A Duet, with an Occasional Chorus by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (ebook reader web .TXT) 📕

light, sir. There, they are quite bright and nice. In with them! Now, if you will cut some bread and butter it, we shall soon have our supper ready.'

'It's too new to cut,' cried Frank, sawing away upon the kitchen table. 'Besides, new bread is better in chunks. Here are some cloths and knives and forks in the dresser drawer. I will go and lay the table.'

'And leave me here alone. No please, Frank, if I am cook, you must be scullery-maid. Get the cups down and put the cocoa in them. What fun it all is! I think it is simply SPLENDID to be mistress of a house.'

'With one scullery-maid.'

'And she perfectly incompetent, and much given to embracing her mistress. I must take my hat off. Get the sugar for the cocoa out of the cupboard. The kettle is singing, so it won't be long. Do you know, Frank'--she paused, listening, with the egg-saucepan in her hands. 'There's a dog or something in the room.'

They had both become aware of a sort of sibilant breathing, and they looked round them in bewilderment.

'Where is it?' asked Maude. 'Frank, I believe it's a mouse.'

'Hope for the best. Don't frighten yourself unnecessarily. I fancy it comes from under these curtains.' He approached them with his candle, and was suddenly aware of a boot which was projecting from them. 'Great Scot!' he cried, 'there's a woman here asleep.'

Reassured as to the mouse, Maude approached with her saucepan still clutched in her hand. There could be no doubt either as to the woman or the sleep. She lay in an untidy heap, her head under the table, and her figure sprawling. She appeared to be a very large woman.

'Hullo!' cried Frank, shaking her by the shoulder. 'Hullo, you there!'

But the woman slumbered peacefully on.

'Heh, wake up, wake up!' he shouted, and pulled her up into a sitting position. But she slept as soundly sitting as lying.

'The poor thing must be ill,' said Maude. 'O Frank, shall I run for a doctor?'

'Wake up, woman, wake up!' Frank yelled, and danced her up and down. She flopped about like a sawdust doll, with her arms swinging in front of her. He panted with his exertions, but she was serenely unconscious. At last he had to lower her on to the floor again, putting a footstool under her head.

'It's no go,' said he. 'I can make nothing of her. She will sleep it off.'

'You don't mean to say, Frank, that she is--'

'Indeed I do.'

'How horrible!'

'That kettle is boiling now. Suppose we have our supper.'

'Dear Frank, I could not enjoy my supper with that unfortunate woman lying there. O Frank, I know that you could not either.'

'Bless her!' said Frank bitterly, as he gazed at the inert lump. 'I really don't see why we should put ourselves out for her. She is quite comfortable.'

'Oh I couldn't, Frank. It would seem inhuman.'

'What are we to do, then?'

'We must put her to bed.'

'Great heavens!'

'Yes, dear, it is our duty to put her to bed.'

'But look here, my dear girl, we must be practical. The woman weighs half a ton, and the bedrooms are at the top of the house. It's simply impossible.'

'Don't you think, Frank, that if you took her head and I took her feet, we might get her up?'

'Not up the stair, dear. She is enormous.'

'Well, then, on to the drawing-room sofa,' said Maude. 'I could have my supper, if I knew that she was safe upon the sofa.'

So Frank, seeing that there was no help for it, seized her under the arms, and Maude took her ankles, and they bore her, bulging but serene, down the passage. They staggered exhausted into the drawing- room, and the new sofa groaned beneath the weight. It was a curious and unsavoury inaugural ceremony. Maude put a rug over the prostrate form, and they returned to their boiling kettle and their uncooked eggs. Then they laid the table, and served the supper, and enjoyed this picnic meal of their own creating as no conventional meal could ever have been enjoyed. Everything seemed beautiful to the young wife--the wall-paper, the pictures, the carpet, the rug; but to him, she was so beautiful in mind, and soul, and body, that her presence turned the little room into an enchanted chamber. They sat long together, and marvelled at their own happiness--that pure serene happiness of mere companionship, which is so much more intimate and deeper than all the transports of passion.

But suddenly he sprang from his chair. There was the sound of steps, of several steps, outside upon the gravel path. Then a key clicked, and a burst of cold air told them that the door was open.

'It's agin' the law for me to enter,' said a gruff voice.

'I tell you she's very strong and violent,' said a second voice, which Frank recognised as that of Mrs. Watson. 'She chased the maid out of the house, and I can do nothing with her.'

