The Progress of Love

time. She could have written it for him. (All the letters written by Dawn Rose were enclosed.)
    A minister, unfortunately, is never quite free to love and choose for himself. A minister’s wife must be someone who doesn’t bringwith her any problem that might distract her husband and deflect him from serving God and his congregation. A minister’s wife also must not have anything in her background or connections that would ever give rise to gossip or cause a scandal. Her life is often difficult, and it is necessary that she should have the very best of physical and mental health, with no hereditary taint or weakness, in order to undertake it.
    All this came out with a great deal of repetition and enlargement and sidetracking, and in the middle of it they had some sort of wrangle about bringing Dawn Rose to see some doctors here, getting her put away somewhere. Trevor said that Dawn Rose was obviously a very deranged sort of person.
    But instead of feeling that she wanted the problem of Dawn Rose solved for her by Trevor, Violet now seemed to feel that she had to protect Dawn Rose against him.
    “Couldn’t we ask God to cure her?” she said.
    She knew by his look that he thought she was being insolent. It was up to him to mention God, not her. But he said calmly that it was through doctors and treatment that God cured people. Through doctors and treatment and laws and institutions. That was how God worked.
    “There is a kind of female insanity that strikes at that age,” he said. “You know what I mean. She hates men. She blames them. That’s obvious. She has an insane hatred of men.”
    Later, Violet wondered if he had been trying to keep a door open for her then. If she had agreed to Dawn Rose’s banishment, would he have broken off their engagement? Perhaps not. Though he tried to sound so superior and sensible, he, too, was probably feeling desperate.
    Several times he had to say the same thing to her. “I won’t talk to you, I can’t talk to you, unless you stop crying.”
    The minister’s widow came in and asked if they wanted supper. They said no, and she went away, disapproving. Trevor said he couldn’t swallow. When it was getting dark, they went out. They walked down the street to a drugstore, and ordered two milkshakes, and a chicken sandwich for Violet. The chicken felt like bits ofwood in her mouth. They walked on to the Y.W.C.A., where she could get a room for the night. (The room at her boarding house was being held for her, but she couldn’t face going there.) She said she would catch the early-morning train.
    “You don’t have to do that,” said Trevor. “We could have breakfast. My voice is gone now.”
    It was. He was whispering.
    “I’ll pick you up,” he whispered. “I’ll pick you up at eight-thirty.”
    But never touched, again, his mouth or his cool cheek to hers.
    The early train left at ten to eight, and Violet was on it. She planned to write to the woman at the boarding house and to the church office where she had meant to work. She would not write her examinations. She could not stay in Ottawa another day. Her head ached horribly in the morning sunlight. This time, she really had not closed her eyes all night. When the train began to move, it was as if Trevor was being pulled away from her. More than Trevor. Her whole life was being pulled away from her—her future, her love, her luck, and her hopes. All that was being pulled off like skin, and hurt as much, and left her raw and stinging.
    Did she despise him, then? If she did, she didn’t know it. That wasn’t something she could know about. If he had come after her, she would have gone back to him—gladly, gladly. Until the last minute, she hoped that he would come running onto the station platform. He knew when the early train left. He might wake up, and know what she was doing, and come after her. If he had done that, she would have given in about Dawn Rose; she would have done anything he wanted.
    But he hadn’t come after her, he hadn’t come. No face was his; she couldn’t bear to look at anybody.
    At moments like this, thought Violet, it must be at moments like this that people do the things you hear about, and read about in the newspapers. The things you try to imagine, or try not to imagine. She could imagine it, she could feel what it would be like. The quick sunny flight, then the smack of the gravelly bank. Drowningyourself would be pleasanter, but would require a firmer purpose. You’d have to