After a morning's tussle with
one unfortunate chapter, the desperate author sent off the rest in their
sins, and rode his bicycle to abolish thought. But that mild pastime
fell lamentably short of its usual efficacy. It was not one of his
heroines who was worrying the novelist, but a real woman whom he liked
and her husband whom he did not. The husband it was who had finished
matters by entering the field of speculation during the morning's work.
It may he confessed that Langholm had not by any means disliked him the
year before.
What was the secret of this second marriage on the part of one who had
been so recently and so miserably married? Was it love? Langholm would
not admit it for a moment. Steel did not love his wife, and there was
certainly nothing to love in Steel. Langholm had begun almost to hate
him; he told himself it was because Steel did not even pretend to love
his wife, but let strangers see the abnormal terms on which they lived.
What, then, was the explanation--the history--the excuse? They were
supposed to have married on the Continent; that was one of the few
statements vouchsafed by Steel, and he happened to have made it in the
first instance to Langholm himself.
Pages:
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232