THE BREAKER MENDS

INTRODUCTION, by Vella Munn

When Homer wrote his mostly speculative fiction, the romance industry had yet to become the force it now is. The Breaker Mends is his attempt to focus primarily on a husband/wife relationship theme. By today’s standards it wouldn’t be considered a romance, but it is softer than most of his work.

For the record, the big name in romance, Harlequin Enterprises, wasn’t founded until May of 1949—initially in Canada. The first books sold for twenty-five cents and for a while struggled to become profitable. Obviously that has changed. According to Romance Writers of America, in 2011, $1.368 billion was spent on romance books.

The Breaker Mends is an interesting mix of a man’s journey to try to understand his wife’s emotional needs and Homer’s fascination with engineering, which was his focus when he went to school. It isn’t known how much, if any, input his wife had into the story, but it’s easy to speculate that some husband/wife issues factored in. After all, in addition to writing, Homer had a full time job as a shoe repairman and had a strong interest in inventions. It’s possible his wife insisted on more of his time and the writer in him ran with what she’d taught him.

* * * *

Fans of Homer’s work know he died when his oldest child was only nine, leaving his widow to raise their three children on her own. After the school in the small town where she was teaching closed down, she moved into the home her mother lived in until the older woman’s death four months after Homer’s. That home was in need of major work, and in 1944, Mabel had it torn down and a nine-hundred-square-foot, two-bedroom, one-bath home built in its place. Doubtless, she didn’t spend as much time obsessing over the roof’s design as the male character did in The Breaker Mends.

The Breaker Mends

* * * *

“What are you going to do this evening, dear?” Lucy asked, just a shade too casually. She knew well enough what the answer would be.

“Guess I’ll tackle that design again,” trying not to be too off-hand. I rose from the table and turned to the door, hoping there wasn’t going to be a scene.

“Jim.” Lucy was fingering her napkin-ring nervously. Her face was flushed, as always when she anticipated an argument. “I wish you could let it go tonight. Can’t you, just for once?”

I know, now, that I should have been more patient. “No, hon! You know very well what it means to me, and to us both! I’ve really got to do it.” I moved on a step.

She jumped up and ran and put her arms around my neck. Then she pulled my head down and laughed into my eyes. “Jim, you big dunce, you mustn’t work yourself to death. You’ll get so you can’t sleep if you keep it up. Do you know that you were tossing around until after one last night? Please. Jim!”

“But, dear!” Then I saw that I must clear up my motives. Plainly, she didn’t understand. I led her to the big chair and pulled her down on my knees.

“It’s a bigger matter then you think, Lucy. Your idea is, we’re simply trying to work up a design that will make a better impression on the Board than any other. That’s only half the problem. We’ve got to work up something that’s never been done before.”

Then I told her how little space there would be for the new hall, how the land was on a decided slope, that we must provide space for thirty classes and do it all with seven hundred thousand. “But the real point is, our design must harmonize with the other buildings. Sounds easy, doesn’t it?”

Lucy nodded, and I went on relentlessly. “Well, North Hall is a more or less conventional structure done on the Roman Corinthian order. South Hall, a later example, is a rambling affair in Californian mission style. There was no harm in that when it was put up—they were separated by trees, then. But now the trees come out, and the building that goes up there must jibe with both the others.”

I didn’t notice till afterwards that I had pushed Lucy off my lap and was striding up and down the room in my earnestness. “The other smaller halls have to be considered, also. Don’t you see, dear? We’ve got an extraordinary opportunity—a chance to pull off something absolutely new!” I got excited. “It’s more than an opportunity—it’s a duty! Why, if we solve this, we’ll add something to the art!

“Harper”—my partner—“even suggested two different façades! I told him he was a timid fool. What we must do is conceive of something daringly original, yet dignified.” Lucy watched me in silence while I paced about, my latest conception vividly before my eyes.

“Today I thought that something Moorish would do. Something like the Alhambra. But the arches”—my voice trailed off into nothing as I caught a glimpse, in my mind’s eye, of what looked like a promising lead. I rushed into my den and set to work feverishly.

At that time I did not realize that there was a fundamental difference in our temperaments. I thought that Lucy was much like me, capable of intense enthusiasm over a creative problem. I didn’t know enough about people to see that she was of the type that dislikes changes. She wanted to have things mapped out definitely, securely. She liked to make a comfortable home and keep it comfortable. She wanted a balanced life.

