“Oh,” he added after a moment, “I forgot! Marian says we must be sure not to let Mr. Latimer know at present.”
“Of course not,” said Mrs. Latimer, as though it were too elementary a truth to deserve mention. “Marian’s much more intelligent than you ever gave her credit for being,” she added, an instant later.
“Yes, I know that,” Stacey admitted freely, even though he did not see the present application of the remark, or, indeed, why both Marian and her mother deemed it essential that Mr. Latimer should not learn that the engagement was off.
“Naturally,” said Mrs. Latimer thoughtfully, poking holes in the gravel with the tip of her parasol, “I could see that things were not the same as once. Well, that was to be expected. I shouldn’t have been at all surprised to have you show a kind of—of fond indifference to Marian. But what I don’t understand—there’s so much I don’t understand about you, Stacey—is the positive hostility I’ve felt sometimes in the looks you gave her. It was as though you hated her. Why? Poor Marian! She’s just the same as always. Is that itself—her sameness—the reason?”
“No,” Stacey muttered, “of course not! I don’t know why.”
“Can’t you—find out why?” she asked gently.
Stacey reflected, painfully and with resentment at the need. Finally he drew his hand across his forehead and looked at Mrs. Latimer. An odd fanatical intensity glowed in his face.
“I don’t know,” he said, speaking thickly and with difficulty. “I hadn’t thought. But perhaps it’s—because Marian’s perfection is so—dependent on wealth. I see Marian,” he went on, his words suddenly pouring out, “as a flower that you get by fairly watering the ground with money. Put her by herself in the panting sweating world and what would she be? Her grace is money! Her ease—money. All her charm—money! Everything in her except her chiselled Greek beauty is money! I hate money!” And he fell into tumultuous silence.
“So that was it,” Mrs. Latimer said in a tired voice. “Poor Stacey! Confidence for confidence,” she added abruptly, after a pause. “Have you ever wondered why we gave up Italy and came here to live?”
“Often,” he answered, surprised. “I used to fancy it was your decision—your feeling that Marian ought to know America.”