"Conventions!" Armstrong repeated the word with emphasis. "You don"t imagine that I am going to let local conventions tell me what to do when I get home?"
"I don"t imagine anything," replied Uncle Peabody. "I was merely stating a fact."
Helen saw the hot retort upon her husband"s lips. "I would not discuss this any more until after dinner," she said, quietly, as she rose. "As Jack says, it is a perfectly natural thing for Inez to visit me. It is possible that it can be arranged in some way."
"Good!" cried Armstrong. "I am glad that there is one sensible person in the party!"
He tried to slip his arm around Helen"s waist, but she gently avoided him.
"Come," she urged, "we shall be late if we don"t get ready now. We have too little time as it is."
After dinner Uncle Peabody and Inez announced their intention of devoting the evening to letter-writing, so Helen and Jack found themselves alone together in the garden. Helen wrapped her shawl closely about her, wondering at the chill which came over her when she realized that she was alone with her husband and that the opportunity for which she had waited was at hand. She was silent, trying to decide how best to open the conversation. Her mind was made up at last. If others had begun to notice the estrangement, it was time that Jack knew of it, and from her. All doubt, all uncertainty had vanished.
She looked long at her husband in the dim starlight. He was so near her, yet how far away he really was! Even he did not realize how far.
She could see the lines of his face lighted by his cigar as he silently smoked it, his eyes fixed upon the lights of the city beyond. How strong it was, Helen thought, how strong he was compared with her own weak self! She wondered what his thoughts were centred upon--whether on his masterpiece or upon Inez! Upon Inez! That brought her back to the task before her.
It was a difficult task; she realized that. There could be no immediate separation, for that would mean an interruption to the work. She must stay in Florence until the ma.n.u.script was completed or Inez could not remain. No, there must not be any break between Jack and herself for the present, or his mind would be taken from his book and another failure added to the great one in which she felt herself to be the most concerned. Yet she must make him understand that she was not dull to the signs which she and the others could but read. To continue to act as if ignorant of them would be the worst of all. She must remain his wife until his supreme effort was accomplished, then the living lie could be ended and the new and separate life begun.
Armstrong interrupted her reverie before it had quite come to an end.
"You are not looking like yourself lately, Helen," he said, abruptly. "I meant to have spoken of it before."
Helen started at the suddenness of his remark. "Not looking like myself?" she repeated, mechanically. "How do you mean?"
"You look tired and worn out."
"I am getting older, Jack," Helen smiled, sadly. "Perhaps that is what you have noticed."
"Nonsense," replied Armstrong. "You used to be so bright and vivacious, and now you sit around and hardly say a word."
She could not answer for a moment. "I did not realize that I had become such poor company, Jack. You have not seemed interested lately in the things I would naturally talk about, and of course a great deal of your conversation is upon subjects with which I am unfamiliar."
"You are quite sure that you are not getting too tired going to all these social functions?"
"Quite sure. If you stop to think a moment, these are really the only entertainment I get. Would you prefer that I stayed here at the villa alone?"
"Why, no; unless you are doing too much of that sort of thing. Are you feeling perfectly well?"
Helen hardly knew what to reply. "Yes," she said, at length, "I am feeling perfectly well."
Armstrong showed his relief. "I told Uncle Peabody he was an alarmist,"
he said.
"What did Uncle Peabody say?" queried Helen, straightening up, Emory"s remarks coming back to her. "I did not know that you and he had been discussing me."
"He said that you were unhappy, and fast becoming a fit subject for Italian malaria. He had better stick to his specialty, and not try to become a general pract.i.tioner."
"Oh," said Helen, relieved that she had not been antic.i.p.ated, and resuming her former position.
"Of course he was as mistaken about your being unhappy as he was about your being ill," Armstrong continued, his remark being half a.s.sertion and half question.
Helen made no response. He waited a moment or two, glancing at her furtively, and then put his question more directly.
"You are not unhappy, are you?"
Helen tried to fathom the motive which underlay this question. At last Jack had become conscious of the fact that he had hurt her and was endeavoring to make amends. This was like him; what he had said and done during the weeks past was not like him. Now something which Uncle Peabody had said had brought him to himself again. He saw a duty to perform, and he a.s.sumed it conscientiously; but it was an act of duty rather than an act of love--she felt that in every word he spoke.
"Yes, Jack," she finally admitted, "I am very unhappy."
Armstrong was annoyed. "I really thought you were stronger, Helen," he said, petulantly. "It is all over this library work, I suppose."
"I am not strong," replied Helen, quietly. "That is where the whole trouble lies. I am wofully weak, and I only wish that you and I had discovered it sooner."
"How would that have helped matters any?"
"If we had discovered it before we were married it would have helped matters a great deal," said Helen, with decision. "As we did not do that we must accept things as they are until we can find a solution of the problem."
"I have offered time and again to give up my work; now it has reached a point where I simply must finish it."
"Of course you must; I should be the first to oppose you were you to suggest anything different."
"Then why are you unhappy? I don"t understand you at all."
"I know you don"t, and you understand yourself just as little. The work you are doing is simply an incident; the results of that work in making you an entirely different man is the main point. Do you not feel that yourself?"
"So that is it," replied Armstrong. "The work has made a different man of me, and you object to the change."
"No, it is not the change which has made me unhappy. During these weeks you have become infinitely bigger and stronger and grander, and I admire you just that much the more."
"Then why are you unhappy?"
"Because"--Helen choked down a little sob--"because, as you say, I am so weak. Because it has left me just that much behind, and has shown me how little suited I am to be your wife."
"How you do magnify things!" exclaimed Armstrong. "It is not an uncommon thing for a husband to have interests apart from his wife; it is no reflection on the wife."
"But how much better--how much more helpful--if the husband and the wife can share the same interests?"
"Granted. But why suggest a modern miracle?"
"It has shown me another thing," Helen continued, fearful lest she should be diverted from her main theme. "Inez is already much more to you than I."
Armstrong sprang to his feet, with difficulty holding back the angry words upon his lips. "This is going too far, Helen," he said, with forced calm. "Do you realize that you are actually making an accusation?"
Helen regarded him calmly but sadly. "I am making no accusation," she said, quietly. "I believe in your loyalty to me and in your sense of what is right, but the fact remains. Inez loves you, and has loved you almost since the day she arrived. Is it possible that you are insensible to this?"
"You must stop!" expostulated Armstrong. "You cannot realize what you are saying!"