“You see,” she said after a little pause, “during that time it was possible to come to understandings. Neither I nor my husband had understood the other. In that interval it was possible—to explain.
“Yes. You see, Mr. Brumley, we—we both misunderstood. It was just because of that and because I had no one who seemed able to advise me that I turned to you. A novelist always seems so wise in these things. He seems to know so many lives. One can talk to you as one can scarcely talk to anyone; you are a sort of doctor—in these matters. And it was necessary—that my husband should realize that I had grown up and that I should have time to think just how one’s duty and one’s—freedom have to be fitted together.... And my husband is ill. He has been ill, rather short of breath—the doctor thinks it is asthma—for some time, and all the agitation of this business has upset him and made him worse. He is upstairs now—asleep. Of course if I had thought I should make him ill I could never have done any of this. But it’s done now and here I am, Mr. Brumley, back in my place. With all sorts of things changed. Put right....”
“I see,” said Mr. Brumley stupidly.
Her speech was like the falling of an opaque curtain upon some romantic spectacle. She stood there, almost defensively behind her chair as she made it. There was a quality of premeditation in her words, yet something in her voice and bearing made him feel that she knew just how it covered up and extinguished his dreams and impulses. He heard her out and then suddenly his spirit rebelled against her decision. “No!” he cried.
She waited for him to go on.
“You see,” he said, “I thought that it was just that you wanted to get away——That this life was intolerable——That you were——Forgive me if I seem to be going beyond—going beyond what I ought to be thinking about you. Only, why should I pretend? I care, I care for you tremendously. And it seemed to me that you didn’t love your husband, that you were enslaved and miserable. I would have done anything to help you—anything in the world, Lady Harman. I know—it may sound ridiculous—there have been times when I would have faced death to feel you were happy and free. I thought all that, I felt all that,—and then—then you come back here. You seem not to have minded. As though I had misunderstood....”
He paused and his face was alive with an unwonted sincerity. His self-consciousness had for a moment fallen from him.
“I know,” she said, “it was like that. I knew you cared. That is why I have so wanted to talk to you. It looked like that....”
She pressed her lips together in that old familiar hunt for words and phrases.
“I didn’t understand, Mr. Brumley, all there was in my husband or all there was in myself. I just saw his hardness and his—his hardness in business. It’s become so different now. You see, I forgot he has bad health. He’s ill; I suppose he was getting ill then. Instead of explaining himself—he was—excited and—unwise. And now——”