Part 60 (1/2)

”It is not fair to use that word. I tell you that we both confidently expected that when you had more experience you would be like other women and adjust yourself sensibly to your conditions.”

”I see,” said Hadria, ”and so it was decided that Hubert was to pretend to have no objections to my wild ideas, so as to obtain my consent, trusting to the ponderous bulk of circ.u.mstance to hold me flat and subservient when I no longer had a remedy in my power. You neither of you lack brains, at any rate.” Henriette clenched her hands in the effort of self-control.

”In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, our forecasts would have come true,” she said. ”I mean----”

”That is refres.h.i.+ngly frank,” cried Hadria.

”We thought we acted for the best.”

”Oh, if it comes to that, the Spanish Inquisitors doubtless thought that they were acting for the best, when they made bonfires of heretics in the market-places.” Henriette bent her head and clasped the arms of the chair, tightly.

”Well, if there be any one at fault in the matter, _I_ am the culprit,”

she said in a voice that trembled. ”It was _I_ who a.s.sured Hubert that experience would alter you. It was I who represented to him that though you might be impulsive, even hard at times, you could not persist in a course that would give pain, and that if you saw that any act of yours caused him to suffer, you would give it up. I was convinced that your character was good and n.o.ble _au fond_, Hadria, and I have believed it up to this moment.”

Hadria drew herself together with a start, and her face darkened. ”You make me regret that I ever had a good or a pitiful impulse!” she cried with pa.s.sion.

She went to the window and stood leaning against the cas.e.m.e.nt, with crossed arms.

Henriette turned round in her chair.

”Why do you always resist your better nature, Hadria?”

”You use it against me. It is the same with all women. Let them beware of their 'better natures,' poor hunted fools! for that 'better nature'

will be used as a dog-chain, by which they can be led, like toy-terriers, from beginning to end of what they are pleased to call their lives!”

”Oh, Hadria, Hadria!” cried Miss Temperley with deep regret in her tone.

But Hadria was only roused by the remonstrance.

”It is cunning, shallow, heartless women, who really fare best in our society; its conditions suit them. _They_ have no pity, no sympathy to make a chain of; _they_ don't mind stooping to conquer; _they_ don't mind playing upon the weaker, baser sides of men's natures; _they_ don't mind appealing, for their own ends, to the pity and generosity of others; _they_ don't mind swallowing indignity and smiling abjectly, like any woman of the harem at her lord, so that they gain their object.

_That_ is the sort of 'woman's nature' that our conditions are busy selecting. Let us cultivate it. We live in a scientific age; the fittest survive. Let us be 'fit.'”

”Let us be womanly, let us do our duty, let us hearken to our conscience!” cried Henriette.

”Thank you! If my conscience is going to be made into a helm by which others may guide me according to their good pleasure, the sooner that helm is destroyed the better. That is the conclusion to which you drive me and the rest of us, Henriette.”

”Charity demands that I do not believe what you say,” said Miss Temperley.

”Oh, don't trouble to be charitable!”

Henriette heaved a deep sigh. ”Hadria,” she said, ”are you going to allow your petty rancour about this--well, I will call it error of ours, if you like to be severe--are you going to bear malice and ruin your own life and Hubert's and the children's? Are you so unforgiving, so lacking in generosity?”

”_You_ call it an error. _I_ call it a treachery,” returned Hadria. ”Why should the results of that treachery be thrust on to _my_ shoulders to bear? Why should _my_ generosity be summoned to your rescue? But I suppose you calculated on that sub-consciously, at the time.”

”_Hadria!_”

”This is a moment for plain speaking, if ever there was one. You must have reckoned on an appeal to my generosity, and on the utter helplessness of my position when once I was safely entrapped. It was extremely clever and well thought out. Do you suppose that you would have dared to act as you did, if there had been means of redress in my hands, after marriage?”

”If I _did_ rely on your generosity, I admit my mistake,” said Henriette bitterly.