And she told Harry: marriage that should be a
partnership—not an absorption by the greater
of the less; not one part active and the other passive;
one giving, the other receiving; one maintaining, the
other maintained; none of these, but instead a perfect
partnering, a perfect equality that should be equality
of place, equality of privilege, equality of duty,
equality of freedom. “Harry, each with
work and with a career. Harry, each living an
own life as every man, away from home, shutting his
front door upon that home and off to work, leads an
own and separate life. Harry—”
Oh, wonderful beneath this imperturbable sky, amongst
these common, passive things—these paths,
those trees, that grass, this bench—within
this seclusion of that murmurous investment of this
city, the ceaseless roar of London, standing like patient
walls, eternal and indifferent, about her quietudes.
Oh, wonderful in these accustomed and insensible surroundings
thus to be calling “Harry,” as he were
brother, him that a day and night away virtually was
unmet; to be exposing, as to a gracious patron, all
her mind’s treasury of thought; to be revealing,
as in confessional, her inmost places of her heart;
to be receiving, as by transfusion, the glow of affirmation
on her way and in her trust. Oh, wonderful!
Wonderful, because remember for her that she was still
beneath the shock of her dismay at her betrayal of
herself; still breathless at that rout from her prepared
positions; not yet assured her banners were unsullied
in their withdrawal to her second line; not yet convinced
it was no rout but a withdrawal, wise and strategical,
ranks unbroken, to the true point of her defence.
Do try to imagine her, tremulous in this her vital
enterprise, tremulous in this wonder that her armies
found. It is very desirable to remember what
can be remembered for that girl.
CHAPTER III
Harry assured her! Harry convinced her!
Harry was here upon the battlements, come with her
in her retirement, joined with her as her ally.
All her ideas were his ideas. He, too, had these
new views of marriage. He said they always had
been his. He hated, as she hated, that old dependence
notion: all the privileges the man’s, the
woman’s all the duties. That was detestable
to him, said Harry. Marriage in his view—
“I’ll tell you this,” was one thing
Harry said. “I’ll show it to you
this way, Rosalie. I don’t exactly know
what a reciprocating machine is, but I know what it
sounds like, and what it sounds like is what a marriage
ought to be,—a perfect fitting together,
a perfect harmonising, a perfect joining of two perfect
halves that everywhere reciprocate.”
The word delighted her. A reciprocating machine!
Yes, yes! Each an own part; each with own and
separate interests; and their parts, and the production
arising out of their interests—their individual
selves—approached together, by free will,
to join towards a mutual benefit, a shared endeavour,
a common advancement, a single end.
