Beyond the Rocks

Lady Anningford's duties as hostess took her away from them then, and he

sat down on the sofa in her place.

"Oh, how I hate all this!" he said. "How different it is to Paris! It

grates and jars and brings out the worst in one. These odious women and

their little, narrow ways! You will never stay much in London--will you,

Theodora?"

"I have always to do what Josiah wishes, you know; he rather likes it,

and means us to come back after Whitsuntide, I think."

Hector seemed to have lost the power of looking ahead. Whitsuntide, and

to be with her in the country for that time, appeared to him the

boundary of his outlook.

What would happen after Whitsuntide? Who could say?

He longed to tell her how his thoughts were forever going back to the

day at Versailles, and the peace and beauty of those woods--how all

seemed here as though something were dragging him down to the

commonplace, away out of their exalted dream, to a dull earth. But he

dared not--he must keep to subjects less moving. So there was silence

for some moments.

Theodora, since coming to London, had begun to understand it was

possible for beautiful Englishmen to be husbands now and then, and that

the term is not necessarily synonymous with "bore" and "duty"--as she

had always thought it from her meagre experience.

She could not help picturing what a position of exquisite happiness some

nice girl might have--some day--as Hector's wife. And she looked out of

the window, and her eyes were sad. While the vision which floated to him

at the same moment was of her at his side at Bracondale, and the

delicious joy of possessing for their own some gay and merry babies like

Fordy and his little brother and sister. And each saw a wistful longing

in the other's eyes, and they talked quickly of banal things.