"Thank heaven, you're still moral!" Mrs. Delancy ejaculated, in accents of huge relief.
"I think I must be," was the low-spoken admission, "because—because I'm so unhappy!" The scarlet lips drooped to a tremulous pathos, as she went on speaking in a voice of poignant feeling. "Oh, Aunt Emma, when I see Charles so harassed, so tired, so troubled in every way, I just long to throw my arms around his neck, and to kiss all those hard lines away from his dear face, and to tell him how much I love him, and how sorry I am, and how much I want to help him."
"Heaven bless you, child!" Mrs. Delancy exclaimed, surprised and delighted. "Why don't you, then?"
"Because," came the gloomy explanation, "if I did, I'd be like you."
The old lady was not gratified by this candid defense.
"Humph! Well, you might do worse, if I do say so myself," she declared, with a toss of her head.
"Of course, you old dear," Cicily agreed, with an air of humility, "in lots and lots of ways—but—"
"You're obstinate!" came the tart rebuke. "If you're really in love with him, give in!"
"That's just the trouble," the young wife said. "Because I'm so much in love with him, I can't give in in this particular. I love him too much to be content with just the bits of him that are left over from the other things. I want a partnership. Marriage has changed since your day, Auntie. Real marriage to-day must be a partnership in all things. I must have that, a full share in my husband's life—or nothing! I tell you, there is too much of men and women swearing before God to become as one, and walking away to begin life and to live it ever after as two. It was all very well when the women had the house to keep, and didn't think; but nowadays most of them have no house to keep, and they are beginning to think."
"But," Mrs. Delancy objected, much discomposed by this tirade against matrimony as she knew it, "you're upsetting all the holy things. To look up to your husband—that's love."