive as 
 her supreme moment, the high tide of youth and joy. 
 The weather was perfect; the Bois was at its gayest. 
 The drives thronged with handsome turn-outs, each bear 
 ing at least one woman dressed in exquisite taste; the 
 walks and woods and lawns filled with happy, well- 
 dressed, well-mannered children and their watchful, lov 
 ing mothers and nurses. And Viola drank it all in, 
 slowly, luxuriously, enjoying each second as if she were 
 a child dreaming of fairies with no cloud upon delight 
 except a faint fear of awakening. " Can t we go round 
 once more? " she pleaded. 
 
 " Twice, if you like," said he. 
 
 And as they were passing D Armenonville he sug 
 gested tea. " If you only would ! " cried she, clasping 
 her hands in ecstasy. As they drove, everyone had been 
 
 1 looking at her. Now that they were seated where her 
 
 beauty of face and form and dress could be surveyed at 
 leisure, both the women and the men of that attractive 
 throng of idlers frankly stared. 
 
 " There must be something wrong with me, that 
 everyone is rubbering so," said she, aifecting great un 
 easiness. 
 
 But her ruse was not successful " It s your beauty 
 452 
 
"LOFE IN TIGHT SHOES" 
 
 and your long, blue feather," replied he absently. 
 Presently he roused himself to say : " In return for what 
 you ve done for me, it s only fair I should do something 
 for you something toward securing your future. . . . 
 iYou re probably not the most provident person in the 
 world are you ? " 
 
 " I never had a chance to find out," confessed she. 
 " It always took everything I could get to keep me 
 afloat." 
 
 " Well, we d better not risk it. No doubt, there s 
 some scamp somewhere whom you think you care for and 
 whom you d give anything he asked." 
 
 " No, indeed," she assured him, her eyes eloquent. 
 " Truly, there s nobody nobody." There was a little 
 catch in her voice as she added shyly, " nobody else." 
 
 He laughed with careless incredulity. " No matter. 
 It seems to me it would be wise to put my investment for 
 you in trust. You will have only the income, but you ll 
 have that always." 
 
 She was so happy that joy seemed to irradiate from 
 her like rays from a star. " You re perfectly right," 
 said she. " I d rather have it that way." Then with 
 an absence of worldliness she would have risked, even 
 had she not known how safe she was, she added: 
 " Though I m sure I ve done nothing for you. . . . You 
 haven t let me. I never saw such a man." 
 
 His face clouded. " I wish I could I wish I could," 
 he said to himself rather than to her. "But I m a 
 damn fool." 
 
 His expression, the outward sign of an emotion be 
 yond the range of any she was capable of feeling or 
 understanding, made her shrink silent into herself, as 
 one draws back from a precipice. Presently he said, 
 " I m off for good to-night." 
 
 453 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW, 
 
 " Aren t you going to take me? " she cried, her voice 
 shrill with alarm. 
 
 He looked at her with a sad gentleness that made her 
 eyes fill. " It s a long and hard journey. I must go 
 alone." 
 
 " I d go anywhere with you," she pleaded wistfully. 
 " Won t you let me care for you? " 
 
 The hardest of the men who play the game of life 
 with human pawns winces when one of the pawns shows 
 that it is hurt, sends a human cry of pain into his very 
 ears ; and Murdock, though relentless, was anything but 
 hard. For the moment he could not satisfy his con 
 science by reminding it that while it was true that Viola 
 was as easily pained as a child it was also true that 
 she recovered and forgot as easily and completely. He 
 winced before her pained, reproachful eyes, before those 
 tears she was too deeply in awe of him to shed. " That 
 sort of thing is out of my life forever," said he, his tone 
 curt and cold, with intent to pique and repel. " To fin 
 ish our arrangements. I took the house for three months. 
 If you wish to keep it you can. I do not insist, but I 
 should like it if you would stay on there at least a month 
 longer alone. And I hope you ll not go back to Amer 
 ica for six months. Can you stand it here? " 
 
 " I d be glad to. If you wish, I ll agree not to see 
 anybody. And I ll keep my word." 
 
 / " Oh, no, I don t ask that. But please try to stay on 
 until the late fall, say and keep away from English and 
 Americans. Go to Biarritz. You ll make very attractive 
 acquaintances there. If you once got into the ways on 
 this side you d like it far better than America. They re 
 more tolerant in their ideas. They don t take life so 
 solemnly and sourly as we do." 
 
 The victoria was at the villa. With most respectful 
 454 
 
"LOVE IN TIGHT SHOES" 
 
 formality he assisted her to alight. " The trap and the 
 horses are yours, of course," said he, lifting hi* hat and 
 extending his hand. 
 
 " Good-by," she responded awkwardly, making him 
 a funny little bow reminiscent of her childhood in the 
 dull prim village from which a " drummer s " tales of the 
 gorgeous gayety of New York had lured her. " Good- 
 by. Thank you." 
 
 She did not cry until she was in the house, with the 
 quaintly carved court door closed behind her by her 
 butler. He watched with sympathy and alarm. Madame 
 was very young and pitiful most pitiful, most forlorn, 
 as she leaned upon the balustrade in tears ; but Evi 
 dently monsieur had at last definitely dismissed her, prob 
 ably without funds The situation was uncertain, the 
 outlook cloudy, and it behooved a prudent servant to 
 prepare for the worst. She entered her boudoir, sobbing. 
 "Hurry, Lil!" she cried. "Help me off with my 
 things before I spoil them. I m going to have hyster 
 ics." And, eased of her finery, she proceeded to have 
 them, Lilly standing by to take care of her when the 
 spasm should be over, but meanwhile holding aloof. 
 
 " Now honey, you feels better, don t you ? " said she, 
 with motherlike tenderness as soon as there was sign of 
 cessation. 
 
 " Cognac, Lil." 
 
 She drank it straight down, turned the emptied crys 
 tal between her fingers and gazed at it reflectively. " Per 
 haps it s just as well. I never did feel at ease with 
 him. I never could. He isn t at all my style." 
 
 " Nothing like good solid comfort, dearie," assented 
 the maid. " There ain t much in love in tight shoes, 
 deed there ain t." 
 
 " I wonder how much he ll leave for me. . . . I ll 
 455 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 cable Jessie to run over. She needs a vacation. . . . Did 
 that hat come from Esther Mayer? " A huge sigh. 
 " I ll cry myself to sleep, many a night." 
 
 " That s the best time, honey. Then it don t do the 
 eyes no harm." - 
 
 A long silence, with Lilly bathing her face. Then : 
 " Still, I could have loved him if he d have let me. I 
 wonder who it is? I felt it the first night I met him." 
 
XXXIV 
 
 SOPHY STARTS AFBESH 
 
 t 
 
 reading the St. Christopher Gazette at 
 his solitary breakfast, frowned as his eyes caught upon 
 this paragraph: 
 
 It is said that the engagement of Mrs. Murdock of the 
 Eyrie and Mr. Melville Blagden will soon be announced. 
 
 He laid aside the paper, ate his breakfast slowly, 
 with long pauses to survey reflectively, between the wide- 
 flung glass doors of the breakfast room, the prospect of 
 perfectly ordered lawns, gardens, hedges, drives, and 
 woods, a prospect vastly improved since he had been in 
 stalled as Mrs. Murdock s general manager, but still far 
 from his exalted ideal. Life was moving delightfully at 
 the Eyrie ; this paragraph, publishing broadcast what : 
 had been merely a local rumor, meant an interruption, a , 
 crisis a rehash throughout the country of the Murdock |. 
 scandal, freshened with a sauce of scandal about Blag- 
 den and the divorced wife. At first blush he had been. , 
 angry and somewhat alarmed. But, as he thought the 
 matter over, he decided that the crisis, which must have 
 come sooner or later, could not have found him better 
 prepared. 
 
 " I ll not be really secure until we are married," 
 said he to himself. " In my devotion to her affairs 
 I mustn t let my own drift. That would be bad, very 
 30 457 
 
OLD WIVES FOB NEW 
 
 bad." He glanced at the servant with eyes that saw 
 surfaces to the minutest detail and noted a flaw as if 
 it were capped with a magnifying glass. The servants 
 at the Eyrie were fairly well trained now, as well 
 trained as could be expected of even an imported 
 menial class out West, where the environment was all 
 against the menial spirit. At Blagden s glance the 
 servant, standing at respectful attention, removed his 
 plate, brought an ash tray, a box of cigarettes and 
 a spirit lamp. " You forgot to brush away the crumbs, 
 James," said Blagden. 
 
