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Majendie's prejudices were moral even more than social. But moral prejudice could be overcome by cleverness working towards a formidable moral effect. She would call after six o'clock, an hour incompatible with any social intention. An hour when she would probably find Mrs. Majendie alone. She rested all afternoon. At five o'clock she fortified herself with strong tea and brandy.
Her instinct told her that the spirit of pure comedy was destruction to the dreams she dreamed. She tried to be genial to her guest's accomplishment; but she felt that if Mr. Majendie's talents were let loose in her drawing-room, it would cease to be the place of intellectual culture. On the other hand she perceived that Miss Proctor's idea was to empty that drawing-room by securing Mr.
After all that, there was something flattering in the thought that, at forty-five, she should yet find her name still coupled with Walter Majendie's in a passionate adventure. It might easily have been, but for Walter's imbecile, suicidal devotion to his wife. He had got nothing out of his marriage. Worse than nothing.
And Majendie's manner did still more to take the wind out of the proud sails of her tragic adventure. But Anne herself was a sufficiently pathetic figure as she appeared under his umbrella, descending from the Eliotts' doorstep, with delicate slippered feet, gathering her skirts high from the bounding rain, and carrying in her hands the boots she had not waited to put on.
He submitted humbly to Majendie's judgment of his conduct. He agreed that he had been a brute to Maggie, that he might certainly do worse than marry her, and that his best reason for not marrying her was his knowledge that Maggie was ten times too good for him.
All the time, she knew he had a wife and child, but her fancy refused to recognise Mrs. Majendie's existence. It allowed him to have a child, but not a wife. She knew that he spent his Saturdays and Sundays with them at his home. He never came, or could come, on a Saturday or Sunday, and Maggie refused to consider the significance of this. She simply lived from Friday to Friday.
Majendie's own making, I'm inclined to think." "I don't think Mrs. Majendie would make faces. I'm sure she isn't happy." "Are you? Well then, if you're fond of her, I think you'd better try and see a little more of her, Rosy. You can help her a good deal better than I can now." Professional honour forbade him to say more than that. He passed to a more absorbing topic.
Majendie's sister lay on her couch by the window, as they had left her, as they would always find her, not like a woman with a hopelessly injured spine, but like a lady of the happy world, resting in luxury, a little while, from the assault of her own brilliant and fatiguing vitality.
In the evening he went round to Thurston Square to get the truth out of Gardner. He stayed there an hour, although a very few words sufficed to tell him that his hope had become a certainty. The President of the Scale Philosophic Society had cast off all his vagueness. His wandering eyes steadied themselves to grip Majendie as they had gripped Majendie's wife.
"She's the living image of you, ma'am," said Nanna, conscious of the other's blunder. "I wish she had my strength," said Anne, in a voice fine and trenchant as a sword. Nanna and the nurse retired discreetly. The parents looked at each other over the frail body of the little girl. Majendie's face had flushed under his wife's blow. He knew that she was thinking of Edith and her fate.
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