“An ideal marriage,” said I. “She brought him the money he wanted. He brought her the title she wanted. And they don’t annoy each other. He devotes himself to sport, she to society. These aristocratic people, with their simple, vulgar wants that are so easily gratified—how they are to be envied!”
Edna was observing me furtively, uneasily. I pretended not to notice. I went on: “Now, if they wanted the difficult things—things like love and companionship and congeniality—they might be wretched. When a child cries for a stick of candy or a tinsel-covered rattle—for money or social position—why, it’s easily pacified. But if it cries for the moon and the stars—” I laughed softly, enjoying her wonder as much as my own fancies.
After a while she said, with some constraint: “You see a great deal of Armitage?”
“We console each other,” said I, with mild raillery.
“Have you been going out much?”
“I’m very busy.”
“In one of your letters— Those rare little notes of yours! You are cruelly neglectful, Godfrey— In one of them you spoke of a week end or so on Armitage’s yacht. You and he don’t go off alone?”
“Oh, no. Some literary and artistic people usually are aboard.”
“I didn’t know you cared for that sort.”
“They’re interesting enough.”