"Yes, and the nice little square-toed white silk shoes—like a Reynolds lady's—and like nobody else's. I do so like your square toes."
"I cannot bear pinched toes," said Karen. "My father gave me a horror of that; and Tante. Her feet are as perfect as her hands. She has all her shoes made for her by a wonderful old man in Vienna who is an artist in shoes. She was looking well, wasn't she, Tante?" Karen added, in even tones. Gregory and she were sitting now on the sofa together, their arms linked and hand-in-hand.
"Beautiful," said Gregory with sincerity. "How well that odd head-dress became her."
"Didn't it? It was nice that she liked those pretty teacups, wasn't it. And appreciated our view; even though," Karen smiled, taking now another bull by the horns, "she was so hard on our flat. I'm afraid she feels her Bouddha en travestie here."
"Well, he is, of course. I do hope," said Gregory, also seizing his bull, "that she didn't think me rude in my joke about being willing to burn him. And you will change everything—burn anything—barring the Bouddha and the teacups—that you want to, won't you, dear?"
"No; I wouldn't, even if I wanted to; and I don't want to. Perhaps Tante did not quite understand. I think it may take a little time for her to understand your jokes or you her outspokenness. She is like a child in her candour about the things she likes or dislikes." A fuller ease had come to her voice. By her brave pretence that all was well she was persuading herself that all could be made well.
Perhaps it might be, thought Gregory, if only he could go on keeping his temper with Madame von Marwitz and if Karen, wise and courageous darling, could accept the unspoken between them, and spare him definitions and declarations. A situation undefined is so often a situation saved. Life grows over and around it. It becomes a mere mummied fly, preserved in amber; unsightly perhaps; but unpernicious. After all, he told himself—and he went on thinking over the incidents of the afternoon while he dressed—after all, Madame von Marwitz might not be much in London; she was a comet and her course would lead her streaming all over the world for the greater part of her time. And above all and mercifully, Madame von Marwitz was not a person upon whose affections one would have to count. He seemed to have found out all sorts of things about her this afternoon: he could have given Sargent points. The main strength of her feeling for anyone, deep instinct told him, was an insatiable demand that they should feel sufficiently for her. And the chief difficulty—he refused to dignify it by the name of danger—was that Madame von Marwitz had her deep instincts, too, and had, no doubt, found out all sorts of things about him. He did not like her; he had not liked her from the first; and she could hardly fail to feel that he liked her less and less. He was able to do Madame von Marwitz justice. Even a selflessly devoted mother could hardly rejoice wholeheartedly in the marriage of a daughter to a man who disliked herself; and how much less could Madame von Marwitz, who was not a mother and not selflessly devoted to anybody, rejoice in Karen's marriage. She was right in feeling that it menaced her own position. He did her justice; he made every allowance for her; he intended to be straight with her; but the fact that stood out for Gregory was that, already, she was not straight with him. Already she was picking surreptitiously, craftily, at his life; and this was to pick at Karen's.
He would give her a long string and make every allowance for the vexations of her situation; but if she began seriously to tarnish Karen's happiness he would have to pull the string smartly. The difficulty—he refused to see this as danger either—was that he could not pull the string upon Madame von Marwitz without, by the same gesture, upsetting himself as well.