And they were married. But instead of hiding their happiness in
their beautiful clean home, they set out on a journey among strange,
indifferent, curious, and even hostile people. Then they went from
hotel to hotel, were stared at at tables d'hôte, got headaches in
museums, and in the evening were dumb with fatigue and put out of
humour by mishaps.
Tom away from his work and his surroundings, the industrious man found
it difficult to collect himself. When his thoughts went back to the
business matters which he had left in the hands of others, he was
inattentive and tiresome. They both longed for home, but were ashamed
to return and to be received with ridicule.
The first week they occupied the time by talking over the
recollections of their engagement; during the second week they
discussed the journeys of the first. They never lived in the present
but in the past. When there was an interval of dullness or silence
he had always comforted her with the thought that their intercourse
would be easier when they had amassed a store of common memories,
and had learnt to avoid each other's antipathies. Meanwhile, out of
consideration, they had borne with these and suppressed their own
peculiarities and weaknesses as well-brought-up people usually do.
This led to a feeling of restraint and being on one's guard which was
exhausting; and the time had come for making important discoveries.
Since he possessed more self-control than she did, he was careful
not to say too much, but concealed one inclination and habit after
another, while she revealed all hers. As he loved her, he wished to
be agreeable, and therefore learned to be silent. The result was that
with all her inherited habits, peculiarities, and prejudices she had
so insinuated herself into his life that he began to feel himself
attenuated and annihilated.
One evening the young wife was seized with a sudden desire to praise
her sister, a hateful coquette, whom her husband disliked because
she had tried, from selfish motives, to break their engagement. He
listened to his wife in respectful silence, now and then murmuring an
indistinct assent. At last his wife's praise of her sister mounted to
a paean, and though he thought her affection for her relatives a fine
trait in her character, he could not entirely place himself in her
skin nor see with her eyes. So he took refuge in the kind of silence
which is more eloquent than plain words. This silence was accompanied
by a gnawing of the lips and a violent perspiration. All the words and
opinions he had suppressed found mute expression in these movements
of his lips--he merely "marked time" as actors say--and the breaths
which were not used in forming words, he emitted through his nose.
Simultaneously the pores of his skin opened as so many safety-valves
for his suppressed emotions, and it became really unpleasant to have
him at the table.
The young wife did not conceal her annoyance, for she feared no
revenge. She made an ugly gesture, which always ill becomes a woman;
she held her nose with both fingers, looking around to those present as
if to ask whether she was not right!
Her husband became pale, rose, and went out. Several people were
sitting close by who witnessed the unpleasant scene. When he came out
on the streets of the foreign town, he unbuttoned his waistcoat and
breathed freely. And then his thoughts took their own course ruthlessly.
"I am becoming a hypocrite simply out of consideration for her. One
lie is piled up on another, and some day it will all come down with a
crash. What a coarse woman she is! And it was from her that I believed
I should learn and be refined into a higher being. It is all optical
delusion and deceit. All this 'love' is merely a piece of trickery on
the part of nature to dazzle one's sight."
He tried to picture to himself what was now happening in the
dining-room. She would naturally weep and appeal with her eyes to those
present as if to ask whether she was not very unfortunate with such a
husband. It was indeed her habit so to appeal with her eyes, and when
he expected an answer from her, she always turned her looks on those
around as if asking for help against her oppressor. He was always
treated as a tyrant, although out of pure kindness he had made himself
her slave. There was no help for it!
He found himself down by the harbour, and caught sight of the
swimming-baths--that was just what he wanted. Quickly he plunged into
the sea, and swam far out into the darkness. His soul, tortured by
mosquito-stings and nettle-pricks, was able to cool itself, and he felt
how he left a wake of dirt behind him. He lay on his back and gazed at
the starry sky, but at the same moment heard a whistling and splashing
behind him. It was a great steamer coming in, and he had to get out of
the way to save His life. He made for the lamp-lit shore and saw the
hotel with all its lights.
When he had dressed, he felt an unmeasured sorrow--sorrow over his lost
paradise. At the same time all bitterness had passed away.
In this mood he entered his room and found his wife seated at the
writing-table. She rose and threw herself into his arms without a word
of apology; naturally enough he did not desire it, and she had no idea
of having done wrong.
They sat down and wept together over their vanished love, for that it
had gone there was no doubt. But it had gone without their will, and
they sorrowed over it, as over some dear friend which they had not
killed but could not save. They were confronted by a fact before which
they were helpless; love the good genius who magnifies every trifle,
rejuvenates what is old, beautifies what is ugly, had abandoned them,
and life stretched before them in naked monotony.
But it did not occur to them that they would be separated or were
separated, for their grief itself was an experience they shared, which
held them together. They were also united in a common grudge against
Fate, which had so deceived them in their tenderest emotions. In their
great dejection they were not capable of such a strong feeling as hate.
They only felt resentment and indignation at Fate, which was their
scapegoat and lightning-conductor.
They had never talked so harmoniously and so intimately before, and
while their voices assumed a more affectionate tone, they formed a firm
resolve to go home and commence their domestic life. He talked himself
into a state of enthusiasm at the thought of home, where one could
exclude all evil influences, and where peace and harmony would reign.
She also dilated on the same topic with similar warmth till they had
forgotten their sorrow. And when they had forgotten it, they smiled
as before, and behold! love was again there, and not dead at all; its
death was also a delusion and so was all their grief.