The main trouble was that I didn’t care for amusements when hot on the trail of a big idea. It was amusement enough for me to do the work I liked so well. But Lucy was convinced that a certain amount of recreation was an essential part of a well ordered life. Conventional recreation, I mean: cards, dancing, theaters and so on; things that I enjoy immensely when there isn’t something better to do.

Well, my ignorance of this difference led to my wife’s looking elsewhere for amusement. The first time she went out of an evening without me, I was so engrossed in what I was doing that I cannot tell to this day whether it was the Robinsons or the Streets who called for her. I am always sure, though, that they took her to play. She did not mention the matter to me afterwards.

However, she did ask me from day to day, how the work was progressing. Each time I was obliged to admit that the particular idea I then had in mind had not worked out satisfactorily as yet. Each day she asked a bit more perfunctorily; in time her voice took on an impatient note, and finally there came a shade of contempt. But this was only after several months, and I did not recognize the symptoms at the time. I did not understand until later.

One evening she stared at her dessert a long time without tasting it. I was mentally arranging arbutus leaves around the top of a vase, contriving a new form of column capital. Lucy cleared her throat.

“Gregory Boston is going to call for me tonight,” she stated, quietly.

“Who? Gregory—oh, the actor!” I stared at her stupidly, my mind not free of my problem. “Isn’t he—I thought he worked nights.”

“He’s taking a vacation, studying movie acting.” Lucy glanced up at me keenly. “We’re going to Mrs. Twohy’s reception.”

“That’s nice!” I beamed at her inanely. Apparently I was not to be asked as to my own plans for the evening. I sighed with relief and moved over to the door in a brown study.

“You don’t seem to care much!” She said it abruptly. I started, astonished.

“Eh? Oh—ah—why, yes I do! Of course! Ah—let’s see—you always enjoy Mrs. Twohy’s affairs, don’t you?” I felt I had said what was expected of me. I opened the door, and then added, for good measure, “Hope you have a fine time, dear!” I smiled absently and forgot all about it.

Now you can see what a one-sided fool I was. I had a whole year in which to work up my confounded design, yet I didn’t spend a minute of it in trying to analyze my wife’s position. In self-defense I might insist that my ambition was as mush to her interest as to mine, that I wasn’t putting my vanity first, exactly. I just didn’t think.

It was a few weeks later that I hit upon the right idea. It came to me, rather, as I was bathing one morning, a way to adapt the standard Byzantine order to a Doric base. As it happened, we had already blocked out a rough outline which would do to a nicety. This drawing was at the office.

I rushed into my clothes and burst into the breakfast room. Lucy was waiting for me, but I had no place for breakfast in my plans. I automatically kissed her on the run, automatically uttered a banal “Excuse me,” and automatically dashed down the stairs and into my car. I have a vague recollection of someone coming to the door…

Harper caught the idea at once and together we threshed out the materials and color scheme. Then he turned his attention to the engineering details, while I experimented with the ornamentation. We had six weeks to finish, but you would have thought it six days, by the way we rushed. We felt, somehow, that we had found a great secret.

It was but a few days later that I went home in the depths of discouragement. The roof simply wouldn’t come out right. No matter what I designed, no ornament would jibe with the balance of the scheme. I had tried gargoyles, crestings, pinnacles; invented a dozen cornices, but none of them would harmonize. I didn’t feel like eating.

Lucy had been very quiet at meals of late, but tonight, what with my own preoccupation, the room was almost noiseless. At length I noticed it subconsciously, and probably showed it with a certain uneasiness, for shortly Lucy broke the ice in a peculiarly determined fashion.

“Are you intending to work tonight, Jim?” Her eyes were very bright. Afterwards I remembered that she was really anxious.

“No, for once I’m not,” I replied, gloomily. “My head is empty, I’m dead tired; I’ve got to get some sleep.” I was surprised to hear myself say it; I wouldn’t have admitted it in argument.

“I see.” Lucy attacked her chops with unnecessary vigor, and said nothing further. I had given up trying to think, and allowed my mind to drift along in a semi-conscious condition. If anything more was mentioned at that meal, I don’t know what it was. I was sound asleep fifteen minutes later.

