Part 62

“Envy,” she said, “and love.”

“You're not lonely?”

“I've plenty to do--and lots of people.”

“Well?”

“I want you.”

“You've got me.”

She put her arm about me and kissed me. “I want you,” she said, “just as if I had nothing of you. You don't understand--how a woman wants a man. I thought once if I just gave myself to you it would be enough. It was nothing--it was just a step across the threshold. My dear, every moment you are away I ache for you--ache! I want to be about when it isn't love-making or talk. I want to be doing things for you, and watching you when you're not thinking of me. All those safe, careless, intimate things. And something else--” She stopped. “Dear, I don't want to bother you. I just want you to know I love you....”

She caught my head in her hands and kissed it, then stood up abruptly.

I looked up at her, a little perplexed.

“Dear heart,” said I, “isn't this enough? You're my councillor, my colleague, my right hand, the secret soul of my life--”

“And I want to darn your socks,” she said, smiling back at me.

“You're insatiable.”

She smiled “No,” she said. “I'm not insatiable, Master. But I'm a woman in love. And I'm finding out what I want, and what is necessary to me--and what I can't have. That's all.”

“We get a lot.”

“We want a lot. You and I are greedy people for the things we like, Master. It's very evident we've got nearly all we can ever have of one another--and I'm not satisfied.”

“What more is there?

“For you--very little. I wonder. For me--every thing. Yes--everything. You didn't mean it, Master; you didn't know any more than I did when I began, but love between a man and a woman is sometimes very one-sided. Fearfully one-sided! That's all....”

“Don't YOU ever want children?” she said abruptly.

“I suppose I do.”

“You don't!”

“I haven't thought of them.”

“A man doesn't, perhaps. But I have.... I want them--like hunger. YOUR children, and home with you. Really, continually you! That's the trouble.... I can't have 'em, Master, and I can't have you.”

She was crying, and through her tears she laughed.

“I'm going to make a scene,” she said, “and get this over. I'm so discontented and miserable; I've got to tell you. It would come between us if I didn't. I'm in love with you, with everything--with all my brains. I'll pull through all right. I'll be good, Master, never you fear. But to-day I'm crying out with all my being. This election--You're going up; you're going on. In these papers--you're a great big fact. It's suddenly come home to me. At the back of my mind I've always had the idea I was going to have you somehow presently for myself--I mean to have you to go long tramps with, to keep house for, to get meals for, to watch for of an evening. It's a sort of habitual background to my thought of you. And it's nonsense--utter nonsense!” She stopped. She was crying and choking. “And the child, you know--the child!”

I was troubled beyond measure, but Handitch and its intimations were clear and strong.

“We can't have that,” I said.

“No,” she said, “we can't have that.”

“We've got our own things to do.”