'You are different from me. I cannot talk to all manner of people.'
'Politics, you know, and art, and a little scandal, and the wars, with a dozen other things, make talking easy enough, I think. I grant you this, that it is very often a great bore. Hardly a day passes that I don't wish to cut out somebody's tongue.'
'Do you wish to cut out my tongue, Conway?'
He began to perceive that she was determined to talk about herself, and that there was no remedy. He dreaded it, not because he did not like the woman, but from a conviction that she was going to make some comparison between her and Clara Van Siever. In his ordinary humour he liked a little pretence at romance, and was rather good at that sort of love-****** which in truth means anything but love. But just now he was really thinking of matrimony, and had on this very morning acknowledged to himself that he had become sufficiently attached to Clara Van Siever to justify him in asking her to be his wife. In his present mood he was not anxious for one of those tilts with blunted swords and half-severed lances in the list of Cupid of which Mrs Dobbs Broughton was so fond.
Nevertheless, if she insisted that he should now descend into the arena and go through the paraphernalia of a mock tournament, he must obey her.
It is the hardship of men that when called upon by women for romance, they are bound to be romantic, whether the opportunity serves them or not. A man must produce romance, or at least submit to it, when duly summoned, even though he should have a sore throat or a headache. He is a brute if he decline such an encounter--and feels that, should he so decline persistently, he will ever after be treated as a brute. There are many Potiphar's wives who never dream of any mischief, and Josephs who are very anxious to escape, though they are asked to return only whisper for whisper. Mrs Dobbs Broughton had asked him whether he wished that her tongue should be cut out, and he had of course replied that her words had always been a joy to him--never a trouble. It occurred to him as he made his little speech that it would only have served her right if he had answered her in quite another strain; but she was a woman, and was young and pretty, and was entitled to flattery. 'They have always been a joy to me,' he said, repeating his last words as he strove to continue his work.
'A deadly joy,' she replied, not quite knowing what she herself meant.
'A deadly joy, Conway. I wish with all my heart that we had never known each other.'
'I do not. I will never wish away the happiness of my life, even should it be followed by misery.'
'You are a man, and if trouble comes upon you, you can bear it on your shoulders. A woman suffers more, just because another's shoulders may have to bear the burden.'
'When she has got a husband, you mean.'
'Yes--when she has a husband.'
'It's the same with a man when he has a wife.' Hitherto the conversation had had so much of milk-and-water in its composition that Dalrymple found himself able to keep it up and go on with his background at the same time. If she could only be kept in the same dim cloud of sentiment, if the hot rays of the sun of romance could be kept from breaking through the mist till Miss Van Siever should come, it might still be well. He had known her to wander about within the clouds for an hour together, without being able to find her way into the light. 'It's all the same with a man when he has got a wife,' he said. 'Of course one has to suffer for two, when one, so to say, is two.'
'And what happens when one has to suffer for three?' she asked.
'You mean when a woman has children?'
'I mean nothing of the kind, Conway; and you must know that I do not, unless your feelings are indeed blunted. But worldly success has, Isuppose, blunted them.'
'I rather fancy not,' he said. 'I think they are pretty nearly as sharp as ever.'
'I know mine are. Oh, how I wish I could rid myself of them! But it cannot be done. Age will not blunt them--I am sure of that,' said Mrs Broughton. 'I wish it could.'
He had determined not to talk about herself if the subject could be in any way avoided; but now he felt that he was driven up into a corner;--now he was forced to speak to her of her own personality. 'You have no experience yet as to that. How can you say what age will do?'
'Age does not go by years,' said Mrs Dobbs Broughton. 'We all know that. "His hair was grey, but not with years." Look here, Conway,' and she moved back her tresses from off her temples to show him that there were grey hairs behind. He did not see them; and had they been very visible she might not perhaps have been so ready to exhibit them. 'No one can say that length of years has blanched them. I have no secrets from you about my age. One should not be grey before one has reached thirty.'
'I did not see a changed hair.'
''Twas the fault of your eyes, then, for there are plenty of them. And what is it that has made them grey?'
'They say hot rooms will do it.'
'Hot rooms! No, Conway, it does not come from heated atmosphere. It comes from a cold heart, a chilled heart, a frozen heart, a heart that is all ice.' She was getting out of the cloud into the heat now, and he could only hope that Miss Van Siever would come soon. 'The world is beginning with you, Conway, and you are as old as I am. It is ending with me, and yet I am as young as you are. But I do not know why I talk of this. It is simply folly--utter folly. I had not meant to speak of myself; but I did wish to say a few words to you of your own future. Isuppose I may still speak to you as a friend?'
'I hope you will always do that.'
'Nay--I will make no such promise. That I will always have a friend's feeling for you, a friend's interest in your welfare, a friend's triumph in your success--that I will promise. But friendly words, Conway, are sometimes misunderstood.'
'Never by me,' said he.