She was rarely twice alike, often she merely acted, thinking of herself as a strange character in a drama. She was genuinely uncertain of herself. Her love flamed wild sometimes. Then she would pull herself up and remember that something like this she had felt once before, and it had proved a will o’ the wisp over a bog. She wanted to walk warily.
“Supposing I am wrong again this time?” she asked him once with wide eyes.
“You are not. This is real. Trust me, trust yourself.” She liked to nestle in the shelter of his arm, to feel his lips on her hair, to torment and adore him. The week-ends seemed very short; the week-days long. Week-days during which she was restless and excitable, and Peter Kennedy and his bag of tricks, medical tricks, often in request. She was very capricious with Peter, calling him ignorant, and a country yokel. As a companion he compared very badly with Gabriel. As an emotional machine he was easier to play upon. She spared him nothing, he was her whipping-boy. Watching him one noticed that he grew quieter, improved in many ways as she secured more and more mastery over him. When there were scenes now they were of her and not of his making. He was wax in her hands, plastic to her moulding. Sometimes she was sorry for him and a little ashamed of herself. Then she gave him a music lesson or lectured him gravely on his shortcomings. But from first to last he was nothing to her but a stop-gap. His devotion had the smallest of reward.
The weeks went by. Gabriel Stanton coming and going, staying always at the local hotel. Ever more secure in his position with her, but never taking advantage of it.
“He is naturally of a cold nature,” she argued. And once her confidant was Peter Kennedy and she compared the two of them. This was in early days, before her treatment of Peter had subdued him.
“What’s he afraid of?” Peter asked brusquely.
“Until the decree has been made absolute I am not free.”
“So what he is afraid of is the King’s Proctor?”
“Don’t.”
“His precious respectability, the great house of Stanton.”