"The matter with me?" she had said. "There isn't anything the matter with me--is there? I'm--I'm playing the game."
It certainly couldn't be grief over Mrs. Thornton's death--she had begun to act that way before Mrs. Thornton died--that night when she came home with Thornton, and he and the Flopper were behind the trellis. Thornton! Had Thornton anything to do with it, after all? No--Madison had laughed at it then, and he had much more reason to laugh at it now. Thornton was still in Chicago, and hadn't been back to Needley.
For three weeks this sort of thing occupied a considerably larger share of Madison's thoughts than he was wont to allow even the most vexing problems to disturb his usually imperturbable and complacent self--and then one afternoon, he smiled a little grimly, and, leaving the hotel, started along the road toward the Patriarch's cottage.
"What Helena needs is--a jolt!" said Madison to himself. "I guess her trouble is one of those everlasting feminine kinks that all women since Adam's wife have patted themselves on the back over, because they think it's a dark veil of mystery that is beyond the acumen of brute man to understand. That's what the novelists write pages about--wade right in up to the armpits in it--feminine psychology--great! And the women smile commiseratingly at the novelist--the idea of a man even pretending to understand them--kind of a blooming merry-go-round and everybody happy! Feminine psychology! I guess a little masculine kick-up is about the right dope! What the deuce have I been standing for it for? I don't have to--I don't have to go around making sheep's-eyes at her--what? She wants grabbing up and being rushed right off her feet _à la_ Roost, and--hello, Mr. Marvin, how are you to-day!"--he had halted beside a middle-aged man who was sitting on the grass at the roadside.
"Better, Mr. Madison, better," returned the man, heartily. "Really very much better."
"We all saw the Patriarch to-day--God bless him!" said Marvin. "We've been waiting out there two days, you know--that woman with the bad back got up off her stretcher."
"Splendid!" exclaimed Madison enthusiastically. "And the glorious thing about it is that there's no reason why everybody can't be cured if they'll only come here in the right spirit."