The Love Affairs of an Old Maid | Page 7

even seem to be surprised,
for he is so proud he would have resented any surprise on my part. He
told me about it of course, knowing that I could not fail to be pleased.
(His photograph is in that japanned box of mine. This smile on my face,
Tabby, is rather sardonic. Why is it that men expect an old sweetheart
to take an active interest in their bride-elect, and are so deadly sure that
they will like each other?)
"She is the most sympathetic little thing," he said enthusiastically. "She
reminds me of you in so many ways. You are very much alike."
"Oh, thank you, Bronson Sturgis Herrick! I assure you I would
cheerfully drown myself if I thought you were right about that," I
exclaimed mentally.

He repeated over and over that she was "so sympathetic." He meant, of
course, that she had wept over him. Flossy's tears flow like rain if you
crook your finger at her, and tears wring the heart of a man like
Bronson. To think he was going to marry her! I just looked at him, I
remember, as he stood so straight and tall before me, and said to myself,
"Well, you dear, honest, loyal, clever man! You are just the kind of a
man that women fool most unmercifully. But it's nature, and you can't
help it. Go and marry this Flossy girl, and commit mental suicide if you
must."
"Sympathetic!"
So he married her five years ago, and became her man-servant.
When they had been married about a year, people said that Bronson
was working himself to death. I, being an Old Maid, and liking to
meddle with other people's business, told him that I thought he ought to
take a vacation. He said he couldn't afford it. I was honestly surprised
at that, because, while he was not rich, he was extremely well-to-do,
with a rapidly increasing law practice. And then Flossy's father had
been very generous when she married him. He was considerate enough
to reply to my look.
"You know I married a rich girl. Flossy's money is her own. She has
saved it--I wished her to save it, I wished it--and I am doing my level
best to support her as nearly as possible in the way in which she has
been accustomed to live. She ought to have an easier time, poor child."
So he did not take a vacation, and the summer was very hot, and when
Flossy came home from Rye she found him wretchedly ill, and
discovered that he had had a trained nurse for two weeks before he let
her know anything about it. Then people pitied Flossy for having her
summer interrupted, and Flossy felt that it was a shame; but she very
willingly sat and fanned Bronson for as much as an hour every day and
answered questions languidly and was pale, and people sent her flowers
and were extremely sorry for her.
When Bronson became well enough to go away, as his doctors ordered,

for a complete rest, Rachel English happened to go on the same train
with them, and the next day I received a letter, or rather an envelope,
from her, with this single sentence enclosed: "And if she didn't make
him hold her in his arms in broad daylight every step of the way,
because the train jarred her back!"
(Tabby, there is no use in talking. I must stop and pull your ears. Come
here and let Missis be really rough with you for a minute.)
There are some women who prefer a valet to a husband; who think that
the more menial are his services in public, the more apparent is his
devotion. It is a Roman-chariot-wheel idea, which degrades both the
man and the woman in the eyes of the spectators. I wrote to Rachel, and
said in the letter, "One horse in the span always does most of the
pulling, you know, especially uphill." And Rachel wrote back,
"Wouldn't I just like to drive this pair, though!"
Bronson had his ideals before he was married, as most men have,
concerning the kind of a home he hoped for. He always said that it was
not so much what your home was, as how it was. He believed that a
home consisted more in the feelings and aims of its inmates than in
rugs and jardinières. He said to me once, "The oneness of two people
could make a home in Sahara."
He was ambitious, too, feeling within himself that power which makes
orators and statesmen, but needing the approval and encouragement of
some one who also realized his capabilities, to enable him to do his best.
He himself was the one who was sympathetic, if he had only known it.
His