He had brought her into a circle where she did not belong; it was as if a gardener had set among roses some hardy, showy plant, a flaunting weed. Pleased as Mrs. Harmon was, her position irked her to maintain; respectability was often very wearisome, very flat. There was little spice and go to life; too much restraint was required. Not entirely vulgar, not exactly coarse, she fretted first, then yearned for other things. Barbaric is the word that fits her best; she was like the educated Indian who longs for his free dress and freer ways.
Liberty was out of the question, since she would never give up the brilliance of her position. Personal freedom she had; for the Judge, when he found that she could not be the companion that he hoped, gave her all the money that he could, and let her (within bounds which she understood very well and overstepped only in secret) do as she pleased. But she had in her the craving for physical stimuli; earth was her mother. A five-mile walk daily might have kept her mind clear, yet she would have had to walk alone, and that was unbearable. Loving people, she lacked companionship, for with women below her station she would not chum, while with those in it she could not. We have seen how Judith failed her; there remained only the men. Handsome and shrewd, Mrs. Harmon had gained her position without yielding to their snares; but now that the dangers which beset her single life were past, she began to look back at them inquiringly. Her beauty was full-blown; soon it would begin to fade, and her nature cried out against losing youth and all its pleasures.
Her feelings were from instinct, not calculation; her actions were impulsive. When she first met Ellis, quite unconsciously her thoughts had dwelt on him. He was unresponsive; the two dropped into a habit of semi-intimacy, but having thus begun to let her fancy roam, Mrs. Harmon yearned for an Adonis until her dreams centered with some constancy upon a vision which answered to the name of Jim.
Circumstances are everything; there is nothing human which does not depend upon them absolutely, and Mrs. Harmon might have "sighed and pined and ogled" forever, had not Wayne been thrown in her path at a time when his mind was ready to welcome diversion.
It happened that he had planned to go to the theater with Beth. They wanted to go alone, therefore they must go in the afternoon. He chose a Wednesday, though only Saturday afternoons belonged to him. The play was advertised in a manner to excite Jim's interest, and he assured Beth it would be "bully." Coming up from Chebasset at eleven o'clock, he dressed himself in his best and lunched at the Blanchard's. Then as the hour approached he started with Beth for the temple of amusement.
She pressed his arm as they stood for a minute in the vestibule. "Naughty boy!" she said, beaming on him. "Naughty to spend so much money on me!"
"We mustn't dry up, Beth," he answered. "Life's too serious to have no fun in it."
"But to take an afternoon from work!" she said, so prettily that only conscience would have blinded him to the intended thanks. Jim's sense of guilt, however, made him start.
"Confound it, Beth," he cried, stopping short and looking at her, "don't you trust me to take an afternoon off without stealing it?"