The Age of Innocence--Edith Wharton [134]
‘‘No—it’s not that: do you mind if I open the window?’’ he returned confusedly, letting down the pane on his side. He sat staring out into the street, feeling his wife beside him as a silent, watchful interrogation, and keeping his eyes steadily fixed on the passing houses.
At their door she caught her skirt in the step of the carriage, and fell against him.
‘‘Did you hurt yourself?’’ he asked, steadying her with his arm.
‘‘No; but my poor dress—see how I’ve torn it!’’ she exclaimed. She bent to gather up a mud-stained breadth and followed him up the steps into the hall. The servants had not expected them so early, and there was only a glimmer of gas on the upper landing.
Archer mounted the stairs, turned up the light, and put a match to the brackets on each side of the library mantelpiece. The curtains were drawn, and the warm, friendly aspect of the room smote him like that of a familiar face met during an unavowable errand.
He noticed that his wife was very pale, and asked if he should get her some brandy.
‘‘Oh, no,’’ she exclaimed with a momentary flush, as she took off her cloak. ‘‘But hadn’t you better go to bed at once?’’ she added, as he opened a silver box on the table and took out a cigarette.
Archer threw down the cigarette and walked to his usual place by the fire.
‘‘No; my head is not as bad as that.’’ He paused. ‘‘And there’s something I want to say; something important— that I must tell you at once.’’
She had dropped into an armchair, and raised her head as he spoke. ‘‘Yes, dear?’’ she rejoined, so gently that he wondered at the lack of wonder with which she received this preamble.
‘‘May—’’ he began, standing a few feet from her chair and looking over at her as if the slight distance between them were an unbridgeable abyss. The sound of his voice echoed uncannily through the homelike hush, and he repeated: ‘‘There is something I’ve got to tell you . . . about myself . . .’’
She sat silent, without a movement or a tremor of her lashes. She was still extremely pale, but her face had a curious tranquillity of expression that seemed drawn from some secret inner source.
Archer checked the conventional phrases of self-accusal that were crowding to his lips. He was determined to put the case baldly, without vain recrimination or excuse.
‘‘Madame Olenska—’’ he said; but at the name his wife raised her hand as if to silence him. As she did so the gaslight struck on the gold of her wedding ring.
‘‘Oh, why should we talk about Ellen tonight?’’ she asked with a slight pout of impatience.
‘‘Because I ought to have spoken before.’’
Her face remained calm. ‘‘Is it really worthwhile, dear? I know I’ve been unfair to her at times—perhaps we all have. You’ve understood her, no doubt, better than we did: you’ve always been kind to her. But what does it matter, now it’s over?’’
Archer looked at her blankly. Could it be possible that the sense of unreality in which he felt himself imprisoned had communicated itself to his wife?
‘‘All over—what do you mean?’’ he asked in an indistinct stammer.
May still looked at him with transparent eyes. ‘‘Why— since she’s going back to Europe so soon; since Granny approves and understands, and has arranged to make her independent of her husband—’’
She broke off, and Archer, grasping the corner of the mantelpiece in one convulsed hand and steadying himself against it, made a vain effort to extend the same control to his reeling thoughts.
‘‘I supposed,’’ he heard his wife’s even voice go on, ‘‘that you had been kept at the office this evening about the business arrangements. It was settled this morning, I believe.’’ She lowered her eyes under his unseeing stare, and another fugitive flush passed over her face.
He understood that his own eyes must be unbearable, and turning away, rested his elbows on the mantelshelf and covered his face. Something drummed and clanged furiously in his ears; he could not tell if it were the blood in his