Page:The Prussian officer, and other stories, Lawrence, 1914.djvu/105



When her boy was three years old, Mary had another baby, a girl. The three years had gone by monotonously. They might have been an eternity, they might have been brief as a sleep. She did not know. Only, there was always a weight on top of her, something that pressed down her life. The only thing that had happened was that Mr. Massy had had an operation. He was always exceedingly fragile. His wife had soon learned to attend to him mechanically, as part of her duty.

But this third year, after the baby girl had been born, Mary felt oppressed and depressed. Christmas drew near: the gloomy, unleavened Christmas of the rectory, where all the days were of the same dark fabric. And Mary was afraid. It was as if the darkness were coming upon her.

“Edward, I should like to go home for Christmas,” she said, and a certain terror filled her as she spoke.

“But you can’t leave baby,” said her husband, blinking.

“We can all go.”

He thought, and stared in his collective fashion.

“Why do you wish to go?” he asked.

“Because I need a change. A change would do me good, and it would be good for the milk.”

He heard the will in his wife’s voice, and was at a loss. Her language was unintelligible to him. But somehow he felt that Mary was set upon it. And while she was breeding, either about to have a child, or nursing, he regarded her as a special sort of being.