“She has other friends. And—I don’t think Aggy is quite so fond of me as she used to be.”
“Oh, nonsense. She’s not quite herself now; you mustn’t mind her when she’s a bit off color.”
“That’s not why I’m going; I merely mentioned it to show that there was less reason for my staying than you supposed. It’s very good and very kind of you—of you both—to have had me with you so long, and not to have got tired of my sober-sidedness. But don’t you know yet how obstinate I am?”
“Obstinate? I should hardly put it that way. Firm, I should say. Yes, I’ve observed it; you generally have your own way.”
“I didn’t mean that. And how can you tell? Perhaps I’m wise enough only to let my wishes be known when I feel pretty sure of getting them, and to bottle them up tight when I know they’re hopeless.”
They walked along some way in silence. Alice had become a habit, and to learn that she was going to leave them made him realize that the absence of her quiet influence would make a real change to him. His wife had almost suddenly grown to be nothing to him but a burden which he had taken up and which he must carry with as good an outward grace as he could assume. He believed her emotions to be so shallow that she would not long moan over his dead affection and that she would be reasonably content so long as he could provide her with luxuries and amusement. But now he was brought definitely face to face with the fact that he was bound to a companion who was becoming every day more distasteful to him and with whom he would have to spend many days alone. There are people whose influence though strong is so quiet that we do not value them at their true price until they are taken from us; such an one was Alice Lane. Her suddenly announced departure showed plainly to West that she had become almost a necessity to him; that she had helped often to smooth away asperities and to cover over Agatha’s deficiencies, and that she could give him that comradeship which he had learned the need of by discovering his wife’s inability to give it to him.
Comradeship only, he believed, for he did not, in any usual sense of the word, love her. She had become a quiet, steadying, soothing influence, a mental support and sedative. It was not her strange, placid comeliness that appealed to him; it was not the feminine in her: she was almost to him what a man friend would be, save that, as a woman, he had to treat her with respect, and with self-respect. She had not come between him and his wife, but, on the contrary, by complementing her deficiencies, had made her the longer endurable. He had grown accustomed during the last few months to her companionship; he had not, indeed, talked much to her, or in any degree sought her confidence, but her mere presence had acted soothingly upon him; and to be with her had been restful and pacifying. Her return to her brother’s house would practically mean that she would go out of his life, except for occasional visits and meetings. But he could think of no compelling reason that he could urge for her staying longer with them, and, as she had accused him of being, he was well aware of her firmness in carrying out any decision to which she had come. He had been accustomed to having his own way with those around him, but instead of irritating him, it added to his respect and admiration for her, to find that what she thought right to do, she would do, and that no persuasion of his could move or stay her.
“Tell me why you are going?” he asked, as they turned to go homeward, and faced the eager wind. “And why you think that Aggy doesn’t care so much for you as she used to do?”
“If I were a man I suppose I should be expected to give a reason for my doings. But you see, I’m a mere woman, and of course act on impulse.”
“Not at all a mere woman. And much too clever, not to know that generalizations are always untrue. I conclude that a man’s an ignorant ass when he says that something or other is ‘just like a woman.’ Though it is rather like a woman to avoid answering a question by making an aimless remark. Why are you going home?”