She had been a simple country girl when he married her; her bees, her horse, and her father’s dogs had been her great interests; to ride with her father over his farms had been her chief delight. She had often risen with the lark, and was budding her roses amid the dews.
When the young rising politician, Alick Morton, had first met her at a neighbouring squire’s house, her sweet bloom and unconscious beauty won him in spite of himself, and from the first hour of their meeting he vowed to himself that Violet Cheriton should be his wife.
No greater change had ever come to a woman. In spite of her great love, there must have been times when Violet Morton looked back on her innocent and happy girlhood with something like regret, if ever a true-hearted wife and mother permits herself to indulge in such a feeling.
Mr. Morton was a devoted husband, but he was an autocrat, and, in spite of many fine qualities, was not without that selfishness that leavens many a man’s nature. He wanted his wife to himself; his busy ambition aimed high; politics was the breath of his life; unlike other men in this, that he lived to work, instead of working to live.
These sort of natures know no fatigue; they are intolerant of difficulties; inaction means death to them. Mr. Morton was a committee man; he worked hard for his party. He was a philanthropist also, and took up warmly certain public charities. His name was becoming widely known; people spoke of him as a rising man, who would be useful to his generation. If he dragged his wife at his triumphal chariot wheel, no one blamed him; these sort of men need real helpmeets. In these cases the stronger nature rules: the weaker and most loving submits.
Mrs. Morton was a submissive wife; early and late she toiled in her husband’s service; their house was a rallying point for his party. On certain occasions the great drawing-rooms were flung open to strangers; meetings were held on behalf of the charities in which Mr. Morton was interested; there were speeches made, in which he largely distinguished himself, while his wife hovered on the outskirts of the crowd and listened to him.
He kept no secretary, and his correspondence was immense. Mrs. Morton had a clear, characteristic handwriting, and could write rapidly to dictation, and many an hour was spent in her husband’s study.
This was at first no weariness to her—she loved to be beside him and share his labours. What wife begrudges time and work for her husband? But she soon found that other labours supervened that were less congenial to her.
Mr. Morton was overworked; the demands on his time were unceasing. Violet must visit the wards of his favourite hospitals, and help him in keeping the accounts. She must represent him in society, and keep up constant intercourse with the wives of the members of their party during the season. She worked harder even than he did. Her bloom faded under the withering influence of late hours and hot rooms. Night after night she bore, with sweet graciousness, the weary round of pleasures that palled on her. It was a martyrdom of human love, for, alas! in the hurry of this unsatisfactory life, the Divine voice had grown dim and far off to the weary ear of Violet Morton; the clanging metallic earth bells had deadened the heavenly harmonies.
Sometimes a sad, pathetic look would come into her eyes. Was she thinking, I wonder, of the slim, bright-eyed girl budding roses in the old-fashioned garden, while the brown bees hummed round her? Was the fragrance of the lilies—those tall, white lilies of which she so often spoke to me—blotting out the perfume of hothouse flowers, and the heavy scents of the crowded ball-room?