Through the Eye of the Needle: A Romance

by William Dean Howells

  IV

  The noise is bad everywhere in New York, but in some of the finerapartment-houses on the better streets you are as well out of it as youcan be anywhere in the city. I have been a guest in these at differenttimes, and in one of them I am such a frequent guest that I may be saidto know its life intimately. In fact, my hostess (women transact societyso exclusively in America that you seldom think of your host) in theapartment I mean to speak of, invited me to explore it one night when Idined with her, so that I might, as she said, tell my friends when I gotback to Altruria how people lived in America; and I cannot feel that Iam violating her hospitality in telling you now. She is that Mrs. Makelywhom I met last summer in the mountains, and whom you thought so strangea type from the account of her I gave you, but who is not altogetheruncommon here. I confess that, with all her faults, I like her, and Ilike to go to her house. She is, in fact, a very good woman, perfectlyselfish by tradition, as the American women must be, and wildly generousby nature, as they nearly always are; and infinitely superior to herhusband in cultivation, as is commonly the case with them. As he knowsnothing but business, he thinks it is the only thing worth knowing, andhe looks down on the tastes and interests of her more intellectual lifewith amiable contempt, as something almost comic. She respects business,too, and so she does not despise his ignorance as you would suppose; itis at least the ignorance of a business-man, who must have something inhim beyond her ken, or else he would not be able to make money as hedoes.

  With your greater sense of humor, I think you would be amused if youcould see his smile of placid self-satisfaction as he listens to ourdiscussion of questions and problems which no more enter his daily lifethan they enter the daily life of an Eskimo; but I do not find italtogether amusing myself, and I could not well forgive it, if I did notknow that he was at heart so simple and good, in spite of hiscommerciality. But he is sweet and kind, as the American men so oftenare, and he thinks his wife is the delightfulest creature in the world,as the American husband nearly always does. They have several times askedme to dine with them _en famille;_ and, as a matter of form, hekeeps me a little while with him after dinner, when she has left thetable, and smokes his cigar, after wondering why we do not smoke inAltruria; but I can see that he is impatient to get to her in theirdrawing-room, where we find her reading a book in the crimson light ofthe canopied lamp, and where he presently falls silent, perfectly happyto be near her. The drawing-room is of a good size itself, and it has aroom opening out of it called the library, with a case of books in it,and Mrs. Makely's piano-forte. The place is rather too richly and denselyrugged, and there is rather more curtaining and shading of the windowsthan we should like; but Mrs. Makely is too well up-to-date, as she wouldsay, to have much of the bric-a-brac about which she tells me used toclutter people's houses here. There are some pretty good pictures on thewalls, and a few vases and bronzes, and she says she has produced agreater effect of space by quelling the furniture--she means, having fewpieces and having them as small as possible. There is a little stand withher afternoon tea-set in one corner, and there is a pretty writing-deskin the library; I remember a sofa and some easy-chairs, but not toomany of them. She has a table near one of the windows, with books andpapers on it. She tells me that she sees herself that the place is keptjust as she wishes it, for she has rather a passion for neatness,and you never can trust servants not to stand the books on their heads orstudy a vulgar symmetry in the arrangements. She never allows them inthere, she says, except when they are at work under her eye; and shenever allows anybody there except her guests, and her husband after hehas smoked. Of course, her dog must be there; and one evening after herhusband fell asleep in the arm-chair near her, the dog fell asleep onthe fleece at her feet, and we heard them softly breathing in unison.She made a pretty little mocking mouth when the sound first becameaudible, and said that she ought really to have sent Mr. Makely out withthe dog, for the dog ought to have the air every day, and she hadbeen kept indoors; but sometimes Mr. Makely came home from business sotired that she hated to send him out, even for the dog's sake, though hewas so apt to become dyspeptic. "They won't let you have dogs in some ofthe apartment-houses, but I tore up the first lease that had that clausein it, and I told Mr. Makely that I would rather live in a house all mydays than any flat where my dog wasn't as welcome as I was. Of course,they're rather troublesome."

  The Makelys had no children, but it is seldom that the occupants ofapartment-houses of a good class have children, though there is no clausein the lease against them. I verified this fact from Mrs. Makely herself,by actual inquiry, for in all the times that I had gone up and down inthe elevator to her apartment I had never seen any children. She seemedat first to think I was joking, and not to like it, but when she foundthat I was in earnest she said that she did not suppose all the familiesliving under that roof had more than four or five children among them.She said that it would be inconvenient; and I could not allege thetenement-houses in the poor quarters of the city, where children seemedto swarm, for it is but too probable that they do not regard conveniencein such places, and that neither parents nor children are morecomfortable for their presence.