I took, involuntarily, a deep breath. Would she mention Nancy? Was it in reality Nancy who had brought about this crisis? And did Maude suspect the closeness of that relationship?
Suddenly I found myself begging her not to go; the more astonishing since, if at any time during the past winter this solution had presented itself to me as a possibility, I should eagerly have welcomed it! But should I ever have had the courage to propose a separation? I even wished to delude myself now into believing that what she suggested was in reality not a separation. I preferred to think of it as a trip.... A vision of freedom thrilled me, and yet I was wracked and torn. I had an idea that she was suffering, that the ordeal was a terrible one for her; and at that moment there crowded into my mind, melting me, incident after incident of our past.
"It seems to me that we have got along pretty well together, Maude. I have been negligent--I"ll admit it. But I"ll try to do better in the future. And--if you"ll wait a month or so, I"ll go to Europe with you, and we"ll have a good time."
She looked at me sadly,--pityingly, I thought.
"No, Hugh, I"ve thought it all out. You really don"t want me. You only say this because you are sorry for me, because you dislike to have your feelings wrung. You needn"t be sorry for me, I shall be much happier away from you."
"Think it over, Maude," I pleaded. "I shall miss you and the children. I haven"t paid much attention to them, either, but I am fond of them, and depend upon them, too."
She shook her head.
"It"s no use, Hugh. I tell you I"ve thought it all out. You don"t care for the children, you were never meant to have any."
"Aren"t you rather severe in your judgments?"
"I don"t think so," she answered. "I"m willing to admit my faults, that I am a failure so far as you are concerned. Your ideas of life and mine are far apart."
"I suppose," I exclaimed bitterly, "that you are referring to my professional practices."
A note of weariness crept into her voice. I might have known that she was near the end of her strength.
"No, I don"t think it"s that," she said dispa.s.sionately. "I prefer to put it down, that part of it, to a fundamental difference of ideas. I do not feel qualified to sit in judgment on that part of your life, although I"ll admit that many of the things you have done, in common with the men with whom you are a.s.sociated, have seemed to me unjust and inconsiderate of the rights and feelings of others. You have alienated some of your best friends. If I were to arraign you at all, it would be on the score of heartlessness. But I suppose it isn"t your fault, that you haven"t any heart."
"That"s unfair," I put in.
"I don"t wish to be unfair," she replied. "Only, since you ask me, I have to tell you that that is the way it seems to me. I don"t want to introduce the question of right and wrong into this, Hugh, I"m not capable of unravelling it; I can"t put myself into your life, and see things from your point of view, weigh your problems and difficulties. In the first place, you won"t let me. I think I understand you, partly--but only partly. You have kept yourself shut up. But why discuss it? I have made up my mind."
The legal aspect of the matter occurred to me. What right had she to leave me? I might refuse to support her. Yet even as these thoughts came I rejected them; I knew that it was not in me to press this point. And she could always take refuge with her father; without the children, of course. But the very notion sickened me. I could not bear to think of Maude deprived of the children. I had seated myself again at the table.
I put my hand to my forehead.
"Don"t make it hard, Hugh," I heard her say, gently. "Believe me, it is best. I know. There won"t be any talk about it,--right away, at any rate. People will think it natural that I should wish to go abroad for the summer. And later--well, the point of view about such affairs has changed. They are better understood."
She had risen. She was pale, still outwardly composed,--but I had a strange, hideous feeling that she was weeping inwardly.
"Aren"t you coming back--ever?" I cried.
She did not answer at once.
"I don"t know," she said, "I don"t know," and left the room abruptly....
I wanted to follow her, but something withheld me. I got up and walked around the room in a state of mind that was near to agony, taking one of the neglected books out of the shelves, glancing at its meaningless print, and replacing it; I stirred the fire, opened the curtains and gazed out into the street and closed them again. I looked around me, a sudden intensity of hatred seized me for this big, silent, luxurious house; I recalled Maude"s presentiment about it. Then, thinking I might still dissuade her, I went slowly up the padded stairway--to find her door locked; and a sense of the finality of her decision came over me. I knew then that I could not alter it even were I to go all the lengths of abjectness. Nor could I, I knew, have brought myself to have feigned a love I did not feel.
What was it I felt? I could not define it. Amazement, for one thing, that Maude with her traditional, Christian view of marriage should have come to such a decision. I went to my room, undressed mechanically and got into bed....
She gave no sign at the breakfast table of having made the decision of the greatest moment in our lives; she conversed as usual, asked about the news, reproved the children for being noisy; and when the children had left the table there were no tears, reminiscences, recriminations.
In spite of the slight antagonism and envy of which I was conscious,--that she was thus superbly in command of the situation, that she had developed her pinions and was thus splendidly able to use them,--my admiration for her had never been greater. I made an effort to achieve the frame of mind she suggested: since she took it so calmly, why should I be tortured by the tragedy of it? Perhaps she had ceased to love me, after all! Perhaps she felt nothing but relief. At any rate, I was grateful to her, and I found a certain consolation, a sop to my pride in the reflection that the initiative must have been hers to take.
I could not have deserted her.
"When do you think of leaving?" I asked.
"Two weeks from Sat.u.r.day on the Olympic, if that is convenient for you."
Her manner seemed one of friendly solicitude. "You will remain in the house this summer, as usual, I suppose?"
"Yes," I said.
It was a sunny, warm morning, and I went downtown in the motor almost blithely. It was the best solution after all, and I had been a fool to oppose it.... At the office, there was much business awaiting me; yet once in a while, during the day, when the tension relaxed, the recollection of what had happened flowed back into my consciousness.
Maude was going!
I had telephoned Nancy, making an appointment for the afternoon.
Sometimes--not too frequently--we were in the habit of going out into the country in one of her motors, a sort of landaulet, I believe, in which we were separated from the chauffeur by a gla.s.s screen. She was waiting for me when I arrived, at four; and as soon as we had shot clear of the city, "Maude is going away," I told her.
"Going away?" she repeated, struck more by the tone of my voice than by what I had said.
"She announced last night that she was going abroad indefinitely."
I had been more than anxious to see how Nancy would take the news. A flush gradually deepened in her cheeks.
"You mean that she is going to leave you?"
"It looks that way. In fact, she as much as said so."
"Why?" said Nancy.
"Well, she explained it pretty thoroughly. Apparently, it isn"t a sudden decision," I replied, trying to choose my words, to speak composedly as I repeated the gist of our conversation. Nancy, with her face averted, listened in silence--a silence that continued some time after I had ceased to speak.
"She didn"t--she didn"t mention--?" the sentence remained unfinished.
"No," I said quickly, "she didn"t. She must know, of course, but I"m sure that didn"t enter into it."
Nancy"s eyes as they returned to me were wet, and in them was an expression I had never seen before,--of pain, reproach, of questioning.
It frightened me.
"Oh, Hugh, how little you know!" she cried.
"What do you mean?" I demanded.
"That is what has brought her to this decision--you and I."
"You mean that--that Maude loves me? That she is jealous?" I don"t know how I managed to say it.
"No woman likes to think that she is a failure," murmured Nancy.
"Well, but she isn"t really," I insisted. "She could have made another man happy--a better man. It was all one of those terrible mistakes our modern life seems to emphasize so."
"She is a woman," Nancy said, with what seemed a touch of vehemence.
"It"s useless to expect you to understand.... Do you remember what I said to you about her? How I appealed to you when you married to try to appreciate her?"