Madame de Treymes | Page 7

with
the child's first consciousness; it's in his nursery stories, his baby
prayers, his very games with his playmates! Already he is only half
mine, because the Church has the other half, and will be reaching out
for my share as soon as his education begins. But that other half is still
mine, and I mean to make it the strongest and most living half of the
two, so that, when the inevitable conflict begins, the energy and the
truth and the endurance shall be on my side and not on theirs!"
She paused, flushing with the repressed fervour of her utterance,
though her voice had not been raised beyond its usual discreet
modulations; and Durham felt himself tingling with the transmitted
force of her resolve. Whatever shock her words brought to his personal
hope, he was grateful to her for speaking them so clearly, for having so
sure a grasp of her purpose.
Her decision strengthened his own, and after a pause of deliberation he
said quietly: "There might be a good deal to urge on the other side--the
ineffectualness of your sacrifice, the probability that when your son
marries he will inevitably be absorbed back into the life of his class and

his people; but I can't look at it in that way, because if I were in your
place I believe I should feel just as you do about it. As long as there
was a fighting chance I should want to keep hold of my half, no matter
how much the struggle cost me. And one reason why I understand your
feeling about your boy is that I have the same feeling about you: as
long as there's a fighting chance of keeping my half of you--the half he
is willing to spare me--I don't see how I can ever give it up." He waited
again, and then brought out firmly: "If you'll marry me, I'll agree to live
out here as long as you want, and we'll be two instead of one to keep
hold of your half of him."
He raised his eyes as he ended, and saw that hers met them through a
quick clouding of tears.
"Ah, I am glad to have had this said to me! But I could never accept
such an offer."
He caught instantly at the distinction. "That doesn't mean that you
could never accept me?"
"Under such conditions--"
"But if I am satisfied with the conditions? Don't think I am speaking
rashly, under the influence of the moment. I have expected something
of this sort, and I have thought out my side of the case. As far as
material circumstances go, I have worked long enough and successfully
enough to take my ease and take it where I choose. I mention that
because the life I offer you is offered to your boy as well." He let this
sink into her mind before summing up gravely: "The offer I make is
made deliberately, and at least I have a right to a direct answer."
She was silent again, and then lifted a cleared gaze to his. "My direct
answer then is: if I were still Fanny Frisbee I would marry you."
He bent toward her persuasively. "But you will be--when the divorce is
pronounced."
"Ah, the divorce--" She flushed deeply, with an instinctive shrinking

back of her whole person which made him straighten himself in his
chair.
"Do you so dislike the idea?"
"The idea of divorce? No--not in my case. I should like anything that
would do away with the past--obliterate it all--make everything new in
my life!"
"Then what--?" he began again, waiting with the patience of a wooer on
the uneasy circling of her tormented mind.
"Oh, don't ask me; I don't know; I am frightened."
Durham gave a deep sigh of discouragement. "I thought your coming
here with me today--and above all your going with me just now to see
my mother--was a sign that you were not frightened!"
"Well, I was not when I was with your mother. She made everything
seem easy and natural. She took me back into that clear American air
where there are no obscurities, no mysteries--"
"What obscurities, what mysteries, are you afraid of?"
She looked about her with a faint shiver. "I am afraid of everything!"
she said.
"That's because you are alone; because you've no one to turn to. I'll
clear the air for you fast enough if you'll let me."
He looked forth defiantly, as if flinging his challenge at the great city
which had come to typify the powers contending with him for her
possession.
"You say that so easily! But you don't know; none of you know."
"Know what?"
"The difficulties--"

"I told you I was ready to take my share of the difficulties--and my