“Even so, he ought to stay. He used to like me to listen to him, at first.”
Miss McQuinch looked at the sunset with exceeding glumness. There was an ominous pause. Then she said, abruptly, “You remember how we used to debate whether marriage was a mistake or not. Have you found out?”
“I dont know.”
“That sounds rather as if you did know. Are you quite sure you are not in low spirits this evening? He was bantering you about being out of temper when you came in. Perhaps you quarrelled at Kew.”
“Quarrel! He quarrel! I cannot explain to you how we are situated, Nelly. You would not understand me.”
“Suppose you try. For instance, is he as fond of you as he was before you married him?”
“I dont know.”
Miss McQuinch shrugged herself impatiently.
“Really I do not, Nelly. He has changed in a way—I do not quite know how or why. At first he was not very ceremonious. He used to make remarks about people, and discuss everything that came into his head quite freely before me. He was always kind, and never grumbled about his dinner, or lost his temper, or anything of that kind; but—it was not that he was coarse exactly: he was not that in the least; but he was very open and unreserved and plain in his language; and somehow I did not quite like it. He must have found this out: he sees and feels everything by instinct; for he slipped back into his old manner, and became more considerate and attentive than he had ever been before. I was made very happy at first by the change; but I do not think he quite understood what I wanted. I did not at all object to going down to the country with him on his business trips; but he always goes alone now; and he never mentions his work to me. And he is too careful as to what he says to me. Of course, I know that he is right not to speak ill of anybody; but still a man need not be so particular before his wife as before strangers. He has given up talking to me altogether: that is the plain truth, whatever he may pretend. When we do converse, his manner is something like what it was in the laboratory at the Towers. Of course, he sometimes becomes more familiar; only then he never seems in earnest, but makes love to me in a bantering, half playful, half sarcastic way.”
“You are rather hard to please, perhaps. I remember you used to say that a husband should be just as tender and respectful after marriage as before it. You seem to have broken poor Ned into this; and now you are not satisfied.”