5
Rose-Ann, meanwhile, as her husband supposed, was at her father’s home in Springfield. If her presence there excited any curiosity, she was scarcely aware of it. She was not concerned with anything but the problem of herself and Felix....
She was not, however, as he sometimes imagined, waiting for a letter from him to make easy her return home. She was, as she had told him, trying to “think things out.”
She had gone away with that sentence of his ringing in her mind: “So you didn’t mean it after all!”
She had not slept that night, on the train; nor very much since that time. She was too busy trying to think things out; and the chief thing to think out was: had she meant it when she offered Felix his freedom?
No, obviously enough! And yet her pride revolted from that fact. Had she been a liar, a hypocrite, all this while? Had she only pretended? It was too shameful....
She really had meant it. She had been in earnest. She had understood what she was saying. She had thought she could do it....
Was she too weak, then? Oh, no! It was a mere momentary weakness, a spiritual infirmity that she had not expected, but that she could have conquered. If only Felix had not come in just then! What a fool she must have seemed! What a liar!
But why couldn’t he have understood? She was a woman, after all.
No! he had been quite right to disdain her. After all she had said to him, to sit there on the floor, blubbering.... She blushed with infinite shame.
That was the trouble.... She had not had time to adjust herself to the situation. It had been a moment of madness when she suddenly commenced packing to go home. She had not known what she was doing.... An hour later, she would have been calm again, herself, assured, smiling. He need never have known....
But—if she really meant it—then she must prove it.
Well?
In among these reasoned arguments that pursued each other in an endless weary circle in her mind, floated irrelevant memories—the pressure of Felix’s arm about her shoulders that afternoon on the train going out to Woods Point to be married—a fragment of that wild letter he had written her from Canal Street, about the girl in Iowa—the look in his eyes as he had seen her among the children at the Community Theatre.... and still more irrelevant memories—the complaining tones of her mother, saying cruel and unjust things about her father, things not meant for a child’s ears, years ago—and her father’s face, with its wise, mocking, incredulous, ironic smile, cutting her to the heart....
Well?
If she went back, if she proved that she meant what she had said—things would have to be different. They had been too close. They had been like other married people. That was his fault. Yes, it was his fault, after all, that she had not been able to carry out her promises. He had made it too hard for her.... They never should have lived together under the same roof. They never should have become legally married in the first place....
They would have to live apart, in separate studios. They must not pretend to be man and wife. She would be—yes, that was the word which made their relationship clear—his mistress. It was a good word, making no pretences. His mistress—yes, she could be that. If she loved him enough....
What? Did she love him enough only to be his wife? Not enough to give him his freedom?
Her father’s face, with its mocking, incredulous, ironic smile, came into her mind, blurring her thoughts, rousing her to a queer anger against herself.
No. Or yes?...
Well, then?