CGRRA HARRIS
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 to
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE
 
 BOOKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 A Circuit Rider s Widow 
 A Circuit Rider s Wife 
 The Co-Citizen 
 Eve s Second Husband 
 In Search of a Husband 
 The Recording Angel
 
 "She was deliberately flinging plates, cups, glasses, 
 everything as she came to it, upon the floor, and she was 
 working like lightning"
 
 MAKING HER 
 HIS WIFE 
 
 BY 
 
 CORRA HARRIS 
 
 Illustrated 
 By W. B. King 
 
 GARDEN CITY NEW YORK 
 
 DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 
 
 1918
 
 Copyright, 1918, by 
 
 DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 
 
 All rights reserved, including the right of 
 
 translation into foreign languages, 
 
 including the Scandinavian 
 
 COPYRIGHT, igi?, BY THE PICTORIAL REVIEW COMPANY
 
 4-1 
 
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 "She was deliberately flinging plates, cups, 
 glasses, everything as she came to it, upon the 
 floor, and she was working like lightning" 
 (See page 155) Frontispiece 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 And isn t marriage savage? Of course it is. 
 Fiercest relation on earth. Can t make it any 
 thing else "... 
 
 * Such an adventure ! exclaimed the girl, 
 spreading her hands in an ecstatic gesture" . 
 
 "The next moment the masqueraders were 
 astonished to see a knight falling head over 
 heels to the ballroom floor" 272
 
 PART ONE
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 PART ONE 
 
 IN 1845, when the South was a feudal civilisa 
 tion which produced beautiful women, brilliant 
 orators, and valuable slaves, and when the 
 Southern Literary Messenger published continued 
 poems of fifty thousand words which were eagerly 
 read by the beautiful women and the brilliant ora 
 tors, Colonel Phillip Arms, from Virginia, moved to 
 Cherokee, Georgia, and established his dynasty 
 there. He brought with him the proverbial hun 
 dred slaves. Shortly afterward other Virginians 
 came with their retinues and wealth. They were 
 in the nature of courtiers to Colonel Arms, and 
 they were prevailed upon to follow him by the fact 
 that the Colonel had discovered in the land iron ore 
 which was even more valuable than Virginia cotton. 
 Cherokee quickly grew into one of those ante-bel 
 lum towns built according to the more or less mag-
 
 4 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 nificent fancy of the ante-bellum aristocracy. Every 
 house in it was a mansion, and there were not many 
 of them. The white population did not exceed two 
 hundred souls; the slaves numbered nearly a thou 
 sand. Fifteen years later the Arms Iron Foundry 
 on the river beyond the town did a tremendous 
 business casting cannon and moulding minie balls 
 for the Confederate Army. 
 
 This was the state of affairs when Sherman, on 
 his march to the sea, surrounded the town. It was 
 defended by a garrison in the Foundry defended 
 until the smokestack looked like an old black pepper 
 pot punctured by ten thousand bullet holes, until 
 the walls were rent by shells and every man within 
 had fallen. 
 
 When the refugees who fled at the approach of 
 the Federal forces returned and saw by the graves 
 in the glade beyond the town how many men had 
 died in their defence, they changed the name. They 
 called it Valhalla, in memory of the heroes slain in 
 battle. 
 
 Many years later a Northern syndicate built a 
 railroad to somewhere which, quite by accident, ran 
 along the ridge between the town and the Confed-
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 5 
 
 erate Cemetery. This is the only thing which 
 divides the living from the dead in that place. 
 
 Nowhere else, except in the long years wake of 
 Sherman s march through Georgia, may such a town 
 be found as Valhalla not ugly, but prematurely old 
 and sad; not squalid, but roomily poverty-stricken, 
 with paint worn from its weather boarding and 
 rubbed from its high cornices; with faded green 
 blinds and tall, fluted porch columns shrunken and 
 parted between the flutes like slits between the 
 plaits of an elegant but indigent old gentleman s 
 shirt front. Lilac-scented lilies standing like can 
 dles in the dark shade of old gardens. Roses and 
 vines climbing over it as they creep over the graves 
 in the glade, covered with the dust of memories, 
 governed by epitaphs. In short, an old dead town, 
 which gave up its splendid ghost upon the day the 
 Foundry fell and every man there fell with it. 
 
 It is easier to recover from anything than from 
 a particularly glorious past. If the garrison had 
 surrendered to the Federals, Valhalla would not 
 have been Valhalla; it would have been a flourishing 
 city with a manufacturing plant in the glade where 
 tombstones stand and lean above the grass like
 
 6 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 dingy leaves turned and blown from the tragic book 
 of war and death. 
 
 Other poorer people moved in after the war and 
 built slatternly houses "round and round the old 
 Avenue where the mansions still stood like gray 
 mausoleums of that same glorious past. Nothing 
 now remained of the famous Arms estate but the 
 ruined Foundry with its tumbled ore fields over 
 grown with weeds and brambles, the old Arms place 
 on the Avenue, and young John Arms who lived 
 there with his widowed mother. 
 
 He was the most distinguished looking man in 
 Valhalla and he had never accomplished anything 
 commensurate with his appearance. But for the 
 fate of the heroic garrison when his grandfather, 
 Colonel Arms, also lost his life, he might have been 
 president of the Cherokee Steel and Iron Company. 
 As it was, there was no such company. He kept a 
 hardware store, and sold plows, horse collars, cook 
 ing stoves, and pewter spoons, crockery and glass 
 syrup pitchers, and he was not successful in that 
 business, partly because no business could be suc 
 cessfully conducted in Valhalla, and chiefly because 
 he lacked imagination, that financial emotion which
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 7 
 
 inspires so many modern Americans to create op 
 portunities. He was not exactly dull, but coldly 
 temperate. He was endowed with silence as an 
 other man may be with a gift. Not a forbidding 
 silence, but the reserve of one who has not yet made 
 up his mind to deliver himself. 
 
 Valhalla cherished him and wondered what he 
 meant. He was! the anti-climax of the Arms dynasty. 
 You could not call him a plebeian, but he had more 
 of the virtues of a man than the graces of a gentle 
 man. He belonged to a type which is to be found 
 only in the South a cross between the primitive 
 and the old feudal aristocrat. Wherever you find 
 this man he is a trifle out of drawing with the 
 situation. 
 
 In the first edition of Ridpath s "History of the 
 United States" there is a picture of Powhatan. It 
 is a very good likeness because it is not a photo 
 graph, but the ideal of a noble primitive man drawn 
 in the features of the North American Indian. 
 The resemblance between the picture and John 
 Arms was so striking that the story went in Val 
 halla that his great grandmother, the wife of Phillip, 
 was too dark, that she was pigeon-toed, and that,
 
 8 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 in fact, John was descended from the famous chief. 
 
 He was not tall, but he had what may be called 
 an instinct for height, a lift in his sense of presence 
 which made him appear taller than he really was. 
 His shoulders spread at right angles from his neck 
 and were perfectly square. He was so narrow 
 through the hips that he never looked quite right 
 in his clothes. His skin was sallow, not dark. He 
 had the high cheek bones, the peculiar wide-bridged 
 nose, and a mouth of such repose and strength that 
 it might have been drawn upon the face of a stone, 
 no tenderness, no humour. The long upper lip was 
 flat and almost overlapped the straight lower lip. 
 A square chin with no curve in it. A lofty but re 
 treating brow. Gray eyes deeply sunken, and coarse, 
 straight dark hair. 
 
 He was thirty years old and not married. 
 
 Mrs. Arms sat in awe of her son. She was the 
 kind of woman who would never have stood in any 
 other relation to the opposite sex. It was too much 
 like withstanding it. Being an old-fashioned 
 gentlewoman she was incapable of that. She was 
 industrious between times in her house, but since 
 he had reached manhood s estate she constantly sat
 
 MAKING HER jHIS WIFE 9 
 
 to John. It was a pose she had toward men. And 
 it was an evidence of serious agitation when she 
 departed from it by showing any kind of physical 
 activity in his presence. The effect was soothing, 
 dignified. When he came down to breakfast, he 
 always found her sitting at the table waiting for 
 him. When he returned from the store in the 
 evenings, she would be sitting again in the old faded 
 parlour, or upon the veranda, still waiting for him. 
 It was as if the hands of her spirit were folded upon 
 her breast in some inarticulate prayer for this her 
 son who was a stranger to her. 
 
 She was an ample old lady who wore gray striped, 
 full-skirted gowns, with large lavender-coloured 
 flowers between the stripes, and a white tatted 
 collar pinned with a brooch which was a miniature 
 of John s father painted from a picture made in his 
 youth. You will have observed this about women 
 who wear husband s .miniatures. They are always 
 old women and the picture in their brooches is 
 always that of the young man whom they married 
 many years ago. The crayon portrait of John s 
 father which hung in the parlour was that of a meek 
 old man with a long white Moses beard. The minia-
 
 10 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 ture pinned upon Mrs. Arms s breast was that of 
 gay young rascal who did not in the least resemb 
 his son John. 
 
 This was a matter to which Mrs. Arms had give 
 much thought in the confusion of her simple min( 
 She had done this thing. She had produced a so 
 who did not resemble his father either in charact< 
 or appearance. Neither was he like herself. SI: 
 was fair, with the oval face of the Anglo-Saxoi 
 She had never heard of reversion to type. In an 
 case, she would not have understood that. M 
 Arms, senior she had always called him "M 
 Arms," even in the privacy of their chamber- 
 had been a lively, eloquent, irresponsible person i 
 his youth, dissipated. And he was sufficiently er 
 terprising in his mature years to have failed thre 
 times in business. Any woman instinctively unde] 
 stands such a man as that. But no woman ca 
 understand one, even if he is her own son, who i 
 not subject to emotional aberrations; who is neve 
 betrayed to her by his weaknesses; who appears to b 
 moral without an effort; who never fails and neve 
 succeeds, and who keeps his own counsel as if i 
 were a sacred covenant he had made with silence
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 11 
 
 This was why she sat patiently in awe of her son. 
 She did not understand him. And for that reason 
 she was anxious for him. When a man is entirely 
 right, every woman knows that there is something 
 wrong with him. He is not all there. 
 
 The matter about which she concerned herself 
 most was the fact that John was not married, and 
 would not marry. No mother really wishes her son 
 to marry, but every mother knows she ought to 
 wish it; therefore Mrs. Arms was troubled because 
 John showed what she feared were persistent 
 bachelor tendencies. His interest in women was 
 keen, but it was not romantic. He was a student 
 of that sex. And the man who studies women is not 
 nearly so apt to fall into the illusion of love. She 
 did not know when John began his psychological 
 investigations of femininity. But it had been going 
 on for a long time, since he returned from college 
 in his junior year to take charge of the remnants of 
 his father s business. He was not cynical in his 
 observations to her upon this subject, but he was 
 fearfully astute, which was queer in a man. At 
 the same time he was fearfully astute in his com 
 ments upon girls in general. One might have sup-
 
 12 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 posed that he had a wide experience of them, much 
 wider than the maidens of Valhalla afforded. As a 
 matter of fact, he was an attic philosopher of women. 
 Hypothecating whom he did not know upon what he 
 did know. And he frequently made cryptic remarks 
 on this subject which disturbed his mother. She 
 could never discover what kind of girl he would 
 marry, but his ideas of a wife were not familiar to 
 her. This was the only thing she could worry about, 
 so she worried about that. 
 
 It was seven o clock in the evening of a day early 
 in September, 1914. Yellow leaves hung like flecks 
 of gold among the green boughs of the trees in the 
 Avenue. 
 
 Mrs. Arms was sitting on the veranda, looking 
 like a faded posy, a gentle, old, sundown lady, the 
 sweeter part of the autumn twilight. 
 
 John came through the door from the hall and 
 sat down near her. This was a habit they had in 
 pleasant weather. After supper they sat together 
 on the veranda and said nothing. 
 
 He was smoking, and he was thinking, merely 
 recalling the scene on the Square that afternoon. 
 Valhalla was vaguely excited, something was hap-
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 13 
 
 pening in the world at last which aroused the splen 
 did ghost of memories in that place. Belgium was 
 dying. The German army w r as marching on Paris. 
 Six thousand men lay dead upon the field. "An 
 other case of Sedan!" the old men said, as they 
 gathered in groups with the evening papers in their 
 hands. Merchants came out of their stores. Farm 
 ers halted their wagons and left their teams while 
 they learned the news. Dogs got themselves kicked, 
 and yelped bloody murder because they wished to 
 share the sensation, whatever it was. Colonel 
 Seaborn Ripley had been going about all the after 
 noon trying to organise a military company which 
 was to be called the Valhalla Volunteers. One 
 might have inferred that Paris was only fifty miles 
 distant and that Valhalla would march to the front 
 in the morning. John had his placid share in this 
 purely imaginary performance. He had been made 
 lieutenant of the Volunteers. Later in the after 
 noon he had motored out to the Foundry in the 
 Colonel s car with that old veteran, who declared 
 that he wished to refresh his memory on "certain 
 details." Also he had been commissioned to pur 
 chase arms and other equipment for the company.
 
 14 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 Being in the hardware business, it was supposed 
 that he could manage this with proper economy. 
 
 But Mrs. Arms was far removed from these ac 
 tivities. She rarely went down-town. She did not 
 know of this revival of militarism. All wars were 
 over so far as she was concerned. She was thinking 
 of something which belonged to the eternal order 
 of things. She was crocheting another tidy. At 
 this hour she was always doing that. Every chair 
 in the Arms house had a white web over the back 
 done in some kind of stitch. 
 
 As her needle flew in and out she glanced up over 
 the rim of her glasses from time to time at her son. 
 He was not aware of this inspection. He continued 
 to smoke with his feet elevated, village fashion, upon 
 the banister. Mrs. Arms worked faster. She knew 
 that when he finished the cigar he would go in and 
 audit his books until bed-time. The cigar was 
 going fast when she began to fidget like an old hen 
 spreading her wings. She arose, went into the 
 parlour, returned, sat down, and fumbled in her 
 work basket as if she had lost something. It was 
 her courage. She kept that in her work basket, 
 and she could never find it when John was around.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 15 
 
 She stood up, walked to the other end of the veranda, 
 seized the vagrant tendril of a clematis vine which 
 grew there, and tucked it into the trellis as if she had 
 corrected a child. Then she went back into the 
 house. When she came out the second time she 
 walked swiftly, and she looked as grim as the pa 
 thetic sweetness of her countenance permitted, as 
 if she had at last taken the bit between her 
 teeth and was about to do to John what she ought 
 to do. 
 
 He turned his head and looked at her, in the 
 absent-minded way a man stares at a woman when 
 he is pursuing a train of thought which leads in an 
 other direction. 
 
 He understood that she would presently take him 
 to task about something. She always did this way 
 when she had him on her mind. She cackled with 
 her skirts, she fussed herself, primped her mouth, 
 and looked at him over the rim of her glasses. 
 
 "What is it, Mother?" he asked, tossing away 
 the end of his cigar. 
 
 "Nothing. Why?" she answered quickly. 
 
 "I thought you were going to say something," 
 he accused, smiling.
 
 16 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 She resumed the tidy, sighed, dropped a stitch, and 
 gave it up. 
 
 "John," she exclaimed suddenly, in a quavering, 
 plaintive voice, "when your father was your age he 
 had been married six years ! " 
 
 "Yes, Mother," answered her son, and waited. 
 
 "You should have had a wife long ago, John! 
 Why don t you marry?" 
 
 "I will, Mother!" he answered, smiling broadly 
 at her so rarely accusative, so primly submissive to 
 whatever fate, now so faintly in revolt, so timidly 
 belligerent, with a pink stain purpling in either 
 cheek like a dying rose. 
 
 She went on presently: 
 
 "A woman gets through with her feelings just 
 for herself when her first child is born. Then she 
 feels for him, she thinks for him, she loves for him, 
 and he is her hope and her salvation. Then, John, 
 when he grows up, when he is no longer her child, 
 her feelings, her thoughts run ahead. They pass 
 him, too. They take hold and live again in his 
 children. If he has none, she is just childless again 
 in her old age. Do you think I like to crochet 
 tidies? I do that because there is no one for whom
 
 " And isn t marriage savage? Of 
 course it is. Fiercest relation on 
 earth. Can t make it anything else "
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 17 
 
 I can make the dearer little things!" she concluded 
 tearfully. 
 
 "Bless my soul, Mother!" he exclaimed, "I 
 what can I do?" 
 
 " You can get married like a sensible man ! There s 
 Anna Berry, she s a nice girl, she would make you 
 a good wife. And she s fond of you, John," she 
 returned, determined to get down to particulars in 
 this business. 
 
 "Mother, I want to make the woman I marry a 
 good wife to me." 
 
 "I don t understand," she said plaintively. 
 
 "No, you wouldn t. Can t explain, but I feel I 
 must marry an enemy." 
 
 "An enemy?" 
 
 "A man generally does, anyhow." 
 
 "My son, you don t know what you are saying." 
 
 "Yes, I do. It s the right way; always was the 
 natural way until men fell into the weakness of love- 
 making." 
 
 "To hear you, one might think you expected to 
 chase a woman and club her. It s savage." 
 
 "And isn t marriage savage? Of course it is. 
 Fiercest relation on earth. Can t make it anything
 
 18 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 else until you make your own wife. If you don t, 
 she ll make you. Always tries that, don t she?" 
 he said. 
 
 "I don t know where you got such ideas," she 
 said, sighing. 
 
 "Born with em," he answered, laughing. "By the 
 way, Mother, I m going to Atlanta to-morrow. Had 
 a big order for rifles to-day. Can t get back for a 
 day or two. Better ask Anna to come over at night." 
 
 "Very well." 
 
 He stood up, looked down at her, still smiling. 
 Then he bent and kissed her. 
 
 "Don t worry, Mother, about what I said just 
 now. I ll probably never marry, because I shall 
 never find my dear enemy in your sex," he said, 
 with penitent courtesy. 
 
 "Nothing would be easier if you look for her in 
 the wrong direction, John," answered the old lady, 
 still ruffled. 
 
 Late in the afternoon of the following day a 
 young man shouldered his way through the holiday 
 throng on Whitehall Street in Atlanta. No one 
 noticed him; he noticed every one. This is the
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 19 
 
 mark of the stranger from the country in a city. 
 There, people are so accustomed to people that they 
 never see them if they can avoid it. But to the 
 man who has lived all his life where there is more 
 space and less of the fever of humanity, every face 
 he sees in the crowd is a leaf to be read, a riddle to 
 be solved, something to be believed or rejected. 
 
 This young man s countenance was an open coun 
 try, with strange winds blowing across it. One 
 moment you would have said, "This man is dull. 
 He does not think in the terms of life." The next 
 moment you would have said, "This man is wise. 
 His feet are set in the way of life. Nothing can move 
 him from the right order of things. And nothing 
 can withstand him." Again, as the people pressed 
 him, as he caught the contagion of all passions from 
 these other bodies of himself, his eyes flamed, his 
 nostrils spread, his face flushed with fierce desire, 
 homeless emotion. Then you would have said, 
 "This man is dangerous. He is intoxicated, and he 
 is ravenous!" 
 
 But no one thought of these things, because there 
 were too many to think. When you are in a crowd, 
 you do not think, you only feel. You are not your-
 
 20 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 self, but a part of the whole; breathing, pushing on, 
 an emotion of that restless body. 
 
 It was Labour Day. Every moment the throng 
 increased. Thousands of women, thousands of men, 
 all excited, all going somewhere in a hurry. 
 
 There had been a parade of automobiles by the 
 Piedmont Driving Club. Presently the street cars 
 were blocked by the long procession of these gaily- 
 decorated motors moving slowly up the street like 
 a long, crawling caterpillar, an enormous composite 
 of every hue and splendour of all the caterpillars in 
 the world. They were covered with flowers. The 
 wheels were revolving wreaths; streamers flew; 
 women sat like lilies and roses in all this floating 
 splendour of colour, smiling, flirting, living their 
 hour of perfume and joy. Men stared at them, 
 answering eye to eye, smile for smile. 
 
 The last car passed. John Arms stood upon the 
 curb, lifted and confused by the brilliant spectacle. 
 The throng which for a moment had paused, dis 
 solved, hurried on. 
 
 Suddenly everybody stopped, gasped, held his 
 breath. Street car bells clanged, policemen rushed 
 forward shouting, waving their hands imperatively.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 21 
 
 A little runabout came roaring into the street. 
 It was covered with goldenrod. The wheels were 
 solid masses of yellow chrysanthemums. It moved 
 swiftly, zigzagging, without reference to the laws of 
 traffic. There was only one person in it a girl, 
 wearing a shining black coat with yellow facings. 
 Her head was thrown back, her face flushed, her red 
 lips parted. She held to the wheel desperately, and 
 stared wildly at the crowd with wide-open, terror- 
 stricken black eyes which seemed to shriek for help. 
 
 At this moment the car turned its yellow nose 
 straight toward the curb where John was standing, 
 and made for him. The next instant the front 
 wheels were upon the sidewalk. And John himself 
 was flung high, only to land with astonishing agility 
 upon the running board. 
 
 Having done its worst, the thing stopped. The 
 girl flung her hands and cried: 
 
 "Oh, I can t make* it go on!" 
 
 "And a good thing you can t, Miss," shouted an 
 indignant policeman. "Where was you aiming 
 to go?" 
 
 "Please help me. It won t move," she said, 
 ignoring the officer and addressing herself to the
 
 22 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 dishevelled young man whom Providence seemed 
 to have dropped upon the running board. 
 
 "You ve got your foot on the brake," exclaimed 
 John. 
 
 "Oh, is that it? But if I take my foot off, this 
 thing will bump into that drugstore!" she sobbed. 
 
 "Hold it down, Miss, till I get your name and 
 book you for charges!" exclaimed the officer. 
 
 "Olive Thurston, One Hundred and Twenty-three 
 Peach tree Street," she admitted, tearfully, pressing 
 hard upon the brake. 
 
 He looked up respectfully at this, and said politely: 
 
 "You can t run this car, Miss; you don t know 
 how. I ll call an officer." 
 
 "No, please don t!" she said, and looked up 
 distractedly at John, who returned the gaze with the 
 calm of a man who has made up his mind for all 
 time. 
 
 He reached in, seized a rod she had forgotten, 
 gave it a wrench, and peace descended upon the 
 scene. 
 
 "It s all right; we can manage now, thank you," 
 said the young woman haughtily, as she slid to the 
 other side.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 23 
 
 "Well, I bedam! Flings him heels over head, 
 and then she takes him for her chauffeur!" muttered 
 the policeman, as John grasped the wheel, backed 
 the car, and started off. 
 
 He steered around the next corner into a less 
 crowded thoroughfare. The girl sat beside him, 
 very erect, but pale and trembling. Not a word 
 was spoken until they came out upon the Fort 
 McPherson Road in West End. Then, for the first 
 time, she glanced at him, turned her head away. 
 
 "You saved my life and nearly lost your own," 
 she said, with a sob. 
 
 "What made you do it?" he demanded severely, 
 without taking his eyes from the road. 
 
 "It was a wager," she said, beginning to laugh 
 hysterically. "This is Dicky Blake s car. We 
 were in the parade and I bet twenty-five dollars 
 that I could take it home along Whitehall Street 
 through the crowd, you know. It was for the Bel 
 gium Relief Fund." 
 
 "What was?" 
 
 "The twenty-five dollars; we ve done everything 
 trying to raise money for that." 
 
 "Ever drive a car before?"
 
 24 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Only for a block or two. That was why it was 
 a wager, you see," she explained simply. 
 
 "Often take a chance like that?" he demanded, 
 after a pause. 
 
 "Well, not exactly, but I never miss taking one 
 if I can help it," she said, then caught her breath, 
 flushed, and stared at him, with the level dark 
 glance of the fear-not woman. 
 
 He was looking straight at her for the first time, 
 not daringly, but with that challenge always spoken 
 between a man and a girl, with the eyes, not the 
 lips. 
 
 "Who are you?" she asked coolly. 
 
 "Not a highwayman, as you begin to suspect, nor 
 a chauffeur," he answered, smiling, but with equal 
 coolness. "I m John Arms, from the little old dead 
 town of Valhalla. Been dead myself, I think, 
 until to-day." 
 
 Still the measuring glances between them like 
 the crossing of swords. Still he smiled like an 
 honest antagonist. 
 
 "John, not Phillip, of course, who did something 
 awful during the Battle of the Foundry," murmured 
 the girl thoughtfully.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 25 
 
 "Died there, after discharging a cannon filled 
 with scrap iron at the enemy." 
 
 "I have heard Uncle Richard tell about that," 
 she said. 
 
 "He was my grandfather highly respectable 
 ancestry, never drink, never have gambled until 
 this day in my life," he added, still covering her 
 with that encircling gaze which separated her and 
 marooned her from all the world. 
 
 "And to-day, you gamble?" 
 
 "On a sure thing," he agreed. 
 
 "What, may I ask?" in a tone which meant, 
 "I dare you!" 
 
 "On myself," he returned, quite unexpectedly. 
 At the same time the car shot ahead at increasing 
 speed along the open country road. 
 
 "Where are we going?" she demanded suddenly, 
 looking about her. 
 
 "For a drive," he answered cheerfully. 
 
 "Dickie will be crazy!" 
 
 "I hope he will be dead!" 
 
 "Are you ?" she hesitated, as if she would 
 
 not countenance this offence against her own dig 
 nity. But he answered:
 
 26 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Yes, I am No, not yet. And you who 
 
 never miss a chance," he challenged, " you ll 
 take this one. It s a greater one for me than for 
 you!" 
 
 "Really!" 
 
 "Ah, she s afraid to dare, and she s too wickedly 
 woman to give it up!" he interpreted triumphantly 
 to himself. 
 
 "You must turn back, Mr. Arms!" in that tone 
 a woman uses when she calls even her enemy, man, 
 to her defence, and he dares not refuse for the 
 honour of his manhood. 
 
 "You really want to go back?" he said, stopping 
 the car, and looking at her with a kind of secret 
 intelligence. 
 
 She sat for a moment perfectly still, with her face 
 turned from him. Then she pressed her hands to 
 her breast and began to laugh. She moved back and 
 forth in a perfect gale of mirth. Then to his amaze 
 ment she looked at him plaintively, with tears in her 
 eyes. 
 
 "It s ridiculous, all this you know and not 
 not right," she added almost in a whisper. 
 
 "It is not ridiculous. Probably the most natural,
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 27 
 
 the gravest thing you ever did. And right," he 
 returned. 
 
 "Are you sure?" 
 
 "On my honour." 
 
 "Then drive on; I don t care! I m so depress- 
 ingly happy." 
 
 "Yes, I know; as if somewhere beyond these 
 shadows that droop like gray wings over the earth 
 we were going to meet something terrible and sweet. 
 Neither of us wants to, but we long to. And we 
 know that we cannot escape not now!" he said, 
 sending the car forward into the deepening shade 
 between the hills. 
 
 Love is the present tense of life, immediate. It 
 is a long time dying. But nothing else comes so 
 swiftly into the heart. You do not learn how to love, 
 you always know how. You only wait for it like beg 
 gars at the High Gates of Life. And when it comes, 
 all the words you have, all the ways you know, they 
 are useless for the speech and meaning of that. 
 This is why lovers sing to each other first with their 
 eyes, speak in symbols, act so contrarily and 
 strangely, according to the standards of those who 
 do not love. Each is a dear and dangerous mystery
 
 28 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 to the other. Each fears the other. And God himself 
 cannot save these victims henceforth from the 
 anguish and sweetness of love. 
 
 The translation this man and this woman made to 
 themselves of the struggle between them was : 
 
 John to John: "I have found my dear enemy!" 
 
 Olive to Olive: "Who is this man?" 
 
 John: "I will have her!" 
 
 Olive: "I am afraid of him!" 
 
 John: "She knows; she is already afraid of me." 
 
 Olive: "I must not permit him to make love to 
 me." 
 
 John: "She is willing. She only hangs back 
 from feminine deceit." 
 
 Olive: "I cannot trust myself. He must turn 
 back!" 
 
 John: "Here is the test. She will not insist upon 
 going back. She wants to be here." 
 
 Olive: "I am lost! I cannot will myself away 
 from him." 
 
 John: "She flies to a woman s last refuge, pro 
 priety." 
 
 Olive: "I can only trust to his honour now." 
 
 John: "She places the responsibility upon me."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 29 
 
 Olive: "It is just for this hour. I shall never 
 see him again." 
 
 John: "I will see her to-morrow." 
 
 It was seven o clock in the evening. Mrs. Thurs- 
 ton sat beside the phone desk behind the staircase 
 in the hall of the Thurston residence on Peachtree 
 Street. 
 
 "Information," she wailed, "give me Police 
 Headquarters!" 
 
 A young man stood facing her. He wore exag 
 geratedly correct evening clothes. His shirt front 
 glistened like snow on a black cat s back. His face 
 was long, flushed. His chin receded like the point 
 he had missed in life. His hair was combed flat 
 and straight back, affected simplicity in the simplest 
 of all products, a man who w r as nothing and could 
 do nothing except spend the fortune he had inherited. 
 
 "Horrible to be calling the Station House, and 
 about my own niece," she exclaimed, addressing him 
 while she waited with the receiver cupped to her 
 ear. "I ve never spoken to a policeman in my life." 
 
 "No use to worry," he replied. "Olive s a good 
 sport; she always lands on her feet."
 
 30 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 " She s probably landed on her head this time. 
 Why d you let her What? Is this Police Head 
 quarters? . . . This is Mrs. Richard Thurston speak 
 ing to you," she began, turning her attention to the 
 phone. 
 
 She explained. Miss Olive Thurston, her niece, 
 had undertaken to drive a car down Whitehall 
 Street. She was not accustomed to driving a motor. 
 She should have arrived an hour since. She had 
 not returned. She was anxious, and so forth and 
 so on. Yes, the car was decorated in yellow. Yes, 
 she wore a black motor coat. She paused to listen. 
 She gasped, fell back in her chair, and closed her 
 eyes. 
 
 "Oh, Dickie, they ve made a case against her for 
 
 reckless driving What? Nearly killed a man? 
 
 Drove off with him in the car? Merciful Heavens!" 
 she cried, dropping the receiver and closing her eyes. 
 
 Dickie hastened forward. 
 
 "Don t mind me," she cried faintly. "Call the 
 hospitals!" 
 
 At this moment the doorbell rang. The next 
 moment Olive whisked in, accompanied by a man 
 who wore a pepper and salt coat which was short
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 31 
 
 but which still denied any relation to his person from 
 the waist down, and black trousers which bagged 
 at the knees. He stood behind her like a graven 
 image, as calm and remote as that. 
 
 "Olive!" shrieked the old lady. 
 
 "Such an adventure!" exclaimed the girl, spread 
 ing her hands in an ecstatic gesture. 
 
 She was radiant. Her face glowed like a gold or 
 Ophir rose. Black curling wisps of hair escaped 
 from her close-fitting turban, as if the wind had 
 blown this bloom of woman from thundering 
 clouds. 
 
 "Where have you been?" demanded her aunt 
 indignantly. 
 
 "I present Mr. John Arms! My Aunt, Mrs. 
 Thurston; Mr. Blake," she said, turning to her 
 companion. And then, facing her astonished rela 
 tive, merely including Blake incidentally, she added: 
 
 "You ll have to ask him where we ve been; I 
 don t know!" 
 
 "We went for a drive after the accident, on the 
 McPherson Road," answered the graven image, 
 bowing and addressing himself grimly to Blake. 
 
 "Then there was an accident?"
 
 32 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Yes, I nearly killed Mr. Arms, but I didn t 
 really hurt him at all. And, Dickie, give me that 
 money; I won!" she exclaimed, holding out her 
 hand. "Also you may pay my fine to-morrow in the 
 police court. It was your car." 
 
 Mrs. Thurston had risen. She offered her hand 
 to John. 
 
 "Pleased to know you," in a tone which indi 
 cated that she was very much displeased with him, 
 with Olive, and the whole situation. 
 
 "Yes, Auntie, he saved my life," added Olive. 
 
 "Seems to have gone on saving it!" thought 
 Blake to himself as he acknowledged this doubtfully 
 prolonged service with a bow. 
 
 "And you are going to stay to dinner," Olive en 
 treated, swimming back to John. 
 
 "Of course!" conceded Mrs. Thurston politely 
 but none too cordially. 
 
 "No, thanks, 1 have an engagement," answered 
 Mr. Arms, offering his hand to Olive. 
 
 "Then I ll see you to-morrow," she said. 
 
 "Yes," keeping her to himself for the length of 
 one brief glance as he took his departure. 
 
 "Did he did that person say that he would see
 
 Such (in adventure! exclaimed the yirl, spreading 
 her hand* in an ecstatic gesture"
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 33 
 
 you to-morrow, Olive?" demanded Dickie as the 
 door closed after the "person." 
 
 All this time he had not spoken. He had been 
 doing a certain distasteful sum in addition and sub 
 traction which left him as a remainder. 
 
 "Yes," answered Olive without looking at him, 
 as she threw off her coat. "We are going to have 
 lunch at the Driving Club. Don t you want to 
 come?" 
 
 "No!" he returned promptly. 
 
 "And I simply can t go, Olive," chimed in Mrs. 
 Thurston. "I have that engagement with the 
 Waltharns! What are you going to do?" 
 
 "Lunch with Mr. Arms, of course!" answered 
 Olive, with cheerful emphasis, as if she had sud 
 denly outgrown chaperons. 
 
 The next day Mrs. Arms received this telegram 
 from her son : 
 
 Detained by important business, may not return before 
 Saturday. JOHN. 
 
 It was half-past nine o clock on the Saturday 
 morning predicted by John in this same telegram.
 
 34 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 Olive Thurston was seated before her dressing 
 table. She wore a white silk something which re 
 vealed the curves of her young body and which 
 spread with every lift of her arms like shimmering 
 white wings. 
 
 She was preening herself, pecking daintily with 
 fingers at the curls over her ears. She drew them 
 back, smoothed her hair until it lay parted and 
 puritan prim about her brow. Then she made a 
 face at herself in the mirror, a sad good little face. 
 She thrust out her rounded chin, let the corners of 
 her mouth droop until her red lips spelled a kind of 
 childish piety. She contemplated the effect from 
 beneath lowered lids and was not satisfied. 
 
 "It s this horrid little turned-up, sophisticated 
 nose that spoils everything. And I can t change it!" 
 She giggled, flirting herself this way and that, con 
 templating the side view and the back view of her 
 art from a hand mirror which reflected the image 
 she made in the larger glass. 
 
 After much thought she reached back and plucked 
 two short tendrils from the braids behind so that 
 they lay like smoke rings on the nape of her white 
 neck.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 35 
 
 "They do look unintentional, as if I could not 
 help it. And they are just right!" she murmured. 
 
 There was a knock at the door. 
 
 "Is that you, Thompson? Never mind. I don t 
 need you this morning. I am doing my own hair," 
 she called out, still absorbed in that business. 
 
 "Are you up, Olive?" came a cool voice, authori 
 tative but feminine, from the other side of the door. 
 
 "Oh, it s you, Auntie. Come in!" 
 
 Mrs. Thurston entered. 
 
 She was very handsome, with the expression of 
 an old worn-out beauty who has come down to the 
 hard nails of worldly wisdom and means to enforce it. 
 
 Her black eyes, still brilliant beneath the wrinkled 
 lids, smarted angrily upon her niece as she advanced. 
 
 "Don t muss me, Auntie! If you are going to 
 kiss me, do it somewhere else. It has taken me an 
 hour to make up," cried that young person, who 
 continued to pluck and dab at her head with ab 
 sorbed attention. 
 
 "What on earth are you doing to yourself?" ex 
 claimed the old lady. 
 
 "I am trying to make Olive Thurston look sweet 
 and good and innocent. Now, doesn t she?"
 
 36 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "No, she does not. You look like an adventuress 
 who has taken up church work, if you ask me!" 
 snapped Mrs. Thurston, seating herself with the air 
 of one who has come on purpose to tell the truth and 
 nothing but the truth. 
 
