an
illustrated volume, her husband's gift today. Many were the presents he
had bestowed upon her, costly some of them, all flattering the recipient
by a presumption of taste and intelligence.

She had been here since early in the afternoon, it was now near seven
o'clock.

Nancy looked at the pictures, but inattentively, her brows slightly
knitted, and her lips often on the point of speech that concerned some
other matter. Since the summer holiday she had grown a trifle thinner in
face; her beauty was no longer allied with perfect health; a heaviness
appeared on her eyelids. Of course she wore the garb of mourning,
and its effect was to emphasise the maturing change manifest in her
features.

For several minutes there had passed no word; but Tarrant's face,
no less than his companion's, signalled discussion in suspense. No
unfriendly discussion, yet one that excited emotional activity in both
of them. The young man, his pipe-hand falling to his knee, first broke
silence.

'I look at it in this way. We ought to regard ourselves as married
people living under exceptionally favourable circumstances. One has to
bear in mind the brutal fact that man and wife, as a rule, see a great
deal too much of each other--thence most of the ills of married life:
squabblings, discontents, small or great disgusts, leading often
enough to _altri guai_. People get to think themselves victims of
incompatibility, when they are merely suffering from a foolish
custom--the habit of being perpetually together. In fact, it's an
immoral custom. What does immorality mean but anything that tends
to kill love, to harden hearts? The common practice of man and wife
occupying the same room is monstrous, gross; it's astounding that
women of any sensitiveness endure it. In fact, their sensitiveness is
destroyed. Even an ordinary honeymoon generally ends in quarrel--as
it certainly ought to. You and I escape all that. Each of us lives a
separate life, with the result that we like each other better as time
goes on; I speak for myself, at all events. I look forward to our
meetings. I open the door to you with as fresh a feeling of pleasure
as when you came first. If we had been ceaselessly together day and
night--well, you know the result as well as I do.'

He spoke with indulgent gravity, in the tone of kindness to which his
voice was naturally attuned. And Nancy's reply, though it expressed a
stronger feeling, struck the same harmonious note.

'I ca