Sister Carrie: A Novel
“It’s too bad you couldn’t have been there, really. I was sorry to hear
you weren’t feeling well.”
Feeling well! Mrs. Hurstwood could have echoed the words after him
open-mouthed. As it was, she extricated herself from her mingled
impulse to deny and question, and said, almost raspingly:
“Yes, it is too bad.”
“Looks like there will be quite a crowd here to-day, doesn’t it?” the
acquaintance observed, drifting off upon another topic.
The manager’s wife would have questioned farther, but she saw no
opportunity. She was for the moment wholly at sea, anxious to think for
herself, and wondering what new deception was this which caused him to
give out that she was ill when she was not. Another case of her company
not wanted, and excuses being made. She resolved to find out more.
“Were you at the performance last evening?” she asked of the next of
Hurstwood’s friends who greeted her as she sat in her box.
“Yes. You didn’t get around.”
“No,” she answered, “I was not feeling very well.”
“So your husband told me,” he answered. “Well, it was really very
enjoyable. Turned out much better than I expected.”
“Were there many there?”
“The house was full. It was quite an Elk night. I saw quite a number of
your friends—Mrs. Harrison, Mrs. Barnes, Mrs. Collins.”
“Quite a social gathering.”
“Indeed it was. My wife enjoyed it very much.”
Mrs. Hurstwood bit her lip.
“So,” she thought, “that’s the way he does. Tells my friends I am sick
and cannot come.”
She wondered what could induce him to go alone. There was something
back of this. She rummaged her brain for a reason.
By evening, when Hurstwood reached home, she had brooded herself into a
state of sullen desire for explanation and revenge. She wanted to know
what this peculiar action of his imported. She was certain there was
more behind it all than what she had heard, and evil curiosity mingled
well with distrust and the remnants of her wrath of the morning. She,
impending disaster itself, walked about with gathered shadow at the
eyes and the rudimentary muscles of savagery fixing the hard lines of
her mouth.
On the other hand, as we may well believe, the manager came home in the
sunniest mood. His conversation and agreement with Carrie had raised
his spirits until he was in the frame of mind of one who sings
joyously. He was proud of himself, proud of his success, proud of
Carrie. He could have been genial to all the world, and he bore no
grudge against his wife. He meant to be pleasant, to forget her
presence, to live in the atmosphere of youth and pleasure which had
been restored to him.
So now, the house, to his mind, had a most pleasing and comfortable
appearance. In the hall he found an evening paper, laid there by the
maid and forgotten by Mrs. Hurstwood. In the dining-room the table was
clean laid with linen and napery and shiny with glasses and decorated
china. Through an open door he saw into the kitchen, where the fire was
crackling in the stove and the evening meal already well under way. Out
in the small back yard was George, Jr., frolicking with a young dog he
had recently purchased, and in the parlour Jessica was playing at the
piano, the sounds of a merry waltz filling every nook and corner of the
comfortable home. Every one, like himself, seemed to have regained his
good spirits, to be in sympathy with youth and beauty, to be inclined
to joy and merry-making. He felt as if he could say a good word all
around himself, and took a most genial glance at the spread table and
polished sideboard before going upstairs to read his paper in the
comfortable armchair of the sitting-room which looked through the open
windows into the street. When he entered there, however, he found his
wife brushing her hair and musing to herself the while.
He came lightly in, thinking to smooth over any feeling that might
still exist by a kindly word and a ready promise, but Mrs. Hurstwood
said nothing. He seated himself in the large chair, stirred lightly in
making himself comfortable, opened his paper, and began to read. In a
few moments he was smiling merrily over a very comical account of a
baseball game which had taken place between the Chicago and Detroit
teams.
The while he was doing this Mrs. Hurstwood was observing him casually
through the medium of the mirror which was before her. She noticed his
pleasant and contented manner, his airy grace and smiling humour, and
it merely aggravated her the more. She wondered how he could think to
carry himself so in her presence after the cynicism, indifference, and
neglect he had heretofore manifested and would continue to manifest so
long as she would endure it. She thought how she should like to tell
him—what stress and emphasis she would lend her assertions, how she
should drive over this whole affair until satisfaction should be
rendered her. Indeed, the shining sword of her wrath was but weakly
suspended by a thread of thought.
In the meanwhile Hurstwood encountered a humorous item concerning a
stranger who had arrived in the city and became entangled with a
bunco-steerer. It amused him immensely, and at last he stirred and
chuckled to himself. He wished that he might enlist his wife’s
attention and read it to her.
“Ha, ha,” he exclaimed softly, as if to himself, “that’s funny.”
Mrs. Hurstwood kept on arranging her hair, not so much as deigning a
glance.
He stirred again and went on to another subject. At last he felt as if
his good-humour must find some outlet. Julia was probably still out of
humour over that affair of this morning, but that could easily be
straightened. As a matter of fact, she was in the wrong, but he didn’t
care. She could go to Waukesha right away if she wanted to. The sooner
the better. He would tell her that as soon as he got a chance, and the
whole thing would blow over.
