He was going round the world for one or
two years. It was even possible he would not go alone. There was a
man at Cambridge he might persuade to come with him, a don called
Prothero who was peculiarly useful in helping him to hammer out his
ideas. . . .
To her it became commandingly necessary that none of these things
should happen.
She tried to play upon his jealousy, but her quick instinct speedily
told her that this only hardened his heart. She perceived that she
must make a softer appeal. Now of a set intention she began to
revive and imitate the spontaneous passion of the honeymoon; she
perceived for the first time clearly how wise and righteous a thing
it is for a woman to bear a child. "He cannot go if I am going to
have a child," she told herself. But that would mean illness, and
for illness in herself or others Amanda had the intense disgust
natural to her youth. Yet even illness would be better than this
intolerable publication of her husband's ability to leave her
side. . . .
She had a wonderful facility of enthusiasm and she set herself
forthwith to cultivate a philoprogenitive ambition, to communicate
it to him.
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