It was all cruelly pathetic, his voice, and his face, and his gesture, and the strained hopeless look in his small wife’s eyes.
“Gwen is not ready yet for complete happiness,” said Mr. Fellowes; “when she is, it will come to her in full measure.”
“But—she is a person of intelligence and what is called grown-up,” said Mr. Waring anxiously, “and very perfect in her development—outwardly,” he added, a doubtful look fleeting across his face.
“Yes, to look at, she is perfect, but does it not strike you,” said Mrs. Fellowes slowly, “that much of Gwen’s womanhood is still elemental? Do you not think that some of her senses are also still in that condition?”
“Ah!” murmured Mr. Waring, looking sadly down on his wife, “Ah! I have thought, I have feared this. I cannot see in our daughter Gwen a complete creature, but I thought, knowing so little of women as I do, that I might be mistaken. Do you hope for ultimate completeness in our daughter?” he asked suddenly, watching curiously for the answer.
The Rector’s superior knowledge of Gwen had fixed him very uncomfortably on a pedestal, there was no getting off it just yet, he had to make the best of the situation.
“Indeed I do, no half development will content Gwen when she learns her deficiencies, nor her husband either.”
“These elements then may develop to ultimate greatness or wither and die—to reappear, of course, in some form or other. But to disappear from our knowledge untimely! Ah! that would be sad waste. We will hope it may not occur. Do you happen to know if her husband looks on our daughter as we do, in relation to her ultimate possibilities of development, or if he has chosen her for the thing she looks—a most beautiful and finished young woman of fair intelligence?”
“I am quite sure that Strange loves Gwen strongly and truly,” began Mr. Fellowes evasively.
It was a difficult subject to thrash out thoroughly with this wonderful pair, it might be better to let it fade gradually from their minds, and to aid them to glide back into their own still waters.