A Good Enough Wife

I am, as the young would say, seriously old—so old that even my griefs, though faded, are well remembered and still capable of summoning sadness from the deep. I am fine, thank you, but I don't like to dwell on my state of health, which, by the way, is excellent. I know that I have lived well beyond the time allotted in the Bible, but that book is overrated, to put it mildly.

I am the widow of Benjamin Stead, who, as everyone knows, was a leading citizen of this small river town, Harrison Center. It is, however, large enough to have a number of such citizens; large enough, too, to have cliques and quarrels and disapproving looks. From time to time I have been the object of these looks, but I have always been quietly unrepentant in my determination to be myself. For instance I have never gone to church, the Harrison Center Presbyterian Church, and that refusal used to shock my fellow citizens—not that I despise them for their willingness to conform, for some of them are quite nice. Nowadays the disapproval has dissipated, and I am merely regarded as a little old lady. Well, I am old and, compared to many of the women here, little.

In our earlier days Ben wanted me to go to church, "It's the right thing to do."

"But I am not a believer."

"No one will ask you whether you believe in God."

"Then what's the point?"

"There is a point. I should think you would have recognized it."

"Yes, I know." I am not stupid.

"I think you do. You dress sensibly. You have excellent manners. You are a good mother."

"Oh, yes, I am conventional enough. I don't fancy shocking Harrison Center by behaving extravagantly. But church is something else."

"No, it's not, and I ask you to go with me on Sunday."

"I can't do it."

"You mean you won't do it."

"I can't, Ben. "

"I am disappointed."

"You will get over it," and he did. But I felt I should say something more. "I think you underestimate the strength of your own position. You're a leading citizen, deservedly." I said this without irony. "What I do, so long as I behave decently, is not going to compromise you in any way. And I have no intention of behaving in any way but decently."

That was that. He never mentioned the subject again. So we had a relationship that never became quarrelsome or even tiresomely ironical. Sarcasm was not Ben's way. Nor mine. In some ways this was an advantage. But I had learned that my marriage was one of deprivation—not exactly neglect. For he came home every night, greeted me, ate his dinner, and smoked his cigar afterward. During the meal he told me what had gone on in the mill that day. He also asked about the children and the garden, and—sometimes—what I was reading.

How often did I lament my marriage in his lifetime, under my breath to be sure; and how glad I was when, just over seventy, he died. I was then in my early sixties and from the day of his funeral onward I have lived as I wanted to live, free to be sure, but not quite happy. The grief of having been his wife—what a waste of my young years—remains with me.

In most outward ways I had been the ideal wife of the leading citizen that Ben rapidly became. Our circumstances were easy; Ben was a good businessman, hardworking and honest. He not only owned the mill but made some shrewd real-estate investments. That was fine with me, not least because he was away from home a good deal of the time. And I dressed the part: in my dark outfits I was at one with the other ladies of Harrison Center.

Because Ben was not to my taste I paid as little attention to him as possible, and he understood why, for he was not obtuse. He countenanced my indifference...