It is then that one most desires to be strong and
free, to be infinitely patient and tender and loving, to be
different. And then one comes back to the world with a sense of jar
and shock, to broken purposes, and dull resentments, to unkindly
thoughts, and people who do not even pretend to wish one well. I
have been trying with all my might in these desolate weeks to be
brave and affectionate and tender, and I have not succeeded. It is
easy enough, when one is happily occupied for a part of the day,
but when one is restless, dissatisfied, impatient, ineffective, it
is a constant and a weary effort. And what is more, I dislike
sympathy. I would rather bear a thing in solitude and silence. I
have no self-pity, and it is humiliating and weakening to be
pitied. Yet of course Maud knows that I am unhappy; and the
wretchedness of it is that it has introduced a strain into our
relations which I have never felt before. I sit reading, trying to
pass the hours, trying to stifle thought. I look up and see her
eyes fixed on me full of compassion and love--and I do not want
compassion. Maud knows it, divines it all; but she can no more keep
her compassion hidden than I can keep my unrest hidden.
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