“He hurt me very much once. I tried to marry him, I tried to forget it, but it was useless. I was dreadfully unhappy, in a great many ways—”
“So you sent for me,” he put in as she paused reflectively. “I didn't hurt you, at any rate.” It seemed to her that his tone was shadowed. “You have never hurt me, Arnaud,” she assured him, conscious of the inadequacy of her words. “You were everything I wanted.”
“Except for my hats,” he said in a brief flash of his saving humor. “It would be better for me, perhaps, if I could hurt you. That ability comes dangerously close to a constant of love. You mustn't think I am complaining. I haven't the slightest reason in the face of your devastating honesty. I didn't distress you and I had the necessary minimum—the fifty thousand.” His manner was so even, so devoid of sting, that she could smile at the expression of her material ambitions. “I realize exactly your feeling for myself, but what puzzles me is your attitude toward the children.”
“I don't understand it either,” she admitted, “except that I am quite afraid of them. They are so different from all my own childhood; often they are too much for me. Then I dread the time when they will discover how stupid and uneducated I am at bottom. I'm sure you already ask questions before them to amuse yourself at my doubt. What shall I do, Arnaud, when they are really at school and bring home their books?”
“Retreat behind your dignity as a parent,” he advised. “They are certain to display their knowledge and ask you to bound things or name the capital of Louisiana.” She cried, “Oh, but I know that, it's New Orleans!” She saw at once, from his entertained expression, that she was wrong again, and became conscious of a faint flush of annoyance. “It will be even worse,” she continued, “when Vigné looks to me for advice; I mean when she is older and has lovers.”
“She won't seriously; they never do. She'll tell you when it's all over. Lowrie will depend more on you. I may have my fun about the capital of Louisiana, Linda, but I have the greatest confidence in your wisdom. God knows what an unhappy experience your childhood was, but it has given you a superb worldly balance.”
“I suppose you're saying that I am cold,” she told him. “It must be true, because it is repeated by every one. Yet, at times, I used to be very different—you'd never imagine what a romantic thrill or strange ideas were inside of me. Like a memory of a deep woods, and—and the loveliest adventure. Often I would hear music as clearly as possible, and it made me want I don't know what terrifically.”
“An early experience,” he replied. Suddenly she saw that he was tired, his face was lined and dejected. “You read too much,” Linda declared. He said: “But only out of the printed book.” She wondered vainly what he meant. As he stood before the glimmering coals, in the room saturated in repose, she wished that she might give him more; she wanted to spend herself in a riot of feeling on Arnaud and their children. What a detestable character she had! Her desire, her efforts, were wasted.
He went about putting up the windows and closing the outside shutters, a confirmed habit. Linda rose with her invariable sense of separation, the feeling that, bound on a journey with a hidden destination, she was only temporarily in a place of little importance. It was like being always in her hat and jacket. Arnaud shook down the grate; then he gazed over the room; it was all, she was sure, as it had been a century ago, as it should be—all except herself.