Rose took long lessons from the nun, and as she slowly and painstakingly began to master the intricate and exquisite language of her husband she felt as if she were approaching his spirit, and preparing for herself and for him a fresh world of understanding and companionship. Day by day Léon brought her, with fresh enthusiasm, endless stories of his progress with the affair Gérard. Some instinct in Rose told her that by the length of these stories, and by Léon’s absorbed, invigorated returns to her, their love was still safe.
She needed all the assurances that she could get, for she was very much alone. She was always just the same to Léon; she spread about him the warm, wide sea of her magnanimity; he was never to know she felt sad or strange, or that she had a silly habit of almost crying when she walked alone on the cliffs above the bright, transparent sea.
He wasn’t to dream that she minded his boating and driving and walking with Madame Gérard, or that she kept explaining to herself how natural it was for him to talk more and with more gaiety in French, and not to care so much as he used to for moonlight in the garden.
She succeeded so entirely in the effect of appearing not to mind that she thoroughly annoyed Léon.
He had been looking forward to a fresh drama with Rose, a little visible but not fettering jealousy, a scene or two, even a few tears, wise and tender explanation on his part, and passionate pleading upon her own.
But Rose’s passion was very quiet and it never occurred to it to plead.
She had no such intention, but she made Léon’s vanity smart, under her daily serenity. “Is she made of wood--or of iron,” he asked himself bitterly, “that she lets me live in the pocket of another woman even during the honeymoon? What have I to look forward to--centuries of ice?”
He knew very well that there was no ice in Rose, but his bad conscience enjoyed resentment very much. It was not only his vanity that was injured, he began to be conscious of a secret fear.
Rose was to be his guardian angel in this affair--he mustn’t, whatever happened, be allowed to lose his head.
He didn’t expect his wife to stop his doing what he wanted, but she ought to be so effective, so in the center of things as to prevent his wanting it, and Rose wouldn’t come into the center of things. She remained in the background, trusting him. He felt the burden of her confidence checking him at every turn.