The Revolt of Mrs. Van.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 9, 10 July 1909, Page 10

The Revolt of Mrs. Van.

By MELVILLE CHATER.

Not. that Mrs. V3n was anything of ft Tartar, or had ever read De Quincey on their revolt. Sbe merely sat on her verandah, one blue morning, and declared to the world at large, "Oh, I'm just sick of everything !" In fact, she had strode one of those 'days of mental deadlock periodical with all women. Sbe had a bad Headache, •ihe cook had threatened to leave, the cat had broken her favourite epergne (Maa-y saw it happen), fehe nange was out of order, and theae was ink on the new carpet. Mrs. Van coaW have told yon of eleven other things that had happened since Sunday. Worst of all, she had reached the climax of a long train of abuses and usurpations,, as the Deciasrafcion of Independence says,- and when this occurs .maritally there often follows a similar declaration. Jimmy Van—the rest of his doesn't matter — was the best, ieHow in the world,- but very thoughtless. He would stay in town until the nridnight*train and wake up cheerfully, next morning, with : "Why, I took some business friends out to dinner. No, I didn't telephone you because of course I knew you knew I was all right. J didn't dream you'd worry, Bess." Then Bess would turn to her mother, ■who lived with Siem at Fairoaks, New Jersey, and say, "Well, don't, you call it a mean, thoughtless, pig-dog trick?" And Mrs. Straker isould reply : "Don't appeal to me. You know I disapprove of ijaterfering." Of course her uefusal to talk always made Jimmy feel like an unspeakable brute. Such is the modern type of mo&er-in-taw, rendered superseusitive ■by the jeers of comic papers. • > ""Well, what, would you think" — Bess would face her husband indignantly — "if I were to stay away ail night without a word of warning ? Wouldn't y<xti worry?" • Whereat Jimmy would laugh hugely «nd say no, he wouldn't worry j he'd sit down and read the paper until she came home. What was the use of wor-' rying? Then he would put his arm around her and say, "Forget it, old girl !" This was Jimmy's little way of, settling such things, and Mrs. Van ■found it exasperating : it seemed to her that ' the advertising business — which was Jimmy's calling -in life — consisted mainly in eating, drinking, and late hours. But one day, a week ago, Jimmy had done an unconscionable filing. He had declined his decennial class reunion- because' Mrs. Straker was away and Bess had not been feeling well; but, unluck-flyj-one the eve of -that function, he had encountered Iwo classmates bound there-, for.-'-wiio had kidnapped him in their Bite-Mather 30-h.p. Promptly at six, that evening, Jimmy composed at the JJley Haven House the following dutious,' discreet telegram : "."""Am with friends. Shall not be l}ome to dinner." -*This he put in his pocket, amidst the excitement ,of the moment, and forgot to, "fiend. Tvrenfcy-foror hours later he turned up .' at home looking rather drawn," with several small cuts on his face which he said were due to a blowout. "I've heard them called that at boarding-school," said Mrs. Van, severely. "I thought you called them class- dinners." "On the road, I mean," said Jimmy, meekly. ■ "Bess, the "iiitz-Mather is a car. Now, -when I buy you one, next summer " This was Jimmy's little way, but it failed to salve Mrs. Van's outraged feelings. He exhibited' the wire that he had forgotten to send, and Mrs. Van dismissed it with the satirical sniff of ancient wisdom, which, being interpreted, means, <!I! I know ?' And so, this blue Wednesday morning, when Georgine ■ Halkett rolled by in her De Yieux car and called to Mrs. .Van, nursing her wrongs on the verandah, "Come alang; it'll do your headache good!" Mrs. Van donned her new hiit, to put her in good spirits, and climbed aboard. First they went marketing in Hardenbnrg, the nearest place of barter and trade to Fairoaks, which is an exclusive little island of young married people, entirely surrounded by woods ; and on the way Airs. Van told Georgine her troubles until' she' felt quite cheerful again. Then said Mrs. Halkett, ingenuously ; "Ned's -in Chicago at a business convention, and I'm going into town to spend a: few days With Stella Wayburn. Now, what you need is a little fun. Come along in and have lunch with me." Mrs. Van