In his own Calvinistic Dissenting society the pious women
who were members of the church took little or no interest in the
mental life of their husband. They read no books, knew nothing of
politics, were astonishingly ignorant, and lived in their household
duties. To be with a woman who could stand up against him was a new
experience. Here was a girl to whom every thought her father
possessed was familiar!
But there was another experience. From his youth upwards he had been
trained with every weapon in the chapel armoury, and yet he now found
himself as powerless as the merest novice to prevent the very sinful
occupation of dwelling upon every attitude of Pauline, and outlining
every one of her limbs. Do what he might, her image was for ever
before his eyes, and reconstructed itself after every attempt to
abolish it, just as a reflected image in a pool slowly but inevitably
gathers itself together again after each disturbance of the water.
When he got home, he found, to his surprise, that his wife was still
sitting up. She had been to the weekly prayer-meeting, and was not
in a very pleasant temper. She was not spiteful, but unusually
frigid.
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