“I always used to think somewhat sadly about you,” Clytie went on. “I seemed to read in your face and eyes that you would marry a man quite unworthy of you, who would ill treat you, and that you would love him more as he became worse, that your life would be a dreadful, purposeless sacrifice. And now you see how you have escaped. Victor is just the husband I could have picked out for you. So you are a lucky girl.”
“I wish you were as happy as I am, darling,” said Winifred, looking at her somewhat wistfully through her own gladness.
“Perhaps I am,” replied Clytie, with a flush. “Who knows? Utter completion of existence is not possible in this imperfect world of ours; and if my life has its gaps that ache a little, yet it has its fulness, believe me, dear. I am happier now than I have ever been. After all, the gaps matter very little.”
“Now you are getting somewhat beyond me,” said Winifred. “I can't quite follow you.”
“Ah, you needn't, Winnie dear,” replied Clytie. “Only go on loving and trusting me. Don't you see that I am happy because I too have a good man's love?”
“But if—if you had been—if things were different—you might have married,” said Winifred hesitatingly.
“That does not make the love less beautiful and life-giving,” replied Clytie.
This and other conversations of a like tenor succeeded finally in allaying Winifred's doubts as to Clytie's happiness. An uneasy burden was lifted off her mind, glad as her heart was in the new joy of her marriage. Henceforth she was content to take Clytie's assurances, and to trust in her own rooted idea that Clytie's deep, complex nature was beyond the reach of her simple comprehension, and ungovernable by the canons that regulated commoner clay. Strong in this faith, she triumphed in the first little conflict of opinion that arose between herself and her husband. Fine and generous as his views were, he had, nevertheless, a strict churchman's regard for the proprieties of life. The recognised intimacy between Clytie and Kent, harmless as it appeared before Clytie's marriage, had begun to cause him certain uneasiness. He was fond of them both, partly for their own sakes, partly on account of his wife. An unkind thought concerning them hurt his sensitive nature, and yet, as time went on, such thoughts began painfully to formulate themselves in his mind. At last his conscience forced him to broach the subject to Winifred. She listened with a little flush of spirit in her cheek, and then broke into such a warm torrent of words that Treherne was fairly amazed. He had never dreamed that his gentle, brown-eyed wife could be capable of such passionateness. Her logic of devotion overmastered his scruples, and he was almost converted to Winifred's unswerving faith. At any rate, from that time forth he was Clytie's firm friend and ally.
During these two years Clytie was in some need of friends. The society in which she had moved during her married life was a world unknown to her now. Only the circle of her girlhood's acquaintances remained, and of these some manifested disapprobation at the mode of life she had adopted. Every staunch adherent was therefore of inestimable value, and half unconsciously she clung to every hand held out in friendship.
The resumption of her life with Kent had produced also great tension in her relations with Durdleham. Finally it snapped them entirely.