And on their removal to Paris, where certain of these “friends” soon after appeared, Katharine Vreeland bravely continued “to do as she pleased,” and her now bitter husband partook himself to sparkling wine and “the sights of Paris.”
He was driven along from day to day, for he had no reliable news from the seat of war. He realized that he was alone in the world and without one trusty friend. His wife was only a bright enigma.
“The lone-hand game has its disadvantages, I perceive,” was his bitter secret comment, as he tired of the Hotel Continental—the perfunctory drives in the Bois, the open summer amusements—and visibly fretted at his wife’s endless shopping.
Even with Garston’s substantial bribe, he began to see that Mrs. Katharine Vreeland’s “separate estate” was to become a very “burning question”—in the near future.
She was a “money-eater” of the first class.
“Let us get back to New York,” he moodily said after one of a series of wordy recriminations. “With all my heart,” placidly retorted the “beautiful Mrs. Vreeland,” for she had now acquired that professional designation in the journals and the cant phrases of the uneasy floating “American circle” of Parisian high life.
Harold Vreeland was now mentally tired of the by-play of marital fencing. He realized, in all their varied encounters, that she was calmly superior at every clash.
Bright, bold and ready, she “came back at him” every time, and he was quietly cornered by that flashing rapier, her tongue. What man can prevail against that two-edged sword?
But one resource was left. He had run the gamut of sullenness, persuasion, a bit of bullying, some pleading and even a touch of lofty tenderness, but her point was carried high, her wrist easy, and her blade opposed to him at every turn.
He could not avouch himself a mere fortune-hunter, and so, he took refuge in an ominous and expectant silence. “I will get hold of her estate, and then curb her extravagance,” he brooded.