 "That s it exactly!" laughed Olive. "I am an 
 adventuress; all the girls in my set are. And now 
 suppose I am going to take up church work. That 
 would be an adventure!" 
 
 "This is no joking matter, Olive; I want to talk 
 to you seriously." 
 
 "Oh, not this early in the morning, Auntie. You 
 know you are never quite agreeable until afternoon." 
 
 "I have no intention of being agreeable." 
 
 "Yes, I know the symptoms, dear; you ve lain 
 awake all night, couldn t sleep." 
 
 "Yes, I have!" 
 
 "Then you did sleep?" 
 
 "No, I didn t not a wink!" 
 
 "Thinking about me, of course?" 
 
 "Yes, and I must speak to you, Olive." 
 
 "Well, if you must, you must, but wait till I get 
 ready. I can t stand it perpendicularly," she said, 
 flinging herself upon the bed and folding her hand
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 37 
 
 over her head. Her knees fitted neatly over the side. 
 She began to do a whispering dance with her slip 
 pered feet upon the rug. 
 
 "I m ready, go ahead," she sighed. "But hurry; 
 I ll have to do my hair again." 
 
 "This affair has gone far enough, Olive." 
 
 "What affair?" 
 
 "This flirtation with that bleached Indian you ve 
 picked up." 
 
 "He is not an Indian, Auntie. I wish he was!" 
 
 "Well, then, who is he, what is he?" 
 
 "He he really, I don t know exactly who he 
 is. He s very reticent." 
 
 "He s not a gentleman, I can tell you that!" 
 snapped the old lady. 
 
 "No, not what we call a gentleman. That s his 
 fascination. I m so tired of gentlemen. He s the 
 first man I ever met in my life." 
 
 "He s a village clown. He doesn t know how to 
 dress, and he doesn t know what to do with his 
 hands, and he s 
 
 "Oh, yes, he does, dear; he works with them," 
 Olive interrupted. "He s a hardware merchant, 
 handles plows and things!"
 
 38 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Olive!" 
 
 "Yes," exclaimed the girl with animation, as she 
 sat up beaming, "and you ought to feel his hands. 
 They are hard!" 
 
 "Olive! do you mean to admit that you ve been 
 holding hands with that that person? " demanded 
 Mrs. Thurston, gazing in horror at her niece. 
 
 "I have! But it was no easy matter, I can tell you, 
 Auntie; not in the least like avoiding Dickie Blake s 
 flabby fins like my dear, it was like having a 
 black and angry eagle clamp you with his claws!" 
 she said, with delicious awe. 
 
 "You are perfectly shameless!" gasped her aunt. 
 
 "I know I am. It s the way I ve been brought up. 
 But he s not shameless. He didn t want to do it. 
 He hates me because he loves me." 
 
 Mrs. Thurston was too scandalised for words. 
 
 "It was last night at the Ralston s ball. You 
 know how absurd Dickie was Dickie s cocktails 
 don t go to his head. They can t, nothing there. 
 They go to his heels. He wanted every dance. At 
 last I made some excuse, got away, went out in the 
 garden, and there he was roosting on one of the 
 benches, like that, you know."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 39 
 
 "Like a burglar!" sniffed Mrs. Thurston. 
 
 "No, he had an invitation. I asked Mrs. Ralston 
 to send him one." 
 
 "You are making yourself perfectly ridiculous, 
 letting everybody know of this, this infatuation, 
 this hysteria. Mr. Blake was furious last night." 
 
 "Yes, I know it. When he came out looking for 
 me that was when it happened John caught me 
 to him. He groaned, he was so mad with himself 
 for doing it!" She laughed triumphantly. 
 
 "Has it gone as far as that calling him John 
 and allowing him to embrace you?" 
 
 "Not exactly embrace. But it has got as far as 
 John and Olive, " she admitted. "And why are 
 you making such a fuss? Dickie was as near drunk 
 as he could be last night. If he had called me Olive 
 he always does, you know if he had kissed me, 
 would you have minded? " 
 
 "You know why I should not. We expect you to 
 marry Mr. Blake, and Mr. Blake expects you to." 
 
 "But why? What is Dickie? What has he ever 
 done? What will he ever do but play golf and polo, 
 and drink cocktails and get fat and have softening 
 of the brain?"
 
 40 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "He is your own kind, and he has a fortune of 
 i over a million dollars!" warned the old lady. 
 
 "But what kind is our kind, Auntie? What do 
 we do except seek some further excitement, some 
 new experience? We are always going the limit. 
 That s the way we live and fight ennui. Don t you 
 see how natural it is for me to want something dif 
 ferent like John Arms, who is so strange to me 
 that I cannot even imagine what he is really like? 
 And what is there new in marrying a million dol 
 lars? You never really marry the man that s got the 
 million. Money makes our kind free too free." 
 
 "These high ideals are not like you, Olive." 
 
 "I know it. Borrowed them from John!" she 
 laughed. 
 
 "Are you seriously contemplating marriage with 
 this adventurer?" demanded Mrs. Thurston. 
 
 "Well, he s contemplating it seriously," Olive 
 confessed, flushing. "But don t call him an ad 
 venturer, dear. An adventurer has imagination, 
 enterprise. John hasn t got a bit. I m not sure but 
 I suspect him of being dull, and of attending divine 
 worship on Sunday. An adventurer is the mascu 
 line of me selfish, designing, irresponsible, ex-
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 41 
 
 travagant. John is wilful, not selfish, determined, 
 hot designing, and thrifty. Do you know, he took 
 me to a moving picture show yesterday, five cents a 
 ticket!" She laughed. She shrieked and clapped 
 her hands in a perfect gale of merriment. 
 
 "Olive, I entreat you to be sensible," moaned the 
 old lady tearfully. "You will regret it to the longest 
 day you live if you do not give up this madness." 
 
 "I know I shall, Auntie. And after it s over, I 
 can t sue him the way we do for alimony. He hasn t 
 got anything but a widowed mother and an old house 
 in Valhalla. I m doing my best not to do it, but at 
 the same time I know I m trying with all my might 
 to win him," she answered with sudden soberness. 
 
 "You are crazy! That man has hypnotised you!" 
 
 "No, it s myself, the way I ve lived, always crav 
 ing, craving something different." 
 
 "Do you, can you possibly think you are in love 
 with him?" cried the other, wringing her hands in 
 genuine distress. 
 
 "That s it: I don t know," said the girl, looking 
 at her queerly, as if she contemplated a mystery. 
 "What do we know about love, the women of our 
 kind? It is an adventure, isn t it like the rest?
 
 42 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 We try it out, and cast it from us for the next one, 
 don t we?" 
 
 "Any one would think you had no morals to 
 hear you." 
 
 "Well, I m not sure that I have. But, Auntie, 
 wouldn t it be splendid to to develop a character, a 
 real character of your own, not like just your kind 
 and gingham morals?" 
 
 "Gingham morals!" gasped Mrs. Thurston. 
 
 "Yes, you see we would be poor." 
 
 "But you are not poor. You have a fortune of 
 your own." 
 
 "That s one funny feature of the situation. He 
 says we shall live on what he earns. Think of it! 
 like camping and doing your own work!" 
 
 "You ve never camped longer than three weeks, 
 and you couldn t stand it six months." 
 
 "I know it. And naturally I do not take him too 
 seriously about that. I should of course be able 
 always to have what I want." 
 
 "You ve actually been thinking about marrying 
 him, Olive. Every word you say reveals that. I 
 never could have imagined your folly going as far 
 as that."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 43 
 
 "I didn t sleep a wink last night thinking of just 
 that," the girl said, smiling helplessly. 
 
 "It s preposterous!" 
 
 "Yes," sighed the culprit. 
 
 "I m glad you admit it, and I shall exercise my 
 authority to save you from further scandal. Your 
 Uncle Richard is your guardian. He placed you in 
 my care. I positively forbid your seeing or com 
 municating with that man again!" she said, rising 
 stiffly. 
 
 Olive sat looking at her a moment, very pale. 
 Then her eyes suffused with tears. She flirted over, 
 buried her face in the pillow, and began to weep 
 hysterically. 
 
 "There, my dear, of course you are a bit ashamed. 
 But everything is all right. Girls do such foolish 
 things sometimes," murmured Mrs. Thurston, 
 highly gratified, as she bent and patted the black 
 head. 
 
 "Don t cry. You will spoil your pretty eyes. 
 I ll send Thompson up at once. Mr. Blake has been 
 waiting all this time downstairs with the car. He s 
 come for that drive we are to take out to the Shoals 
 this morning."
 
 44 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Oh, Auntie, please excuse me. I can t go, not 
 to-day I I feel like a widow!" sobbed the girl. 
 
 "Bless the child! Very well; have your cry out. 
 I shall tell him you have a headache. We will be 
 back for lunch." 
 
 She went out. 
 
 Olive continued to weep with the happy abandon 
 of youth until she heard the roar of Dickie Blake s 
 car in the street below. Then she sat up, every curl 
 on end, but with that sadly chastened look a woman 
 always wears when she has been obliged to give up 
 her ghost. 
 
 She seized the phone from the table. 
 
 "Central, give me Ivy, one, three, four, six," she 
 said, holding the receiver to her ear. 
 
 "Is it you?" she almost whispered, winking hard 
 against her tears. 
 
 Evidently it was. 
 
 "John, I can t!" she sobbed. 
 
 "What? No, I m not c crying. I m laughing. 
 It s all been so foolish." 
 
 "Do you mean Dickie? No, he isn t here. He s 
 motoring with Aunt Sarah." 
 
 "I can t tell you over the phone."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 45 
 
 "I mustn t. It s no use," she quavered. 
 
 "No, please don t come." 
 
 "See you where?" brightening. 
 
 "Oh, yes! I will, just to say good-bye." 
 
 An hour later a tragically pale but beautiful young 
 woman wearing a white tailored suit and carrying 
 the latest thing in parasols walked rapidly along 
 Peachtree Street. She was very calm, all things 
 considered. This, in fact, was the reason for her 
 calm. She had reached that conclusion every woman 
 reaches just before she marries, that she cannot, will 
 not, must not do it. Being young and compara 
 tively inexperienced in this matter, she did not know 
 that this was the negative state of the final affirma 
 tive. Her eyes were already fixed upon an automo 
 bile which stood beside the curb a block farther on. 
 As she drew near, the door was flung open. She 
 let down her parasol with a jerk and stepped in. 
 
 "No nice girl would do this," she whispered, as 
 John Arms drew her down beside him. 
 
 "Listen, dear," she went on with quivering lips, 
 "we can t do it. I should ruin your life. I ll have 
 to marry Dickie Blake. I m his kind, not yours. 
 Dickie plays the races, and I ve always played
 
 46 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 the men." She looked up at him as if suddenly she 
 beat her wings against him, terrified. He held her 
 in his arms, kissed her, would not release her. 
 
 "You can t trust me, oh, you can t trust me," she 
 sobbed, dropping her head upon his breast. 
 
 "I know it; I m only trusting myself," he an 
 swered with grave assurance. Then he leaned for 
 ward. 
 
 "Drive to Christ Church," he said, speaking to 
 the chauffeur. 
 
 "To Christ Church!" she exclaimed, startled. 
 
 "Yes, we can t be married in a taxi, you know," 
 he answered smiling, as he again pressed her to him. 
 
 "Oh, thank Heaven, I cannot escape from this 
 man," she murmured with a sigh of surrender. 
 
 Thompson was upstairs packing her young lady s 
 things. Her young lady had disgraced herself. 
 Her trunks were to be expressed at once to the 
 present seat of disgrace, a little unfashionable 
 resort somewhere in North Georgia. 
 
 Mrs. Thurston was below stairs, prostrated upon 
 the drawing-room sofa. 
 
 "I can t think what made her do it. She as
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 47 
 
 good as admitted to me only this morning that 
 she did not care for him," she was saying to Mr. 
 Blake. 
 
 "Sporting instinct; Olive is a gambler from her 
 heart out. Risk anything," he answered. 
 
 He was really a very intelligent man of his kind, 
 and just now he was feeling very much as he often 
 felt when he staked too much money on the wrong 
 horse. 
 
 "Person at the phone who says he s a representa 
 tive of the press. Wishes to speak to Mrs. Thurs- 
 ton," announced the butler from the door. 
 
 "No, I ll go," said that lady, rising and waving a 
 detaining hand at Blake, who made as if to spare 
 her this disagreeable experience. Dickie was out 
 of the running now, she reflected as she went out. 
 The less he said, the sooner he disappeared alto 
 gether, the better. 
 
 Where a rich young man marries a chorus girl, 
 it is one of those matrimonial "casualties" which 
 society ignores until the rich young man reappears, 
 minus the chorus girl. But where a rich young 
 woman marries out of her own class, somewhere 
 beneath her financially, that is a different matter,
 
 48 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 seriously damaging, and the scandal must be covered 
 up even if you gag on your own rage while you do it. 
 
 As Mrs. Thurston placed her ear to the receiver, 
 she was too much agitated to be introspective, but 
 she was nevertheless equal to the situation. 
 
 No, her niece had not married a chauffeur! Cer 
 tainly not! She had married Captain John Arms, 
 of the Valhalla Volunteers. Member of the cele 
 brated Virginia Arms family. Yes, she admitted 
 that the wedding had been quite unexpected, but 
 the reporter was instructed not to say that in his 
 paper. He was only to announce the marriage 
 and the groom s ancestry. 
 
 "I might have said he owned an iron foundry," 
 she said regretfully as she returned to the drawing- 
 room. 
 
 Meanwhile, Dickie had considerately made the 
 wisest possible disposition of himself. 
 
 "I m taking the night express to New York," 
 he told her. 
 
 "Yes, it s very warm here. I don t blame you," 
 said the old lady, with admirable poise. 
 
 "But I may run down later in the season," he 
 added as he took his leave.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 40 
 
 Dickie was a New York importation. So were 
 the Thurstons, for that matter. Richard Thurston 
 came to Atlanta with his wife and niece, who was 
 also his ward, only a year since for business reasons. 
 He was a cotton broker. Mr. Blake had followed 
 as a matter of course, having nothing in the world 
 to do at the time but to court Olive. 
 
 He was not overwhelmingly cast down at the 
 denouement of that affair. It was all in the game. 
 But he thought with a cryptic smile as he ran down 
 the steps to his car that he would come back, say 
 in about three months. He would give Olive three 
 months to get through with this adventure. 
 
 Your prophecies are always made for you by 
 the one who rocked you in the cradle, or by some 
 one who kissed you before you were married to 
 some one else. They are your apocryphal scriptures, 
 written for you in sighs or in spite. And, left to 
 yourself, nine times out of ten you would come true 
 to your apocrypha. But who is left to himself or to 
 herself? You cannot work out your own damnation 
 with that consistency planned for you, nor even your 
 salvation. Somebody comes along and seizes you by 
 the hand, and says, "You belong to me. My life shall
 
 50 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 be your life. My God your God. My fate your fate!" 
 Farewell prophecies! Hail all contradictions! 
 You are no longer just yourself. You are the mere 
 accompaniment of some one else. Your whole life 
 henceforth consists in erasing your own life, even 
 when you struggle most to preserve it. You re 
 solve that you will do thus, and you will not do so. 
 And immediately you do not do thus, and you do 
 do so. Ages which you thought were buried in the 
 dust of centuries dark and deep bind you. Little 
 hands as frail as the green tendrils of growing vines 
 detain you with the strength of bonds. You are dis 
 solved by the forces about you. You exist only to 
 impart life, not to live yourself. This is the ultimate 
 fate of every man and every woman. Courts cannot 
 give freedom, wealth cannot buy it. We are in 
 bondage to the inevitable. And the inevitable is the 
 awful God of destiny withstanding us in the face 
 of this husband or this wife, in these conditions 
 which we cannot change, in every day and every 
 night of all the years. It sounds terrible, and it is 
 terrible, but in it consists the only safety. No man 
 is fit to be the captain of his own soul. And no 
 woman can be the right keeper of her own heart.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 51 
 
 The one belongs to God, and the other belongs to 
 man. When women have their wish of equal rights, 
 when children are born of health, and not disease, 
 when Capital is Labour, and Labour is Capital, when 
 we have accomplished all reforms even to the last 
 one of living in love and charity, the same inequali 
 ties will still exist between man and man, and be 
 tween men and women. We can do nothing alto 
 gether of ourselves, but always handicapped and 
 strengthened and finally destroyed by that other 
 one who seized us long ago in the narrow bridal path 
 of the great illusion, love, which is the only true 
 prophet, because it is the one everlasting illusion. 
 
 It was six o clock in the afternoon one week later. 
 
 Valhalla faced the setting sun, gray gables among 
 the green trees, open verandas like countenances 
 very old and kind showing above the frowsy syringa 
 and lilac bushes. The high, thin chords of the "Maid 
 en s Prayer" played upon an ancient piano floated 
 plaintively from some parlour window on the 
 Avenue hoopskirt music in an old hoopskirt town. 
 Sparrows chirruped in the magnolia trees. A little 
 whirlwind of dust and yellow leaves arose from
 
 52 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 somewhere and came bobbing, whirling, down the 
 street and suddenly dissolved like the airy spirit of 
 nothingness, leaving the pavement before the Arms 
 house spattered with dying leaves shining like fairy 
 gold upon the ground. 
 
 One would have said that this place was a memory, 
 a dream, an old faded picture in an old musty book, 
 not a real place at all, and that nothing could hap 
 pen there just as something was about to happen. 
 
 The night express blew in the hills above the town. 
 
 Mrs. Arms came out upon the veranda. She wore 
 a stiff black silk gown which spread out and rustled 
 magnificently upon the floor behind, old lace in the 
 sleeves and pinned above her breast with the minia 
 ture brooch. Her thin hair lay as smooth as two 
 white wings folded upon her head. She wore that 
 expression of repose which an old woman can al 
 ways assume when she is agitated. She looked down 
 the Avenue toward the station. That was the train ! 
 John and his bride would be coming presently. She 
 hurried back into the house, moved from room to 
 room inspecting ^everything, making sure that no 
 chair had set one leg before the other while she was 
 upstairs dressing. She suspected her chairs. She
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 53 
 
 had often observed that although every one might 
 be in its place against the wall, when she returned 
 some little old rickety mahogany rocker would be 
 out of line, leaning back with its nose turned up. 
 But upon this great day every leg toed the mark, 
 every tidy hung stiff fringed as it should hang. She 
 w r ent into the dining-room. The table glistened; the 
 silver tea service winked at her. No matter who the 
 girl was that John had married, she had never seen 
 handsomer silver nor thinner china, she reflected. 
 
 And she did not know whom he had married. His 
 letter announcing the event was brief. No lover s en 
 thusiasm about his bride. He had merely said that 
 they were married, and when they should come 
 home, and would she ask Colonel Ripley to meet 
 them at the station with his car, which was, in fact, 
 the only car in Valhalla, except one other, which, 
 for reasons, was barred from society. 
 
 She thought, she hoped, John could be trusted 
 in this matter of choosing a wife. He was a sensible 
 man, not flighty. Still, her hands trembled as she 
 went back to the veranda at the sound of wheels 
 and of a motor softly purring, and of a high, young 
 voice keen and sweet as the notes of a flute.
 
 54 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 The next moment a marvellous being flew up the 
 walk between the box hedges and precipitated her 
 self upon the old lady s breast. 
 
 "I m John s wife, Mother; not the girl he should 
 have married, just the one he did marry!" 
 
 Was she sobbing or was she laughing? The mother 
 embraced her, and made this inquiry of John, who 
 replied with smiling eyes that it did not matter which 
 his wife was doing, she did both with equal effect. 
 
 As it turned out, Olive was doing both. When 
 she lifted her face from Mrs. Arms s shoulder, her 
 eyes were full of tears, and her lips were sweetened 
 with the most adorable smile. She stared at the old 
 lady as one contemplates an old and beautiful 
 masterpiece, while Mrs. Arms looked again at her 
 son, as much as to say, "What does this mean, 
 John? You are a hawk and you have married a bird 
 of Paradise." 
 
 For Olive was lovely beyond any creature she had 
 ever seen, enhanced by the fine art which gathers 
 beauties to beauty, perfumed with a fragrance as of 
 all flowers, slender, dark, richly flushed, perfect with 
 that perfection which makes one wonder what it is 
 good for.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 55 
 
 John kissed his mother for an answer, and the 
 beginning was begun, but the end was nowhere in 
 sight, though each of the three must have wondered 
 what it would be. 
 
 The "infare" which followed wedding suppers 
 were always called "infares" in Valhalla was an 
 event which promised to be as solemn as a funeral. 
 John and his bride sat together at one end of 
 the long table. Mrs. Arms commanded the other. 
 On either side were the men and women whom 
 John s wife would be permitted to know, according 
 to the usage of the best manners and customs of 
 that place. 
 
 Olive wore a white gown, very simple, she thought. 
 It was really the most amazing garment ever seen in 
 Valhalla. Cut very low, bodice beaded with pearls, 
 no sleeves at all, her head and shoulders rising out of 
 it like a brilliant exotic flower. She was very gay, 
 talking to every one without looking at any one. 
 Meanwhile, every eye was fixed upon her except those 
 of her husband. The women stared with prim re 
 serve, the men with open admiration. 
 
 Colonel Ripley arose to propose a toast to the 
 bride. He was a wizened, gray old veteran with one
 
 56 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 leg two inches shorter than the other, owing to that 
 same circumstance of being a veteran. 
 
 He stood one-sided like an old bent sword, hold 
 ing his glass high. 
 
 "We drink, John, to your wife," he began. "Some 
 women are like flowers, very pale and fair; some 
 are like fruit, very fine and sweet. Some are lean 
 and some are fat (from whom, God, deliver us); 
 but here s to the fairest flower, the finest bunch of 
 grapes, the most beautiful bride ever seen in Val 
 halla." 
 
 Every old, plump, withered wife at the table let 
 down the curtain of her face. They had all been 
 fair brides once upon a time. 
 
 "May you have many returns of this happy 
 day," the Colonel went on, bowing to Olive, who 
 clasped her husband s hand beneath the table; 
 "and may all your troubles be little ones, my 
 dear," he concluded shamelessly, as Olive gasped 
 and dropped John s hand. An old man at a wed 
 ding often is guilty of a kind of irreverence to 
 the bride. 
 
 They clinked glasses and drank the toast awk 
 wardly. The women as if it were a bitter medicine;
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 57 
 
 the men bobbing their bald heads at Olive as if they 
 tasted her in the glass. 
 
 "I drink to my mother," said John, rising, "to 
 the wives and mothers of Valhalla. May my wife 
 grow like them is the dearest wish of my heart," 
 he concluded, bowing to Mrs. Arms. 
 
 Olive swept both sides of the table with her bright 
 glance and resolved, so help her life and all cosmetics, 
 art and clothes, that she would never "grow like" 
 these five frowsy, lethargic wives who, however 
 serviceable and good, had no charm and no grace in 
 their years. She wondered as she looked at her hus 
 band if he really meant it, or if he was merely pro 
 viding a compliment with which to cover and excuse 
 their stupidity. 
 
 They filed out of the dining-room, the women still 
 silent, the men talking loudly, doing their mascu 
 line best to differentiate the occasion from a funeral. 
 But you never can do that at a wedding except in 
 well-trained society. The women will not be gay, 
 not if they are old and experienced in the marriage 
 relation. The freshness, youth, and happiness of the 
 bride remind them of something long past, like 
 another life out of which they died years and years
 
 58 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 ago when their children were born, and they gave 
 up their ghosts to become the bond servants of the 
 next generation. 
 
 This was the trouble when Colonel Ripley 
 suddenly discovered that his wife was not 
 present. She had disappeared like a voluminous 
 old lady thunderhead the moment they entered 
 the parlour. He always missed her when she 
 was not with him, and he never was aware of 
 her when she was beside him. He hastened to 
 find her. 
 
 Mrs. Ripley sat in the deepest darkness of the 
 veranda with her handkerchief pressed to her eyes. 
 Her feelings stuck out in a kind of bristling wifely 
 indignation at the Colonel, who was always wound 
 ing them. 
 
 "What on earth is the matter, Mother?" he ex 
 claimed, skipping up to her. 
 
 "I m not a flower nor a fruit ! I m old and 
 fat, Mr. Ripley," she sniffled; "but I can remember 
 the time when you thought I was the fairest bride. 
 Still, I never showed my person to the public as 
 John Arms s bunch of grapes is d dangling her 
 self before all eyes."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 59 
 
 "Bless my soul, Mother, you are the harvest of 
 all things to me, and you are not fat. I never thought 
 of such a thing!" exclaimed the lying, gallant old 
 husband, endeavouring to embrace his sheaf of all 
 things. 
 
 "You felt it, which is worse! And right now you 
 are in love with her, every one of you are," she 
 sniffed. Which was the truth. The five old wives 
 knew it, though their husbands were far from sus 
 pecting their own romantic defection. The best 
 man is an unconscious vandal where a pretty woman 
 is concerned. 
 
 While all this was going forward, Olive had at 
 last fixed her attention upon some one. This was a 
 girl who sat on the left of Mrs. Arms at the table. 
 She was no longer young, but she had that unmis 
 takable starved maiden stare which often defines 
 the unmarried woman far gone in her twenties. 
 Never once did she look straight into the face of 
 John s wife, even when she greeted her so becom 
 ingly, nor afterward when they exchanged some 
 words which neither remembered nor meant, they 
 were so absorbed in guessing about something else. 
 
 A bridegroom is always the author of the bride.
 
 60 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 And the handsomer she is, the more engaging, the 
 more does he feel justified in remaining in the back 
 ground. This is why brides are so prominent im 
 mediately after the wedding. She is his trophy, the 
 intimate victory of love. As a trophy Olive was a 
 stunning success. She showed all those indications 
 brides show of not yet belonging entirely to her 
 husband, of having been won but riot conquered. 
 She was the gay spirit of the evening. She flirted 
 quite naturally with the men. With equal ease she 
 almost ignored the gentle old wives, even when she 
 floated from one to another declaring with sweet 
 animation that she "adored" everything, and Val 
 halla was a "dream of a place," and didn t they 
 think so? They did not, but they did not know how 
 to say so. They merely said that she would soon 
 get acquaintedj and they hoped she would not be 
 "too lonely," and that she would be happy, "hop 
 ing" being the one term brides cling to until they 
 fold it away with their wedding garments. 
 
 When the guests were gone and Olive was alone 
 with her husband in their chamber, she inspected 
 him, she stared at him through the mirror as he 
 stood before the window. Then she went to him,
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 61 
 
 slipped her arm in his, rubbed her head feline 
 fashion against his shoulder, and said: 
 
 "John, who was that girl?" 
 
 "What girl?" he asked innocently. 
 
 "You know; the only one, who sat beside your 
 mother at the table," she accused, smiling up into 
 his stare. 
 
 "Oh, that was Anna Berry." 
 
 "Why didn t you marry her?" 
 
 "What a question! Didn t want to; never 
 thought of it. Why?" 
 
 "She s in love with you." 
 
 "Nonsense!" 
 
 "Yes, and she d have made you exactly the kind 
 of wife you want me to be like the others here to 
 night," she sighed, permitting herself to be folded 
 in his arms. 
 
 "Didn t you like them?" he said, kissing her. 
 
 "Yes" faintly "but how can their husbands 
 love them, I wonder. Do you really w r ant me to be 
 like them?" 
 
 "Not yet," he admitted, smiling down at her with 
 candid desire. 
 
 "They John, they reminded me of fat old prov-
 
 62 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 erbs. Isn t there some mention of them in the 
 Bible the woman who praiseth her husband within 
 the gates? I never saw them before; to-night they 
 were all here; and their husbands didn t praise 
 them at all only you, who have not got a proverb 
 for a wife," she ended with a giggle which was a 
 half sob. 
 
 Then her thoughts went back to Anna. 
 
 "But that girl, John, she didn t look even as 
 cheerful as a proverb ; like one of the sadder psalms. 
 Did you notice her mouth?" 
 
 "No, certainly not!" as if he would clear him 
 self of this scandal at once. 
 
 "Oh, you must have; her lips were pale, so 
 bravely sweet, John, as if she would have opened 
 them only to say Selah if you burned her at the 
 stake." 
 
 "Olive, are you unhappy?" demanded her hus 
 band, getting to the root of the matter at once. 
 
 "No; but John, I love you like a transgressor. 
 I couldn t cry Selah if you burned me at the stake, 
 and I don t want to live just to praise you within 
 the gates!" 
 
 "It s the way the best women have of praising
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 63 
 
 themselves," he returned, with that grave mascu 
 line conceit which is characteristic even of the 
 bridegroom. 
 
 "Thank Heaven, I m modest!" she laughed, 
 placing her hands against his breast and swinging 
 back in his arms. "I don t want to be a best wo 
 man. I want to be loved because I am myself, not 
 a scriptural reminder of sorrow and all the virtues." 
 
 "But do you want that?" he asked gravely, 
 searching her as a man looks for a secret in a woman s 
 eyes. 
 
 "Oh, I do! If you don t love me more than I can 
 possibly love you, dear, I don t know what will 
 h happen," she said, flinging herself upon his 
 breast. 
 
 She was, in fact, a little thankful since seeing 
 Anna. Her husband was less merely a mystery to 
 her, more her own man, to have and to hold against 
 all others. What else, she asked herself, did this 
 uneasiness, this ache somewhere in her mean? 
 
 No wife ever settles herself in her husband s arms 
 with the passionate determination to stay there till 
 death parts them until she finds this other woman 
 whom he might, could, would, or should have loved.
 
 64 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 The first thing every bride does is to search for her 
 until she discovers her. And she is not contented 
 until she does. After that the only difference is that 
 she knows the name, the features, the dress, and 
 character of her discontent. And the back of her 
 hand is to that woman, even if for reasons of strat 
 egy she adopts her for her dearest friend. The 
 victim she chooses for this role may be innocent. 
 She may be the last person in the world who could 
 attract her husband. That has nothing to do with 
 the case. She must exist in the mind of the wife, 
 either potentially or really, as surely as the mar 
 riage ring encircles her finger. She is the postscript 
 of the wedding ceremony which serves to clench the 
 bands, and she is strictly a feminine illusion, this 
 other woman. Many a man has lived and died, and 
 married twice without ever feeling a pang of jeal 
 ousy for his wife. Your good wife never inspires that. 
 But however faithful her husband is, the wife does 
 not live who has not felt the pangs of jealousy, even 
 if she is only jealous of the beautiful girl she was 
 when he fell in love with her. 
 
 Jealousy is no part of love. It is simply the raw 
 seam of that relation which irritates love.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 65 
 
 Olive had found this enemy sought and feared by 
 every wife in the person of Anna Berry. And that 
 which was far more significant than she could im 
 agine was that she herself became almost at once 
 this enemy of every wife in Valhalla who laid eyes 
 upon her opulent beauty and candid charm. 
 
 If she had known, she would have been amused, 
 not offended. She knew how far she could be inno 
 cent, and exactly how guilty she had a right to be. 
 If at this time she had resolved her sense of acquisi 
 tive femininity into a creed, it would have read 
 something like this: "I am for all men to love a 
 little, and I myself will love only one if I can." 
 
 When a young man marries he knows he has 
 done something right and he is proud of it; but 
 when an old bachelor marries he knows he has done 
 something queer and he is anxious about it. 
 
 John Arms was more than anxious. He was in the 
 state of a man who has invaded a foreign country, 
 seized a valuable hostage, and is now determined 
 to make her a native of his own country. This is 
 not an easy thing to do even when the victim is 
 willing to be naturalised. But it is especially hard
 
 66 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 where the difference is not in nationality, but a 
 difference in social caste. You may live five blocks 
 further down-town and belong to a civilisation as 
 different as if it were six thousand miles away across 
 the sea. The great divider in this world is not 
 morals nor manners, nor culture, nor the lack of 
 culture. All these things may be acquired or 
 abandoned as the case demands. But it is money. 
 Poverty may separate a man from the world to 
 which he belongs by right or birth, education and 
 attainments. Wealth is often the only thing which 
 keeps a man out of the gutter and slums where he 
 belongs. It begets an arrogant consciousness of 
 superiority where no superiority really exists. It 
 affords a fool a sense of assurance which nothing 
 that he is or can do justifies. It enables him to 
 despise and abhor other people who are better than 
 he is, because they wear dingy clothes, do dingy 
 things, practise contemptible economies. They 
 offend his delicacy. For that is one thing wealth 
 inspires in the most degradingly indulgent people, 
 a neurasthenic abomination for the odour of grime, 
 sweat, and honest labour. They are as clean outside 
 as the other man is inside. And God himself can-
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 67 
 
 not teach them the significant difference in these 
 two conditions. 
 
 John had married a rich girl and he was himself 
 almost wretchedly poor. He had no compunctions 
 about that. He believed with a sort of elemental 
 dignity that if a man was poor, endured hardships, 
 his wife was no better than he was. She must en 
 dure the same condition and accept the same hard 
 ships. He was not one of those men who long to 
 give their wives "everything," surround her with 
 luxuries and keep her in idleness, and who serve life 
 sentences to hard labour, practise ignoble methods 
 to win wealth, all to this end. In his dull way he 
 believed this was wrong, immoral. That if a man 
 worked, his wife should also work; if he econo 
 mised, she should be thrifty. In his opinion there 
 was nothing tragic, nothing to regret, in having 
 taken Olive from an existence based upon false 
 standards of wealth and indulgence. He was not 
 responsible for the fact that she had started life 
 wrong. She would now begin it right. He had this 
 understanding with her before their marriage. She 
 was not to spend her own money. She must live 
 within his means, adjust herself to the simplicities
 
 68 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 and necessary economies of their station in life. It 
 would not be difficult, he told her. Every one in 
 Valhalla was poor. She had agreed. It was true 
 she looked at him a little vaguely, but most adorably 
 submissive. 
 
 "Yes," she had said, tucking one of her pretty, 
 delicate hands beneath his big, hard palms. He 
 felt it tremble, like the wing of a bird, "and it 
 will be lovely living like that, something new." 
 
 "No," he interrupted, "something old, as old as 
 man, and right." 
 
 "Yes, like beginning in the first garden with 
 just a few things," she giggled shamelessly, at 
 which he smiled in spite of himself, though he felt, 
 somehow, that she was missing the point. 
 
 "Olive, my beloved, it will not be like that." 
 
 "No?" crooningly, as if it didn t really matter. 
 
 "It will be hard; work, you know, self-denial, 
 no fine things, no pleasures except the simplest, no 
 companionship except with the simplest God-fear 
 ing people 
 
 "Women who do not curl their hair, and who say 
 their prayers, and who believe it s wrong to play 
 cards, and who think they love their neighbour as
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 69 
 
 themselves; yes, I know," she recited, thrusting 
 her other hand beneath his, as if she conceded that 
 wing also. 
 
 "You do understand?" he insisted, looking at 
 her doubtfully. 
 
 "Yes. And do they stand behind their husband s 
 chair when they have their pictures made? I d love 
 that, John!" 
 
 "Well, it s not as bad as that, but far more strenu 
 ous. And it s for keeps, Olive. I shall never be a 
 rich man," he answered solemnly. 
 
 "And when I come into my fortune I m not 
 of age yet, you know I ll give it to What ll 
 I do with it, dear?" she asked, as if she referred 
 to an extra garment which she would not need 
 this trip. 
 
 "You ll want to spend it, my lady. That s what 
 you will want to do, and that s when the trouble 
 will begin, because as my wife you can t, not a dollar 
 that I do not earn myself and give to you." 
 
 "I understand, and you are perfectly grand, John, 
 and I m in love with you! And you will give me 
 street car fare are there street cars in Valhalla?" 
 
 "No!"
 
 70 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Then we can save that expense," she sighed 
 thankfully. 
 
