Duer, always moved by her innate emotional force and charm, whatever other lack he had reason to bewail, gazed before him in startled sympathy, astonishment, pain, wonder, for he was seeing very clearly and keenly in these echoing sounds what the trouble was. She was feeling neglected, outclassed, unconsidered, helpless; and because it was more or less true it was frightening and wounding her. She was, for the first time no doubt, beginning to feel the tragedy of life, its uncertainty, its pathos and injury, as he so often had. Hitherto her home, her relatives and friends had more or less protected her from that, for she had come from a happy home, but now she was out and away from all that and had only him. Of course she had been neglected. He remembered that now. It was partly his fault, partly the fault of surrounding conditions. But what could he do about it? What say? People had conditions fixed for them in this world by their own ability. Perhaps he should not have married her at all, but how should he comfort her in this crisis? How say something that would ease her soul?
“Why, Margie,” he said seriously, “you know that’s not true! You know you’re not dull. Your manners and your taste and your style are as good as those of anybody. Who has hinted that they aren’t? What has come over you? Who has been saying anything to you? Have I done anything? If so, I’m sorry!” He had a guilty consciousness of misrepresenting himself and his point of view even while saying this, but kindness, generosity, affection, her legal right to his affection, as he now thought, demanded it.
“No! No!” she exclaimed brokenly and without ceasing her tears. “It isn’t you. It isn’t anybody. It’s me—just me! That’s what’s the matter with me. I’m dull; I’m not stylish; I’m not attractive. I don’t know anything about music or books or people or anything. I sit and listen, but I don’t know what to say. People talk to you—they hang on your words—but they haven’t anything to say to me. They can’t talk to me, and I can’t talk to them. It’s because I don’t know anything—because I haven’t anything to say! Oh dear! Oh dear!” and she beat her thin, artistic little hands on the shoulders of his coat.
Duer could not endure this storm without an upwelling of pity for her. He cuddled her close in his arms, extremely sad that she should be compelled to suffer so. What should he do? What could he do? He could see how it was. She was hurt; she was neglected. He neglected her when among others. These smart women whom he knew and liked to talk with neglected her. They couldn’t see in her what he could. Wasn’t life pathetic? They didn’t know how sweet she was, how faithful, how glad she was to work for him. That really didn’t make any difference in the art world, he knew, but still it almost seemed as if it ought to. There one must be clever, he knew that—everybody knew it. And Marjorie was not clever—at least, not in their way. She couldn’t play or sing or paint or talk brilliantly, as they could. She did not really know what the world of music, art, and literature was doing. She was only good, faithful, excellent as a housewife, a fine mender of clothes, a careful buyer, saving, considerate, dependable, but——
As he thought of this and then of this upwelling depth of emotion of hers, a thing quite moving to him always, he realized, or thought he did, that no woman that he had ever known had anything quite like this. He had known many women intimately. He had associated with Charlotte and Mildred and Neva Badger and Volida Blackstone, and quite a number of interesting, attractive young women whom he had met here and there since, but outside of the stage—that art of Sarah Bernhardt and Clara Morris and some of the more talented English actresses of these later days—he persuaded himself that he had never seen any one quite like Marjorie. This powerful upwelling of emotion which she was now exhibiting and which was so distinctive of her, was not to be found elsewhere, he thought. He had felt it keenly the first days he had visited her at her father’s home in Avondale. Oh, those days with her in Avondale! How wonderful they were! Those delicious nights! Flowers, moonlight, odors, came back—the green fields, the open sky. Yes; she was powerful emotionally. She was compounded of many and all of these things.
It was true she knew nothing of art, nothing of music—the great, new music—nothing of books in the eclectic sense, but she had real, sweet, deep, sad, stirring emotion, the most appealing thing he knew. It might not be as great as that exhibited by some of the masters of the stage, or the great composers—he was not quite sure, so critical is life—but nevertheless it was effective, dramatic, powerful. Where did she get it? No really common soul could have it. Here must be something of the loneliness of the prairies, the sad patience of the rocks and fields, the lonesomeness of the hush of the countryside at night, the aimless, monotonous, pathetic chirping of the crickets. Her father following down a furrow in the twilight behind straining, toil-worn horses; her brothers binding wheat in the July sun; the sadness of furrow scents and field fragrances in the twilight—there was something of all these things in her sobs.
It appealed to him, as it might well have to any artist. In his way Duer understood this, felt it keenly.
“Why, Margie,” he insisted, “you mustn’t talk like that! You’re better than you say you are. You say you don’t know anything about books or art or music. Why, that isn’t all. There are things, many things, which are deeper than those things. Emotion is a great thing in itself, dearest, if you only knew. You have that. Sarah Bernhardt had it; Clara Morris had it, but who else? In ‘La Dame aux Camelias,’ ‘Sapho,’ ‘Carmen,’ ‘Mademoiselle de Maupin,’ it is written about, but it is never commonplace. It’s great. I’d rather have your deep upwelling of emotion than all those cheap pictures, songs, and talk put together. For, sweet, don’t you know”—and he cuddled her more closely—“great art is based on great emotion. There is really no great art without it. I know that best of all, being a musician. You may not have the power to express yourself in music or books or pictures—you play charmingly enough for me—but you have the thing on which these things are based; you have the power to feel them. Don’t worry over yourself, dear. I see that, and I know what you are, whether any one else does or not. Don’t worry over me. I have to be nice to these people. I like them in their way, but I love you. I married you—isn’t that proof enough? What more do you want? Don’t you understand, little Margie? Don’t you see? Now aren’t you going to cheer up and be happy? You have me. Ain’t I enough, sweetie? Can’t you be happy with just me? What more do you want? Just tell me.”
“Nothing more, honey-bun!” she went on sobbing and cuddling close; “nothing more, if I can have you. Just you! That’s all I want—you, you, you!”
She hugged him tight. Duer sighed secretly. He really did not believe all he said, but what of it? What else could he do, say, he asked himself? He was married to her. In his way, he loved her—or at least sympathized with her intensely.