Laura said scornfully that of course they hadn’t got children; a man like Richard couldn’t expect them. He’d be so miserly he’d grudge them their very life.
At the end of three years she detested him. Since his realisation that they would, in all probability, never have children, he had been at first ostentatiously offended. Later, however, his grievance took a subtler form. He persisted in loading his wife up with jewels, handsome clothes, and furs—“Putting his trade mark on me, so that I can’t be mislaid wherever I go,” said Laura bitterly. This action on his part caused other wives to say in envious tones, “It must be wonderful to have a husband like Richard Gray. That wife of his hasn’t done a thing for him, and he’s the most generous soul alive. Some women have luck.” Which, as Laura knew, was Richard’s crafty intention, and a new way of humiliating her. Added to this was the fact that her relations had failed to fulfil her husband’s expectations of them, having indeed become an embarrassment rather than an aid. They had seceded some years earlier to an advanced Radicalism that horrified and disgusted Richard, whose mode of argument was that a certain class had held power and lands for centuries, and therefore had proved their ability to govern.
Laura, while maintaining a gay and spirited attitude, was actually extremely unhappy. This was partly due to the humiliation of realising her inability to compare with her own kitchenmaid, who, with admirable composure and no legal sanction, had recently been delivered of twins. But still more was it the result of the dreary ineffectual life she supported with her husband. By nature apt to be reckless and impulsive, she had schooled herself to a cool and polished manner that flaunted its cynicism in the face of an indifferent world. At heart she detested the innumerable political intrigues in which her husband engaged, whose rewards seemed contemptible. In addition, she was deeply in love with a man who, like Richard, was chiefly concerned with the fruits of office, and who heaped humiliations upon her by beseeching her in the most craven manner to be perpetually on guard against revealing a hint of the true relationship between them. Laura had sometimes dallied with the notion of asking Richard for a divorce, but in her heart she knew both men too well to hope that either would lay aside a spark of his ambition to accommodate her.
She was aware of, and utterly sickened by, Richard’s present strait. He had for some time been devoured by a passion to obtain a peerage; the amount of feeling he could squander on the attainment of this paltry ambition seemed to her more contemptible than the money entailed. He had not contemplated this step in his original scheme, but since overhearing a club member, a little less snobbish than himself, observe to a neighbour, “What earthly good is a title to a fellow like Gray? He’s got no one to follow him,” his intention became fixed. He would at all events command respect and notice, if not from posterity, at least from contemporaries. This determination had now become an obsession with him. Already it had lured him to unjustifiable lengths. It was not only the peerage that he coveted, but a certain appointment to which, he believed, a peerage was a necessary step. There was a second competitor in the field, a man in many ways more favoured than himself, and to this silent, heart-breaking, neck-to-neck race he applied himself recklessly. The course involved an expenditure far too heavy for his purse, and he had already entered into obligations he could not meet. The man he must satisfy was a rigid Nonconformist, who would certainly disapprove of his candidate’s action in running headlong into debt. Once let the tale of his financial embarrassments come to F——’s ears and he might abandon all hope both of title and political advancement.
The money, he considered, had been wisely spent; a certain proportion had been speculated in good works, the endowing of a bed in a somewhat obscure hospital in F——’s constituency, a handsome subscription to a fund being inaugurated for the unemployed, and various donations to societies for dealing with the destitute and unfortunate. So far, so good, even from F——’s point of view. But, far outbulking these moneys, were enormous sums spent on entertainment, costly wines, fruits out of season, astounding frocks for Laura, flashing jewels, a car whose photograph appeared in various Society journals, prominent positions at fashionable gatherings, all designed to create the impression that where Richard Gray was absent something was lacking. And as if it were not troublesome enough to be bombarded by short-sighted creditors, who didn’t appear to realise the position, or the good fortune that would reward their patience, there was the affair of Greta Hazell.
Miss Hazell was a striking young woman of a southern type of beauty, warm-blooded, entrancing, and—oh, very expensive. Quite how expensive Richard was only just beginning to understand. He had supposed himself lavish, if not recklessly extravagant, in his treatment of his wife, but Greta showed him how, without any of that ostentation, a mistress could prove quite as costly. There, though he would not for worlds have admitted it, even to himself, lay the root of this financial embarrassment that irked him day and night. The rest he might have supported, but this made the burden intolerable. The lady in question, being a woman of business flair and experience, was blackmailing him for an absurd sum. When he protested, she said, “It wouldn’t suit your book at all, my dear Richard, to have our connection made public. Whereas it wouldn’t injure me at all. Indeed, considering the amount of limelight you’ve enjoyed of late, it might even be