 At the time he thought, he was sure, she under 
 stood as nearly as she could without experience, 
 and that she meant to abide by the agreement. But 
 later, when he had more knowledge of his wife, he 
 discovered that she got quickly through under 
 standing his point of view upon any matter, was 
 radiantly interested until she did, then she returned 
 to her own mind, her own conviction on that sub 
 ject, whatever it was, with a sort of directness which 
 left nothing else to be said. 
 
 She remained elusive, either consciously or un 
 consciously beyond his reach. He loved her dearly, 
 and was afraid to show how dearly. He was no 
 sooner aware of this than he was also aware of the 
 fact that she had divined it, and that she was far 
 from resenting the situation. He could not escape 
 from the impression that he was something she had 
 acquired that lived, moved, and had a being, which 
 was delightful in the nature of a toy. He resented 
 this feeling, being a man, and not accustomed as so 
 many women are to the toy-consciousness of re 
 lationship to their husbands.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 71 
 
 "I ve married my enemy all right," he said grimly 
 to himself one day as he blustered among the 
 plows and trace chains in the back of his store. 
 "But I ll make her my wife." 
 
 At the same time Olive was pacing to and 
 fro in the room upstairs, primping it with her 
 own things, giving it an air, preparing to seduce 
 John with pretty touches of colour and charm, 
 little luxuries and conveniences on his old "high 
 boy" and upon her own old-fashioned dressing 
 table. 
 
 So long as there was something to conquer in 
 John, there was something absorbing in her line to 
 do which w r ould keep her mind off the main issue. 
 The main issue she had recognised it by this time 
 was that Valhalla was not her world; these 
 drowsy village folk with their scriptures and their 
 prejudices were not her people. These days, so 
 placid, so uneventful, so utterly empty of all ex 
 citements, dances, dinners, balls, and card parties 
 were not her kind of days; and these nights were 
 not her nights, when John returned to her, tired, 
 silent, but ever with that brooding question in his 
 eye, as much as to say:
 
 72 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Well, is the struggle on? Not yet? Good! Kiss 
 me!" 
 
 Whereupon she did kiss him, and she was en- 
 chantingly sweet with that beam in her eye which 
 always answered his question, as much as to. say, 
 "That, Mr. John, is in the next act. This one is so 
 interesting, and you are so funny and helpless, dear, 
 we will go on with these lines, please." 
 
 He resented this attitude and he could not change 
 it. He was not so much her husband yet as he was 
 a wager it seemed that she had made to raise the 
 wind. 
 
 These soft autumn evenings were not the usual 
 change of season. They were simply a stage setting 
 filched by Olive from the elements for a certain 
 drama. He could not doubt, however, that she 
 liked it, was enraptured with it, with him, and with 
 everybody she needed in it. 
 
 We are all actors, some good, some bad. We re 
 cite our lines as if we wrote them ourselves from the 
 fullness of life, instead of having inherited them, or 
 had them put in our mouths by the times in which 
 we live, or by the emergency of the present moment. 
 Or, we stumble upon the boards too soon or too late,
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 73 
 
 get in our little speech while the audience is cheering 
 some one else, miss our cue, sneak back into the 
 wings without having been noticed, although we 
 have just given our lives in a good cause. It all 
 depends, I say, upon whether we have the histrionic 
 gift for living, whether we are good actors or bad. 
 Olive was a good one. She was born to star a role, 
 any role she chose. She literally lived it, that part. 
 The only question was whether she could or would 
 keep on living in it. 
 
 Apparently she had no thought of changing now. 
 On the contrary, she was developing with startling 
 genius all the possibilities this drama suggested. 
 
 "I just love this house, John," she said one day. 
 "It s so quaint, so faintly, sweetly fragrant of the 
 souls of women, of all the sad things they make and 
 cherish in their loneliness." 
 
 "These tidies," she went on, turning in her chair 
 and running her fingers through the fringe, "they 
 are eloquent of the life your mother has lived. So 
 industrious all the long, silent evenings for so many, 
 many years with just her needle and thread. What 
 was she thinking? Women do think, you know, 
 when they sit like that."
 
 74 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 John looked at her, startled. This divination con 
 cerning his mother was almost uncanny. 
 
 "You didn t talk with her, did you, dear?" 
 
 "No, not much. We are not a loquacious family," 
 he admitted uneasily. 
 
 "And you don t talk much to your wife, either, 
 do you, John?" 
 
 "What is there to say? " 
 
 "That s it; nothing at all. No news, no gossip, 
 no different plans for to-morrow or next year. I 
 have to invent things to say. It s delightful. And 
 everybody is so dear and dead, except you, John. 
 You are very much alive, only you don t know how 
 to prove that," she concluded, laughing and pre 
 tending that she was fearful of the liberty she took 
 of kissing him, which was exceedingly grateful to 
 his vanity. 
 
 One evening when they walked through the town, 
 which brooded silent and still in the twilight, she 
 quite unwittingly gave herself away. 
 
 "It is beautiful," she said, looking about her, 
 "this place where the trees drop their leaves like 
 fairy gold, and the flowers almost speak to you, 
 and the people come and go like men and women in
 
 75 
 
 legends. I shall always remember Valhalla as the 
 loveliest ballad in the world." 
 
 "Remember?" he repeated quickly, glancing 
 down at her. 
 
 "Well, I mean, I think of it that way," she an 
 swered, confused. 
 
 "When you live in a place for years you do not 
 remember it, you do not even think much about it, 
 you become part of it." 
 
 "Yes, I suppose so," she replied faintly, as if he 
 had suddenly caught her by the wings and revealed 
 to her w r hat she did not know was in her mind. 
 
 "But, please kiss me, John, when we get back to 
 the house," she added after a pause. "I feel much 
 the need of being kissed." 
 
 "Very well, we will turn back now," he agreed, 
 wondering at her resiliency, her ability to return 
 fresh and wilfully sweet to the one thing they had 
 in common, their love. 
 
 A woman may be excited, very much frightened, 
 without knowing that she is. Olive was in this 
 state before the honeymoon month of her marriage 
 ended in blustery October weather. She would 
 not permit herself to think of the future. At the
 
 76 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 same time she was subconsciously arranging that, 
 fold beneath fold of her myriad mind. She was 
 reproducing John in a person he would never have 
 recognised. He was not so lacking, however, in 
 telepathy that he did not instinctively feel this new 
 presence of himself in Olive s thoughts. She had a 
 card up her sleeve. He knew that. And she con 
 cealed it with more than her sleeve, with blandish 
 ments of every charm she possessed. That is to say, 
 he was sure of her, and he was not sure of her. This 
 is the experience of the most fortunate lovers, but not 
 of many husbands. He admitted the enchantment, 
 but, good Lord! would she never let him put his 
 feet upon the ground? This was precisely the point. 
 She would not, for in her opinion it meant putting 
 them upon the neck of her spirit. He had every 
 thing else, and her allowance was lying idle in the 
 bank. She would keep something. 
 
 Meanwhile she passed the time as best she could. 
 She did not know how to do any useful thing, but 
 she endeavoured to learn with an energy which was 
 distracting to her victims. The furniture in the 
 parlour lost its head under her directions. That 
 staid old room took on an air of garish publicity.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 77 
 
 Flowers glowed upon the marble top centre table 
 where the family Bible had rested since John could 
 remember beside a walnut-framed, glass-eyed tele 
 scope and a tray filled with pictures of famous 
 places. 
 
 The Bible was stowed on top of the piano with 
 its gilt-lettered back to the scandal. The piano, 
 closed these many years, was wide open. It had 
 apparently lost three front teeth owing to the ab 
 sence of ivory on these keys. Now with its cover 
 reared back it seemed to grin at some joke. The 
 chairs jollied each other leg to leg in circles, as if 
 company had just left, much company of the lively, 
 companionable kind. Mrs. Arms put on her glasses 
 now when she went into the parlour lest she should 
 stumble over the sofa, which had been moved from 
 the wall facing the fireplace. 
 
 She was devoted to her daughter-in-law. Olive 
 brought life into the house. Never before had Mrs. 
 Arms been associated with a young being who, upon 
 the slightest pretext, or even with none at all, would 
 precipitate herself upon this aged breast and insist 
 upon being embraced in a perfect ecstasy of some 
 thing which resembled hysteria, or happiness, she
 
 78 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 did not know which. Sometimes the girl would 
 laugh merrily at nothing and kiss her on each cheek. 
 Sometimes the old lady thought she saw tears in her 
 eyes. But she could not see well. Besides, the 
 child s eyes were naturally so bright. If she could 
 ever have made sure of those tears, she would have 
 mentioned the circumstance to John. John, she 
 thought, did not know what a treasure his wife was. 
 Men were like that when they made a good mar 
 riage; took it for granted. Olive would make a 
 splendid housekeeper, too, if she could ever teach 
 her anything whereupon she would sigh at her 
 own limitations in this line. For she could not teach 
 her. She knew this was her fault, because Olive was 
 so bright, so eager to learn. She tried her with every 
 thing, from making bread to simple darning. And 
 Olive learned everything quickly, with adorable 
 animation, like a little girl playing dolls. But she 
 never did anything right afterward. One might 
 suspect this was perversity, the mistakes she made, 
 but for the ardour and earnestness with which she 
 accomplished these errors. 
 
 One morning shortly after breakfast they both 
 saw John limping painfully up the Avenue.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 79 
 
 "What is the matter, dear?" cried Olive, meet 
 ing him at the door and assisting him as he hobbled 
 upstairs. 
 
 "I don t know," he groaned; "frightful pain in 
 my heel, can t lean my weight on that foot." 
 
 "Don t tell me you have rheumatism!" ex 
 claimed Mrs. Arms. 
 
 "It s the very mischief, whatever it is," he said, 
 making a face as he took off the shoe, then the sock. 
 
 Immediate relief. He held up the sock, looked 
 at it, felt of it suspiciously. 
 
 "Oh! I remember now," said Olive, with a gasp. 
 She snatched the sock from him and fell back, 
 laughing hysterically. "I forgot and left the needle 
 in the the darn!" she explained, replying to their 
 astonished stare. 
 
 "Really, I m sorry, John, and I ll never do it 
 again!" she pleaded, still laughing. 
 
 These little things happen to the newly married, 
 but usually if the wife is the culprit, she is filled 
 with remorse, she is dissolved in tears. It was not 
 the needle which stung John most deeply, it was 
 this unfeeling mirth. There was something cryptic 
 about that.
 
 80 
 
 Mrs. John did not confine her activities to the 
 home circle. 
 
 Colonel Ripley had insisted upon her being 
 elected sponsor to the Valhalla Volunteers. She 
 was pleased. So were the Volunteers. She went 
 twice a week to the baseball park, the only place 
 of amusement in the town, and sat on the bleachers 
 with the rag-tag audience to watch the company 
 drill. And she was always accompanied by Anna 
 Berry, who looked as if she had been dragged 
 there which was near the truth. Olive would 
 have her. She attached herself with a "we-have- 
 something- in-common" air which Anna could not 
 resist. 
 
 They, that is, Olive, were invariably surrounded 
 by the Volunteers after the drill. Drolly awkward 
 khaki-clad men of all ages and conditions who said 
 little but stared much at this beautiful vivacious 
 lady who had dropped among them like a naming 
 tropical bird. Anna was in the ring, but out of the 
 running. 
 
 When John suggested that she ought not to go 
 except when he could leave the store and come too, 
 she said:
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 81 
 
 "I do it for Anna s sake, dear; she is such a dear, 
 dim little thing. I m bringing her out. She needs 
 the diversion. She has so few, you know." 
 
 He said no more, but he lost custom after that 
 by closing the store earlier on these days and at 
 tending the drills. 
 
 "Olive," said Mrs. Arms, one fatal day, "The 
 Placid Hours meet with Mrs. Ripley this afternoon." 
 
 "The Placid Hours, Mother?" interrupted the 
 girl. 
 
 "Yes, it s a club we ve had for years, composed 
 of some ladies who are interested in music, art, lit 
 erature, you know." 
 
 "Yes," answered Olive with suspicious primness. 
 
 "And you ve been asked to help with the enter 
 tainment. It s quite a compliment." 
 
 "What can I do, Mother?" 
 
 "Recite, or sing something. You do sing, don t 
 you?" 
 
 "Yes a little," she answered demurely. 
 
 "Then do that, it s the very thing." 
 
 "Are you sure?" 
 
 "Of course, the ladies will be so pleased. We ve 
 just finished Taming the Shrew. Anna Berry
 
 82 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 gave a splendid paper on the Heroines of Shake 
 speare at our last meeting. We should like something 
 a little different now." 
 
 "Very well; if you insist I will," said Olive 
 modestly. 
 
 Mrs. Arms was pleased when she came down 
 dressed for the occasion. She wore such a simple 
 little white frock, a trifle short, to be sure, but 
 Olive s feet were so neat, and the skirt was very full. 
 Her hat was a plain, broad-trimmed Leghorn with 
 one rose merely clinging to it, as if attracted by 
 the rose face beneath. 
 
 "You look like a girl of the 60 s, my dear. They 
 were pretty girls, I can assure you," she said, with 
 the pride of an old lady who is suddenly reminded 
 of her own youthful beauty. 
 
 The Placid Hours sat like old round-faced clocks 
 ticking with their knitting needles, talking between 
 the "papers" which were read. Then they moved 
 up, so to speak. They were all attention. 
 
 "We are very glad to welcome Mrs. John Arms 
 among us. I have the pleasure to announce that 
 she will now favour us with a song," said Mrs. Rip- 
 ley by way of introduction.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 83 
 
 "Favour us" was a favourite expression in Val 
 halla. You always "favoured" the company when 
 you recited "Curfew Shall Not Ring To-night," or 
 when you read a selection from "Lalla Rookli." 
 
 Olive rose and went toward the piano, which was 
 opened for her. But she did not sit down. She 
 stood before it, stole a glance at Mrs. Arms, who 
 was endeavouring not to look the pride she felt in 
 being so nearly related to this lovely creature. 
 
 Olive opened her lips and began to sing. No one 
 understood. The words were French. So were the 
 gestures that accompanied them. 
 
 She spread her arms before her, primped up her 
 eyes; looked away, apparently she was telling 
 something very intimate about herself. She touched 
 her breast airily with one flying finger. She pointed 
 significantly at first one foot then the other, lifting 
 them with marvellous agility as she did so. Then 
 she abandoned herself to the expression of this 
 emotion, whatever it was. As she sang she began to 
 dance, at first very timidly, making little plaintive 
 sounds by way of accompaniment. At last she 
 whirled into a perfect frenzy of motion, the song 
 changing accordingly, becoming violent, insistent.
 
 84 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 She spun upon one toe while she elevated the other 
 at right angles to her person. 
 
 The Placid Hours flattened themselves against 
 the wall, their eyes bulged, their mouths fell open. 
 Not one of them had ever seen a ballet, but they 
 had "heard of such things." 
 
 "My dear," said Mrs. Ripley to Mrs. Evelina 
 Bray, who had not been present, "she made no 
 attempt to keep her skirts down. Every minute 
 we expected to see something, but we never did. I 
 don t know how she managed it, the brazen thing!" 
 
 "I feel so sorry for John s mother. Such a lady 
 as she is, and always has been," said Mrs. Bray. 
 
 "Well, I m sorry for John Arms. And I have 
 been from the moment I laid my eyes on that girl. 
 I told Mr. Ripley the night they came home, when 
 we dined there, that she wouldn t do." 
 
 "Do you suppose he could have married a chorus 
 girl?" 
 
 "They say not. Mr. Ripley knows her uncle, 
 Richard Thurston, by reputation. They are very 
 wealthy people. We ve heard that John s wife has 
 money." 
 
 "Well, she certainly has brass."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 85 
 
 Several days passed before Mrs. Arms could trust 
 herself to speak to Olive about what she had done, 
 and of which she seemed artlessly innocent. At 
 last she made up her mind to tell John. And she 
 did, glossing the thing over. Still she thought per 
 haps he ought to speak to Olive, caution the child a 
 little. People were so ready to misinterpret a thing 
 like that. She had herself entirely recovered from 
 the shock. Olive had not been properly reared, that 
 was apparent. But she was a dear good girl. 
 
 John found his wife kneeling before the window 
 in the parlour trying to coax a little yellow butter 
 fly by trailing a spray of goldenrod before it. 
 
 "You see the poor thing has been born in the 
 wrong place, and at the wrong time of the year. It 
 must die!" she said, looking up at him. 
 
 "Olive, what was that thing you sang the other 
 day at the Ripleys ?" he demanded, seating him 
 self not too near, and coolly ignoring the fate of the 
 butterfly. 
 
 "Oh, that! It was a little French song; you do 
 it with a dance." 
 
 "So I hear," he said grimly. 
 
 "Well, what about it?"
 
 86 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Just this: my wife does not sing that kind of 
 song nor dance that kind of dance!" he said 
 sternly. 
 
 Silence. The butterfly lifted itself on feeble 
 wings, wavered and dropped upon Olive s head, 
 clung there like pale gold among the dark curls. 
 
 John brought himself to look at her. He knew 
 that this was dangerous. Still he risked it, but with 
 a severity of expression which Powhatan himself 
 could scarcely have surpassed. She was very pale, 
 and she stared at him with terrified eyes. 
 
 "Oh, John, don t look at me like that," she 
 whispered. 
 
 "You knew it was wrong!" 
 
 "Afterward, yes. I ve been so miserable, dear, 
 every day since, expecting this." 
 
 "Why did you do it?" 
 
 "I don t know," she sighed. "I felt desperate, 
 as if I had to do something awful, move a mountain, 
 or something. And I can t budge you, John. Your 
 name should be Peter, the Rock, dear. So I moved 
 The Placid Hours." 
 
 He continued to cover her with a look as cold as 
 ice.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 87 
 
 "I think," she went on, "it comes from being 
 good so long. I m not used to that. We are good 
 a little, and then we do other things, not bad, but 
 exciting, you know. Besides," she added, with a 
 hysterical titter, "I wanted to stir them up, those 
 old Placid Hour women, and I did. They will never 
 forget it." 
 
 "No, they never will," he answered bitterly. 
 
 "Not if I m very quiet and good all the rest of 
 my life? I feel now that I can be. Please don t 
 look at me like that!" she cried, covering her face. 
 "I love to sing, John. I ve done that and danced 
 since I was little," she said from behind her hands. 
 "And you ve never asked me once to sing for you. 
 Are you looking kinder now?" 
 
 He refused this information. She dropped her 
 hands to see, and evidently felt some encourage 
 ment. 
 
 "Listen, dear; I ll sing something just for you," 
 she cried, springing up and going to the piano. 
 
 She spread her ringers upon the yellow keys. 
 They tinkled plaintively, like an old lady who re 
 members the tune but cannot quite make it:
 
 88 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "In days of old, when Knights were bold 
 And barons held their sway, 
 A warrior bold, with spurs of gold, 
 Sang merrily his lay ..." 
 
 She looked at him over her shoulder, smiling as she 
 went on, lifting her rich young voice until it filled 
 the room with the splendour of all the memories of 
 love and courage : 
 
 " My love is fair, my love hath golden hair 
 And eyes so blue, and heart so true, 
 
 That none with her compare. 
 
 So what care I if death be nigh; 
 I ll live for love or die. 
 
 I ve fought for love, I ve fought for love, 
 For love for love, I die!" 
 
 "Olive, my heart," he cried, lifting her, pressing 
 her to his breast with fierce strength. 
 
 She felt his tears upon her cheek, looked up in 
 wonder and triumph. 
 
 "The mountain is moved at last," she thought to 
 herself with a happy sigh. 
 
 "You love me, John?" 
 
 Undoubtedly he did, with deep trouble in his 
 heart. Never once had he put this everlasting 
 question to her.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 89 
 
 They heard the soft frow-frow of skirts, the tap 
 of two heels upon the floor. They sprung apart; 
 Olive dropped back upon the stool; John affected 
 to have been engaged all this time in folding his 
 evening paper. 
 
 "I thought I heard you singing, Olive, my dear," 
 said Mrs. Arms, coming into the room. She was 
 probably the only woman in the world who could 
 smile over her spectacles. 
 
 "Yes, Mother, I was soothing the savage breast. 
 Music hath charms for that, you know," answered 
 the girl gaily. 
 
 "I m glad you know the old songs," said Mrs. 
 Arms, and wished she had made better use of that 
 knowledge on a previous occasion. "I haven t 
 heard In the Days of Old since I was a girl," she 
 went on. "We used to sing it. You don t have 
 such songs now. I don t know what has become of 
 the old music. It was so sweet." 
 
 " You are it, Mother. And John is the chorus. 
 He repeats himself like that, over and over. But," 
 she added plaintively, "what is one to do if one 
 can t sing it, nor live it, this ballad life of the 
 past?"
 
 90 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 For dajs after this the Arms household enjoyed 
 that kind of peace which comes from being 
 easy for the moment, but expecting any moment 
 that a certain anguish would begin again. Olive 
 was making a home reputation for being the 
 source of all happiness and the prognostication of 
 much unhappiness. She was always amiable, with 
 that dangerous sweetness which one feels cannot 
 last. "Always" was a term which did not belong 
 to her, which never defined her. She skipped 
 from one mood to another as if presently she 
 would have tried them all out. And then 
 Heaven help us all! And doubtless the devil would 
 claim his own the devil was a very real person in 
 Valhalla. 
 
 One night the three sat at the supper table. Olive 
 was glowing. She had been to watch the drill as 
 usual. She thought Colonel Ripley was "such a 
 funny old dear." 
 
 "He always comes to greet me, throwing that 
 game leg high in the air, as if he meant to shake 
 hands with his foot!" she said. 
 
 "That s the way he does, exactly," said John, 
 laughing.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 91 
 
 "By the way, I saw somebody there this after 
 noon," Olive added presently. 
 
 "A lot of us were there," put in John. 
 
 "Yes; but she was different, like the italicised 
 word in the sentence." 
 
 Mrs. Arms primped her mouth and exchanged a 
 glance with her son, as if they had a guilty secret 
 between them. 
 
 "You must have noticed her, John; the woman 
 in the car who wore the red coat and moved herself 
 like the banner of your company. Very handsome, 
 very enthusiastic over the Volunteers." 
 
 John refused to admit that he had noticed such a 
 person. 
 
 Olive looked from one to the other, at first curi 
 ously, then with twinkling mirth. 
 
 "You must be alluding to Mrs. Bigsby, my dear," 
 said Mrs. Arms primly, after a pause. 
 
 "What about her? She looked familiar to me," 
 insisted Olive. 
 
 "I don t know her, my dear; never met her. And 
 John doesn t know her either," explained the old 
 lady quickly. 
 
 "Oh!" exhaled Olive. She was gratified. She
 
 9-2 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 had found the skeleton in Valhalla s closet. She 
 had no idea such a pretty, iridescent skeleton could 
 have been hidden there. Mrs. Bigsby was certainly 
 iridescent. Later, upstairs in their room, she re 
 sumed the subject. 
 
 "John, who is Mrs. Bigsby? What is her relation 
 to the situation?" she demanded. 
 
 "I m not in Mrs. Bigsby s confidence," he an 
 swered coldly. 
 
 "Oh, you sharper than a serpent s tooth, good 
 man, John, how you can bite when you wish to 
 damn!" she laughed. 
 
 "Olive, you must never know that woman, 
 nor speak to her, nor admit that you even see her!" 
 he said, slowly and with emphasis. 
 
 "Is she as bad as that?" 
 
 "She is divorced." 
 
 "But, John dear " 
 
 "We will say no more about her," he interrupted, 
 leaving the sting of his wife s curiosity still smarting. 
 
 Two days later she hurried to meet him when he 
 came home in the evening. 
 
 "Absolve me, John, quickly!" she cried, standing 
 before him in the hall.
 
 MAKING HKR HIS WfFK 03 
 
 "What is it? What are you bilking about?" he 
 asked. 
 
 "I know her; I ve met her; arid I ve spoken to 
 her Mrs. ]Jig-;by!" she said rapidly. 
 
 "You have spoken to that woman rny wife!" 
 
 "How could I help it? I was in the drugstore. 
 She frame in, walked straight to me, said she was 
 glad to meet me -how could I help that? I couldn t 
 say, A vaunt, false woman! My husband says he s 
 not in your confidence! could I?" 
 
 "Thin is no joking matter, Olive," said John 
 sternly. 
 
 "f knew it, dear; I feel like a Sadducee, con 
 taminated, first time in rny life, though I ve known 
 as many divorced women as any other kind! 
 
 For the first time, also, her cheeks began to red 
 den angrily beneath her husband s gaze. 
 
 "You only said she was divorced," she exclaimed. 
 "I may be divorced myself some day, and then you 
 won t like it if nice people refuse to speak to me." 
 
 "Hush! You don t know what you are saying." 
 
 "Yes, I do!" she cried, but still trying to muster 
 herself. "You are narrow, cruel in your judgments, 
 less charitable than the people I have known."
 
 94 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 A sort of ashened pallor spread over his face. She 
 was frightened, and went on trying to defend her 
 self. 
 
 "In Rome, John, you do as Rome does, because 
 you can. There are a lot of things to choose 
 from and still be enough like the Romans not to 
 excite criticism. But here in this place there 
 aren t! Nothing but the Ten Commandments to 
 live by, and a few of the more damaging to happi 
 ness scriptures, written by prophets in their sour 
 old age and, well, I just can t measure up; I 
 don t know how!" she sobbed, backing away 
 from him. 
 
 "There s one thing every wife must learn," he 
 began, following her. 
 
 "What s that?" stopping shortly. 
 
 "To obey her husband!" he answered slowly. 
 
 "And there s one thing every husband does learn!" 
 she returned. 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "That she won t!" she cried, flaring. "Oh, I 
 begin to think my name is spelled with a don t ! 
 It s Don t, Olive, don t, don t, from morning un 
 til night, until I ve don ted so much, there s noth-
 
 95 
 
 ing left to do!" she sobbed, turning swiftly and 
 flying upstairs. 
 
 If you want to start a woman going, just keep on 
 trying to stop her. John had not got this far in the 
 wisdom of that sex. He was still firmly fixed in the 
 convictions of his own sex which are somewhat 
 drastic so far as women are concerned. He went 
 into the parlour and sat down. 
 
 The curtain had fallen on the first act. Upstairs, 
 Olive was arranging the scenes for the next; he 
 knew that. The thing which irritated him most was 
 that she had begun by placing him in the wrong. 
 He was indignantly conscious of showing up in this 
 unfair light to her, but he never doubted that he was 
 right. And Olive, who lay weeping upon her bed 
 upstairs, would have trembled if she could have 
 known what a grip John was taking downstairs upon 
 the curtain of that next act.
 
 PART TWO
 
 PART Two 
 
 WHEN an engaged couple quarrel there is 
 a remedy at hand. They look at each 
 other, coldly disillusioned. He per 
 ceives for the first time that she has a mole in one 
 of her eyebrows. Strange that he had never noticed 
 this disfigurement before! She notices that he is 
 slightly bow-legged. Why had she never realised 
 how ridiculous he was ! How could she ever have con 
 templated marrying a bench-legged man ! 
 
 "It has all been a hideous mistake. I do not, 
 never could, love you," she says, with conviction. 
 
 "I m glad we found it out before it was too late," 
 he replies, with evident relief. 
 
 She returns his ring and his letters, has a good 
 cry, and there is an end of the matter at least, 
 until they "make up." Then the girl says con 
 tritely : 
 
 "It was so foolish to quarrel over such a little 
 thing when we really love each other!" 
 
 99
 
 100 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "And we will never wound each other that way 
 again, dear," he answers tenderly. 
 
 "Of course we shall disagree " she begins. 
 
 "Naturally," he finishes; "but we can do that 
 calmly and lovingly." 
 
 Beatific arrangement, sealed with kisses. 
 
 So they are married, with the confident expecta 
 tion of living happily ever after, the experiences of 
 all other married people to the contrary, notwith 
 standing. 
 
 It is like the vow to remain sober that a man makes 
 with absolute confidence and sincerity after a par 
 ticularly bad "spree." He cannot keep it. He will 
 not even want to keep it, because he is a drunkard. 
 Marriage does not change the nature of a man, nor 
 of a woman. It only develops the same along the 
 edges. Each will have his or her rights, though they 
 may be the other s wrongs, though the heavens fall 
 and love dies a murdered death. 
 
 This is why the first quarrel after marriage is 
 such a tragic affair. They were not expecting it. 
 Each had done his or her best for the first three long 
 weeks to avoid this very thing possibly they got 
 through the fourth week, but this indicates more
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 101 
 
 coolness and wisdom than love usually imparts to 
 its victims. 
 
 And the perfectly awful thing about it is that 
 there is no remedy. The outraged young wife can 
 not return the marriage ring. The indignant hus 
 band cannot stalk from out her presence never to 
 return. Law, society, have them both by the neck. 
 She must go on being the wife of "this this Brute," 
 w r ho has no regard for her feelings. He must go on 
 cherishing this serpent in his bosom who is cer 
 tainly not the woman he took her to be. 
 
 What on earth are they to do about it? 
 
 Only nature which precipitated this situation 
 knows that they will live through it, and through 
 many more like it, until they become callous to each 
 other s limitations and perversities and learn to ac 
 cept them as the bad weather of their common 
 human heinousness. 
 
 Olive and John had just entered this danger zone 
 of matrimony. They had quarrelled about Mrs. 
 Bigsby. 
 
 John was downstairs talking to his mother as if 
 nothing had happened; Olive was lying face down 
 ward upon her bed upstairs, w r eeping furiously.
 
 102 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 She had a double grievance. She had married a 
 stranger, a man whose standards and whose train 
 ing according to those standards made him seem 
 almost of a different species to her own. 
 
 This, she thought with renewed rage, would not 
 be so bad if she could do anything with John, broaden 
 his views, make him see a few things as she saw 
 them, and live a little as if life were a jolly good 
 thing and not a long sentence to righteousness, 
 poverty, and duty. The worst of it was that he 
 was equally determined to reduce her to his own 
 standards. She was to have no life, no will of her 
 own. She was to "obey" him. 
 
 "Oh!" she gasped, leaping from the bed and 
 pacing the floor with clenched hands. 
 
 If you would see the emotional drama in its 
 keenest manifestations, observe a woman alone 
 with a grievance in her own room. No actress famed 
 as a tragedian can equal, much less surpass, the 
 dimmest, dumbest woman in such a state of upheaval, 
 with only God and her own soul for an audience. 
 
 "He associates with all kinds of men; every man 
 does. But he would choose my friends as if I were 
 morally irresponsible!" she said, like a furious
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 103 
 
 Lady Macbeth working herself up to the point of 
 murder. 
 
 "I will speak to Mrs. Bigsby. I will be seen with 
 her, whatever that means I ll, I ll lay my head on 
 her bosom. I ll show John a thing or two. And 
 let him do his worst. I wish he would do his worst. 
 I m so tired of this d-damn stagnation that I don t 
 care what happens, so something happens!" 
 
 At this she stood with staring eyes and parted 
 lips, the tears upon her cheeks. The vision she sud 
 denly beheld, following when she showed John "a 
 thing or two," and when he really began to do his 
 worst, was so terrible that she flew back to the bed, 
 flung herself upon it, and wept aloud. Being thus 
 cast down, she was still the great tragedian. 
 
 "I will never speak to him again until he apolo 
 gizes," she wailed, kicking the footboard and writh 
 ing in the anguished strength of that resolution. 
 
 "No, thanks, Mother, I will not be down to sup 
 per. I have an awful headache," she answered, when 
 Mrs. Arms, who was in happy ignorance of the trag 
 edy, came up and knocked at the door. 
 
 She remained alone with her sorrow. She wanted 
 to get possession of her soul again in the quiet dark
 
 104 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 room. Where had her soul been, anyhow, these four 
 weeks, while she had been piping and dancing to 
 John, doing everything he said do, and nothing that 
 she wanted to do ! 
 
 She did not really know that she had been ex 
 pecting him to come up to her after supper until 
 she heard him go out and slam the door after him. 
 
 "What does that mean?" she said, sitting up and 
 listening. "He never goes out at night." 
 
 She ran to the window, thinking he might look 
 up at it. He always did when he went out if she 
 was upstairs. But no. She could see him striding 
 down the Avenue, looking very huge in the half 
 darkness, with his hat pulled far forward over his 
 eyes. 
 
 "As if he meant to make a night of it!" she 
 could not help exclaiming, with an hysterical giggle. 
 
 She stood a long time before the window, a sadly, 
 sweetly dishevelled figure, with the cold autumn 
 moonlight streaming over her. She expected every 
 minute to see him returning. Surely he would not 
 be cruel enough to keep her in this suspense. He 
 must realise by now how wicked and cruel it was to 
 speak to her the way he had spoken about Mrs.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 105 
 
 Bigsby and about obeying. In polite circles 
 wives did not obey their husbands; it was only 
 among the lower classes that they obeyed. 
 
 At last she turned away with a sigh. One more 
 illusion gone. She had been married only one 
 month, and she knew already that her husband 
 stayed out in the evenings. But where? There were 
 no clubs, no saloons, no place where the men of his 
 kind naturally would go. 
 
 She went to the dressing table, lighted a little old 
 glass lamp which had a wreath of coloured flowers 
 round the pot-bellied chimney, and sat down to 
 look at herself. 
 
 If any woman is left alone with a mirror, no mat 
 ter how old and faded she is, no matter how young 
 and confident she should be by her fairness and 
 beauty, she will seek a certain confirmation in that 
 shining surface. The old woman will gaze sorrow 
 fully at her image as if it were her naked soul, as if 
 every wrinkle were a prayer she had said which had 
 not been answered. And the young one will search 
 for new possibilities of loveliness if she is happy, 
 and with fearful anxiety for the first shadowy line 
 of something awful if she is not happy.
 
 106 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 Olive was "perfectly miserable." She expected 
 to behold a countenance aged and pallid with grief. 
 
 It afforded her mournful satisfaction to discover 
 a flush upon her cheeks as of angry roses blown in 
 a storm. Her lashes were still wet, like dew upon 
 thorns among roses. Her eyes were bright with bit 
 ter grief, her lips were fiercely sweet. Her hair hung 
 in a black cloud, framing all this prettiness and 
 sadness. 
 
 Beauty is shamelessly provident of itself. This 
 is why the exceedingly pretty girl is so much more 
 apparent than the modestly homely girl. The 
 former will not be lovely just in the wings. She 
 must and she will come forth, very demure, of 
 course, but where she can. be seen. Change the 
 modelling 1 of their features and the homely girl will 
 do the same. 
 
 "If," thought Olive with a sigh, as she regarded 
 her reflection in the mirror if I were in New York, 
 now, I should be at the theatre in a box. Or I should 
 be at a ball, dancing, with not nearly enough dances 
 and Dickie Blake would be making love to me. 
 Dickie could make love. At least he knew that 
 much ! " Which was in the nature of a dark reflection
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 107 
 
 upon some one who shamefully neglected his op 
 portunities. 
 
 She wondered vaguely if she regretted Dickie 
 no, not Dickie, but life, the splendour and excitement 
 of all that world out of which she had dropped. Yes, 
 "dropped" was the right word. 
 
 She thought of Mrs. Thurston. At least she did 
 not regret Aunt Sarah. The contrast between that 
 lady and John s mother was overwhelming in the 
 latter s favour. She had written once to her aunt, 
 an affectionate and enthusiastic letter. The reply, 
 long delayed, had been as coldly reserved as if Mrs. 
 Thurston had addressed it to the whole Arms family. 
 It implied plainly that since Olive had chosen her 
 bed, no doubt a skimpy, hard one, she must lie upon 
 it. She could not understand how a girl brought 
 up as she had been could bring herself to make such 
 a useless sacrifice of her future. Still, she hoped she 
 would be "happy." 
 
 Uncle Richard would not return from abroad 
 before the latter part of December. Olive supposed 
 there would be another bad time then, when she 
 would be reminded of all she had missed and undone 
 for herself. She was glad she had written to him,
 
 108 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 too, before her lips quivered before she discov 
 ered what kind of a man John was, and how hard 
 everything was going to be; that is, until she could 
 change everything for on this point her mind 
 never wavered for a moment. 
 
