She was going to be
free from her husband--true, but she had not been so entirely shackled
before. The difference was not so pronounced that she could steadily
continue to revel in it.
And to this was added an indefinable fear, now when the irrevocable
separation confronted her; the thought that she was to leave her home was
tinged with a vague sense of regretfulness, of impalpable foreboding.
Sometimes a quivering pang would pierce her heart when the children put
out their little arms to her; why that pain? She had got out of her bed
last night and looked at them in their sleep. There they were lying, each
in her little bed; they had kicked the blankets off and were uncovered up
to their very arms, but they slept soundly and moved, now and then, a rosy
finger or a dimpled toe in their sleep. Such children! To lie there
unblushingly naked, with arms and legs pointing in all directions! She
tucked them carefully in and left them with bowed head, her shoulders
shaken by inaudible sobs.
How was she going to arrange her future? She was free, but in reality she
was married still; for three years she would have to live somewhere, pay
rent, keep house for herself.
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