Chapter CXXXIV: Section 4: This never ceased to be the case between them; but perhaps it

was intensified at this time by the fact that their sex-life had to be suppressed. This was a problem which they had talked out between them before they came away. Thyrsis, who was groping for the truth about these matters, had come to the conclusion that the factor which gave dignity and meaning to intercourse between a man and woman was the desire, or at any rate the willingness, to create a child. Corydon was not sure that she agreed with him in this; but so far as their own case was concerned, it was quite clear that they could take no remotest chance of any accident--another child would mean certain destruction for all three of them. And so they had gone back to the “brother and sister” arrangement with which they had begun life. This was a simple matter for Thyrsis, who was utterly wrapped up in his book; it was not so simple for Corydon, though neither of them realized it, nor could have been brought to admit it. As usual, Corydon desired to be what he was, and to feel what he felt; and so Thyrsis did not realize how another side of her was being blighted. Hers was predominantly a love-nature; it was intolerable to her that any one she loved should not love her in return, and love her in the same way, and to the same extent; and now, when her entire being went out to him, she found herself obliged to suppress her emotions.

Sometimes the thing would break out in spite of her.

“Thyrsis,” she would cry, “aren’t you going to kiss me good-night?”

“Didn’t I kiss you, dearest?” he would answer.

“Oh, but such a cold and perfunctory kiss!”

And so he would come and put his arms about her; but even while she held him thus, she would feel the life go out of his caresses, and see his eyes with a far-off expression. She would know that his thoughts were away upon some battle-field.

“Tell me, Thyrsis,” she would exclaim. “Do you really love me?”

“Yes, dear,” he would reply. “I love you.”

“But how _much_ do you love me?”

And then he would be dumb. What a question to ask him! As if he had the time and the energy to climb to those heights, to speak again that difficult language! Had he not told her a thousand times how much he loved her! and could she not believe it and understand it?

“But why should it be so hard to tell me?” she would protest.

And he would answer that to him it was a denial of love to explain or to make promises. He was as unchangeable as the laws of nature--he could no more be faithless to her soul than he could to his own.

“I want you to take that for granted,” he would say; “to know it as you know that the sun will rise to-morrow morning.”

“But, Thyrsis,” she would answer, when he used this metaphor, “don’t people sometimes like to go out and see the sun rise?”