“The cellar needs a new floor. While Mr. Smith puts down a new floor in the cellar I am going to wash windows, and scrub—”
“You poor poor dear,” Mrs. Armstrong said.
“I hardly think I need sympathy, Mrs. Armstrong.” Mrs. Smith made her voice a little sharper; all of this sounded like implied criticism of her husband, and Mrs. Smith had a stern view of the obligations of a wife, particularly one who had been rescued from loneliness and unhappiness at what was surely the very last moment. “Mr. Smith has been married before, certainly, but I hardly think that his former wife—”
“His former wife,” Mrs. Armstrong said. “Sure. All six of them.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Why do you think everyone around here has been wondering and talking and some of us thought we ought to go to the police but of course they always take such a dim view if you’re wrong? You think people around here are blind?”
“I think the people around here have been very thoughtful, and I certainly appreciate—”
“It’s been in the papers,” Mrs. Armstrong said desperately, “didn’t you know it’s been in the papers?”
“I do not read newspapers, Mrs. Armstrong. Mr. Smith and I agree on that, I am thankful to say. Newspapers, radio, all forms of mass—”
“Maybe,” Mrs. Armstrong said heavily, “maybe it wouldn’t hurt you this once—wouldn’t hurt you, listen to me!—just to glance a little at a clipping I got here. Just look at the picture, maybe.”
Mrs. Smith, a little amused, looked down briefly at the clipping Mrs. Armstrong took from her apron pocket. Sensationalism, Mrs. Smith was thinking; how these people do thrive on it. “Very interesting,” Mrs. Smith said politely.
“How about the picture?” said Mrs. Armstrong. “That look like anyone you know?”
“Hardly, Mrs. Armstrong. I do not have acquaintances who put their pictures into the newspapers.”
“Well.” Mrs. Armstrong sat back and sighed deeply. “You know what this fellow did, this fellow in the paper?”
“I confess I did not read it.”
Mrs. Armstrong picked up the clipping and looked at it again. “Six wives,” she said. “Drowned them in the bathtub and they found them buried in the cellar. Six.”
Mrs. Smith laughed aloud. “I know this fascinates you” she began, but Mrs. Armstrong interrupted her.
“They got this picture because a neighbor just happened to take a snapshot of him going into the cottage. The cottage. Afterward, after they found… dug up the cellar… they got this snapshot and enlarged it. It’s supposed to be a very good likeness.”
“Mrs. Armstrong, really, I—”
“Now, this fellow is still loose somewhere, and they don’t know where. A wife slayer. He drowns them in the bathtub and then buries—”
The coffee boiled, and Mrs. Smith moved thankfully over to the stove, set the coffee aside, and turned to take out cups and saucers. I won’t offer her a second cup of coffee, Mrs. Smith was thinking, as soon as she finishes her first I’ll start to pick up, and if she keeps on telling me these vulgar horrors I shall positively turn her out of the house; in any case, Mrs. Smith was thinking, I shall be very cold to her when we meet next; she is not at all the kind of acquaintance Mr. Smith would like me to have—suppose she considered herself a close enough friend to come calling when we are in our new house? What, Mrs. Smith wondered, and smiled to herself, what would dear Janet think, at such a person in her house? “Sugar?” said Mrs. Smith politely.
Mrs. Armstrong had been drumming her fingers impatiently upon the table. “Look, dearie,” she said as soon as Mrs. Smith turned around. “I’m not trying to be nosy, but please try to look at it our way. We—and that’s all of us, all of us around this neighborhood, because we all saw the picture and we’re all just about agreed and there’s even some, as I say, wants to go to the police—we have kind of gotten to like you. You’re hard to make friends with, I must say, but even so there’s not a harsh word going around about you. And if we’re wrong, we’ll be the first to say so.”
“It’s very kind of all of you to think so well of me. I am a very shy person, although I try not to be.”
“Did he make you take out insurance?” Mrs. Armstrong asked bluntly.
Mrs. Smith was puzzled. “He? You mean Mr. Smith?”
