An odd self-consciousness invaded Lily on these occasions; she wished that her replies were less perfunctory than she felt them to be.
She did not, somehow, feel exuberant, as Nicholas did, but oddly bewildered and tired.
Sometimes Nicholas was solicitous for her and asked anxiously whether she had a headache, or felt fatigued, but he was curiously lacking in discernment, and seldom made the enquiry on occasions when Lily really was tired.
She decided, after a time, that he only did so when prompted by some lassitude of his own.
Lily was not consciously disappointed by a certain lack of sympathy between herself and her husband, partly because it was only evinced in small and infrequent ways, and partly because she conscientiously recalled to her memory the many warnings received from Cousin Ethel and other authorities.
Marriage was a thing of give and take, they had said.
Nothing was perfect in this world.
Romance was an affair of the imagination, and imagination was something to be kept strictly within bounds.
With these and other platitudes Lily contrived to stifle the memory of her old day-dreams, so kindly and gravely condemned by Miss Melody.
There were a great many lighter aspects of her new life that gave her a childish sense of gratification.