“CARRIE'S all right. She's finicky, but she'll over it. But I wish she'd up about it! What she can't is that a medicine in a small town like this has got to cut out the stuff, and not all his time going to and his shoes. (Not but what he might be just as good at all these and art as some other folks, if he had the time for it!)” Dr. Will Kennicott was in his office, a free moment toward the end of the afternoon. He in his desk-chair, a of his shirt, at the news in the of the Journal of the American Medical Association, the magazine, with his right thumb in the arm-hole of his and his left thumb the of his hair.
“By golly, she's taking an big chance, though. You'd her to learn by and by that I won't be a lizard. She says we try to 'make her over.' Well, she's always trying to make me over, from a perfectly good M. D. into a with a necktie! She'd have a fit if she how many would be to up to Friend Will and him, if he'd give 'em the chance! There's still a that think the old man isn't so unattractive! I'm I've all that woman-game since I've been married but——Be if sometimes I don't to up to some girl that has to take life as it is; some that doesn't want to talk Longfellow all the time, but just my hand and say, 'You look all in, honey. Take it easy, and don't try to talk.'
“Carrie thinks she's such a at folks. Giving the town the once-over. Telling us where we off. Why, she'd turn up her and if she out how much she doesn't know about the high old times a wise guy have in this on the Q.T., if he wasn't to his wife. But I am. At that, no what she's got, there's nobody here, no, in Minn'aplus either, that's as nice-looking and square and as Carrie. She ought to of been an artist or a or one of those things. But once she took a at here, she ought to by it. Pretty——Lord yes. But cold. She doesn't know what is. She hasn't got an í-dea how hard it is for a full-blooded man to go on to be satisfied with just being endured. It tiresome, having to like a just I'm normal. She's so she doesn't for my her. Well——
“I I can weather it, same as I did earning my way through and started in practise. But I wonder how long I can being an in my own home?”
He sat up at the entrance of Mrs. Dave Dyer. She into a chair and with the heat. He chuckled, “Well, well, Maud, this is fine. Where's the subscription-list? What do I for, this trip?”
“I haven't any subscription-list, Will. I want to see you professionally.”
“And you a Christian Scientist? Have you that up? What next? New Thought or Spiritualism?”
“No, I have not it up!”
“Strikes me it's of a on the sisterhood, your to see a doctor!”
“No, it isn't. It's just that my isn't yet. So there now! And besides, you ARE of consoling, Will. I as a man, not just as a doctor. You're so and placid.”
He sat on the of his desk, coatless, his open with the thick gold line of his watch-chain across the gap, his hands in his pockets, his big arms and easy. As she he an eye. Maud Dyer was neurotic, religiocentric, faded; her were moist, and her was unsystematic—splendid and arms, with thick ankles, and a that was in the places. But her milky skin was delicious, her were alive, her shone, and there was a from her ears to the place her jaw.
With he his stock phrase, “Well, what to be the matter, Maud?”
“I've got such a all the time. I'm the trouble that you me for is back.”
“Any of it?”
“N-no, but I think you'd me.”
“Nope. Don't it's necessary, Maud. To be honest, old friends, I think your are mostly imaginary. I can't you to have an examination.”
She flushed, looked out of the window. He was that his voice was not and even.
She quickly. “Will, you always say my are imaginary. Why can't you be scientific? I've been reading an article about these new nerve-specialists, and they that of 'imaginary' ailments, yes, and of pain, too, are what they call psychoses, and they order a in a woman's way of so she can on a higher plane——”
“Wait! Wait! Whoa-up! Wait now! Don't mix up your Christian Science and your psychology! They're two different fads! You'll be mixing in next! You're as as Carrie, with your 'psychoses.' Why, Good Lord, Maud, I talk about and and and and just as well as any specialist, if I got paid for it, if I was in the city and had the nerve to the fees that those do. If a you for a hundred-dollar consultation-fee and told you to go to New York to Dave's nagging, you'd do it, to save the hundred dollars! But you know me—I'm your neighbor—you see me the lawn—you I'm just a practitioner. If I said, 'Go to New York,' Dave and you would laugh your off and say, 'Look at the Will is on. What he think he is?'
“As a of fact, you're right. You have a perfectly well-developed case of of instinct, and it the old Ned with your body. What you need is to away from Dave and travel, yes, and go to every dog-gone of New Thought and Bahai and Swami and Hooptedoodle meeting you can find. I know it, well 's you do. But how can I it? Dave would be up here taking my off. I'm to be family physician and and lawyer and and wet-nurse, but I the line at making Dave up on money. Too hard a job in weather like this! So, savvy, my dear? Believe it will rain if this keeps——”
“But, Will, he'd give it to me on my say-so. He'd let me go away. You know how Dave is: so and in society, and oh, just LOVES to match quarters, and such a perfect sport if he loses! But at home he a till the blood. I have to him for every single dollar.”
