"I was not thinking of it, I assure you," said Frances. "I only wondered whether it were right." She elucidated her point. "For you, for your happiness, considering——"
"I'm not thinking of my own happiness, or I couldn't do it. No, I couldn't do it. I was thinking"—her voice sank and vibrated, and rose, exulting, to the stress—"of his."
Frances looked at her with gentle, questioning eyes. Hugh's happiness, no doubt, was the thing; but she wondered how Gertrude's presence was to secure it.
Slowly, bit by bit, with many meditative pauses, many sinkings of her thought into the depths, as if she sounded at each point her own sincerity, Gertrude made it out.
"Mrs. Brodrick is very sweet and very charming, and I know they are devoted. Still"—Gertrude's pause was poignant—"still—she is unusual."
"Well, yes," said Frances.
"And one sees that the situation is a little difficult."
Frances made no attempt to deny it.
"It always is," said Gertrude, "when the wife has an immense, absorbing interest apart. I can't help feeling that they've come, both of them, to a point—a turning point, where everything depends on saving her, as much as possible, all fret and worry. It's saving him. There are so many things she tries to do and can't do; and she puts them all on him."
"She certainly does," said Frances.