 The servant removed the things he had just set 
 down, cleaned the space before Blagden, returned the 
 cigarettes, lamp and tray, and was about to pour the 
 coffee. " You have forgotten your cuffs again," 
 said Blagden. James reddened, retired to the pantry, 
 soon reappeared with cuffs showing at the ends of his 
 coat sleeves. " That s better," approved the manager 
 of the Eyrie. And the coffee was poured. 
 
 Blagden was by nature and by careful education 
 an expert in the art of living fashionably. Perhaps in 
 other surroundings his ability at organization and 
 leadership might have found wider employment 
 though it by no means follows that a man has genius 
 for the large because he shows genius for the little. 
 Large affairs did not interest him; fashionable people, 
 the fashionable mode of life, seemed to him the highest 
 expression of mundane existence. In matters of food 
 and wine and dress, of household economy, luxury and 
 aesthetics, he was an authority. The Eyrie was his first 
 opportunity to give free range to this genius of his; 
 and, though he had been in charge but a few months 
 and had had to combat the most disheartening obsta 
 cles, chiefly arising from the indifference and contempt 
 
 458 
 
SOPHY STARTS AFRESH 
 
 in which such refinements of civilized cultured life were 
 held so far from Europe and direct European influ 
 ence, he had achieved results of which he was not 
 ashamed. 
 
 " I ve been so absorbed in making this place fit for 
 a gentleman to live in," thought he, " that I ve lost 
 sight of the main point." 
 
 Just there his face lighted up with an expression of 
 tenderness and pride. In the doorway was Sophy, 
 habited for a ride Sophy, the real monument to this 
 rare genius of his, genius of a species until recently not 
 highly esteemed. Whenever he looked at her, he 
 swelled with the creator s pride. His labor of trans- 
 forming her, like his labor of transforming the Eyrie, 
 was by no means finished ; but so rapidly and so far had 
 it advanced that one could already see the ultimate 
 woman, as the statue that is to be appears in the mar- : 
 ble soon after the sculptor has begun work. Youth s I 
 springtime he could not conjure back for Sophy; she 
 had neglected herself too long for that. But by in 
 ducing her to walk and to ride, to diet, to keep him 
 company in systematic regular habits, and to interest 
 herself in his work as manager and major-domo and 
 installer of fashion work easily within her range 
 by rousing her desire to please him and by keeping it 
 stimulated in a word, by giving her love and intelli 
 gent loving interest he had lifted her above the life 
 of mere eating and sleeping, had re-created her into a 
 handsome, well-proportioned woman in youth s sum 
 mer, with clear eyes and skin, with solid and shapely 
 flesh, with a carriage that showed pride in her ap 
 pearance, and self-respect. He had made of her an 
 object lesson in the might of regularity and persist 
 ence when inspired by Purpose. 
 
 459 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " Good morning ! " cried she, as he rose. " The 
 horses are waiting." 
 
 " I m ready," said he. Then his glance fell upon 
 the Gazette 9 and his face clouded. 
 
 " What is it ? " she asked, for she watched his fea 
 tures nowadays as a farmer the sky. " Bad news ! " 
 
 " I ll tell you when we get under way." And as the 
 horses were walking side by side along the drive toward 
 the hill road, he said, " The Gazette publishes our en 
 gagement." 
 
 " Isn t that outrageous ! What business is it of 
 theirs?" 
 
 " That means," pursued he, " columns in the Chi 
 cago papers in all the papers. The whole scandal 
 warmed over and doubtless some nasty insinuations 
 about you and me." 
 
 " I don t care." 
 
 " Yes, you do," replied he. " And so do I. Sophy, 
 we must be married at once." 
 
 The horses walked a quarter of a mile before either 
 spoke again. He held his gaze sternly ahead; she 
 glanced at him anxiously from time to time. " You 
 mustn t ask that," she said at last. " I couldn t do it 
 yet. Think how people would talk." 
 
 " True," observed he, coldly. " So, I m going 
 away. And I ll not return until you re ready to 
 marry." 
 
 " Are you angry with me, Melville ? " 
 
 " With myself. I oughtn t have stayed on here. 
 No wonder people talk. I should have had more con 
 sideration for you." 
 
 " You stayed because I wanted you, because I 
 needed you. I simply couldn t have got along without 
 you. You know as well as I do how much you ve done 
 
 460 
 
SOPHY STARTS AFRESH 
 
 for me." She looked at Blagden with a touching and 
 thrilling tenderness in her lovely eyes. " You ve given 
 me something to live for, and have taught me how to 
 live. . . . Melville, you won t go away?" 
 
 " I must. God knows, I m not looking forward to 
 it with pleasure. But there s no alternative. I am 
 causing people to talk about you" 
 
 " I tell you, I don t care. I do as I please." 
 
 " You are going to be my wife. I have plans for 
 you for our future here and in the East, and we 
 mustn t do anything that would interfere." 
 
 She saw that his will was fixed. She was con 
 sciously and proudly dependent upon him as plant 
 upon sun. She was not only eager to please; she 
 feared to offend. " I don t see how we could marry 
 anyways soon," ventured she hesitatingly. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "When?" 
 
 4 To-day this afternoon no, right away and 
 leave for a trip to-night." 
 
 " But the scandal " 
 
 " We re in for it, anyhow. Why not have it all over 
 with? Yes, let s marry this morning. Don t you see 
 that s the sensible thing to do? The engagement has 
 been suspected by everybody here for a month. It has 
 been announced now. Isn t it clear, Sophy, that the 
 sooner it s all over the better? Besides " He gave her 
 a long, eager look, a meaning smile upon his lips, the 
 seriousness of the lover in his eyes. 
 
 She colored. " It does seem sensible," she mur 
 mured. 
 
 Blagden s thus easy victory, like all his victories with 
 her, took him by surprise. His love and awe of her 
 and of her wealth made it impossible for him to appreci- 
 
 461 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 ate how completely under his control she was. Also, 
 his nature had that streak of pessimism so necessary to 
 success ; he always took the gloomy view, saw the reasons 
 why he probably would not get what he wanted long 
 before he saw the brighter prospects. But his surprise 
 did not paralyze action. He laid his hand caressingly 
 upon her arm. " Sophy " he urged tenderly. And his 
 eyes said the rest. 
 
 Her expression was assent. 
 
 He lifted his horse into a canter, hers keeping pace. 
 In the outskirts of the eastern end of Saint X there was 
 a Baptist Church, the parsonage adjoining. The par 
 son s wife called him in from the corn field ; and, without 
 his changing his clothes, or even putting on a coat, the 
 marriage was solemnized a high-stepping hen led her 
 twittering, huddling brood in at the open front door, 
 through the dingy little parlor and out at the back door, 
 just as he read the last lines of the service. He closed 
 the book, put his spectacles in his vest pocket, said with 
 out the smallest intent of humor, " Well, Mrs. Blagden, 
 better luck this time." 
 
 Sophy suddenly felt hysterically gay. She and 
 Blagden looked at each other, laughed outright. And 
 she, shaking hands with the preacher, replied, eyes danc 
 ing, and the look of a girl in them : " Thank you, Mr. 
 Paget, and I think your wish ll come true." 
 
 " Very likely, ma am," replied Paget. " You re old 
 enough to know what you re about this time. Then, too, 
 you ve had experience. I often tell my wife no woman is 
 fit to be a wife till she s been married at least once." 
 
 " How about the man ? " inquired Blagden. 
 
 " Oh, he don t count. Marrying is a woman s busi 
 ness." 
 
 As they rode away, the parson and his wife and his 
 462 
 
SOPHY STARTS AFRESH 
 
 angular old-maid sister in faded pink calico waving 
 from the doorway, Blagden s eyes were dim. " If any 
 one had asked me about it beforehand," said he in a very 
 uncertain voice, " I d have said a wedding in such cir 
 cumstances would be a farce. But I feel now that 
 Sophy, it was just you and I, wasn t it with no pre 
 tense coming between us just you and I, pledging our 
 selves to each other." 
 
