As he was taller, stronger, and had more
brain and heart than most, he had greater and keener pangs to do battle
with, and in the world he must at intervals be thrown across her path
and she across his, and as he had been haunted by talk and rumours of
her in the years before he was haunted now. 'Twas but natural all
should praise to him his kinsman's wife, sure that he would feel
pleasure when he heard her lauded.
Women, especially such as are great ladies, have not at their command,
if they hide pain in secret, even the refuges and poor comforts
possessed by men. They may not feed their hungry souls by gazing at a
distance upon the beloved object of their heavy thoughts; they cannot
pace the night through before a dwelling, looking up as they pass at
the darkened windows behind which sleeps--or wakes--the creature their
hearts cry to in their pain; tears leave traces; faces from which
smiles are absent, eyes from which light has fled, arouse query and
comment. My lord has a certain privacy and license to be dull or
gloomy, but my lady cannot well be either without explaining herself,
either by calling in a physician or wearing mourning, or allowing the
world to gain some hint of domestic trouble or misfortune.
Her ladyship of Dunstanwolde was surely a happy woman. Having known
neither gayety nor luxury in her girlhood, it seemed now that she could
give her lord no greater pleasure than to allow him to surround her
with both.
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