The installation at Windlow seemed as natural and obvious as any other
of the wonderful steps of Howard's new life. The only thing which
bothered him was the incursions of callers, to which his marriage
seemed to have rendered the house liable. Howard loved monotony, and in
the little Windlow party he found everything that he desired. At first
it all rather amused him, because he felt as though he were acting in a
charming and absurd play, and he was delighted to see Maud act her
wedded part. Mrs. Graves frankly enjoyed seeing people of any sort or
kind. But Howard gradually began to find that the arrival of county and
clerical neighbours was a really tiresome thing. Local gossip was
unintelligible to him and did not interest him. Moreover, the necessity
of going out to luncheon, and even to dinner, bored him horribly. He
said once rather pettishly to Maud, after a week of constant
interruptions and little engagements, that he hoped that this sort of
thing would not continue.
"It seems to knock everything on the head," he went on; "these country
idylls are all very well in their way; but when it comes to
entertaining parties day by day, who 'sit simply chatting in a rustic
row,' it becomes intolerable. It doesn't MEAN anything; one can't get
to know these people; if there is anything to know, they seem to think
it polite to conceal it; it can't be a duty to waste all the time that
this takes up?"
Maud laughed and said, "Oh, you must forgive them; they haven't much to
do or talk about, and you are a great excitement; and you are really
very good to them!"
Howard made a grimace. "It's my wretched habit of civility!" he said.
"But really, Maud, you can't LIKE them?"
"Yes, I believe I do," said Maud. "But then I am more or less used to
the kind of thing. I like people, I think!"
"Yes, so do I, in a sort of way," said Howard; "but, really, with some
of these caravans it is more like having a flock of sheep in the place!"
"Well, I like SHEEP, then," said Maud; "I don't really see how we can
stop it."
"I suppose it's the seamy side of marriage!" said Howard.
Maud looked at him for a moment, and then, getting up from her chair
and coming across to him, she put her hands on his shoulders and looked
in his face.
"Are you VEXED?" she said in rather a tragic tone.
"No, of course, not vexed," said Howard, catching her round the waist.
"What an idea! I am only jealous of everything which seems to come in
between us, and I have seemed to see you lately through a mist of oddly
dressed females. It's a system, I suppose, a social system, to enable
people to waste their time. I feel as if I had got caught in a sort of
glue--wading in glue. One ought to live life, or the best part of it,
on one's own lines. I feel as if I was on show just now, and it's a
nuisance."
"Well," said Maud, "I am afraid I do rather like showing you off and
feeling grand; but it won't go on for ever. I'll try to contrive
something. I don't see why you need be drawn in. I'll talk to Cousin
Anne about it."
"But I am not going to mope alone," said Howard. "Where thou goest, I
will go. I can't bear to let you out of my sight, you little witch! But
I feel it is casting pearls before swine--your pearls, I mean."
"I don't see what to do," said Maud, looking rather troubled. "I ought
to have seen that you hated it."
"No, it's my own stupid fault," said Howard. "You are right, and I am
wrong. I see it is my business at present to go about like a dancing
bear, and I'll dance, I'll dance! It's priggish to think about wasting
one's sweetness. What I really feel is this. 'Here's an hour,' I say,
'when I might have had Maud all to myself, and she and I have been
talking about the weather to a pack of unoccupied females.'"
"Something comes of it," said Maud. "I don't know what it is, but it's
a kind of chain. I don't think it matters much what they talk about,
but there is a sort of kindness about it which I like--something which
lies behind ideas. These people don't say anything, but they think
something into one--it's alive, and it moves."
"Oh, yes," said Howard, "it's alive, no doubt. It would amuse me a good
deal to see these people at home, if I could just be hidden in the
curtains, and hear what they really talked about, and what they really
felt. It's when they have their armour on that they bore me. It is not
a pretty armour, and they don't wear it well; they don't fight in
it--they only wear it that you mayn't touch them. If they would give
themselves away and talk like Miss Bates, I could stand it."
"Well," said Maud, "I am going to say something rather bold. It comes,
I think, of living at Cambridge with clever people, and having real
things to talk about, that makes your difficulty. You care about
people's minds more than about themselves, perhaps? But I'm on their
level, and they seem to me to be telling something about themselves all
the time. Of course it must be GHASTLY for you, and we will try to
arrange things better."
"No, dearest, you won't, and you mustn't," said Howard. "That's the
best of marriage, that one does get a glimpse into different things.
You are perfectly and entirely right. It simply means that I can't talk
their language, and I will learn it. I am a prig; your husband is a
prig--but he will try to do better. It isn't a duty, and it isn't a
pleasure, and it isn't a question of minds at all. It is just living
life on ordinary terms. I won't have anything different at all. I'm
ashamed of myself for my moans. When I have anything in the way of work
to do, it may be different. But now I see what I have to do. I am
suffering from the stupidity of so-called clever people; and you
mustn't mind it. Only don't, for Heaven's sake, try to contrive, or to
spare me things. That is how the ugly paterfamilias is made. You
mustn't spoil me or manage me; if I ever suspect you of doing that,
I'll just go back to Cambridge alone. I hate even to have made you look
at me as you did just now--you must forgive me that and many other
things; and now you must promise just this, that if I am snappish you
won't give way; you must not become a slipper-warmer."
"Yes, yes, I promise," said Maud, laughing; "here's my hand on it! You
shall be diligently henpecked. But I am always rather puzzled about
these things; all these old ideas about mutual consolation and advice
and improvement and support ought to be THERE--they all mean
something--they mean a great deal! But the moment they are spoken
about, or even thought about, they seem so stuffy and disgusting. I
don't understand it! I feel that one ought to be able to talk plainly
about anything; and yet the more plainly you talk about such things as
these, the more hateful you are, and the meaner you feel!"