 The horses drew together until their flanks touched. 
 Blagden bent toward his wife, kissed her passionately. 
 " I shall do my best to make you happy," he said. " My; 
 best, so help me God ! " 
 
 When they straightened in the saddle again, their 
 cheeks were wet with each other s tears. And each felt 
 that those tears had washed the past clean, that at last 
 they were to have the chance to be and to do what God 
 had intended. 
 
 Joe and Norma happened to come out to lunch that 
 clay ; after lunch, while the two men were in the billiard 
 room, Sophy told her daughter the news. " I don t 
 think," began she, " you ll be much surprised to hear 
 Mr. Blagden and I got married this morning." 
 
 " No," replied Norma, in a tone of quiet sincerity. 
 " I ve been expecting it. ... I m glad." And she em- 
 braced her mother with enthusiasm. 
 
 " I looked at it from all sides," continued Sophy, to 
 impress her daughter that the affair was more practical 
 than romantic. " It seemed the best thing to do." 
 
 " Charley and I talked it over before he went East," 
 said Norma, " and we came to the same conclusion." 
 
 " Your father and I," continued Sophy, encouraged 
 to full confidence, " never were suited to each other. We 
 were mighty fond of each other for a while; I never 
 
 463 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 could be fond of anybody else in just the same way. 
 But it was the kind that flares up and then winks out. 
 I guess it was as much my fault as his. I didn t under 
 stand him at all, and we were both too young to look at 
 things seriously before we d got into the habit of not 
 caring at all for each other. I was bitter against him 
 until this morning. But, as Melville and I were riding 
 home after the ceremony, it came over me what a great 
 favor Murdock had done me without intending it. If 
 I hadn t have met Melville I suppose I d never have 
 realized it." 
 
 " I ve never seen such a change, mother. You re not 
 the same person not at all." 
 
 " I m more like what I used to be, before I fell into 
 the way of not caring what happened. Everybody s got 
 to have somebody to keep them up to the mark, and I 
 had nobody. But that s all over and done now." Sophy 
 gave a sigh of content. 
 
 " Blagden is a very nice fellow," said Norma. " He 
 has a good character and a good heart. He s the sort 
 of man a woman can trust to be kind to her if she gives 
 him half a chance." 
 
 " I was a little afraid you and Charley would turn 
 against him." 
 
 " We want you to be happy. And we believe he ll 
 try to make you happy. ... He hasn t much money 
 of his own, has he? " 
 
 Sophy colored furiously. " What s that got to do 
 with it? " she demanded, ready to bristle. 
 
 " Now, please, mother! Do wait till I finish before 
 you get angry. I was simply going to ask you if you 
 didn t think he ought to be made independent. It seems 
 to me it cuts into a man s self-respect to have to come 
 to a woman for money, and I ve noticed women are worse 
 
 464 
 
SOPHY STARTS AFRESH 
 
 about those things than men. They seem to enjoy mak 
 ing a man come to them, even for pocket money. If I 
 were a poor man I d rather beg in the streets than marry 
 the average rich woman." 
 
 Sophy looked embarrassed. " I d thought of that," 
 said she, " and I d about made up my mind to do some 
 thing of the kind. But . . . There s another side, isn t 
 there? " 
 
 " Well? " encouraged her daughter. 
 
 " We re about of an age, but A woman, espe 
 cially if she s had experience, can t help thinking of these 
 things. You see, being a woman and he a man, I ll get 
 old quite a while before he does probably. I don t want 
 to lose him. If he has plenty of money maybe just 
 when I most need him he ll be neglecting me." 
 
 " That s true," admitted Norma, admiring the vein 
 of shrewdness under her mother s simplicity. " But a 
 woman s got to take her chance it seems to me. He cares 
 for you now. If he began to feel dependent on you in 
 a petty, sordid way he d soon hate you. And wouldn t 
 you rather lose a man altogether than have him playing 
 the hypocrite? Besides, it seems to me, if one acts 
 meanly, does mean things from mean motives, it destroys 
 one s own power of enjoyment. You d soon be miserable 
 suspecting him of hypocrisy and despising him, even 
 though you might cling to him because there wasn t any 
 one else convenient." 
 
 " Then you d advise me to give him part of what 
 I ve got outright? " 
 
 " Outright," was Norma s emphatic answer. " Don t 
 throw away your best chance of happiness, mother. 
 Don t be halfway generous. That s worse than out and 
 out meanness because it s weak and cowardly as well as 
 mean." 
 
 465 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Sophy reflected. " I guess you re right," she finally 
 said. For the first time in their lives she looked at her 
 daughter as if she were both daughter and friend. " You 
 don t think I m mean for harboring such ideas ? " 
 
 "Indeed not!" replied Norma warmly. "That s 
 human nature. And it s only right that in such an im 
 portant matter one should look at all sides especially 
 at the under side for that s the foundation." 
 
 " I got to thinking about how near of an age wci 
 were, and about how much it meant to me to to have 
 him." Sophy s voice was trembling. " And it fright 
 ened me." 
 
 Norma stood behind her mother and kissed her. 
 " Just do what your generous heart prompts you to do, 
 dear," she said. " Then no matter what comes you may 
 be certain it s better than what would have come if you d 
 been small or sordid. Tempt him to be honorable, not 
 dishonorable." 
 
 " I will," declared Sophy. " I ll do it right away. 
 And now I ve made up my mind I can t understand how 
 I could ever have thought of anything else." 
 
 When Joe and Blagden came in, Norma said to 
 Blagden, " Mother has been telling me." She put out 
 both her hands with a friendly smile. " I am so glad 
 glad for both of you." 
 
 " What s this? " cried Joe. " An engagement? " 
 
 "Better than that," answered Norma. "They 
 slipped away quietly this morning and were married. 
 Aren t you going to kiss me, Mr. Blagden? " 
 
 Blagden kissed her. His face was fiery and his hands 
 trembled. " Thank you, Norma, thank you," was all 
 he ventured to try to utter. 
 
 When she and Joe were on the way home, Joe said : 
 " Well ! You certainly did carry that off beautif uUy. 
 
 466 
 
SOPHY STARTS AFRESH 
 
 I shouldn t have thought there was so much diplomacy 
 in you." 
 
 "Diplomacy?" inquired Norma, looking at him in 
 frank surprise. 
 
 " Making the best of it," explained Joe. 
 
 " But you re mistaken," protested Norma. 
 
 " Oh, come now, child. You needn t pretend witli 
 me." 
 
 The expression of Norma s face astonishment, then 
 pa}n, then an effort to hide her pain made him scarlet 
 with confusion and shame. " I take that back," he said 
 humbly. " I judged you by by myself." 
 
 Norma forgot this incident but Joe never did. It 
 was with him the beginning of a new belief in his wife, 
 and through it, of a new view of and belief in human 
 nature. And when a man discards the shallow cynicism 
 of worldliness and begins to believe in his fellow-beings, 
 it chiefly means that he has begun himself to be worthy 
 of confidence. 
 
XXXV 
 
 VIOLA, a bewitching color scheme of violet shades, 
 stepped from her victoria before Rumplemayer s for 
 " just one " of those deadly, delicious babas to find her 
 self directly in the path of Juliet Raeburn and her sister 
 Emma walking in the Rue de Rivoli. " Why, Miss Rae 
 burn ! " exclaimed she breathlessly. " How do you 
 do?" 
 
 The elder Miss Raeburn gave Viola one sweeping, 
 searching, stripping glance, frowned, compressed her 
 prim lips, marched straight on. But Juliet put out her 
 hand with a friendly smile and a " How are you, Viola? 
 How well you re looking ! " 
 
 But that rebuke from militant and celibate respecta 
 bility had brought Viola up standing. Her face burned 
 scarlet. " I beg your pardon," she muttered, eyes down 
 and lips trembling. " I forgot. I was just just glad 
 to see some one from home." 
 
 She moved to pass, but Juliet, who had felt rather 
 than seen her sister s glance, detained her. " You 
 look as if you belonged here," said she, pressing 
 Viola s reluctant hand. " I m glad to see you are 
 happy." 
 
