Everything was military and gay and brilliant, and I forgot the
very existence of practical things, in listening to the dreamy
strains of Italian and German music, rendered by our excellent
and painstaking orchestra. For the Eighth Infantry loved good
music, and had imported its musicians direct from Italy.
This came to an end, however, after a few days, and I was obliged
to descend from those heights to the dead level of domestic
economy.
My husband informed me that the quarters were ready for our
occupancy and that we could begin house-keeping at once. He had
engaged a soldier named Adams for a striker; he did not know
whether Adams was much of a cook, he said, but he was the only
available man just then, as the companies were up north at the
Agency.
Our quarters consisted of three rooms and a kitchen, which formed
one-half of a double house.
I asked Jack why we could not have a whole house. I did not think
I could possibly live in three rooms and a kitchen.
"Why, Martha," said he, "did you not know that women are not
reckoned in at all at the War Department? A lieutenant's
allowance of quarters, according to the Army Regulations, is one
room and a kitchen, a captain's allowance is two rooms and a
kitchen, and so on up, until a colonel has a fairly good house."
I told him I thought it an outrage; that lieutenants' wives
needed quite as much as colonels' wives.
He laughed and said, "You see we have already two rooms over our
proper allowance; there are so many married officers, that the
Government has had to stretch a point."
After indulging in some rather harsh comments upon a government
which could treat lieutenants' wives so shabbily, I began to
investigate my surroundings.
Jack had placed his furnishings (some lace curtains, camp chairs,
and a carpet) in the living-room, and there was a forlorn-looking
bedstead in the bedroom. A pine table in the dining-room and a
range in the kitchen completed the outfit. A soldier had scrubbed
the rough floors with a straw broom: it was absolutely forlorn,
and my heart sank within me.
But then I thought of Mrs. Wilhelm's quarters, and resolved to
try my best to make ours look as cheerful and pretty as hers. A
chaplain was about leaving the post and wished to dispose of his
things, so we bought a carpet of him, a few more camp chairs of
various designs, and a cheerful-looking table-cover. We were
obliged to be very economical, as Jack was a second lieutenant,
the pay was small and a little in arrears, after the wedding trip
and long journey out. We bought white Holland shades for the
windows, and made the three rooms fairly comfortable and then I
turned my attention to the kitchen.
Jack said I should not have to buy anything at all; the
Quartermaster Department furnished everything in the line of
kitchen utensils; and, as his word was law, I went over to the
quartermaster store-house to select the needed articles.
After what I had been told, I was surprised to find nothing
smaller than two-gallon tea-kettles, meat-forks a yard long, and
mess-kettles deep enough to cook rations for fifty men! I
rebelled, and said I would not use such gigantic things.
My husband said: "Now, Mattie, be reasonable; all the army women
keep house with these utensils; the regiment will move soon, and
then what should we do with a lot of tin pans and such stuff? You
know a second lieutenant is allowed only a thousand pounds of
baggage when he changes station." This was a hard lesson, which I
learned later.
Having been brought up in an old-time community, where women
deferred to their husbands in everything, I yielded, and the huge
things were sent over. I had told Mrs. Wilhelm that we were to
have luncheon in our own quarters.
So Adams made a fire large enough to roast beef for a company of
soldiers, and he and I attempted to boil a few eggs in the deep
mess-kettle and to make the water boil in the huge tea-kettle.
But Adams, as it turned out, was not a cook, and I must confess
that my own attention had been more engrossed by the study of
German auxiliary verbs, during the few previous years, than with
the art of cooking.
Of course, like all New England girls of that period, I knew how
to make quince jelly and floating islands, but of the actual,
practical side of cooking, and the management of a range, I knew
nothing.
Here was a dilemma, indeed!
The eggs appeared to boil, but they did not seem to be done when
we took them off, by the minute-hand of the clock.
I declared the kettle was too large; Adams said he did not
understand it at all.
I could have wept with chagrin! Our first meal a deux!
I appealed to Jack. He said, "Why, of course, Martha, you ought
to know that things do not cook as quickly at this altitude as
they do down at the sea level. We are thousands of feet above the
sea here in Wyoming." (I am not sure it was thousands, but it was
hundreds at least.)
So that was the trouble, and I had not thought of it!
My head was giddy with the glamour, the uniform, the
guard-mount, the military music, the rarefied air, the new
conditions, the new interests of my life.
