nsposing two words into a more ordinary sequence is not
a very heinous offence; but to Owen, racked with pain, the whole affair
was an instance of the most flagrant ignorance, and he let fly one or
two biting sarcasms as he bent over the papers, which reduced Toni to a
state of trembling, impotent misery.

To do him justice Owen repented as soon as he had spoken, and when he
saw how he had hurt her, he threw aside the proof-sheets and devoted
himself to making amends for his harshness.

He succeeded finally in winning back something of her usual serenity;
but to both the incident was oddly discomposing; to Toni because for the
first time she saw the critic in the husband, and trembled to think how
often she must fall short of his high standard; to Owen because the
affair seemed to open up such vast tracts of ignorance in the woman who
was his wife, and showed, more clearly than ever before, the dividing
line between intellect and ordinary shrewdness.

For just one illuminating moment he saw Toni as she was; a pretty,
winning, half-educated little girl, to whom the world of art and
literature was a sphere apart, its shibboleths mere meaningless babble
in her ears, its greatest exponents but so many confusing names,
divorced from any enlightening personalities.

Where, he asked himself half desperately, was there any common meeting
ground for two beings so widely diverse as they, husband and wife though
they were? Surely they were as widely sundered as the poles....

And then the sight of Toni's face, her eyes filled with tears, her
childish mouth quivering, lighted a sudden flame in his heart which
consumed, for the time being, all doubts and petty vexations. After all,
she was only a child--and she loved him; and so he took her in his arms
and kissed away the tears with a remorseful tenderness which might well
pass--with an uncritical being like Toni--for love.

But Toni was not thinking of that dreadful episode on this brilliant
June morning. Rather she was trying to realize that she was the mistress
of this beautiful place, that Greenriver, with its grounds, its flowers,
its lofty rooms, was to be her home; and to the girl who had lived in
Winter Road, Brixton, Greenriver was indeed a revelation.

They had been home a week; and so far Owen had not left her for more
than a few hours, on the occasion of a business visit to London. The
weather had been superb; and they had spent several long afternoons on
the rive