Maddison acted as she expected. After the first outburst of passion he was strongly impelled to draw back, to survey critically the situation into which he had been drawn almost against his will, and certainly against his better judgment, and to ask himself repeatedly if there could be any continued content for him in this liaison.
He settled Marian in a pretty flat not far from his studio, and the first test to which he put her was to watch carefully her taste in the decorating and furnishing of her new home.
“I want everything to be just what you like,” she said to him, as they surveyed the bare, unpapered rooms. “It is so lovely to start with everything to do and not to have to put up with what other people have put up. Everything must be just what you like, George.”
He laughed.
“What I like?—What you like.”
“Perhaps we shall both like the same things! Though it’s cheeky of me to imagine that my taste could be as good as yours. I don’t think I shall want anything you will consider dreadful, but you must teach me what are the best things. Only, do let everything be pretty and quiet—and not too many things. And don’t let’s go to one shop and get everything there; I’d much rather do it bit by bit. I want a home—our home—not a gimcrack shop or a ready-made bandbox as if I were a new hat—a real home.”
She spoke the word almost sadly, and turning away from him, went across the room and looked out of the window at the canal, the noisy road, the vast vistas of houses and the dun-colored sky. Her tone touched him, as she had hoped it would; there rushed in on him a sudden realization that he had taken into his keeping a human soul, a lonely soul that had called to him for help.
“Don’t think I’m ungrateful—talking like this,” she said, going back to him and laying her hands on his shoulders; “but—I do love you so much, and I do want to be what you want me to be—so that you will go on loving me. Teach me. You’re so strong and I’m so weak. You’re able to do so much for me and I can do so little for you. I’ll try hard to make you so happy that you’ll—never be sorry.”
He took her face between his hands, looking into her deep, eager eyes, then drew her close to him, kissing her again and again, eagerly, passionately. She lay passive in his arms, her head on his shoulder. Then forced herself quick apart.
“Don’t, don’t, George! We mustn’t be too happy—it can’t last.”