ine--you will not mind my calling you by your Christian name--you
can explain it if you like."

Catharine smiled. "It is very kind of you, Mrs. Cardew, to call me
Catharine, but I have no explanation. I could not give one to save my
life, unless it is the contrast."

"You cannot think how I wish I had the power of saying what I think and
feel. I cannot express myself properly--so my husband says."

"I sympathise with you. I am so foolish at times. Mr. Cardew, I should
think, never felt the difficulty."

"No, and he makes so much of it. He says I do not properly enjoy a thing
if I cannot in some measure describe my enjoyment--articulate it, to use
his own words."

He had inwardly taunted her, even when she was suffering, and had said to
himself that her trouble must be insignificant, for there was no colour
nor vivacity in her description of it. She did not properly even
understand his own shortcomings. He could pardon her criticism, so he
imagined, if she could be pungent. Mistaken mortal! it was her patient
heroism which made her dumb to him about her sorrows and his faults. A
very limited vocabulary is all that is necessary on such topics.

"I am just the same."

"Oh, no, you are not; Mr. Cardew says you are not."

"Mr. Cardew?--he has not noticed anything in me, I am certain, and if he
has, why nobody could be less able to talk to him than I am."

Catharine knew nothing of what had passed between husband and wife--one
scene amongst many--and consequently could not understand the peculiar
earnestness, somewhat unusual with her, with which Mrs. Cardew dwelt upon
this subject. We lead our lives apart in close company, with private
hopes and fears unknown to anybody but ourselves, and when we go abroad
we often appear inexplicable and absurd, simply because our friends have
not the proper key.

"Do you think, Catharine--you know that, though I am older than you and
married, I feel we are friends." Here Mrs. Cardew took Catharine's hand
in hers. "Do you think I could learn how to talk? What I mean is, could
I be taught how to say what is appropriate? I _do_ feel something when
Mr. Cardew reads Milton to me. It is only the words I want--words such
as you have."

"Oh, Mrs. Cardew!"--Catharine came closer to her, and Mrs. Cardew's arm
crept round her waist--"I tell you again I have not so many words as you
suppose. I believe, though, that if people take pains they can find
them."

"Couldn't yo