- description
- # Wife's Tactics and Dialogue
## Overview
This segment, titled "Wife's Tactics and Dialogue," is a portion of the short story "I and My Chimney." It spans lines 927 to 969 of the source text and was extracted on January 30, 2026.
## Context
This segment is part of the short story "[I and My Chimney](arke:01KG8AJ72QDX8N8STJ3550X2NW)," which is included in the "[Melville Complete Works](arke:01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW)" collection. The text was originally sourced from the file "[i_and_my_chimney.txt](arke:01KG89J1H4TA19251AXAPE3ZWC)". This segment follows "[Wife's Campaign Involving Mr. Scribe](arke:01KG8AJNXWSVVQNP8HPRK5RQB3)" and precedes "[Escalation and Narrator's Final Resolve](arke:01KG8AJNYA0H7PWHYYEKPMVN25)".
## Contents
The segment depicts a late-night conversation between the narrator and his wife on a chilly autumn evening. The wife initiates a discussion about the chimney, suggesting something is in it and that it is smoking excessively. The narrator engages in wordplay, comparing the smoke to a note from "Mr. Scribe" and humorously defending his and the chimney's right to "smoke." The dialogue then shifts to the possibility of a "secret closet" within the chimney, with the wife hinting at its contents and the narrator playfully referencing folklore about devils emerging from ash-holes. The conversation highlights the wife's persistent tactics and the narrator's witty, often evasive, responses.
- description_generated_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:02.437Z
- description_model
- gemini-2.5-flash-lite
- description_title
- Wife's Tactics and Dialogue
- end_line
- 969
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:47:36.358Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 927
- text
- A few days after, my spouse changed her key.
It was nearly midnight, and all were in bed but ourselves, who sat up,
one in each chimney-corner; she, needles in hand, indefatigably
knitting a sock; I, pipe in mouth, indolently weaving my vapors.
It was one of the first of the chill nights in autumn. There was a fire
on the hearth, burning low. The air without was torpid and heavy; the
wood, by an oversight, of the sort called soggy.
“Do look at the chimney,” she began; “can’t you see that something must
be in it?”
“Yes, wife. Truly there is smoke in the chimney, as in Mr. Scribe’s
note.”
“Smoke? Yes, indeed, and in my eyes, too. How you two wicked old
sinners do smoke!—this wicked old chimney and you.”
“Wife,” said I, “I and my chimney like to have a quiet smoke together,
it is true, but we don’t like to be called names.”
“Now, dear old man,” said she, softening down, and a little shifting
the subject, “when you think of that old kinsman of yours, you _know_
there must be a secret closet in this chimney.”
“Secret ash-hole, wife, why don’t you have it? Yes, I dare say there is
a secret ash-hole in the chimney; for where do all the ashes go to that
we drop down the queer hole yonder?”
“I know where they go to; I’ve been there almost as many times as the
cat.”
“What devil, wife, prompted you to crawl into the ash-hole? Don’t you
know that St. Dunstan’s devil emerged from the ash-hole? You will get
your death one of these days, exploring all about as you do. But
supposing there be a secret closet, what then?”
“What then? why what should be in a secret closet but—”
“Dry bones, wife,” broke in I with a puff, while the sociable old
chimney broke in with another.
- title
- Wife's Tactics and Dialogue