 " Indeed I m not ! " protested Viola. " I m horribly 
 lonesome. How I wish I was back in New York ! But 
 I ve got to stay on for two months longer, and I ve got 
 
 468 
 
THE WILD BIRD S CAGE OPEN 
 
 to keep away from everybody." In her excitement she 
 was unable to stop herself. " It s all very mysterious, 
 isn t it? But then he s such a strange man. Oh, he s 
 been generous to me. But what am I saying? I m so 
 worried about him. I I " 
 
 Juliet s eyelids fluttered. " Is he ill? " 
 
 " No at least, I don t know." Impulsively : 
 " Won t you let me come to see you ? I m dying to speak 
 to somebody about it. I ll come quite quietly no one 
 shall know. Do let me come to-morrow morning, Miss 
 Kaeburn. I mustn t stand here talking to you. Some 
 one might see." 
 
 A look of pain came into Juliet s eyes. It seemed to 
 her melancholy enough that a woman should be thus 
 a pariah, when men, and women, far worse because hypo 
 critical, were accepted, were respected ; but the crowning 
 tragedy was that Viola could thus recognize her po 
 sition, yet live on and dress herself deliberately to attract 
 attention. " Certainly," Juliet said. " Come to-morrow 
 at twelve. You and I will lunch together in my apart 
 ment." 
 
 " Oh, thank you, thank you," cried the girl, her eyes 
 swimming. " You were going in Rumplemayer s. Yes, 
 I m sure you were. I ll go somewhere else." And she 
 darted to the curb and signaled her coachman. 
 
 Juliet, rejoining her sister, said in response to a 
 severe look : " She used to work with us. Such a sweet 
 girl, so good-natured. I am fond of her." 
 
 " You might have more regard for me than to notice 
 her in the public street." 
 
 " I m sorry you feel doubtful about your reputa 
 tion." 
 
 " I wasn t thinking of my reputation," retorted 
 Emma. 
 
 469 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " Oh of mine? " Juliet elevated her eyebrows. 
 " What people think of me never did interest me. That 
 sort of reputation isn t a business asset with a woman 
 in my line, any more than it is with a man in any; 
 line. So I haven t even business reasons for keeping up 
 appearances." 
 
 " But respectable people " 
 
 " Dear, dear Emma," cried Juliet, " what have /i 
 to do with respectable people? I m not respectable. 
 Being independent I do as I please." 
 
 " I observe you please to do respectably." 
 
 " An accident, not a virtue," was Juliet s reply, with 
 a look deliberately intended to jar upon her sister s sensi 
 bilities a look like a challenge from a harem lattice. 
 " As for Viola Hastings " 
 
 "Was that Viola Hastings?" Emma Raeburn 
 stopped short in the street, transfixed with horror. " Vi 
 ola Hastings! The woman that terrible Murdock is 
 flaunting in everybody s face. I read about it. It was 
 most scandalous. I think every respect every virtuous 
 woman should have rallied to the support of his poor, 
 unfortunate wife." 
 
 " The Herald this morning says she s about to 
 marry a Mr. Blagden who was Mr. Murdock s private 
 secretary." 
 
 " Naturally, she wished to get rid of his name as 
 quickly as possible. . . . To his former secretary, you 
 say? . . . Well, at least she s having the decency to 
 marry" 
 
 Juliet laughed scornfully. For the past few minutes 
 her face had had more than its wonted pallor of the olive 
 skin. " To marry ! To marry ! And that makes every 
 thing all right. If Viola had played her cards more 
 craftily, had married one of her men for his money, had 
 
 470 
 
THE WILD BIRD S CAGE OPEN 
 
 hired herself permanently to the same appetite, it would 
 have been most respectable, most proper." 
 
 "Juliet! How can you, even in jest and to tease 
 me, defend such creatures ! " 
 
 " Defend ? I ? I m not defending her, but neither 
 am I attacking her. She s just the average woman, 
 selling herself because she s too lazy to work. She has 
 a better excuse than most of them because her beauty 
 brought temptations too strong for a far stronger char 
 acter than God saw fit to give her." 
 
 " I wish you would keep your views to yourself ! " 
 
 " I do, except when they are demanded," Juliet an 
 swered. Then contritely : " Don t mind me, Emmy 
 dear. I m all upset. My nerves seem suddenly to have 
 gone to pieces." 
 
 Usually she was patient with Emma s foibles ; but, 
 in the mood into which Viola s mysterious and disquiet 
 ing hints about Murdock had precipitated her, she could 
 not listen in her wonted good-natured silence. It rasped 
 upon her, this rancour of the homely old maid against 
 the woman who attracted more than one man when 
 there were obviously and cruelly not enough men to go 
 round; this fury against the woman who gave herself 
 for less than the standard market price, her keep for 
 life. Virtue was the one string to Emma s harp. She 
 had always twanged on it; latterly this twanging had 
 become a mania. As with all celibates, the cardinal 
 temptation, the cardinal sin, was that joy of life of which 
 she was deprived. Normal people have many interests, 
 the celibate but one; so it dogs his or her days and 
 debauches his or her nights. 
 
 Emma could not take the hint and drop the danger 
 ous subject. She liked to talk it because her mind was 
 always revolving it; she had satisfactory self -excuse for 
 
 471 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 talking it in her duty to her young sister, a genius 
 and therefore irresponsible. Juliet led the most in 
 offensive of lives, a life of monotonous regularity, like 
 inmate of convent or penitentiary, or one of the myriad! 
 wage slaves who, unconscious of their slavery, live by] 
 the clocks and whistles of their masters. This did not 
 convince Emma. She could not quiet the fears aroused 
 by Juliet s ardent, adventurous eyes, by the defiant curve 
 of her mouth, by the free movements of her slender, 
 supple body. No opportunity must be missed for min 
 istering to Juliet, for trying to trim her nearer the 
 social pattern for the proper, respectable human being. 
 Accordingly, after a brief silence, Emma resumed her 
 nagging. " To think," said she, " that you spoke 
 friendlily to the woman who seduced Murdock from his 
 duty." " 
 
 Juliet s eyes flashed. " He was driven, not seduced," 
 she retorted. 
 
 "Driven!" 
 
 " By his wife." 
 
 "Juliet!" 
 
 " I know what I m talking about, Emma," cried 
 Juliet, angered the more by her sister s scandalized tone. 
 " His wife didn t care enough about him to try to hold 
 him, didn t even care enough about herself to keep from 
 becoming a fat frump. No, I shouldn t say that. I ve 
 no right to judge her. I believe she s a good woman, as 
 women go. She s simply one more victim of the curse 
 of woman s traditional training." 
 
 " That is," Emma said in high dudgeon, " she de 
 voted herself to her home and her children." 
 
 " Fudge ! Fudge ! " cried Juliet impatiently. " Don t 
 I work harder than any woman who keeps house, even 
 without servants? Yet I m not letting myself go to 
 
 472 
 
THE WILD BIRD S CAGE OPEN 
 
 pieces, mentally and physically. Don t you manage a 
 house all our personal affairs, and try to manage me? 
 Yet you contrive to be intelligent and well dressed and 
 orderly. As for children, please don t repeat to me the 
 feminine cant about the agony of having them and the 
 wear and tear of bringing them up; there are no men 
 present, so we can be quite honest. We know that the 
 woman who goes about bearing and training children 
 intelligently has no great amount of trouble." 
 
 " You talk like a traitor to your own sex. If women 
 would stand together 
 
 " The men are on speaking terms with Viola," was 
 Juliet s disconcerting interruption. " Isn t it the women 
 that trample her? And you know very well, Emma, 
 you d merely shake your head reprovingly at a man 
 of her sort and say, Naughty, naughty, without really 
 meaning it." 
 
 " I wouldn t notice Murdock any more than if he 
 were the dirt under my feet," cried Emma, all aquiver 
 with fury. " And I know you wouldn t either. At heart 
 you are a good woman." 
 
 Juliet could not repress the longing that surged up 
 within her the longing to ease her heart of its secret 
 and to confound her sister. " At heart, I am just a 
 woman," she said, and there was in her calm an energy 
 that terrified Emma. "Notice him? Why, I love 
 him!" 
 
 Again Emma stopped short on the crowded sidewalk 
 and stared at her beautiful sister, heedless of the amused 
 spectators. " You don t even know the man ! " 
 
 " Know him? " Juliet laughed strangely. " Then 
 
 no human being ever knew another. And in spite of the 
 
 way he has acted with Viola, I love him, I d serve him 
 
 like a dog its master. It s shameful that I have no 
 
 81 473 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 pride. I ought to despise him. Instead, I only love 
 him the more, and despise myself for being so weak, 
 so womanish, that in the bottom of my heart I don t 
 blame him. A woman feels that she belongs to the man 
 she loves, but she doesn t feel that he belongs to her 
 though she d like to." 
 
