BOOK II—THE STRUGGLE
CHAPTER I
THE NEWLY-WEDS
It was nearly a week before I recovered from the surprise of my sudden marriage.
As far as the actual ceremony went it seemed as if I were the person least concerned. One, James Horace Madden, was tying himself in the most awkward manner to a member of the opposite sex, a slight, pale, neatly-dressed girl whose lucent blue eyes were already beginning to regard him with positive adoration. The said James Horace Madden, a tall, absent-minded young man, stared about him continually. He was, indeed, more like a curious and amused spectator than a principal in the affair, and it was nearly over before he decided to become interested in it.
Well, I was married, so they told me, as they shook my hand; and I had a wife, so she assured me as she clung lightly to my arm. She seemed extravagantly happy. When I saw she was so happy I was glad I had married her. To tell the truth, I had almost backed out. The inconsiderateness of Captain Fitzbarrington in not dying had hurt my feelings and aroused in me a resentment against Fate. In the end, however, good nature prevailed. I believe I am good-natured enough to marry a dozen women should occasion demand.
We had not been wed five minutes before Anastasia developed an extraordinary capacity, for unreserved affection. I have never been capable of unreserved affection, not even for myself; but I can appreciate it in others, particularly if I am the object of it. She also developed such a morbid fear of the infuriate O’Flather that on my suggesting we spend our honeymoon in Paris her enthusiasm was almost grotesque. When we arrived at the Gare du Nord I believe she could have knelt down and kissed the very stones.
And to tell the truth my own delight was hardly less restrained. There’s only one mood in which to approach Paris—Rhapsody. So for ten marvellous days I rhapsodised. The fact that I was on a honeymoon seemed trivial compared with my presence in the most adorable of cities. Truly my bride had reason to be jealous of this Paris, and, as she was given that way, doubtless she would have been had not she herself loved so well.
But there was another matter to distract me: had I not a new part to play? As a young married man it behooved me, in the first place, to acquire a certain seriousness and weight. After due reflexion I decided to give up the flippant cigarette and take to the more dignified pipe. So I made myself a present of a splendid meerschaum, and getting Anastasia to encase the bowl in a flannel jacket I began to colour it.
Imagine me, then, on a certain snappy morning of late December, nursing my flannel-clad meerschaum as I swing jauntily along the Quai des Tournelles. Seasonable weather! the brilliant sunshine playing on the Seine with all the glitter of cutlery: beyond the splendid stride of steel between the two Iles, the Hôtel de Ville: to the left the hideous Morgue; beyond that, again, the grey glory of Notre Dame, its bone-blanched buttresses like the ribs of some uncouth monster, its two blunt towers like timeworn horns, its gargoyles etched in ebon black against the sky.
“After all,” I am reflecting, “the advantages of marrying a person one does not know are sufficiently obvious. Then there is no bitterness of disillusionment, no chagrin of being found out. What woman can continue to idealise an unshaven man in pyjamas? What man can persist in adoring a female in a peignoir with her hair concentrated into knots? In good truth we never marry the person with whom we go through the wedding ceremony: it’s always some one else.”