I was interrupted after that last word (I was writing late, in the study) by quick footsteps down the staircase, and Lilia came in in her dressing-gown.
“I was dreadfully frightened!” she said. “I must have fallen asleep, although I thought I was awake, listening for you; and I woke up and you were not there! And the clock struck one!”
“And if it did?” I said, taking her on my knee, after shutting this book into a drawer. Her heart was beating, she was trembling. “Oh, Lilia!” I said. “I thought I had married a woman who would bravely face life at my side, not shrink and cower at shadows like a nervous horse.”
Then I talked seriously to her. Many husbands in my position would have been able to use the argument of maternal responsibility to urge her to be more matter-of-fact, less absurd in her fancifulness, and I said so.
“You dislike giving me pain, dear, I know,” I said. “And your horror of the poor little one God may give to us is a great pain to me. Other women rejoice at such a prospect.”
She drew herself away from my arm and looked fixedly at me.
“What other women do you mean?” she said.
“All women, at least most women,” was my answer. “Lilia, I cannot understand this feeling, or rather this want of feeling, in you. Tell me truly, frankly, darling, why do you hate the idea of a child—our child?”
She took my face between her hands and kissed me.
“Because,” she spoke passionately, “you may love it—would love it; and I cannot spare one thought, one word, one look of yours!”