 Emma, looking as if she were about to faint, signaled 
 a cab. " Au Bois," she said or, rather, gasped, to the 
 driver as they seated themselves. At last at last ! She 
 had always felt it in her bones that Juliet would sooner 
 or later listen to the whisperings of the flibbertigibbet, 
 the same imp that had teased her in her own youth to 
 revolt from the docile, rooted fate of our cousins of the 
 vegetable kingdom. No real temptation from without 
 reenforcing those bad, sweet plaguings, she had tri 
 umphed over them ; and the stronger the nature the more 
 firmly it conforms, once it has been shaped to the mold 
 and cooled there. But Juliet At last at last ! The 
 wild bird s cage was open! She did not feel equal to 
 speech until they had passed the Arch. Then she said: 
 
 " And I have seen nothing of this suspected noth- 
 ing!" 
 
 "Why should you?" replied Juliet wearily. "Do 
 you suppose I ve been wrestling with the world since I 
 was seventeen, without learning to hide my heart and 
 smooth my front, and smile? What if everything did 
 go smash with me? Still, life had to be lived. Thank 
 God, I had my work to turn to! Ladies and gentle 
 men, with nothing to do but think about their souls, 
 can afford the luxuries of broken lives and despairs and 
 such interesting tragic playthings. But not we working 
 people." 
 
 " He is a greater scoundrel than I thought ! " ex 
 claimed Emma. " He has betrayed two good women." 
 
 4.74 
 
THE WILD BIRD S CAGE OPEN 
 
 Juliet glanced inquiringly at her sister; as the full 
 ness of Emma s inconsistency came over her she laughed. 
 
 " And you can laugh ! " cried Emma tragically. 
 
 " Why not ? A heartache doesn t suspend the sense 
 of humor. And your morals are very funny, Emmy." 
 
 " Evidently you care nothing for him. You were 
 simply vexing me." 
 
 " As you please. Let s talk no more about it." 
 
 " I should think not! It s no fit subject for respec 
 table women. Such low people " 
 
 " No more. Please no more," said Juliet. " If I 
 keep on thinking about it I shall go quite mad." 
 
 Emma was silenced by the expression of her eyes and 
 mouth. Emma s heart swelled with sympathy ; but she 
 did not venture to show it. " She d think I was pitying 
 her," she said to herself. " Besides, sympathy would en 
 courage her." 
 
XXXVI 
 
 VIOLA GIVES THE CLEW 
 
 WHEN Viola entered the Raeburn sisters apart 
 ment at noon the next day, she was dressed quietly, for 
 Viola a toque, a dark-blue walking dress, a silver-fox 
 collar and muff, no jewels but a beauty box, a chain of 
 amethysts and two marquise rings, one on either hand. 
 Juliet received her with burning cheeks and lowered eyes. 
 46 Really, no one knows," Viola hastened to explain, know 
 ing nothing that could enlighten her as to the true 
 reason. " Really, Miss Raeburn, I m only going to 
 bother you a few minutes. I understand." 
 
 " Viola," said Juliet, " you mustn t say those things 
 to me." 
 
 " Oh, but I saw how you felt. And I don t blame 
 
 you. I know my class." She tossed her head and tried! 
 
 to look as unconcerned before Juliet as she would before 
 
 anyone else. " It s quite good enough for me. It takes 
 
 , all kinds to make a world." 
 
 "You misunderstood," said Juliet earnestly, 
 can t tell you why, but I ought to be apologizing to 
 you. And you must not talk to me about Mr. Mur- 
 dock." 
 
 Viola was amazed. " How did you know that? Do 
 you know him? Have you seen him? Did he tell you 
 he warned me, before he went away, that I mustn t see 
 any Americans or English? " 
 
 476 
 
VIOLA GIVES THE CLEW 
 
 66 No, I haven t seen him. But you mustn t talk 
 about him." 
 
 " Why, that s what I came for ! I can t sleep or eat 
 or anything for fretting about him." She began to cry. 
 Her grief and her account of her sufferings would have 
 been more impressive had she not been obviously in that 
 perfect physical condition which results only from sound 
 sleep and a good appetite. 
 
 " He will probably come back, when he can," said 
 Juliet. " He wouldn t have taken you from America 
 with him if he hadn t wanted you." 
 
 " Wanted me ! Why, he hasn t even kissed me but 
 once. That was the first day the day I met him at 
 the station. I got a telegram from him. I went there, 
 and he made a scene before everybody. And I thought 
 things were going to be with him and me as they were 
 before " 
 
 Juliet checked her with a sharp : " You mustn t, 
 {Viola. I don t wish to hear. I don t wish to know." 
 
 Viola was puzzled and amused. " Why, everybody 
 knows," cried she. " So what s the difference? . . . 
 Anyhow, he took me away from the station and treated 
 me You d have thought I was the wife he was getting 
 a divorce from. Then he brought me over here, and 
 kept away from me, and left me after a month less than 
 a month. Lilly that s my maid could tell you just 
 when. I never remember dates. And " she burst out 
 crying " Oh, I m so lonely, and I do love him so ! 
 He gave me all the money I wanted, and everything." 
 She stopped crying as abruptly as she had begun, and 
 was smiling. " It s too funny." 
 
 Juliet was pale and rigid, her hands clasped in her 
 lap. But Viola did not see; her glance, errant as her 
 butterfly thoughts, had lighted upon Juliet s dress. 
 
 477 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 u What a beautiful, sweet matinee you ve got on. I see 
 it s from Callot. I know all the models now. Do you 
 like Callot? I prefer Le Ferriere this season though, 
 when it comes to wraps, none of them has the the swell- 
 ness of Paquin. . . . But, I was saying, it s very funny 
 about him and me. Even when he and I first first 
 got well acquainted, do you know, it was so queer, he 
 always gave me the feeling that he was imagining I was 
 some other woman. Oh, but he s strange ! " 
 
 Juliet s eyes were brilliant; her color had returned. 
 
 " Men are funny, anyhow," continued Viola. 
 " They re full of all kinds of crazy notions. They re 
 never sensible where women are concerned. And it irri 
 tates them to find out how practical we women are. A 
 woman has to pretend not to be human with them. The 
 crazier she acts the better they like it. I ve learned just 
 to keep my mouth shut and look ; then they think they 
 see it all in my eyes." 
 
 Breakfast was announced. Viola protested; Juliet 
 insisted ; Viola yielded. As she ate and drank her spirits 
 grew lighter and lighter. " You don t know how lone 
 some I ve been. But my time s nearly up. He said six 
 months; so I can sail two weeks from Wednesday. I 
 promised him to stay, and I ve kept my word. I ll find 
 Jessie in a convent. She always was religious, but I 
 never thought it d be so serious with her while her looks 
 lasted. It just shows you how you never can tell what s 
 going on in people s heads. I guess she loved that 
 horrible Tom Berkeley. Did you know him ? No ? You 
 may be glad you didn t. He was very different from 
 Mr. Murdock. . . . That s another funny thing. I 
 always always called him Mr. Murdock yes, indeed 
 always." And she nodded and smiled roguishly at 
 Juliet over the rim of her glass of red wine. " Did you 
 
 *78 
 
VIOLA GIVES THE CLEW 
 
 ever hear anything so funny? Do you wonder I used 
 to get to thinking about him until I d be all worked up, 
 and then, as soon as I d see him it d be like like cold 
 storage. Fancy ! " 
 
 " You say he has gone? " 
 
 " Gone! " Viola felt that it was the stage, the ro 
 mantic drama, in real life, herself the heroine. Play 
 acting " make believe " as the children call it is our 
 chief business all our lives. There is the conscious, stud 
 ied playing of various roles for various advantages 
 among the educated classes ; with them the natural theat 
 rical, imitative instinct has been developed by the read 
 ing of literature which accepts as genuine and accentu 
 ates as admirable the struttings and posings of mere 
 mortals. And among the educated, " make believe " is 
 carried on with never a grin, like their other solemn 
 frauds of manners and dress and conventionality. But 
 among the simpler beings, those unspoiled by carefully 
 intrained pose and pretense, the staginess is less serious. 
 Viola put on a tragic face and got ready for her 
 " turn " ; but she had a sensible eye, alert for signs that 
 Juliet was not impressed. And the signs were obvious. 
 * Yes, gone," she said, lapsing briskly into " every 
 day." " And while he did the handsome thing by me 
 I m afraid something has happened to him. I don t 
 see his name in the Herald as having arrived anywhere. 
 Do you think anything dreadful could have happened 
 to him?" 
 
