Affinities, and Other StoriesRinehart, Mary Roberts
General
Affinities, and Other Stories
Rinehart, Mary Roberts
Fiction; Short stories
Nobody said anything. It was true and we knew it. Ida Elliott put down
the scarf she was knitting for the Belgians and looked down over the
hill to where a lot of husbands were playing in the swimming pool.
"It isn't just a matter of being bored, you know, Carrie," she said. "A
good many of us have made mistakes." Then she sighed. Ida is not really
unhappy, but she likes to think she is.
None of the rest made any comment. But one or two of the other girls put
down their knitting and looked out over the hills.
"I hope you don't mind my saying it, Clara," Carrie said, turning to me;
"but it's a mistake to have a week-end party like this. Last night when
I played pool with your Bill after the rest of you had gone upstairs,
Wallie refused to speak to me when I went to bed. He's still sulking."
I am not sensitive; but when they everyone turned on me and said it was
a beautiful party, but why, in heaven's name, had I asked only husbands
and not one extra man, it made me a trifle hot.
"As most of us see our husbands only during week-ends," I said tartly,
"I should think this sort of family reunion would be good for us."
Carrie sniffed.
"See them!" she snapped. "They've been a part of the landscape since we
came, and that's all. Either they're in the pool, or playing clock golf,
or making caricatures of themselves on the tennis court. A good
photograph would be as comforting, and wouldn't sulk."
Well, the whole thing really started from that. I made up my mind,
somehow or other, to even up with them. I'd planned a really nice party,
and even if they were bored they might have had the politeness to
conceal it.
Even now, badly as things turned out, I maintain that the idea was a
good one. I had a bad time, I'll admit that. But the rest of them were
pretty unhappy for a while. The only thing I can't quite forgive is that
Bill--but that comes later on.
There had been very little doing all spring. Everybody was poor, and
laying up extra motors, and trying to side-step appeals for Eastern
relief, and hiding dressmakers' bills. There were hardly any dividends
at all, and what with the styles completely changing from wide skirts
to narrow ones, so that not a thing from last year would do, and the men
talking nothing but retrenchment and staying at the table hours after
every dinner party, fighting the war over again, while we sat and
knitted, I never remember a drearier spring.
"Although," Carrie Smith said with truth, "the knitting's rather good
for us. No woman can enjoy a cigarette and knit at the same time."
The craze for dancing was dying away, too, and nothing came along to
take its place. The débutantes were playing tennis, but no woman over
twenty-two should ever play tennis, so most of us were out of that.
Anyhow it's violent. And bridge, for anything worth while, was apt to be
too expensive.
But to go back.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account