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CHAPTER 10 Family Matters (1928–1929) With the first draft of his World War I novel behind him, Ernest needed a break to recover from the stress of writing, so he and Pauline hunted and fished their way through Wyoming for the next month. Pauline found the trip somewhat grueling, but the fresh air had a therapeutic effect, and she enjoyed being with her husband. They established one of their base camps at a ranch called the Wigwam on the eastern side of the Bighorn Mountains near Sheridan. Elsie Byron, who helped her father operate the Wigwam, recalled that Pauline had a great sense of humor. One day as Ernest and his wife sat in the car with Elsie’s father, they encountered a sheepherder who began swearing. Her father quickly chastised him about swearing in front of a lady. The sheepherder glanced over at Pauline and said, “I don’t see no lady.”1 In her overalls and denim shirt, with her hair cropped like a boy’s and wearing a French cap, Pauline hardly looked like a former Vogue fashion writer. Elsie and others at the ranch admired Pauline’s spunk, although they wondered why she tolerated Ernest’s boorish behavior. “I’ve never seen anybody act like Ernest did,” Elsie recalled. “He snatched papers and photos from Pauline while she was looking at them. She’d be looking at something and he’d grab it right out of her hands and look at it first, and then hand it back. I used to get mad at him over that, but you couldn’t be mad at him for long no matter what he did.”2 While Ernest and Pauline stayed in Wyoming, Virginia concentrated on getting Patrick “raised” by the time his parents returned from their trip. She sent detailed reports on her progress to Pauline and Ernest and told them Patrick had everyone in the house well trained. He had settled into a routine and made sure everyone followed it precisely. If not put out on the swing for his amusement hour at 4 P.M., for example, the baby wailed until he got his 100 way. Virginia bragged about his handsome eyes, his mouth like Bumby’s, and his beautiful skin that browned in the sun. “And I keep him KLEEN,” she said. “I have found a little Dutch Cleanser a great help for the knees.”3 Virginia also recruited friends to assist with Patrick’s care, including Ayleene Spence, who recalled, “Virginia loved babies; she loved children; and she loved her family. She wanted Pauline to go with Ernest when he wanted her to go.”4 Virginia and Ayleene passed many afternoons pushing Patrick’s baby carriage around the Piggott square, showing him off to merchants and townspeople. The trips inevitably included stops at Reve’s Drug Store on the north side of the square and Potter’s Drug Store to the east. Both had soda fountains, famous for cherry cokes, and both served as gathering spots for ladies of the town in the afternoons. Virginia and Ayleene timed their trips to make sure everyone had the opportunity to fawn over young Patrick. When Ernest and Pauline returned to Piggott in September, they found that Patrick had doubled his weight in three months, hardly ever cried, and thrived on his new formula. “Patrick is a fine kid,” Ernest crowed to his sister Sunny. “I am thinking of advertising as a male parent—Exceptional children for All Mothers—are your children deformed, underweight, rickety: E Hemingway son of Grace Hall Hemingway the Paintress—perhaps He can help You.”5 Ernest told Sunny he planned a drive to Oak Park in about two weeks, but for the time being had to stay in Piggott to help with the baby. When his mother-in-law and sister-in-law departed on a two-week trip, Ernest and Pauline shared parenting responsibilities for the first time. With the first draft of his yet-unnamed novel completed more than a month earlier, Ernest determined to delay revisions until they returned to Key West. Pauline and Ernest had agreed while on their western trip to winter in Key West, rather than immediately return to Paris, where they were likely to encounter miserable weather and attendant colds and sore throats. In Key West Ernest could revise without interruption and would be closer to his publisher. Ernest worked for much of the remaining time in Piggott on short stories, including a story...

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