“Yes, much better; the pain has almost ceased; perhaps it will be quite gone when you return. Can you spare just ten minutes to sit beside me? There is something I have been wanting to say, and perhaps this is my only chance. When I am well again I may... be afraid.”
Mrs. Marsden sat down wondering, and her husband waited a minute.
“One understands many things that puzzled him before, when he lies in quietness for weeks and takes an after look. I suspected it at times before, but I was a coward and put the thought away. It seemed curious that no one came to spend an hour with me, as men do with friends; and I noticed that they appeared to avoid me. I thought it was fancy, and that I had grown self-conscious.
“Everything is quite plain now, and I... am not hurt, dear, and I don't blame any person; that would be very wrong. People might have been far more impatient with me, and might have made my life miserable.
“God gave me a dull mind and a slow tongue; it took me a long time to grasp anything, and no one cared about the subjects that interested me. Beatrice... I wish now you had told me how I bored our friends; it would have been a kindness; but never mind that now; you did not like to give me pain.
“What troubles me most is that all these years you should have been tied to a very tiresome fellow,” and Marsden made some poor attempt at a smile. “Had I thought of what was before you, I would never have asked you to marry me.
“Don't cry, dear; I did not wish to hurt you. I wanted to ask your pardon for... all that martyrdom, and... to thank you for... being my wife; and there's something else.
“You see when I get well and am not lying in bed here, maybe I could not tell you, so let me explain everything now, and then we need not speak about such things again.
“Perhaps you thought me too economical, but I was saving for a purpose. Your portion has not brought quite so much as it did, and I wished to make it up to you, and now you can have your six hundred a year as before; if this illness had gone against me, you would have been quite comfortable—in money, I mean, dear.
“No, I insist on your going to Lady Gloucester's; the change will do you good, and I'll lie here digesting the Reformation, you know,” and he smiled, better this time, quite creditably, in fact “Will you give me a kiss, just to keep till we meet again?”