 But where was John? What could be keeping 
 him so late? It was as if she were in prison. Noth 
 ing could deliver her from this room, from these sad 
 thoughts, but John. Why didn t he come home? 
 
 She looked at her watch. It was nearly eleven 
 o clock. She went back to the window and looked 
 out. Everybody asleep but the trees and the wind 
 and the leaves, sad little ghosts of summer days 
 whirling and flying past her window. 
 
 Meanwhile John was acting up to the nature of 
 being a man first and a husband afterward, which is 
 the manner of his kind. 
 
 He had gone back to the store to audit his books. 
 Not that this was necessary, but he felt the need of 
 doing something familiar and commonplace by way 
 of getting a grip on the situation. When a man s 
 wife offends him, he does not fall into the error of the 
 emotional drama. He leaves that to her, and her to 
 that, no matter how young and beautiful she is.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 109 
 
 He did not need the mirror for this business. But 
 if there had been a mirror above the old long-legged 
 desk in the back of the store he might have been 
 astonished at his reflection in it as he stood copying 
 entries upon his larger ledger. The Indian was up 
 permost in him. The expression of habitual repose 
 had deepened into a forbidding grimness. He was 
 at least thinking in the terms of war paint. 
 
 At last, when he could do no more with the books, 
 he slammed the covers, thrust his hands in his pock 
 ets, and began to walk up and down, kicking shovels 
 and plow points out of the way as he went. He re 
 called the first visit Olive made there and the last. 
 For she had never repeated it. Shortly after their 
 marriage she whisked in one day, and stood amazed 
 upon the threshold. He had seen that queer, mean 
 ing stare upon her face before she saw him standing 
 far back among the nail kegs and oil barrels. The 
 next moment she looked about her, made no com 
 ment. She stood lightly poised in all that dinginess 
 like a pretty bird concerned not to muss its feathers. 
 At length, feeling his curious, inquisitive gaze, as if 
 he were trying her out with these hard, ugly, useful 
 things, she affected an interest.
 
 110 
 
 "What on earth is that awful thing with grinning 
 red teeth?" she exclaimed, backing away from it 
 with a pretty pretence of terror. 
 
 "That s a harrow," he exclaimed. 
 
 "And these chains, are they for prisoners, dear? * 
 
 "No; for gears, for dragging logs," he answered, 
 smiling. 
 
 "Chains are associated in my mind with dan 
 gers," she said, mincing and peering at the row of 
 cheap stoves, at the clutter of irons and staves and 
 axes lying against the wall. 
 
 Finally, upon one of the shelves filled with tin 
 cans and crockery, she caught sight of a pale blue 
 glass pitcher with a bunch of gilt grapes raised on 
 the glass. It was finished with a pewter cover. 
 
 "Oh, John, what is that charming thing up 
 there?" smacking her hands together as if she 
 cheered the one bright object in this mean, dark place. 
 
 "That s a syrup pitcher," he answered. 
 
 "Do give it to me," she laughed. 
 
 He climbed up the rolling ladder and brought it 
 down. 
 
 "What use have you for such a thing?" he said. 
 
 "Oh, I don t want to use it; I want to keep it as
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 111 
 
 a souvenir. It s so funny, so splendidly, opu 
 lently cheap. It spells trade, doesn t it?" 
 
 "Well, I ve sold fifteen like it," he answered coolly. 
 
 "And you could sell a thousand, I suppose. Why 
 don t you get everything with gilt on it?" 
 
 "Because gilt is expensive, and my customers 
 are poor. That pitcher costs fifty cents." 
 
 "Oh, as much as that? Then you ll have to 
 credit me, John, for I haven t got fifty cents," she 
 laughed. 
 
 He saw that she was trembling; that there were 
 tears in her eyes. Then he went back to the till, 
 gathered up in one hand all the small change there, 
 and gave it to her. 
 
 She blushed furiously, and kissed him. He did 
 not know then why she blushed. He had given her 
 every penny he had. But now, as he tramped back 
 and forth, he knew. It was because he had, would 
 always have, so little to give her. 
 
 He remembered that she was in a hurry to be 
 gone and that she had never come again. Not un 
 til this night had he permitted himself to admit the 
 reason for that. This store with its display of poor 
 things for poor people was like a little mean stall
 
 112 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 on some back street in the city places one glanced 
 at but never entered. And he, her husband, was 
 the keeper of this stall. 
 
 If many of the women who vaunt themselves in 
 jewels and silks, and whisk superbly from one diver 
 sion to another in their limousines, could see the 
 way their husbands earn the money they spend, 
 they would spend it nevertheless, but they would 
 feel less pride in their hearts. After you make your 
 fortune, you may have a magnificent office and a 
 rosewood desk, but before you get it you may be 
 one of the curb gang on Wall Street who yell bids to 
 the fellow in the second-story window. Or you may 
 be the foreman of a sweat shop or even a peddler 
 of umbrellas, long before you knew your wife and 
 bought her with promises of jewels and fine raiment 
 and the limousine. 
 
 John, however, did not go far with his reflections. 
 He was a man whose imagination never carried 
 him further in his business than his capital justified. 
 
 The problem he faced was Olive, and the fact 
 that it was always the glitter which caught her eye, 
 whether it was a fifty -cent syrup pitcher or a thirty- 
 cent woman like Mrs. Bigsby. She had made a
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 113 
 
 joke of the pitcher, but she was evidently resolved to 
 make an unforgiveable fact of Mrs. Bigsby. 
 
 He knew that she was ashamed of him in rela 
 tion to his business, the narrow, cheap way he made 
 his living and hers. He was obliged to admit that 
 her attraction to Mrs. Bigsby grew out of her 
 familiarity with that kind of woman, in a circle of 
 society where Mrs. Bigsby would not be so outrage 
 ously offensive, because that kind of society was 
 polluted and degraded by wealth, license, and 
 inordinate self-indulgence. He was resolved to 
 change all that in his wife. But how? That 
 was the question. It is not so easy to make a 
 woman over once she has been made at all; and 
 it never occurred to him that he might make a 
 few admirable changes in himself by way of solv 
 ing the difficulty. 
 
 Some men are born to fight. They do not live, 
 they will make no concessions until they win. They 
 are like reservists behind the long battle line of life, 
 concealed by the commonplace, their natures and 
 their courage unsuspected until the crucial moment 
 arrives. You may live with them and never know 
 that they are waiting for this. They do not know
 
 114 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 it themselves. But when the hour strikes they come 
 forth armed and ordained to accomplish that thing, 
 whether it is to take a city or lead revolutions, or 
 merely to work righteousness when unrighteousness 
 is the fashion. 
 
 John Arms belonged to this class. Once he set 
 forth, he had to win, and he would or die. Never 
 once did it occur to him that Olive was a dangerous 
 wife for such a man; that she might possess a charac 
 ter equal in strength to his own, with different, more 
 subtle agility for achieving her will. The only thing 
 he knew was that he had married her, that he loved 
 her, and that he would make her a good wife to him. 
 After that he would do everything else, including a 
 large business. He felt that when he had Olive off 
 his mind and properly adjusted, he would put more 
 energy in the hardware business and he would suc 
 ceed at that because he had succeeded with himself. 
 Olive was that part of himself which required 
 discipline now. He did not think of her any other 
 way. 
 
 He looked at his watch. Ten minutes after eleven. 
 He turned down the lamp, watched the last blue 
 flicker of the dying flame, went out, locked the door
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 115 
 
 after him all done very deliberately, as if there 
 were no reason in the world to hurry and took his 
 way home through the sleeping town. 
 
 He did not plan what he would do, nor what he 
 would say to Olive. He simply knew that he was 
 tired, that he was going to bed and to sleep. He 
 knew so little of the candle-in-the-window spirit of a 
 waiting woman that it did not occur to him that 
 Olive might still be up. And he was moved as per 
 haps nothing else she ever did had moved him when 
 he looked up from the street and saw her standing 
 there, ghostly white in the moonlight, staring down 
 at him with a wildly tragic Charlotte Corday ex 
 pression through the black checks of the window 
 panes. Bless her! Was the girl awake still! He 
 hurried upstairs. 
 
 "John, oh, John, it s been so terrible!" she cried, 
 flinging herself upon his breast as he entered the 
 room. 
 
 "What s been terrible, my sweet?" he exclaimed, 
 folding her in his arms and kissing the piteous lips 
 upturned to his. 
 
 One might have inferred that he had not thought 
 of her; one could not have believed to see him thus
 
 116 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 that he had spent hours thinking of nothing else 
 but planning what he would do with her. 
 
 "Oh, it s been awful," she murmured between 
 kisses; "the suspense, not knowing where you were. 
 
 And no one could have believed that this trem 
 bling, tender woman could have spent hours plan 
 ning rebellion against this man. 
 
 "I didn t even know, John, if you would ever 
 come back to me!" she moaned. 
 
 "You dear little goose," he laughed; "I d come 
 back to you from the ends of the earth, from the 
 depths of the sea. I d walk upon coals of fire, I d 
 commit murder, stop at nothing which separated 
 me from you." 
 
 She sighed, looked up at him for the moment 
 shriven of every fond ambition. Contented merely 
 to be loved and to know that she was so loved. 
 
 "You are my business in life now: don t you 
 know that, Olive?" he added presently, lifting her 
 face and gazing into her eyes with a gravity which 
 she found disconcerting, for she said with a little 
 gasp: 
 
 "Oh, not that, John! I don t want to be your 
 business, please; but just your love in life."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 117 
 
 "Can t be one without being the other," he an 
 swered, lifting her, possessing her with all his 
 strength as he bore her across the room and laid her 
 upon the bed, folding the covers over her with rough, 
 dragging tenderness. 
 
 "There ! You should have been asleep hours since." 
 
 She considered all this. It was not what she ex 
 pected, what she had a right to expect; but it was 
 very good just the same. She thought it was John s 
 dumb, sweet way of apologising for the way he had 
 behaved. 
 
 She should have been very thankful that she did 
 not make the mistake of extorting the apology, even 
 supposing she could have got it. The wife who does 
 that learns to her sorrow that the one thing a man is 
 longest in forgiving her is the apology he is forced to 
 make. 
 
 Long afterward Olive heard an old and very wise 
 wife who had lived in singular peace with a very 
 difficult husband say: 
 
 "A woman should always be the first to ask for 
 giveness of her husband when there has been any 
 trouble between them. If the fault is hers, she 
 clears her skirts; if it is his, he knows it, and the fact
 
 118 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 that she assumes the blame only adds to his sense 
 of guilt, makes him work out his penitence slyly 
 but surely. It is much better than demanding an 
 apology which absolves him from the actual doing 
 of penitence." 
 
 Nothing had been settled by this first clash of 
 arms between John and his wife; neither had 
 yielded one jot or tittle to the other. The only 
 thing made clear by the incident was obscured for 
 both in the struggle which followed that love 
 may remain true to love in the hearts of a man 
 and a woman who are enemies, who have not a 
 single other interest to bind them together. This is 
 really a phenomenon of married life which has not 
 received the attention nor the confirmation it 
 deserves. 
 
 During the days that followed Olive showed a 
 decided change in the weather of her spirit. She 
 was grave; not pensive, but reserved. She made 
 herself as silent as John was. She no longer met 
 him in the evenings with that prancing, provocative 
 air so enlivening to the spirit of a tired man. No, 
 she did not care to go to the drill as usual on
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 119 
 
 Wednesday afternoon. She was tired of that parrot 
 business. Colonel Ripley was an old bore, that s 
 what he was, cavorting round her like an old lame 
 war horse. He made her sick, he and his Volun 
 teers! Why didn t they do something different, if 
 only it were a game of baseball! 
 
 She was also tired of going to church on Sunday. 
 "Oh, how do you stand it year after year!" she ex 
 claimed to Mrs. Arms one Sabbath morning. "The 
 same hymns, the same sermon really, though he 
 takes another text just to fool us and pretend it 
 isn t. He always glorifies St. Paul, as if St. Paul 
 were a near relative of his. He always shouts and 
 shouts about the upright man, blessed is the 
 upright man I should think John would get tired 
 of being exposed that way every Sunday to the envy 
 of the congregation," she concluded, with a sidelong 
 look at her husband, who was reading the Christian 
 Herald and who refused to permit his attention to 
 wander. 
 
 "Well, I m not an upright man, thank goodness," 
 she went on. "I m just a woman. But does he 
 ever say anything to us? Certainly not! We are 
 those jades his cousin St. Paul commanded to wear
 
 120 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 their heads covered, and to keep silent in the 
 churches, and to submit submit mit mit our 
 selves to our husbands." 
 
 "Olive!" exclaimed Mrs. Arms, astonished at 
 this Olive whom she had never seen before. 
 
 "It s the truth, Mother. I wonder you don t 
 resent it, a gospel for men only." 
 
 "My dear, the Bishop s going to preach to-day. 
 He s a very eloquent man. You will enjoy hearing 
 him," coaxed the old lady. 
 
 "Very well; if you insist, I ll go," she conceded, 
 implying that if any one else in that room made the 
 point, she would not go. 
 
 "But if it s a Bishop, I know he ll preach about 
 St. Paul. They always do, as if they were more like 
 him, and therefore better qualified to tell you how 
 far short the rest of us are." She added this as she 
 moved with lagging steps to get ready. Then she 
 paused in the door, looked back at Mrs. Arms, 
 seated with the Bible on her knee like a dim old 
 lady saint who has just received a shock. 
 
 "Mother!" she cried, flying back to kiss her, 
 "if only you could preach a sermon from the gospel 
 according to Martha!"
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 121 
 
 "My dear, you are irreverent. There is no such 
 gospel," exclaimed Mrs. Arms. 
 
 "Yes, there is! some day they ll find it, too. A 
 lot of tear-stained tablets with all your sorrows, 
 Mother, with all the griefs of all the women who 
 have ever lived written upon them. The thoughts 
 you ve had and believed rebellious; the beautiful, 
 beautiful deeds you ve done and didn t know were 
 beautiful at all they ll be w r ritten there, scrip 
 tures, too. And they ll be sweeter than the 
 psalms, braver than Moses, sadder than the cove 
 nant of Job and so much kinder than St. Paul to 
 just women." 
 
 The old lady was moved, her chin quivered, her 
 eyes filled with tears. She took off her glasses and 
 tried to look at John. She hoped he was absorbed 
 in that Herald, that he was not listening. 
 
 Olive hoped he was listening. 
 
 "Yes," she went on, "and if ever you did preach a 
 sermon, Mother, I d be there. I d say Amen! 
 I d come and kneel at your altar, dear, and con 
 fess my sins to you; just to you, for you d under 
 stand that they were not sins at all, only blind 
 sorrows. But, so help me, I ll never tell them nor
 
 122 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 admit them to any man ! " she concluded, laughing, as 
 she ran from the room. 
 
 "Got grit in her little gizzard, hasn t she?" 
 this in a deep bass voice from behind the Herald. 
 
 "What what did you say, John?" asked his 
 mother, looking round at him guiltily. 
 
 He did not repeat it, only laughed. 
 
 Things were changing fast, and Olive thought 
 she was making progress somewhere. She did not 
 know exactly where. 
 
 One evening when he came in John looked round 
 for her. It gave him a curious weaned feeling not 
 to find her waiting for him. 
 
 "Where s Olive, Mother?" he asked. 
 
 "I don t know. She was here just now," she an 
 swered. "She must have gone upstairs. The child 
 is not well, John. I ve noticed that ever since the 
 night she had the headache and missed her supper." 
 
 He hurried upstairs, and found the sick "child" 
 looking very well indeed. 
 
 She was seated beside the window, wearing some 
 thing filmy, with pale green leaves in it, over silver 
 embroidered satin. The bodice was cut low, and 
 there was a thin silver chain round her neck with a
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 123 
 
 dull flat piece of old jade hanging from it like an 
 evergreen leaf upon her white breast. The effect 
 she produced was of a particularly frosty and beau 
 tiful winter twilight the younger part of a very 
 dark night with her face for a star that had wan 
 dered out above that silver and gray mist ahead of 
 the other stars therefore very lonely. 
 
 "Good evening, Mrs. Arms!" said John, bow 
 ing low before her in his baggy trousers and his 
 shabby coat. It was always evening in Valhalla 
 after twelve o clock in the day. 
 
 "Good afternoon, John!" returned the star, 
 stirring the mist by lifting one satin-slippered foot 
 and crossing its knees carelessly after the manner of 
 stars in that element, but conceding not one beam of 
 recognition by so much as a glance of the eye. It 
 was as if she had outclassed him in some way peculiar 
 to stars, as if he were an old runt of a tree clothed 
 in rough bark with only a few ragged branches to 
 his credit. 
 
 He was mystified. He was still further con 
 fused at the sight of his own best clothes laid 
 out upon the bed, with a very high stiff collar 
 ringed on top. "Where are we going?" he asked,
 
 124 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 looking from the folded raiment on the bed back to 
 Olive. 
 
 "Nowhere; just downstairs to dinner as usual. 
 But we always dress for you in the evening, Mother 
 and I, and gentlemen always do, too." 
 
 Here was one gentleman who always did not dress 
 in the evening. If there was any difference, he was 
 inclined to undress. The best he could do after 
 the labours of the day was to bathe his face and 
 hands and brush his hair. 
 
 "Your collars are awful, John a year out of style. 
 I ve bought some for you; not quite correct, but a 
 little better," she said, as she rose and swept past 
 him to the door. "Your bath is ready, and you ll 
 have to hurry," she said, closing it behind her. 
 
 If she had dashed ice water over him he could 
 not have been more astonished. 
 
 "Well, I be damned!" he murmured under his 
 breath, still staring at the door. 
 
 He looked at himself very much as Adam must 
 have done on the day when he discovered that his 
 honest skin was not the proper garment to wear 
 with Eve to a Paradise dinner. He put one leg out, 
 then the other, studied his dusty shoes. He turned
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 125 
 
 to the mirror and considered the wrinkled front of 
 his negligee shirt with the collar sagging round his 
 neck. Then he went and sat down before the things 
 on the bed, fixed his eyes gloomily upon them. 
 
 It was not that he minded putting them on damn- 
 it, no! but it was what that meant, the confession. 
 
 At last he made up his mind. Olive must do what 
 he told her to do. He would humour her in this small 
 matter. He would dress for dinner if she wanted 
 him to. He would prove to her that he was ready 
 to please her. 
 
 He reached over for the collar, examined it, and 
 began to grin. It is very bad for a woman w T hen her 
 husband grins like that behind her back. 
 
 "What can be keeping John? Everything is get 
 ting cold; supper will not be fit to eat!" exclaimed 
 Mrs. Arms nervously. 
 
 "John is dressing," said Olive. 
 
 "Dressing!" exclaimed his mother. "Are you 
 expecting company this evening?" 
 
 "No; we are just going to look decent in the 
 evenings, that s all. I told John he had to change." 
 
 "And did he do it?" mildly astonished at this 
 unexpected exhibition of authority.
 
 126 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "He s doing it, I suppose," returned Olive 
 primly. 
 
 At this moment the victim appeared. Mrs. 
 Arms gasped and threw up her hands. Olive took 
 one look at him and shrieked. She should have been 
 ashamed, but she was not; she clapped her hands 
 and laughed until she was breathless. 
 
 He was clothed in his Sunday clothes, all right. 
 His black trousers firmly creased, his coat elegantly 
 buttoned across his breast. His shoes glistened, 
 but his collar was at least one number too large for 
 him. He looked more like a savage than ever, like 
 a savage with no sense of clothes. The upper part 
 of his face alone could be seen; his chin was concealed 
 behind that stiff white band of linen which had ears 
 in the wrong place. 
 
 He advanced with exaggerated dignity, bowed, 
 and offered Olive his arm. 
 
 "But, John," she cried, hanging back, "you must 
 change that collar; you can t possibly eat with your 
 mouth down in that hollow!" 
 
 "It s the style, my dear. I must do the best I 
 can. Not for worlds would I change it!" 
 
 They really had a very gay evening after Olive
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 127 
 
 with her own deft fingers had ripped off the collar 
 and freed her husband. 
 
 But you can be very cheerful without changing 
 your mind about the main issue. 
 
 The next morning when John was half dressed, 
 he tiptoed to the bed and looked down at Olive, who 
 was apparently sleeping soundly. Her hands were 
 folded like a child s upon her breast, her black hair 
 lay in ringlets upon the pillow. She was pale like a 
 pearl, as innocent looking as that. 
 
 He did not want to disturb her. But everybody 
 was out of bed before seven o clock in Valhalla. It 
 was inconceivable that any one should not rise at 
 least by seven. Suddenly he saw that her eyelids 
 quivered very slightly. 
 
 "Hello, you are awake, then," he said. 
 
 "No, I m not; I m fast asleep," she sighed, 
 snuggling down deeper into the pillow. 
 
 "Time to get up!" he laughed, kissing her. 
 
 She did not get up. She turned over, offered him 
 her back, and the wall her face. 
 
 "Seven o clock, Olive!" he said, after waiting a 
 moment. 
 
 "I don t care if it s eight o clock. I m not ac-
 
 128 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 customed to rising so early. I shall stay in bed." 
 
 She scored. A man, however determined he is 
 to make a good and obedient wife, cannot drag her 
 out of bed when she will not rise without doing 
 violence to his own dignity. 
 
 From this day he had breakfast in silence alone 
 with his mother. And he never knew that the 
 moment he was out of the room Olive dashed into 
 the tub and flew into her clothes and was usually 
 at the table before he reached the store. 
 
 When a woman makes up her mind to be per 
 verse, she can surpass a man in mere stubbornness 
 so far that he is not in her class. She is subtle about 
 it, always in a position to prove her innocence if he 
 protests. Olive found a hundred ways to obstruct 
 and confuse John. From playing with him as if 
 he had been her funny home-made rag doll that first 
 month, winning laughter and delight from his "dear 
 queer ways" as she called them, she now gave her 
 attention to changing those dear queer ways. Why, 
 oh, why, if he used tobacco, didn t he smoke ciga 
 rettes instead of that horrid pipe? It made her sick, 
 positively did! 
 
 "I like cigarettes myself, John. We could have
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 129 
 
 such a nice time here in the evenings smoking to 
 gether!" she said, having forced him to resign the 
 pipe on penalty of leaving the room, and never 
 staying in it if he didn t. 
 
 "I d like to see my wife smoke!" he exclaimed 
 indignantly. 
 
 The same evening Colonel Ripley and his wife 
 came to call. 
 
 "I hope you are enjoying living here," said Mrs. 
 Ripley when Olive came over and sat down beside 
 her on the sofa. 
 
 "Oh, no, I wouldn t think of doing such a thing," 
 she chimed loud enough for John and the Colonel 
 to hear. 
 
 "Why?" asked the old lady, mystified by such 
 candour. 
 
 "It would be a sin, in Valhalla, wouldn t it?" 
 returned Olive. 
 
 Then she caught the Colonel s eye fixed upon her, 
 wittily affirmative. 
 
 "By the way, Colonel Ripley, have you any 
 cigarettes with you? John says he d like to see me 
 smoke," she called across to him. 
 
 John looked at the old blade darkly, as much
 
 130 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 as to say, "If you give my wife a cigarette, I ll kill 
 you!" 
 
 "Oh oh, do you smoke?" asked Mrs. Ripley, 
 sliding primly away. 
 
 "No, not since I ve been here. But John does, 
 a perfectly awful pipe. He ought to keep it in the 
 stable, it s so strong!" 
 
 Fortunately, the Colonel did not have any 
 cigarettes. 
 
 "I like Deities best, don t you?" this to Mrs. 
 Ripley. 
 
 "I don t smoke; I never saw a lady smoke 
 in my life," she answered, emphasising the word 
 "lady." 
 
 "No? You dip snuff here, I believe," returned 
 Olive, as if this were merely a difference in custom, 
 not morals, with the odds in favour of smoking. 
 
 As a matter of fact, a few elder women in the South 
 do dip snuff. But it is a very private matter, never 
 admitted, never referred to by a living soul with 
 any sense of decency. Mrs. Ripley, as it happened, 
 was one of these women who delicately concealed 
 her little sin and clove to it as she would not have 
 done to the hardest virtue.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 131 
 
 "Mr. Ripley, it s late; we must go," she said, 
 rising with an air of outraged dignity. 
 
 "Oh, no, you ve only just come. Mother will 
 be so sorry to miss you. She s at prayer meeting 
 with Anna Berry," protested Olive, and then added 
 shamelessly: "I was just thinking we might have a 
 little game of auction bridge before she gets back." 
 
 "I don t play cards!" snapped Mrs. Ripley, as 
 if she had said, "I don t commit adultery; it s a 
 &in. " 
 
 "Surely people do play cards here," exclaimed 
 Olive, as if she meant that Valhalla couldn t be with 
 out some redeeming grace. 
 
 "I know of but one person who plays cards in 
 this town, and we don t know her!" she answered 
 quickly. 
 
 Every one exchanged glances except Mrs. Ripley, 
 who was still predicting her departure by keeping 
 her eyes fixed upon the door. 
 
 "My wife refers to Mrs. Bigsby," explained the 
 Colonel. "I ve heard that she plays a very good 
 game," he added, hurriedly, as he slipped forward 
 to help Mrs. Ripley put on her coat. 
 
 When their guests were gone, Olive went back
 
 132 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 to the sofa. She made herself as small as she could 
 in one corner of it. She crossed her knees, waved 
 the elevated foot gently, and stared at an engrav 
 ing of Patrick Henry over the mantelpiece. 
 
 John sat staring into the fire, both feet planted 
 upon the floor as if he never meant to move, both 
 hands grasping his knees, his elbows sticking out, 
 the firelight casting a red gloom over his face, 
 which was lined with suppressed fury. The clock 
 ticked and the coals crackled in the grate. Not a 
 word was spoken. But the old parlour was a ring. 
 And this man and this woman were stripped for the 
 fray. 
 
 Olive began one of those conversations with her 
 self with which a wife occasionally whets the edge 
 of her spirit in the condemning silence of her husband. 
 Wives are the only ones in the world capable of this 
 demoniacal telepathy, because they are the only 
 creatures living who know how to pick the lock of 
 their husbands minds and rummage through their 
 indignant thoughts. 
 
 Olive, to herself, casting a quick look at John: 
 "I ve proclaimed my sins. It will be all over town 
 to-morrow that I smoke cigarettes and gamble;
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 133 
 
 and John is furious. He is making up his mind to 
 stop me. No! My goodness, what an expression! 
 I believe he is wishing it was proper for a man to 
 beat his wife. I m glad I ve come to myself. I m 
 no longer afraid of his anger. If that wicked 
 Bigsby person doesn t call soon, I ll be reduced to 
 seeking her acquaintance. We could at least have a 
 game of dummy whist. It s been two months since 
 I ve had a new frock. To-morrow I shall order 
 some things from my dressmaker, let the heathen 
 rage. Poor John! He is tugging at the millstone 
 about his neck, me. I wish he d move or say 
 something Oh 
 
 She rose, went to the mantel, tiptoeing, smiling 
 down at his bowed head. She lifted an old blackened 
 briar root pipe, holding it gingerly between her 
 thumb and forefinger, spreading her other fingers 
 from it, making them proclaim daintily how nasty 
 she thought the pipe was still, just to soothe him, 
 she offered it. She poked as near as she dared to his 
 nose. 
 
 His nose was not sensitive, his eyes were blind. 
 
 She laid it back upon the mantel with a sigh. 
 
 "If I were dead, John, that thing held to my nose
 
 134 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 would make me sneeze. I don t see how you can 
 ignore it, even if you are determined to ignore me," 
 she said aloud, flinging herself upon the sofa. 
 
 At this point John made a remark to himself 
 without speaking which nevertheless was perfectly 
 audible to Olive: "She has shamed me before my 
 friends; now she thinks she will play with me. I ll 
 settle this once for all. I ve made up my mind what 
 to do and how to handle this situation." 
 
 "What on earth is he thinking with his mouth 
 glued together like that?" thought Olive. "I m 
 afraid of him. I wish I had the courage to leave this 
 room and go upstairs. But I feel as if a sword was 
 hanging over my head, and if I move, it will drop." 
 
 A door banged somewhere down the street. 
 
 "Oh!" she cried, starting up, "this place is so 
 dead, that if there s a sound, just a sudden noise, it 
 scares me crazy. I simply can t endure it." 
 
 John undid himself, relaxed, leaned back in his 
 chair and stared at her moodily. He recalled some 
 thing his mother had said earlier in the day. 
 
 "John, I think Olive needs a little change. She 
 is not well. She never goes out any more. You 
 ought to do something."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 135 
 
 "She s not a guest, you know, Mother," he had 
 answered coolly; "we are not entertaining her. 
 She s my wife, a member of the family." 
 
 Olive certainly was nervous, he reflected, seeing 
 her start at the slamming of the door. He was glad 
 he had made up his mind to look after her better, 
 take her seriously in hand. 
 
 "If you were going to say anything, John, what 
 would you say?" she asked, looking at him whim 
 sically. 
 
 "I was thinking," he answered. 
 
 "Of me?" 
 
 "Of you." 
 
 "Then please don t look so much as if you were 
 planning my execution!" 
 
 "On the contrary, I was planning a place for you 
 in life." 
 
 "Away from here, then. This town is a cemetery, 
 with its virtues walking like forlorn ghosts." 
 
 "It hasn t been a month since you said you loved 
 it," he accused. 
 
 "Yes, I remember. But you don t understand. 
 After a lot of excitement and just the exhaustion of 
 living every moment, one might even enjoy lying
 
 13C MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 peacefully in one s grave for a few days. But nobody 
 wants to stay buried forever, not even the dead." 
 
 "They do stay, though." 
 
 "Not because they like it, but because we fling six 
 
 feet of earth in on them Oh, I feel as if I could lift 
 
 my arms like this, John" stretching them tragically 
 over her head "and throw the dust sky high!" 
 
 "We ll change all that." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "To-morrow; at once." 
 
 "But I don t like your expression, John; it s so 
 so forbidding." 
 
 
 
 "Can t expect me to look pleasant after what 
 you did here to-night." 
 
 It was out at last, the real issue! 
 
 "Oh, telling the Ripleys that I smoked and 
 played cards? One must be honest, John. I do 
 play and smoke when I get the chance." 
 
 "One needn t be depraved." 
 
 "No, not like that old Ripley woman; she is bad." 
 
 "Come! Don t add slander," he said sternly. 
 
 "Yes, she is; she thinks evil, John, and nothing 
 else. She suspects the worst in everybody because 
 she can t really think any other way."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 137 
 
 "She doesn t suspect me." 
 
 "Because she knows you. But since I m a 
 stranger, since my ways are not her ways, she thinks 
 the worst of me." 
 
 "No worse than you admit yourself," he re 
 turned. 
 
 "Tell me this, John: am I myself, or just your 
 wife. I can t be twins, you know." 
 
 He considered that, beginning to smile. Having 
 made up his mind what he would do with her, he was 
 anxious to start the experiment by being agreeable. 
 
 "Couldn t you combine your adorable self with 
 my wife, and, I admit it, make her dearer to me?" 
 reaching out his hand and drawing her to him. 
 "Couldn t you combine my wife with yourself, and 
 so make a finer, braver, better woman?" 
 
 "John," she said, permitting herself to be taken 
 in this snare, "did you ever feer as if the neck of 
 your soul was being stretched and stretched until 
 the very bones of your spirit cracked?" 
 
 "No, I never did!" he answered, laughing in 
 spite of himself. 
 
 "Well, it s been like that for me. If you could 
 see my soul, it would have the neck of a zebra,
 
 138 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 striped with many stripes. I ve tried so hard to be 
 what you wanted me to be, and I cannot, John 
 dear; so I ll just be myself!" 
 
 He did not know it, but she had the better of him, 
 and was contented to be led with her long-necked 
 soul upstairs. 
 
 This is a queer thing about married life that a 
 husband and wife can never get anywhere with an 
 argument, only further apart. The one may silence 
 the other, but neither can convince the other. The 
 real solution is love. Having done their worst and 
 blindest, the one to the other, Love steps in, ignores 
 the rights and wrongs of the whole contention, and 
 settles it upon the basis of the remaining fact that 
 they still love each other. They do not see how they 
 can, but they do. 
 
 You may understand a woman if you are a man; 
 you may read the secret script of her like an open 
 book; but no man can predict what she will do next 
 if she is in an up-and-doing mood. 
 
 John knew exactly what he would do the next morn 
 ing. He did not intend to leave Olive in bed again 
 when he himself was out. He even rehearsed the scene.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 139 
 
 He would say: "It s time we were up, Olive." 
 No "my dear," nor "my sweet," just plain 
 "Olive." If she did not rise, he would stand over 
 her and say, "Get up! I mean it; none of this 
 foolishness." 
 
 He did not go so far as to think what w r ould hap 
 pen if she refused. He knew she would not. A 
 woman never can when a man is glaring at her with 
 that primitive, trampling, mastodon gaze of author 
 ity, not w T hile he is looking at her. He had nerved 
 himself up to this with a grimness of determination 
 which he knew would be sufficient for the emer 
 gency. He did not rest well, thinking about it. 
 He lay awake long after he supposed Olive was 
 peacefully asleep. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the moment he kicked his 
 feet from under the cover, which was always the last 
 instinctive thing he did before beginning his deep 
 breathing exercise of profound slumber, the lids of 
 Olive s eyes flew open, and she considered him 
 thoughtfully. Only her particular imps know how 
 long the inspection lasted, nor the conclusion she 
 reached. 
 
 The next morning when he awakened he was
 
 140 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 astonished to see Olive, fully dressed, moving softly 
 about the room. A woman cannot lie for hours 
 beside a man without knowing what he is thinking, 
 if he is thinking about her. And your really wise 
 wife never risks an encounter with her husband 
 when she is in doubt about her ability to hold her 
 own. 
 
 "Time you were up, John, unless you have 
 decided to have your breakfast in bed," she said, 
 implying that he was that kind of a man, who made 
 his downtrodden wife wait on him hand and foot. 
 
 He was astonished and confused. His forces were 
 all pent up ready for the struggle, and there was 
 to be no struggle. There she was flowing swiftly 
 over the dam he had made of himself against her. 
 He crawled sheepishly out of bed, very indignant 
 at something, but not in a position to place the 
 something. 
 
 "You must hurry. Mother will be waiting 
 breakfast for you," she tinkled icily, as she whisked 
 through the door. 
 
 He thumped hastily across the room in his bare 
 feet to where his watch lay upon the dressing table. 
 
 "Not seven o clock!" He was relieved. If he had
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 141 
 
 overslept, she would have held the winning cards. 
 But he had not. 
 
 "Waiting breakfast for me!" he grumbled as he 
 got into his clothes. "For me, by cracky, when 
 she gets up so late herself Mother doesn t even wait 
 for her!" 
 
 He was still in the first month s primer of his 
 married life, or he would have known better than to 
 task himself with these reflections upon the injustice 
 of women, especially wife-women. 
 
 The day passed as other days until late in the 
 afternoon, except that Olive spent most of it writ 
 ing at the old secretary in the parlour. 
 
 She was ordering two or three frocks from her 
 dressmaker. Simple things. The whole bill, includ 
 ing hat, gloves, and accessories would not be above 
 five hundred dollars, she thought. And her allow 
 ance was three hundred every month. This had been 
 lying to her credit in the bank for over two months. 
 But since she was ordering the things by mail, and 
 could not discuss the styles and materials in person, 
 she must be particular about the details. She wanted 
 a tailored suit of some dark material, preferably blue, 
 very chic. The two gowns must be elegant but not
 
 142 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 too fussy. Madame knew her taste in everything. 
 Something to match the winter season in clouds and 
 flowers; not too much colour, but just enough, and 
 so forth and so on. 
 
 She added a postscript, instructing Madame to 
 send "the package and the bill to Mrs. John Arms, 
 not Mr. John Arms, Valhalla, Ga." 
 
