"You did like my dear Belots," Karen said, as she and Gregory drove away. She had, since her marriage, grown in perception; Gregory would have found it difficult, now, to hide ironies and antipathies from her. Even retrospectively she saw things which at the time she had not seen, saw, for instance, that the idea of the Belots had not been alluring to him. He knew, too, that she would have considered dislike of the Belots as showing defect in him not in them, but cheerfully, if with a touch of her severity. She had an infinite tolerance for the defects and foibles of those she loved. He was glad to be able to reply with full sincerity: "Ils sont de braves gens et de bons artistes."
"But," Karen said, looking closely at him, and with a smile, "you would not care to pass your life with them. And you were quite disturbed lest I should say that I wanted to go and take the Lippheims by surprise at Leipsig. You like les gens du monde better than artists, Gregory."
"What are you?" Gregory smiled back at her. "I like you better."
"I? I am gens du monde manqué and artiste manqué. I am neither fish, flesh nor fowl," said Karen. "I'm only—positively—my husband's wife and Tante's ward. And that quite satisfies me."
He knew that it did. Their happiness was flawless; flawless as far as her husband's wife was concerned. It was in regard to Tante's ward that Gregory was more and more conscious of keeping something from Karen, while more and more it grew difficult to keep anything from her. Already, if sub-consciously, she must have become aware that her guardian's unabated mournfulness did not affect her husband as it did herself. She had showed him no more of Tante's letters, and they had been quite frequent. She had told him while they were in Scotland that it had hurt Tante very much that they should not have waited till her return; but she did not enlarge on the theme; and Gregory knew why; to enlarge would have been to reproach him. Karen had yielded, against her own wishes, to his entreaties. She had agreed that their marriage should not be so postponed at the last minute. In his vehemence Gregory had been skilful; he had said not one word of reproach against Madame von Marwitz for her disconcerting change of plan. It was not surprising to him; it was what he had expected of Madame von Marwitz, that she would put Karen aside for a whim. Karen would not see her guardian's action in this light; yet she must know that her beloved was vulnerable to the charge, at all events, of inconsiderateness, and she had been grateful to him, no doubt, for showing no consciousness of it. She had consented, perhaps, partly through gratitude, though she had felt her pledged word, too, as binding. Once she had consented, whatever the results, Gregory knew that she would not visit them on him. It was of her own responsibility that she was thinking when, with a grave face, she had told him of Tante's hurt. "After all, dearest," Gregory had ventured, "we did want her, didn't we? It was really she who chose not to come, wasn't it?"
"I am sure that Tante wanted to see me married," said Karen, touching on her own hidden wound.
He helped her there, knowing, in his guile, that to exonerate Tante was to help not only Karen but himself. "Of course; but she doesn't think things out, does she? She is accustomed to having things arranged for her. I suppose she didn't a bit realise all that had been settled over here, nor what an impatient lover it was who held you to your word."
Her face cleared as he showed her that he recognised Tante's case as so explicable. "I'm so glad that you see it all," she said. "For you do. She is oh! so unpractical, poor darling; she would forget everything, you know, unless I or Mrs. Talcott were there to keep reminding her—except her music, of course; but that is like breathing to her. And I am so sorry, so dreadfully sorry; because, of course, to know that she hurt me by not coming must hurt her more. But we will make it up to her. And oh! Gregory, only think, she says she may come and stay with us."
One of her first exclamations on going over his flat with him was that they could put up Tante, if she would come. The drawing-room could be devoted to her music; for there was ample room for the grand piano—which accompanied Madame von Marwitz as invariably as her tooth-brush; and the spare-bedroom had a dressing-room attached that would do nicely for Louise. Now there seemed hope of this dream being realised.
Karen had not yet received a wedding-present from her guardian, but in Paris, on the homeward way, she heard that it had been dispatched from New York and would be awaiting her in London, and it was of this gift that she had been talking as she and Gregory drove from the station to St. James's on a warm October evening. Tante had not told her what the present was, but had written that Karen would care for it very much. "To find her present waiting for us is like having Tante to welcome us," Karen said. After her surmise about the present she relapsed into happy musings and Gregory, too, was silent, able only to give a side-glance of gratitude, as it were, at the thought that Tante was to welcome them by proxy.