One sorry satisfaction attends on circumstance which admit no prospect
of great happiness or pleasurable development, disappointment and
disillusion are alike avoided. During five dull years of married life
Prudence passed from one stage to another of repugnance, remorse, and
hostility, till she reached the final stage of apathetic resignation to
the conditions of her life.
The years, and Prudence's lack of any response, had considerably altered
Edward Morgan's feelings towards her. The ardour of his passion had
cooled, and a polite indifference mainly characterised his mental
attitude in regard to his girl-wife. He remained proud of her, proud of
her youth and of her beauty; but they were in no sense companions, or
even faintly interested in each other's concerns. They went their
separate ways within the first two years of the ill-assorted union.
During the first year they quarrelled frequently. Mr Morgan,
unaccustomed to opposition, found himself so constantly opposed to his
young wife in small things that his temper suffered considerably. Their
first serious difference was in the matter of open windows. Mr Morgan
was unaccustomed to sleeping with his window open to the treacherous
ills of the night air; Prudence was unaccustomed to sleep with them
closed. She could not, she averred, sleep at all in an insufficiently
ventilated room; she couldn't breathe without air. It transpired that
Mr Morgan's respiratory organs worked better in a confined atmosphere.
He ought to have belonged to the toad, or other hybernating species,
Prudence reflected, but forbore to frame her reflections in speech.
They spent some hours one cold night in the unprofitable exercise of
jumping in and out of bed, alternately opening and shutting the window;
until Prudence, recognising the absence of dignity in these proceedings,
feigned slumber; and awoke in the morning with a headache, and the fixed
resolve to have a separate sleeping apartment.
Quarrels were frequent after that decision, which she adhered to firmly;
until finally they arrived at that state of mutual indifference to which
most unsuitably married people attain in time, when they are not
sufficiently spirited to part, or are deterred by other considerations
from taking this step.
No children came to bless the union. The little hands which might have
drawn them together, the little feet which alone could have bridged the
distances, were destined never to gladden their hearts. It was a great
grief to Prudence that she had no child. Had a little child been born
to her it would have eased her heart hunger and filled her lonely life
and satisfied her. It might possibly have reconciled her to her
marriage. The mother instinct was strong in her. She desired a child
with passionate intensity, and she was denied this greatest wish of her
life. She resented this. It widened the gulf between herself and her
husband, and fed her discontent from the perennial springs of regret
which occasionally submerge the barren woman's soul in bitter waters.
She wished to adopt a child; but Edward Morgan objected to the
introduction into his quiet home of a child who was not his; and she let
the matter drop. It would have caused dissension had she persisted.
Edward was seconded in his objection by old Mrs Morgan, who continued
to live with them, her promise of a separate establishment having ended
in a temporary absence from Morningside, to which she returned on a
visit to her daughter-in-law, which prolonged itself indefinitely until
her presence in the home was tacitly accepted as a matter of course.
Had she adopted a child, there would have been, Prudence foresaw,
considerable disagreement in regard to its upbringing; she and the
Morgans held such opposite views on subjects of hygiene and education
and general discipline.
Mrs Henry was Prudence's sole refuge from unutterable boredom. The
worldly-minded little woman proved a staunch ally. But her influence
did not tend towards reconciling Prudence to her lot. Mrs Henry
cordially detested her husband's people, and enjoyed nothing better than
inciting her sister-in-law to rebellion.
"They would flatten you out, if you allowed them to," she declared,
"until you felt like nothing in the world so much as a tired worm. They
tried it on with me."
Prudence fell into the habit of seeking Mrs Henry's society whenever
life at home proved more than usually trying; and Mrs Henry, whose
house enjoyed the reputation of being a sort of free hotel, encouraged
her visits, recognising in her pretty sister-in-law's presence an
additional attraction to her successful parties.
The intimacy between the two women was a source of continual annoyance
to Mrs Morgan; but Edward, who liked his brother's wife and trusted his
own wife implicitly, saw no reason for objecting to the friendship.
Possibly he was wise enough to recognise that any objection to this
harmless pleasure would be futile. The affair of the windows had left a
lasting impression on his mind.
The beginning of the sixth year of her married life, when Prudence, at
the age of twenty-five, outwardly very little altered since the day she
married, had become resigned, if not reconciled, to a life in which she
foresaw no possibility of change, witnessed the outbreak of war--the war
which sprung so suddenly upon the world, and which was destined to
change so many lives. Lives which were fitted into grooves so deeply
that it seemed they had rusted there and could never be dislodged, were
flung out of their ruts like lava spit from the mouth of a volcano by
this greatest upheaval which the world had known. To Morgan Bros, as to
Mr Graynor, the great disaster brought added prosperity. The works
were engaged in the manufacture of khaki, which Bobby, afire with
enthusiasm, and eager for release from a life that was irksome and
uninspiring, donned speedily, to William's manifest satisfaction, and
his grandfather's pride and grief.