 " No," replied Juliet, giving her an assurance that 
 far from satisfied herself. " If anything had happened, 
 then his bankers whoever communicates with him 
 and he would have to keep in touch with somebody, 
 wouldn t he ? they d have begun an open search." 
 
 The good sense of this moved Viola to admiration. 
 479 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " What an advantage it is to have brains ! Now, if I 
 had thought of that I d have saved myself many a sleep 
 less that is, a good deal of worry. You see, having 
 nothing much to do, I ve thought about him." 
 
 "How long has it been?" 
 
 " He left me early in June no, late in May He 
 just lifted his hat at the door he never once was even 
 inside the house, though it s a perfect dream a 
 beauty " 
 
 " And didn t say where he was going ? " 
 
 " Just lifted his hat and shook hands and said 
 good-by, as if I were some fashionable lady friend he d 
 been calling on. He was using me for some purpose, 
 and he was done. That s my opinion." 
 
 Juliet was gazing past Viola, her eyes wide and 
 strange. Viola stared. " Why, what s the matter, 
 Miss Raeburn ! " she exclaimed. 
 
 " Nothing nothing," said Juliet slowly and with 
 difficulty returning to her surroundings. " You say 
 you ve been to all the shops. I wonder what you saw 
 that I overlooked." And they plunged into discussion 
 of fall styles, winter styles, hats, dresses, wraps, furs. 
 Viola talked well, so well that Juliet presently inter 
 rupted with, " It s a shame your talent shouldn t be 
 used. Why don t you settle down and go into busi 
 ness?" 
 
 Viola instantly became uneasy; her self-conscious 
 ness had returned^ the memory of what she was. " Oh 
 you know. I m out of it ." 
 
 " Do you like what you re doing ? " 
 
 " I do and I don t. Now that Tie has given me 
 an income I didn t tell you about that. He told 
 roe Fd done him a great service, though I can t see 
 it, and he said he owed it to me. Anyhow, I ve got 
 
 480 
 
VIOLA GIVES THE CLEW 
 
 it. It s where I can t blow it in. I ll not have to 
 worry any more, or put up with with things I don t 
 like." 
 
 " Did you ever think you d like to have a home and 
 a baby?" j 
 
 " Never ! " exclaimed Viola. " No, I was born to 
 be free, and to roam about. I hate to be respectable 
 church, Sunday school, prayer meeting, not go out af 
 ter supper O Lord! it gives me the horrors to 
 think of Sunday at our house I had to be all that 
 till I was sixteen. Then I scooted! ... If it wasn t 
 for getting old " Viola shivered, but it was a sum 
 mer shiver at thought of winter. " Still, that s a long 
 ways off yet. Please don t preach ! " 
 
 " I wasn t going to preach." 
 
 " But you are preaching. It s in your eyes." 
 
 " No, no," Juliet protested. " I d like to, but some 
 how the things that are usually said on such occasions 
 seem not to fit." 
 
 "That s it they don t fit. I m happy. Why 
 should I change? I don t hanker after respectability. 
 I ve got no brains for anything useful " 
 
 " I could make a place for you a good place." 
 
 " You wouldn t have me about." 
 
 " Indeed I would." 
 
 " But you know what kind I am." 
 
 " Business people don t bother about those things in 
 business." 
 
 When Viola rose to go she returned to the subject* 
 and her manner showed that it was attracting her. 
 " About your offer," said she shyly : " If you had me 
 around, respectable people would shun Dangerfield s." 
 
 " I m assuming you d have enough regard for me to 
 cause no scandal." 
 
 481 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 " You d reaUy have me? " 
 
 " I want you. I need you," replied the head of Dan- 
 gerfield s. " I d agree to make you chief foreign buyer 
 if you d agree not to to set the rest of us a bad 
 example." 
 
 " You d really have me ? " 
 
 " Really. If you ever get tired of your present 
 line, come round and talk it over. You d live over here 
 iHost of the year." 
 
 Viola looked at her wistfully. " If I only had a tiny 
 spark of the lady in me or of longing to be a lady. But 
 I haven t. I m a born what the men call me when I 
 make them angry." 
 
 " Don t take yourself so seriously," advised Juliet. 
 " You ll come out all right. You ll sow your wild oats 
 get even for those dreary Sundays after a while, 
 and want to do something permanently interesting. 
 Then " 
 
 " I wonder," mused Viola. " You make me think 
 I m not such a fool, after all." She blushed, said with 
 humble hesitation, " Would you mind if I kissed you? " 
 
 " I d like it ! " exclaimed Juliet, and proceeded to 
 kiss her heartily. " Good luck ! I believe I could fit you 
 out with a job that would interest you more than any 
 thing- you ever did in your life." 
 
 " I may astonish you by turning up." 
 
 A safe quarter of an hour after Viola left, Emma 
 came into the salon, first taking a thorough precaution 
 ary look round. " The man said she had gone." She 
 sniffed the air and made a wry face. 
 
 " What hypocrisy ! " said Juliet impatiently. " She 
 uses the same perfume I do." 
 
 " But it smells different on her." 
 
 Juliet went into her dressing room, returned with 
 482 
 
VIOLA GIVES THE CLEW 
 
 hat and gloves. " I m going out," she said. " I may 
 not be back until late." 
 
 "Wither?" 
 
 Juliet gave a queer laugh. " Worse than that 
 much worse." 
 
 Her expression was so strange that Emma went into 
 a panic. " I know you will do nothing unwomanly," 
 said she, her agitation betraying that the words, as those 
 words usually do, meant precisely the reverse. 
 
 " Nothing unwomanly, I assure you." 
 
 Juliet s accent upon the unwomanly confirmed her 
 sister in dread. " Juliet, I do not trust you I " she cried. 
 " No woman is to be trusted where a man is concerned, 
 and no man where a woman is concerned." 
 
 " I should hope not. What a dull world it would 
 be, if it weren t so and how little you d have to inter 
 est you." 
 
 With that she departed, leaving deepening anxiety 
 behind her. For the longer Emma revolved Juliet s 
 astounding confession about Murdock the more con 
 vinced she was that the long-dreaded crisis had come 
 the crisis she had been expecting ever since Juliet at 
 fifteen suddenly transformed from an awkward, not es 
 pecially pretty though unusual chatterbox of a girl 
 into a beautiful woman, willful, whimsical, impatient of 
 restraint and monotony, contemptuous of conventionali 
 ties which are law and testament to most human beings. 
 iA woman no man could look at unmoved was certain 
 some day to meet the man who would move her. Then 
 what? " He will certainly be an improper person," 
 Emma had always thought. " Good, sober, regular men 
 do not attract her. She imagines she thinks them either 
 hypocrites, suppressing their natural selves, or cowards 
 who dare not be what they long to be. She has utterly 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 false and perverted notions of human nature. She is 
 absolutely irresponsible. A wild bird " Emma wrung 
 her hands " and the cage door is open at last." 
 
 At her bankers, Juliet got a list of all the banks in 
 Paris that did direct business with America. She went 
 to each, and said to the mail clerk : " I wish to leave a 
 letter here for Mr. Murdock." As she said it she watched 
 the clerk s face narrowly. But at none of the banks did 
 he give any indication of knowledge of Murdock. She 
 was certain that if any of them were in the habit of 
 receiving mail for him she would have seen it. Discour 
 aged, she returned to her own bank to ask the clerk 
 there whether he had not omitted some one banker. As 
 her cab reached the curb a cab ahead was just driv 
 ing away; something in the air of the occupant made 
 her look again. It was Simcox. 
 
 " Follow that fiacre," said she to her cabman, " and 
 don t lose sight of it. A louis beside your fare." 
 
 " Parfaitement, madame. He shall not escape." 
 
xxxvn 
 
 "DO YOU NO LONGER CAEE? " 
 
 &FTER that farewell drive with Viola, Murdock, 
 returning to his hotel, told Simcox to pack certain of 
 his belongings into a small box and a bag, both new and 
 unmarked. " Send the rest to storage. I m going away 
 to-night. Here is a check. That will give you a chance 
 to look about." 
 
