A nice wife
like that!"
The stenographer sat forward and snapped, "You got a nice wife
yourself." She was a little jealous of Zada, perhaps--or of
Mrs. Cheever--or of both.
Peter left his office to escape telephoning Charity, but he could
imagine how the message crushed her. He felt as if he had stepped
on a hurt bird. When he met Zada he kept trying to be patient and
forgiving with her, in spite of her blameworthiness.
Zada saw through his sullenness, and for a little moment was proud
of her victory. Then she began to suffer, too. She understood the
frailty of her hold on Cheever. His loyalty to her was in the eyes of
the world a treachery, and his disloyalty to her would be applauded
as a holy deed. She was becoming an old story with him, as Charity
had become one.
She suffered agonies from the cloud on her title and on her name,
and she was afraid of the world. A woman of her sort has no sympathy
to expect; her stock in trade vanishes without replenishment, and
her business does not build. In spite of herself she cannot help
envying and imitating the good women. As a certain great man has
confessed, "There is so much good in the worst of us," that there
is hardly any fun in being bad. It is almost impossible to be very
bad or very good very long at a time.
So here was Zada already copying a virtuous domestic woe and wondering
how she could fasten Cheever to her, win him truly for herself. She
honestly felt that she could be of value to him, and make more of
a man of him than his lawful wife ever could.
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