"She has so many that it's inevitable some should get broken."
"All if she'd only choose! Now that Ralph has had into business, and is kept in his office so late, it's cruel of her to drag him out every night. He told us the other day they hadn't dined at home for a month. Undine doesn't seem to notice how hard he works."
Bowen gazed meditatively at the crumbling fire. "No—why should she?"
"Why SHOULD she? Really, Charles—!"
"Why should she, when she knows nothing about it?"
"She may know nothing about his business; but she must know it's her extravagance that's forced him into it." Mrs. Fairford looked at Bowen reproachfully. "You talk as if you were on her side!"
"Are there sides already? If so, I want to look down on them impartially from the heights of pure speculation. I want to get a general view of the whole problem of American marriages."
Mrs. Fairford dropped into her arm-chair with a sigh. "If that's what you want you must make haste! Most of them don't last long enough to be classified."
"I grant you it takes an active mind. But the weak point is so frequently the same that after a time one knows where to look for it."
"What do you call the weak point?"