All through one week, a man of whom she later remembered only that his white flannels were beautiful made whispered love to Effie May by moonlight. She did go to sleep on his shoulder one evening, but after that she was snappish. But when Myron came out on Saturday, she was waiting for him so impatiently that he was gratified and rather bewildered; she was at the station when he came in, and when he chuckled, 'What do you say to a little tennis before dinner?' she panted, 'Oh, no, I want to kiss you, first!' and, her hand in his, she dragged him to their room and seized him with so desperate a clutch that his whole being rose to delight in her.
He had intended to spend most of that week-end in making plans for interesting Mark Elphinstone in the Perfect Inn. But he swam with her, he loafed close beside her in hot little pine woods, and about building the Inn he never thought.
Eyeing the men who were moved by Effie May's pink and gold and by her ardent dancing, and who said that she was not one of your doggone, modern, intellectual women that bothered you with deep questions, Bertha Spinney had hopes for Effie's social career. As they rocked together on the Frigate Haven Manor terrace, knitting bright scarfs which no one would ever wear, Bertha hinted, 'If you ever got divorced from Myron, how much alimony do you think you could get?'
'Get divorced? Get divorced from Myron? Why! I'd never dream of such a thing! I love him like anything! Ummmm! I could just hug him to death!'
'Oh yes, of course, my dear! I didn't mean . . . Don't be silly! I just meant, I was thinking about alimony in general. Women have to stand together. I never went out for the vote and women's rights and all that silly rot, but I do remember--I was so interested, I heard Dr. Malvina Wormser, this lady doctor, lecturing, and it's just as she said, women must stick together and not let these men try to put it over on them, and what I meant was . . . of course Myron and you will get away with it, but I do think every lady ought to know about these things, so that--so she can advise others! Just like a lady friend of mine that was the first to put me wise that you always got to keep men waiting and guessing, or else they'll take advantage of you. And what I was thinking of: if you ever have a friend that's going to get divorced, you just keep right after her, and what is most important, make sure she doesn't sign any contract so her alimony ceases if she gets remarried. That's where these dirty dogs of Ex's get you! You have to watch 'em like a hawk! Of course the second or third time you might marry somebody that's richer than the first one was, but on the other hand, you might want to marry some nice boy that wasn't just mean and penny-pinching and commercial like the Old Man was, and that couldn't hardly support himself, let alone you, but was so kind and loving you didn't mind, and then, of course, you'd want to go on getting your income and not give your Ex a chance to cut it off, the dirty hog! And serve him right, too! I tell you, a girl that's been married to a man, any man, and given herself to him, and stood for his nasty tempers and his disgusting habits and his behaving the way he does, so he prevents you from going on and taking your rightful place in social circles, I tell you you've earned your share of his cash, and it's your right and duty to go on compelling him to give you your just rights, and if he's been fool enough to go and make new marital arrangements in the meantime, why, that's just his hard luck--he certainly never consulted you about it! So that's how I mean. If anything should ever happen between Myron and you . . . But nothing ever will, of course, or I'll be the most surprised girl that ever lived!'
'Oh, no-o! I hope and pray that Myron and I will always stick to each other!'
She did not like Bertha Spinney, just then. She was inexplicably afraid. She wished that Myron were there, to protect her, to explain away the hints of danger she felt in the Spinney's toothily smiling confidences. She had a won'erful idea! She would run into New York to-morrow, to surprise him, and stay with him till the next Saturday.
But the day after was so hot, and Bertha had planned a swimming party.
When she returned to the Westward, in the fall, Myron had worked out a plan of saving her from sloth. ('Another of my darn plans! Oh, Lord, I do hope this one is intelligent!')
Many wives of hotel-men took part in running the shop, and seemed to enjoy it. Myron had had an uncomfortable feeling that he must save Effie from such toil, but pondering through lonely evenings all this summer--sitting on hot nights in a large chair by a window that looked up hectic Broadway, stripped to his undershirt, a cold drink in his tired hand--he had convinced himself that this was a prejudice springing from the memory of his overworked mother in an hotel kitchen.
Effie May might become a great executive of the Back of the House, and have activity, triumphs, an income of her own. Wasn't she a trained cook, housekeeper, buyer--for you couldn't tell him that it had been the horse-faced Julia, and not his shining Effie May, who had controlled the Lambkin mansion!
Effie May was scarcely back from Frigate Haven when Myron cried that he had an Idea!
That was nice, said Effie.
Why didn't she look over the Westward kitchens and see if she could think of any useful changes? Here was her commission to do so, signed by Elphinstone and Carlos Jaynes, and they had promised that if she had any valuable notions, they would pay her.
She was delighted, and next morning, early--for her--she was exploring the kitchen, alone. Myron would not go with her. No, he would only be in the way.
She had had a tour of them a year ago, but she had noticed little beyond the obsequiousness (or so she had considered it) of everyone to her big, handsome, clever Myron. Now venturing through a swinging door into the vast main kitchen, she was bewildered and intimidated.
The second cook waddled up with, 'Good morning, Mrs. Weagle. Anything I can do for you?'
'No--no--I just thought I'd like to look around.'
She dared not flourish her pretentious 'commission'.
She bravely poked ahead, and at every step was more confused by the complex of coal ranges, charcoal broilers, steam tables, steam bake-ovens, soup-boilers large as three wash-tubs, electric ice-cream freezers, electric egg-boilers, machines for grinding bread crumbs and peeling vegetables and polishing silver, the butcher-shop, refrigerator-rooms with various temperatures for fish, game, joints, and milk, storerooms like whole groceries, and skilfully operating all these mysteries, a hundred brisk men and girls.
Their uniforms were so neat, their hands moved so surely. They looked at her as an outsider.
She fled.
When Myron came up to the suite for lunch, expectant, Effie May howled. 'I went down and looked at the kitchen, and I was absolutely scared! I got all confused! I don't know a thing! I just know about frying chicken and scrambling eggs and like that, and sitting down and peeling potatoes with a little knife and not with a great, big, huge machine! Oh, dear!'
'But you could learn . . .'
'Oh, no, no, no! I'm too stupid! And the noise scared me--it was so noisy, and the cooks--oh, they were nice as pie, but they were all laughing up their sleeve at me, they were, and I was scared!'
To comfort her, he took her shopping.
He had always worried because he had never felt able to buy jewellery for her. He had heard that pretty women have a strange liking for jewellery. That was not very comprehensible to him. He had always disliked diamond cuff-links and pearl stick-pins on desk clerks. Why didn't they buy New York Central stock, or real estate equity, or something solid, whose value couldn't ever decrease? But still, authorities like Luciano Mora, who understood women, assured him that they really did care for these shiny stones, and he bravely led Effie May to one of the gaudiest shops on Fifth Avenue. There, he was appalled to find that what he believed to be such a pretty amethyst, for which he would be willing to pay three or four hundred dollars, was an alexandrite priced at five thousand.