Next morning I was remarkably refreshed. I got up early and read the paper before breakfast, and in my exuberance gossiped spiritedly with my next door neighbor over our porches. I felt that, if ever a man could solve a problem, I could now.

Just as I turned to go in, I caught sight of the medical college on the hill a few blocks away, its walls brilliant in the morning sun. Like a flash I got my inspiration. Now I knew how my roof must be. There must be a double row of tiny arcades, and a mansard effect—

We always ate at seven, for I liked to get to work early. I set through that meal, eating like a machine, my thoughts forty feet in the air. Lucy said nothing, but I remember being slightly surprised when she spilled my second cup of coffee. I did not think, then, what it meant for her to be that nervous.

As I started to leave the house, she stepped out into the hall with me, instead of remaining at the table as she had done for months. Not seeing her in her chair, my automatic self failed to prompt me to kiss her. I said:

“Pretty busy; think we’ll get there today!” And I meant it, though I had said the same thing often.

Lucy held the door open for me, and I noticed her take a deep breath. I did the same. “Fine day!” I exclaimed and started down the steps, weaving arcades as I went.

“Good-bye!” Lucy called after me, quietly.

“Bye.” I muttered, lifting my hat carefully and stepping into the car…

It was just nine o’clock when, with a sigh, I tore the paper from my pad and looked towards Harper. Instantly he jumped up and ran over, and eagerly scanned my rough sketch.

“Gee, boy, you’ve got it!” He scrutinized the detail drawings of the columns and cornice. “Swell!”

“Think it’ll work in with the rest okay?” I was eager for approval.

“Will it!” He rushed into the next room and ruthlessly pushed a draftsman away from a freshly stretched sheet. “Leave it to me, Jim. Just watch it growl.”

I protested. “I’d love to work it up, Harper.”

He wouldn’t have it. “You’ve stuck to this blame thing long enough. Man, you need a vacation! Get out of this office, d’ye hear?” He rushed me to the door, thrust me into my cost and jammed my hat on my head.

“We don’t need you, old man,” affectionately. “The rest is just plain grind; we’ll do it. Now run along and play for a couple of weeks.”

I went home with a free mind for the first time in nearly a year. I knew that Harper and the rest of the boys could finish what I had begun, and my thoughts quickly came round to Lucy. Poor girl, she needed a vacation as much as I. Now I could give her some attention. I saw that I had really neglected her, and told Roberts to speed up a bit; I was eager to compensate for the past.

Not waiting for anyone to come to the door, I let myself in with my own key and strode into the living room, jubilating over the prospects of breaking the good news. “Lucy!” I called.

Next I glanced into her bedroom. Then I thought of asking the girl, but remembered that it was her day off. I looked through the house, calling once or twice, and finally concluded that Lucy had gone out too.

Then I went into my own room and looked up some clothes suitable for the beach. Lucy would prefer the seaside. I began to gather my toilet articles together, and that is how I found her note, stuck in the mirror right where I must see it.

Instantly I had a presentment of evil; the chills ran down my back as I read:

Jim, I’ve left you. I can’t stand it any longer. You haven’t treated me right and you know it. I’m not going to argue with you; you didn’t care when I went out with Gregory, and now it’s your own fault if you care that I’ve gone to him.

He told me that if ever I got so disgusted with you that I’d be willing to come to him, he’d take care of me. I’m ashamed to live any longer with a man who ignores me! Gregory loves me; I don’t care what people think. They can’t think worse than they’ve been thinking lately, anyhow.

If you still retain a spark of respect for me, just let me alone. Good-bye.

Lucy

It took me a little while to compose myself and figure the thing out. I saw very clearly, all at once, what I had overlooked before in my abstraction. And I felt no bitterness; I thought I understood her now. It had been my fault!

As for Boston—I scarcely knew the man, but that didn’t better his case. The damned scoundrel! He was older; he ought to have given her advice, some sort of clue to the difficulty. Instead, he had offered her a way out—the wrong way…

Suddenly I stared at the clock. Half-past nine! Lucy had no idea that I would return early; I hadn’t even come home for lunch for a year. What were her plans? Where was Boston?

I recalled a scene in a play, and swiftly felt the backs of all the chairs. One, in her room, was not as cool as the rest. She had just left!

