DEAR BEVERLEY:
You are perfectly right not to tell Tilly about the ferns. Here I come in: there must always be things that a man must refuse to tell a woman. As soon as he tells her everything, she puts her foot on his neck. I have always refused even to tell Polly some things, not that they might not be told, but that Polly must not be told them; not for the things' sake, but for Polly's good—and for a man's peaceful control of his own life.
For whatever else a woman marries in a man, one thing in him she must marry: a rock. Times will come when she will storm and rage around that rock; but the storms cannot last forever, and when they are over, the rock will be there. By degrees there will be less storm. Polly's very loyalty to me inspires her to take possession of my whole life; to enter into all my affairs. I am to her a house, no closet of which must remain locked. Thus there are certain closets which she repeatedly tries to open. I can tell by her very expression when she is going to try once more. Were they opened, she would not find much; but it is much to be guarded that she shall not open them.
The matter is too trivial to explain to Tilly as fact and too important as principle.
Harbour no fear that Polly knows from me anything about the ferns! When I am with Polly, my thoughts are not on the grass of the fields.
Let me hear at once how the trouble turns out with Tilly.
I must not close without making a profound obeisance to your new acquaintances—the Chamberlains.
BEN.
TILLY SNOWDEN TO POLLY BOLES
June 15.