It was always puzzling to him to reconcile her undoubted intellectual activity with the practical emptiness of the existence she professed to enjoy. In one direction, she had indeed a genuine outlet for her energies, which he could understand her regarding in the light of an occupation. She was crazier about flowers and plants than anybody he had ever heard of, and it had delighted him to make over to her, labelled jocosely as the bouquet-fund, a sum of money which, it seemed to him, might have paid for the hanging-gardens of Babylon.
It yielded in time--emerging slowly but steadily from a prodigious litter of cement and bricks and mortar and putty, under the hands of innumerable masons, carpenters, glaziers, plumbers, and nondescript subordinates, all of whom talked unwearyingly about nothing at all, and suffered no man to perform any part of his allotted task without suspending their own labours to watch him--an imposing long line of new greenhouses, more than twenty in number. The mail-bag was filled meanwhile with nurserymen's catalogues, and the cart made incessant journeys to and from Punsey station, bringing back vast straw-enwrapped baskets and bundles and boxes beyond counting, the arrival and unpacking of which was with Edith the event of the day. About the reality of her engrossed interest in all the stages of progress by which these greenhouses became crowded museums of the unusual and abnormal in plant-life, it was impossible to have any suspicion.
And even after they were filled to overflowing, Thorpe noted with joy that this interest seemed in no wise to flag.
She spent hours every day under the glass, exchanging comments and theories with her gardeners, and even pulling things about with her own hands, and other hours she devoted almost as regularly to supervising the wholesale alterations that had been begun in the gardens outside. There were to be new paths, new walls with a southern exposure, new potting sheds, new forcing pits, new everything--and in the evenings she often worked late over the maps and plans she drew for all this. Thorpe's mind found it difficult to grasp the idea that a lady of such notable qualities could be entirely satisfied by a career among seeds and bulbs and composts, but at least time brought no evidences of a decline in her horticultural zeal.
Who knew? Perhaps it might go on indefinitely.
As for himself, he had got on very well without any special inclination or hobby. He had not done any of the great things that a year ago it had seemed to him he would forthwith do--but his mind was serenely undisturbed by regrets. He did not even remember with any distinctness what these things were that he had been going to do.
The routine of life--as arranged and borne along by the wise and tactful experts who wore the livery of High Thorpe--was abundantly sufficient in itself. He slept well now in the morning hours, and though he remained still, by comparison, an early riser, the bath and the shaving and slow dressing under the hands of a valet consumed comfortably a good deal of time. Throughout the day he was under the almost constant observation of people who were calling him "master" in their minds, and watching to see how, in the smallest details of deportment, a "master" carried himself, and the consciousness of this alone amounted to a kind of vocation. The house itself made demands upon him nearly as definite as those of the servants. It was a house of huge rooms, high ceilings, and grandiose fireplaces and stairways, which had seemed to him like a royal palace when he first beheld it, and still produced upon him an effect of undigestible largeness and strangeness. It was as a whole not so old as the agents had represented it, by some centuries, but it adapted itself as little to his preconceived notions of domesticity as if it had been built by Druids. The task of seeming to be at home in it had as many sides to it as there were minutes in the day--and oddly enough, Thorpe found in their study and observance a congenial occupation.
Whether he was reading in the library--where there was an admirable collection of books of worth--or walking over the home-farms, or driving in his smart stanhope with the coachman behind, or sitting in formal costume and dignity opposite his beautiful wife at the dinner-table, the sense of what was expected of him was there, steadying and restraining, like an atmospheric pressure.
Thus far they had had few visitors, and had accepted no invitations to join house-parties elsewhere.
They agreed without speaking about it that it was more their form to entertain than to be entertained, and certain people were coming to them later in the month.
These were quite wholly of Edith's set and selection, for Thorpe had no friends or acquaintances outside her circle for whose presence he had any desire--and among these prospective guests were a Duke and a Duchess.
Once, such a fact would have excited Thorpe's imagination.
He regarded it now as something appropriate under the circumstances, and gave it little further thought.
His placid, satisfied life was not dependent upon the stir of guests coming and going, even though they were the great of the earth. He walked on his spacious terrace after luncheon--a tall, portly, well-groomed figure of a man, of relaxed, easy aspect, with his big cigar, and his panama hat, and his loose clothes of choice fabrics and exquisite tailoring--and said to himself that it was the finest view in England--and then, to his own surprise, caught himself in the act of yawning.
From under the silk curtains and awning of a window-doorway at the end of the terrace, his wife issued and came toward him.
Her head was bare, and she had the grace and fresh beauty of a young girl in her simple light gown of some summery figured stuff.
