It
seemed to put a finish to the radiance of our friendship and,
worse than that, it brought me up against my father, who had often
said to me: "You will never marry Flower; you must marry your
superior."
Peter himself, in a subconscious way, had become aware of the
situation. One evening, riding home, he said:
"Margie, do you see that?"
He pointed to the spire of the Melton Church and added:
"That is what you are in my life. I am not worth the button on
your boot!"
To which I replied:
"I would not say that, but I cannot find goodness for two."
I was profundly unhappy. To live for ever with a man who was
incapable of loving any one but himself and me, who was without
any kind of moral ambition and chronically indifferent to politics
and religion, was a nightmare.
I said to him:
"I will marry you if you get some serious occupation, Peter, but I
won't marry an idle man; you think of nothing but yourself and
me."
PETER: "What in the name of goodness would you have me think of?
Geography?"
MARGOT: "You know exactly what I mean. Your power lies in love-
making, not in loving; you don't love any one but yourself."
At this, Peter moved away from me as if I had struck him and said
in a low tense voice:
"I am glad I did not say that. I would not care to have said such
a cat-cruel thing; but I pity the man who marries you! He will
think--as I did--that you are impulsively, throbbingly warm and
kind and gentle; and he will find that he has married a governess
and a prig; and a woman whose fire--of which she boasts so much--
blasts his soul.
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