 She spent the afternoon going through her things, 
 discarding most of them, like a fine young bird 
 moulting her feathers. 
 
 She was so busy that she did not hear the rattle, 
 the very noisy clanking and clattering of old wheels 
 with loose spokes that stopped at the gate of the 
 Arms s residence. 
 
 "Olive, my dear!" called Mrs. Arms from the foot 
 of the stairs. 
 
 "Yes, Mother." 
 
 "John wants you. He s come to take you for a 
 drive!" 
 
 "A drive! Oh, goody!" She ran out and fairly 
 shouted over the banisters. 
 
 "Yes, and it s very raw; put on your cloak, wrap 
 up well," continued the old lady. 
 
 Olive hastened to take these precautions against
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 143 
 
 the November weather. She did not recall until 
 afterward a certain vague anxiety in Mrs. Arms s face 
 as she looked up from the hall below. She was elated. 
 She had had only one drive since she came to Val 
 halla. This was in the Ripley car. She supposed 
 John had obtained the use of it for the occasion. 
 John was a perfect old dear; she had only to be 
 patient; he would come around in time. 
 
 She flew down the stairs. 
 
 "Aren t you going, Mother?" she called on the 
 way to the door, seeing Mrs. Arms seated before the 
 parlour fire. 
 
 "No, there won t be room," she answered. 
 
 "Of course there s room " 
 
 "Run along, dear; John s waiting." 
 
 Olive ran. She was half-way down the walk be 
 fore she caught sight of John s chariot, and of John. 
 
 He was sitting high upon the spring seat of a little 
 old Methuselah wagon. The paint had long since 
 disappeared from the body and frame, if indeed it 
 had ever been painted. An old horse with a thread 
 bare tail and skimpy mane stood slipshod in the 
 shafts, with his head down, after the manner of these 
 patient martyrs of man.
 
 144 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 She had seen both the wagon and horse before. 
 John used them to deliver his wares. Once she had 
 laughed as the negro boy drove by the house with a 
 stove rattling noisily in the old rickety body. 
 
 "Why do his legs jiggle so, John?" she asked, re 
 ferring to the horse. 
 
 "He s very old, knees are sprung, and he s string 
 halted in one of his hind legs. Faithful beast," he 
 answered. 
 
 "Well, he looks faithful! Looks as if he d been 
 disappointed in love a thousand years ago and had 
 never recovered!" she laughed. 
 
 That was the "turnout" with which John waited 
 at the gate. 
 
 Olive stopped short as if really she could not be 
 lieve her own eyes. 
 
 "Come on," called John. 
 
 She came very slowly, as if she were walking in 
 her sleep, would_awaken presently, and when she 
 did- 
 
 "Jump in! He s very frisky; can t let go the 
 line to help you!" 
 
 He was actually making a joke of it. 
 
 "John," she said, looking up at him from the
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 145 
 
 curb, "y u can t, you don t expect to take me out 
 in that thing!" 
 
 "It s all I ve got to take you in!" he answered, 
 reddening. 
 
 "Oh, you are crazy." 
 
 They measured each other. 
 
 "Get in!" he commanded. 
 
 "I will not not get in!" she cried, backing off, 
 with tears of rage and mortification in her eyes. 
 
 She never knew exactly how it happened. She saw 
 John take a flying leap. She felt him grasp her, 
 roughly "brutally" was the term she used when 
 she recalled the incident. And the next moment 
 she was flung "like like a sack!" upon the 
 seat. The next after that he was beside her with 
 the reins in his hand, and they were off down the 
 Avenue, every spoke rattling, the wheels whining 
 on the axles, and the old horse wagging his tail from 
 side to side as he jiggered along under the impres 
 sion that he was trotting. 
 
 They passed a number of people, who stared at 
 them, smiled and bowed. 
 
 Olive was too angry, too startled, to return these 
 salutes.
 
 146 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 You may despise people and still feel their opinion 
 of you, their comments upon your misfortune, as 
 keenly as if they were the great of the earth. This 
 explains the tyranny of waiters and bellboys and 
 porters over the public. Olive did passionately 
 despise the citizens of Valhalla, but this fact did not 
 lessen her anguish and humiliation. 
 
 They went on through the town and out upon the 
 country road in silence, John staring firmly ahead, 
 Olive with trembling lips also staring straight ahead 
 in front of her at the bleak fields, and at the old 
 Foundry, at the smokestack leaning against the 
 leaden skies. 
 
 "Where are we going?" she asked finally, and 
 remembered that once before, seated in Dickie 
 Blake s runaway car upon a summer road, she had 
 put the same question to the mysterious stranger 
 beside her. 
 
 "For a drive," answered John, remembering, too. 
 
 Another half a mile of silence, then it was Olive 
 who broke it again. 
 
 "Why does this poor old beast try to stop at every 
 house we pass? Is he calling for help, or does he wish 
 to attract attention to his gallantry and yours?"
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 147 
 
 "He s accustomed to delivering things to these 
 places: plows, crockery, stoves, pipes. Maybe he 
 thinks I m going to deliver you, too. But I m not." 
 
 There was nothing further to be said after that. 
 And she said it in that perfect silence which is the 
 loudest speech of woman. 
 
 When they reached the Foundry John got out, 
 went in, and presently returned carrying an im 
 mense old anvil, reared back beneath the weight 
 of it, the cords in his neck stretched like stout ropes, 
 his veins swelled and purple with the effort. He 
 deposited it in the back of the wagon with a drop 
 which made even the old horse start, and Olive 
 jumped and shrieked as if a mountain had fallen 
 behind her. 
 
 John smacked his hands together, and brushed the 
 dust arid rust from his clothes serenely, as if it were 
 the most natural thing in the wo rid for brides to shriek. 
 
 "I ve sold this anvil to the blacksmith," he said, 
 going round to soothe the old horse, who thought, 
 only thought, he might run away in case that noise 
 was repeated. 
 
 Olive hoped he would run, and throw her out and 
 kill her. She longed to die.
 
 148 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "We own all this," he said, holding the bridle 
 with one hand and waving the other in a wide circle, 
 "as far as you can see. And this earth is one solid 
 bed of the finest iron ore." 
 
 Olive refused to permit herself to be included in 
 that married "we." She merely lifted her chin by 
 way of detaching herself from this man and his iron. 
 When a woman sulks, she puts her whole mind upon 
 it. She does not allow her attention to wander, not 
 by even a glance, from the business in hand. 
 
 "When I get a few thousand dollars ahead, I 
 shall open this foundry again; in a small way at 
 first, but I shall begin to be what I am, an iron 
 master. Then we shall be rich ever after." 
 
 He gave her that further encouragement as 
 cheerfully as if she had listened with enthusiasm 
 to the whole scheme. She allowed something which 
 resembled the serpent of a smile to curl her lips: 
 this was the only reply she made to the "few thou 
 sands ahead" idea, as John climbed back upon the 
 seat. 
 
 He turned the horse and the wagon, the latter 
 groaning and whining, the former pricking up his 
 ears at the thought of jogging back to his stable.
 
 1VIAKIXG HER HIS WIFE 149 
 
 As they were entering the town, there was a roar 
 behind, and the next moment a car passed them. 
 Mrs. Bigsby and the Colonel occupied the front 
 seat. They both bowed hastily as they passed, 
 as you do sometimes bow at the last moment when 
 you are not expecting to see that particular person. 
 The car stopped. The Colonel thrust his head out 
 and waved frantically, meaning that he had some 
 thing delightful to say. 
 
 The old horse made an effort to meet the situation. 
 In spite of the fact that John pulled on the reins, he 
 quickened his pace. 
 
 "Good afternoon." 
 
 It was Mrs. Bigsby who leaned forward as they 
 drew up, including both of them with a charming 
 smile. 
 
 "I m so glad we came up with you young people," 
 she said. "Colonel Ripley tells me you play auction 
 bridge 
 
 "Oh, I love it!" put in Olive quickly. 
 
 "Then come over to dinner Thursday night, quite 
 informally, and we ll have a little game." 
 
 "We ll be delighted to come!" answered Olive, 
 before John could open his mouth to refuse.
 
 150 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "So glad you can manage it. Dinner at seven," 
 purred Mrs. Bigsby. 
 
 "Wait! Hold on there!" shouted John to the 
 Colonel, who was driving. But the Colonel was 
 deaf. The car jumped ahead and was immediately 
 far in advance. 
 
 "What did you do that for?" John demanded 
 angrily, turning on his wife. "You know we cannot 
 accept an invitation to that woman s house." 
 
 "We have accepted one," she returned, laughing, 
 and then entreatingly she added: "I must have 
 something to do, John." 
 
 "You shall, but it won t be playing cards with 
 Mrs. Bigsby. That s one of the ways she makes 
 her living." 
 
 "Oh, she plays for money, then? We always did, 
 too; not much, just enough to make it interesting," 
 she confessed. 
 
 "Get up!" This to the horse, slapping his back 
 with the reins. 
 
 Olive s good humour was restored by this inci 
 dent. She talked all the way down the Avenue to 
 her silent and morose husband. 
 
 "It s been a perfectly lovely ride!" she told Mrs.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 151 
 
 Anns when she ran into the house. Something 
 warned her not to add the news which was on the 
 tip of her tongue, that they were going to dine with 
 Mrs. Bigsby Thursday evening. She said to her 
 self as she ran upstairs that she would, would go to 
 Mrs. Bigsby s. It was beyond her power to think 
 that probably she would be entirely out of the class 
 of light-literature life to which Mrs. Bigsby be 
 longed by Thursday. 
 
 Her heart was so set upon this one thing, upon 
 keeping John in a good humour and winning him 
 to her wishes, that she obeyed almost meekly the 
 next morning when he told her he wanted her to 
 come down to the store. 
 
 "What for, John dear?" she asked. 
 
 "I need you," he answered, and waited for her 
 while she went to put on her hat and coat. 
 
 They walked in silence, John with the air of ab 
 straction a man wears when he contemplates cer 
 tain changes in the world s history. Olive sensed 
 these changes, that they might have some remote 
 bearing upon her own fate. And the nearer they 
 came to the store, the more her heart misgave her. 
 She almost made up her mind to excuse herself and
 
 152 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 go back home. But after another glance at John 
 she decided that she might as well see what sort of 
 card he had up his sleeve. 
 
 They entered, and he closed the door. 
 
 "You see it s the dull season, no custom. We 
 may as well keep it closed while we work," he said, 
 beginning to undo a package he carried. 
 
 "Work!" exclaimed Olive; and then catching 
 sight of the package, "What s that?" 
 
 "One of Mother s aprons I borrowed, to keep your 
 clothes clean. Lots of dust here," he answered, 
 with the strings spread out, the voluminous folds 
 widening. 
 
 "I don t understand, John" backing off. 
 
 "Put it on while I explain!" 
 
 She knew positively that she would not put it on, 
 she knew it even while she was tying the strings 
 around her slender waist, but John would not take 
 his eyes off her, so she had to do it. 
 
 "Now, we re going to take stock. Know what 
 that is?" 
 
 She did not, but refused to say so. 
 
 "Well, we find out what we have first, what 
 everything on these shelves is worth. Then we find
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 153 
 
 out how much we can collect of what is owing to us. 
 Then we add it all up with our little balance in the 
 bank, and subtract that from what w y e ourselves 
 owe the wholesale hardware firms in Atlanta; and 
 the remainder well, this year I fear the remainder 
 will be very small." 
 
 She was not listening to what he said; she w r as 
 doing a certain sum in the personal equation which 
 left John as the remainder. 
 
 "But first we must straighten things out a bit, so 
 that we can get to them," he went on cheerfully. "I ll 
 sort out these axes and plows and the junk on the 
 floor generally; you ll get up on the counter and di 
 vide the sheep from the goats on those lower shelves. 
 That is, the crockery from the glass, and so forth." 
 
 She did not move. She stood with her lips parted, 
 staring at him, endeavouring to comprehend this new 
 and uncalled-for indignity. She, Olive Thurston, 
 with a fortune of nearly a hundred thousand dollars, 
 to be reduced to scrubbing John Arms s store for 
 him! Nothing had been said about scrubbing, but 
 she was sure that would be included. Her lip 
 curled at the thought. But just as it began to curl 
 he seized her hand and said.
 
 154 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Let me help you. It s quite a step up! " 
 
 She did not know whether she really mounted, 
 or whether he lifted her on to the counter. But she 
 served notice on him with one look of rage as she 
 went up. Rather than look at him again, she turned 
 to the little pot-bellied sheep and goats, as he called 
 the hideous stuff. She actually raised her hands 
 to it. Then all at once she went at it furiously. She 
 must do something until she could make up her 
 mind what to do. 
 
 John turned and went back to the junk on the 
 floor. He was not exactly grinning, but he was 
 pleased with himself. 
 
 For the next twenty minutes one might have 
 thought from the noise, from the ring of iron upon 
 iron, from the thinner, higher jingle of glass 
 against glass, that this was bedlam, where crazy 
 stars were made. Clouds of dust ascended and 
 descended. And through this confusion, the slim 
 form of a girl could be seen crucified, with arms 
 lifted above her head, and the huge form of a 
 man moving indistinctly in the lower regions of 
 terrible things. 
 
 Suddenly it happened; the inevitable conclusion
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 155 
 
 toward which both had been working indefatigably 
 since the hour of their marriage. 
 
 John was stooping over the scattered parts of a 
 harrow in the back of the store when something like 
 a clap of crockery thunder fell behind him. 
 
 He leaped up, faced about, and beheld his wife. 
 He could see her flaming eyes and flushed cheeks 
 through the clouds of dust. She was deliberately 
 flinging plates, cups, glasses, everything as she came 
 to it, upon the floor, and she was working like 
 lightning. 
 
 With two bounds he seized her, almost flung her 
 over his head as he set her upon the floor, trem 
 bling in every limb and ghastly pale between the 
 streaks of smut and dust upon her face. 
 
 "What does this mean?" He hissed the words 
 through clenched teeth. 
 
 "It means I married, thinking I was to be your 
 wife, John Arms, but I ll be no man s slave!" 
 
 He still held her by the wrists, and now he moved 
 toward a corner w r here there was a chair, dragging 
 her after him. He flung her upon it and stood be 
 fore her, grief and terror in his heart, but neither 
 fear nor mercy in his face.
 
 156 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Now we ll have it out!" he said. 
 
 "That s it; just let me out, please. I want to 
 go home!" 
 
 "You can t do that; we ve a lot of work to do 
 here before noon, and we are going to do it." 
 
 "I want to go back to Aunt Sarah and Uncle 
 Richard! I hate you, the shame of it all!" 
 
 She buried her face in her hands and began to 
 weep. 
 
 "The shame of what?" he demanded. 
 
 "Of just letting myself down to this drudgery; 
 of these mean people; of this mean, ugly little old 
 town; of marrying a man who has no respect for 
 me, no more than if I were a common drudge. You 
 cannot possibly love me, John, or you would have 
 more consideration for me. You are cruel and mean 
 and narrow, too; like the rest, only worse." 
 
 He did not interrupt her though every word stung 
 him like a rapier thrust. He waited until she re 
 sumed her weeping. 
 
 "Olive, all this is beside the mark. However you 
 may regret it, you are my wife, and you must be 
 that as long as we live." 
 
 "But we needn t live together. I don t love you,
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 1,57 
 
 John; I couldn t after the way you have treated 
 me." 
 
 Thereupon she ceased to weep, sat up and re 
 garded him sadly. 
 
 "Well, you ll have to begin all over again and 
 learn to love me the man, this one, not the one 
 you thought you could make me. Because I will 
 not let you go." 
 
 "You mean to keep me; you have no more respect 
 for yourself than to try to keep me after what I ve 
 said?" 
 
 "I d keep you if I had to chain you to the wall, 
 because I respect myself and you!" was the aston 
 ishing answer. 
 
 "Oh, the horror of it!" she cried, throwing back 
 her head and clasping her hands. 
 
 "Listen, Olive; haven t you complained for a 
 month that you had nothing to do, that you were 
 bored to distraction 
 
 "Yes, but that didn t mean that I wanted to 
 to scrub your floors for you, nor clean your your 
 nasty things here!" she interrupted. 
 
 "What did you want, then?" 
 
 "I want to live as I ve always lived. I want a
 
 158 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 car; I want pretty things to wear; I want to go 
 driving not in a delivery wagon; I want to amuse 
 myself, to have friends, the kind of people I ve al 
 ways known." 
 
 " Well, why don t you ask some of your friends to 
 visit us?" 
 
 "What! Here, with our little negro maid to do 
 everything about the house, with you coming in 
 looking like a burglar or a socialist in your dingy 
 clothes, with nothing here to entertain them? You 
 must be crazy to think I have so little pride." 
 
 Seeing that he remained silent, she went on: 
 
 "And it s all so unnecessary. We could have 
 everything, every luxury. Renovate the house, paint 
 it, keep servants, a chauffeur, do things right, be 
 somebody, wake up this old town. I have a for 
 tune, John; I m a rich woman. And you, you 
 needn t work at all. You could be a gentleman, 
 have your club, play golf, enjoy life." 
 
 "On my wife s money. No, thank you! Besides, 
 what would I have in common with your clubfellow, 
 with your golfstick hero? I m a man!" 
 . She looked at him. She had to admit that he was. 
 
 "Let s get down to the root of this matter."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 159 
 
 "I m in the dust of it already!" 
 
 "I want to ask you a question and I want you to 
 answer it upon your honour," he went on, without 
 noticing this interruption. 
 
 She looked at him as if she were bracing herself 
 against him with all the animosity and fear of a 
 helpless woman. 
 
 "Suppose I did exactly as you wish. Suppose 
 we got the car, changed the old house until it 
 shrieked your wealth from the roof and walls; 
 and you had your maid, and I a manservant, and 
 I wore fine clothes, and we entertained and did 
 nothing but amuse ourselves would you regret 
 that you married me? That s the question I want 
 you to answer." 
 
 "No, I m certain I would not," she answered 
 slowly, as if she looked inward upon her own heart. 
 
 "Then it s not me you care for at all. It s only 
 appearances. Just to be idle, like the useless men 
 you ve known. Just to be fashionable and extrava 
 gant like the worse than useless women you ve 
 known. To play, to dance, to flirt, and never to 
 earn with your own hands and brains the right to 
 live. Good God! you ve married a man, not a cad,
 
 160 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 and you haven t got the sense to know the differ 
 ence!" he exclaimed bitterly. 
 
 "It wouldn t be like that, John." 
 
 "Yes, it would, worse than words can paint. You d 
 have to give me a check with which to buy my 
 clothes, or maybe you d make me an allowance! 
 Every man, every woman, that passed us in this 
 town would know your husband was your baby, that 
 you dressed and fed and dandled him. Lord ! 
 
 "We needn t live in this town," she interrupted. 
 
 "It doesn t matter where we lived. I d be your 
 rag doll, and everybody would know it." 
 
 "At least I should be allowed to spend my own 
 money, then, for my own needs and pleasures," 
 she said by way of evading that picture of John as a 
 rag doll. 
 
 "And reduce me to the shame of having a wife 
 whom I did not support. Never! I can take care 
 of you, give you everything the wife of a poor man 
 ought to have, or should want!" he answered. 
 
 You do not need to lay the scene of a great drama 
 in a proud place. It is the veracity of human nature 
 that counts. Only portray some truth, some false 
 hood which is the truth of the times, anything that
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 161 
 
 is common to life, and you are sure of convincing 
 effect, no matter where the scene is laid. In this 
 dingy store, in this dead and forgotten town, this 
 man and this woman stared at each other through 
 the grime and dust. They saw between them the 
 naked truth of the most hideous and disintegrating 
 problem of social and domestic life, out of which 
 come false standards, false ideals, and decay rising 
 like a poisonous vapour the desire for indulgence, 
 the shrinking from responsibilities which belong 
 to the common lot, all springing from wealth or the 
 struggle for wealth. 
 
 John considered the pathetic figure of his wife, 
 very sad now, with the flame of anger gone from 
 her eyes, with her arms hanging listlessly upon 
 either side of the chair. And he was moved, but 
 as a physician is moved who must perform a dan 
 gerous and perhaps fatal operation merely with the 
 chance of saving the patient s life. He had no com 
 punctions about the course he meant to pursue in 
 this matter; on the contrary, he was more deter 
 mined than ever. 
 
 "I must be frank with you, dear," he began 
 more kindly.
 
 162 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "You are always frank, John. That is your vice. 
 The sword you use for wounding me," she put in. 
 
 "We are both armed with swords," he said with 
 a grim smile. "You are an able woman, Olive. 
 You have brains, energy, and an invincible will, 
 yet what have you ever done with your unusual 
 gifts? Not one good or useful service. Your ac 
 complishments have all been employed for self-in 
 dulgence. You are dissipated, just as dissipated as 
 any other drunkard. You crave change, excitement, 
 diversion. This is why you find the life here so hard. 
 You have been compelled to do without your usual 
 intoxicants." 
 
 "You add insult to injury," she cried, flam 
 ing up. 
 
 "No, I m telling you the wholesome truth about 
 yourself." 
 
 "Then why did you marry me?" 
 
 "Because I knew you were capable of better 
 things; because 
 
 "Oh, your horrid, everlasting better things, I hate 
 them!" she cried. 
 
 "But you must learn to love them. Do you 
 know why the people here are not pleasure mad?
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 163 
 
 It s because they work. These are the men and the 
 women who are holding this civilisation together, 
 keeping the covenants; not the people you have 
 known. If we were all like them, society, law, 
 honour, chastity would be legends." 
 
 "And if they were all like you, what would the 
 world be?" she demanded, which was such a shrewd 
 question he pretended not to hear it. But all at 
 once his manner changed. He knelt beside her, 
 drew her gently to him, and she did not resist. She 
 was tired and she was frightened. 
 
 "Listen, my sweet; success never made a man. 
 It s the fight, the effort to win that makes him, 
 determines his honour and his quality. You have 
 missed all that." 
 
 "I don t want to be a man, John," she moaned, 
 laying her head upon his shoulder. 
 
 "No, heaven forbid; but you must help me to 
 be one, not a mendicant dependent upon your 
 charity. If you will, Olive my dear, I promise you 
 that I shall win all things for you, and your hus 
 band!" 
 
 She sighed. 
 
 He lifted her to her feet, led her to the tin basin
 
 164 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 and water bucket on the shelf behind the nail kegs. 
 He rummaged somewhere beneath and found a 
 clean towel. 
 
 She looked up at him as he dipped the end of it 
 in the basin. Her face was streaked where the 
 tears had made white lines in the dirt. He began 
 to laugh as he bathed that sad little countenance. 
 He kissed her tenderly. He lifted each grimy hand, 
 cocked his eye at it, was deeply impressed, kissed 
 them also, before he thrust them in the basin. She 
 laughed, too, and found that it made her weep again 
 to laugh. It made no difference. He attended to 
 her tears, as a mother soothes her child. 
 
 John was coming on! Never before had she felt 
 so near to him, so sure of his love. But, oh heaven! 
 his love was nearly as terrible as his anger. 
 
 Still, she was very happy beneath her deep dis 
 content. He had not changed that. She knew 
 that he was right. She had never thought of these 
 things as he had put them before her. But it was 
 appalling to be the prisoner of righteousness. And 
 from that hour this thought was constantly with 
 her. She was the prisoner of John s righteousness. 
 She was in bondage to awful forces outside herself.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 165 
 
 She gave up once and for all the conviction that he 
 and these surroundings were inferior to the men and 
 the conditions she had been accustomed to. She 
 knew now that the fault was in her. But it was 
 there. And she was here in this cruel place, with an 
 invincibly good man for a keeper. She did not 
 know what she should, or could do about it. Noth 
 ing, she supposed; just get through from one day 
 to the next somehow. The only thing she knew 
 for certain was that they would not go to Mrs. Bigs- 
 by s dinner party; that she w T ould not even think 
 of suggesting such a thing to John now, not after 
 the livid light he had shed upon her world, which 
 was not dissimilar except in details from Mrs. 
 Bigsby s little chromo world. 
 
 They went home for lunch together. John said, 
 staring with a grin at the broken glass and crockery 
 upon the floor: 
 
 "That s too much of a job after what we ve been 
 through!" 
 
 "I ll replace it all with gold-rimmed china, 
 John," she returned tremulously, looking back at 
 the mess from the door as they went out. 
 
 "No, my sweet. It was worth it, that smashing.
 
 166 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 That is your own foolish pride down there broken 
 upon the floor. We ve done with it forever." 
 
 She did not reply. He was obliged to take her 
 silence for assent. But they were so peaceful and 
 kind to each other when they reached the house 
 that Mrs. Arms was almost elated. She had been 
 anxious about the morning s work. She knew John, 
 and she had her suspicions of Olive. She did not 
 know what might happen when he undertook to 
 put her to work in the store. And she inferred that 
 this was his purpose when he borrowed the apron. 
 But it had evidently turned out all right. Olive 
 was a little pale, to be sure. But she had never 
 seen John so tenderly considerate of his wife. 
 Marriage was really wonderful. It did unite two 
 people in the most marvellous way, no matter how 
 far apart they had been before. 
 
 Olive was upstairs resting now, she supposed. 
 She was glad John said nothing about taking her 
 back to the store after lunch. 
 
 As a matter of fact, Olive was upstairs weeping 
 her heart out. But fortunately their nearest and 
 dearest do not know every time a wife does that. 
 And the world never suspects the terror of the
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 167 
 
 young wife who has left her own people and her 
 own more familiar gods for her husband, his people, 
 and his more or less strange gods. They have no 
 protection, these young and tender beings. It is not 
 really good form to return to one s own tribe, and 
 they cannot call the police. So they weep, and 
 wonder how in the world they can endure this 
 strange man, and his strange god, and how in the 
 world it will all end; because of course it must end 
 somehow, some time, since they cannot possibly live 
 through it, not for years and years and Y-E-A-R-S. 
 
 Affairs went smoothly for a w r eek. Olive helped 
 John w r ith his stock taking in the forenoons, return 
 ing very tired, with her clothes mussed. Mrs. Arms 
 was keen enough to observe that they never talked 
 about their business in the evenings. They did not 
 talk at all. Olive was as silent as her husband, read 
 when he read, sat and looked into the fire when he 
 sat and looked into the fire. 
 
 However, the old lady was about to settle down 
 after the manner of the aged in this situation, when 
 without warning the whole thing slid again from 
 under her feet. 
 
 The young have very little consideration for the
 
 168 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 old. They are always changing things and adjust 
 ing things to themselves so that the old ones never 
 can stay "put," until after the funeral, when clods 
 fall upon the coffin lid and the grass springs above 
 the clods. Then perhaps they do rest. 
 
 Mrs. Arms was in the pantry bending over the 
 flour bin late one afternoon when John sought a pri 
 vate interview with her. This was what he said : 
 
 "I want to speak with you privately, Mother." 
 
 The old lady stood up, dusted the flour from her 
 hands, and looked startled. Where was the public? 
 There was not a soul in sight except John. Cindy, 
 the cook, was having her afternoon off. Did he 
 think the soda jar had ears? 
 
 "Shall we go in the parlour?" she asked, flus 
 tered because he looked so grave. 
 
 "No, Olive s in there," he answered, leading the 
 way through the back door. 
 
 They went out behind the kitchen and sat down 
 upon a bench under the grape arbour, which spread 
 above them, a web of naked vines in the November 
 twilight. 
 
 "Is anything the matter, John?" she asked 
 anxiously.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 169 
 
 "Mother, wouldn t you like to make a visit to 
 Aunt Clarinda?" he began. 
 
 "Visit your Aunt Clarinda! What for?" 
 
 "Well, you need the rest, for one thing." 
 
 "I m not tired, John; I ve been really happy 
 since you and Olive married, and I haven t seen 
 Clarinda in so long ten years it s been since I was 
 out there that, well, I don t feel drawn to go. 
 Besides, you and Olive couldn t get on without me," 
 she concluded. 
 
 "That s it: Olive must learn to get on without 
 you, and she never will so long as you do everything 
 for her; and it is not my idea to make a profes 
 sional woman of my wife, a hardware clerk," he 
 began again slowly. 
 
 "I ve wondered at you, John. The women in 
 your family have always been true to their sphere." 
 
 "I want Olive to learn the duties of a home. 
 That s why I want you to pay that visit to Aunt 
 Clarinda. And Cindy must have a vacation, too." 
 
 "What are you thinking of? Olive can t cook." 
 
 "She must learn. You did all the work of the 
 house the last five years Father lived, didn t you?" 
 
 "Yes, but I knew something about it."
 
 170 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "She must learn." 
 
 "But not all at once. You are too hard on her, 
 John. I ve wanted to tell you so." 
 
 "The way to teach Olive is to drop the whole 
 thing on her so hard she ll feel it; won t have time 
 to mope. I never heard you complain of being 
 bored." 
 
 "But she s young, John, and accustomed to have 
 her way." 
 
 "She s married and must realise the responsi 
 bilities of her position. And she doesn t. She s 
 thinking from morning till night how to escape 
 these duties, this life," he said, which indicates 
 that he was not so ignorant as he appeared to be of 
 what was going on behind the closed doors of Olive s 
 mind. 
 
 "I think you are making a grave mistake, my 
 son. Women, they are not the same these days. 
 They think, John. I used never to think apart 
 from your father, his wishes, his comfort. You 
 oughtn t to start Olive to thinking against you." 
 
 "I m going to give her the opportunity to think 
 and do for me, as I live and work for her." 
 
 "Well, I ll go if you insist," she agreed with a
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 171 
 
 sigh; "but you must keep Cindy. Olive couldn t 
 make a biscuit. I ve tried her." 
 
 "She must learn. Cindy s going when you go, 
 and when you return I ll wager you ll find things all 
 right here. Olive s very capable. All she needs is 
 the right chance to make good." 
 
 They went back in the house, Mrs. Arms feeling 
 like a traitor as she entered the parlour and saw 
 Olive reading the society column of the Atlanta 
 paper, serenely unconscious of the plot against her 
 peace. 
 
 In the afternoon on the day of Mrs. Arms s de 
 parture to visit her sister, Olive met her husband 
 at the door with a tragic face. 
 
 "John," she gasped, " Cindy is gone, says she 
 won t be back till Mother returns. What are we to 
 do?" 
 
 "Simplest thing in the world; I ll make the fire 
 in the stove, and you ll get the dinner," he answered 
 cheerfully. 
 
 "But I can t! I don t know how to cook!" 
 
 "You ll have to learn. Part of a woman s work 
 in the home," he said on his way to the kitchen.
 
 172 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 The most intelligent and capable women in the 
 world are those who have developed their wits and 
 energies in the keenest competition in the world 
 that of fashionable society. Leave them to devote 
 the same amount of thought and enterprise to any 
 other effort, whatever it is, from running a business 
 to practising the domestic arts, and they will suc 
 ceed nine times out of ten. Anything which de 
 velops intelligence and awakens energies is training 
 for anything else that person undertakes. 
 
 Olive had suffered so many shocks to her pride 
 lately that one more grievance only served to make 
 her desperate. She despised cooking. She thought 
 it was outrageous that this drudgery should be re 
 quired of her. But she would show John that she 
 could do it, and do it well; that she was not the 
 useless creature he seemed to think she was. 
 
 And she did, with a fury which amounted to 
 inspiration. She left nothing undone. If she was 
 to be a slave, she would be a slave. She worked 
 from morning till night, and she prepared such food 
 as John said he d never tasted in his life. She knew 
 herself that it was good, but she received his praise 
 with cool dignity.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 173 
 
 Before the end of the week it was John who 
 suggested that they should have cold suppers in the 
 evenings, for he saw that she was exhausted with 
 the unaccustomed tasks. She objected at first, said 
 it made no difference to her whether she cooked, 
 or rubbed silver, or did something else there was 
 always more than she could do. She let him know 
 that she merely yielded to his demands about the 
 cold suppers. 
 
 It was his custom after that to come home about 
 five o clock and go to the refrigerator on the back 
 porch, for a "snack," as he called it. And Olive 
 hated the word. It sounded so vulgar. At eight 
 o clock they had their real supper on a tray before 
 the parlour fire. 
 
 This gave them more time together in the even 
 ings, but it hung heavy upon their hands. You 
 may lead a horse to water, but you cannot make 
 him drink. You may force a woman to your will, 
 but you cannot make her willing. 
 
 Olive had never been in such a state of revolt as 
 she was now. For now she perceived clearly the 
 issue between her and her husband. She must be 
 not the kind of woman she was, but the kind of wife
 
 174 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 he wanted. There was a difference of one generation 
 and sixty thousand dollars between these two women. 
 For she never forgot that she had a fortune which 
 really made her independent of this man. 
 
 One night when she had prepared a particularly 
 appetising and dainty supper, he looked up at her 
 with praising eyes. 
 
 "You see, my beloved, it s not the knowing of 
 things that counts," he said; "it s the knowing of 
 things along the way you have to go." 
 
 "But a man chooses the way he goes," she an 
 swered coldly. 
 
 "And you chose yours, didn t you?" 
 
 "A wife can t be anything but a wife, it seems," 
 she answered with trembling lips; "but a man can 
 be anything he likes. He can change his business 
 add something else to it." 
 
 "So can a wife. She can become a mother." 
 
 His tone was not accusative. They had not been 
 married long enough for that. Still, she felt the 
 deep, searching gaze fixed intently upon her. 
 
 Was there no end to what this man would have 
 of her, she asked herself. He demanded her body, 
 all the energies of her life; and now, O God! he
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 175 
 
 was demanding her blood. She felt like that, as she 
 sat before him, but withdrawn from him by the 
 deepest instincts of a woman s sense of self-pro 
 tection. 
 
 You do not settle one issue in the married life 
 before another issue pops its head up and says: 
 "What about me? I m here, too." This is inevi 
 table, for it is the married people who work out the 
 models of life, test problems by living through 
 them, settle all the economics and social questions 
 that are settled at all, and of which we hear so much. 
 They are the experimental stations which determine 
 civilisation and every form of government, all its 
 laws and unlawfulness. This is why the up-and- 
 doing married couples do not get along well to 
 gether. They have so much to do, to try out on 
 each other. It is only in the last years of their 
 union, when they are tired and worn out, that they 
 give it up and live happily ever after, because by 
 this time they can leave the racket and the experi 
 ments to the next set of married people. 
 
 A week passed before John and Olive mustered 
 the courage to seize on one another by their re 
 spective demons and go at it again all in the in-
 
 176 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 terest of humanity, you understand, though they 
 were far from suspecting that they were engaged 
 in such a large business. 
 
 This time Olive was the aggressor. They were 
 seated as usual before the parlour fire. They had 
 divided the evening paper between them. 
 
 Olive was only pretending to read. She was 
 working up her courage to start something; and 
 being a woman, she knew how to begin a long way 
 from where she meant to land. 
 
 "The social unrest in this country is a terrible 
 thing," she said, addressing the back of John s 
 paper. He did not rise to the bait, went on reading 
 in that inhuman manner peculiar to husbands. 
 
 "It s especially bad in the cities," she urged, con 
 fidently, for she knew something of these matters. 
 She had belonged to the Colonist Club in New York, 
 and they study economics there, I can tell you, till 
 the female mind burns them up, leaves a trail of 
 cinders behind it. 
 
 "Eh? What did you say, Olive?" 
 
 "I was just thinking out loud," she answered. 
 "Did you hear me?" 
 
 "Well, I thought I heard a nice little sound," he
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 177 
 
 said, smiling, as he laid aside his paper. "What 
 was the nice little sound telling me?" 
 
 "I was saying something about the social un 
 rest. It s awful, you know." 
 
 "Imaginary, my dear, purely imaginary." 
 "But it is not, John. There are hundreds of 
 thousands of men out of work in New York. And 
 they are starving." 
 
 "Starving because they won t work, then." 
 "They can t; there isn t enough for them to do." 
 "Yes, there is: more to be done than all of them 
 and as many more could accomplish. Whenever 
 you hear of a thousand or a hundred thousand men 
 wanting jobs, just remember this: that there are 
 wide places in this country where men are calling for 
 labour and can t get it." 
 "Where, for example?" 
 