“Did you notice,” he said, at last, breaking forth concerning another
item which he had found, “that they have entered suit to compel the
Illinois Central to get off the lake front, Julia?” he asked.
She could scarcely force herself to answer, but managed to say “No,”
sharply.
Hurstwood pricked up his ears. There was a note in her voice which
vibrated keenly.
“It would be a good thing if they did,” he went on, half to himself,
half to her, though he felt that something was amiss in that quarter.
He withdrew his attention to his paper very circumspectly, listening
mentally for the little sounds which should show him what was on foot.
As a matter of fact, no man as clever as Hurstwood—as observant and
sensitive to atmospheres of many sorts, particularly upon his own plane
of thought—would have made the mistake which he did in regard to his
wife, wrought up as she was, had he not been occupied mentally with a
very different train of thought. Had not the influence of Carrie’s
regard for him, the elation which her promise aroused in him, lasted
over, he would not have seen the house in so pleasant a mood. It was
not extraordinarily bright and merry this evening. He was merely very
much mistaken, and would have been much more fitted to cope with it had
he come home in his normal state.
After he had studied his paper a few moments longer, he felt that he
ought to modify matters in some way or other. Evidently his wife was
not going to patch up peace at a word. So he said:
“Where did George get the dog he has there in the yard?”
“I don’t know,” she snapped.
He put his paper down on his knees and gazed idly out of the window. He
did not propose to lose his temper, but merely to be persistent and
agreeable, and by a few questions bring around a mild understanding of
some sort.
“Why do you feel so bad about that affair of this morning?” he said, at
last. “We needn’t quarrel about that. You know you can go to Waukesha
if you want to.”
“So you can stay here and trifle around with some one else?” she
exclaimed, turning to him a determined countenance upon which was drawn
a sharp and wrathful sneer.
He stopped as if slapped in the face. In an instant his persuasive,
conciliatory manner fled. He was on the defensive at a wink and puzzled
for a word to reply.
“What do you mean?” he said at last, straightening himself and gazing
at the cold, determined figure before him, who paid no attention, but
went on arranging herself before the mirror.
“You know what I mean,” she said, finally, as if there were a world of
information which she held in reserve—which she did not need to tell.
“Well, I don’t,” he said, stubbornly, yet nervous and alert for what
should come next. The finality of the woman’s manner took away his
feeling of superiority in battle.
She made no answer.
“Hmph!” he murmured, with a movement of his head to one side. It was
the weakest thing he had ever done. It was totally unassured.
Mrs. Hurstwood noticed the lack of colour in it. She turned upon him,
animal-like, able to strike an effectual second blow.
“I want the Waukesha money to-morrow morning,” she said.
He looked at her in amazement. Never before had he seen such a cold,
steely determination in her eye—such a cruel look of indifference. She
seemed a thorough master of her mood—thoroughly confident and
determined to wrest all control from him. He felt that all his
resources could not defend him. He must attack.
“What do you mean?” he said, jumping up. “You want! I’d like to know
what’s got into you to-night.”
“Nothing’s _got_ into me,” she said, flaming. “I want that money. You
can do your swaggering afterwards.”
“Swaggering, eh! What! You’ll get nothing from me. What do you mean by
your insinuations, anyhow?”
“Where were you last night?” she answered. The words were hot as they
came. “Who were you driving with on Washington Boulevard? Who were you
with at the theatre when George saw you? Do you think I’m a fool to be
duped by you? Do you think I’ll sit at home here and take your ‘too
busys’ and ‘can’t come,’ while you parade around and make out that I’m
unable to come? I want you to know that lordly airs have come to an end
so far as I am concerned. You can’t dictate to me nor my children. I’m
through with you entirely.”
“It’s a lie,” he said, driven to a corner and knowing no other excuse.
“Lie, eh!” she said, fiercely, but with returning reserve; “you may
call it a lie if you want to, but I know.”
“It’s a lie, I tell you,” he said, in a low, sharp voice. “You’ve been
searching around for some cheap accusation for months and now you think
you have it. You think you’ll spring something and get the upper hand.
Well, I tell you, you can’t. As long as I’m in this house I’m master of
it, and you or any one else won’t dictate to me—do you hear?”
He crept toward her with a light in his eye that was ominous. Something
in the woman’s cool, cynical, upper-handish manner, as if she were
already master, caused him to feel for the moment as if he could
strangle her.
She gazed at him—a pythoness in humour.
“I’m not dictating to you,” she returned; “I’m telling you what I
want.”
The answer was so cool, so rich in bravado, that somehow it took the
wind out of his sails. He could not attack her, he could not ask her
for proofs. Somehow he felt evidence, law, the remembrance of all his
property which she held in her name, to be shining in her glance. He
was like a vessel, powerful and dangerous, but rolling and floundering
without sail.
“And I’m telling you,” he said in the end, slightly recovering himself,
“what you’ll not get.”
“We’ll see about it,” she said. “I’ll find out what my rights are.
Perhaps you’ll talk to a lawyer, if you won’t to me.”
It was a magnificent play, and had its effect. Hurstwood fell back
beaten. He knew now that he had more than mere bluff to contend with.
He felt that he was face to face with a dull proposition. What to say