"I won't be so stupid as to try to make excuses for you," said Helen,
tucking up snugly against my shoulder. "Let's own up honestly we made a
mistake, Ted. For I must be to blame somewhere, too. Yes, Ted dear--I
know it. Don't go on shaking your head. It isn't comfy. We mustn't make
a mistake like this again--that's all. It isn't like us."
"It wasn't just a case of putting my foot in it, sweetheart. I went and
sat down in the spilt milk."
Helen laughed gently. "Poor old boy, your pride has had a nasty knock,
hasn't it? So has mine, dear."
I thought this over in silence. We were young enough to take each other
tragically. But I had my first doubt as to whether I was of heroic
stuff--I mean that for the first time I wondered if success were
inevitably mine. Suppose I was only a commonplace person who got along
amiably enough, yet never pulled off anything big? In that case all the
hopes Helen had in me would prove to be vain dreams. Then what would
happen? Would she love me then--or didn't love demand the heroic? It was
Knowlton who had made Deep Harbor a success, and now my father had
stepped in and saved me again. Where was the missing cog in my
mechanism? What could I do--what ought I to do--how could I find out?
"It isn't your fault, hubby-boy," Helen said, her face against mine.
"You aren't meant to be a chemist. Your father has had you learn a
profession which at best is no more than a secret anxiety to you. It
haunts you with a never-ending fear, because it is not really your work.
It's only a part you are trying to play to please him."