Boston’s name was not in the phone book. I ran out to the car and told Roberts to find a directory. Then I thought more rapidly and clearly than I had ever done before. Violence would never do…I saw another way…

I got his address at a drug store—a hotel on O’Farrell Street. Would my wife go to such a place? My heart sank as I realized how I must have humiliated her with my neglect, to make her that desperate…

I put on a nonchalant air as I asked the clerk if the actor were in. Inwardly I rehearsed what I was planning to say.

“Gregory Boston? He’s not here anymore—left a month ago. He’s joined a picture company at Niles, I think; that’s where we forward his mail.”

Niles! I got a time-table and studied the trains. There were few in that direction in the forenoon. Here was one at ten o’clock; plainly, the one my wife would take! It was ten minutes to the hour. I leaped into the car, and we made break for the Ferry.

The street was crowded. We lost minutes at the crossings, but made it up in between. We reached the pier and burst through the auto entrance just as the big gates closed behind us.

By good luck there was space for us. Roberts drove on very quietly, while I huddled in the back seat, wondering if Lucy would be on the watch. Then it occurred to me that she would be trying to avoid notice in the most out of the way corner of the upper deck. I felt secure.

When we reached Oakland pier, I caught a glimpse of my wife coming down the stairs. She was carrying a suitcase…We were the first to cross the apron, and out into the roadway as quickly as we dared.

Roberts seemed to sense the trouble, and drove as never before. We crossed Broadway at Thirteenth long before the Niles train passed on First; but we had to go slow on the Boulevard. Whenever it looked safe, we hit it up to nearly thirty; and as soon as we left the city limits, we averaged better than that.

We were halted at Haywards. I plead the old sickness excuse; and something in my face made the officer stop in the middle of “That’s what they all say.” He marked us down and let us go at that.

When we dipped down under the track at Niles, the train was not yet to be seen. We stopped at the studio a few yards further on, and I ran into the office.

“Mr. Boston is not working today,” said the girl, behind the railing, in answer to my question. I found out where he lived, a little cottage on a side street. On inspiration, I asked if he had called that morning.

“Yes, he was here for a while. He had a message that called him away.” Probably she had phoned…I turned that over in my mind as we drove over to the address. Before we left the main street, I noticed that the train had not yet arrived.

I told Roberts to wait two blocks down the street, and to look for me soon. I rang the bell and wondered at a bachelor taking over an entire house, little as it was. Then I remembered that the town was too small to afford the hotel life he was so accustomed to…

A middle-aged woman opened the door. Housekeeper, I judged. Yes, he was at home. I handed in my card, and she gave me a seat in a handsomely furnished living room. A second after she left Boston rushed in.

His eyes were about to pop out of his head. His face was yellow, and his hands shook as he feverishly lit a cigarette. He waited until his nerves calmed down before saying a word. I simply sat and stared at him, gripping the arms of the chair with all my might to keep under control.

“Well?” he said, finally, defiantly. “What can I do for you?” At the sound of his own voice, he regained a bit of confidence. Perhaps he thought I didn’t know anything after all.

I tossed Lucy’s letter to him. I didn’t dare come near him with it. He read it through, his cheeks reddening as he approached the end. For a moment I thought he was going to run, or throw himself at me, or something equally wild. Then suddenly the life went out of him, and he dropped into a chair, beaten. A quick-thinking man…I must not lose my temper…

“You contemptible fool.” I scarcely knew my voice. I didn’t know I could say such a thing in that matter-of-fact way. “You contemptible idiot!

“Do you mean to tell me that you really thought you could make her happy? Under such circumstances?” He made a move to interrupt, but I stopped him.

“I know I was to blame. I have only just waked up…But you, you could see what was wrong! In God’s name, why didn’t you set her right? She only needed to see what I’ve discovered…If I thought you intended to throw her down after!—”

“No! No! So help me God, Carter!” The actor was on his feet before me. “I swear I thought it was for the best! I thought—I told her, if she hated you enough to come to me, here—then—she would want me enough—enough to be happy with me! I meant it! That’s what I told her!” He hesitated, then dropped back into his chair limply, as though he had lost his nerve again. Had he “put it over”?

But I believed him. I thought I understood. When I first met Lucy, her beauty had made me just as irrational, just as reckless. I remembered.

“You poor idiot.” I said it almost compassionately. At that instant I heard the one long blast of the whistle. Her train would reach the depot in one minute.

