But he did not say so, because, in spite of himself, he hoped that it would, if only because Addie wanted it to and because it was such a long way off, the Polytechnic, and because Addie lately had worn such a wrinkle in his forehead, as though he were disappointed ... possibly in him.
"We're a great trouble to you, Addie, what?"
"If only you work hard, Piet ... then it won't be such a trouble and things will look after themselves."
But Piet was not the only one to see it: they all saw it, the boys and girls alike, and wondered if it was because of them only or because of something quite different—himself, or Mathilde—that his forehead wrinkled so and his grey eyes grew so sombre....
CHAPTER XXII
At the Hague, Mathilde felt a certain gratification, a satisfaction; and the bustle of the early weeks gave her a pleasant feeling of excitement and made her forget the despairing thoughts of the last few weeks spent at Driebergen. They had an attractive little new house in a side-street off the Bezuidenhout itself. It was freshly painted, bright in colouring; and she found it delightful to be able to furnish the house, now that summer was approaching, with light, modern furniture which looked and suggested a doll's house, with the small rooms and the abundance of light-coloured muslin in the drawing-room and conservatory, which she thought looked nice and cheerful. The first spring light entered hard and shrill; and the new colours of the wallpapers showed up in the first sunny days, crying out at Addie when he returned from his visits in his smart little brougham. And she displayed a certain solicitude that above all he should be nicely dressed, that he should look very well-groomed: she insisted on his ordering a couple of new suits. He had not a large practice yet, but that was sure to come: she was full of hope. In the afternoons, she would go out, rejoicing in the shopping-streets, in all the errands which she had to do, in the old-acquaintances whom she met, people whom she had known in her parents' house—they were both dead now—and occupying a somewhat lower social scale than her own at present. And she loved especially to show herself to her relations—a few uncles and aunts and cousins in her elaborate new dresses: Baroness van der Welcke.... And, in her gratification, in her satisfaction, in her new environment, created by herself in sympathy with her commonplace illusions, it was as though she had suddenly wiped all Driebergen out of her life, as though they had never existed, the nearly three crowded early years of her marriage yonder, in the melancholy, rainy village, in the sombre house, the haunted house full of lunatics and invalids. A newness, fresh and commonplace as the paint of her house, reigned all around her; she inhaled newness and was grateful to Addie; but that which, despite herself, had begun to grow refined in her, through her intercourse with antagonistic but yet finer natures than her own, now became blunted at once; and the days of real misery which she had undergone now, in her superficial thoughts, seemed very far away, as though they had been never lived but only dreamed, as read in a book, but never felt. The feeling had not burst forth from her, like a plant that buds, but had moved slowly around her, like a wind that blows or a drifting cloud. It had moved her, but had not metamorphosed her. Now, in her own atmosphere, she was blossoming up, fully, like a flower transplanted to the earth which it needed in order to blossom entirely.
And yet, though she recovered herself, she was not quite herself again. Even though she no longer craved to know and to receive that which escaped her in Addie, yet she continued to know that something in him did escape her; and, however eagerly, in her simple entreaty, she had begged that he would love her, now, even though she uttered the same request, almost with a childish plaint—"Addie, you do love me, don't you?"—she had to admit to herself that she now saw him really very far above herself, not only in that which escaped her, but also in that which she understood: the daily sacrifice which he was making by living at the Hague, by acting as she had asked, seeking to establish a practice as she wished, by shifting the tenor of his life, as with a strong grip of the hand, in the direction which would make her happy, her, the woman who no longer loved him as she had done ... as she had done when she felt him akin to herself, in the healthy normal life of physical natures.... He was that still, but he was also different; and that different thing was not akin to her, nor was the superiority with which he sacrificed himself. The superiority, the sacrifice oppressed her.... She soon forgot; and, when she was out of doors, going along the shops, meeting acquaintances who admired her, she was happy. When she came home, waiting with her two children for Addie's return, she suddenly felt oppressed:
"I grew melancholy at Driebergen," she would think.
But now she was in her new, freshly-painted house; and she was oppressed and felt unattractive; she dragged with her something that she could not shake off. She often wept, sobbed, as at Driebergen, but there, she knew, it was only about Marietje van Saetzema, whereas here she did not know what she was sobbing for.... At meals, sitting with him alone, she was silent, or else spoke harshly, without intending to. She did not sit with him when he was working, though he asked her to. When he wanted to kiss her, she drew back. At night she often locked herself in, pretended to be asleep.... Only in the children did she feel in harmony with him, did she agree with him, with his system of feeding them, of sending them out every day in all weathers. The children united them, now and then, for a few moments.... When the children were in bed, their life together became strangely unreal, as though both were asking themselves why, why? And it grew worse daily. He was now living exactly as she wished; and it seemed to him as if he had no life of his own. The keeping up of his reading, in the evenings, became mechanical; and mechanically he went once, sometimes twice, a week to Driebergen, remaining there for half the day. They saw him looking strange, unsettled, old, with wrinkles in his forehead and a gloom of despair in his eyes.