And what was the good of that, if he had
no leisure to enjoy it? Or was it the truth that he feared being dragged
into the vortex? . . . of learning to care, he, too, whether or no his
name topped subscription-lists; whether his entertainments were the most
sumptuous, his wife the best-dressed woman in her set? Perish the
thought!
He did not disquiet Mary by speaking of these things. Still less did he
try to explain to her another, more elusive side of the matter. It was
this. Did he dig into himself, he saw that his uncongenial surroundings
were not alone to blame for his restless state of mind. There was in him
a gnawing desire for change as change; a distinct fear of being pinned
for too long to the same spot; or, to put it another way, a conviction
that to live on without change meant decay. For him, at least. Of
course, it was absurd to yield to feelings of this kind; at his age, in
his position, with a wife dependent on him. And so he fought them--even
while he indulged them. For this was the year in which, casting the
question of expense to the winds, he pulled down and rebuilt his house.
It came over him one morning on waking that he could not go on in the
old one for another day, so cramped was he, so tortured by its
lath-and-plaster thinness. He had difficulty in winning Mary over; she was
against the outlay, the trouble and confusion involved; and was only
reconciled by the more solid comforts and greater conveniences offered
her.
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