“Sure, I know, but it's your fight, honey. Keep after him. He'd my in.”
He over and her shoulder. Outside the window, the fly-screen that was with and lint, Main Street was for the of a car. She took his hand, pressed his against her cheek.
“O Will, Dave is so and little and noisy—the shrimp! You're so calm. When he's up at parties I see you and him—the way a a terrier.”
He for professional with, “Dave 's not a fellow.”
Lingeringly she his hand. “Will, by the house this and me. Make me be good and sensible. And I'm so lonely.”
“If I did, Dave would be there, and we'd have to play cards. It's his off from the store.”
“No. The just got called to Corinth—mother sick. Dave will be in the store till midnight. Oh, come on over. There's some on the ice, and we can and talk and be all and lazy. That wouldn't be of us, WOULD it!”
“No, no, it wouldn't be wrong. But still, oughtn't to——” He saw Carol, black and ivory, cool, of intrigue.
“All right. But I'll be so lonely.”
Her young, above her of and machine-lace.
“Tell you, Maud: I'll in just for a minute, if I to be called that way.”
“If you'd like,” demurely. “O Will, I just want comfort. I know you're all married, and my, such a proud papa, and of now——If I just near you in the dusk, and be quiet, and Dave! You WILL come?”
“Sure I will!”
“I'll you. I'll be if you don't come! Good-by.”
He himself: “Darned fool, what 'd I promise to go for? I'll have to keep my promise, or she'll hurt. She's a good, decent, girl, and Dave's a skate, all right. She's got more life to her than Carol has. All my fault, anyway. Why can't I be more cagey, like Calibree and McGanum and the of the doctors? Oh, I am, but Maud's such a idiot. Deliberately me into going up there tonight. Matter of principle: ought not to let her away with it. I won't go. I'll call her up and tell her I won't go. Me, with Carrie at home, little woman in the world, and a messy-minded female like Maud Dyer—no, SIR! Though there's no need of her feelings. I may just in for a second, to tell her I can't stay. All my fault anyway; ought to have started in and Maud along in the old days. If it's my fault, I've got no right to Maud. I just in for a second and then I had a country call and it. Damn nuisance, though, having to up excuses. Lord, why can't the let you alone? Just once or twice, seven hundred years ago, you were a fool, why can't they let you it? Maud's own fault. I'll away. Take Carrie to the movies, and Maud. . . . But it would be of at the tonight.”
He from himself. He on his hat, his over his arm, the door, locked it, downstairs. “I won't go!” he said and, as he said it, he would have a good to know he was going.
He was refreshed, as always, by the familiar and faces. It his to have Sam Clark bellow, “Better come to the this and have a swim, doc. Ain't you going to open your at all, this summer? By golly, we miss you.” He noted the progress on the new garage. He had in the of every of bricks; in them he had the of the town. His was to its by the of Oley Sundquist: “Evenin', doc! The woman is a better. That was medicine you gave her.” He was by the of the at home: the of a tent-worm on the wild tree, with a cut in the right of the car, the road the house. The was to his hands. As the with a sound, a of was in the dust.
Dave Dyer came along.
“Where going, Dave?”
“Down to the store. Just had supper.”
“But Thursday 's your night off.”
“Sure, but Pete home. His mother 's to be sick. Gosh, these you nowadays—overpay 'em and then they won't work!”
“That's tough, Dave. You'll have to work clear up till twelve, then.”
“Yup. Better in and have a cigar, if you're downtown.
“Well, I may, at that. May have to go and see Mrs. Champ Perry. She's ailing. So long, Dave.”
Kennicott had not yet entered the house. He was that Carol was near him, that she was important, that he was of her disapproval; but he was to be alone. When he had he into the house, up to the baby's room, and to Hugh, “Story-time for the old man, eh?”
Carol was in a low chair, and by the window her, an image in gold. The in her lap, his on her arm, with while she sang from Gene Field:
'Tis little Luddy-Dud in the morning—
'Tis little Luddy-Dud at night:
And all day long
'Tis the same dear song
Of that growing, crowing, little sprite.
Kennicott was enchanted.
“Maud Dyer? I should say not!”
When the up-stairs, “Supper on de table!” Kennicott was upon his back, his hands in the to be a seal, by the with which his son him. He his arm about Carol's shoulder; he to supper that he was of stuff. While Carol was the to he sat on the steps. Nat Hicks, tailor and roue, came to him. Between of his hand as he off mosquitos, Nat whispered, “Say, doc, you don't like you're a again, and out for a Time tonight, do you?”
“As how?”
