barriers, evade violent pressures. I have come these latter years
of my life to believe that it is possible for a man and woman to be
absolutely real with one another, to stand naked souled to each
other, unashamed and unafraid, because of the natural all-glorifying
love between them. It is possible to love and be loved untroubling,
as a bird flies through the air. But it is a rare and intricate
chance that brings two people within sight of that essential union,
and for the majority marriage must adjust itself on other terms.
Most coupled people never really look at one another. They look a
little away to preconceived ideas. And each from the first days of
love-making HIDES from the other, is afraid of disappointing, afraid
of offending, afraid of discoveries in either sense. They build not
solidly upon the rock of truth, but upon arches and pillars and
queer provisional supports that are needed to make a common
foundation, and below in the imprisoned darknesses, below the fine
fabric they sustain together begins for each of them a cavernous
hidden life. Down there things may be prowling that scarce ever
peep out to consciousness except in the grey half-light of sleepless
nights, passions that flash out for an instant in an angry glance
and are seen no more, starved victims and beautiful dreams bricked
up to die. For the most of us there is no jail delivery of those
inner depths, and the life above goes on to its honourable end.

I have told how I loved Margaret and how I came to marry her.
Perhaps already unintentionally I have indicated the quality of the
injustice our marriage did us both. There was no kindred between us
and no understanding. We were drawn to one another by the
unlikeness of our quality, by the things we misunderstood in each
other. I know a score of couples who have married in that fashion.