CHAPTER XXXII.—HUSBAND AND WIFE.

Forster’s study was the smallest room in the mansion, furnished very plainly but cosily, and shut off by two baize doors from the rest of the house. It contained, besides the ordinary furniture, a few favourite pictures in water-colour, and a small number of books, selected from the shelves of the library. Here Forster spent many a pleasant evening, following those studies in early English poetry and literature which were his chief recreation.

The couple entered and seated themselves. Madeline had her eyes fixed thoughtfully on the fire, but she was fully conscious that her husband, leaning back in his writing chair, had his eyes intently upon her face. What could it mean? What was coming? She waited and trembled.

‘My dear Madeline,’ he said at last, ‘I have been thinking about you all day long. That, of course, is nothing unusual, for I need not tell you that you are ever uppermost in my thoughts; but to-day I have been much troubled on your account.’

She started and looked at him. What did he mean? His face was curiously grave, and in his eyes there was the shadow of a great and wistful pain.

‘I am sorry you have been troubled,’ she said in a low sad voice, ‘and that I have been the cause.’

‘Nay, my dear, it is no fault of yours; but the truth is I am very anxious. Sometimes of late—not always, but sometimes—I have thought that you are a little disappointed, a little weary. All my wish, all the dream of my life, is to see you happy; and yet——’

He paused, and passed his hand across his eyes; for tears were there.

‘Do not think I am unhappy,’ she replied. ‘I am not. I am happier than I deserve.’

‘This is a dull house, I know,’ continued Forster, as if pursuing his own thoughts, ‘and Margaret, I am afraid, a somewhat dull companion. It is not at all the life which you have been accustomed to, and I do not wonder that you find it dull. Well, how shall we brighten it?’ Here his face was lit by a loving smile. ‘How shall I make my darling happy? I think I have discovered the way. Indeed, if I had not been a commonplace fool, I might have discovered it long before.’

Still more puzzled than ever, she kept her eyes fixed upon his face; then seeing him smile so brightly, so kindly, she drew near to him and kissed him.

‘Don’t cry, my darling!’

‘I can’t help it—you are so good to me!’

‘Not half so good as you deserve. Now listen—I have settled it. You shall return to the stage.’

She started in amazement.

‘No, no!’

‘But yes! Your divine gift shall not perish from want of use; you shall go back to the Art which you so love, and I—I shall be by, to rejoice in your happiness and your success.’

Instead of receiving the proposal with joy, as he had anticipated, Madeline rose, trembling and very pale.

‘Do not decide hastily,’ said Forster, gently, ‘but think it well over.’

‘It is quite unnecessary—I shall never act again; never! never!’

‘Madeline!’

‘I have disgraced you enough already.’

‘Disgraced me—God forbid! Madeline, you are my pride, my treasure—only honour can come to me through you. Don’t think I am such a Philistine as to underrate your gifts, or the art you delight to follow. When I persuaded you to adopt this quiet life, I thought it might be better for your peace of mind, for your health. I see that I was wrong. Genius like yours cannot be contented with the mere humdrum of an English home. I was selfish, dear. You shall be my Imogen again, and, as I said, I will share your happy triumphs.’

‘It is impossible,’ cried Madeline, impetuously. ‘I hate the stage. Rather than return to it I would die.’

It was now Forster’s turn to be amazed.

‘Hate the stage!’ he echoed. ‘Ah, you do not mean what you say.’

‘But I do mean it. When I first acted it was for my guardian’s sake—to make him happy, and, perhaps, rich. But I never loved the life, and now—I sicken at it. Oh, James!’ she continued, in deepening agitation, ‘do not think me foolish or ungrateful. I am quite, quite happy here with you. Yes, when we are alone together, when we are away from the world and all its feverish tumult, I am more than happy—I am at peace. Don’t think otherwise. You ask me to go back into the world; it is the world that makes me miserable. If we should go away together—far from London, far from the wicked city—to some green country place, where none could know us, none could care for us, then, I think, I should be at peace indeed.’ As she spoke, she threw herself into his arms, for he had risen as if to implore her to be calm, and laid her head upon his breast.

‘Then you are not unhappy?’

‘I don’t know—I cannot tell!’ she sobbed. ‘I think it is my disposition—never quite contented, never restful. When I was a child, I was a trouble to those who loved me; and afterwards—afterwards everything seemed to go wrong with me. But oh! do not think that I am ungrateful—that I do not love you as you deserve. I do! I do! I do!’

And as she clung to him sobbing, she repeated her protestations again and again. He too was strongly moved, and tried in vain to calm her.

‘It is like you to reproach yourself,’ he said tenderly. ‘My loving, unselfish darling!’

‘But I am selfish,’ she said. ‘I am not good, like you, James. It would have been better, far better, if we had never met.’

‘Don’t say that, Madeline!’

‘I must say it. I bring sorrow to all that love me.’

‘You have never brought sorrow to me. Only happiness, my dear!’

‘If I could believe that! But where another woman would have been contented, I have been ill at ease. I hate myself for it! I hate my life! But oh! I love you! You do not doubt it, dear?’

‘If I doubted it I should be a miserable man.’

‘Whatever happened, you would still believe it.’

‘Till my dying day. You have proved it,’

‘Have I, James?’

‘God knows you have. You are not like common women—you are greater and better, and it is your very affection which makes you reproach yourself. But let us speak again—calmly, seriously—of what I proposed. You want occupation—you want play for your noble powers; here, darling, you are like a bird in a golden cage. Let me persuade you to try your wings again, to end this dreary existence. I can easily arrange everything for your return to the profession.’

She shook her head sadly. ‘Never! never!’

‘But why?’

‘Have I not told you? Because I prefer to remain alone with you.’

He pressed her still, suspecting that her determination was caused by solicitude on his account, or some secret fear of compromising him; but when he saw that she was firm he was pleased. In the secresy of his own mind he rather dreaded the step that he proposed; lest that step, if taken, might draw them further asunder, and in more than one way lead to misconstruction. He was far too little of a Philistine to despise the theatre, to undervalue a beautiful and much-neglected art; but he knew its decadence, and understood its baser ambitions. He preferred to keep the woman he loved to himself, to screen her from the contamination of mercenary speculators and the coarse admiration of the dregs of the public which unhappily fill our theatres. The excitements of the stage, he thought, were not beneficial to a nature so overwrought as that of his wife; its morale was not edifying, its literature not spiritually ennobling, its successes were evanescent, its rewards too often achieved by ignoble means. All this he thought, yet did not say, for he honestly set his wife’s personal happiness above all considerations of prejudice; but when he heard her emphatic determination, a weight was taken from his mind.

So the interview ended, bringing the husband and wife more closely and tenderly together, but still leaving on the woman’s heart the sense of a nameless dread, which she dared not utter, and which he, of course, did not understand.