The Painted Veil by W. Somerset Maugham

want a row, but we can’t take it lying down.’
    ‘Why need we defend it?’
    ‘What a question to ask. After all, it’s not only you that are concerned, I’m concerned too. But as a matter of fact I don’t think you need be afraid of that. We shall be able to square your husband somehow. The only thing that worries me is the best way to set about it.’
    It looked as though an idea occurred to him, for he turned towards her with his charming smile and his tone, a moment before abrupt and business-like, became ingratiating.
    ‘I’m afraid you’ve been awfully upset, poor little woman. It’s too bad.’ He stretched out his hand and took hers. ‘It’s a scrape we’ve got into, but we shall get out of it. It’s not...’ He stopped and Kitty had a suspicion that he had been about to say that it was not the first he had got out of. ‘The greatest thing is to keep our heads. You know I shall never let you down.’
    ‘I’m not frightened. I don’t care what he does.’
    He smiled still, but perhaps his smile was a trifle forced.
    ‘If the worst comes to the worst I shall have to tell the Governor. He’ll curse me like hell, but he’s a good fellow and a man of the world. He’ll fix it up somehow. It wouldn’t do him any good if there was a scandal.’
    ‘What can he do?’ asked Kitty.
    ‘He can bring pressure to bear on Walter. If he can’t get at him through his ambition he’ll get at him through his sense of duty.’
    Kitty was a little chilled. She did not seem able to make Charlie see how desperately grave the situation was. His airiness made her impatient. She was sorry that she had come to see him in his office. The surroundings intimidated her. It would have been much easier to say what she wanted if she could have been in his arms with hers round his neck.
    ‘You don’t know Walter,’ she said.
    ‘I know that every man has his price.’
    She loved Charlie with all her heart, but his reply disconcerted her; for such a clever man it was a stupid thing to say.
    ‘I don’t think you realise how angry Walter is. You haven’t seen his face and the look of his eyes.’
    He did not reply for a moment, but looked at her with a slight smile. She knew what he was thinking. Walter was the bacteriologist and occupied a subordinate position; he would hardly have the impudence to make himself a nuisance to the upper officials of the Colony.
    ‘It’s no good deceiving yourself, Charlie,’ she said earnestly. ‘If Walter has made up his mind to bring an action nothing that you or anybody else can say will have the slightest influence.’
    His face once more grew heavy and sulky.
    ‘Is it his idea to make me correspondent?’
    ‘At first it was. At last I managed to get him to consent to let me divorce him.’
    ‘Oh, well, that’s not so terrible.’ His manner relaxed again and she saw the relief in his eyes. ‘That seems to me a very good way out. After all, it’s the least a man can do, it’s the only decent thing.’
    ‘But he makes a condition.’
    He gave her an inquiring glance and he seemed to reflect.
    ‘Of course I’m not a very rich man, but I’ll do anything in my power.’
    Kitty was silent. Charlie was saying things which she would never have expected him to say. And they made it difficult for her to speak. She had expected to blurt it out in one breath, held in his loving arms, with her burning face hid on his breast.
    ‘He agrees to my divorcing him if your wife will give him the assurance that she will divorce you.’
    ‘Anything else?’
    Kitty could hardly find her voice.
    ‘And – it’s awfully hard to say, Charlie, it sounds dreadful– if you’ll promise to marry me within a week of the decrees being made absolute.’

25
    For a moment he was silent. Then he took her hand again and pressed it gently.
    ‘You know, darling,’ he said, ‘whatever happens we must keep Dorothy out of this.’
    She looked at him blankly.
    ‘But I don’t understand. How can