“You know this new dressmaker, Mrs. Swiftwaite?—swell with hair? Well, she's a good goer. Me and Harry Haydock are going to take her and that that in the Bon Ton—nice kid, too—on an tonight. Maybe we'll drive to that farm Harry bought. We're taking some beer, and some of the you to. I'm not none, but if we don't have a picnic, I'll miss my guess.”
“Go to it. No skin off my ear, Nat. Think I want to be wheel in the coach?”
“No, but look here: The little Swiftwaite has a friend with her from Winona, and some bird, and Harry and me maybe you'd like to off for one evening.”
“No—no——”
“Rats now, doc, your dignity. You used to be a good sport yourself, when you were foot-free.”
It may have been the that Mrs. Swiftwaite's friend to Kennicott an ill-told rumor, it may have been Carol's voice, in the as she sang to Hugh, it may have been natural and virtue, but he was positive:
“Nope. I'm married for keeps. Don't to be any saint. Like to out and Cain and shoot a drinks. But a a duty——Straight now, won't you like a when you come to the after your jamboree?”
“Me? My in life is, 'What they don't know won't 'em none.' The way to wives, like the says, is to catch 'em early, 'em rough, and tell 'em nothing!”
“Well, that's your business, I suppose. But I can't away with it. Besides that—way I it, this love-making is the one game that you always at. If you do lose, you foolish; and if you win, as soon as you out how little it is that you've been for, why then you than ever. Nature us, as usual. But at that, I a of in this would be if they that goes on their backs, eh, Nattie?”
“WOULD they! Say, boy! If the good what some of the boys away with when they go to the Cities, why, they'd a fit! Sure you won't come, doc? Think of all off by a good long drive, and then the lov-e-ly Swiftwaite's white hand mixing you a good highball!”
“Nope. Nope. Sorry. Guess I won't,” Kennicott.
He was that Nat of going. But he was restless. He Carol on the stairs. “Come have a seat—have the whole earth!” he jovially.
She did not answer his joviality. She sat on the porch, silently, then sighed, “So many out here. You haven't had the screen fixed.”
As though he was her he said quietly, “Head again?”
“Oh, not much, but——This is SO slow to learn. I have to her everything. I had to clean most of the myself. And Hugh was so all afternoon. He so. Poor soul, he was hot, but he did wear me out.”
“Uh——You want to out. Like to walk to the shore? (The girl can home.) Or go to the movies? Come on, let's go to the movies! Or shall we jump in the car and out to Sam's, for a swim?”
“If you don't mind, dear, I'm I'm tired.”
“Why don't you sleep down-stairs tonight, on the couch? Be cooler. I'm going to my mattress. Come on! Keep the old man company. Can't tell—I might of burglars. Lettin' little like me all alone by himself!”
“It's sweet of you to think of it, but I like my own room so much. But you go ahead and do it, dear. Why don't you sleep on the couch, of your on the floor? Well I I'll in and read for just a second—want to look at the last Vogue—and then I'll go by-by. Unless you want me, dear? Of if there's anything you WANT me for?”
“No. No. . . . Matter of fact, I ought to and see Mrs. Champ Perry. She's ailing. So you in and——May in at the store. If I'm not home when you sleepy, don't wait up for me.”
He her, off, to Jim Howland, stopped to speak to Mrs. Terry Gould. But his was racing, his was constricted. He walked more slowly. He Dave Dyer's yard. He in. On the porch, by a wild-grape vine, was the of a woman in white. He the swing-couch as she sat up abruptly, peered, then and to relax.
“Be to have some beer. Just in for a second,” he insisted, as he opened the Dyer gate.
II
Mrs. Bogart was calling upon Carol, protected by Aunt Bessie Smail.
“Have you about this woman that's to have come here to do dressmaking—a Mrs. Swiftwaite—awful blonde?” Mrs. Bogart. “They say there's some of the goings-on at her house—mere boys and old gray-headed in there and and every of goings-on. We can't the in the of men. I tell you, though I been with Will Kennicott almost since he was a boy, like, I wouldn't trust him! Who what designin' might him! Especially a doctor, with rushin' in to see him at his office and all! You know I hint around, but haven't you that——”
Carol was furious. “I don't that Will has no faults. But one thing I do know: He's as simple-hearted about what you call 'goings-on' as a babe. And if he were such a sad dog as to look at another woman, I he'd have to do the tempting, and not be into it, as in your picture!”
“Why, what a thing to say, Carrie!” from Aunt Bessie.
“No, I it! Oh, of course, I don't it! But——I know every in his so well that he couldn't anything if he wanted to. Now this morning——He was out late, last night; he had to go see Mrs. Perry, who is ailing, and then a man's hand, and this he was so and at and——” She forward, to the two harpies, “What do you he was of?”
“What?” Mrs. Bogart.
“Whether the needs cutting, probably! There, there! Don't mind my naughtiness. I have some fresh-made for you.”
