CHAPTER IX
Lucia was alone in her white sitting-room on the afternoon of her twenty-third birthday. She had been married rather more than two years; for it was mid-June, and just a month ago her husband had given her the most delightful wedding-anniversary present in the shape of an enormous black pearl. He had been rather mysterious about what he was going to give her for her birthday, and had only said that he was sure she would like it very much. She had liked it, and at this moment she was looking at it, or at least looking at bits of it, for it was large, and there was not the possibility of seeing it all together, since the human eye is the human eye. It was enormous, being the entire Kelmscott Press on vellum. But after the black pearl, and Edgar's admission that she would like the new gift very much, she had—no doubt without sufficient grounds—expected that her birthday-present would be more pearls, or perhaps diamonds. The Kelmscott Press was delightful; Lucia liked it enormously. But she liked pearls also very much, and just now, in the middle of the season, there seemed more time for them than for Chaucer. Of course, it was charming of Edgar to present her with so magnificent a birthday-gift, and she had gasped deliciously when he brought her to it (for it was physically impossible to bring it to her with any ease), but she had certainly expected jewels. For when, a week ago, he was wondering what he should give her—what was worthy of her was his exact phrase—she had told him point-blank she wished for nothing, that she had all, all that she desired, and hoped he would not spend his money on her. Immediately afterwards, she had referred to a sale of jewels that was coming on that week at Christie's, and had said there was a diamond necklace (necklet rather, for it was only an affair of twenty stones) that was a dream. She blamed herself now for that miscarriage; she ought to have said it two or three times to make sure. Oh yes, it was her fault, for in an unthinking
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