 " Very well, sir," said Simcox. His wrinkled leath 
 ery countenance expressed normally the last degree of 
 funereal despair ; so the only changes to which it could 
 respond were toward a lightening of the gloom. As this 
 was not an occasion for such a change he remained appar 
 ently impassive. 
 
 " Here is the check," repeated Murdock, holding it 
 out. 
 
 " Yes, sir." But Simcox made no move to take it. 
 
 " What s the matter? " asked Murdock impatiently. 
 Any trifle would now set the hot bubbles of causeless 
 anger to boiling in his blood. 
 
 " I m dazed, sir taken aback like. I was trying to 
 think." 
 
 Murdock put the check on the table in the center of 
 the room, seated himself at the desk and resumed tearing 
 up letters and papers. 
 
 " Beg pardon, sir," interrupted Simeon s respectful 
 voice. 
 
 485 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 Murdock frowned, turned abruptly. " What! Still 
 standing there ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir. I ve been thinking." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " I haven t got anybody but you, sir, and you ve got 
 to have somebody to take care of you. I ll never forget 
 what a state you was in when I first came to you. And 
 I don t want to go back to my drinking, Mr. Mur 
 dock. But I surely will if I get lonesome again. It s 
 lonesomeness that leads to drink." 
 
 Murdock reddened ; he had been drinking heavily of 
 late, because it benumbed his nerves. " I don t know 
 just what I m going to do with myself, Simcox," said 
 he. " You wouldn t care to knock about as I probably 
 shall." 
 
 " One place is just the same as another to me, sir. 
 I m like a dog all I want is my master and my meals." 
 
 Murdock averted his face abruptly. So there was 
 somebody in the world who cared for him somebody 
 who put him first. The irony of it ! He, envied prob 
 ably by those who were taking advantage of his silence 
 and absence to denounce him he, with so much that the 
 world most esteems he, ever more and more solitary and 
 lonely, as his wealth and his power grew he, now with 
 but one friend left, and that one a dependent, a valet, 
 without ambition enough to be disloyal and scheme to 
 use his master for his own advancement. He turned in 
 his chair and surveyed the ungainly, common figure and 
 face. As he looked, his eyes softened to the blue gray 
 that changed the whole character of his features, took 
 away relentlessness and hardness, and reflected the best 
 of his generous, human heart. In the whole world, how 
 many of those living and dying, fancying they were 
 surrounded by friends how many could, if the real test 
 
 486 
 
"DO YOU NO LONGER CARE?" 
 
 came, show one single human friend as faithful as the 
 meanest dog would be as a matter of course? " Why, 
 I m rich ! " said Murdock to himself, gazing at the 
 stooped, slouching figure of Simcox. " Rich ! I ve got 
 a real friend ! " 
 
 " There ain t no reason why you should cast me 
 adrift, is there now ? " urged Simcox, funereal and 
 monotonous. 
 
 " Stay if you like," said Murdock gruffly. 
 
 Their eyes met for an instant, and each understood 
 the other. " Thank you, sir," said Simcox. He tore 
 up the check without having looked at it, and went 
 about his duties. 
 
 That was indeed a nomad summer. Murdock s life, 
 with all its purposes and activities blighted, had become 
 a desert ; and he was lost in it, was using his tremendona 
 energy in furious, futile efforts to escape. The ever- 
 increasing crowd of human beings who roam restlessly 
 up and down the earth and to and fro therein contains 
 not a few of these lost ones. They stand out, distinct 
 as Wandering Jew in caravan of Christian pilgrims, 
 from those seeking knowledge or satisfying curiosity or 
 trying to stifle boredom s yawns. They are the men and 
 women who have lost caste or reputation or love or hope,, 
 yet for one reason or another do not put the sure quietus 
 upon their torment ; they fly from place to place, in their 
 eyes the look of the damned in hell ; they hasten, pause, 
 hasten on again, rush forward, wheel, and rapidly re 
 trace their steps. They drink and suddenly abandon 
 drink; they gamble madly, then fly from the tables to 
 return no more ; they wind in and out of concourses for 
 pleasure ; they rush eagerly into sensuality, only to quit 
 the glittering banquet table, impelled by sudden nausea. 
 And all the while, their torment utters no word or ges- 
 
 487 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 m~-^^^^^^mm^mu~* i *-^^m~^^*^^^mm*~mmmim m , ^^ 
 
 ture ; for the real tragedies are dumb, having no long 
 ing to attract the sympathy or pity for which outward 
 signs of woe are the signals. Life has ceased to be a 
 theatrical performance, has become a horrible reality. 
 The hours cease to fly, the years to revolve ; eternity be 
 comes a present fact, and each moment gives the pendu 
 lum ample time to swing through an infinite arc. 
 
 " What day is it? "What time is it? "these were 
 the questions that made up most of Murdock s conver 
 sation with Simcox. And he always heard Simcox s an 
 swer with the same stern frown. In August, he turned 
 back from the wilds of the Balkans to speed across 
 Europe in automobile; travel in any other way had 
 become monotonously tedious. He embarked at Liver 
 pool, still under an assumed name, but got off at Queens- 
 town and dashed back across Ireland and England to 
 the Continent. He lay in a drunken stupor many days 
 at the Bristol in Vienna, roused himself, fled to Switzer 
 land, recklessly ascended several dangerous peaks ; with 
 a sprained ankle, which his restlessness would not per 
 mit to heal, he had himself motored down through France 
 to the Pyrenees, to Madrid, to Gibraltar, back again, 
 going night and day, to Paris ; and there, in late Sep 
 tember, he hid in an apartment in the Boulevard St. 
 Germain, sinking down in a torpor. 
 
 Through all those wanderings and hardships he suf 
 fered little physical change. The same force that was 
 benumbing his mind seemed to preserve his body intact. 
 His strong, rather grim but distinctly youthful face, 
 bronzed by exposure, showed no traces of what was 
 going on within, except in the eyes ; they seemed to burn, 
 as if he had a high fever and were on the verge of de 
 lirium. Simcox brought him the mail every steamer day 
 great bundles of it, and cablegrams. But he simply 
 
 488 
 
"DO YOU NO LONGER CARE?" 
 
 glanced at the envelopes or at the code messages, with 
 no desire to penetrate further ; it was news from a world 
 which he no longer inhabited and which no longer inter 
 ested him. Simcox put before him a photograph of 
 Norma s boy. He stared at it, let it fall to the floor, 
 forgot it. 
 
 " Seems like he can t neither die nor live," said the 
 valet. And he gave many an hour to revolving plans 
 without getting anywhere for his master s cure. As 
 he drove away from the one bank at which Juliet had not 
 thought to inquire her own he saw her following. 
 But he did not change his order to the coachman. The 
 two cabs crossed the Pont Alexandre III, one close be 
 hind the other, Juliet taking care to keep the coach 
 man s broad, sedentary back between her and Sim- 
 cox s range of vision. Simcox descended at Murdock s 
 apartment, sent away his cab; with the big bag of 
 mail beside him on the curb he waited for Juliet to 
 drive up. She looked disconcerted, but his expression 
 reassured her. When she was facing him on the side 
 walk he touched his hat and said, " Do you wish to see 
 him, ma am? " 
 
 " Yes, Simcox." 
 
 " Very well, ma am. I ll take you to him." 
 
 They entered the house, ascended to the second floor. 
 He opened one of the great double doors of Murdock s 
 apartment, motioned her into a seat in the hall. " Wait 
 here," said he. After about ten minutes he returned, 
 explaining : " He don t know anybody s come. He s sit 
 ting in the salon, there." 
 
 She silently put out her hand. Simcox touched it 
 
 respectfully. " God bless you, ma am," he mannured. 
 
 She drew aside the curtain just enough to permit her 
 
 to enter. The lofty room, all white and giM aad niir- 
 
 32 489 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 rored, was in twilight; a wood fire blazed cheerfully 
 in the far corner. Before it, staring at the quiet, 
 softly brilliant flames, sat Murdock, a cigar between 
 the fingers of one hand that hung listlessly over the 
 arm of the chair. 
 
 " Murdock ! " she said gently. 
 
