As you neared the
forties, too, it grew ever harder to fit yourself to other people: your
outlook had become too set, your ideas too unfluid. Hence you clung the
faster to ties formed in the old, golden days, worn though these might
be to the thinness of a hair. And then, there was one's wife, of course
--one's dear, good wife. But just her very dearness and goodness served
to hold possible intimates at arm's length. The knowledge that you had
such a confidante, that all your thoughts were shared with her, struck
disastrously at a free exchange of privacies. No, he was alone. He had
not so much as a dog now, to follow at heel and look up at him with the
melancholy eyes of its race. Old Pompey had come at poison, and Mary had
not wished to have a strange dog in the new house. She did not care for
animals, and the main charge of it would have fallen on her. He had no
time--no time even for a dog!
Better it would assuredly be to have some one to fall back on: it was
not good for a man to stand so alone. Did troubles come, they would
strike doubly hard because of it; then was the time to rejoice in a
warm, human handclasp. And moodily pondering the reasons for his
solitariness, he was once more inclined to lay a share of the blame on
the conditions of the life. The population of the place was still in a
state of flux: he and a mere handful of others would soon, he believed,
be the oldest residents in Ballarat. People came and went, tried their
luck, failed, and flitted off again, much as in the early days.
Pages:
470
471
472
473
474
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487
488
489
490
491
492
493
494