said oh, she . couldn't, at least not in the -clothes she had on; and Mrs. Halkett returned, according to ancient custom : "Why, you're dressed twice .a» well as I am. What a pretty hat you're wearing!" So off they started. Stivers sped them across the Jersey meadows, while Mrs. Van leaned back feeling as relaxed and care-free , as the Statue of Liberty taking' a day off to visit Coney Island. Now, Georgine was no bosom friend ""bf Mrs. Van's, who found her somewhat too dashing and smart. The Halketls always seemed to' live, move, and .have their being quite independently of each other, a thing which shocked Mrs. Van's simple, domestic nature to tho core. Jimmy even disapproved of her. But this morning Georgine was glorified into the . good angel of the moment, and Mrs. van tool her like a heartening dash of cognac poured into life's demi-tasse, thick with grounds — sufficient grounds, we had almost said, for divorce. They lunched pleasantly at the Belgium House, where Mrs. Van quite forgot the existence of No. 18, Lincolnavenue, Fairoaks, New Jersey, in studying other women's clothes and watching imagined brides and grooms ; and afterwards, when Georgine 1 said, as they roled up Fifth-avenue, "Oh, never Blind your cook t cut loose and come to & matinee!" it seemed quite" the natural thing to do. Stivers dropped them at the Lafayette Theatre because they thought f'The Cat's Cradle," billed across its portals, . fcounded like a good play. It was all about a poor, little, "neglected woman whose husband was badly gored by the Wall-street bulls just as 'she was about* to go back to her mother, Mrs. Van, who was as sentimental as a schoolgirl over the drama, blinked hard at the chandelier during the sad parts; and ■when the leading lady (four times divorced in private life) sobbed, "My love, once given, is given for ever !" she openly wiped her eyes. * At five o'dock, as they climbed back into the De Vieux, Mrs. Halkett, one of J&ose indefatigable people who must always be seeiug, doing, or going, suggested a ride through Central Park ; and half an hour later, when they reissued into Columbus Circle, she turned to Mrs. iVao with :. .. . „ "See here ! The. Wayburns are diningjut to-night and' don't expect mo till " nine o'clock. Let's run up Riverside ' Drive and back and then have dinner somewhere. Ifll send you home in the* car immediately afterward." "Oh, I couldn't 1 Mother's away, and ' Jimmy would be aJI alone. I really couldn't..

This is not what 'Mrs. Van said.; it is only what she intended to say. For just here she took evil counsel with her soul and determined, once for all, to give Jimmy a lesson. "Why, I don't know," she returned dubiously. "Yes, it — it would be rather fun." | "Lots of fun !" encouraged Geocgine. "I'll tell you : we'll go to the Cafe Toscana, that bohemisn place down-town where everybody sings a-fter dinner and the plates have 'In vino veritas' printed) around the rim." >frs. Van nodded. She hadn't the faintest notion of what or where the Cafe Toseana. was, but it sounded dreadfully wicked. They drove until the lights sprang up over tie darkening city, giving Mrs. Van mild thrills. Great adventures seemed to portend. "I think FH telephone up to the Wayburns," said Georgia© as they, stopped at a hotel pay-station. "Do you want to call up yonr house a± the same time'?" "Oh, no," said M«3. Van lightly — she had caught something- of Georgine's reckless, dashing manner. "I never worry about Jimmy, and Jimmy never worries about m«. " The Cafe Toseana -was simply a long room of little tables aRd. frescoed -walls that exhibited a highly coloured pattern of grapevines ; bat -when one adfciired the potted lemon- tr«ea — artificial, ■with waxen fruit — and saw the rnshbound wine-flasks, and heard the waiters say, ''Snbito. subito !" in response to the managers injunctions, one seemed, with a slight call upon the imagination, thousands of^milea from home. As the pair seated themselves some people on the way out brushed, against their table — Jean Harian and her husband, who had an apartment in the Dicksee. Jean and Sflrs. Van had known each other ever since their boarding- ' school days. "Why, Bess !" site said with surprised enthusiasm. They efaat- j ted a moment. Mrs. Van introduced Georgine amd( mentioned incidentally that shej ' herself, was in town just for dinner. There was no more to it than this ; and yet she knew instinctively that Jean saw something queer in her being there, and dipliked Mrs. Halkefct's looks. It gave her a sneaky unpleasant feefing. "This soup's all right," said G-eorgme, powdering it with grated cheese. "Yes?" returned Mrs. Van absently. She had heard a clock strike seven, and knew that at this moment Jimmy was alighting at the Fairoaks station. Mentally she traced him through the wellknown streets. Now he was whistling to her from the door-ma-t ; now he was inside, calling up-stais£; now he was questioning Mary and receiving her reply : " 'Deed an' I don't know, sh, She do be gone since this mornin' " ; and now he was Wandering aimlessly about -the empty house, murmuring to himself, "Where" the dickens " "Yes, take it away," said Mrs. Van, relinquishing her half-emptied soupplate. There was put before her a square of white-sauced fish — not h&lf so good, she knew, as the fish she had ordered at market that morning. Then she sa*w Jimmy waiting for " her until eight o'clock artd finally- sitting down alone to a miserable, soggy, over-delayed dinner. Jimmy hated what he called "frazzled" food. | It was during fried chicken garnished with mushrooms that Mrs. Van was suddenly paralysed by the dread that the Hardenburg market had forgotten, a 5a 5 once or twice before, to deliver her order. She pictured Jimmy doing his best on scrambled eggs and tinned salmon. . . A fruit salad followed. "Really delicious," commented Georgine. \ Mrs. Van was seated in a clairvoyant trance, beholding the confusion in her well-or-dered menage. Suppose, oh, suppose Jimmy had brought some one home to d : nnei? "Why, what on earth's the matter?" exclaimed Georgine. "You gobble down half youu course and then sit staring at the rest of it like a forlorn hope. Don't you like Ihe cooking here?" "Oh, indeed yes," hastened Mrs.- Van. "I was only thinking that I really ought to be starting for home soon." " She swallowed her ice-cream in forty seconds, and it gave her pangs across the forehead. The vision of Jimmy, panic-stricken, hurrying from house to house for news, accompanied this. The- orchestra began to play some wild rhapsody,, tingeing the scene with foreign colour ; several of the women were smoking, and near by two waiters were altercating in. choice Tuscan. Mrs. Van's heart-cyclometer registered about three thousand miles from- home. "Georgine," she said suddenly, "that man over there — the one with the beard —is smiling at me. Yes, he did j he lifted his glass and smiled right across the top of it." "Well, you needn't smile back if you don't like his looks," said Mrs. Halkett consolingly. "Have some coffee?" Mrs. Van had some — so hurriedly that' it burned all the way down and brought tears to her eyes. ■ The - bearded man and his friend 'were smoking. Presently, with a word or two, he laid something on his waiter's tray, and the waiter came across, bowed to the ladies, and offered Mrs. Van cigarettes out of a gold case. She sat up as if stung, shook her head, and the waiter retired. "They'll follow us," she gasped, regaining vocal utterance, "I known they will 1 I'm— l'm getting terribly nervous. Waiter, will you hurry with that bill?" She was having a little moving-picture show, all of her own ; two unprotected women — appeal to policemen — arrest of the two strangers-^-polioe court next morning — full account* in the afternoon papers. Seizing Georgine's arm, sbe fled to the street and tumbled into the De Vieux. „ > "Drive me across town," she said' "Yes, I'll save 'time that way. There's / a seven-fifty train, and Jimmy will meet it at the other end." At the Ferry-house she bade Mrs. Halkett good-bye, boarded , the boat, and arrived in the Jersey city terminal to find that the se\ en-fifty had been changed to seven-forty, and that there was now no strain until nine o'clock. There' she passed, a miserable hour, having just enough, pride left to prevent her from telephoning to Fairoaks j but retribution soon followed, for the nine o'clock train, having gained the Jersey meadows, stop- # ped with a dull thud. All Mrs. Van ever learned was that there was something wrong with the engine, which seemed evident throughout the eight miles they covered in one hour. Finally they halted