"I am only your husband, it is true, but I think I have a right to know, if my wife goes out, where she is going."
Indiana paused half way to the door. "I'm going to dine with them at the Cecil, where they are stopping." He was silent. She waited, in some suspense, for a remark, her hand on the door.
"I am sorry to disappoint you—but I cannot permit you to go," he said, at length, slowly. "It's not the place for Lady Canning. It may be all very well for strangers—sight-seers—but London is our home. These places are resorts for foreigners, professional women, men-about-town, and others, who delight to bask in the public eye. I have another reason. I do not wish you to be seen in public, until I have formally presented you—as my wife." He approached her and removing her hand gently from the handle of the door, led her back into the room. She went unwillingly, her head drooping. "Indiana," he put his hand under her chin and lifted her face, so that her eyes met his. "I don't wish to force you, but to convince you. Admit it would be a very foolish and inconsistent thing to do."
"Yes, but that's just why I want to do it," she answered, wilfully deaf to the note of appeal in his voice.
"You child! Come now," he forced her gently to lie down on the sofa. "Quiet that eager little mind of yours," tucking her carefully in a rug. "Shut those restless American eyes and sleep for a while. Dream yourself into good humor again." He closed her eyes, patting her cheek tenderly.
"Thurston, they've got a surprise for me," she said, piteously.
"What, another!" he exclaimed. "Your nerves won't stand any more surprises to-night. Now, in one hour, I shall come in and awaken my sleeping beauty with a kiss." Indiana made a little grimace and shut her eyes tightly. He watched her for a moment.
"Asleep already," bending over her, "or sulking—which?"
She flung the rug from her, suddenly sitting up. "Thurston, I want to go. Thurston, why can't I go?"
"Because you yourself have acknowledged it would not be right," he answered, coldly. Her small, red lips drooped plaintively, she coiled herself up on the sofa in a disconsolate attitude. Thurston stood watching her. The sad, little face staring at the fire, stirred his sympathy. This was the first request he had ever refused. He felt an impulse to press her against his heart and beg her not to grieve—to tell her that he felt her disappointment far deeper than she herself could have any idea of. But pride prevented him. He had lately been chary in his demonstrations. His nature, which at first had sung a pæan over the mere fact that she was his, rejoicing in the lavish display of its love, gradually conscious of no hint of response, only a tacit acceptance, had crept back into its cloak of reserve. He suffered from the repression, becoming at times the victim of a terrible discouragement—that sinking of the heart, inevitable to the thought that one has given one's very best in vain. He realized what a frail structure he had builded—that beautiful fairy fabric of spider's webs, illuminated with the tints of the rainbow. Standing, watching Indiana, Thurston remembered the day when she had promised to marry him—that gray, soft, still evening in autumn. It had been like a tender poem. He had likened the little path between the trees upon which they walked, to the dim, narrow aisle of a church, leading to the altar. It had led them to the altar, but he had failed yet to realize the dream, the infinite suggestion beyond. He felt they were still kneeling there. He and the church had done their part. It needed Indiana only to make the bond complete. He suffered in a great measure for her sake alone. Could she respect her own womanhood as his wife when she failed to love him, he asked himself. She, too, might be suffering, without his knowledge. The little figure maintained its disconsolate position. It was only a trivial matter, after all, but he did not want her to harbor the least resentment against him.