“Not much difference? Oh, come; you are talking nonsense. There’s as much difference between their minds as between their bodies. They are made for entirely different duties.”
Monica sighed.
“Oh, that word Duty!”
Pained unutterably, Widdowson bent forward and took her hand. He spoke in a tone of the gravest but softest rebuke. She was giving entertainment to thoughts that would lead her who knew whither, that would undermine her happiness, would end by making both of them miserable. He besought her to put all such monstrous speculations out of her mind.
“Dear, good little wife! Do be guided by your husband. He is older than you, darling, and has seen so much more of the world.”
“I haven’t said anything dreadful, dear. My thoughts don’t come from other people; they rise naturally in my own head.”
“Now, what do you really want? You say you can’t live as we were doing. What change would you make?”
“I should like to make more friends, and to see them often. I want to hear people talk, and know what is going on round about me. And to read a different kind of books; books that would really amuse me, and give me something I could think about with pleasure. Life will be a burden to me before long if I don’t have more freedom.”
“Freedom?”
“Yes, I don’t think there’s any harm in saying that.”