Alice Adams Booth Tarkington (ebook reader txt) š
- Author: Booth Tarkington
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āBut Walterā āā Alice faltered. āWalter doesnāt cost him anything at all any more.ā And she concluded, in a stricken voice, āItās allā āme!ā
āWhy shouldnāt it be?ā her mother cried. āYouāre youngā āyouāre just at the time when your life should be fullest of good things and happiness. Yet what do you get?ā
Aliceās lip quivered; she was not unsusceptible to such an appeal, but she contrived the semblance of a protest. āI donāt have such a bad time not a good deal of the time, anyhow. Iāve got a good many of the things other girls haveā āā
āYou have?ā Mrs. Adams was piteously satirical. āI suppose youāve got a limousine to go to that dance tonight? I suppose youāve only got to call a florist and tell him to send you some orchids? I suppose youāveā āā
But Alice interrupted this list. Apparently in a single instant all emotion left her, and she became businesslike, as one in the midst of trifles reminded of really serious matters. She got up from the bed and went to the door of the closet where she kept her dresses. āOh, see here,ā she said, briskly. āIāve decided to wear my white organdie if you could put in a new lining for me. Iām afraid itāll take you nearly all afternoon.ā
She brought forth the dress, displayed it upon the bed, and Mrs. Adams examined it attentively.
āDo you think you could get it done, mama?ā
āI donāt see why not,ā Mrs. Adams answered, passing a thoughtful hand over the fabric. āIt oughtnāt to take more than four or five hours.ā
āItās a shame to have you sit at the machine that long,ā Alice said, absently, adding, āAnd Iām sure we ought to let papa alone. Letās just give it up, mama.ā
Mrs. Adams continued her thoughtful examination of the dress. āDid you buy the chiffon and ribbon, Alice?ā
āYes. Iām sure we oughtnāt to talk to him about it any more, mama.ā
āWell, weāll see.ā
āLetās both agree that weāll never say another single word to him about it,ā said Alice. āItāll be a great deal better if we just let him make up his mind for himself.ā
VWith this, having more immediately practical questions before them, they dropped the subject, to bend their entire attention upon the dress; and when the lunch-gong sounded downstairs Alice was still sketching repairs and alterations. She continued to sketch them, not heeding the summons.
āI suppose weād better go down to lunch,ā Mrs. Adams said, absently. āSheās at the gong again.ā
āIn a minute, mama. Now about the sleevesā āā And she went on with her planning. Unfortunately the gong was inexpressive of the mood of the person who beat upon it. It consisted of three little metal bowls upon a string; they were unequal in size, and, upon being tapped with a padded stick, gave forth vibrations almost musically pleasant. It was Alice who had substituted this contrivance for the brass ādinner-bellā in use throughout her childhood; and neither she nor the others of her family realized that the substitution of sweeter sounds had made the life of that household more difficult. In spite of dismaying increases in wages, the Adamses still strove to keep a cook; and, as they were unable to pay the higher rates demanded by a good one, what they usually had was a whimsical coloured woman of nomadic impulses. In the hands of such a person the old-fashioned ādinner-bellā was satisfying; life could instantly be made intolerable for anyone dawdling on his way to a meal; the bell was capable of every desirable profanity and left nothing bottled up in the breast of the ringer. But the chamois-covered stick might whack upon Aliceās little Chinese bowls for a considerable length of time and produce no great effect of urgency upon a hearer, nor any other effect, except fury in the cook. The ironical impossibility of expressing indignation otherwise than by sounds of gentle harmony proved exasperating; the cook was apt to become surcharged, so that explosive resignations, never rare, were somewhat more frequent after the introduction of the gong.
Mrs. Adams took this increased frequency to be only another manifestation of the inexplicable new difficulties that beset all housekeeping. You paid a cook double what you had paid one a few years before; and the cook knew half as much of cookery, and had no gratitude. The more you gave these people, it seemed, the worse they behavedā āa condition not to be remedied by simply giving them less, because you couldnāt even get the worst unless you paid her what she demanded. Nevertheless, Mrs. Adams remained fitfully an optimist in the matter. Brought up by her mother to speak of a female cook as āthe girl,ā she had been instructed by Alice to drop that definition in favour of one not an improvement in accuracy: āthe maid.ā Almost always, during the first day or so after every cook came, Mrs. Adams would say, at intervals, with an air of triumph: āI believeā āof course itās a little soon to be sureā ābut I do really believe this new maid is the treasure weāve been looking for so long!ā Much in the same way that Alice dreamed of a mysterious perfect mate for whom she āwaited,ā her mother had a fairy theory that hidden somewhere in the universe there was the treasure, the perfect āmaid,ā who would come and cook in the Adamsesā kitchen, not four days or four weeks, but forever.
The present incumbent was not she. Alice, profoundly interested herself, kept her mother likewise so preoccupied with the dress that they were but vaguely conscious of the gongās soft warnings,
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