 "In all the hard places where it requires strength 
 and endurance and courage. In the fields, for 
 example. This country doesn t produce a third of the 
 crops it should produce, because there are not enough 
 men willing to do that kind of work. It s hard work. 
 Those fellows who are shrieking and leading riots 
 in the cities because they haven t got work are
 
 178 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 fellows who want a job at folding circulars for two 
 dollars a day, or running a machine, something light 
 and easy. They don t want to work for what they 
 can honestly win from the earth, because they are 
 lazy, not equal to the weather, the exposure. They 
 haven t got the grit to get down to it and make their 
 own bread. Want to buy it. Most of the poverty, 
 most of the unhappiness, and most of the disorders of 
 our times come from just that one thing: the de 
 sire for a soft place. And there aren t any for 
 honest men." 
 
 "Still, conditions change, and that changes 
 everything else, even morals. Morals are the re 
 sult of conditions, aren t they?" 
 
 She knew she was right, for she had heard that 
 from a lecturer who was an authority on the history 
 of morals. But she was trying to lead John up to 
 where she was going. 
 
 "Morals are. We don t make them. We never 
 have. We only damage them with our conditions. 
 They were written into us with our flesh and blood, 
 into the earth, into every flower that blooms, every 
 tree that spreads its branches, into the very grass 
 that covers the bare places, when we and they were
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 179 
 
 created in the beginning. Conformity to order, 
 that order, means health, virtue, honour, all the rest 
 of em. And in so far as we do not conform we 
 must perish. That s law, it s not an accident. We 
 do perish. As soon as we find all of our morals and 
 practise them, we shall live, and we shall be clean." 
 
 John was a thinker when he got started. But he 
 did not think along recognised lines. She sup 
 posed it was because he was not trained. 
 
 "We are growing better, though; we are more 
 charitable, because we recognise the facts of life. 
 We are not so narrow about some things," she said, 
 after a pause. 
 
 "I don t know; they say we are progressing. 
 I m not dead certain!" he laughed. 
 
 "There s divorce, now. You believe in that, 
 don t you?" 
 
 She was in sight at last, and John stared at her 
 moodily, as a man will when he is driving a double 
 team of reflections through his mind. 
 
 " I believe in marriage," he answered, giving her the 
 benefit of one line. "Whoever believes in marriage 
 cannot believe in divorce. And whoever believes 
 in divorce cannot absolutely believe in marriage."
 
 180 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "But nearly every one believes in divorce these 
 days, " she insisted. 
 
 "And presently nearly every one will be getting 
 a divorce. That s why. They accept marriage 
 incidentally and pin their faith to the ultimate 
 divorce." 
 
 This was so near an accusation that she took refuge 
 in silence. 
 
 "But," he went on, "if I believed in divorce at 
 all for anything, I d believe in it for the same reason 
 that so many women demand it." 
 
 "What s that?" 
 
 "For non-support." 
 
 "Non-support!" 
 
 "Isn t that what they call it? When a man fails 
 or refuses to provide for his wife?" 
 
 He was grinning at her, but it was not a pleasant 
 grin. 
 
 "Surely you don t think a wife ought to sup 
 port her husband?" she exclaimed at this evident 
 contradiction between John himself and his creed. 
 
 "I do. A wife is under the same obligation to 
 provide for her husband that he is to her." 
 
 "In what way? How can she?"
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 181 
 
 "Well, he furnishes the home, but she must make 
 it his home and hers, with the labour of her hands, 
 as he labours for her that she may have the means 
 with which to create the home. She is his helpmeet. 
 That s what she is made for. She should support 
 him with her faith; her love and her hopes should 
 live in him. She should furnish their home with 
 peace, health, cheerfulness and children." 
 
 "Children!" 
 
 "Especially children. That s one of the reasons 
 an ambitious, honourable man marries. He finds 
 the woman he wants to be the mother of his chil 
 dren. He wishes to provide for his and her immortal 
 ity through the next generation with the sons and 
 daughters of his body." 
 
 "O God! he doesn t even say child, he said 
 children! " she thought. She saw herself for one 
 brief instant surrounded by a perfect mob of yell 
 ing, dancing, whimpering children, all sons and 
 daughters of John s body. Good heavens! Where 
 w r ould her body be? How would it look? Old, 
 withered, ugly. The worst thing about it was one 
 little thing. She saw a fringe of gray hair hanging 
 untidily about her neck behind. She had often
 
 182 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 noticed that mothers of many children seemed to 
 come unravelled this way behind. 
 
 The next cruellest thing to nature in the fate of a 
 wife is the husband who is determined to make 
 more young and beautiful nature out of her, and at 
 her expense. The thought was too awful. She re 
 fused to meet John s gaze. She erased him from her 
 eyeballs. 
 
 "Of course," he said, taking up the subject again, 
 "if he marries a barren woman, he pities her mis 
 fortune. And it is his duty to love and cherish her 
 even in his sore disappointment. But I say if any 
 thing more than another entitled a man to a divorce, 
 it would be the fact that his wife refused to bear his 
 children. Recall the women you have known, the 
 fashionable idle women, who spend their husband s 
 substance as if it were water they dashed upon the 
 ground. Not one in four bears children. They are 
 rogues, these women, who steal first the names of 
 their husbands and bury them with their dust, and 
 then they steal lives from the generation to come, 
 just because they are mean, selfish, with no thought 
 except for their own pleasure. If I had 
 
 "Good-night, John; I m going upstairs to bed,"
 
 183 
 
 Olive interrupted, rising and walking from the room 
 hastily, as if she hoped to win the door before she 
 lost control of herself. 
 
 A woman s spirit is the most deceptive thing she 
 has among her many deceptions. She will give it 
 up, let it lie flat, beating its wings in the dust so long 
 as it entertains her to play the martyr. Then when 
 you least expect it, when you think she is done with 
 the pomp and vainglories of this world forever, she 
 seizes it and rises with it higher, and flies further than 
 any man can follow, provided she gets a good start. 
 You want to suspect your wife most when she is 
 meekest. She is only tying up a few things getting 
 ready to leave you in her astral body, though her 
 body may remain by your side for the next forty 
 years. It is only her ghost, not really all of her. 
 The best wives may accomplish this kind of divorce 
 with no compunction at all, and you never are the 
 wiser. 
 
 John, being more of a man than a psychic hus 
 band, observed nothing strange about Olive the 
 next day. It was true that she seemed preoccu 
 pied, that she hurried from one task to another as if 
 she had something else on her mind which must be
 
 184 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 done, as if there was no time to be lost if she really 
 got round to it. But this is often the manner of 
 busy housewives. If anything, he was gratified to 
 see how diligently she worked, and with what dis 
 patch. Showed that she was taking a woman s 
 interest in the home and its duties. 
 
 "I was right to get Mother off on that visit and 
 give Olive a chance. She s taking hold better than 
 I hoped she would," he reflected as he approached 
 the house late in the afternoon. 
 
 He ran up the steps, entered the hall, and stopped 
 short. He could see the fire burning brightly in the 
 parlour grate through the open door. But he did 
 not see Olive, and he did not see her moving about 
 in the kitchen. What was more, he could not feel 
 her presence, as he always did even if she was up 
 stairs behind a closed door. 
 
 "Olive!" he called. 
 
 No answer. 
 
 Then he noticed that the old walnut hat rack 
 beside the wall was spreading its naked arms and 
 looking at him with his own face questioningly from 
 the little round mirror between the horns. Olive s 
 long coat and hat which always hung there were gone.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 185 
 
 "She s out for a walk," he thought, as he made 
 his way to the refrigerator on the back porch. He 
 was hungry. He was going to get his "snack," as 
 usual. 
 
 When he opened the door and stooped down, the 
 first thing he saw was not the cake, beautifully 
 frosted, not the baked fowl, still warm from the 
 oven, nor the bowl of lettuce on the top shelf, but a 
 note pinned to a loaf of fresh bread. 
 
 He picked it off, too dumbfounded to think what 
 it meant, opened the crisp little blue sheet and read: 
 
 DEAR JOHN: 
 
 If you had said child last night, it would not have been so awful, 
 but you said "children," and I just can t stand it. I ve gone 
 home. 
 
 OLIVE. 
 
 P. S. Mother will be coming back to-morrow. I ve cooked 
 enough things to last you until then. 
 
 By all the laws governing the outraged feelings 
 of husbands deserted, he should have been furious. 
 But as he read it over the second time, recalling the 
 conversation of the night before, he was moved to 
 compassion. 
 
 "The poor little goose!" he exclaimed.
 
 186 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 Then he jumped, looked at his watch. Five 
 o clock! She must have taken the local at four- 
 thirty for Atlanta. The express was due in ten 
 minutes. He could make it! 
 
 He rushed through the hall, seized his hat, banged 
 the front door after him, and made for the station.
 
 PART THREE
 
 PART THREE 
 
 WHEN Olive stepped from the train in 
 Atlanta, the first face she saw was 
 that of her husband. 
 
 "Hello!" he said, grinning. 
 
 "John!" she gasped, "how d you get here?" 
 
 "Flew. Had to fly in order to overtake you. 
 Took the express. Passed you at Kingston," he 
 answered, still grinning, as he drew her arm in his 
 and pressed it close to his side. 
 
 They walked out of the old Union Station to 
 gether. A cold November rain was falling, the 
 streets glistened like black mirrors. The electric 
 light globes on either side were reflected there. They 
 seemed to swing deeply sunken in that bright sur 
 face. Umbrellas bobbed like round-top fungus 
 above the hurrying crowds. Taxis and automobiles 
 slid noiselessly in and out through the rattling 
 drays. A long line of dingy cabs with raw-boned 
 
 horses drooping between the shafts stood with their 
 
 189
 
 190 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 backs to the sidewalk outside the station. But John 
 ignored the shouting drivers, the more dignified 
 solicitation of the taxi chauffeurs. It cost fifty 
 cents to ride in one of those things. 
 
 "Well, that fellow is a chump, soaking a pretty 
 gal like that because he s too stingy to dig up his 
 fare!" growled an old man from his seat upon a 
 particularly disreputable cab. 
 
 The "chump" heard him, but he had eyes only 
 for the "pretty gal," smiling eyes, too. 
 
 Olive was wearing the "chic" tailored suit she 
 had ordered from Madame, and she wore a cun 
 ning little hat on her head, shaped like a Scotch 
 bonnet, with a green and red checked band around 
 it, a slim rakish feather lacing it, and two narrow 
 black ribbons hanging down to the nape of her neck 
 behind. Beneath John s quizzical gaze she could 
 not have felt more guilty if she had stolen these 
 things, even the yellow chamois gloves upon her 
 hands and the smart black and tan shoes that were 
 twinkling in and out from beneath her skirt. 
 
 "You are looking mighty fine, Honey," he said. 
 
 "And I m getting soaking wet! Where are we 
 going, John?"
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 191 
 
 "Well, not to the church this time," he answered, 
 as they both recalled a former occasion when she 
 asked this question. 
 
 Olive reddened until her face was a rose in the 
 rain, as crimson and as wet as that. 
 
 "But," he added, praising her with his eyes, 
 "I d marry you again this minute if I hadn t done 
 it already." 
 
 "I m not so sure I would!" she answered, not 
 entirely able to cheat the rose of a smile. 
 
 "Oh, yes, you would, my sweet. You are born 
 with the blood of adventure calling in your veins. 
 You d do it again, even though you know how 
 dingy the store is, and what a stupid man John is." 
 
 "You are a sport yourself, John." She actually 
 laughed. 
 
 "Well, not what you d call an out and out bookie, 
 who stands to win or lose. I always bet on a sure 
 thing, and I hold to it until I win," he answered 
 gaily. 
 
 She respected him, and she could not help admir 
 ing him more than she had ever thought possible. 
 Women are made very queer and primitive by 
 the soul. They never quite yield to any man who
 
 192 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 is not able and sufficiently ruthless to outwit them, 
 take them, and keep them. 
 
 Still, the humblest wife resents having her togs 
 spoiled. Olive wondered, as they climbed the steps 
 to the viaduct and turned down Marietta Street, if 
 John was deliberately trying to ruin her clothes and 
 make her skirt shrink. So she balked, planted her 
 little feet upon the pavement. What if he was taking 
 her to the police station? She had heard of runaway 
 wives being "incarcerated." You couldn t tell 
 what a man like John would do. He was dull when 
 she wanted him to shine, and he had the speed and 
 wit of a wild Indian when she didn t want him to at 
 all. So she hung back, soiling the glove of her free 
 hand to grasp the railing of the viaduct, not to be 
 dragged on by that other hand which John was 
 cherishing tightly with both of his. 
 
 "I just won t go another step until you tell me 
 where we are going," she exclaimed tearfully. 
 
 "Well, I thought we d get a little snack first. I 
 didn t have time to eat anything before I ran for the 
 train. Think I left the refrigerator door open in my 
 hurry too. And then we might take in a moving 
 picture show before we take the midnight train to
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 193 
 
 Valhalla," he answered, evidently happy at the 
 prospect. 
 
 She sighed and went on. It was not as bad as 
 she had expected. Besides, she had to go or make a 
 scene; for John went, and he would have taken her 
 with him in spite of that smile he wore if he had 
 dragged her. 
 
 They turned into a cheap restaurant, where there 
 were paper napkins, and no cloths upon the tables, 
 and they had the "snack" club sandwiches and a 
 cup of steaming black coffee. 
 
 It may have been the coffee, or it may have been 
 the situation that began to appeal to Olive s ad 
 venturous spirit, which was, after all, only the 
 romantic spirit of a young girl. Anyhow, she began 
 to effervesce. She did not want to talk, but she did 
 talk. She did not want to smile, but she could not 
 help smiling at this handsome, cool-eyed, close-lipped 
 man, w r ho would keep her though the heavens fell. 
 She did not want to be glad that he had followed her 
 and taken her again, but she could not help being 
 glad. It simplified things, his coining for her. She 
 had never answered Aunt Sarah s letter. And she 
 did not know how Aunt Sarah would have received
 
 194 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 her dropping in as a runaway wife. No matter 
 which way she turned, she was "in for it." She 
 might as well make the best of it; at least, until 
 Uncle Richard came home. 
 
 She held to that reservation doggedly. She 
 thought she could explain to Uncle Richard all 
 except about the "children." He was a very smart 
 man, Uncle Richard was, and she did hope he d 
 come back before it was too late! He d be able to 
 explain to John how impossible it was to make a cook 
 and a slave and a scrub-woman out of his niece, 
 who had a fortune, and naturally a right to live ac 
 cordingly. 
 
 They went out again in the rain. Then John 
 pointed to a most worldly bright place across the 
 street. 
 
 "Movie, over there. That s why I chose this 
 place for supper," he explained, almost lifting her 
 over the wet pavement. 
 
 They went in. John smacked down two dimes 
 at the window and received two tickets accordingly. 
 It was a stuffy place, seething with a popular audi 
 ence. And the pictures were popular, too. There 
 was an English girl stolen by an old Turk in the
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 195 
 
 harem commissary business, who sold her to another 
 Turk. And the girl didn t seem to mind. She was 
 put up to dance by way of raising her price. Ad 
 venturous Englishman sees her, snatches her out 
 of the dance, and kisses her. Terrific disturbances! 
 He hadn t paid for her; what did he mean by kiss 
 ing what he hadn t paid for? But the girl didn t 
 seem to mind, clung to the man, eloped with him. 
 Man kisses her again and then commits suicide. 
 Wild applause from the audience. Girl gets kissed 
 by another man in passing. But he is only passing. 
 She wanders footsore and weary through a foreign 
 land. Doesn t know what land it is, but she hopes 
 some man will take her. Makes a mewing fuss be 
 hind a green hedge, and is dragged through it by 
 Lord Somebody, who doesn t know what on earth 
 to do with her. She is in England, my dear, and 
 doesn t she know that she just mustn t, mustn t lay 
 her beautiful head upon a man s shoulder in England, 
 the historic resting place of Cromwell and all the 
 puritan virtues? No, she only knows that she likes 
 his shoulder, and won t he please kiss her? He 
 does, and wrings his hands in horror while the audi 
 ence cheers again. And just as everybody thinks
 
 196 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 she is going to marry him like a decent woman, 
 she runs off with his bosom friend. Not because 
 she wants to marry the bosom friend, heavens, no! 
 but because he kissed her and she didn t know 
 what else to do. There is a wild ride in a blazing 
 automobile while the audience holds its breath in 
 suspense. Then total darkness. Next scene shows 
 the girl out looking for another man, having left 
 the last one dying under his overturned car. 
 
 The audience does not know why, but it pities 
 this poor little wondering She. This is the way 
 with people, common people with their emotions 
 working, when they watch a play on the stage, or 
 even the picture of a play on a screen. They are all 
 for the girl with the golden hair, who stares with 
 speaking eyes and staggers hungry and cold through 
 the snow. It does not matter what she has done. 
 They hope she ll land by the fire with her head on 
 the right man s shoulder. 
 
 But John always took his morals with him when 
 he went abroad, and he was worried. 
 
 "I say," he whispered to Olive; " that girl won t do. 
 Why don t she stay put? Why in thunder doesn t 
 she marry one of em, and have done with it?"
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 197 
 
 "Because, John dear, she wants them all to love 
 her," answered Olive, beginning to snigger. "Be 
 sides, don t you see they couldn t finish the reel if 
 she made up her mind at once?" 
 
 "Well, she s setting a confounded bad example 
 to the girls here," he growled, looking round gravely 
 concerned at the maidens who were suffering and 
 sympathising with the heroine. 
 
 "Oh," giggled Olive, "won t you ever quit gnaw 
 ing your Ten Commandments for a minute, John, 
 and just enjoy something because it s entertaining? " 
 
 "It s entertaining, all right: that s the mischief 
 of it, but 
 
 Fortunately, the "right man" got a hunch in the 
 next scene that the girl was dying in the snow just 
 outside his window, and he went out and rescued 
 her and married her before she thawed; one might 
 have said just to get her out of the way of the rest 
 of mankind. 
 
 "I wouldn t have done it!" John snorted, as the 
 screen faded and the lights came on. 
 
 "Not even if it had been me?" Olive suggested. 
 
 "It couldn t have been you," he answered, mak 
 ing way for her through the crowed to the door.
 
 198 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 One hour later they were on the train, slipping 
 up through the hills to Valhalla. They were hi the 
 day coach, where it didn t matter, so Olive laid 
 her head upon John s shoulder, and let one of her 
 hands drift away in a dream with one of John s 
 hands. 
 
 "I m glad the weather has cleared," he said, 
 looking through the window at the cold, starlit 
 night. 
 
 "John!" 
 
 "Yes, beloved," drawing her closer to him. 
 
 "I told you that day we were married that you 
 couldn t trust me. I warned you, John," she 
 whispered. 
 
 "I remember. I m only trusting myself, not 
 you, dear, not yet. But soon now!" he answered, 
 pressing her hand to his heart. 
 
 "Oh, not soon," she sobbed. "You can t ever. 
 Some day I shall drag our love in the mire, John. 
 It s the way I m made." 
 
 "The one thing which cannot be dragged in the 
 mire is true love, Olive. The more you deface it, 
 the fairer it shines. It can make of sorrow the bread 
 of life. Its indulgence is sacrifice. Its prominence
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 199 
 
 is self-effacement. Nothing can change or diminish 
 love. It thrives upon injustice, blooms above the 
 death of all hopes and even happiness, for it cannot 
 die. That s what immortality is love!" 
 
 She listened in awe. She had a new sense of her 
 husband. He encompassed her with his will. He 
 wrapped her in this shining garment of his love, and 
 she was terrified. For she could not think in these 
 terms of love. And she did not want to love so, 
 and she prayed to be delivered from such a love and 
 such a man. Still, she knew that she was glad to be 
 there beside him going home with him. 
 
 So are women made, of all contradictions, and to 
 so little purpose of their own, with no sustaining 
 strength in themselves to accomplish the liberty of 
 their own souls. Yet ever rebellious, ever striving 
 against their fate. It all came from having been 
 made from the rib of a man, and not from original 
 dust. They are sidekin to him, and nothing that 
 they can do, or provoke men to do, will change that. 
 
 When Mrs. Arms came home the next morning, 
 she found the house swept and garnished like the 
 heart of a good woman, who has made the best of
 
 200 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 everything and blown upon the coals upon her altar 
 to furnish the right warmth and glow for all homely 
 virtues. There was an odour of cleanliness so grateful 
 to the nostrils of an old housewife who had long 
 since proved that this virtue is indeed next to godli 
 ness, and who knew that it could not be obtained 
 without the plentiful use of soap and water and 
 furniture polish. The old threadbare rug in the 
 parlour lay upon the floor like brown and yellow 
 autumn leaves dried in the sun after a drenching 
 rain. The windows glistened like the spectacles of 
 an elegant old lady who is looking through them at 
 the same old town, but with renewed interest. Even 
 the dish cloths in the kitchen were immaculate. 
 The pie pans on the shelf showed that they had been 
 scrubbed, the tea set, canister, butter dish, and water 
 pitcher on the sideboard shone like silver moonlight 
 in the darkened dining-room. 
 
 Olive herself was a kind of prim miracle with her 
 hair so smoothly braided, and her face so pinkly 
 fair, and her slender figure almost, but not quite, 
 concealed in one of Mother s white aprons. 
 
 The old lady was delighted beyond words as sh 
 moved from one room to another with her spectacles
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 201 
 
 elevated like a two-eyed tiara on top of her head. 
 There are some things which even the blind can see 
 without the aid of magnifying glasses. John was so 
 proud that he was unbearably conceited. One 
 might have inferred from the satisfied grin upon his 
 face that he had done all this. And in his secret 
 soul he did not doubt that he had. 
 
 But Olive was silent, not meek, just wordless, 
 merely studying that expression upon John s face 
 with cool attention. 
 
 "Olive, my child, it is wonderful. I couldn t 
 have done it so well myself, everything, and kept 
 the house like this!" exclaimed Mrs. Arms, em 
 bracing her daughter-in-law. 
 
 "You ought to be proud of your wife, John," she 
 added, looking over Olive s shoulder at her son. 
 
 "I am. I m so proud I can hardly keep both feet 
 on the floor," he answered with a laugh. 
 
 But Olive stared at him soberly. 
 
 "He s only proud of having made me do it," she 
 thought to herself. 
 
 And the old lady never knew that the bread, the 
 cake, the cold fowl, and the salad they had that day 
 for lunch were prepared to keep John alive until she
 
 202 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 should return, by a wife who had made up her 
 mind to desert him. 
 
 Since she could do so well in this business, he had 
 a plan to propose. 
 
 "What s the use of having Cindy back at all?" 
 he demanded. 
 
 "But, John, it s one thing to do all the work of 
 this house for two weeks, and a very different thing 
 to do it all the time!" his mother objected. 
 
 "Work is a very good thing, Mother; the best 
 remedy in the world for all the troubles in the 
 world. Look at Olive: did you ever see her looking 
 better, fairer, sweeter or half so becoming to 
 herself?" 
 
 They both took Olive in, John with smiling eyes, 
 Mrs. Arms with evident anxiety. The young wife 
 suddenly concealed herself as if she dropped a curtain 
 somewhere within and retired behind it either to 
 pray or to lift her hands rebelliously, vowing some 
 thing which she called upon high heaven to witness. 
 
 "Not since you have been away has she com 
 plained of being bored," he went on, reaching over 
 to pat Olive s shoulder. "She s a howling success, 
 that s what my wife is."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 203 
 
 "It will make no difference at all in my plans, 
 Mother, whether we have a cook or not," said the 
 "howling success," carefully addressing Mother 
 and not John. 
 
 She had "plans," then! He was not so inatten 
 tive to that term as he appeared to be. 
 
 "Very well, then; we ll try it for a month," 
 agreed the old lady. " Cindy is a trial. She will 
 leave the top off the soda can, and she is not really 
 neat. But I warn you, John, if Olive begins to look 
 peaked or worried, we ll make a change at once." 
 
 So it was settled, and the Arms house began to 
 revolve upon its diurnal axes, as if the angels greased 
 them, which the angels did not do. Olive insisted 
 upon doing the kitchen work, and she did the worst 
 of it with suspicious thoroughness. She appeared 
 to be in her element when she cleaned out the stove. 
 She managed to be engaged in this soot-smearing 
 duty at the hour when John returned from the store 
 in the afternoon. She made of herself a little ash 
 can wife and refused to be kissed, lest he might soil 
 himself, which he was eagerly willing to do in so 
 good a cause. Also, she did not dress for dinner. 
 She said she did not have time, that everything
 
 204 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 would be cold, not fit to eat, if she delayed to clean 
 up. So she came to the table looking as much like 
 a cook as she could. And then she did not eat 
 much, because she said it took her appetite to pre 
 pare the food. She put the kitchen in order and 
 would not allow John to wipe the dishes, though he 
 was quite willing, because she said she preferred to 
 do everything herself. Then she thought she would 
 go upstairs to bed. She was tired. Would they 
 excuse her? This from the parlour door as she 
 passed through the hall from the kitchen. 
 
 It was enough to move the heart of a stone, and 
 Mrs. Arms was moved deeply. 
 
 "John, this won t do! That child is making a 
 drudge of herself!" she exclaimed one evening as 
 they sat alone by the fire. 
 
 He did not answer. He was smoking his pipe 
 and auditing his books, as he had done at night be 
 fore his marriage. 
 
 "I shall send for Cindy to-morrow," she an 
 nounced, in a tone which meant that she would not 
 be contradicted. 
 
 He really wished she would. But he did not want 
 to say so. It was too much like admitting that he
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 205 
 
 had made a mistake. But he was anxious about 
 Olive. She certainly was not like herself. 
 
 No woman ever is after her husband actually suc 
 ceeds in adjusting her to his own ideas of what a 
 wife should be. And no man would ever choose 
 such a woman if she was in that state of silence and 
 submission before he married her. But this is one 
 thing you cannot teach a man. He will object to 
 the very qualities in his wife which attracted him 
 to her as a girl. If he has his own way with her 
 he will put her in flat-heeled shoes, though he was 
 in love with her little French slippers. He says to 
 her that he wonders why she fusses up her hair so, 
 when it was these same vagrant curls he noticed 
 the first time he saw her. And why in thunderation 
 doesn t she get sensible clothes, when, in fact, the airy, 
 flimsy, foolish frock she wore once when he came to 
 call, a sweet little lace-trimmed cloud hint she gave 
 him then of how winged and happy she was in her 
 heart to him. So he reduces his wife to the prose 
 of his own masculine mind, and then spends the 
 rest of his days vaguely in need of that girl she was 
 before he changed her into this plain woman who 
 wears broad-toed shoes, smooths her hair back, and
 
 206 
 
 clothes herself in just sensible frocks that are as 
 ugly as hell. Lord! why doesn t she do something 
 to make herself attractive? It comes to that! Mean 
 while the poor thing is doing everything she can to 
 conform to what he said he wanted, considering his 
 wishes and his comfort in every act of her life, and 
 even in her prayers. 
 
 The truth of the whole business is jealousy. The 
 man knows that the same feminine enchantments, 
 enhanced by feminine arts of toilet, would also 
 attract other men to her as he was attracted. Now 
 that she is his wife, he will not tolerate that. There 
 fore he cheats himself out of the adorable girl she 
 was in order that no other man may discover that 
 she might, could, or would be adorable. And he 
 does all this without ever admitting to himself why 
 he does it. Perfectly innocent of his ugly, flat- 
 footed, plain clothes wife! 
 
 Mammon may be the root of all evil. 1 do not 
 say it is not. But if you want to study the growth 
 and development of the green bay tree of all mean 
 ness, observe the manifestation of jealousy in the 
 lives of men. It is hardy, deadly, and you cannot 
 get rid of it without killing the victim.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 207 
 
 John was not as bad as all this, and Olive was not 
 so good as all this; but she had got as far as the flat 
 shoes, the only kind to be had in Valhalla, and as 
 far as the very "simple" blue serge frock which she 
 and Mrs. Arms made between them. They had "a 
 time," as the old lady expressed it, taking up the 
 darts, which did not really matter, since the thing 
 would have looked as well or as bad without any 
 darts at all, it was so warped to ugliness. Olive was 
 secretly saving the things Madame had made and 
 sent to her. 
 
 One bright afternoon early in December she 
 started for the grocery store. She wore "the dress" 
 beneath her last winter s coat, and she wore her 
 last winter s hat, and she carried a market basket 
 on her arm, with a long list of things in her purse 
 which would be needed for the Christmas fruit cake. 
 
 As she walked along the Avenue, she saw Mrs. 
 Bigsby some distance ahead, thrillingly dressed as 
 usual, with a white fur collar laid opulently over 
 the back of her new velvet coat, and a bunch of 
 tittering artificial flowers pinned upon her white 
 muff. She was fairly crimping the ground as she 
 pranced. Olive lagged. She did not want to catch
 
 208 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 up with "that woman." She did not know why 
 she thought of her as "that woman." It might 
 have been the white furs, or it might have been some 
 sad growth of grace in herself. She only knew that 
 she was unhappy and that she wished to be alone 
 with her sorrow. 
 
 The emissaries of the world always appear when 
 the tired good of you is craving a strong drink of 
 coffee. Doubtless they will be in Paradise, too, 
 dangerous stronger spirits with flaming topknots and 
 wider wings. At this moment Olive heard a roar 
 behind her, not the gargling motor of a "flivver," 
 but the satin smooth thunder of a high-powered car. 
 The next instant a magnificent midnight blue limou 
 sine, with a silver monogram embossed upon its 
 side and an embossed gentleman lolling inside, passed 
 her. 
 
 "Dickie!" she screamed, and then held her 
 breath in horror lest he should have heard her. Oh, 
 heavens! suppose he had seen her, recognised her in 
 these old last winter s rags! 
 
 She leaned against the palings, she was so faint 
 from the shock, not of seeing Dickie, though that 
 was enough, but for fear Dickie had seen her in these
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 209 
 
 old things. Eve could not have been more mortified 
 at the chance of meeting one of the flaming sword 
 angels before she exchanged her innocence for her 
 first evening gown. 
 
 The girl stood watching the car until it disap 
 peared. She knew she had seen Blake, but what did 
 Blake mean by coming to Valhalla? Atlanta was 
 only fifty miles distant, and sometimes tourists from 
 that place did pass through the town in pleasant 
 summer weather, but the sight of Blake in mid 
 winter flying through w r as like seeing a ghost. She 
 thought he was in New York. Aunt Sarah had given 
 her that information in the only letter she had had 
 from her. Why had he returned? Olive Thurston 
 had been the attraction for him in Atlanta, and now 
 there was no Olive Thurston. 
 
 She was pale to the lips. She knew how the dead 
 felt who could not rise from the dust of themselves. 
 All the thoughts which she tried not to think cried 
 out against this fate. All the gay scenes she tried 
 not to remember swam like mirages before her 
 vision. And she was here in this hideous little dead 
 town working like a drudge, never, never to escape. 
 She had lost all hope of changing John, and, what
 
 210 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 was more to the point, she knew John could never 
 change her, make her into the wife he wanted. She 
 only obeyed with her hands and feet. Her heart 
 was burnt within by a terrible despair. Only death 
 could release her from this awful tragedy she had 
 made of her life. And death was so far off. She 
 might live for years and years. She might O God, 
 those "children!" They haunted her. Sometimes 
 they swarmed in through the kitchen door, never 
 just one, but John s many sons and daughters. And 
 they looked at her with begging eyes. She stood 
 there with the last rags of the red winter sun spread 
 like a fan over her, with the bare branches of the 
 trees making a web of shadows about her feet, her 
 heart like lead in her bosom. 
 
 Suddenly she realised that some one was scream 
 ing behind her. She looked back and saw Mrs. Rip- 
 ley flying up the Avenue, bareheaded, with her arms 
 waving like an old fat duck s wings. What was the 
 woman shrieking? What were all those people yell 
 ing and gesticulating about as they ran into the 
 Avenue? 
 
 "Fire!" 
 
 "Fire!"
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 211 
 
 "Fire! Fire! F-I-R-E ! " the most horrific 
 word, the most despairing word that can be heard 
 in a town of old kindling wood houses with no means 
 to fight the arch enemy of destruction. 
 
 The sun had dropped dawn upon the roof of the 
 old Arms mansion. It bobbed up and down, a 
 blazing yellow ball. 
 
 She saw that as she turned and began to run back. 
 Fear lent wings to her feet. 
 
 As she burst in through the front door and started 
 up the stairs, she saw Mrs. Arms sitting before the 
 fire in the parlour, placidly knitting. 
 
 "What is all this fuss, Olive?" she called after her. 
 
 "The house is on fire!" answered Olive from the 
 hall above. 
 
 She seized a fire extinguisher which John kept 
 there. It was frightfully heavy, but she did not 
 know that as she raced with it up the attic stairs. 
 
 In another moment she had climbed the ladder 
 to the man-hole in the roof. 
 
 The next moment the crowd below saw a slim dark 
 figure running swiftly down the gradually sloping roof 
 to that blazing ball of fire which was already stretch 
 ing up into an exclamation point of destruction.
 
 212 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 There was a loud report followed by a black and 
 green column of smoke. 
 
 Olive stood staring at the little charred hole in 
 the shingles. She was just in time. Then she turned 
 and walked back toward the high coronet in the front 
 of the house which always conceals the wide, nearly 
 flat roof of the old ante-bellum mansion. 
 
 She heard the murmur of voices below. She knew 
 that the crowd was scattering, mostly women and 
 children; that Mrs. Ripley and Mrs. Bray were 
 speaking in the high treble of feminine excitement 
 to Mother on the veranda, and she knew that they 
 thought she was on her way back through the attic. 
 
 But she was not. She stood concealed from them 
 behind the cornice. She could see the square be 
 tween the branches of the naked trees. She saw 
 John rush out of the store. He was running toward 
 the Avenue. 
 
 She walked deliberately to the edge of the roof, 
 still hidden by the coronet above the veranda. She 
 looked down, just once, and closed her eyes. It was 
 far, fatally far to the ground below. She stood 
 there, swaying gently, something terrible dragging 
 her forward. Was it the dizzy height, was it some
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 213 
 
 anguish in her mind? She did not know. She felt 
 the beads of perspiration chilling upon her brow. 
 Her limbs were freezing. Then as if from a great 
 distance she heard* 
 
 "Olive!" 
 
 But she could not answer. 
 
 "Olive, wait! I m coming!" 
 
 John s voice. Very strange it sounded in her ears, 
 as if he meant to steady her. But, O God! she 
 could not wait, and she did not want John to come. 
 She heard footsteps behind her, many feet. 
 
 She was falling, utter peace in a black night of de 
 spair. 
 
 When she opened her eyes after ages and ages, 
 she looked into John s face. She was lying upon her 
 bed; Mother was moving softly round on the other 
 side with the camphor bottle and a handkerchief 
 in her hands. 
 
 She closed her eyes, and felt the tears creep 
 through. 
 
 "You are all right, darling," she heard Mother 
 say. 
 
 "And the bravest woman in the world. Don t 
 cry, my sweet," whispered John. Then she heard
 
 214 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 Mrs. Arms go out. They were alone together. 
 
 "John," she said, looking up at him, "please 
 go. I want to think." 
 
 "But I can t leave you now, dear," he protested, 
 kissing her. 
 
 "You must. I want to think, John!" she cried, 
 shivering beneath his warm lips. 
 
 Now she was alone in the dark, and she could not 
 think. But she knew, oh! she knew that she could 
 not go on. It was as if she had been led upon a high 
 place and had seen the kingdoms of the world from 
 that roof. Why had she not done what she wanted 
 to do in the anguish of her despair? 
 
 She was weeping wildly when Mrs. Arms again 
 entered the room, stood looking down at her with a 
 candle in her hand. 
 
 "Mother!" cried the girl frantically, "please go! 
 I want to think, by myself. I must be by myself!" 
 