That was the beginning of the changes in Prudence's life. Apart from
her anxiety on Bobby's account, and the natural gravity which the
appalling immensity of the disaster occasioned, Prudence in the early
days witnessed only the lighter side of war. Mrs Henry, destined
before those tragic five years ran their terrible course to lose both
her young sons, worked hard in the early days--indeed, she worked
unflaggingly to the end, and bravely strove to hide her sorrow from the
world--to give the men she knew, and many who were strangers to her
until the wearing of the uniform made them participators in her
hospitality, the best of times while they remained in England. Dances
and entertainments of every description were organised on a princely
scale for the benefit of the men who were out to defend the honour of
the Empire.
Old Mrs Morgan looked upon all this festivity disapprovingly, and
remonstrated with her, urging the unseemliness of feting in such
frivolous fashion men who were about to face death, and many of whom
would be called inevitably before long to meet their God. But Mrs
Henry treated these remonstrances with smiling indifference.
"The heroes of Waterloo left a ball-room to defeat their enemies," she
argued. "I expect the poor dears fought better and died happier by
reason of those few bright hours. The boys like being amused, and they
love flirting with the girls. Whatever does it matter? If one has to
die one might as well have a good time first. It is the moment, after
all, which counts. We have only the present to think for; there may be
no to-morrow."
Which view of things did not tend to soothe her mother-in-law, who had
arrived at an age which avoids reflecting on the uncertainty of the
future.
"Rose has no spiritual outlook," she observed one evening, over the
nightly glass of hot water which she sipped with an enjoyment a toper
might evince while imbibing his grog. "Her attitude towards the
Hereafter is frankly pagan. She will perhaps be brought some day
through suffering to recognise the vanity of this world, and the
importance of the Future Life. No one can escape responsibility for his
acts."
"Quite possibly Rose's record will be finer than the records of many
people who lead seemingly exemplary lives," returned Prudence, to whom
her mother-in-law's narrow views were particularly irritating. "`How
strange it will be,' as Lewis Hind says, `if, when we awake from the
dream of death, we find that we are judged only by the good we have
done.' That would cause a considerable readjustment of the balance."
"People who lead good lives do good by example," Mrs Morgan insisted;
"those who spend their days in a feverish round of pleasure exert an
evil influence."
"The warm impulses which make for kindly human acts and brighten life
for others have for me greater virtue than any prayer," came the quick
retort, which scandalised Edward Morgan as well as his mother, and
provoked him into joining in the discussion.
"I don't like to hear any disparagement of prayer," he said quietly.
"Your training in a pious home should have taught you at least respect
for such things. I say nothing against pleasure, except where it
clashes with duty. In the lives of upright people duty ranks above
everything."
"I've heard so much about the paramount importance of duty that I am a
little weary of it. It seems good to turn instead to the more genial
side of human nature. I think Rose's practical idea of a God-speed to
the men by sending them off smiling is just splendid. They all kissed
her in sheer gratitude when they left her house the other night."
"I hope," Edward Morgan said stiffly, "that you don't allow them to take
those liberties with you?"
Prudence laughed suddenly.
"I'd just love it, if they did," she said. "But I am too near their own
age for them to attempt it. I've, promised to write to quite a number
of them though. That includes parcels. They will all be glad of gifts
from home. They are so young and jolly and full of life--just like
Bobby."
Her eyes were a little wistful. She stood up, a graceful girlish figure
in blue velvet, with the light falling softly on the gold of her hair.
Edward Morgan's gaze followed her movements, as she walked to the
fireplace and stood leaning with her arm on the mantelshelf, looking
down on the hearth. This free and frequent mixing with young life of
the male sex disturbed him. He was jealous. It seemed to him that this
new stream of sturdy youthful masculinity flowed between them, and set
them still further apart. If his love for Prudence had diminished, his
sense of proprietorship had not abated in the least. His pride of
ownership was in arms against this incursion of new interests, new
friendships, in which he had no share.
"Rose is giving another dance to-morrow night, isn't she?" he said. "I
think I'll go with you and look on for a bit."
She lifted her head and glanced towards him, surprised, and not
particularly overwhelmed with gladness at the prospect of his company.
Her reception of his proposal was not exactly flattering.
"You! You will be--bored. It's just a romp."
"Henry will be there, I suppose?"
"Oh, Henry! He likes that sort of thing. He romps too."
"Henry was always a fool," Mrs Morgan put in acidly. "He would not
have married Rose if he had possessed ordinary common sense. It will be
as well for you to go, Edward; it may lend a little dignity to the
occasion."
Prudence laughed.
"Oh! there's plenty of dignity--of a joyous nature," she said. "We
don't rag."
She crossed to old Mrs Morgan's side and laid a hand on the back of her
chair, feeling remorseful, as she so often felt when she had been
provoked into a show of ungraciousness.
"You come too," she said softly,--"just for an hour, and look on. You'd
love it; and they would love to see you there. It's you, and others
like you, that every mother's son of them is out to fight for. Come and
show them you appreciate their sacrifice."
"I can better show my appreciation," Mrs Morgan answered, "by praying
for them on my knees every night and morning of my life." She handed
her empty tumbler to her daughter-in-law, and stood up. "It is time I
went to bed," she said. "I find these talks very upsetting."
"I'm sorry," Prudence said, and suffered the distant good-night kiss,
which was the customary parting between them, regardless of any feeling
of antagonism that lay behind the caress.