Besides, the husband does not like it. He discourages religion, except
in homoeopathic doses, taken by way of a little tonic, as one goes to
the theatre for a pick-me-up. As he remarks, he does not believe in
women being too spiritual. It is not “healthy.” If his wife goes to
church with any regularity he suspects there is an attractive cleric
round the corner. And sometimes he is right. Anyhow, he does not feel
the need of religion, except when he gets a pretty bad dose of influenza
and has an uneasy thought that he is going to “peg out.” As a rule he
enjoys good health, and has no time to bother about the supernatural.
He does not meet it in the city. It is not a marketable commodity. It is
not, as he says, “in his line of country.” He does not see why it should
be in his wife’s line of country. He is annoyed when his wife takes
up any of these cranky ideas. He rages inwardly when she takes them up
passionately. Why can’t she be normal?
Why on earth can’t she go on as she began, with her little feminine
interests, keeping herself pretty for his sake, keen on the latest
fashions, neighborly with young wives like herself, and fond of a bit
of frivolity now and then? When she complains that she has idle hands in
her lap, and wants something to do, he reminds her that she found plenty
to do in the first years of her married life. When she cries out that
she is bored, he points out to her that she gets much more amusement
than he does.
And that is true, because by the time he has reached the Eighth Year
he is pretty busy. Ambition has caught hold of him and he is making a
career. It is not easy. Competition is deadly. He has got his work cut
out to keep abreast with his competitors. It is a constant struggle “to
keep his end up.” He finds it disconcerting when he comes home in the
evenings after the anxiety of his days, dog-tired and needing sympathy,
to find that his wife has an attack of nerves, or a feverish desire to
go out and “see something.” He wants to stay at home and rest, to dawdle
over the evening paper, to listen to a tune or two from his wife.
He would like her to bring his slippers to him, as she used to do in the
old days, to hover round him a little with endearing words, and then,
with not too much of _that_, to keep quiet, assenting to his opinions
when he expresses them, and being restful. He has his own grievances.
He is not without troubles of soul and body. He has had to face
disappointment, disillusionment, hours of blank pessimism. He has had
to get to grips with reality, after the romanticism of his youth, and to
put a check upon his natural instincts and desires. In many ways it is
harder for the man than for the woman. Civilization and the monogamous
code have not been framed on easy lines for men. To keep the ordinary
rules of his caste he must put a continual restraint upon himself,
make many sacrifices. Women and wives forget that human nature has not
changed because men wear black coats and tall hats instead of the skins
of beasts. Human nature is exactly the same as it ever was, strong and
savage, but it has to be tamed and repressed within the four walls of a
flat in West Kensington, or within a semi-detached house at Wimbledon.
There are moments when the man hears the call of the wild, and loathes
respectability and conventionality with a deadly loathing. In his
heart, as in the heart of every man, there is a little Bohemia, a little
country of lawlessness and errant fancy and primitive desires. Sometimes
when he has shut himself up in his study, when the servants are in the
kitchen washing up the supper-things, when his wife is lying down with a
bad headache, he unlocks the door of that Bohemia in his heart, and his
imagination goes roving, and he hears the pan-pipes calling, and the
stamp of the cloven hoofs of the old Nature-god. He would like to cut
and run sometimes from this respectable life of his, to go in search of
adventure down forbidden pathways, and to find the joy of life again in
Liberty Hall. This fretful wife of his, this social-ladder climbing, the
whole business of “playing the game” in the same old way, makes him
very tired, and gets on his nerves at times most damnably. He has his
temptations. He hears siren voices calling him. He sees the lure of the
witch-women. To feel his pulse thrill to the wine of life, to get
the fever of joy in his blood again, to plunge into the fiery lake of
passion, are temptations from which he does not escape because he is
Something in the City, or a barrister-at-law, and a married man with
a delicate wife. But, being a man, with a man’s work, and a man’s
ambition, he keeps his sanity, and quite often his self-respect. His
eyes are clear enough to see the notice-boards on the boundary lines of
the forbidden territory, “Trespassers will be prosecuted,” “Please keep
off the grass,” “No thoroughfare.” He locks up the gate to the little
Bohemia in his heart, and puts the key into a secret cupboard of his
brain. He understands quite clearly that if he once “goes off the
rails,” as he calls it, his ambitions will be frustrated and his career
spoiled. Besides, being a conventionalist and somewhat of a snob, he
would hate to be found out in any violation of the social code, and his
blood runs cold at the idea of his making a fool of himself with a
woman, or anything of that kind. The creed of his social code, of the
pot-hatted civilization, of this suburban conventionality of these
little private snob-doms, is stronger in the man than in the woman. When
she once takes the bit between her teeth, as it were, she becomes
utterly lawless. But the man reins himself in more easily. He finds it
on the whole less difficult to be law-abiding. He has also a clearer
vision of the logic of things. He knows that certain results follow
certain causes. He can measure up the consequences of an act, and weigh
them. He is guided by his brain rather than by his emotions. He has
certain fixed principles deeply rooted in him. He has a more delicate
sense of honor than most women. It is summed up in that old
school-phrase of his--“playing the game.” However much his nerves may be
jangled, and goodness knows they are often jangled, especially as the
Eighth Year draws near, he is generally master of himself. At least he
does not, as a rule, have hysterical outbursts, or give rein to
passionate impulses, or suddenly take some wild plunge, upsetting all
the balance of his life. He does not take frightful risks, as a woman
will always take them, recklessly, when she reaches her crisis.
So it is that he looks coldly upon his wife’s desires for some new
emotional activity, of whatever kind it may be, religious, political, or
ethical. He hates any symptoms of fanaticism. He shivers at any breach
of good form. He would like her always to be sitting in the drawing-room
when he comes home, in a pretty frock, with a novel in her lap, with
a smile in her eyes. He does not and will not understand that this
childless wife of his must have strong interests outside her little home
to save her from eating her heart out. He hides from himself the fact
that her childlessness is a curse which is blighting her. He pooh-poohs
her tragic cry for help. He is just a little brutal with her when she
accuses him of thwarting all the desires of her soul. And he is scared,
thoroughly scared, when at last she takes flight, on wild wings, to some
spiritual country, or to some moral, or immoral, territory, where he
could not follow. He tries to call her back. But sometimes she may not
be called back. She has escaped beyond the reach of his voice.