“I mean Mr. Smith.”
“Why… yes. I mean, don’t most married people? It’s the least we could do for one another,” Mrs. Smith said, repeating what Mr. Smith had told her, “to make sure that if anything happened to one of us, the other would be provided for. Money, of course, could never make up for the loss of a treasured companion, but we are neither of us as young as we used—”
“I don’t want to frighten you,” Mrs. Armstrong said. “If all of us around here should turn out to be wrong, as I say, we’d be the first to come forward handsomely and say so. How did you come to meet him?”
“Really,” said Mrs. Smith, blushing deeply. “I hardly think—”
“Has he said anything funny? Anything that might make you suspicious?”
“Mr. Smith was married before,” Mrs. Smith explained patiently. “He was married to a splendid, upright woman, and he told me so himself. We have discussed the situation thoroughly, and I assure you that I have no intention of trying to take her place. Mr. Smith and I were both very lonely people, and we can hardly expect our marriage to resemble that of a pair of twenty-year-olds. I have no reason to suspect that Mr. Smith has acted suspiciously or dishonorably toward me in any fashion.”
“Have you searched his things?”
“Mrs. Armstrong!”
“The least you could do is find out whether he has a knife or a gun… but no. He doesn’t do it that way, does he?” She shivered. “I don’t know but what I’d prefer a knife,” she said. “There’s bathtubs every where.”
Mrs. Smith spoke as politely as she could manage. “Mrs. Armstrong,” she said, “I assure you, emphatically, that I have absolutely no interest in sordid crime. I am not, of course, attempting to criticize your pleasure in murder and sudden death, but it is simply not a subject that appeals to me. Suppose we talk about something else while we finish our coffee?”
“I don’t think I want any coffee,” Mrs. Armstrong said almost sullenly. She got up from her chair. “Well,” she said darkly, “just don’t ever say I didn’t warn you.”
Mrs. Smith laughed, privately pleased that her visitor was leaving so delightfully soon. “Living in a city sometimes makes you dwell on horrible things,” she said. “I’m glad that we’ll be out in the country soon.”
Mrs. Armstrong stopped in the doorway and held out her hands eloquently. “Look,” she said, “all I can say is if you need any help—any help, anytime—just open your mouth and scream, see? Because my Ed will be up as fast as he can come. All you have to do is scream, or stamp on the floor, or if you can get away, make it downstairs to our place. One of us is sure to be there. Just remember—all you have to do is scream.”
“Thank you,” Mrs. Smith said. “I’ll be sure to call on you if I need anything.”
Mrs. Armstrong started to close the door behind her, and then opened it again and said in a voice which she tried to make humorous, “Just don’t take any baths,” and closed the door. Her voice trailed up from the stairs. “Thanks for the coffee,” she said.
Mrs. Smith sighed with relief, and went into the kitchen to clean up the coffee cups. After she had washed and dried the two cups and saucers she took a clean cup for herself and filled it with coffee and went to sit by the living room window. Looking out and down onto the dark and dirty street below, she fell once more into her state of quiet happiness; three weeks ago, she told herself, I was miserable and without a friend in the world. Father was gone, and there I sat, all alone and—she skipped hastily over the thought—even wondering what it would be like to walk out into the sea and just keep walking on and on, and then he sat down beside me; “I hope you won’t think me forward,
” he said. Mrs. Smith gave a little secret laugh, and sipped her coffee.
She was broiling the lamb chops when the sound of her husband’s key in the door brought her out of the kitchen and into the living room. They were still a little awkward with each other, so that Mrs. Smith did not quite dare to run to the door to greet him, and was touched when he came inside and nearly across the room to kiss her gently on the forehead. “How’s my wife?” he asked.
“I missed you all day,” she said. “Did your business go well?”
“Yes,” he said. “I think I’ve settled everything.”
“I just realized,” she said, hurrying into the kitchen, “that I don’t even know whether you like lamb chops; I hope you do.”
