Part 77 (1/2)

'Will you tell me,' he said at length, 'how your position is regarded by these friends of yours? I don't mean your mother and brother, but the people who come to this house.'

'I have not asked such people for their opinion.'

'Still, I suppose some sort of explanation has been necessary in your intercourse with them. How have you represented your relations with me?'

'I can't see that that concerns you.'

'In a manner it does. Certainly it matters very little to me how I am thought of by people of this kind, but one doesn't like to be reviled without cause. Have you allowed it to be supposed that I have made life with me intolerable for you?'

'No, I have not. You insult me by asking the question, but as you don't seem to understand feelings of that kind I may as well answer you simply.'

'Then have you told them the truth? That I became so poor you couldn't live with me?'

'I have never said that in so many words, but no doubt it is understood.

It must be known also that you refused to take the step which might have helped you out of your difficulties.'

'What step?'

She reminded him of his intention to spend half a year in working at the seaside.

'I had utterly forgotten it,' he returned with a mocking laugh. 'That shows how ridiculous such a thing would have been.'

'You are doing no literary work at all?' Amy asked.

'Do you imagine that I have the peace of mind necessary for anything of that sort?'

This was in a changed voice. It reminded her so strongly of her husband before his disasters that she could not frame a reply.

'Do you think I am able to occupy myself with the affairs of imaginary people?'

'I didn't necessarily mean fiction.'

'That I can forget myself, then, in the study of literature?--I wonder whether you really think of me like that. How, in Heaven's name, do you suppose I spend my leisure time?'

She made no answer.

'Do you think I take this calamity as light-heartedly as you do, Amy?'

'I am far from taking it light-heartedly.'

'Yet you are in good health. I see no sign that you have suffered.'

She kept silence. Her suffering had been slight enough, and chiefly due to considerations of social propriety; but she would not avow this, and did not like to make admission of it to herself. Before her friends she frequently affected to conceal a profound sorrow; but so long as her child was left to her she was in no danger of falling a victim to sentimental troubles.

'And certainly I can't believe it,' he continued, 'now you declare your wish to be formally separated from me.'

'I have declared no such wish.'

'Indeed you have. If you can hesitate a moment about returning to me when difficulties are at an end, that tells me you would prefer final separation.'