Their outward relations had not changed since her outburst on the subject of Hubert’s marriage.  That incident had left her half-ashamed, half-frightened at her behaviour, and she had tried to atone for it by the indirect arts that were her nearest approach to acknowledging herself in the wrong.  Raymond met her advances with a good grace, and they lived through the rest of the winter on terms of apparent understanding.  When the spring approached it was he who suggested that, since his mother had consented to Hubert’s marrying before the year of mourning was over, there was really no reason why they should not go up to Paris as usual; and she was surprised at the readiness with which he prepared to accompany her.

A year earlier she would have regarded this as another proof of her power; but she now drew her inferences less quickly.  Raymond was as “lovely” to her as ever; but more than once, during their months in the country, she had had a startled sense of not giving him all he expected of her.  She had admired him, before their marriage, as a model of social distinction; during the honeymoon he had been the most ardent of lovers; and with their settling down at Saint Desert she had prepared to resign herself to the society of a country gentleman absorbed in sport and agriculture.  But Raymond, to her surprise, had again developed a disturbing resemblance to his predecessor.  During the long winter afternoons, after he had gone over his accounts with the bailiff, or written his business letters, he took to dabbling with a paint-box, or picking out new scores at the piano; after dinner, when they went to the library, he seemed to expect to read aloud to her from the reviews and papers he was always receiving; and when he had discovered her inability to fix her attention he fell into the way of absorbing himself in one of the old brown books with which the room was lined.  At first he tried—­as Ralph had done—­to tell her about what he was reading or what was happening in the world; but her sense of inadequacy made her slip away to other subjects, and little by little their talk died down to monosyllables.  Was it possible that, in spite of his books, the evenings seemed as long to Raymond as to her, and that he had suggested going back to Paris because he was bored at Saint Desert?  Bored as she was herself, she resented his not finding her company all-sufficient, and was mortified by the discovery that there were regions of his life she could not enter.

But once back in Paris she had less time for introspection, and Raymond less for books.  They resumed their dispersed and busy life, and in spite of Hubert’s ostentatious vicinity, of the perpetual lack of money, and of Paul’s innocent encroachments on her freedom, Undine, once more in her element, ceased to brood upon her grievances.  She enjoyed going about with her husband, whose presence at her side was distinctly ornamental.  He seemed to have grown suddenly younger and more animated, and when she saw other women looking at him she remembered how distinguished he was.  It amused her to have him in her train, and driving about with him to dinners and dances, waiting for him on flower-decked landings, or pushing at his side through blazing theatre-lobbies, answered to her inmost ideal of domestic intimacy.