Part 143

"No. But look here----" He was very gentle and forbearing. "Need you do it quite so soon?"

"So soon? If I don't do it now, when shall I do it?"

He did not answer her. He sat looking at her hands in their nervous, restless play.

Her grave eyes, under their flattening brows, gazed thoughtfully at him. The corners of her mouth lifted a little with their wing-like, quivering motion. Two moods were in her; one had its home in her brooding, tragic eyes, one in her mysterious, mocking lips.

"It's no use, dear," she said. "You'll never turn me into that sort of woman."

"What sort of woman?"

"The sort of woman you like."

He waited in silence for what she would say next.

"It's not my fault, it's yours and Henry's. You shouldn't have made me go away and get strong. The thing always comes back to me when I get strong. It's me, you see."

"No, Jinny, the whole point is that you're not strong. You're not fit for anything creative."

At that she laughed.

"You're not, really. Why, how old is that child?"

"Six months. No--seven."

"Well, Henry said it would take you a whole year to get over it."

"I thought I should never get over it. We were both wrong."

"My child, it's palpable. You're nervy to the last degree. I never saw you so horribly restless."

"Not more so than when I first knew Baby was coming."

"Well, quite as much."

She gave him a little look that he did not understand.

"Quite as much," she said. "And you were patient with me then."

He maintained a composure that invited her to observe how extremely patient he was now.

"And do you remember--afterwards--before he came--how quiet I was and how contented? I wasn't a bit nervy, or restless, or--or troublesome."

He smiled, remembering.

"Can't you see that anything creative--everything creative must be like that?"

He became grave again, having failed to follow her.

"Presently, if this thing goes all right, I shall be quite, quite sane. That's the way it takes you just at first. Then, when you feel it coming to life and shaping itself, you settle down into a peace."

Now he understood.

"Yes," he said, "and you pay for it after."