“I’m not going to,” said Keith. “I’ll tell you that, Jenny.”
“But Keith! Who is it that makes it so? There must be somebody to start it. Is it God?”
Keith laughed again, still more drily and grimly.
ii
Jenny was not yet satisfied. She still continued to revolve the matter in her mind.
“You said nobody was free, Keith. But then you said you were free—when you got married.”
“Till I got married. Then I wasn’t. I fell into the machine and got badly chawed then.”
“Don’t you want to get married?” Jenny asked. “Ever again?”
“Not that way.” Keith’s jaw was set. “I’ve been there; and to me that’s what hell is.”
How Jenny wished she could understand! She did not want to get married herself—that way. But she wanted to serve. She wanted Keith to be her husband; she wanted to make him happy, and to make his home comfortable. She felt that to work for the man she loved was the way to be truly happy. Did he not think that he could be happy in working for her? She couldn’t understand. It was all so hard that she sometimes felt that her brain was clamped with iron bolts and chains.