“A particular favorite of mine,” he said. He came into the kitchen and sat down in the chair Mrs. Armstrong had used earlier. “Anything particular happen today?”
“No.” Mrs. Smith, concentrating deeply, regarded the little dinner table set, now, with odds and ends; when she had her house she would have matched dishes and silverware. “The woman downstairs came up for a while,” she said.
There was a minute’s silence. Then, “What did she want?” Mr. Smith asked indifferently.
Mrs. Smith carefully served the lamb chops and the peas, and put a baked potato on Mr. Smith’s plate. “Just to gossip,” she said; “we had coffee, and she chattered on and on till I thought she’d never leave.”
“About what? I mean, what could someone like that have to say to you?”
“I didn’t listen, really; I was just wishing she would leave. She’s one of those people who loves gory details of murders, and I almost thought I would never be able to drink my coffee, the way she was talking.”
“Anything in particular?”
“The plot of some movie she’d seen, I think,” Mrs. Smith said vaguely. “Is the lamb chop all right?”
“Fine.” Mr. Smith attacked his second lamb chop. “You’re a fine cook,” he said, as though surprised. “Imagine your being a fine cook in addition to everything else.”
Mrs. Smith giggled. “What else, silly?” she said. “I thought you married me only to keep house for you.”
“Speaking of keeping house,” Mr. Smith said. He swallowed his mouthful of lamb chop and set down his fork. “I was thinking,” he said, “we’d be better off and save a lot of time if we went down tonight, right after dinner, instead of waiting till tomorrow.”
“I’d like to,” Mrs. Smith said shyly. “I can’t wait to see it.”
“Just get right in the car and take off—there’s no one cares what we do or when. We can stay there tonight—the electricity’s on, and the water—and we’ll be comfortable enough.”
“Fine,” Mrs. Smith said. “I don’t mind a little discomfort; after all, there will be plenty of time to fix things the way we like them.”
“And that way,” Mr. Smith said, as though talking to himself, “I can get started on the cellar first thing tomorrow morning.”
THE HONEYMOON OF MRS. SMITH
(Version II)
The Mystery of the Murdered Bride
WHEN SHE CAME INTO the grocery she obviously interrupted a conversation about herself and her husband. The grocer leaning across the counter to speak confidentially to a customer straightened up abruptly and signaled at her with his eyes, so that the customer, in a fairly obvious attempt at dissimulation, looked stubbornly in the opposite direction for almost a minute before turning quickly to take one swift, eager look.
“Good morning,” she said.
“What’ll it be for you this morning?” he asked, his eyes moving to the right and left to insure that all present observed him speaking boldly to Mrs. Smith.
“I don’t need very much,” she said. “I may be going away over the weekend.”
A long sigh swept through the store; she had a clear sense of people moving closer, as though the dozen other customers, the grocer, the butcher, the clerks, were pressing against her, listening avidly.
“A small loaf of bread,” she said clearly. “A pint of milk. The smallest possible can of peas.”
“Not laying in much for the weekend,” the grocer said with satisfaction.
“I may be going away,” she said, and again there was that long breath of satisfaction. She thought: how silly of all of us—I’m not sure any more than they are, we all of us only suspect, and of course there won’t be any way of knowing for sure… but still it would be a shame to have all that food in the kitchen, and let it go to waste, just rotting there while…
“Coffee?” the grocer said. “Tea?”
“I’m going to get a pound of coffee,” she said, smiling at him. “After all, I like coffee. I can probably drink up a pound before…”
The anticipatory pause made her say quickly, “And I’ll want a quarter pound of butter, and I guess two lamb chops.”
The butcher, although he had been trying to pretend indifference, turned immediately to get the lamb chops, and he came the width of the store and set the small package on the counter before the grocer had finished adding up her order.
One good thing, she was thinking about all this—I never have to wait anywhere. It’s as though everyone knew I was in a hurry to get small things done. And I suppose no one really wants me around for very long, not after they’ve had their good look at me and gotten something to talk about.
