“What does Delia think about it?” he asked.
“Dear me!” Corydon exclaimed. “I haven’t told Delia a word of it!”
“Haven’t told her! But why not?”
“Because she’d be horrified. She’d never speak to Harry Stuart again!”
“But then you want me to speak to him! And even to be cordial to him! You want to go ahead and carry on a sentimental flirtation with him—”
“Oh, Thyrsis!” she protested.
“But that’s what it would come to. And how much peace of mind do you suppose I’d have, while I knew that was going on?”
At which Corydon sighed pathetically. “I’m a fine sort of emancipated woman!” she said. “Don’t you see you’re playing the role of the conventional jealous husband?”
But as she thought over the matter in the privacy of her own mind she was filled with perplexity, and wondered at herself. She found herself actually longing to see Harry Stuart. She asked herself, “Can it really be I, Corydon, who am capable of being interested in any other man besides my husband?” She could not bring herself to face the fact that it was true.
Section 4. Thyrsis went away, and took to wandering about the country, wrestling with his new book. After the fashion of every work that came to possess him, it seemed to possess him as no other work had ever done before. His mind was in a turmoil with it, his thoughts racing from one part to another; he would stop in the midst of pumping a bucket of water or bringing in a supply of wood, to jot down some notes that came to him. Each day he realized more fully the nature of the task. Seated alone at night in his tiny cabin, his spirit would cry out in terror at the burden that had been heaped upon it.