'Very sorry, mum, but it's clean agin' the law of England. Give me a warrant, and in I come. If you will bring her to the doorstep, I will be answerable for her removal.'

'She's in the dining-room. I can see the lights,' said Mrs. Watson; and then, 'Good Lord, Mr. Crosse, what a fright you gave me! Oh dear me, that you should have come when I was out, and I not expecting you for another two days yet. Well, now, I shall never forgive myself for this.'

But all the mistakes and misfortunes were very quickly explained. The telegram was the root of the evil. And then the new cook had proved to be a violent, intermittent drunkard. She had chased the other maid out of the house, and then, while Mrs. Watson rushed for the police, she had drunk herself into the stupor in which she had been found. But now, in the nick of time, the station cab came up with the luggage, and so the still placidly slumbering culprit was carried out to it, and sent off in the charge of the policeman. Such was the first entry of Mr. and Mrs. Crosse into their home at The Lindens.


CHAPTER IX--LAYING A COURSE


Frank Crosse was a methodical young man--his enemies might sometimes have called him pedantic,--and he loved to reduce his life to rule and order. It was one of his peculiarities. But how about this new life into which he was entering? It took two to draw up the rules for that. The little two-oared craft who put out upon that voyage have to lay their own course, each for itself; and all round them, as they go, they see the floating timbers and broken keels of other little boats, which had once started out full of hope and confidence. There are currents and eddies, low sand-banks and sunken reefs, and happy the crews who see them ahead, and trim their course to avoid them. Frank brooded over it all. He had seen something of life, for his years. He was observant and reflective. He had watched his friends who were happy, and he had watched his friends who were not. And now, as a result of all this wise cogitation, he sat down at a table one evening, with a solemn face, and a sheet of foolscap.

'Now, Maude,' said he, 'I want to have a serious talk.'

Maude looked up in surprise from the linen which she was marking.

'Oh dear!' she cried.

'Why "oh dear"?'

'There's something wrong?'

'Nothing in the world.'

'You looked so solemn, Frank. I thought you had been looking at the tradesman's books. What is it, dear?'

'Well, Maude, I have been thinking of married life in general. Don't you think it would be a good thing if we were to make some resolutions as to how it should be conducted--some fundamental principles, as it were?'

'Oh do, dear, do! What fun it will be!'

'But it's serious, Maude.'

'Yes, dear, I am quite serious.'

'It seemed to me, that if we could reduce it to certain rules, then, whatever came upon us in the future, we should always know exactly how to act.'

'What are the rules, dear?'

'Well, we can only arrive at them by talking it over between ourselves. I could not draw up a set of rules, and ask you to submit to them. That is not my idea of a partnership. But if we found that we were agreed upon certain points, then we could both adopt them by mutual consent.'

'How charming, Frank! Do please tell me some of the points.'

'I have a few in my mind, and I should like to hear any which you may have--any ideas, you know, how to get the very highest and best out of our life. Now, first of all, there is the subject of quarrelling.'

'O Frank, how horrid!'

'Dear girl, we must look into the future. We are going to live all our lives together. We must foresee and prepare for all the chances of life.'

'But that is absurd.'

'You can't live all your life and never be in a bad temper!'

'But not with YOU, Frank.'

'Oh, I can be very aggravating sometimes. Now, my idea is this. Ill-humour passes and hurts nobody. But if two people are ill- humoured, then each excites the other, and they say ever so much more than they mean. Let us make a compact never both to be ill-humoured at the same time. If YOU are cross, then it is your turn, and I stand clear. If _I_ am cross, you let me work it off. When either hoists the danger-signal, the other is on guard. What do you think of that?'

'I think you are the funniest old boy--'

'Do you agree?'

'Yes, dear, of course I agree.'

'Article number one,' said Frank, and scribbled upon his paper.

'Your turn, now.'

'No, dear, I have not thought of anything.'

'Well, then, here is another point. Never take each other for granted.'

'What do you mean by that?'

'Never relax those attentions which one lover shows to another. Some husbands seem to forget that their wives are ladies. Some wives speak to their husbands with less courtesy and consideration than to any casual male visitor. They mean no harm, but they get into a slack way. We must not do that.'

'I don't think we are likely to.'

'People get into it unconsciously. Pull me up sharply at the first sign.'

'Yes, sir, I will.'

'The next point that I have noted is an extension of the last. Let each strive to be worthy of the love of the other. People get slovenly and slipshoddy, as if it didn't matter now that they were