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She expressed the hope that everything was going well, and she filled the rest of her letter with gossip of the Hilmers. Mrs. Hilmer was a little better and she was wheeling her out on fine days just in front of the house. The nurse had gone and she was doing everything. But these people had been so good to her! What else was there left to do? She ended with a restrained dignity.
No, that could not account for his acquired suavity, for silence is very often much more awkward than even clumsy attempts at speech. As the dinner progressed, Fred Starratt began to wonder just what had tempted Helen to arrange this little dinner party for the Hilmers. When she had broached the matter, her words had scarcely conveyed their type.
And I think the Hilmers understood." "Yes ... they understood. That's another humiliating thing." She laughed tonelessly. "It must be amusing to watch people like us attempting to be somebody and do something on an income that can't be stretched far enough to pay a sloppy maid her wages." It was not so much what she said, but her manner that chilled him to sudden cold anger.
Fred Starratt had a hasty meal and then he took a direct car line for the Hilmers'. He had never been to their house, but he found just about what he had expected a two-story hand-me-down dwelling in the Richmond district, a bit more pretentious and boasting greater garden space than most of the homes in the block. Helen answered his ring. She had her wrist in a tight bandage.
Beyond his dinner and paper and an occasional sober flight at the movies or bridge with old friends he didn't seem to have any stirring ambitions. That was where a wife came in. Hadn't she been casting around for bait that would make Fred rise to something new? Hadn't she invited the Hilmers to dinner in the hope that the two men would hit it off?
He could almost hear the comments that Helen inspired: "Poor Helen Starratt! She has had an awful time!... I don't know what she would have done without the Hilmers... She's so devoted to Mrs. Hilmer... I do think it's lovely that they can be together." He felt that he could have admired a Helen Starratt with the courage of her primitive instincts.
She had left none. Thus dismissed, he turned his steps toward the Hilmers'. He had expected to come upon the vision of his wife wheeling Mrs. Hilmer up and down the sidewalk, and yet, when these expectations were realized, he experienced a shock. There she was, Helen Starratt, in a black dress and a black hat, pacing with drab patience the full length of the block and back again.
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