"Sometimes ... when Circe is about...." she admitted.
Morris got up and leaned again upon the mantelpiece. He heaved a disconsolate sigh.
"Oh, Lord!... What a talk for a man to have with his wife!" he said heavily.
XLI
Sophy sat watching him, and her heart yearned over him. In spite of her flash of bitterness, she did feel truly mother-like towards him. He seemed to her so young—so very, touchingly young as he leaned there against the old, smoke-toned ivory of the carved mantelpiece, grasping the ledge, his forehead on the back of his hand. She knew how crushingly he was realising that he had "made a mess of things." But then—he had made a mess of things. She was powerless to comfort him there. If she could only show him how much better it would be not to try to rearrange this tangle—but to step free of it, and begin over ... that there was no real adjustment of their two lives—their two utterly different natures, possible.... Could she show him? Well ... she could at least try....
"Morris," she said softly. "Suppose we try to look at it all from another angle? Suppose we try to see it all as though we weren't concerned in it—as if some one had asked our impartial advice? Don't you think that would be a good way to get at it?"
"But what is it you want to 'get at,' Sophy? What is it you want me to do? God knows I'm ready to do anything...."
"Anything?"
"Yes ... anything in reason," he hedged nervously.