When you consider things like the stars, our affairs dont seem to matter very much, do they?
Then she looked at him,
and their eyes meeting, much more seemed to be in common between them
than had appeared possible. At any rate they had a grandfather in
common; at any rate there was a kind of loyalty between them sometimes
found between relations who have no other cause to like each other, as
these two had.
“Well, what’s the date of the wedding?” said Henry, the malicious mood
now predominating.
“I think some time in March,” she replied.
“And afterwards?” he asked.
“We take a house, I suppose, somewhere in Chelsea.”
“It’s very interesting,” he observed, stealing another look at her.
She lay back in her arm-chair, her feet high upon the side of the
grate, and in front of her, presumably to screen her eyes, she held a
newspaper from which she picked up a sentence or two now and again.
Observing this, Henry remarked:
“Perhaps marriage will make you more human.”
At this she lowered the newspaper an inch or two, but said nothing.
Indeed, she sat quite silent for over a minute.
“When you consider things like the stars, our affairs don’t seem to
matter very much, do they?” she said suddenly.
“I don’t think I ever do consider things like the stars,” Henry
replied. “I’m not sure that that’s not the explanation, though,” he
added, now observing her steadily.
“I doubt whether there is an explanation,” she replied rather
hurriedly, not clearly understanding what he meant.
“What? No explanation of anything?” he inquired, with a smile.
“Oh, things happen. That’s about all,” she let drop in her casual,
decided way.
“That certainly seems to explain some of your actions,” Henry thought
to himself.
“One thing’s about as good as another, and one’s got to do something,”
he said aloud, expressing what he supposed to be her attitude, much in
her accent. Perhaps she detected the imitation, for looking gently at
him, she said, with ironical composure:
“Well, if you believe that your life must be simple, Henry.”
“But I don’t believe it,” he said shortly.
“No more do I,” she replied.
“What about the stars?” he asked a moment later. “I understand that you
rule your life by the stars?