The House | Page 8

my honest eyes.
Finally I broke completely down, for I could not stand it any longer. I
actually believe that if I had kept silent another hour the dreadful
consciousness of guilt would have swelled within me to such a bulk as
to have burst me into fragments, which would now be travelling around
aimlessly in space, like the lost Pleiad, or like the dismembered and
stray tail of a comet. So I called my next neighbor, Rush, out behind his
barn, and, under oath of secrecy, revealed the good news to him, and
then I did likewise by neighbor Tiltman, and so on, in seemly
progression, by all the other neighbors, until at last my confidence had
been securely reposed in every one.
I cannot tell you what sweet relief I found in this proceeding. To my
killing consciousness of guilt succeeded a peace which passeth all
human understanding. There was a world of satisfaction, too, in being
assured by each of those dear neighbors that we (Alice and I) had got
the greatest bargain ever heard of, that we were the luckiest couple on
earth, that the old Schmittheimer place was just exactly what we
wanted, that the property would enhance double in value in less than a
year, etc., etc., etc. Oh, it is good to have such neighbors as ours are!
The Denslows were quite as glad as the others were to hear of our

bargain. Mrs. Denslow (bless her kind heart) began at once to picture
the veritable paradise into which it were possible to transform the front
lawn. In the exuberance of her fancy she portrayed winding gravel
walks among rose bushes and beds of gay flowers; rustic bowers over
which honeysuckle and ivy clambered; picturesque miniature Swiss
cottages in the trees for birds to nest in; an artificial lake well stocked
with goldfishes, and upon whose tranquil bosom a swan or two would
glide majestically through the mist of the fountain that perennially
would shower down its tinkling grace.
It was very pleasing to hear Mrs. Denslow and Alice talk about these
things with that enthusiasm peculiar to their sex. Until "our house"
became a probability I did not really know with what rapidity it were
possible for women-folk to discuss and to decide even the most
insignificant details of the subject matter of their enthusiasm. As I
recall, in less than fifteen minutes' time after Alice had confided our
secret to Mrs. Denslow those two amiable and superior women had it
definitely settled what the color of the window shades was to be and
just how many brass-headed tacks would be required to fasten down the
new Japanese rug with which it was proposed to adorn the hardwood
floor of the library in the first story of "the addition" which had already
been determined upon. But Mrs. Denslow was no more prolific of
lovely suggestions than was Alice's widowed sister Adah, who has
made her home with us for the last two years. Adah's one o'ermastering
ambition in life has been to build a house. In the autumn of 1881 she
saw in a copy of "The National Architect" the picture and plans of a
villa owned by a plutocrat at Narragansett Pier. She preserved this
paper as sacredly as if it were one of the family archives, and upon the
slightest pretext she brought it forth and exhibited it and dilated in
extenso upon the surpassing advantages and beauties of the plutocratic
villa.
When Adah learned that Alice and I had actually bought a place at last
she fairly wept for joy, and she excitedly produced her creased and
worn copy of "The National Architect" and besought us to remodel the
old Schmittheimer "rookery"--that is what she dared to call it--into a
villa! And when she was made to understand by means of numerous

long and earnest representations that a villa could not even be dreamed
of by poor folk, Adah was prepared to compromise the affair upon a
basis involving our promise to build a colonial house like Maria's house
in St. Jo.
This Maria, whose name is forever upon Adah's tongue, had been
Adah's schoolmate back in St. Joseph, Missouri. Their friendship
extended through the blissful years of their early wedded life. And at
the present time they are as dear to each other as of yore. Adah
presupposes that everybody else knows who Maria is, and so
everybody is regaled perennially with Adah's loyal tributes to Maria's
transcendent virtues. Occasionally Alice (who is without doubt the
sweetest-natured creature in all the world) rebels against the example of
Maria which Adah continually holds forth.
I have an instance just at hand. It could not have been more than half an
hour ago that I heard Adah say: "Alice, do you know