Peggy shook her head.
“That is nothing,” she said; “he would soon have known, and next week makes no difference. But it was with you he fell in love, with the mind that made that and the hand that wrote it, and the clear eye that saw so much of human things and was so pitiful and kind—oh, me, Edith, if only we poor women were kindly and painlessly put away at the age of fifty how much better for everybody. No, I don’t really think that, because there are lots of things which can only be done by women over fifty, like—like understanding people, which no man ever did, and no woman till she was old. And to understand is so much, and, having understood, to smile and be kind, and——”
“And cease to be oneself,” said Edith quietly.
“No, not that, but to be one’s children, to——”
Edith got up quickly, with the sun shining again.
“But I have no children, dear Peggy,” she said. “Look at my point of view for a moment. Indeed, all the time that the years were passing so beautifully for mothers, for people like you, what was I? You know. And then, when the chains were broken, I did live down those years, I tell you that, and it is true. I hunted every piece of bitterness out of my heart. By God’s grace I cleansed and renewed it, and it is ready—I say it—for the man who loves me. Oh, how often I rebelled, and said that my life had been spoiled, that the years that should have been beautiful had been a succession of days on each of which I wished that I was dead. But He chose that I should not die. Why? I was prepared for other things; God knows that if this had never come into my life I should have continued to live pleasantly and very far from complaining, with a hundred interests, a hundred schemes, and in one’s infinitesimal way trying to make people on the whole glad that one is alive. But now how can I help seeing that all that was in twilight? Hugh came!”
Peggy clasped her hands together.
“Oh, it is hard,” she cried, “I can guess how hard. For I know Hugh, and I love him as I love the sun and the trees, and if one loved him as a man, I can guess, I can imagine what that would be. But think, my darling, just think—what of ten years from now; the years that will but still be bringing nearer his prime of life. What will he be in ten years? Just thirty-five, with five thirties and ten forties still in front of him. And then what? Fifty still! And you? Why, you are seventeen years older than he! What does that matter now? Nothing, of course. But then—his life will be in full swing, the best of its activities still in full force. He will be singing at the opera still. And you? At home, too! It is that which matters. He planning still for the future, and you able only to answer his plans with memories of the past. Yes, perhaps it is grotesque to look forward twenty-five years. But look forward ten only.”
Peggy went to the window she had shut when they came in and flung it open again.
“Ah, if only one was renewed like the night and the river,” she said, “it would be different. But one is not; age comes so quickly when youth is over. And our tragedy is that we feel young still! Have pity on Hugh, dear. Even more have pity on yourself; spare yourself the endless, ceaseless struggle that you will make for yourself in the years to come if you marry him. Oh, Edith, I do want you to be happy so much, and a month ago you were so happy—you looked forward to such happy years.”