. . he found women's hats dotted
about among his papers. Women's wraps and absurd little feminine shoes
and umbrellas were in the hall. . . . Then the bills began to come in.
. . . He tried to speak frankly to her. He found her lying on the great
polar-bear skin in their bedroom, half-undressed, for they were dining
with the Greens in Wilton Crescent, the ruddy firelight making the
diamonds wink and twinkle on her bare arms and in the delicious curve of
her breast--a vision of adorable femininity. He forgave her all.' (Well,
this goes from bad to worse, and finally about fifty pages later, Hugh
takes a week-end ticket to Swanage and 'has it out with himself on the
downs above Corfe.' . . . Here there's fifteen pages or so which we'll
skip. The conclusion is . . .) 'They were different. Perhaps, in the far
future, when generations of men had struggled and failed as he must now
struggle and fail, woman would be, indeed, what she now made a pretence
of being--the friend and companion--not the enemy and parasite of man.'
"The end of it is, you see, Hugh went back to his wife, poor fellow. It
was his duty, as a married man. Lord, Rachel," he concluded, "will it be
like that when we're married?"
Instead of answering him she asked,
"Why don't people write about the things they do feel?"
"Ah, that's the difficulty!" he sighed, tossing the book away.
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