A Duet, with an Occasional Chorus Part 13

'Yes, dear, of course I agree.'

'Article number one,' said Frank, and scribbled upon his paper.

'Your turn, now.'

'No, dear, I have not thought of anything.'

'Well, then, here is another point. Never take each other for granted.'

'What do you mean by that?'

'Never relax those attentions which one lover shows to another. Some husbands seem to forget that their wives are ladies. Some wives speak to their husbands with less courtesy and consideration than to any casual male visitor. They mean no harm, but they get into a slack way. We must not do that.'

'I don't think we are likely to.'

'People get into it unconsciously. Pull me up sharply at the first sign.'

'Yes, sir, I will.'

'The next point that I have noted is an extension of the last. Let each strive to be worthy of the love of the other. People get slovenly and slipshoddy, as if it didn't matter now that they were married. If each were very keen to please the other, that would not be so. How many women neglect their music after marriage.'

'My goodness, I haven't practised for a week!' cried Maude.

'And their dress and their hair'--Maude's hand flew up to her curls.

'My darling, yours is just perfect. But you know how often a woman grows careless. "He will love me anyhow," she says to herself, and perhaps she is right, but still it is not as it should be.'

'Why, Frank, I had no idea you knew so much.'

'I have heard my friends' experiences.--And the man too: he should consider his wife's feelings as much as he did his sweetheart's. If she dislikes smoke, he should not smoke. He should not yawn in her presence. He should keep himself well-groomed and attractive. Look at that dirty cuff! I have no business to have it.'

'As if it could make any difference to me.'

'There now! That is what is so demoralising. You should stand out for the highest. When I came to you at St Albans, I had not dirty cuffs.'

'You forgive me the music, Frank, and I'll forgive you the cuff. But I agree to all you say. I think it is so wise and good. Now I've got something to add.'

'Good. What is it?'

'Each should take an interest in the other's department.'

'Why, of course they should.'

'But it is not done.'

'Why naturally, dear, you take an interest in my City work.'

'Yes, sir, but do you take as keen an interest in my housekeeping?'

'Perhaps I have been a little thoughtless.'

'No, no, dear, you haven't. You are always full of consideration.

But I have noticed it with mother, and with others also. The husband pulls out his cheque-book at the end of the week or month, and he says, "Well, this is rather more than we can afford," or "This is less than I expected," but he never really takes any interest in his wife's efforts to keep things nice on a little. He does not see it with her eyes and try to realise her difficulties. Oh, I wish I could express myself better, but I know that the interest is one- sided.'

'I think what you say is quite right. I'll try to remember that.

How shall we enter it upon our list?'

'That Interests should be mutual.'

'Quite right. I have it down. Well, any more points?'

'It is your turn.'

'Well, there is this, and I feel that it is just the holiest thing in matrimony, and its greatest justification--that love should never degenerate into softness, that each should consciously stimulate the better part of the other and discourage the worse, that there should be a discipline in our life, and that we should brace each other up to a higher ideal. The love that says, "I know it is wrong, but I love him or her so much that I can't refuse," is a poor sort of love for the permanent use of married life. The self-respect which refuses to let the most lofty ideal of love down by an inch is a far n.o.bler thing, and it wears better too.'

'How will you express all that?'

'Mutual respect is necessary for mutual love.'

'Yes, I am sure that that is right.'

'It sounds obvious, but the very intensity of love makes love soft and blind. Now I have another, which I am convinced that you will not agree with.'

'Let me hear it.'

'I have put it in this way, "The tight cord is the easiest to snap."'

'What do you mean?'

'Well, I mean that married couples should give each other a certain lat.i.tude and freedom. If they don't, one or other will sooner or later chafe at the restriction. It is only human nature, which is an older and more venerable thing than marriage.'

'I don't like that at all, Frank.'

'I feared you wouldn't, dear, but I believe you'll see it with me when I explain what I mean. If you don't, then I must try to see it with you. When one talks of freedom in married life, it means, as a rule, freedom only for the man. He does what he likes, but still claims to be a strict critic of his wife. That, I am sure, is wrong.

To take an obvious example of what I mean, has a husband a right to read his wife's letters? Certainly not, any more than she has a right to read his without his permission. To read them as a matter of course would be stretching the chain too tight.'

'Chain is a horrid word, Frank.'

'Well, it is only a metaphor. Or take the subject of friendships.

Is a married man to be debarred from all friendship and intimacy with another woman?'

Maude looked doubtful.

'I should like to see the woman first,' she said.

'Or is a married woman to form no friendship with another man who might interest or improve her? There is such a want of mutual confidence in such a view. People who are sure of each other should give each other every freedom in that. If they don't, they are again stretching it tight.'

'If they do, it may become so slack that it might as well not be there at all.'