There was no real ground for divorce; besides, he shunned the publicity of it in connection with an honoured name. Our country—alas!—won’t give people divorces for incompatibility. The usual result followed.
Well—he thought his wealth, his name, his achievements would live down, or, rather, drag up, the “woman of his choice.” Did they?
No. Of course not. He thought also that this time he had found an idol, a sympathiser, an inspiration. All went well for a time. Then the chains became irksome. She chafed at her position. She had everything but that marriage ring which spells respectability. She became discontented, irritable, the love grew less, the desire to be made “an honest woman” grew more and more. He dare not face the world a second time and own he had misjudged woman’s character. Therefore their dog-and-cat life continued—because they hadn’t the pluck to break it.
It was a tale of woe. Broken in health and in spirit, he owned he had defied the world and yet—with all the odds of position and wealth in his favour—had failed.
One day he suddenly wrote: “I can’t come and see you again, you belong to the world I have left, or that has left me. It only stirs up the misery of my present life. I thank you for your help, your sympathy, your much-prized friendship, but it is not fair on you to let you worry over me, and being with you is making me more discontented than ever. And so good-bye.”
As he stepped suddenly across my path, he stepped as suddenly back into the shadow. Poor man. His is the tale of many, but that does not make it any the less sad.
I lived in the world he had turned his back on—the world which finally shut him out, and that proud heart, that big brain and scholarly man literally laid down his arms, weary of heart, sick of soul, ambition sapped—life gone. He merely dragged out his existence from day to day. Chained to a loathsome sore. He did not complain. How could he? The chain was of his own making, the sore its inevitable result. Why, we ask, did he submit? Why? Because habit had become stronger than will.
Success is made or marred by individuality.