in the midst of a malarial cat-tail marsh, to await another engine. Had any one poked Mrs. Van ttith a playful forefinger, at this juncture, she would have shrieked with hysteria. Presently two lights swung down the country road and halted alongside the trade. It was Stivers, straight from the hand of Providence, in the De Vieux. Mrs. Van called to him, clambered aboard, and, as they shot off, sighed, "Thank Heaven !',' Whatever might have been the particular brand of Providence wherein Stivers had been indulging since leaving Mrs. Halkett in Eighty-sixt-h-street, the cold calamity remains that at the 1 en 4of half an hour Mrs. Van found herself still fleeting at breakneck speed through totally strange country; while

all that Stivers would vouchsafe, in a dogged, husky voice, was, "I know this State, ma'am— all th v roads an' short cutsh." Now did Mrs. Van lift hands to heaven and prepare for sudden death. But Stivers was drunk, and Mrs. Van called herself a fool many times, so perhaps the Providence .which ministers unto those two conditions protected them doubly. At last, after another half-hojr qf many blood-chilling corners and circles. Stiver's stumbled upon a town ten miles from Fairoaks, and murmuring triumphantly, "Told you I knew th' short cutsh !" headed the car for home. It was reaJly only eleven o'clock when they reached the house, but to Mrs. Van it seemed like two in the morning. She had been working up a fine state of nerves ever since seven o'clock, and [ now she was ready to Binß herself upon her frantic husband's neck and sob contritely. • Nerving herself to the orcteali she crept in. There sat Jimmy with a pipe in his mouth, a book in his hand, and s» glass of something at his elbow, looking as callous and comfortable as a hardshell bachelor. He said, yawning : "Hullo there, old girl ! Baok from town ? I was just beginning to wonder about you." Mrs. Van sat down, utterly crushed. At length, smothering her indignation, j she asked : "Where did you think I was? Did you wait dinner?" "Sure [" said, Jimmy. "Waited until half -past seven. Then I .thought, of course, you must be staying in town with Aunt Mary, so I went down to the d«b. After dinner some other fellows dropped in, -and we played bridge — not much of ,a game." "I'm glad k> — Mrs. Van steeled herself to the living lie^ — 'Tm glad you didn't worry. I went to a matinee with Georgine HaDcett, and we had dinner together afterward. It Was lots of fun, but now I'm rather — rather sleepy. Good night !" Of all the wrathful, wronged, humiliated, utterly neglected, and let-down women in human history Mrs. Van felt herself to be It. She had spoiled a good dinner and spent a horrible evening, worrying over Jimmy's worrying about her ; while Jimmy had- said, ' Oh, at Aunt Mary's, of course !" and gone off to the club. Mrs. Van passed the next two days in a moral Turkish bath, feeling the self-importance roll off her in streams. She wept a few tears, as well. The third morning, however, brought regeneration in tho form of Mrs. Archie Hewitt, who said : " "Well, you gave your husband a great scare the other night. I heard that he went down to meet all the trains, wouldn't eat a bit of dinner, and was telephoning all over the place. He told Archie he'd left you not feeling very well that morning, and that he was worried to death. Then Archie dragged him down to the club, but he wouldn't play bridge, and went right on making city calls untiJ he found — from some friend of yours at the Dicksee, I thinkthat you were with Georgine Halkett and -were coming out in the car. I can see Archie worrying over me like that ! Still, it must be rather a — a responsibility." "Oh, I don't mind," said Mrs. Van sweetly. And she smiled a June-bride smile. That afternoon, at three, Jimmy telephoned out to say that he simply must stay in town for dinner, but would be home at nine o'clock. He sounded so solicitous and dutiful that Mrs. Van got remorse, and subsequently confessed the miseries of her night at the Cafe Toseana, first having extracted from him a statement, which included the words, "I was never so worried in my life." So when the telephone bill for seven , dollars and seventy cents came in that month, with twenty-two city calls, Mrs. Van merely f-nuled an I said, "i;bt > ap i enough !" — Cosmopolitan.