“And I’d like a wife!” Paul flashed back at her hotly. “A wife that’d be a help and not a hindrance to everything I want to do—a wife that’d be loyal to me behind my back, and not listen to sneaking foreigners telling her that she’s a misunderstood martyr—martyr!” His sense of injury exalted him. “Yes; all you American wives are martyrs, all right, I must say. While your husbands are working like dogs to make you money, you’re sitting around with nothing to do but drink tea and listen to a foreigner who tells you—in summer time, while you’re enjoying the cool breeze out here on a—maybe you think a dynamo-room’s a funny place to be, with the thermometer standing at—what am I doing when I’m away from you? Enjoying myself, no doubt. Maybe you think it’s enjoyment to travel all night on a—maybe you think it’s nice to make yourself conspicuous with another man that’s been abusing your—”
Lydia could hear no more for a loud roaring in her ears. She knew then the blackest moment of her life—a sickening scorn for the man before her. Madeleine had been right, then. They were of the same blood. His sister knew him better than—she, his wife, his wedded wife, was not to be spared the pollution of having her husband—
“I didn’t take any stock in Madeleine’s nasty insinuations about your flirting with him, of course, but it showed me what you’ve been thinking about me all this time I’ve been working like a—”
Lydia drew the first conscious breath since the beginning of this nightmare. The earth was still under her feet, struck down to it though she was. The roaring in her ears stopped. She heard Paul say:
“Maybe you think I’m made of iron! I tell you I’m right on my nerves every minute! Dr. Melton threatens me with a breakdown every time I see him!” There was a sort of angry pride in this statement. “I can’t sleep! I’m doing ten men’s work! And what do I get from you? Any rest? Any quiet? Why, these first years, when you might have made things easier for me by taking all other cares off my mind and leaving me free for business—they’ve actually been harder because of you!”
He thrust his arms into his overcoat and caught up his satchel. “I haven’t wanted anything so hard to give! Good Lord! All I asked for was a well-kept house where I could invite my friends without being ashamed of it, and to live like other decent people!” He moved to the door, and put one hand, one strong, thin hand, on the knob. With the unearthly clearness of one in a terrible accident, Lydia noticed every detail of his appearance. He was flushed, a purple, congested color, singularly unlike his usual indoor pallor; hurried pulses throbbed visibly, almost audibly, at his temples; one eyelid twitched rapidly and steadily, like a clock ticking. With a gesture as automatic as drawing breath, he jerked out his watch and looked at it, apparently to make sure of catching his trolley, although his valedictory was poured out with such a passionate unpremeditation that the action must have been involuntary and unconscious. “But I don’t even ask that now—since it doesn’t suit you to bother to give it! All I ask now ought to be easy enough for any woman to do—not to bother me! Leave me alone! Keep your everlasting stewing and fussing and hysterical putting-on to yourself! I don’t bother you with my affairs—I haven’t, and I never will—why, for God’s sake, can’t you— Some men marry women who help them, and pull with them loyally, instead of pulling the other way all the time! Such a woman would have made me a thousand times more successful than I—”
Lydia broke in with a loud voice of anguished questioning: “Do they make them better men?” she asked piercingly.
Her husband looked at her over his shoulder. “Oh, you and your goody-goody cant!” he said, and going out without further speech, closed the door behind him.
The clock struck the half-hour. Their conversation had lasted less than five minutes.