An Old-Fashioned Man by Edgar Saltus
Claire Hemingway receives an anonymous letter, cramped and florid in hand, telling her that her husband Fred is amusing himself elsewhere. She has overheard Fred telephoning someone named Marvalho about an unnamed matter before he left the house without a word. Claire, a Verelst by birth and thus impeccably descended, studies her own reflection and finds it mocks her. She recalls Fred's habitual graciousness, marred only once, when he furiously dismissed a drunken butler after a dinner with her brother Harry and his wife Lilian. Unsettled, Claire goes to the house of her brother Harry Verelst, near the Plaza, to find Lilian, whom she loves as a true sister. Lilian is out, but Harry arrives by motor, smelling of champagne and Turkish tobacco, and receives a letter of his own from the footman, which he pockets unread. Inside, he chatters about turkey-trotting downtown and his approaching birthday before Claire tells him of her letter. Harry counsels her, in his lazily cynical way, to ignore it entirely: people of their sort never notice what wasn't meant for them, and jealousy only betrays a sense of inferiority. He argues that a man requires variety as naturally as he requires terrapin and canvasback, and that the great virtues of marriage are smiling, forbearing, and minding one's own business, not fidelity in trifles. Claire protests that she is flesh and blood and will not simply pretend virtue she doesn't feel; she insists that if the letter is true she will leave Fred. Harry dismisses self-respect as mere egotism and invokes her grandmother's disapproval of scandal, until Claire retorts that he would not preach the same sermon if Lilian received such a letter about him. The remark unsettles him, since his own conscience is not entirely clear, but he covers by returning to his theory that constancy is an outdated illusion, like crinolines or knights in armor. He even asks bluntly whether she has "a man up her sleeve," which offends her. Reaching for his cigarette case, Harry instead finds the letter he pocketed earlier and opens it. It informs him, in the same cramped hand, that his wife Lilian and his brother-in-law Fred are having an affair. Claire reads it and immediately laughs off the charge as absurd, pointing out that it condemns itself by the very logic Harry had just been preaching — that decent people ignore anonymous accusations and that constancy is unimportant. She teases him that perhaps he too has "a woman up his sleeve." At that moment Fred and Lilian enter together, cheerful and unembarrassed, having spent the afternoon selecting a birthday present for Harry. Lilian goes off to order tea. Fred explains that he had come to see Harry after lunch and noticed the letter addressed to him in the hall; he had already taken his own anonymous letter, along with a wage receipt, to Marvalho, a handwriting expert, who identified the letters as the work of Fred's dismissed butler. Fred intends to prosecute and asks Harry and Claire to hand over their letters as evidence, noting Marvalho says the penalty is five years. Fred reveals that his own letter, though addressed to him, seemed meant for Lilian, accusing Harry of being a model of what a husband ought not to be. Harry, deflated, admits he thought his own letter was rubbish. When Lilian returns with servants bringing in a heavily laden tea salver, Fred again asks Harry for his letter to add to the evidence. Harry hesitates, and Claire explains to Fred that Harry fears seeing all their names in the newspapers if the butler is prosecuted. Harry, buttering a scone, admits that is exactly what he fears, prompting Lilian's fond, teasing verdict that he is "delightfully old-fashioned."
By Edgar Saltus · First published 1921 · Genre: Social Satire, Domestic Comedy, Literary Fiction · 3,232 words
First lines
Again Claire looked at the anonymous letter. On florid paper, in a hand that was cramped and perhaps disguised, but in words entirely free from restraint, it informed her that her husband was amusing himself elsewhere.
She turned. A Verelst -- that is to say one whose ancestry extended to the days when New York was a sleepy Dutch seaport -- there were few here better born than she and, as she never mentioned the fact, there were few also that were better bred.
What this Textopian page supports
An Old-Fashioned Man is listed on Textopian as a short story by Edgar Saltus, dated 1921 CE.
This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.
- Work type: Short story
- Author: Edgar Saltus
- Date: 1921 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Social Satire, Domestic Comedy, Literary Fiction, Psychological Realism, Comedy of Manners
- Length: 3,232 words
- Structure: 1 section, 93 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Easy (6th Grade)
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- Work identity for An Old-Fashioned Man by Edgar Saltus
- Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
- Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
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Genres
- Social Satire — The work fundamentally satirizes upper-class conventions and hypocrisy regarding marriage and reputation, exposing the absurdity of Harry's self-serving arguments about 'decent people' and proper behavior.
- Domestic Comedy — The matrimonial crisis is treated with comedic irony and anticlimax; the scandal proves baseless with humor deriving from character reactions, reversals, and the farcical unraveling of accusations.
- Literary Fiction — Sophisticated prose style, witty dialogue, psychological depth, and careful narrative technique demonstrate the artistic quality and stylistic sophistication characteristic of literary fiction.
- Psychological Realism — The narrative emphasizes character psychology and motivation through introspection, dialogue, and behavioral observation, particularly in exploring Claire's internal states and character revelation.
Tags
anonymous letters · infidelity accusations · handwriting expert · fired butler · servant revenge · mystery · marriage · jealousy · constancy · social propriety · hypocrisy · false accusations