“Dream stuff! You’re following a mere will-o’-the-wisp!”
“That’s what women have been following in the past,” she returned breathlessly. “Look among your married friends. How many ideally happy couples can you count? Very, very few. And why are there so few? One reason is, because the man finds, after the novelty is worn off, that his wife is uninteresting, has nothing to talk about; and so his love cools to a good-natured, passive tolerance of her. Most married men, when alone with their wives, sit in stupid silence. But see how the husband livens up if a man joins them! This man has been out in the interesting world. The wife has been cooped up at home. The man has something to talk about. The wife has not. Well, I am going to be out in the interesting world, doing something. I am going to have something to talk to my husband about. I am going to be interesting to him, as interesting to him as any man. And I am going to try to hold his love, Arnold, the love of his heart, the love of his head, to the very end!”
He was exasperated by her persistence, but he still held himself in check.
“That sounds very plausible to you. But there is one thing in your argument you forget.”
“And that?”
“We are grown-up people, you and I. I guess we can talk straight out.”
“Yes. Go on!”
He gazed at her very steadily for a moment.
“There are such things as children, you know.”
She returned his steady look.