At first my heart had leaped with victory.  Dicky had come back, and he was not angry.  Then as his lips sought mine, and I caught his breath, my victory turned to ashes.  The regret or repentance which had driven my husband back to my arms had not come from his heart but from the depths of a whiskey glass.

XXII

AN AMAZING DISCOVERY

It was two days after our quarrel over Grace Draper and her selection of a summer home for us before Dicky again broached the subject of leaving the city for the summer.

“By the way,” he said, as carelessly as if the subject had never been a bone of contention between us, “that house I was speaking of the other night; the one Miss Draper thought we would like, has been rented, so we will have to look for something else.”

I had no idea how he had managed to get rid of taking the house after his protege had gone to the trouble of hunting one up, nor did I care.  I told myself that as the girl’s insolent assurance in selecting a house for me had been put down I could afford to be magnanimous.  So I smiled at Dicky and said with an ease which I was far from feeling: 

“But there must be other places in Marvin that are desirable.  That day we were out there I caught glimpses of streets that must be beautiful in summer.”

Into Dicky’s eyes flashed a look of tender pleasure that warmed me.  Taking advantage of his mother’s absorption in her fish he threw me a kiss.  I knew that I had pleased him wonderfully by tacitly agreeing to go to Marvin, and that our quarrel was to him as if it had never been.  I wish I had his mercurial temperament.  Long after I have forgiven a wrong done to me, or an unpleasant experience, the bitter memory of it comes back to torment me.

“That’s my bully girl!” was all Dicky said in reply, but when the baked fish had been discussed and we were eating our salad he looked up, his eyes twinkling.

“This green stuff reminds me that if I’m going to get my garden sass planted this year or you want any flower beds, we’ll have to get busy.  Can you run out to Marvin with me tomorrow morning and look around?  We ought to be able to find something we want.  Real estate agents are as thick as fleas around that section.”

We made an early start the next morning, Mother Graham, with characteristic energy, spurring up Katie with the breakfast, and successfully routing Dicky from the second nap he was bound to take.  I had been up since daylight, for it was a perfect spring morning, and I was anxious to be afield.

As we neared the entrance of the Long Island station I thought of the first trip we had taken to Marvin, and the unpleasantness which had marred the day, and I plucked Dicky’s sleeve timidly.

“Dicky!” I swallowed hard and stopped short.

He adroitly swung me across the street into the safety of the runway leading down into the station before he spoke.