 The old lady went back downstairs, set the candle 
 upon the parlour table, and glared at her son. 
 
 "John, there s something wrong with Olive!" 
 as if she accused him. 
 
 "It s just the shock; she ll be all right in the 
 morning," he answered hopefully.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 215 
 
 "No, it isn t just the shock. And she won t be all 
 right in the morning. That child s got something 
 on her mind, John." 
 
 He thought as much himself. He was very 
 miserable. 
 
 "And it s you!" exclaimed his mother. "You ve 
 been too hard on Olive. You just haven t got any 
 sense about women, John." 
 
 It was no time to argue this point. Perhaps he 
 had been a little exacting, he thought, staring into 
 the fire. 
 
 "I shouldn t be surprised if she did something 
 desperate. And it s your fault, John; you can t 
 train a woman as if she was a horse!" 
 
 She sniffed as she took up the candle and went out 
 to the kitchen. 
 
 It was ten o clock on the fifteenth of December. 
 To be exact, one week after Olive had put out the 
 fire on the roof of the Arms mansion. 
 
 Mrs. Thurston was seated at her desk writing 
 notes. It was a little teakwood toy desk that she 
 had picked up somewhere in her travels and she 
 was proud of it. So she kept it in the drawing-room.
 
 216 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 She had just been talking to Dickie Blake over 
 the phone. She wondered what had brought him 
 South again during the winter when there was no 
 golf, no roads for motoring, and no Olive to flirt with. 
 
 She always sighed when she thought of Olive, as 
 one sighs at the memory of the last grave in the 
 family lot at the cemetery. Olive was not even 
 buried in the family lot. She had gone off and 
 buried herself in a misalliance with a common 
 clodhopper. 
 
 Well, that was not her fault, she reflected grimly. 
 She had made every effort possible to keep the girl 
 from making such a fool of herself. When Richard 
 came home from Liverpool she had told him all about 
 it, more than she could tell in her letters. She had 
 cleared her skirts of the whole affair. 
 
 "She was simply infatuated with that man. I 
 can t understand it," she said, as they sat together 
 on that first evening of his arrival. 
 
 "Love, my dear, is a damn smart little rogue. 
 And nobody can understand him!" her husband 
 replied, twiddling his fingers. 
 
 "But Olive! How could she, the way she has 
 been brought up? The opportunities she s had to
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 217 
 
 make brilliant marriages! Why, Dickie Blake was 
 crazy about her!" 
 
 Thurston snorted. He always snorted when 
 Blake s name was mentioned if he was where he 
 could snort without attracting attention. 
 
 Mrs. Thurston was relieved that he took this reve 
 lation of his niece s folly so coolly, but she did not 
 see how he could be so callous. She had grieved 
 terribly for Olive, though of course she could do 
 nothing for a girl who had simply thrown herself 
 away. She was glad Olive did not write. She had 
 the decency to keep her unhappiness to herself. For 
 she did not doubt she was perfectly miserable. The 
 social season promised to be unusually gay. Not 
 that she cared for gaiety at her age, still one must 
 keep in the swim. And it was better to leave 
 the dead past to bury its dead which is the 
 only scripture society knows how to live up to 
 literally. 
 
 If one is accomplished in the fashionable clerical 
 work of answering notes, accepting and refusing 
 invitations, one may write them and keep up a 
 train of obituary reflections at the same time about 
 vanished relatives; and Mrs. Thurston had written
 
 218 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 half a dozen notes since that talk with Dickie over 
 the phone an hour since reminded her of poor Olive. 
 
 "It s a nuisance having to ask him to dinner," 
 she complained out loud. For she had done that. 
 And there was no reason in the world now why she 
 should be bothered with Blake. He was and always 
 had been a bore. 
 
 "I suppose he ll take us to the theatre afterward, 
 
 though. He certainly does pay his debts There s 
 
 the postman now!" she exclaimed, rising hurriedly 
 with the letters as she heard the door bell ring. 
 She hoped Thompson would remember to come for 
 them. What on earth was happening! The post 
 man appeared to be making an awful racket. She 
 could hear James and the maid exclaiming about 
 something. 
 
 She was staring at the drawing-room door when 
 it was flung open by James with a flourish. 
 
 "Olive!" 
 
 "The very same!" cried that young person, pre 
 cipitating herself upon the exalted satin bosom of 
 her " dear Auntie." 
 
 "Why, where d you come from?" gasped Mrs. 
 Thurston.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "From the back woods of Paradise, dear. Don t 
 I look it?" 
 
 Mrs. Thurston thought she did as she held her at 
 arm s length and considered her, but she did not 
 say so. Olive was pale; or was she merely fairer, 
 with that wild rose colouring instead of the damask 
 flush she remembered? And well, there was no 
 denying it, the girl was most becomingly dressed. 
 She noticed that with inward relief, even in her 
 excitement. 
 
 "I just had to come, I was so homesick to see you 
 and Uncle Richard. He s back, isn t he?" ex 
 claimed Olive. 
 
 "Yes, landed in New York Saturday. Got home 
 Monday morning." 
 
 "No wounds, no scars of war on him, I suppose?" 
 
 "No, only those of financial depression. He says 
 things are perfectly awful over there." 
 
 They looked at each other, and then the older 
 woman made up her mind that she might as well 
 know the worst at once. 
 
 "Where s your husband, Olive?" 
 
 "Oh, John " as if she referred to a handker 
 chief which she feared she had mislaid.
 
 220 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Did he come with you?" demanded Mrs. Thurs- 
 ton steadily,. 
 
 "No, indeed. You don t know John. He s too 
 busy getting getting rich, you know, Auntie. He s 
 an awful shark about his business. So I just came 
 by my lonesome, you see," she added, with a little 
 catch in her voice. 
 
 "Of course we are glad to have you, dear," said 
 Mrs. Thurston, as if there might have been some 
 doubt about that under certain circumstances. 
 
 "Well, you must be; for I ve come for ever so 
 long, Auntie, and I want to be very, very gay, have 
 lots of fun and excitement. It s rather quiet in 
 Valhalla, you know." 
 
 Mrs. Thurston said dryly that she supposed it 
 was. 
 
 "And I have some lovely things, Auntie. John 
 insisted upon that. You must come upstairs and 
 see my gowns. Thompson s unpacking now." 
 
 "Well," thought Mrs. Thurston as they went up, 
 "if she has clothes, things are not so bad. We can 
 make a proper appearance at once." 
 
 Still, she was not quite satisfied in her mind. 
 Olive was merely like her old self, not really her old
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 221 
 
 self. Something was amiss. She was sure of that 
 as she watched the feverish way Olive the woman 
 mimicked Olive the girl. 
 
 She told Richard that she suspected something 
 that night after they returned from the theatre. 
 Blake had dined with them, and, paying his debt 
 promptly, had taken them all to the show. Olive 
 was beautiful, by far the most beautiful woman in 
 any of the boxes. And she had behaved to Blake 
 with a dignity which was most becoming. He did 
 not seem to realise, stared at her worshipfully, that 
 sort of thing. It was disgusting. 
 
 "I tell you, Richard, there s something wrong," 
 insisted Mrs. Thurston as she took off her false 
 front and her braid and her minor curls, that night. 
 
 "I don t see a thing wrong with the child, Sarah. 
 She talked about her husband for an hour to me, 
 as if he was the demigod every young wife thinks her 
 husband is. Couldn t praise him enough. I think 
 you ve exaggerated the whole affair. Shouldn t be 
 surprised from what she tells me that she s done 
 very well for herself, married a fine man." 
 
 "You ll see!" answered Mrs. Thurston, in 
 Cassandra tones.
 
 222 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 Meanwhile, Olive sat upon the side of her bed 
 wondering at herself. Why had she told all those 
 lies to Aunt Sarah and Uncle Richard? Why had 
 she not admitted the truth at once by saying that 
 she had come home for good, because she could not 
 bear the life John led her, could not endure the 
 dreariness and drudgery, and all the hopeless for 
 ever of it? Instead of that, she had boasted, actually 
 boasted to Aunt Sarah of her domestic accomplish 
 ments. And instead of telling Uncle Richard how 
 she had suffered for things that were necessary for 
 her comfort, how poor John kept her and would not 
 allow her to spend a penny of her own money, she 
 had praised John to him until the old gentleman 
 grew enthusiastic, and chided her for not bringing 
 John with her, even if it was only for the day. Why, 
 then, didn t she fall upon his neck and tell him the 
 anguishing truth that she had taken French leave 
 of John and meant never, never to return to him! 
 Oh, it was horrible! She had encompassed herself 
 about with a fortress of lies. She had made John 
 out such a hero that no one could excuse a woman 
 for leaving such a man. 
 
 As for Dickie Blake, he was simply awful, ut-
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 223 
 
 terly shameless. It was true that she had left her 
 husband, but she was a married woman, and she d 
 thank him to remember that ! 
 
 "Well, anyhow," she laughed, turning out the 
 light and flinging herself upon the bed, "I won t 
 have to rise at six in the morning to get breakfast. 
 I ll have my own in bed. And I ll not wash dishes 
 or scrub the kitchen floor to-morrow. And we are 
 going to lunch with the Warrens, and we re going 
 to the matinee in the afternoon, and somewhere in 
 the evening. And we are going, going, going all the 
 time, and I m so happy I could shout to be here, not 
 there!" 
 
 Whereupon she turned over on her pillow and 
 did not sleep, and did weep because she could see 
 John and Mother sitting silent and bereaved by the 
 parlour fire. 
 
 However, this was the first night. She would 
 get accustomed to things presently, and forget John. 
 She was determined to forget John. 
 
 So far as appearances could prove, she succeeded. 
 She went everywhere. She was the gayest of the 
 gay. And she was "much admired" everywhere 
 she went. She tried not to show how ravenous she
 
 224 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 was for compliments when Uncle Richard pinched 
 her cheeks one day and told her that he had heard 
 he didn t know how true it was, but the rumour was 
 widely circulated in Atlanta that Mrs. John Arms 
 was far and away the most beautiful woman "out" 
 that winter. 
 
 They dined alone that evening, as it happened. 
 Mrs. Thurston, after observing her niece for days, 
 decided to mention something. 
 
 "You don t eat anything, Olive. Why don t you 
 eat?" 
 
 "Come, that will never do," her uncle chided. 
 "Can t stand up to this day-and-night pace you re 
 going if you mince your feed, Olive." 
 
 "I don t seem to care for it," she said with an 
 effort, looking away from her plate as if it was the 
 most distasteful thing she ever saw in her life. 
 
 "If you ll excuse me, Auntie, I ll go up and lie 
 down. I m a bit fagged," she said, rising. 
 
 "Well, now, what do you think of that? " demanded 
 Mrs. Thurston, laying down her salad fork and look 
 ing at her husband with a mysterious feminine stare. 
 
 "Seems to be off her feed," he answered, as if that 
 was no tragedy.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 225 
 
 "Well, I think it complicates matters most 
 awfully." 
 
 "To what matters do you refer, my dear?" 
 
 "Richard," she said, glancing toward the door of 
 the butler s pantry and lowering her voice as if that 
 door had a keyhole ear, "this is the middle of 
 January." 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 "Olive has been here a month, and she has not 
 received a single letter from her husband that I know!" 
 
 "Perhaps they are carrying on a clandestine cor 
 respondence," he suggested lightly. 
 
 "Don t think you are deceiving me, Richard; 
 you know you are anxious. And," she went on, 
 accumulating evidence, "Christmas passed without 
 a message, or an exchange of gifts, or a visit from 
 John Arms, who is only fifty miles away." 
 
 "My dear, don t meddle. The balance of many 
 a marriage has been destroyed by the poking fingers 
 of old people." 
 
 "Am I meddling?" she fired back indignantly. 
 "Don t I go night and day, until my tongue hangs 
 out, trying to give her all the excitement and what 
 ever it is she wants?"
 
 226 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Keep it up." 
 
 "It s all very well for you to say that, but you d 
 think differently if you saw how things are 
 going." 
 
 "How are they going?" 
 
 "Well, Dickie Blake hangs about Olive every 
 where all the time. People will be gossiping pres 
 ently, if they are not already at it." 
 
 "Does she encourage him? " he asked, frowning. 
 
 "I can t say that she does. No, she tries to 
 ignore him. She never dances with him, never 
 dances at all, in fact." 
 
 "And right she is; shows she has a proper sense 
 of how a married woman should behave when she 
 is away from her husband." 
 
 "But it isn t like Olive to be proper and " 
 
 "Marriage often improves a woman s idea of pro 
 priety, thank God!" 
 
 "Richard, you are only fencing. You know and 
 I know that Olive has left her husband." 
 
 "My dear, I do not know anything of the kind. 
 What I do know is that many a woman would leave 
 her husband if nature did not bind her closer to him 
 than the wedding ceremony. Just sit steady in the
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 227 
 
 middle of the boat and wait. Now will you ring 
 for the coffee?" 
 
 While these confidences were exchanged between 
 the old people Olive paced the floor of her room 
 like a tragic young sorrow. 
 
 "O God! what must I do, what must I do!" 
 she whispered, clasping her hands over her head in 
 a fine frenzy. 
 
 "How can I bear this?" she moaned, exhausted 
 at last. Falling upon her knees beside the bed, she 
 flung her arms across it like broken wings, and 
 buried her face. 
 
 If you are a woman, it is never wise to jump out 
 of the frying pan into the fire. A man may do it, 
 get away, and even take the frying pan with him. 
 But a woman cannot. Nature is against her. It 
 is best to stay in the pan and cool it with your tears. 
 
 Olive had progressed during these weeks beyond 
 tears. The anguish and suspense, which slowly 
 gave place to a frightful certainty, were too deep 
 for tears. She could not suffer, and suffer, she 
 thought, as she rose from her knees and went to 
 repair the damages of such acute secret suffering at 
 her dressing table.
 
 228 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 She rubbed her cheeks in vain. They would not 
 flame. Her face was pale as moonlight, and it 
 wore that sad, distant radiance of the moon. Well, 
 then, rouge it must be. She would not go out in 
 the world looking like a ghost. She put it on with 
 a lavish hand. She poked out her lips and reddened 
 them until they glowed. She could do nothing to 
 her eyes, which were wide and dark with all despair. 
 Still, she knew the effect was splendid as she threw 
 her opera cloak over her arm and trailed downstairs 
 where Dickie and Mrs. Thurston were waiting for 
 her. 
 
 They were going to the Drama League perform 
 ance which was to be given at the Driving Club. 
 
 She felt Dickie s searching gaze, merely felt it, 
 for she had learned not to return it; and she was 
 glad that she could not change colour, since she had 
 put on so much colour like a mask. 
 
 "Have a good time, my dear," said Uncle Rich 
 ard, patting her shoulder. Why did Uncle Richard 
 speak so tenderly, as if he knew? Well, nobody 
 should know or suspect! 
 
 "Oh, I always do have the loveliest time," she 
 laughed. "I m perfectly happy, you know."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 229 
 
 He did not know, he was not sure, his brooding 
 eyes told her, as Dickie held the cloak for her to slip 
 into. 
 
 "You are all snow and roses to-night, Olive, 
 stunning," he whispered. 
 
 "Olive, hurry, or we shall be late," called Mrs. 
 Thurston from the door. 
 
 While Dickie was putting the old lady in the car 
 and pulling up the rug, they both heard Olive ex 
 claim, as if she suppressed a scream. 
 
 "What is it? What s the matter?" asked Blake, 
 turning round. 
 
 "Oh, I thought I saw somebody over there in in 
 the shadows," gasped the girl, hurrying into the car. 
 
 "My goodness, Olive, you are nervous!" ex 
 claimed her aunt impatiently. "Why shouldn t 
 you see somebody? This town s full of people." 
 
 "Yes," laughed Blake, jumping in, "you are 
 not in Valhalla Cemetery for heroes slain in battle. 
 Lots of real live people here. Must get used to seeing 
 em on the streets." 
 
 Still she trembled, and then she laughed, a little 
 explosive giggle, as she drew nearer the fat warmth 
 of Mrs. Thurston s ample person.
 
 230 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 Her companions were both conscious of a light 
 ning change in her, a lift of the spirits. And never 
 had the beautiful Mrs. Arms been so lovely, so 
 charming, and withal so sedate as she was that 
 evening. 
 
 They were in the ballroom after the performance, 
 watching the dance. 
 
 Chan Wilton, an old beau, came up, seated him 
 self on the other side of Mrs. Thurston. 
 
 "Your niece is the handsomest woman in the 
 room," he whispered gallantly. 
 
 "Olive is a very good-looking girl," returned 
 the old lady, wondering what on earth the very 
 good-looking girl meant by stinging and stabbing 
 every man who approached her with merciless wit. 
 
 "And she knows how to take care of herself. 
 Look at Blake. He s bleeding from a dozen wounds. 
 Heard her tell him just now that she despised, posi 
 tively despised a man who didn t earn his own liv 
 ing. Fancy saying that to a fellow who couldn t 
 earn a penny to save his life!" 
 
 " Mr. Blake is an old friend of the family. Olive s 
 known him for years," answered Mrs. Thurston, 
 making an effort to cover the situation.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 231 
 
 "So? Well, it s my opinion that he doesn t know 
 Mrs. Arms at all. She s passed out of his knowledge. 
 Women do that sometimes, you know." 
 
 "I suppose so" with her mind on something else. 
 She was wondering if the perverse little baggage had 
 passed out of her knowledge, too. 
 
 The next afternoon the Bridge Whist Club met 
 with Mrs. Thurston. The game was over, the little 
 company of women and girls were scattered about 
 the drawing-room having tea. Every one was dis 
 cussing the game, what they could have done if they 
 had had such and such a hand, or if so and so hadn t 
 played the kind of hand she did play. 
 
 "Did you see that old cat renege?" from Mrs. 
 Warren in a whisper to Olive, with whom she was 
 seated near the window. 
 
 "I didn t notice," said Olive tactfully. 
 
 "Well, she did; she always does. Bless me, here s 
 Mr. Blake!" 
 
 "Just in time!" said that gentleman, bowing 
 himself in all directions as he advanced toward the 
 tea table. 
 
 "Don t tell me there s nothing left for a hungry 
 dog!" he said, addressing Mrs. Thurston.
 
 232 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "How will you have your tea, Dickie? " she asked, 
 not pleased, but willing to feed him. 
 
 "Strong, dear lady, very strong. I m a wreck; 
 had a frightful experience last night after I left you! " 
 he announced, sweeping the room with a provocative 
 grin. 
 
 "What happened?" 
 
 " Did you lose a lot of money playing poker?" 
 
 " Were you arrested? Some of our best people 
 are since the 
 
 " Oh, let him tell it in his own thrilling way. 
 Begin, Mr. Blake." 
 
 All this in a chorus from the ladies, while Olive 
 endeavoured to keep her companion s attention, she 
 alone of the company failing to acclaim the entrance 
 of the hero. 
 
 "I will; I m all puffed up with it; if you ll only 
 give me a chance to relate it," he answered, fixing 
 his eyes upon Olive, who continued to talk in an 
 undertone. 
 
 "Listen, he s going to give us a thrill." 
 
 "Well, it was rather startling," Blake went on. 
 "After I left you and Mrs. Arms, I stopped at a 
 little place to take something "
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 233 
 
 "Yes, we know about those little places!" 
 
 " It was late, and I decided to walk back to the 
 hotel; took a short cut through well, I think it 
 must have been an alley. Anyhow, it was very 
 dark in there 
 
 "Oh, it s going to be a desperate encounter!" 
 
 Suddenly a man stepped out in front of 
 me 
 
 "A robber! I told you so." 
 
 That s exactly what he was. I couldn t see 
 his face, it was so dark; but he stood there before 
 me so close I could feel him. I was not armed, you 
 see, and I admit I was pretty well stirred up. He 
 was so deliberate. Never met a footpad like him." 
 
 "This suspense is awful! What did you do, Mr. 
 Blake?" 
 
 "Why, I frightened him away. Took nerve, I 
 can tell you. I said, I fairly hissed, Begone! you 
 ruffian, or I ll shoot spots all over you! And be 
 lieve me, he went, disappeared like that!" blowing 
 his breath. 
 
 "Without robbing you?" 
 
 "Certainly. You see, I frightened him." 
 
 A peal of laughter, merry and at the same time
 
 234 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 tinkling with scorn, broke the heroic silence. It was 
 Olive. She was clapping her hands, in a paroxysm 
 of mirth, as she stared at Blake. 
 
 "Oh, Dickie," she gasped, "maybe he was not 
 after your wallet. Maybe he was after your life. 
 And when he saw, considered what a what a harm 
 less creature you are he vanished like that!" 
 puffing out her cheeks and blowing in imitation. 
 
 Blake flushed furiously. How could she have 
 guessed so nearly what had really happened? In 
 fact, he had met a man, a fearfully tall man, and a 
 wide one, in the darkened street, and he had stood 
 for the Lord only knew how long with his hands up, 
 waiting to be robbed, praying to be robbed and have 
 done with it. Then the thief, or whatever he was, 
 laughed in his face. "You damn coward, you are 
 not worth killing!" and had indeed vanished, "like 
 that." 
 
 "You ought to have a guard, Mr. Blake, an im 
 portant man like you!" 
 
 "Yes, you might be carried off and held for a 
 ransom." 
 
 "Well, I ll think of it," said Blake, comforted 
 that Olive s devilish prescience was not telepathic
 
 235 
 
 and that he had scored with the other ladies at 
 least. 
 
 But about Olive. He must do something. He 
 was tired of dangling. He would bring things to an 
 issue at the first opportunity. He thought he knew 
 his ground, and it was all to the good for him. The 
 girl had evidently left her husband, as he knew she 
 would. She was only playing him, so as not to be too 
 easy. He was up to a game like that himself. But, 
 by George! she was stunning. Marriage, he had 
 observed often, added a forbidding charm to a 
 woman. He wanted her more than he ever had when 
 she was a girl and free to entangle him in the bonds of 
 wedlock. No bonds like that now. And no alimony 
 later. A man in his position had to think in terms 
 of ultimate alimony if he married. It would be 
 smoother sailing. No wedding, no divorce, no 
 damages. Olive had lost. And he had won, practi 
 cally. He had only to pick up the stakes; that is, 
 Olive herself. He supposed there would be the 
 deuce of a scandal. But scandal was the spice of 
 life. Society had come to recognise that, and to 
 rejoice in such escapades; furnished excitement.
 
 236 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 One fine morning early in January the old Rip 
 Van Winkle town of Valhalla awakened, sat up, 
 rubbed the dust of half a century from its eyes, and 
 stared. 
 
 The object which attracted this stare was a 
 notice written in large script and posted on the door 
 of John Arms s hardware store, which was closed. 
 A crowd of men stood before it with their necks 
 stretched and their heads poked forward as if they 
 could not believe their eyes. 
 
 Colonel Ripley saw them from his office in the 
 Court House and came skipping across the Square, 
 throwing his game leg higher than usual in his 
 hurry to get there. 
 
 "What s up? John Arms gone into bankruptcy?" 
 he exclaimed, pushing his way through the crowd. 
 
 "No, he s just gone crazy, that s all," answered 
 some one. 
 
 The Colonel put on his glasses and read aloud: 
 
 WANTED AT ONCE : Ten carpenters, eight stone 
 masons, two civil engineers, and fifty day labourers. 
 Report to John Arms to-day before twelve o clock. 
 
 (Signed) JOHN ARMS.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 237 
 
 "Well," shouted the Colonel, facing the men, 
 "by cracky! what are we standing here for? Why 
 don t we report?" 
 
 "Reckon he s in earnest? " asked a man who wore 
 a mason s apron. 
 
 "That s what he s been all his life. Cut his teeth 
 in earnest when he was a baby. Wouldn t let his 
 Ma run her finger in his mouth to feel his gums then. 
 Fought every boy in this town in dead earnest soon 
 as he was old enough to fight. Went to work in 
 earnest after his Pa failed that last time and he had 
 to come home from college to make the living. Been 
 in earnest ever since. Never knew him to do but 
 one frisky thing, that was to marry. And if you 
 ask me, I believe that s why he s so much more in 
 earnest now. Got to make up for that frolic." The 
 Colonel laughed and the crowd laughed with him. 
 
 "You may stand around here if you like, gen 
 tlemen," he added over his shoulder as he hopped 
 off; "but I m on my way to the Foundry to apply 
 for the position of attorney to represent the darned 
 thing. Always knew John would fetch a surge some 
 day, and take hold. Now he s done it, and I m going 
 to get in on the ground floor."
 
 238 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 This was the beginning of a tremendous activity 
 in Valhalla. Cotton sold for six cents a pound dur 
 ing the autumn of 1914. The poor were desperately 
 poor. Men were glad of a chance to earn anything. 
 And John Arms had more applications for work than 
 he could fill. Still he paid a fair wage. And it was 
 said of him that he personally saw to it that every 
 man put in full time and did his stint. 
 
 The old Foundry was torn down, and immedi 
 ately the walls of it began to rise again. Machinery 
 was installed in the ore beds. Scrapers scraped, and 
 fifty teams hauled stone, lumber, and chaos generally 
 back and forth. 
 
 No one knew where Arms got the money for this 
 stupendous enterprise. He gave no confidences. 
 But since he never had "talked," they accepted his 
 reticence as natural. The only information they 
 had about the opening of the Foundry was from a 
 story published in one of the Atlanta papers with 
 headlines on the front page. This was an exceed 
 ingly flattering account, in which John Arms 
 was mentioned as a "young captain of industry," 
 and the Iron Foundry was exploited as probably 
 the beginning of a "great business." John was
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 239 
 
 himself astonished at this publicity, for he had 
 never given out his plans. Still, he was gratified 
 and encouraged. 
 
 At once the people of Valhalla began to look up 
 to him as a "prominent citizen." Two things are 
 essential to fame: first, the public must recognise 
 your ability. Your neighbours never do until then. 
 Second, if you wish to convince the community, 
 whether that is a village, a city, or the whole country, 
 that you are a person of distinction, be ruthless, and 
 envelop your ruthlessness in silence. 
 
 John had become ruthless. He collected bills 
 from men who never expected to pay, as if he did 
 not care any longer for a goodwill which depended 
 upon credit. He was mercilessly exacting as an 
 overseer at the Foundry. He went to Atlanta twice 
 and often three times a week. And he was so de 
 tached in his manner from the people of Valhalla 
 that Old Jim Grimes was heard to say one day: 
 
 "To see John Arms strutting around here in his 
 fine clothes now, you wouldn t think I made his 
 shoes out of rawhide leather and put a brass band 
 on the toe to keep him from kicking em out when 
 he was a boy, now would you?"
 
 240 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 Nobody would, and everybody said so. It was 
 as if he looked up at a lofty monument with an 
 exaggerated pose, and said: 
 
 "I can recollect when that thing wasn t nothing 
 but a rock out here in the granite quarry." 
 
 These are the first evidences of a man s fame, 
 when his neighbours begin to remind one another of 
 the time when he wore ragged breeches and went 
 barefooted. 
 
 From all these circumstances you will infer that 
 John had come far and changed much since that 
 day in December when he went home in the evening 
 to learn from his mother that Olive had gone, and 
 that she had taken "all her things except the little 
 blue frock." 
 
 "She told me good-bye, John, and said she was 
 going home. That s all. Called it *liome, " ex 
 plained the old lady with quivering lips. 
 
 He had made no reply, simply stood for a long 
 time staring at her. But she noticed then that it 
 was not the gaze of a beaten man. 
 
 They took up their old silent life together as if 
 there never had been an Olive in the house. Every 
 evening John worked upon his ledgers by the par-
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 241 
 
 lour fire. Only he had more ledgers and larger ones, 
 and many, many bills to reckon up, and many letters 
 to write. She always left him when she returned, 
 still busy among these papers with the green shade 
 over his eyes, which served the double purpose of 
 concealing from her the deepening frown upon his 
 forehead. She wondered what he was doing, how 
 he came by the money with which to build and equip 
 the Foundry. But she was not the woman to med 
 dle in a man s affairs. And John was not the man 
 to confide them. He never mentioned Olive s name. 
 And Mrs. Arms dared not mention it. 
 
 There was no way to defeat some men. They are 
 the ones who die fighting upon the red battle lines of 
 war, victorious in death. They are the ragged 
 remnant of conquered armies who return home in 
 vincible to bring a new civilisation and a better 
 one out of the ashes of defeat. They are always 
 pioneers, the patriots of immortal courage whose 
 country is To-morrow. They reclaim the waste 
 places, build all the cities, establish all governments, 
 and make all histories. 
 
 Over and above the other kind of men in the 
 South, it is peopled with this kind. Soldiers of for-
 
 242 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 tune who live and die in poverty and who manage 
 to acquire a kind of invisible wealth which sustains 
 them magnificently in that condition. They are 
 the very will of God to do what they believe. And 
 you can no more change that than you can change 
 the Order of Things. 
 
 John Arms belonged to this class. He did not 
 know it, but the first thirty years of his life had been 
 spent in organising himself and his faculties into a 
 kind of force to do the thing he chose to do. Now 
 the time had come. And until that hour struck he 
 did not know what he was for. 
 
 The fact that his wife had left him acted like 
 an explosion. He was shocked into facing the 
 eminence of defeat. And being capable of that 
 larger comprehension of manhood, he did not miss 
 the point in the situation. He left Olive as a mere 
 detail, and set himself to prove his own quality. 
 There could be no better way to prove her error. 
 But this was not in his mind. He had come to that 
 place reached in every man s life when he must 
 stake all he is and all he has upon himself. And 
 having a great opinion of John Arms, it was a fair- 
 sized stake. He knew now that he must win or
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 243 
 
 fail, and that since Olive had thrown herself in 
 the balance against him, the only wise thing to do 
 was to risk all. 
 
 Shortly after her departure he went to Atlanta 
 and borrowed ten thousand dollars. He mortgaged 
 everything he had, his home, a thousand acres of 
 land which included the iron ore fields and the 
 Foundry, to obtain this sum. This was the time to 
 obtain labour, building materials, and machinery 
 at the lowest possible prices. He figured that since 
 the armies of Europe were destroying bridges, rail 
 roads, and everything else made of iron and steel; 
 that since their labour was drafted either to fight 
 or to manufacture ammunitions, and not the material 
 with which these essentials of commerce and civilisa 
 tion must be replaced, that so soon as the w r ar was 
 over there would be an overwhelming demand for 
 iron and steel. He gambled on that. And to finance 
 his gambling he opened a mica mine to furnish mica 
 for ammunitions. He knew that this would lose its 
 value in the market the minute peace was declared. 
 Meanwhile, the mica was extremely valuable and 
 from the first he would be able to make that business 
 pay the interest on his mortgages.
 
 244 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 So, while Valhalla followed the radiant trail of 
 Mrs. John Arms s social triumphs in Atlanta, Mr. 
 John Arms was tearing up the face of the earth 
 upon the outskirts of Valhalla making a trail of his 
 own. 
 
 "I see by the papers that John s wife is visiting 
 her rich kin in Atlanta," was the way Mrs. Ripley 
 put it one day to John s mother when they met for 
 "The Placid Hour." 
 
 "Yes, Olive needs a rest," answered Mrs. Arms. 
 
 "Well, she don t seem to be resting much. She s 
 either been or she s going to a ball or a reception or 
 dinner every day and every night, according to the 
 society column," returned Mrs. Ripley, watching 
 her victim with avid curiosity. 
 
 "Olive has many friends in Atlanta. Of course 
 they ask her to everything. John s so glad she s 
 enjoying herself." 
 
 "When s she coming home?" 
 
 Heaven only knew if she would ever come home! 
 It was already the middle of January. But Mrs. 
 Arms made no such admission. 
 
 "We hope she will stay a long time. John s anx 
 ious for Olive to have a little change. And he s
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 245 
 
 glad for her to be there while he s so busy here," 
 she answered, as coolly as if she had been Ananias 
 instead of a truthful woman. 
 
 "I suppose John sees her when he goes to 
 Atlanta?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, of course he does," she said, making 
 haste to put on her wraps and get away before she 
 should be obliged to perjure her soul with another 
 lie. For she knew that John had had no communi 
 cation with his wife since the day she left Valhalla. 
 
 That night she showed the old signs of restless 
 ness. While John worked on his books, she flurried 
 in and out, and she could not settle herself at her 
 knitting. 
 
 He recognised the weather signs of her discontent. 
 
 "What is it, Mother?" he asked presently, with 
 out looking up. 
 
 "It s very lonely here without Olive, John," she 
 said, making no attempt to conceal her mind. 
 
 "Is it?" he said, in a way which implied that he 
 was thinking of something else. 
 
 "You ought to bring Olive home, John," she 
 began again after a pause. 
 
 "She ll come when she gets ready, Mother."
 
 246 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "But she s your wife, my son; you ought to take 
 better care of her. She s so young and inex 
 perienced." 
 
 "Not in the game she s playing now, Mother." 
 
 "She may be sick for all you know, John." 
 
 "Not a bit of it! She s as healthy as a heathen!" 
 he said, laughing. She sighed, and feared John was 
 becoming a hard man. She was sorry for him; 
 yes, but her sympathy, her real womanly feeling 
 of compassion and understanding, was with Olive. 
 It was one thing to be a man s mother, and a 
 more trying thing to be his wife. She thought she 
 was fortunate in being John s mother, and that 
 Olive was unfortunate in being his wife. She 
 never associated misfortune with John. She had 
 a conviction that he was too strong for misfortune 
 to stick to him. It did stick, was always sticking 
 to women. 
 
 "You ought to do something about this, John. 
 You should write to Olive," she began again after 
 a long silence. 
 
 "What for? I see her every time I go to Atlanta, 
 two or three times a week," he answered coldly. 
 
 "Ah! I m so glad. Then everything will come
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 247 
 
 out all right," she said, as she rolled up her knitting 
 and bade him good-night. 
 
 She was comforted in her heart and in her soul. 
 She was not accustomed to saying her prayers with 
 a lie to explain to the Almighty, and it seemed that 
 she had told the truth to Mrs. Ripley, after all. For 
 if John saw Olive when he went to Atlanta, things 
 could not be so bad between them. But what, then, 
 did this long separation mean? She drifted off into 
 the uneasy sleep of the aged who trouble themselves 
 to the very grave s edge over the new and strange 
 ways of the young. 
 
 We know very little of what is really going on 
 about us. We divine the very smallest part of what 
 takes place in the hearts of men and women, with 
 all our suspicious and clairvoyant scratchings at the 
 door of their invisibleness. The one thing in this 
 world more hidden than God is man. We only see 
 his deeds, hear his cunning speech devised to con 
 ceal. And we only behold the tenement in which 
 he lives, but never the man himself. For he is most 
 false even when he would be revealing, and often 
 most revealing when he would deceive. But when 
 you add all you know of him and subtract that from
 
 248 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 what you do not know, the remainder is the greater 
 part. 
 
 Here was Valhalla believing that Olive was only 
 "visiting her rich kin" in Atlanta. And firmly con 
 vinced that John himself was spending his wife s 
 money to develop his business. There was Mrs. 
 Arms upstairs sleeping upon the comfort that John 
 saw Olive two or three times a week, and that every 
 thing was all right. And there was Mrs. Ripley 
 sitting before the bedroom fire telling the Colonel 
 Mary Arms told her that John had sent Olive home 
 to her folks so he d have more time for his work, and 
 that he meant to keep her there until the Foundry 
 was built, and that he actually wanted her to run 
 around the way she did to balls and things which 
 in her opinion was very strange, considering the 
 decent way John had lived himself. And there 
 was Anna Berry playing the Maiden s Prayer upon 
 her old tin pan piano and wondering if John knew 
 what she had known from the beginning, that his 
 wife did not love him. And there was Mrs. Bigsby 
 hugging herself in a pink silk kimono, and giggling 
 because she knew that John Arms s wife was about 
 to get a divorce from him. And there was Dickie
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 249 
 
 Blake making plans according to what he knew, 
 and there was Mr. and Mrs. Thurston getting a lot 
 of spurious information composed entirely of facts. 
 And there was Olive weeping upon her pillow after 
 the ball was over and the streets were quiet, when 
 she should have been sleeping, because she could 
 see Anna Berry sitting by the parlour fire talking 
 in her droning monotone to Mother, with her pray 
 ing blue eyes always fixed upon John, who would be 
 listening. Finally, here was John pacing the floor 
 with his head sunk upon his breast, with his hands 
 clenched behind his back, and with murder in his 
 heart, nerving himself for just that, when every one 
 thought his whole attention was fixed upon making 
 a fortune. And not one of the whole troop knew a 
 single thing about the very thing they thought they 
 knew everything. 
 
