Vaughan was sitting bolt upright now. "Those books in there— Courtney, you’re not reading impure, upsetting books?"
"They’re—now, Dickey dear, please don’t be shocked—they’re on landscape gardening and interior decoration." She looked up at him mischievously in the starlight. "Are they womanly enough to suit you?"
"Yes, indeed," said he heartily. "But I might have known you’d not read anything a good woman oughtn’t. I love you as you are—and I’d hate to see you changed, my spotless little angel."
She submitted to his caresses. And presently, in that brain which he would have thought it absurd to look into except for the very lightest kind of amusement, there formed the first really disloyal thought she had ever permitted to be born. The thought was: "Dick certainly does take himself terribly seriously. If it weren’t Dick, I’d say he was getting to be a prig." She was instantly shocked at herself, as one always is at the first impulse to doubt the idol one has set up for blind worship. She felt there was but one way to prevent the recurrence of such perilous blasphemy. After a brief silence she said in a constrained voice: "Dick, I was not a stupid, incurious fool as a girl, and I went to college, and I’m a wife and a mother. If by innocence you mean ignorance, I’m anything but innocent."
"Women," she went on earnestly, "always tell each other that before men it’s wise to pretend to be ignorant and too refined to know life, and to be shocked at everything. They say it pleases men. But I’m sure you’re not that sort of man. Anyhow, I can’t be a hypocrite."
"That’s right, dear," said he, nodding approvingly, the amused smile lingering. "Go on with your interior decoration and landscape gardening. You can’t learn too much about them." He was leaning back again, secure, comfortable, happy, enjoying the sensation of caressing her.
She gave it up, as she always did when she found herself being ruffled by that strange antiquated prejudice of his. It would yield in time. Besides, what did it really matter?—since they loved each other, and would be happy once their real life got under way. "I’d have taken up chemistry," she continued, "but one can’t go far alone in that, with only books. And you wouldn’t help me. I’m afraid you’ll find me very rusty when I come down to the laboratory next spring."