"I cannot write any more of this," she said, looking out of the window.
I was so astonished that I could scarcely ask her what she meant.
"This is love-making," she continued, "and with love-making the sisters
of the House of Martha can have nothing to do. It is one of our
principal rules that we must not think about it, read about it, or talk
about it; and of course it would have been forbidden to write about it,
if such a contingency had ever been thought of. Therefore I cannot do
any more work of that kind."
In vain I expostulated; in vain I told her that this was the most
important part of my book; in vain I declaimed about the absurdity of
such a regulation; in vain I protested; in vain I reasoned. She shook
her head, and said there was no use talking about it; she knew the
rules, and should obey them.
I had been standing near the grating, but now I threw myself into a
chair, and sat silent, wondering what I should do. Must I give up this
most admirable plan of carrying on my work, simply because those foolish
sisters had made absurd rules for themselves? Must I wind up my book for
want of material? Not for a moment did I think of getting another
secretary, or of selecting some other sort of that stuff which literary
people call padding, for the purpose of prolonging my pleasant labors.
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