 It is a mystery, my masters, this web of life. And 
 if we actually had the spinning of it in our own 
 hands, we should tear the cloth of gold. But we 
 never do, we only think we do. Another hand guides 
 the thread and determines the yards and yards of 
 cloth of gold which we weave, but never see.
 
 250 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 John Arms read the society page of the Atlanta 
 papers these days with all the envy of a fashionable 
 woman. 
 
 The day after Olive left him he saw this announce 
 ment: "Mrs. John Arms is the guest of Mr. and 
 Mrs. Thurston." The next day all of the papers 
 announced that "Mrs. Richard Thurston will en 
 tertain in honour of her niece, Mrs. John Arms." 
 
 After that the news came with every issue. Some 
 one gave a "luncheon for Mrs. Arms"; "The 
 beautiful Mrs. John Arms was a guest in some one s 
 box at the theatre"; and "Mrs. John Arms, cele 
 brated for her beauty, was much admired at the 
 Ravenwood Club Ball." And "Mr. Richard Blake 
 entertains Mr. and Mrs. Thurston and their guest, 
 Mrs. John Arms, at dinner this evening at the 
 Capital City Club." 
 
 A hardware merchant in a country village can 
 not hold his own against such odds as these. There 
 fore, very early in the game John borrowed ten 
 thousand dollars and became an iron master, with a 
 growing foundry on his hands. Not, mind you, 
 that he admitted the odds, but by way of interpret 
 ing himself and proving his mettle.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 251 
 
 When the announcement of where Mrs. John 
 Arms would appear next came far ahead, he took 
 the train for Atlanta. Ostensibly he went "on 
 business." And it was business, but of a secret 
 kind. It required him to spend the night in the 
 street until the ball was over, if it was a ball. Olive 
 was escorted back and forth upon these occasions 
 by a man who carried a flaming sword of wrath. If 
 women were as telepathic as we think they are, she 
 should have felt his eyes upon her as she trailed 
 through the parlours of the Georgia Terrace one 
 night in January. She should have known when 
 she sat with Dickie Blake just inside the window 
 that John was just outside studying her every 
 glance, even though he could not hear what they 
 said. He never studied Dickie, for he understood 
 the script of that gentleman s fervid looks only too 
 well. 
 
 Once he waited for an hour opposite the Thurston 
 residence on Peachtree Street. When Olive came 
 out with Mrs. Thurston and Blake, he thought she 
 recognised him. This was the night he almost re 
 solved to give up the idea of becoming a wealthy 
 iron master. He decided to kill Blake and accept
 
 252 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 the shorter shift of being a murderer instead. This 
 was the night Dickie met his robber. The deed was 
 nearly done. But as John stood before him, read 
 all the craven history of the man s soul in his livid 
 face, he received a sudden light upon the situation. 
 Olive had lived with him; a man, she knew. She 
 must know the difference between this fungous fellow 
 and a man. Prom that moment a certain nameless 
 dread lifted. And it was for this reason that he 
 struck down Dickie s surrendering hands, laughed 
 in his face, turned upon his heels, and left him there 
 in the dark. 
 
 He would, he knew, come near to killing Dickie 
 sooner or later, but as one trod upon vermin, not as 
 a man fought another man. 
 
 During the first weeks of his pain he had been 
 furious with Olive. He despised her. He could not 
 think of her without experiencing a kind of nausea. 
 But as time wore on, he began to think more sanely 
 of her. At last, being very lonely, and having no 
 one to accuse him, he accused himself. He put him 
 self a little more kindly in her place, permitted him 
 self to comprehend her point of view. After that 
 he was lost, of course. He perceived that he had
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 253 
 
 been exacting, had gone too hard and too fast in his 
 effort to make her the kind of wife he needed. 
 
 This was not all. He saw Olive so often now 
 when she could not possibly know that he was near, 
 and he perceived a change in her, as mysterious as 
 it was pathetic. She was very pale, for the rouge 
 did not deceive him. She was often feverishly gay 
 when surrounded by her friends, but he was always 
 aware of the fact that she wished to escape, that she 
 sought opportunities to be alone as much as she was 
 determined to go everywhere and be in the thick of 
 every brilliant occasion. It was as if two women 
 strove in her frail body. And she was frail. Once 
 he followed her round the gallery of a ballroom, he 
 upon the terrace outside, she making her way to a 
 sheltered corner behind some palms. She flung her 
 self upon the seat, and rested there like a runner 
 who is spent with the race. It was then that he 
 noticed the great difference. A sharpening of the 
 features. Her eyes were larger, blacker, but veiled 
 with some mysterious consciousness as if she were 
 frightened. They were neither the eyes of a maid 
 nor of a wife. They seemed to say: "Life has done 
 this to me; I must die soon!" He could not bear
 
 254 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 for her to go back into the gabbling, giggling throng 
 with that anguished confession in her wide eyes. 
 He was on the point of raising the window like a 
 burglar and speaking to her at any cost when she 
 suddenly sprang to her feet and hastened forward 
 to meet Mrs. Thurston, who was looking for her. 
 
 Later he thought that would have been a mistake. 
 In the first place, he was sure of her now. He did 
 not know why, but he was sure of his wife. Some 
 influence more powerful than he could have willed 
 protected her. 
 
 Any woman, so assured, would have sought a 
 reconciliation, but that is the difference between a 
 man and a woman. They are much shrewder 
 students of woman than even the assistant God, 
 who makes women. John knew that if he kept his 
 wife he must not show the white feather, must never 
 admit that he was wrong and that she was right. 
 This is the same policy practised by parents in man 
 aging their children. You must not admit that you 
 are fallible to your son or your daughter. They 
 will find it out soon enough. It is a very good policy 
 for a man to adopt toward his wife. She knows, 
 always knows, how wrong he is, how unjust to her.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 255 
 
 But so long as he never admits that, she is compelled 
 to accept his illusion of himself. 
 
 But from this night when he saw Olive alone 
 with her terror behind the palms, John was in a 
 hurry to ring down the curtain upon this act and to 
 lay the scene for the next one. It was characteristic 
 of the man that he did not doubt his ability to do 
 that. He had been bitterly angry with her. He 
 had thought his way through that red fog to a better 
 understanding of her and of his own limitations. 
 But never at any time had he entertained the possi 
 bility of losing her. She was his wife, a part of his 
 flesh, and the wings of his spirit. There had not 
 been a day since she left Valhalla when he was not 
 prepared to keep her at no matter what cost. He did 
 not know the meaning of the terror which he had seen 
 so plainly written upon her face, so pitifully submis 
 sive in that inward vision of her eyes. But he knew 
 by the deepest instinct of the protecting nature of 
 man that she needed only one in all the world, and 
 that was her husband. 
 
 When the heart, rather than the brain, furnishes 
 the motive, we act differently. If this were not so, 
 there would be no more romance in life. John was
 
 256 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 about to accomplish the first dime-novel episode 
 of his life. For, while his secret guardianship of Olive 
 since her residence in Atlanta had somewhat the 
 midnight mystery of fervid light literature, it was 
 really as prosaic as that of a policeman, properly 
 armed for that business. He was looking after his 
 property, making sure that his title to it was good 
 by the evidence Olive herself unconsciously fur 
 nished him. What he might have done if this evi 
 dence had proved a flaw is not a part of this nar 
 rative. But it is safe to predict that Dickie Blake 
 would not have survived. His life in these days 
 depended upon the certainty John had of Olive s 
 faithfulness to herself, her own honour, however 
 doubtful he may have been of her loyalty to her 
 husband. He could and would take care of that. 
 
 It was late in February when he first observed 
 the change in her. He returned to Valhalla, and 
 began to cast about for ways and means to accom 
 plish his purpose. He was very restless. A week 
 of snow, followed by rains, held up work at the 
 Foundry. Old Mr. Berry, Anna s father, had been 
 installed as manager of the hardware store since 
 the beginning of the year. Time hung heavy upon
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 257 
 
 his hands when he felt that time was most precious. 
 
 One day he came into the store after a long tramp 
 over the muddy road from the Foundry. He picked 
 up the afternoon paper, sat down before the red-hot 
 stove, and turned as usual to the society page. The 
 first item that met his eye was the announcement of 
 a mask ball to be given on the twenty-eighth of 
 February at the Georgia Terrace, for the benefit of 
 the Belgium Relief Fund. The patrons and patron 
 esses alone would come without masks. Among these 
 John found Mr. and Mrs. Richard Thurston. The 
 list of guests followed. It was to be an exclusive 
 affair for which invitations were issued. And like 
 Abou ben Adhem, the name of Mrs. John Arms led 
 all the rest. Apparently there was no one else in the 
 "A" class, for immediately below came the name 
 of "Mr. Richard Blake." The association was al 
 phabetical, of course, but tc John the order seemed 
 sinister. It may have been the glow from the stove 
 which turned the paper red, but more likely he was 
 seeing things red. 
 
 In the last paragraph there were some pleasant 
 predictions about the gaiety of the occasion. "Guests 
 have been requested to choose characters prominent
 
 258 MAKING HER PUS WIFE 
 
 in the latter part of the eighteenth and the earlier 
 years of the nineteenth century. There is much 
 speculation as to what great figures of history will 
 be represented. Already Dame Rumour has heard 
 that a certain beautiful young married woman who 
 has been much admired here this winter will come 
 as Marie Antoinette, and it is reported by the same 
 authority that a popular clubman will appear as 
 Lafayette. No one seems to know who will dare the 
 role of George Washington, but we are reasonably 
 sure of Benjamin Franklin. Guests will unmask at 
 midnight, after which supper will be served in the 
 famous white and green dining-room." 
 
 John s memory of history was hazy, but he thought 
 he recalled the fact that the gallant young French 
 officer had been packed off to America to fight the 
 Indians and the British after he had been caught in 
 the palace garden kissing the young Queen s hand 
 too fervidly. 
 
 Well, so help his God and his own good right arm, 
 it would not get so far as compromising the Queen 
 with kisses this time! He would attend to Lafay 
 ette, he thought moodily, as he rolled the paper, 
 stuffed it into his overcoat pocket, and went home.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 259 
 
 Mrs. Arms noticed that he did not open his ledgers 
 that evening. He sat smoking and staring with 
 singular animation into the fire. As a rule, live 
 coals fix the expression. But John s features were 
 startlingly active, not pleasant to behold. He had 
 the appearance of a man who must get up presently, 
 go outside, and commit a crime which was his 
 duty. 
 
 "Mother," he said, finally, breaking the silence, 
 "you remember Grandmother s chest?" 
 
 "Yes, it s in the attic. Why?" 
 
 "Well, I was thinking about it, the things in it." 
 
 The old lady laughed. 
 
 "We used to think about it a good deal before 
 she died. You know she would never allow one 
 of us to lift the lid; carried the key as long as she 
 lived. That made your father and me very curious 
 to know what was in it." 
 
 "But afterward you opened it, I remember." 
 
 "Yes, immediately after the funeral. Your grand 
 mother was a queer woman; very silent. We 
 thought she might have a lot of gold hidden in it. 
 We were terribly disappointed." 
 
 "No gold, then?"
 
 260 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Not even a copper. We didn t have coppers then, 
 anyway. Nothing in it but a lot of Indian relics. 
 Indian clothing, rather, if you could call such 
 things clothes. Your father thought she had them 
 from some Chief back there in Virginia. But we 
 never knew really how she came by them." 
 
 "But you kept them?" 
 
 "Oh, yes; I scattered a lot of camphor gum and 
 Chinaberry leaves among them to keep the moths 
 out. You were just a little fellow then, John. I 
 remember how excited you were then, and how you 
 were always wanting to go up there and get the 
 things out. At last you forgot all about them." 
 
 "No, I never did forget. I ve thought of that 
 chest a thousand times. You know, Mother, those 
 Indian togs are valuable." 
 
 "I doubt that." 
 
 "Yes, they are. I want to go up there to-night 
 and look them over. Mind if I do? " 
 
 "Of course you may. The key s in the lock and 
 you ll find the chest just under the window by the 
 stairs." 
 
 He turned as he was about to leave the room. 
 
 "If they are in any state of preservation, I shall
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 261 
 
 take them with me to Atlanta to-morrow and have 
 them cleaned up," he said. 
 
 "You are going again?" she asked, looking round 
 at him. 
 
 "Yes. Can t do anything here; weather is too 
 bad. May be away several days. Better get Anna 
 to come over and stay with you at night." 
 
 It was sadly like the old times, she thought with 
 a sigh, before Olive came, to be asking Anna to stay 
 with her when John was away. She did not want 
 to do it. Either Anna had changed, or Olive s lively, 
 affectionate ways had spoiled her, for she did not 
 find Anna so companionable as she used to be. 
 The girl always talked, when she talked at all, as if 
 she avoided what she was really thinking about. 
 And of what was she thinking, the old lady won 
 dered with cruel impatience. 
 
 The ballroom of the Georgia Terrace never pre 
 sented so gay and splendid an appearance as upon 
 the night of the mask ball. It was as if all the 
 hoopskirt figures in Godey s Lady s Book had 
 stepped from those highly coloured prints into this 
 wide hall. How modest they were from the waist
 
 262 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 down, how innocently immodest they were almost 
 from the waist up, these pretty women! What 
 romantic fashions they had in those days, and how 
 well the cavalier clothes of the men matched those 
 of the women. Such mincing as they courtesied their 
 way through the throng, such tinkling laughter, what 
 pretty red lips and round chins, and dainty noses 
 beneath their masks. And how many laughing eyes 
 showed through the dark dominoes. Everybody 
 was somebody else, shriven of his or her modern self, 
 mimicking the characters and charms of men and 
 women of an elder day. What enchantment to be 
 Lady Lespinasse, sighing for a recreant lover, when 
 usually you were only Caroline Tompkins engaged 
 to Charlie Kidd, who was so near to being a hus 
 band he had almost ceased to be a lover. 
 
 The patrons and patronesses sat at one end of 
 the hall talking together, guessing who this one was 
 and who that one must be. 
 
 "Where is Olive, Sarah?" asked Thurston, turn 
 ing to his wife. 
 
 "She will be coming presently. I left her before the 
 mirror in the dressing-room fussing with her crown. 
 She s afraid it will fall off when she courtesies."
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 263 
 
 "You should have reminded her that the Queen 
 never does except to the King." 
 
 "I did tell her there she comes now!" 
 
 A figure entered the room through a door at the 
 far end. Her gown of white brocade flowed back 
 from beneath the folds of a royal purple robe edged 
 with a wide border of ermine. The tips of her slippers 
 appeared and disappeared like the points of golden 
 lilies. The robe drooped from her shoulders. A 
 single pearl glistened like a tear upon her breast, 
 held there by a mere thread of gold about her neck, 
 so round and fair. The face above was clear white, 
 not a vestige of colour, except the black domino 
 drawn across the eyes, and the red lips proudly prim. 
 The dark curls were piled high upon the stately head, 
 only one escaping from the coiffure behind lying 
 like a ring of smoke upon her shoulder. Upon the 
 curls rested a crown of fine gold, scattering pale 
 rays of light from many gems. She carried a very 
 old lace fan. Two pages dressed in silver and gold 
 walked behind bearing her train. 
 
 "The Queen!" announced the magnificent per 
 son at the door. 
 
 Instantly the guests parted into two lines, sank
 
 64 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 gracefully upon their knees, and the poor little 
 Queen moved slowly down this aisle between the 
 smiling faces and bowed heads, looking neither to 
 the right nor to the left. 
 
 If Marie Antoinette herself had stepped from 
 the dust of centuries dark and deep with all the hor 
 rors of the Revolution still in her thought, she 
 could not have made a presence more nobly tragic. 
 
 "How on earth did she manage that effect, not 
 the clothes, but that proud anguish ! " whispered one 
 Colonial lady to another Colonial lady. 
 
 "It s because the King is not present. You know 
 he never is. Some of us are beginning to wonder 
 if the Queen isn t a grass widow!" answered the 
 other. 
 
 No throne had been provided for the Queen, so 
 when she was near Mr. and Mrs. Thurston she 
 turned to receive her Court. 
 
 They were not so slow. Lords and ladies and 
 grand dames of every country flocked round her, 
 keeping up for a time the mimicry of Court manners, 
 then dissolving and swinging into the graceful figures 
 of a minuet when the music began. 
 
 At this moment, just as the dancers were taking
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 265 
 
 their places, a young nobleman approached the 
 Queen. He wore white satin breeches fastened at 
 the knees with ribbons, elaborately embroidered 
 hose, silver buckles upon his shoes, a ruffled shirt 
 with frills of lace from his sleeves, much gold braid 
 upon his coat; a magnificent crimson cloak hung 
 from his shoulders. And he carried a sword. 
 
 "If your Highness would deign to honour the 
 humblest of her servants!" he said, bowing his 
 powdered wig low before her. 
 
 "No, the Queen dances only with the King to 
 night," she answered, smiling coldly. So Lafayette 
 stood talking to the Queen, by no means pleased 
 with the advantage she had taken of her royal role 
 to refuse the dance. 
 
 "I wonder if old Sapp really thinks he looks like 
 Benjamin Franklin in that ridiculous rig!" he said, 
 nodding in the direction of an old man who was 
 posing as "Poor Richard." 
 
 "George Washington is worse; looks like a Dutch 
 man, too fat and far too short," she answered. 
 
 "I wonder who that little cricket is with the thin 
 legs, in the black satin breeches," said one of the 
 patronesses seated just behind them.
 
 266 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "That," answered the Queen, smiling, "is Sir 
 Horace Walpole. Don t you remember he said he 
 had the bones of a lark ?" 
 
 "Well, in his place I d never have exposed them 
 so publicly," snorted Thurston. 
 
 "And the stout courtier with him is Sir Horace 
 Mann. They were chums, you know," some one 
 explained. 
 
 "Had I been guillotined before Sir Horace made 
 a practice of coming to Paris to flirt every spring?" 
 asked the Queen. 
 
 "You had, my poor dear!" laughed her uncle. 
 
 "I m sorry. I should have liked to meet him," 
 she said whimsically. 
 
 The minuet was in full swing. The young Queen 
 permitted Lafayette to lead her round the circling 
 throng. 
 
 "Richard, look!" gasped Mrs. Thurston, seizing 
 her husband by the arm. 
 
 "What? Where?" he exclaimed, flirting his head 
 quickly in both directions. 
 
 "There, between the column and the palms." 
 
 They beheld an astonishing apparition. An 
 Indian of enormous stature stood gazing through
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 267 
 
 the figures of the dance at the Queen and her escort. 
 He wore a headdress of feathers which hung to his 
 heels behind. A rough garment of skins reached 
 only halfway to his knees. A wampum belt about 
 his waist caught the light from a thousand beads. 
 His shoulders were covered with a red blanket which 
 stuck out on the sides like half-lifted wings. The 
 skin of his legs above his mocassins and upon his 
 breast glistened like polished copper. But the ter 
 rible thing was the face, as old as the earth, as rigid 
 as death, when a man dies triumphant in pain 
 age-old courage, age-old cruelty, and the calm 
 of the ages, it was all painted a deeper rose 
 copper upon that terrific countenance. The man 
 stood leaning upon a long rifle with his powder 
 horn hanging from beneath the folds of his 
 blanket. 
 
 "Good God!" exclaimed Thurston, starting up, 
 "that is an Indian. No white man could look like 
 that." 
 
 By this time the dancers had also caught sight of 
 him, and they reeled through the last figures with 
 their eyes turned back over their shoulders, wide 
 with astonishment.
 
 268 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Oh, did you see him?" cried a little countess, 
 ready to faint. 
 
 "Yes, and he wore no domino, either. What s 
 become of him?" 
 
 "Vanished!" said another. 
 
 "Can t imagine who it can be," said one of the 
 patrons. 
 
 "Well, we ll know at midnight even as we are 
 known," chanted a lady who thought she was 
 dressed as Camille. "I fear nothing. I have long 
 since accepted the proverb of my nation when 
 tempted, yield as soon as possible and avoid the 
 struggle! Let the heathen rage. I m the vain thing! 
 Indians are heathens, aren t they?" 
 
 A chorus of laughter approved Camille. Confi 
 dence was restored. Cavaliers began to chase pretty 
 dominoes who eluded them, and finally permitted 
 themselves to be captured. Everybody was flirting 
 with everybody, having left their own virtues at 
 home to assume the romantic vices of sweeter ladies 
 and bolder knights. 
 
 The dance was about to begin again. A quad 
 rille this time. The music sounded a quaint and 
 seductive measure which set the blood to singing.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 269 
 
 The Queen returned, followed by her Cavalier. 
 She stood watching the slow and stately dance. 
 
 "Olive, my dear," Mrs. Thurston pulled vul 
 garly at the Queen s robe, causing Her Highness to 
 bend a listening ear. "Have you seen the Indian?" 
 whispered her aunt. 
 
 "No. Where?" her glance scouring the crowd. 
 
 "He was over there just now. He was perfectly 
 terrible. We can t imagine who he is. Your uncle 
 vows he is a real savage." 
 
 "Absurd! He s probably nothing more savage 
 than a member of the Capital City Club," she 
 laughed. 
 
 Then she thought of something, and turned to 
 her companion. 
 
 "The Queen will dance!" she said. 
 
 He placed one hand upon his breast, bowed low, 
 and offered his arm. 
 
 "But not with Lafayette. We are informed that 
 there is an Indian Chief here from our American 
 Province. Did we have an American province 
 during our reign?" she laughed, and went on. 
 "We will dance with our loyal Chief. Go! Tell him 
 the Queen bids him come to her."
 
 270 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "A token, My Queen! You send me upon a dan 
 gerous mission. They they gave a ring a signet 
 or something to their messengers, didn t they?" 
 he concluded lamely, being unaccustomed to the 
 ways of royalty. 
 
 The Queen wore but one ring, a plain gold band 
 on her third finger. She looked at it, hesitated 
 at the sacrilege, then drew it off and dropped it 
 carelessly into the outstretched palm of her courier. 
 
 "Say that it is from the Queen, and that he must 
 restore it to her within this hour or sacrifice his 
 life!" she said, with an air of magnificent authority. 
 
 Lafayette swaggered down the long room and 
 disappeared between the column and the palms, 
 where the Indian had made of himself a brief and 
 terrifying apparition. 
 
 "Olive, " whispered Thurston, rising, "your 
 aunt s all in. Gone now to put on her things. 
 Headache from being in this crowded place. I 
 must take her home. The Warrens will look after 
 you and bring you home after the shindig is over." 
 
 "But I m tired, too. I d rather go now with 
 you," said the pale little Queen, looking at him 
 wistfully.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 271 
 
 "Never do! You are masked, part of the show. 
 Must stay until time to take that black smear off 
 your pretty face." 
 
 "Very well," she sighed, remembering that she 
 must wait for her ring. 
 
 "It s all right. I ve spoken to the Warrens," he 
 said, patting her shoulder and hastening after his 
 wife. 
 
 The Queen saw her courier approaching. He 
 was not swaggering. He was striding like a man who 
 was using all his presence of mind to keep from 
 breaking into a run. He was obviously contending 
 with an emotion nearer kin to fear than Lafayette 
 ever felt. 
 
 "Gad! but I ve had a narrow escape," he panted. 
 "Is my scalp on?" 
 
 "Yes, it evidently is. But your wig is awry. 
 What happened? Did you meet the Chief?" 
 
 "Lord, yes! He s sitting over there in that swamp 
 of rubber trees, with a gun as long as I am across 
 his knees!" 
 
 " You delivered our message?" endeavouring to 
 maintain the royal manner, though she was merry 
 at the sight of this dishevelled courier.
 
 272 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "I did, and the ring. Had to do that. He 
 snatched it from me. Said he d attend upon Your 
 Highness within the hour. Say, Olive, are my knees 
 knocking together? " dropping his pose. 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "By George! that s no white man. An Indian, 
 as sure as I live, and with murder in his heart." 
 
 "You are silly!" 
 
 "You d be silly, too, if a red savage made a grab for 
 you in a ballroom. I swear he did that. Just did 
 escape by jumping over one of those green tubs." 
 
 "Somebody is playing his part well." 
 
 "I tell you he isn t playing. He s in earnest. 
 Wouldn t surprise me if he leaped out of there with 
 a whoop and scalped a nobleman. I am going to 
 speak to Warren. That man s no guest." 
 
 "Don t be ridiculous. Here comes Sir Horace 
 Walpole. We must rise from our dust and play the 
 Queen." 
 
 And she did for another hour, with a charm and 
 a gracious dignity which queens rarely show. 
 
 It was after eleven o clock when she finally with 
 drew from the grandiloquent circle which surrounded 
 her and moved away, accompanied by Lafayette,
 
 " The next moment the masquerades were astonished, to 
 see a knight falling head over heels to the ballroom floor"
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 273 
 
 who had sufficiently recovered from his encounter 
 with the Indian to fix his attention upon his own 
 plans. Apparently the Queen had plans, too, for 
 she allowed herself to be conducted to a gallery 
 which ran around the ballroom, one flight up, and 
 which was a jungle of tall plants and flowers. 
 
 "Let s drop this bombastic foolishness and be 
 ourselves, Olive," he said. 
 
 "Agreed," she answered wearily, as she sank upon 
 one of the seats. "I am tired of it and the other 
 foolishness, too, Dickie." 
 
 "What other foolishness?" he demanded quickly. 
 
 "You know. I ve tried to show you that it s 
 offensive to me." 
 
 "Well, you haven t succeeded, my pretty Queen. 
 On the contrary, you have convinced me that it s 
 the only thing you care for in the world," he 
 laughed, looking down at her with an air of pos 
 session. 
 
 "I came here to talk to you, Dickie. I want 
 to make you understand." 
 
 "Come! drop your mask to me, Olive. I know 
 you. Play the game. It s time to look the facts 
 in the face. We love each other. We "
 
 274 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 "Hush!" she whispered, raising her hand. "I 
 never have loved you, and now I despise 
 
 "Drop it! You have done nothing else but en 
 courage me these months. You followed me 
 
 "Followed you?" she gasped. 
 
 "Yes. From Valhalla. Oh!" he laughed, "I saw 
 you that day walking along the street with a basket 
 on your arm, like a laundress. I heard you call me! 
 In less than a week you were here. You had left 
 your husband for me!" 
 
 "You wretch!" she exclaimed, rising. 
 
 "Stay where you are!" he commanded, and she 
 dropped upon the seat lest he should force her 
 back. 
 
 "We are both tarred with the same brush, Olive," 
 he went on, standing before her with folded arms. 
 "We are neither of us good people. We hate dull 
 virtue. You do, at least, or you would not be here 
 with me, my dear. And we can afford the ex 
 travagance. I can give you everything you crave 
 and must have. We " 
 
 "You insult me! You forget I m a married 
 woman!" she cried. 
 
 "I couldn t insult you, my love. And we can
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 275 
 
 both forget that you were married once upon a 
 time." 
 
 "And I love my husband!" 
 
 "Tell that to the marines! Why don t you live 
 with him then?" 
 
 "I m going home to him to-morrow," she whis 
 pered, looking at him with terror-stricken eyes. 
 
 "You are going home with me to-night, my 
 Queen; to-morrow or next day we will be aboard 
 my yacht at Newport News. And then you ll be 
 where you belong! That ring you wore, it s gone! 
 And don t you remember Lafayette kissed the 
 Queen in the garden?" 
 
 He took a step forward, bent, with his arms out 
 stretched. Olive did not move. Her eyes were 
 fixed upon some object beyond him with a terror 
 
 so wild A mere instant, and then before he 
 
 could touch her, he felt himself grasped from be 
 hind, held as in a vise of iron. 
 
 He beheld the face of the Indian, distorted with 
 rage, close to his own. 
 
 He would have shouted, called for help. But he 
 could make no sound. He merely gasped as he 
 felt himself lifted and borne through the rustling
 
 276 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 leaves of the palms to the banisters round the 
 gallery. 
 
 The next moment the masqueraders were aston 
 ished to see a knight falling head over heels to the 
 ballroom floor. 
 
 Wild confusion followed. Men shouted, ladies 
 shrieked and fainted. 
 
 "John, oh, John! If he had touched me, I should 
 have died!" cried Olive, falling upon her husband s 
 breast. 
 
 "Come, we must get out of this quick," he 
 whispered, rushing with her to the stairs which led 
 to the Forsyth Street entrance. 
 
 "John, are we going home like this?" cried the 
 little Queen, half laughing, as the taxi swung round 
 corners at a furious speed. 
 
 "We are, we must. Just time to catch the mid 
 night train. I left my overcoat and your old cloak 
 at the station. We ll manage!" 
 
 "You can trust me now, John!" 
 
 He lifted her face. Again that look, not of the 
 wife nor of the maid, poignant prophecy of pain, of 
 all the terror of a woman s heart, and of perfect 
 submission.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 277 
 
 "Yes," she whispered, answering his deep gaze. 
 Then closing her eyes as if not even to him could 
 she reveal this sweet terror of herself. 
 
 "I did not know until it was too late. Oh, John, 
 forgive me! You can trust me now." 
 
 "You love me, my sweet! You love me!" he 
 whispered, drawing her closer. 
 
 "You were so long saying that, John. So many 
 times I asked you, but you never once asked me if I 
 loved you," she answered, smiling sadly. 
 
 "I m not asking now. I know that you love me 
 at last. And now I no longer trust myself at all, 
 dear; I believe only in you. God! It is sweet to 
 trust a woman and to know that there is no end to 
 this dear faith!" 
 
 Being a man, he did not consider how much he 
 was indebted to nature for this victory. And if 
 Olive knew, she refused to admit that, even to 
 herself. 
 
 Mr. Thurston and his wife were in the drawing- 
 room. He was twiddling his thumbs, which was a 
 habit he had. She lay back in her chair with her 
 eyes closed, sniffing at a bottle of smelling salts.
 
 278 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 They were waiting for Olive. Somewhere in the 
 house a clock struck once. 
 
 "That s half -past eleven. It will be two hours 
 before she comes in. I think I ll go to bed," said 
 Mrs. Thurston, rising languidly. 
 
 "Well, I ll stay up. I want to know who the 
 Indian was," he answered, settling himself for a 
 doze. 
 
 "It s my belief you ll never find out. Somebody 
 who was not invited, playing a joke. He ll slip out 
 before they unmask," she said from the bottom of 
 the stairs. 
 
 The telephone bell rang violently, the way it 
 always rings at night when people are supposed to 
 be asleep. 
 
 "Don t get up, Richard; I ll answer it," she 
 called to him. 
 
 He heard her talking excitedly over the phone. 
 He supposed some one was telling her about the 
 Indian. 
 
 "Well, did you find out who he is?" he asked, 
 as she came hastily into the room. 
 
 "Oh, that girl will be the death of me," she cried, 
 falling into a chair.
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 279 
 
 "What girl? Who are you talking about? "- 
 staring at her. 
 
 "Olive. She s eloped again, Richard!" 
 
 "Olive eloped!" he shouted, leaping from his 
 chair. 
 
 "Yes, she has. And she always leaves me 
 with this whole town to explain things to. It s 
 an outrage!" holding the smelling salts to her 
 nose. 
 
 "Not My God, don t tell me she s gone with 
 
 that cur, Blake!" cried the old man. 
 
 "Of course not. What are you thinking of! 
 She s gone with the man she always elopes with, 
 John Arms!" 
 
 "Why didn t you say so then, Sarah! By 
 George 
 
 "I did say so, Richard. I ve just told you. He 
 was the Indian. Olive called me from the station. 
 They ve taken the midnight train for Valhalla. 
 And I hope, I do hope he ll keep her this time if he 
 has to wear her like like a charm on his watch 
 chain!" she concluded, dabbing her eyes with a 
 handkerchief. 
 
 Thurston stood before the open fire, head bent,
 
 280 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 looking sidewise at his wife, a slow grin spreading 
 over his handsome old hawk face. 
 
 "What have you against that young fellow Arms, 
 Sarah?" he asked after a long pause. 
 
 "What have I against him! When I ve prayed 
 for him to come as I never prayed for my own soul, 
 with Olive too sick to eat her breakfast in the morn 
 ing, and too foolish to send Blake about his busi 
 ness in the evening. Still," she added, sniffing, "I 
 don t see why he can t act like a civilised man and 
 not be always running off with his wife. And I 
 don t believe he is. I believe he s an Indian. I 
 told Olive so the first time I ever saw him." 
 
 "Well, now that everything has turned out right, 
 I ll tell you something. I ve been gambling on 
 Arms to the tune of ten thousand dollars, and 
 then some." 
 
 "I didn t know you had ever even seen the man, 
 Richard." 
 
 "I haven t; but you know Olive talked a lot about 
 him when she first came up 
 
 "She hasn t mentioned his name for a month!" 
 
 " and I gathered from what she said that he 
 was a pretty good sort. Kind of man who would
 
 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 281 
 
 make his own way. So I took a chance with her 
 money, too. When he wanted to borrow money 
 from the Fourth National Bank, Oatleigh, the Vice- 
 President, came to me about it. I told him to go 
 ahead, lend him all he needed, and I d take up the 
 notes. He s borrowed like a gambler or like a man 
 with grit in his gizzard." 
 
 "You let him have Olive s money?" 
 
 "I did. Better than investing it in stocks and 
 bonds with this war playing hell with securities. 
 From all I can find out, and I ve been at some 
 expense to investigate, he s got a big thing in that 
 iron foundry. He ll be worth a couple of millions 
 in ten years." 
 
 "Then Olive is not married to a hardware mer 
 chant?" asked the old lady, pulling this thorn out 
 of her pride. 
 
 "Shouldn t wonder if she had landed the biggest 
 fish in the country. Depends somewhat upon 
 whether the armies in Europe succeed in ripping up 
 all the railroads and blowing up all the bridges. 
 There s bound to be a tremendous market for iron 
 and steel soon or late. Ten thousand, however, is 
 less than half he needs. I m thinking of running
 
 282 MAKING HER HIS WIFE 
 
 out to Valhalla in the morning, just to make the 
 young rip s acquaintance, and talk some sense to 
 him. I reckon he ll come round when he finds out 
 I ve got his notes. Good way as any to invest 
 part of Olive s fortune. Want to go with me?" he 
 asked, after a pause. 
 
 "No, I do not! I ve had enough of Olive and her 
 Indian for the present. I m going to bed and 
 stay there a week. I ve been on the verge of ner 
 vous prostration for months. If you had eyes in 
 your head, you d know that, Richard, after all I ve 
 been through." 
 
 "It has been pretty rough for you, my dear. 
 I ve worried some myself, not much. I ve been 
 on the point of going to Valhalla once or twice and 
 swearing at that damn fool. But it s all over now. 
 And, thank God ! we didn t spoil the dough. Mighty 
 easy thing to do sometimes!" 
 
 He slipped his arm around her. They went up 
 stairs together. 
 
 "Richard," said his wife an hour later, "are you 
 asleep?" 
 
 "I was, Sarah" in injured tones. "What is it 
 now?"
 
 283 
 
 "I was just wondering if they d name the baby 
 for me. They ought to, you know." 
 
 "The baby? Oh, that, my dear, I should think 
 would depend entirely upon the natural phenome 
 non of gender. They ll probably call him Richard," 
 he answered, flirting over and drawing the covers 
 closer.
 
 THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS 
 GARDEN CITY, N. Y.
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
 Los Angeles 
 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. 
 
 Form L9-Series 4939
 
 P 
 
 A 000925121 6