stupid hatred.

This was a little puzzling to Isabel. However, she accepted it in the
course of things. Men were made freakish and unreasonable. Therefore,
when Maurice was going out to France for the second time, she felt that,
for her husband's sake, she must discontinue her friendship with Bertie.
She wrote to the barrister to this effect. Bertram Reid simply replied
that in this, as in all other matters, he must obey her wishes, if these
were indeed her wishes.

For nearly two years nothing had passed between the two friends. Isabel
rather gloried in the fact; she had no compunction. She had one great
article of faith, which was, that husband and wife should be so important
to one another, that the rest of the world simply did not count. She and
Maurice were husband and wife. They loved one another. They would have
children. Then let everybody and everything else fade into insignificance
outside this connubial felicity. She professed herself quite happy and
ready to receive Maurice's friends. She was happy and ready: the happy
wife, the ready woman in possession. Without knowing why, the friends
retired abashed and came no more. Maurice, of course, took as much
satisfaction in this connubial absorption as Isabel did.

He shared in Isabel's literary activities, she cultivated a real interest
in agriculture and cattle-raising. For she, being at heart perhaps an
emotional enthusiast, always cultivated the practical side of life, and
prided herself on her mastery of practical affairs. Thus the husband and
wife had spent the five years of their married life. The last had been
one of blindness and unspeakable intimacy. And now Isabel felt a great
indifference coming over her, a sort of lethargy. She wanted to be
allowed to bear her child in peace, to nod by the fire and drift vaguely,