hen the life of the party went to his club
we had a nice chat. All about Clyde. She hoped I did like him, and I
frankly said he was about the most taking young brat I'd ever been close
to. She explained how their union had been a dream; that during their
entire married life of a year and a half he had never spoken one cross
word to her. She said I couldn't imagine his goodness of heart nor his
sunny disposition nor how much everyone admired him. But the tired thing
got so sleepy in ten minutes, even talking about her husband, that she
couldn't keep back the yawns, so I said I'd had a wonderful evening and
would have to go now.

But up in the bedroom, while I'm putting my things on, she gets waked up
and goes more into detail about her happiness. I've never been able to
figure out why, but women will tell each other things in a bedroom that
they wouldn't dream of telling in any other room. Not that Vida went very
far. Just a few little points. Like how Clyde's father had cast him off
when they married and how she had felt herself that she was nothing but
a bad woman taking advantage of this youth, she being a whole year older
than he was; but Clyde had acted stunning in the matter, telling his
father he had chosen the better part. Also it turned out this father
hadn't cast him off from so much after all, because the old man went flat
broke in Wall Street a couple of months later, perishing of heart failure
right afterward, and about the only thing Clyde would of drawn from the
estate anyway was an old-fashioned watch of his grandfather's with a
chain made from his grandmother's hair when she was a bride.

I gathered they had been right up against it at this time, except for
the two thousand dollars that had been left Vida by her Uncle Gideon
in the savings bank at Fredonia. Clyde, when she drew this out, wanted
they should go to Newport with it where they could lead a quiet life
for a couple of months while he looked about for a suitable opening
for himself. But Vida had been firm, even ugly, she said, on this point.
She'd took the two thousand and started a boarding house that would be
more like a home than a boarding house, though Clyde kept saying he'd
never be able to endure seeing the woman bearing his name reduced to such
ignoble straits.

Still he had swallowed his foolish pride and been really very nice about
it after she got the business started. Now he was always telling her to
be sure and set a good table. H