“Boston!” He jumped in his chair. “You’ve made this mess; now you’ve got to clean it up! She’ll be here in five minutes. Get that, now!”

I leaped to my feet and stood over him, glowering. “She’s got to learn that there’s worse things than neglect. And you’re going to show her! Got any liquor in the house?”

“There’s a little brandy and champagne.” He sensed the idea.

“It’s up to you. When she comes, you’ve got to act the drunk. And you’re going to act as you’ve never acted before! You’ve got to make her so damned disgusted she’ll—”

“She’ll despise me forever!” he flashed at me.

“To hell with what she thinks of you! If you really care for her, you’ll put her right!” I glared at him until his gaze broke. I strode to the window. Lucy was coming slowly down the sidewalk. Boston was searching the sideboard when I turned around. “No fooling, there!” But he was getting out liquor, not weapons.

I darted into a room at the left: his bedroom. “For once, I’ll use the keyhole,” I said. He stared for a moment, then muttered, “I’m game.” The bell rang.

When the housekeeper came, Boston told her he would answer the door. He had sprinkled brandy on his collar and taken a sip of it. I could not see him at the door, but I heard him say: “Come in, m’dear!”

There was a pause, then I heard the door slam and the key turned in the look. Lucy gave a startled cry and backed into the table. “Gregory!” she burst out. “What’s the matter with you?”

“Why, I’m all ri’, sweetheart!” The actor lurched towards her; she dodged aside and he reached for the decanter instead. “Have something wet!” He offered her a slopping glass.

“Good God!” I heard her mutter under her breath. He was looking around wildly now. Boston leashed foolishly and drained the glass at a gulp. He made a dash for her, and she ran from him sobbing. The man certainly could act…

“Ain’t you goin’ to kiss me?” He stopped and glared at her indignantly, swaying as he clutched a chair for support. “Just one, m’ deer!” Lucy gave a little moan, and stood there wringing her hands, a pitiful figure. It was all I could do to keep from running out and comforting her…

Suddenly she noticed that he had dropped the key. Apparently he didn’t know it. She edged around the table; he followed unsteadily, and suddenly she made a dive for the key. Instantly she was at the door, but before she could fit the key, he was upon her.

I opened my door a crack, to see the better; neither of them noticed. Boston apparently did his drunken best to hold Lucy, but she frantically tore him loose and thrust him away again and again. Finally getting the key into the lock, she desperately swept the actor aside, jerked the door open, and was gone.

Evidently she had left her suitcase at the depot. I stepped into the living room as Boston was pouring out some brandy. “Really need this one,” shakily.

I didn’t reply. At the door, though, I turned. “Well, you made good.”

He hesitated a moment, then muttered, bitterly, “Thanks.”

I had the note safe in my pocket. Roberts came up in a moment, and we started right back. There was no train for Lucy until afternoon, but she might take a jitney. As it turned out, she did.

We made good time back to the pier, and caught the boat by such a narrow margin that I felt sure Lucy could hardly have made it too. Nevertheless, as soon as we reached the other side, we went as fast as we dared; for if she really had done it, she could take a taxi.

As I ran up our steps, I was confident that we had beaten her. As swiftly, as possible I put my room in order, just as I had found it, and stuck the note in my mirror in the very same spot. Running back to the car, I told Roberts to drive up a side street.

The precautions weren’t needed. It was twenty minutes before I saw her, from a distance of two blocks, drive up to the house in a taxi and rush up the steps. Five minutes later I called up from a little grocery.

“What is it, dear?” She was on her guard.

“Great news! We’ve got a dandy of a design, and the boys are working it up. Feel like taking a vacation?” My heart beat like a trip-hammer. Had I overdone it?

“My, that—that sounds good!” She laughed oddly. “Oh, I’m so glad, Jim!” I caught a hint of a sob, and kicked myself for the tenth time that day.

“Get ready as soon as you can, hon,” I said, as soon as I could trust my voice. “We’ll go anywhere you say and stay as long as you like! It certainly does sound good, doesn’t it, dear?”

She was laughing almost hysterically now. “Hurry home, Jim!” I heard a funny sound over the wire, something I hadn’t heard since the wonderful days just after our honeymoon. “Did you catch that?” she said. Her voice was a little shaky. My own head wasn’t any too steady, either.

“Hurry, sweetheart!” I hurried.