When her groceries were all in a bag and the grocer was ready to hand it to her across the counter, he hesitated, as he had done several times before, as though he tried to gather courage to say something to her; she was aware of this, and knew fairly well what he wanted to say—listen, Mrs. Smith, it would start, we don’t want to make any trouble or anything, and of course it isn’t as though anyone around here was sure, but I guess you must know by now that it all looks mighty suspicious, and we just figured—with an inclusive glance around, for support from the butcher and the clerks—we all got talking, and we figured—well, we figured someone ought to say something to you about it. I guess people must have made this mistake before about you? Or your husband? Because of course no one likes to come right out and say a thing like that, when they could so easily be wrong. And of course the more everyone talks about this kind of thing, the harder it is to know whether you’re right or not…
The man in the liquor store had said substantially that to her, fumbling and letting his voice die away under her cool, inquiring stare. The man in the drugstore had begun to say it, and then, blushing, had concluded, “Well, it’s not my business, anyway.” The woman in the lending library, the landlady, had given her the nervous, appraising look, wondering if she knew, if anyone had told her, wondering if they dared, and had ended by treating her with extreme gentleness and a sweet forbearance, as they would have treated some uncomplaining, incurable invalid. She was different in their eyes, she was marked; if the dreadful fact were not true (and they all hoped it was), she was in a position of such incredible, extreme embarrassment that their solicitude was even more deserved. If the dreadful fact were true (and they all hoped it was), they had none of them, the landlady, the grocer, the clerks, the druggist, lived in vain, gone through their days without the supreme excitement of being close to and yet secure from an unbearable situation. If the dreadful fact were true (and they all hoped it was), Mrs. Smith was, for them, a salvation and a heroine, a fragile, lovely creature whose preservation was in hands other than theirs.
Some of this Mrs. Smith realized dimly as she walked back to her apartment with the bag of groceries. She, at least, was almost not in doubt; she had known almost certainly that the dreadful fact was true for three weeks and six days, since she had met it face-to-face on a bench facing the ocean.
“I hope you won’t think I’m rude,” Mr. Smith had said at that moment, “if I open a conversation by saying that it’s a lovely day.”
She thought he was incredibly daring, she thought he was unbelievably vulgar, but she did not think he was rude; it was a word ridiculous when app
lied to him.
“No,” she had said, recognizing him, “I don’t think you’re rude.”
If she had ever tried to phrase it to herself—it would hardly be possible to describe it to anyone else—she might have said, in the faintly clerical idiom she had learned so thoroughly, that she had been chosen for this, or that it was like being carried unresisting on the surface of a river which took her on inevitably into the sea. Or she might have said that, just as in her whole life before she had not questioned the decisions of her father but had done quietly as she was told, so it was a relief to know that there was now someone again to decide for her, and that her life, inevitable as it had been before, was now clear as well. Or she might have said—with a blush for a possible double meaning, that they, like all other married couples, were two halves of what was essentially one natural act.
“A man gets very lonesome, I think,” he had told her at dinner that night, in a restaurant near the sea, where even the napkins smelled of fish and the bare wood of the table had an indefinable salty grain, “a man alone needs to find himself some kind of company.” And then, as though the words had perhaps not been complimentary enough, he added hastily, “Except not everyone is lucky enough to meet a charming young lady like yourself.” She had smiled and simpered, by then fully aware of these preliminaries to her destiny.
Three weeks and six days later, turning to go in through the door of the shabby apartment house, she wondered briefly about the weekend ahead; she had been naturally reluctant to buy too much food, but then, if it turned out that she should be there, there would be no way to buy more food on Sunday; a restaurant, she thought, we will have to go to a restaurant—although they had not been together to a restaurant since that first dinner together since, even though they did not actually have to economize, they both felt soberly that the fairly large mutual bank account they now had ought not to be squandered unnecessarily, but should be kept as nearly intact as possible; they had not discussed this, but Mrs. Smith’s instinctive tactful respect for her husband’s methods led her to fall in with him silently in his routine of economy.
Just an Ordinary Day: Stories Page 11