 The figure did not move. 
 
 " Murdock," she repeated in the same soft under 
 tone. 
 
 Still no movement. She advanced toward him; the 
 frou frou of her skirts, though faint, sounded very dis 
 tinct in that stillness. She had bared her hand; she 
 just rested the tips of her fingers upon his thick, crisp 
 hair. He stirred uneasily. She went round, stood 
 before him, one side of her in the semidarkness ; the 
 other in the rich golden light of the blaze. Very sweet 
 and slender and alluring she looked; and her small, 
 oval face, with its halo of waving pompadour crowned 
 by a hat as graceful as a cloud line, irradiated the love 
 and longing that beat in every pulse of her blood. His 
 gaze slowly traveled up her figure until it met hers. 
 At first he seemed not to see, then not to believe his 
 sight. Then there leaped into his eyes such a look 
 that she cried out with joy "Ah! Murdock! Mur 
 dock!" 
 
 He rose; but, instead of advancing toward her, he 
 stood with the great chair between them. He looked 
 cold and calm now. He bowed slightly. " You are 
 lingering in Paris late this year," he said in formal 
 tones. 
 
 She was thrust back, confused for the moment. She 
 showed it by saying, formal as he, " I always stay late, 
 because the best models aren t shown until the dress 
 makers and the tourists have left." 
 
 490 
 
"DO YOU NO LONGER CARE?" 
 
 He moved toward the bell r,ope. " Perhaps you 
 will have tea." 
 
 " Thanks," she murmured. She felt as if she were 
 facing an utter stranger ; and beforehand she had 
 thought there might possibly be any kind of barrier 
 between them except one of ice. He arranged a chair 
 at the fire for her. Simcox came with the tea, drew a 
 small table to her side, set the tray upon it, departed. 
 
 " How will you have yours ? " she asked. 
 
 " As it may happen strong or weak it does not 
 matter." 
 
 He took the cup, set it on the tobacco stand at his 
 elbow. She had been warm ; she now felt as if she were 
 about to have a chill a nervous chill. She could think 
 of nothing to say; there seemed to be nothing to say. 
 And he sat there, rigid, his face unrelaxing ; he not only 
 did not speak, but also froze her from power to speak. 
 Yet speak she must. " We my sister and I are 
 sailing next week." 
 
 " Yes ? " he said politely, and his eyes rested coldly 
 on her for an instant. 
 
 " You are making it terribly hard for me," she 
 cried in desperation. " But I will say what I came to 
 say." 
 
 He looked at her in an attitude of listening and 
 waiting the courtesy of host to unwelcome guest who 
 must yet be treated with politeness. 
 
 " I came to ask you to forgive me for having 
 doubted you and deserted you. I should have under 
 stood. But ... I was jealous." 
 
 " All that belongs to yesterday a dead and buried 
 yesterday." He made a motion to rise a hint that 
 the interview was at an end. 
 
 But she did not rise. She leaned toward him and 
 491 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 her eyes searched his. " Murdock," she said, " do you 
 no longer care for me ? " 
 
 He was silent the silence that seems charitably to 
 withhold an unpleasant truth. 
 
 " I suppose not," she said with a weary sigh. " 7 
 should have forgiven you anything. But that s no rea 
 son why you should forgive me, is it? It killed your 
 love to find out I was not what you thought, that I 
 did not take my stand beside you, when they were try 
 ing to destroy you with their hypocritical scorn." 
 
 He shrugged indifferently. " It s fortunate you 
 acted as you did," said he. " If you had indulged in 
 any such theatricals, we should both have been 
 lynched." 
 
 " Still, I ought to have come. I ve hated myself 
 ever since I found out to-day that you took Viola to 
 fchield me. You were thinking of me, and I " She 
 made a gesture of disdain " I was groveling in 
 jealousy. What a frightful thing an imagination is! 
 I could see her in your arms and, God, how I loved 
 you!" 
 
 He bit his lip and frowned. 
 
 " Pardon me," she said hastily. " I didn t mean to 
 refer to that again. All I wished was to let you know 
 that at least I wasn t a coward." 
 
 He again shrugged his shoulders. " What does it 
 matter?" 
 
 " What, indeed? But when I came here, I hoped it 
 would. And the way you looked when you saw me 
 But that was because you forgot for the instant how 
 unworthy I had shown myself. . . . You see, I do love 
 you, Murdock, and I want you. I think I developed, 
 became a woman, unusually early. I can t remember 
 when I wasn t dreaming of the man I d some day love 
 
 492 
 
"DO YOU NO LONGER CARE?" 
 
 and give myself to. Then up there in the wilderness 
 I met you." 
 
 She paused, leaned her elbow upon the table, like 
 him gazed into the flames. 
 
 " You were right," she went on, her voice low and 
 quiet and sweet as distant music. " I did love you 
 from that time you caught me in your arms to save 
 me from the whirlpool. . . . Do you remember the day 
 we shot the rapids in the canoe you kneeling in front 
 of me, I steadying myself by holding to you? How 
 the river boiled and hissed! and the smooth green 
 water on every side, and the great oily whirlpools 
 crawling out toward our boat to suck it down to de 
 struction if you let the prow vary by so much as an 
 inch in that angry white streak in the center of the 
 river. . . . Do you remember ? " 
 
 Was it the firelight flickering on his face or was 
 it lights and shadows from within? 
 
 " You loved me then ! Is it all dead dead for 
 ever?" 
 
 He was leaning forward, his elbows on his knees, 
 his fascinated gaze upon the fire. 
 
 " I came to-day to be to you whatever you wish. 
 I thought, If he cannot forgive and respect and love 
 me, still perhaps he will let me love him. For, my 
 soul, my body, cry out for you without ceasing. I 
 should have become worn and ugly, I think, if I had 
 not been always thinking I must keep what looks I 
 had for the time when You see, I have no pride; 
 no woman has, when she loves. Yes, I was waiting for 
 the time when you would grow tired of of Viola and 
 might perhaps turn to me. I ve never got a dress or 
 a hat that I ve not said, Will he fancy me in this, if 
 by chance he should come when I have it on ? And 
 
 493 
 
OLD WIVES FOR NEW 
 
 when I saw Viola on the street yesterday, saw you were 
 not with her, my heart leaped, for I began to hope 
 you had wearied of her." 
 
 He started up. " Stop ! " he cried fiercely. 
 "Stop!" 
 
 Her bosom was heaving stormily and she was sob 
 bing, but her eyes were tearless. She flung herself at 
 his feet. " Then, let me stay as a servant. 1*11 never 
 be jealous again at least, you ll never see it. I must 
 stay near you. I ll not trouble you. If you send me 
 away you d be kinder if you killed me." 
 
 He sank into his chair, buried his face in his hands. 
 Presently she put out her arm, timidly touched him; 
 and when he did not draw away, she nestled against 
 his knees. She flung off her hat ; her hair, escaping in 
 strays, waved about her face, and her eyes blazed pas 
 sionately up at him. " Ah, you do love me," she said 
 softly, sand her voice was like the murmur of a tigress 
 under the caresses of her mate. 
 
 " You must go," he insisted. " I have destroyed 
 myself. But I will not destroy you. Nor shall I let you 
 destroy yourself. My life s in ruins / ruined it. I am 
 an outcast. But I will wander alone." He took her 
 small, oval face between his hands. " Love you? " he 
 cried. " I love you so that if I should put my; arms 
 about you I would crush you " 
 
 She straightened herself on her knees, her eyes 
 flashing, her nostrils quivering. " Crush me ! I ll not 
 cry out, unless it is with joy. I love you, Murdock, 
 as they love in the forest where we were at home." 
 
 " Go back to your reputation. To-morrow you 
 will hate me." 
 
 " If I were a man yes. It is you men who cower 
 before opinion. But not women not real women. 
 
 494 
 
"DO YOU NO LONGER CARE?" 
 
 When a real woman finds her master, she follows him. 
 And his approval is her honor, his frown her dishonor." 
 
 " You are mad ! " And then she was in his arms. 
 We are both mad!" 
 
 " Yes yes," she gasped, her fingers biting into his 
 shoulders, and her face upturned to his with eyes wide 
 like an eagle s to the blaze of the sun. " Mad quite 
 mad. Do we not love each other? You are angel and 
 devil, both in one. And I adore you ! " 
 
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