Lydgate sat paralyzed by opposing impulses: since no reasoning he could

apply to Rosamond seemed likely to conquer her assent, he wanted to

smash and grind some object on which he could at least produce an

impression, or else to tell her brutally that he was master, and she

must obey. But he not only dreaded the effect of such extremities on

their mutual life--he had a growing dread of Rosamond's quiet elusive

obstinacy, which would not allow any assertion of power to be final;

and again, she had touched him in a spot of keenest feeling by implying

that she had been deluded with a false vision of happiness in marrying

him. As to saying that he was master, it was not the fact. The very

resolution to which he had wrought himself by dint of logic and

honorable pride was beginning to relax under her torpedo contact. He

swallowed half his cup of coffee, and then rose to go.

"I may at least request that you will not go to Trumbull at

present--until it has been seen that there are no other means," said

Rosamond. Although she was not subject to much fear, she felt it safer

not to betray that she had written to Sir Godwin. "Promise me that you

will not go to him for a few weeks, or without telling me."

Lydgate gave a short laugh. "I think it is I who should exact a

promise that you will do nothing without telling me," he said, turning

his eyes sharply upon her, and then moving to the door.

"You remember that we are going to dine at papa's," said Rosamond,

wishing that he should turn and make a more thorough concession to her.

But he only said "Oh yes," impatiently, and went away. She held it to

be very odious in him that he did not think the painful propositions he

had had to make to her were enough, without showing so unpleasant a

temper. And when she put the moderate request that he would defer

going to Trumbull again, it was cruel in him not to assure her of what

he meant to do. She was convinced of her having acted in every way for

the best; and each grating or angry speech of Lydgate's served only as

an addition to the register of offences in her mind. Poor Rosamond for

months had begun to associate her husband with feelings of

disappointment, and the terribly inflexible relation of marriage had

lost its charm of encouraging delightful dreams. It had freed her from

the disagreeables of her father's house, but it had not given her

everything that she had wished and hoped. The Lydgate with whom she

had been in love had been a group of airy conditions for her, most of

which had disappeared, while their place had been taken by every-day

details which must be lived through slowly from hour to hour, not

floated through with a rapid selection of favorable aspects. The

habits of Lydgate's profession, his home preoccupation with scientific

subjects, which seemed to her almost like a morbid vampire's taste, his

peculiar views of things which had never entered into the dialogue of

courtship--all these continually alienating influences, even without

the fact of his having placed himself at a disadvantage in the town,

and without that first shock of revelation about Dover's debt, would

have made his presence dull to her. There was another presence which

ever since the early days of her marriage, until four months ago, had

been an agreeable excitement, but that was gone: Rosamond would not

confess to herself how much the consequent blank had to do with her

utter ennui; and it seemed to her (perhaps she was right) that an

invitation to Quallingham, and an opening for Lydgate to settle

elsewhere than in Middlemarch--in London, or somewhere likely to be

free from unpleasantness--would satisfy her quite well, and make her

indifferent to the absence of Will Ladislaw, towards whom she felt some

resentment for his exaltation of Mrs. Casaubon.




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