"Speaking as I am in a measure to my own soul, I will descend to no duplicity. That I was entirely unselfish in my desire that her life should be bright and free from anxieties with which she could not cope is true; but none the less true is it that, for the first time, I felt myself under the dominion of a passion deeper and more significant than I had ever felt for woman. It was love, I believe, but love in which there was reason. For I took myself to task; I set my age and hers before me; I did this on paper, and as I gazed at the figures I said. Absurd; it is not in nature, and I must fight it down.' I did wrestle with it, and although I did not succeed in vanquishing it, I was sufficiently master of myself to keep the struggle hidden in my own breast.
"How, then, did this hapless lady become my wife? Not, in the first instance, through any steps voluntarily and unreasoningly taken by myself. I had firmly resolved to hold my feelings in check. It was the mother who accomplished that upon which she had set her heart. I may speak freely. This worldly mother has been long dead, and my confession cannot harm her. It was she who ruined at least the happiness of one life, and made me what I am.
"Needless here to recount the arts by which she worked to the end she desired; needless to speak of the deceits she practised to make me believe her daughter loved me. It may be that the fault was mine, and that I was too ready to believe. Sufficient to say that we fell into the snare she prepared for us; that, intoxicated by the prospect of an earthly heaven, I accepted the meanings she put on her daughter's reserve and apparent coldness, and that, once engaged in the enterprise, I was animated by the ardour of my own heart, in which I allowed the flower of love to grow to fruition. So we were married, and with no doubt of the future I set out with my wife on our bridal tour. She was both child and wife to me, and I solemnly resolved and most earnestly desired to do my duty by her.
"Before we were many days away news arrived that my wife's mother had met with an accident, in a part of the grounds which was being beautified by my workmen according to plans I had prepared for the pleasure of my young bride--an accident so serious that death could not be averted. In sadness we returned to the villa. My wife's coldness I ascribed to grief--to no other cause. And, indeed, apart from the sorrow I felt at the dreadful news, I was myself overwhelmed for a time by the fatality which had deprived my wife of her parents within so short a time on my estate, and while they were my guests. 'But it will pass away,' I thought, 'and I will be parents, lover, husband, to the sweet flower who has given her happiness into my keeping.' When we arrived at the villa, her mother was dead.
"I allowed my wife's grief to take its natural course; seeing that she wished for solitude, I did not intrude upon her sorrow. I had to study this young girl's feelings and impulses; it was my duty to be tender and considerate to her. I was wise, and thoughtful, and loving, as I believed, and I spared no effort to comfort without disturbing her. 'Time will console her,' I thought, 'and then we will begin a new life. She will learn to look upon me not only as a husband, but as a protector who will fully supply the place of those she has lost.' I was patient--very patient--and I waited for the change. It never came.
"She grew more and more reserved towards me; and still I waited, and still was patient. Not for a moment did I lose sight of my duty.
"But after a long time had passed I began to question myself--I began to doubt whether I had not allowed myself to be deceived. Is it possible, I asked myself, that she married me without loving me? When this torturing doubt arose I thrust it indignantly from me; it was as though I was casting a stain upon her truth and purity."
CHAPTER III
[A DISHONOURABLE CONCEALMENT]
"I will not recount the continual endeavours I made to win my wife to cheerfulness and a better frame of mind. Sufficient to say that they were unsuccessful, and that many and many a time I gave up the attempt in despair, to renew it again under the influence of false hopes. Unhappy and disheartened, the pursuits in which I had always taken delight afforded me now no pleasure, and though I sought relief in solitude and study, I did not find it. My peace of mind was utterly wrecked. There was, however, in the midst of my wretchedness, one ray of light. In the course of a little while a child would be born to us, and this child might effect what I was unable to accomplish. When my wife pressed her baby to her breast, when it drew life from her bosom, she might be recalled to a sense of duty and of some kind of affection which I was ready to accept in the place of that thorough devoted love which I bore to her, and which I had hoped she would bear to me.