Page:Dorothy Canfield - Rough-hewn.djvu/356

 Not till the hot water was safely delivered, and her father's comments on bad service diminished to a distant solitary mutter, did Marise go into her own room to dress. She had no hot water, either, but she washed in cold, scorning with all her heart the childishness of men, and laughing childishly at the picture her father had made, shouting and indignant, billowing in his shirt and trousers. He and Biron! One had always to be smoothing them down and wrapping them up in the little things they wanted. It must be truly lovely to be married to one, as poor Mélanie was! But, after all, Father did his best to be good to her, when everything about the house was all right and he could think of it. She hoped the dinner would be all right. It was too bad about that sole. Sole was so expensive too. Not that Father ever objected to anything the table cost. Oh, flûte! she had forgotten to see if Biron had exchanged that Bénédictine for Chartreuse. Father would raise the roof if they served him Bénédictine again. She put on her dress hurriedly, and hooking it up as she went, she stepped hastily down the hall to the kitchen. She never had any help from Melanie in dressing, not even costumes that hooked up on the shoulders and under the arms, because it was important not to disturb the small quantity of gray matter Mélanie had, at the hour of serving a meal. It was all needed for the matter in hand.

Dinner was over, and had been acceptable. Her father had partaken of everything with his careful appraising attention, and had found no adverse comment to make. Coffee had been served, and the Chartreuse—Biron had not forgotten.

Out in the kitchen Biron (first, taught by much experience, loosening the sash which bound his mighty paunch), was sitting with his wife at table, eating and drinking like a page out of Rabelais. The dinner had pleased his exacting and irritable master (Biron immensely respected him for being exacting and irritable), and it also had pleased Biron. There was plenty of it left and this was a house where the cook was never subjected to the indignity of having inquiries made about les restes. He leaned back in his chair, undid the button