Page:Harper's New Monthly Magazine - v109.djvu/701

The Invalid

A MONOLOGUE

BY MAY ISABEL FISK

She lies on a divan, propped up with many cushions. She is clad in a befrilled pink tea-gown, her hair elaborately coifed. In her hand she holds a cut-glass smelling-salts bottle, which she sniffs from time to time. Beside the couch a tabouret supports a pink and gold chocolate service. She puts down her cup as her visitor enters.

MY dear, I should think it was about time—I'm the sickest thing. I've been flat on my back for two weeks—Will you have a cup of chocolate? It's not very cold—Marie can heat it—of course she's busy now, but—Oh, you won't have any? All right: I won't urge you if you don't care for it. . . . You've been sick too?—Well, I must say you don't look it.

If you will believe me, I'm nearly dead—I couldn't describe to you what I go through with every day. . . . No, I haven't any decided pain anywhere, but I am just in agony all over every moment. Up one day and down the next—I never can tell whether I am going to be able to do anything or not. Now, last night was the Ramsdell's dinner, and I barely managed to drag myself there. I had a perfectly gorgeous time, and we danced afterwards till half past one. . . . My dear, why weren't you there? I looked for you. . . . Oh, you weren't. Well, ever since Beatrice has been taken up by the Van Renssalaer crowd she's gotten awfully exclusive—you never know who she is going to cut next.

As I said, I never can tell from one moment to the next how I'm going to feel. Now, to-night we were to have had Uncle Frank and Aunt Eliza to dinner, but I had to telephone them an hour ago not to come.

. . . Mental treatment? No, not for myself, but I tried it once for the cook. It's really much cheaper than a physician, and they tell you to keep about just as though you were all right—they say you are all right. So I thought it would be just the thing for Bridget—it does upset everything to such an extent if one of the servants has to get sick,—I mean sick in bed. Well, it didn't do Bridget a bit of good, and she kept getting worse, and when Henry heard about it he was furious—Henry really has a wretched temper—and insisted on sending for a real doctor. And then he

I cant' tell how I'm going to feel

made her go to bed for ten days. You can imagine how inconvenient it was just when I had decided to give a series of dinners. But, of course, you never can make men see how annoying those things are. Now, understand, I am not complaining or saying one word against Henry—I believe he means well, but I think if some of the people who are always holding him up to me as a model husband could see him here at home sometimes they would change their minds. I am going to tell you something presently

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